OPINION
4A
T HE
D AILY A STORIAN
Founded in 1873
STEPHEN A. FORRESTER, Editor & Publisher
LAURA SELLERS, Managing Editor
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CARL EARL, Systems Manager
JOHN D. BRUIJN, Production Manager
DEBRA BLOOM, Business Manager
SAMANTHA MCLAREN, Circulation Manager
Our neighbors yearn
to breathe free
Immigrants enrich our national fabric
P
Guest column
Free help available when
signing up for health care
W
e at The Insurance Store
people in Clatsop County do not
understand the requirements,
deadlines, and penalties of the
Affordable Care Act.
And of those who do understand,
there are many who are unsure of
what to do or where to turn for help.
Help with enrollment can come
from an assister or agent. The advan-
tages of going through an agent are:
Working with a licensed agent is
free … no cost to you
They are licensed by the State of
Oregon
They are able to discuss deduct-
ibles, co-pays, and prescription ben-
resident Obama’s simple eloquence as a speechmaker
is nowhere more evident than when he speaks on
They are experienced and knowl-
immigration. In November he could not have been clearer:
edgeable about insurance
“We are and always will be a nation of immigrants.”
The deadline to enroll in a major
As he gears up for his State
of the Union speech, it’s likely
that topic will be one of many
challenges he addresses.
Obama is not suggesting
a full amnesty for everyone
who has entered the United
States illegally. Instead, his
plan is that people who can
years, or have children born
here, be encouraged to come
out of “the shadows” and be
provided a smooth path to
citizenship. This would involve
criminal background checks
and eventually have them
paying the same taxes as their
neighbors.
Fairness is at the heart of
Obama’s efforts. “Are we
a nation that tolerates the
hypocrisy of a system where
workers who pick our fruit
and make our beds never have
a chance to get right with the
law?
“Or are we a nation that gives
them a chance to make amends,
take responsibility, and give
their kids a better future?
Regrettably, his comments
come against a background
of voices being raised against
his very reasonable efforts to
reform what he and many others
have labeled our “broken”
system of immigration.
It is sickening to see
Republican
extremists
in Congress bristle in
opposition when they have
demanded action for so long
without getting anything
accomplished.
More than 10 million people
live in America illegally.
Obama suggests a way to
embrace them.
“Mass amnesty would be
unfair. Mass deportation would
be both impossible and contrary
it to our character.”
At the heart of the debate is
the work world. Undocumented
workers help keep America’s
economy going.
Obama noted the unfairness
that business owners who
offer
good
wages
and
their
competitors
exploit
undocumented immigrants by
paying them far less.
“All of us take offense to
anyone who reaps the rewards
of living in America without
taking on the responsibilities
of living in America,” he
said. “And undocumented
immigrants, who desperately
want to embrace those
responsibilities, see little option
but to remain in the shadows,
or risk their families being torn
apart.”
The president believes
reform efforts must combine
compassion. “Tracking down,
rounding up and deporting
millions of people isn’t
realistic. Anyone who suggests
otherwise isn’t being straight
with you. It’s also not who we
are as Americans.”
His multiple-part strategy
involves:
• Accepting the reality
that the U.S. has more than
10 million undocumented
residents who are contributing
to several sectors of the
economy and should not be
persecuted;
• Reshaping an easier path
for immigrants who entered
illegally to seek legal status and
helping them adjust to living in
the United States;
• Acknowledging that our
southern border with Mexico
is a dangerous zone that needs
A key element woven
into these latest reforms is
compassion
for
families.
Birthright
citizenship
is
more than a tradition in the
United States — it is the
law. All children born in the
United States are American
citizens. Separating them from
their parents, who may be
undocumented, is unjust and
inhumane.
It is time for the moderates
in Congress to speak up. We are
tired of the shrill voices playing
the race card or the fear card.
Immigrants enrich our melting
pot society.
Of course if we need
historical guidance on the topic
there’s a certain beautiful statue
in New York Harbor. A plaque
underneath the lady with the
torch reads:
“Give me your tired, your
poor,
“Your huddled masses
yearning to breathe free,
“The wretched refuse of your
teeming shore.
