JULY 27, 2018, KEIZERTIMES, PAGE A5
KeizerOpinion
KEIZERTIMES.COM
Yes to intermodal
transload facility
The Brooks-Hopmere area is one
of the proposed sites in the Willamette
Valley for an Intermodal Transloading
Facility. Millersburg on
the north side of Albany
is another site close to our
area.
Transloading is the
process of transferring a
shipment from one mode
of transportation to an-
other—in this case, from
truck to rail, to be ship-
ping to ports in Portland
and in Washington state.
The Oregon Shipping Group is as-
sisting with the Oregon Port of Wil-
lamette’s proposal for the facility. That
group represents 50 business stake-
holders and is led by Kevin Mannix.
The proposal to the Oregon Depart-
ment of Transportation included sup-
porting letters from a variety of area
business organizations as well as the
agriculture industry.
The rationale for transloading fa-
cilities in the Willamette Valley is to
more effi ciently move products to
foreign markets. Currently farm prod-
ucts are shipped via truck to ports
for shipment overseas. The freeways
in and around the Portland area are
experiencing increased traffi c counts
which results in higher shipping costs
for producers whose goods are stuck
in traffi c.
It is more effi cient for producers to
bypass clogged roadways in the metro-
politan area by utilizing a transloading
facility here in the mid-Willamette
Valley. If Brooks-Hopmere wins the
nod from the state, which will hand
down its decision in late September,
it will be a win for ag business here in
the northern valley but certainly also
a win for ag business in the southern
Willamette Valley; shipping to Brooks
would be cheaper than going all the
way to ports in Portland or points
north.
The Oregon Ship-
ping Ground has laid
the groundwork with
adjourning
commercial
and residential neighbors.
They have solicited com-
ments and ideas, particu-
larly when it comes to
the Brooks-Interstate 5
interchange. If Brooks-
Hopmere is chosen as the
site for the mid-Willamette Valley site
there certainly would be improve-
ments at that interchange. One should
not expect improvement on the level
of the recent Woodburn re-do.
The proposed facility at Brooks-
Hopmere is not designed to add lots
of jobs. As currently design the facil-
ity would feature a handful of posi-
tions. Though it is not heavy with
jobs there are other benefi ts—in-
creased global trade for western Or-
egon growers, fewer big rig trucks on
Portland area freeways (this is impor-
tant because most Keizerites travel to
Portland occasionally) and, eventually
an improved interchange that many
north Keizer residents use.
The proposed sites—one next to
May Trucking Company on the west
side of the freeway, the other north of
Brooklake Road next to the NOR-
PAC plant—will not adversely affect
those who live or have businesses in
the area.
Agriculture is Oregon’s primary
business and anything that can make
it more competitive is a good thing.
We support the Mid-Willamette Val-
ley Intermodal Transloading Facility
whether it is approved for the west or
the east side of the freeway at Brooks-
Hopmere.
—LAZ
our
opinion
Let’s end need for clean-up
We congratulate Richard Boyes
on being named Volunteer of the
Quarter by the Keizer City Council
earlier this week.
Boyes was nominated by mem-
bers of the West Keizer Neighbor-
hood Association for his work over
the past years collecting trash along
Chemawa Road from River Road
to Keizer Rapids Park. The vol-
unteer works on his own to assure
Keizer keeps up its neat and tidy
look.
It is unfortunate that anyone has
to clean trash from our roadways.
After decades of anti-littering mes-
sages, especially from an owl (Give
a Hoot, Don’t Pollute), one would
think that private-sector street trash
collectors would be a thing of the
past. It is not, as evidenced by Mr.
Boyes efforts and by those who
adopt a street.
Each year volunteers help SOLVE
clear tons of trash from Oregon
beaches. If volunteers didn’t chip in
and pick up wrappers, bottles, cans
and other debris, our streets and
beaches would look like a landfi ll.
We grew up hearing the ‘don’t
pollute’ message. If we threw a can
out the car window or along the
curb, we were swiftly comforted. In
other words, we were shamed into
picking up our cast-off and dispos-
ing of it correctly.
We all need to be guardians of
our planet, not to mention our
neighborhoods and stand up to
those who so cavalierly use public
lands as their personal waste basket.
