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JULY 5, 2019, KEIZERTIMES, PAGE A5 Opinion Accessing private information Personal privacy is a triggering is- sue for most Americans. They don’t want the government, business or people they don’t know to go rooting around their lives. The privacy issue takes on a different face when it comes to a loved one, especially when technol- ogy, such as cellphones and computers, is in- volved. In cases of death, get- ting access to information is vital to executors of wills and survivors. Un- fortunately, passwords for phones, computers and other devices are not always shared with family members. There is information that is important for survivors to access and fi nalize the affairs of their loved one. Information regarding fi nancial ac- counts, on-going payments and more can be locked away forever without the cooperation of the companies that maintain cellphones and online accounts such as social media sites. Without a password, survivors are locked out of accessing information. Providing access to secure accounts is not an easy step. Companies must manage their liability, they cannot just open accounts to those who say they are survivors. There has to be stringent steps to assure that those gaining access are the ones who, without question, have the right to access. Ideally, spouses would share their passwords. Bar- ing that, one option is to legislate who, and how, someone gets access to a deceased person’s private information. Any legislation would have to be written succinctly including pro- viding immunity from civil action to companies that provide access on good faith. No amount of legislation can account for the actions of humans. Things never get so complicated and irrational as when a person passes. The death of a spouse or loved one is devastating enough without the added complications of trying to wrap up their lives. — LAZ our opinion Sanctuary America? The star of the fi rst Democratic presidential primary debate, Sen. Ka- mala Harris, D-Calif., was attorney general of California and, before that, district attorney for San Francisco. This put her in the van- guard of the Golden State’s sanctuary state and sanctu- ary city policies. Now, it seems, all the 2020 Democratic hope- fuls—and Harris in partic- ular—are trying to turn the United States into one big sanctuary country where crossing the border illegally is analogous to jaywalking. That’s why all 10 Democrats raised their hands Thursday night when asked if they wanted to make crossing the border without documentation a civil rather than criminal offense. They all also raised their hands when asked if they wanted to provide health care to unauthorized immigrants. During the debate, Harris framed the practice of shielding undocument- ed immigrants from federal immigra- tion enforcement this way: “I know it as a prosecutor. I want a rape victim to be able to run in the middle of -- to run in the middle of the street and wave down a police offi cer and report the crime against her.” It was a variation of an argument crafted earlier by Sen. Dianne Fein- stein, who as mayor of San Francisco pushed through the city’s fi rst sanctu- ary policy in 1985. It applied to un- documented migrants from El Salva- dor and Guatemala. The law, expanded to all undocumented immigrants by city voters in 1989, would make San Francisco safer, DiFi argued, because undocumented residents would not be afraid to report crimes to city police. But as the policy expanded, it didn’t just protect otherwise law-abiding im- migrants—hard-working adults who came here to work and raise a family. It also has shielded gang members and criminals who harm women and chil- dren, as Harris well knows. San Francisco’s 2013 Due Process for All ordinance prohibited local law enforcement from holding unautho- rized immigrants for federal immi- gration offi cials unless the inmate had been convicted of a violent felony in the past seven years. What could go wrong? Many a career car thief or repeat drug offender has enjoyed the same protection as the rape victim Harris said she wanted to protect. The most famous benefi ciary was Jose Ines Garcia Zarate. After he served time for his seventh felony drug con- viction, the feds sent Garcia Zarate to San Francisco on a 20-year-old mar- ijuana charge. The district attorney inevitably did not pursue the moldy case, and so Garcia Za- rate walked out on the street, where he found a gun used to kill Kate Steinle on a summer evening in 2015. Please tell me: What country passes laws to protect career criminals and repeat offenders from being deported? In his fi rst term, President Barack Obama had a smarter take when he directed federal offi cials to target un- authorized immigrants who were “vi- olent offenders and people convicted of crimes.” He expanded the Secure Commu- nities program, piloted by President George W. Bush, which cross-checked fi ngerprints taken at local jails with immigration databases. It was a smart plan. In fi scal 2013, The Los Angeles Times reported, 82% of deported indi- viduals had been convicted of a crime. During the debate, however, Harris railed against Obama’s use of Secure Communities because, well, “The pol- icy was to allow deportation of people who by ICE’s own defi nition were non-criminals.” (Actually, that’s also the defi nition