“Send these, the homeless,
tempest-tost to me,
“I lift my lamp beside the
golden door!”
Poet Emma Lazarus sure had
a way with words.
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • TUESDAY, JANUARY 20, 2015
medical health plan is Feb. 15. After
that date you will have to wait until
November to enroll and you will ac-
crue penalties. There are a few excep-
The deadline to
enroll in a major
medical health plan
is Feb. 15.
tions which would enable you to en-
roll after February. To do so you will
have to have a qualifying life event.
A few examples of a qualifying event
are marriage/divorce, birth of a child
or adoption, move, release from incar-
ceration, change of income, and loss of
coverage, loss of job or a new job.
The penalties for having no cov-
erage in 2015 are $325 per person
($162.50 per child under 18) or
2 percent of your yearly income,
whichever is greater, up to a maxi-
mum of $975 per family. The penalty
increases every year. In 2016, it will
be 2.5 percent of income or $695 per
person. After that it will be adjusted
for the year you don’t have coverage.
There are many factors that help
determine your eligibility for assis-
tance in paying for your insurance
premium including household size,
make less than $16,105 per year for
a household of one you may quali-
fy for the Oregon Health Plan. A
family of four with an income of
$32,913 or less may qualify for the
Oregon Health Plan. With higher in-
come you may still qualify to receive
monthly tax credits to help pay for
your monthly insurance premiums.
Some may also qualify for additional
plan, will reduce the deductibles and
Local insurance agents are:
• Jamay Larson, 503-861-2672,
Warrenton/Astoria
• Phil Morrill, 503-861-2672,
Warrenton/Astoria
• Steve Putman, 503-738-7181,
Seaside
• Karen Halverson, 360-244-
3561, Washington
Does Obama even see threat of terror?
By CHARLES
KRAUTHAMMER
Washington Post Writers Group
W
ASHINGTON — On
Sunday, at the great
Paris rally, the whole world was
Charlie.
By Tuesday,
the veneer of
solidarity was
exposed
as
tissue thin.
It
began
dissolving as
soon as the
real, remaining
Charlie Hebdo
Charles
put out its post-
Krauthammer
massacre issue
featuring a Mu-
hammad cover that, as The New York
Times put it, “reignited the debate
pitting free speech against religious
sensitivities.”
Again? Already? Had not 4 mil-
lion marchers and 44 foreign lead-
ers just turned out on the streets of
France to declare “No” to intimida-
tion, and pledging solidarity, indeed
lie”), a satirical weekly specializing
in the most outrageous and often
tasteless portrayals of Muhammad?
And yet, within 48 hours, the new
Charlie Hebdo issue featuring the
image of Muhammad — albeit a
sorrowful, indeed sympathetic Mu-
hammad — sparked new protests,
denunciations and threats of vio-
lence, which in turn evinced another
AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi
Iranian demonstrators chant slogans during a rally against the satir-
ical magazine Charlie Hebdo’s latest publication of a cartoon depict-
ing the Prophet Muhammad, which some Muslims deem an insult to
Islam, in front of the French Embassy, Tehran, Iran, Monday.
campaign, with bin Laden dead and
al-Qaeda “on the run.”
Hence his call in a major address
at the National Defense Universi-
Congress’ 2001 Authorization of the
Use of Military Force, the very legal
basis for the war on terror. Hence
his accelerating release of Gitmo in-
mates, fully knowing that about 30
go zones where Sharia reigns and
legitimate state authorities dare not
tread.
To call them lone wolves, as did
our hapless attorney general, is to
ington. He has ever since shuttled
between saying that (a) the war must
end because of the damage “keep-
ing America on a perpetual wartime
footing” was doing to us, or (b) the
war has already ended, as he sug-
gested repeatedly during the 2012
the equivalent of the pitiable, men-
tally unstable Sydney hostage taker.
The Paris killers were well-
trained, thoroughly radicalized,
clear-eyed jihadist warriors. They
(Five more releases were announced cannot be dismissed as lone loons.