There’s a place for everything.
We adults have to give a hoot and
shame those, of any age, who choose
to litter. Until the day comes when
no one litters, we will rely upon the
concerned volunteers like Richard
Boyes.
—LAZ
Tariffs stuck on the spin cycle
By VERONIQUE DE RUGY
American fi rms cheering for pro-
tectionism in the form of tariffs on
their foreign competitors should
be careful what they wish for. As
they say, “What goes around comes
around.” Case in point:
The American washer
and dryer manufacturer
Whirlpool Corp.
Last January, the
Trump administration
imposed a penalty on
Americans who buy
foreign-made
wash-
ers. The administration
argued that the need to protect our
domestic washer makers from com-
petition required the imposition,
for a period of three years, of a 20
percent duty on the fi rst 1.2 million
imported washing machines each
year and a 50 percent duty on quan-
tities above that threshold. Whirlpool
loved the idea of getting a leg up on
two of its most fi erce competitors
and increasingly consumer darlings,
South Korean Samsung Electron-
ics Co. and LG Electronics Inc. Why
bother trying to produce goods that
your consumers want to buy when
Uncle Sam can make your competi-
tors’ stuff artifi cially more expensive?
Marc Bitzer, the chief execu-
tive offi cer of Whirlpool, touted this
protection as “without any doubt, a
positive catalyst for Whirlpool.” Of
course, it’s not so good for American
consumers who must now pay a pen-
alty if they insist on buying the for-
eign-made washers that they prefer
over American-made washers. One
result of this penalty, according to
The Wall Street Journal, is that washer
prices have risen by about 20 per-
cent since January. From Whirlpool’s
standpoint, the policy seemed like a
raging success. Imports of large resi-
dential washers fell from a monthly
average of 350,000 in 2017 to an
average of 161,000 each month of
2018 through April.
But it’s not only American
consumers who are harmed
by Trump’s tariffs. American
businesses also get hurt in
the process when consumers,
having to fork over hundreds
of dollars more for washers,
must forgo the purchase
of other products that they
would have otherwise bought. This
isn’t surprising since tariffs always
divert resources toward government-
protected (read: favored) businesses
and away from unprotected ones
(read: everyone else).
Here’s the thing: When you cheer
for protectionism, you never know
when you might become the victim
of the next round of consumer-pun-
ishing tariffs. That’s what happened
to Whirlpool, which is now a victim
of the 25 percent steel tariffs imposed
by the administration to protect the
steel industry from foreign competi-
tion.
It’s funny how that works. Whirl-
pool isn’t too happy about this par-
ticular version of protectionism. The
steel tariffs increase the company
production costs for washers and dry-
ers. And some of these higher pro-
duction costs are covered in the form
of higher prices for consumers. As a
result, since the Trump tariffs were
announced and set in place, prices
have gone up across brands and the
demand for washers has fallen.
Meanwhile, appliance-repair busi-
tho
opinion
of othors
nesses are making a killing as con-
sumers put off the purchase of new
appliances in favor of the expensive
(but relatively cheaper) repairs they
wouldn’t have purchased in a not-
so-long-ago pre-tariff past. Poor
protect-me-but-not-thee Whirlpool;
this sad turn of events has forced the
company to reconsider many of its
hopes for expansion.
With imports down, the company
planned to add workers at its washer
plant in expectation of a new rush
of tariff-induced washer sales. Not so
fast. Thanks to the many tariffs ap-
plied to over $90 billion of imports
from China and other places (in-
cluding inputs and raw materials like
steel), Whirlpool not only didn’t add
1,300 workers to its Clyde factory in
Ohio; it has actually reduced its pro-
duction. It’s therefore unsurprising
that Whirlpool’s share price is down
15 percent since the washer tariffs
were put in place. That’s in spite of
the massive cut in the corporate in-
come tax rate from 35 to 21 percent
and other tax cuts.