of Thursday night’s de- bate team, as they all said they’d like to make unauthorized border crossing a civil offense instead of a crime.) Mark Krikorian of the pro-en- forcement Center for Immigration Studies observed that Harris referred to rape as a “real crime”: “That’s a standard sanctuary city line,” says Krikorian. “At this point, it’s now Democratic Party orthodoxy that only people that have broken ‘real’ laws should be subject to deportation.” And those crimes would have to be tried and convicted and have been committed recently to warrant re- moval. The “tool in the toolbox” of being able to deport an undesirable newcomer who’s not supposed to be in the United States in the fi rst place, Krikorian warned, would disappear. What would happen if Demo- crats were to end criminal penalties for crossing the border? Does anyone think there would be fewer unautho- rized immigrants or more? And would they be more law-abiding otherwise or less? debra j. saunders (Creators Syndicate) Keizertimes Wheatland Publishing Corp. 142 Chemawa Road N. • Keizer, Oregon 97303 Phone: 503.390.1051 • www.keizertimes.com MANAGING EDITOR Eric A. Howald editor@keizertimes.com SUBSCRIPTIONS One year: $35 in Marion County, $43 outside Marion County, $55 outside Oregon ASSOCIATE EDITOR Matt Rawlings news@keizertimes.com COMMUNITY REPORTER PUBLISHED EVERY FRIDAY Lauren Murphy reporter@keizertimes.com Publication No: USPS 679-430 ADVERTISING POSTMASTER Paula Moseley advertising@keizertimes.com Send address changes to: PRODUCTION MANAGER & GRAPHIC DESIGNER Andrew Jackson graphics@keizertimes.com LEGAL NOTICES EDITOR & PUBLISHER Lyndon Zaitz publisher@keizertimes.com Keizertimes Circulation 142 Chemawa Road N. Keizer, OR 97303 Periodical postage paid at Salem, Oregon legals@keizertimes.com BUSINESS MANAGER Leah Stevens billing@keizertimes.com RECEPTION/SUBSCRIPTIONS Lori Beyeler subs@keizertimes.com facebook.com/keizertimes twitter.com/keizertimes Endless self-regard on world stage By MICHAEL GERSON I worked for a leader who was sometimes accused of lacking in the smarts department. But no one I know who spent time with Presi- dent George W. Bush was left with that impression. Bush took an almost gleeful sat- isfaction in picking holes in argu- ments, as any half-pre- pared briefer quickly learned. He was also an avid reader of history. (I remember him passing along to me Judgment Days: Lyndon Baines Johnson, Martin Luther King Jr. and the Laws That Changed America and A Godly Hero: The Life of William Jennings Bryan af- ter he had fi nished with them.) Most important to Bush’s politi- cal rise, he has a remarkable facility for reading the emotional contours of small groups. If someone is feel- ing ignored or reluctant to contrib- ute a relevant point, Bush zeroes in to make him or her feel comfort- able and included. During the 2000 campaign, I recall a briefi ng on hu- manitarian military interventions, attended by all of Bush’s fi rst-string foreign policy advisers. Not being one of them, I was seated at the periphery, in a chair with my back to the wall, trying to avoid notice. About halfway through the meet- ing, Bush paused and said to the group: “You know what I’d really like to know? I’d like to know what Mike Gerson thinks about this.” I sputtered something so forgetta- ble that I have forgotten it. But the memory of feeling valued remains. People close to President Trump may well have similar stories of un- suspected sharpness and acumen. But if this is a secret, it is a well- kept one. Trump has said he has no time to read. “I never have,” he said in 2016. “I’m always busy doing a lot.” People who brief him report a gnat-like attention span. Trump’s frequent accusation that others are stupid or “low IQ” sits uncomfort- ably with his own shocking igno- rance of history, science and eco- nomics. Most recently, he seemed to understand “West- ern-style liberalism” as local governance in Los Angeles and San Fran- cisco. Asked his view of busing, he judged it “a primary method of get- ting people to schools.” Does presidential ig- norance matter? A few presidents— like Thomas Jefferson and Abraham Lincoln—rose through the power of brilliant writing and rhetoric. Ulysses S. Grant wrote a memoir of enduring literary value. The 1912 presidential election pitted the au- thor of The Naval War of 1812: A Complete History (Teddy Roosevelt) against the author of Congressional Government: A Study in American Government (Woodrow Wilson). There is not, of course, a neces- sary connection between brilliance and judgment. And it is true that writers tend (sometimes unfairly) to prefer the kind of intelligence ex- pressed in writing. That said, it is evident that Trump’s combination of ignorance and arrogance exposes the United States to needless global ridicule. His misunderstanding of basic econom- ics—particularly his insistence that China will pay tariffs rather than U.S. consumers —has led to bad and dangerous trade policy. But Trump’s most consequential defi cit may lie in his emotional intelligence—what political scientist Joseph Nye de- fi nes as “the self-mastery, discipline other voices and empathic capacity that allows leaders to channel their personal passions and attract others.” This ground is also covered by the term “temperament.” And we are seeing what happens when pres- idential