Wednesday.) Which is why, since, Worse, they represent a growing
oh, the Neolithic era, POWs tend to generation of alienated European
Muslims whose sheer number is ap-
be released after a war is over.
Paris shows that this war is not. proaching critical mass.
The war on ter-
On the contrary.
ror 2015 is at a new
As it rages, it is en-
phase with a new
tering an ominous
The Paris
geography. At the
third phase.
killers were
core are parallel
would-be caliph-
ca 9/11, involved
well-trained,
ates: in Syria and
sending
Middle
Iraq, the Islamic
Eastern terrorists
thoroughly
State; in central
abroad to attack the
Africa, now spill-
radicalized,
ing out of Nigeria
Then came the
clear-eyed
into
Cameroon,
lone wolf — lo-
a near-sovereign
cal individuals in-
jihadist warriors. Boko Haram; in
spired by foreign
the badlands of
jihadists launching
Yemen,
AQAP,
one-off attacks, as
seen most recently in Québec, Otta- the most dangerous of all al-Qaeda
wa and Sydney.
Paris marks Phase 3: coordinated cast of minicaliphates embedded in
commando strikes by homegrown the most ungovernable parts of the
native-speaking Islamists activat- Third World from Libya to Somalia
ed and instructed from abroad. to the borderlands of Pakistan, but an
(Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula archipelago of no-go Islamist islands
has claimed responsibility for the embedded in the heart of Europe.
This is serious. In both size and
Charlie Hebdo killings, while the
kosher-grocery shooter proclaimed reach it is growing. Our president
allegiance to the Islamic State.) They will not say it. Fine. But does he
even see it?
state.or.us
• State Rep. Deborah Boone
(D): 900 Court St. N.E., H-375, Sa-
lem, OR 97301. Phone: 503-986-
1432. Email: rep.deborah boone@
• State Sen. Betsy Johnson (D):
State Capitol, 900 Court St. N.E.,
S-314, Salem, OR 97301. Telephone:
503-986-1716. Email: sen.betsy john-
son@state.or.us Web: www.betsy-
637, Cannon Beach, OR 97110.
Phone: 503-986-1432. Web: www.
leg.state.or.us/ boone/
R, Scappoose, OR 97056. Phone: 503-
543-4046. Fax: 503-543-5296. Astoria
in the West about the propriety and
limits of free expression. Hopeless.
As for President Obama, he never
was Charlie, not even for those 48
hours. From the day of the massacre,
he has been practically invisible. At
the interstices of various political ral-
lies, he issued bits of muted, mealy-
mouthed boilerplate. Followed by
the now-famous absence of any U.S.
representative of any stature at the
Paris rally, an abdication of moral
and political leadership for which
the White House has already admit-
ted error.
But this was no mere error of
judgment or optics or, most absurd-
ly, of communications in which
we are supposed to believe that the
president was not informed by staff
about the magnitude, both actual and
symbolic, of the demonstration he
ignored. (He needed to be told?)
On the contrary, the no-show,
following the near silence, precise-
ambivalence about the very idea of
the war on terror. Obama began his
administration by purging the phrase
Where to write
• U.S. Rep. Suzanne Bonamici
(D): 2338 Rayburn HOB, Washing-
ton, D.C., 20515. Phone: 202- 225-
0855. Fax 202-225-9497. District
Suite 220, Beaverton, OR 97005.
Phone: 503-326-2901. Fax 503-326-
5066. Web: bonamici.house. gov/
• U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D):
Washington, D.C. 20510. Phone:
202-224-3753. Web: www.merkley.
senate.gov
• State Rep. Brad Witt (D):
State Capitol, 900 Court Street N.E.,
H-373, Salem, OR 97301. Phone:
503-986-1431. Web: www.leg.state.
or.us/witt/ Email: rep.bradwitt@
• Port of Astoria: Executive Di-
rector, 10 Pier 1 Suite 308, Astoria,
OR 97103. Phone: 503-741-3300.
Email: admin@portofastoria.com
• Clatsop County Board of
Commissioners: c/o County Man-
ager, 800 Exchange St., Suite 300,
P.O. Box 179, Astoria, OR 97103.
Phone: 503-325-1000.