The bottom line is that a govern-
ment that’s powerful enough to pro-
tect some producers against foreign
competitors is powerful enough to
protect other producers—protection
that winds up infl icting net damage
on most or even all producers. As for
the 6.5 million workers in Ameri-
ca’s steel-consuming manufacturing
plants (including Whirlpool’s), they
can be added—along with all con-
sumers—to the laundry list of long-
suffering victims of cronyism that the
Washington, D.C., swamp has left out
to dry.
(Croators Syndicato)
Trump’s foreign policy style rankles
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After a two-hour, private, no-
observers meeting between a Rus-
sian dictator and what looks like his
understudy, the news conference
that followed required no training
in body language interpretation to
conclude which one of them en-
joyed the upper hand. The
one, Russia’s President
Vladimir Putin presented
himself with a cocky smile
built on a confi dent, in-
charge stride while the
other, President Donald
J. Trump, appeared ner-
vous, petulant, unsure, and
emasculated.
The two stood at sepa-
rate podiums for a press confer-
ence where the American president
displayed deference to his Russian
counterpart, lavishing high praise
on him while assuming a subor-
dinate role. In answering the very
fi rst question from an audience of
reporters, Trump blamed disputes
and problems between the U.S. and
Russia on his predecessor, former
President Barack Obama, and his
challenger for the presidency, Hill-
ary Clinton. He also recognized
Putin for being honest in claiming
Russia did not interfere in our 2016
election and repudiated his own in-
telligence appointees.
Then, Trump returned to Wash-
ington, D.C. and the next day
changed one word in his give-
away to Putin before the whole
world. He followed over the next
week by reversing himself and, to
date, has done so multiple times
(as before Helsinki and now after).
Meanwhile, we’ve gotten familiar—
from his 18-months in the White
House—that whatever he says the
fi rst time is what he really believes.
What’s become clear is that Trump
listens primarily to himself, some-
times to daughter Ivanka, but is
most infl uenced by Putin, a KGB
agent dedicated to returning Rus-
sian to the Soviet Union-era and its
former sphere of infl u-
ence, adding, presently,
and his greatest ambi-
tion, the West, too.
If the reader does
not know it already, ev-
ery objective fact relat-
ing to America’s special
counsel, Robert Muel-
ler and his team of U.S.
assistants, had already
disclosed that Putin’s Russia helped
Trump into the presidency. Putin
has also confi rmed that he wanted
Trump elected to the presidency. At
this juncture in U.S. foreign affairs, it
must be remembered that, in Phila-
delphia during the 1787 conven-
tion, the authors of what became
the U.S. Constitution, the founding
of our democratic-republic design,
worried a lot about foreign corrup-
tion of the new nation’s presidency.
The month of July, 2018, has
provided, compliments of Donald
Trump, other mind-boggling ac-
tions besides his throw away in Fin-
land. He also denounced the Euro-
pean Union as our “foe,” threatened
to terminate NATO, wrecked the
US-led world trading system, and
intervened in the United Kingdom
and German politics in support of
extremist and pro-Russian forces.
These matters in addition to his
refusal to stand up to protect and
preserve the integrity of our voting
system. Is our sovereignty about to
become a victim of a Russian’s am-
gono
h.
mcintyro
bitions? Will we let it?
Can we actually wait for an-
other election several months away
when our president, who swore to
“preserve, protect, and defend the
Constitution of the United States of
America” has subordinated himself
to Putin? Special counsel Robert
Mueller now investigates how deep
and destructive the union between
Trump and Putin is. In the mean-
time, Trump has invited Putin to
visit the White House for another
private meeting where, it’s surmised
based on Helsinki, the fate of more
than 320 million Americans will re-
main a secret.
The world’s people want to avoid
a nuclear holocaust and that’s why
it is critically important that our
president maintain an open line
with Russia’s president. However,
because Vladimir Putin is a dicta-
tor who seeks to spread his power,
he sees the West’s democratic prin-
ciples and practices as standing in
his way. Hence, to help himself, he’s
using Trump, a naïve, self-centered
leader who admires his strongman
status. Those who value our way of
life, our laws, institutions, norms and
freedoms, are encouraged to give
serious consideration to what’s at
stake before willfully surrendering
the 229-years-old great American
experiment to the wiles of a foreign
totalitarian.
(Gono H. McIntyro sharos his
opinion ovory look.)
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