temperament is entirely absent. Trump’s lack of self-mastery often makes his interventions in for- eign and domestic policy spasmodic and unstrategic. His incapacity for empathy results in cruelty—see the migrant children at the border— that strikes at the moral core of American greatness. Trump is un- able to fi nd any value in the views of a political opponent, which puts both national healing and useful compromise beyond his abilities. He is only capable of governing on behalf of those who support him, making him vulnerable to manipu- lation through fl attery. This is bad enough in the con- text of American politics. It is worse on a global scale. Ultimately, the lack of presidential temperament leaves Trump unable to distinguish between American friends and au- tocratic rivals who playa on his own vanity. And this allows strongmen such as Russian President Vladi- mir Putin and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to murder, intimidate and attack Western liber- alism under the protective cover of Trump’s narcissism. This is a more disturbing matter than gaps in the president’s knowl- edge. Those who dismiss the im- portance of presidential tempera- ment must reckon with the fact that Trump’s endless self-regard is being exploited—and easily exploited— to undermine the interests of the United States. (Washington Group) Post Writers Are we lurching toward war? We’ve been at war with other countries over the last sixty years where outcomes have not been as predicted and promises unfulfi lled. They have brought huge losses in military and collateral lives and dev- astated our treasury. Meanwhile, needs at home go unattended. Ob- jective observers promise that a war with Iran will be quite different from those with Iraq, Libya, Somalia and Afghanistan. The biggest difference is where a loss for us could be the outcome. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has remarked that it would “only” take 2,000 air strikes to elim- inate Iran’s nuclear facili- ties. He sees it as “easy” to place 20,000 Marines on the northern coast of the Persian Gulf to secure the Strait of Hormuz al- though U.S. forces would face 1.7 million Iranian regulars and militia. Pompeo is confi dant the U.S. Navy can cope with literally thousands of supersonic missiles fi red at our ships. Then there are the S-300 missiles Iran now operationally owns. Of course, the U.S. could use nuclear weapons to kill every man, woman and child in Iran. That would add up to about 80 million of them and a U.S. reputation for use of weapons of mass destruction that’d hound our nation for time immemo- rial. In all this, 326 million lives are in the hands of only three Americans. Trump’s National Security Advi- sor is 70-year-old John Bolton. Born in the U.S., he has never been in the military, having escaped the draft vis- a-vis Vietnam. He’s become notori- ous by his advocacy for war with Iran for at least twenty years. Anyone who knows anything about the Muslim religion and its war with Christian- ity, dating back to the fi rst Crusade in 1071, recognizes control of Islam’s devotees is as easy as a trip to Mars via a Cessna. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is a mystery wrapped in an enigma. He’s a 55-year-old who’s appreciated advantages in life many an American could envy. He graduated from the U.S. Military Academy and from Harvard Uni- versity law school to become a lawyer. How- ever, this man is accused of harboring contempt for blacks, gays and Muslims. He’s a dedicated hawk. Al- though he received his fi rst college degree at West Point, and learned the art of war there, he has avoided com- bat although he’s apparently eager to put other Americans in harm’s way by warring in Iran. In his effort to reverse every- thing done by the Obama Admin- istration, one of President Donald Trump’s fi rst acts was to take the U.S. out of the nuclear agreement with Iran, followed by the imposition of heavy sanctions. His actions have caused considerable harm to the Ira- nian economy. More recently there were the oil tanker incidents in the Strait of Hormuz and the shooting gene h. mcintyre down of an American a U.S. drone. These actions have led to what ap- peared imminent war not yet mate- rialized. More Trump sanctions have followed. No one seems to know where Trump’s true sentiments lie. The uncertainty with him is his de- cision-making inclinations, generally understood as based on the last per- son with whom he spoke. Last week, Republicans in the U.S. Senate gave Trump and his two favorite hawks (Bolton and Pompeo) the power to order military strikes without con- sulting with or even notifying the U.S Congress. Another war anywhere in the world will lead to more lives lost in vain, further depletion of the U.S. treasury, and the return of Ameri- can military personnel with physical injuries and mental problems like PTSD. Meanwhile, instead of war with Iran, our government, among others allied in the effort, should lead with a plan to implement an intervention that’d control the brutal lawlessness motivating Guatemalans, Hondurans, Nicaraguans, etc. to seek sanctuary here in the United States. (Gene H. McIntyre shares his opinion regularly in the Keizertimes.) Share your opinion Submit a letter to the editor, or a guest column by noon Tuesday. Email to: publisher@keizertimes.com