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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (May 5, 2015)
OPINION 6A T HE D AILY A STORIAN Founded in 1873 STEPHEN A. FORRESTER, Editor & Publisher LAURA SELLERS, Managing Editor BETTY SMITH, Advertising Manager CARL EARL, Systems Manager JOHN D. BRUIJN, Production Manager DEBRA BLOOM, Business Manager HEATHER RAMSDELL, Circulation Manager Most popular program you’ve never heard of T Land & Water Conservation Fund sustains Willapa refuge he Land and Water Conservation Fund may be the most popular federal program you’ve never heard of. Relying on no taxes, it takes some of the proceeds from offshore oil and gas leases and reinvests those funds in outdoor recreation and conservation throughout America. It is national self-improvement using assets that belong to all of us — a sort of saving account in the form of better state and local parks, as well as enhancements in national parks, wilderness areas, forests and wildlife refuges. Started in 1964, it is key to the creation and mainte- nance of “thousands of local play- JURXQGVVRFFHU¿HOGVDQGEDVHEDOO diamonds,” according to the Trust for Public Land. It was the creation of Washington’s legendary Sen. Henry “Scoop” Jackson, at the re- quest of President John Kennedy. In a continuation of a tiresome pattern, last year Congress used only $306 million for intended pur- poses, siphoning away the bulk of LWCF money. In all the years, $17 billion from the LWCF has been frittered away. For the coming budget period, President Obama has asked that the entire $900 mil- lion in current funds be used as federal law requires. This request is strongly supported by Sens. Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley. The biggest project that may be funded in Oregon is the Pathways WRWKH3DFL¿FZKLFKZRXOGUHFHLYH PLOOLRQ WR VWDELOL]H ¿VK UXQV and improve public access with ac- quisitions in the Oregon National Historic Trail, the John Day Wild and Scenic River, the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area and John Day Fossil Beds National Monument. In the lower Columbia region, this package includes the :LOODSD DQG 5LGJH¿HOG QDWLRQDO wildlife refuges. In Oregon, “Without full fund- ing, some critical projects in Oregon like protecting the east moraine of Wallowa Lake, will never get com- pleted and instead be lost to devel- opment or other threats,” said Kelley Beamer, executive director of the Coalition of Oregon Land Trusts. In Willapa, $4.2 million would pay willing sellers for a 1,458- acre Willapa refuge expansion. According to the Washington Wildlife & Recreation Coalition: “Funds would acquire three prop- erties next to the main unit. They would help protect and improve the overall health and function of the Willapa Bay watershed and the aquatic species within it. This acquisition would also create an opportunity to enhance and restore western red cedar forests to even- tually re-establish late successional old-growth function. These areas are important to Federal and State endangered/threatened species and most migratory bird species XVLQJWKH3DFL¿F)O\ZD\7KHIHG- erally-listed marbled murrelet re- FRYHU\ SODQ LGHQWL¿HV 6RXWKZHVW :DVKLQJWRQ DV D VLJQL¿FDQW JDS in suitable nesting habitat along WKH 3DFL¿F 1RUWKZHVW &RDVW Increasing available habitat in this area is critical to expanding the geographic distribution of the mur- relet within its threatened range.” In our area, U.S. Rep. Suzanne Bonamici is fully supportive of the LWCF. U.S. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Wash. 3rd Dist., has in the recent past voted to elimi- nate the LWCF, even though fel- low Washington Republican Dave Reichert supports it. This program clearly deserves continuing enthusiastic support by Congress. Generations of bi- partisan support for this smart in- vestment of national funds in local communities deserves to be hon- ored and sustained. Hanford has been ‘an unlimited spigot’ I f a massive amount of mon- ey is available for spending, at a minimum there will be waste, perhaps fraud and maybe theft. The larger the amount of money, the bigger the magnet. We’ve seen that in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The same thing happens in the private sec- tor. And it seems to be happen- ing domestically at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. The Richland-based journalist Anna King told an Astoria audi- ence last Thursday that 14,000 Department of Energy employees are working on Hanford’s cleanup. And work is stalled, perhaps hope- OHVVO\DWWKHPXOWLVWRU\YLWUL¿FDWLRQ plant. Also last week, Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden decried the lack of progress in the Hanford cleanup. “Obama has no plan,” said Wyden. “It has been an unlimited spigot. It is astounding the amount of money that’s been laid out.” Hanford was an enormously important, but secret installation of World War II. Its B Reactor made radioactive material that be- came the ingredient for the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, leading to Japan’s un- conditional surrender. When things are done in secret, there is little skepticism and no cross-examination. From the start, +DQIRUG RI¿FLDOV IDLOHG WR UHFRJ- nize they were creating a mess that would haunt our region for eons. Sen. Wyden raises the prospect that national willingness to clean up Hanford might wane. “I’m not sure the rest of the country will go along with this much longer,” he said. Mismanagement is the po- lite word for what’s going on at Hanford. While Hanford is no lon- ger off limits to the public, the ves- tige of secrecy lingers. Anna King described a situation that is long on massive reports and short on can- dor. She is also correct that Hanford is “the legacy that we were hand- ed.” We must contain the damage that is sitting there, perilously close to the Columbia River. THE DAILY ASTORIAN • TUESDAY, MAY 5, 2015 Restoring faith in justice lieve in justice, this is the RI¿FHUVKRWDQGNLOOHG-RKQ case to start showing, be- Crawford in an Ohio Wal- cause I shouldn’t have (sat) Mart as he walked around on death row for 30 years, ast week, Baltimore’s chief WKH VWRUH ZLWK DQ DLU ULÀH Hinton said. ”All they had to he’d picked up off the store’s prosecutor, Marilyn J. Mosby, do was test the gun.” own shelves, and another FKDUJHGVL[RI¿FHUVLQWKHGHDWKRI RI¿FHU JULOOHG KLV JLUOIULHQG Last year Glenn Ford, Freddie Gray. Louisiana’s longest-serving until she cried, “accusing death row prisoner, was also The charges included second-de- her of lying, threatening her set free after nearly 30 years with jail time and suggesting gree murder, manslaughter, assault, facing execution for a mur- she could be on drugs,” ac- Charles PLVFRQGXFWLQRI¿FHDQGIDOVHLPSULV- der that he also did not com- cording to CNN. Blow onment. mit. According to The New After the city of Cleve- (These were only charges. There land claimed — then apologized for York Daily News: “A judge freed Ford ZLOOEHDGHIHQVHDQGDWULDO7KHRI¿- claiming — that Tamir Rice was re- from the Louisiana State Penitentiary cers remain innocent until and unless VSRQVLEOHIRUKLVRZQGHDWKZKHQRI¿- a year ago when evidence, believed to cers shot him in the stomach — an inju- have been suppressed during the trial, proven guilty.) Mosby said at a news conference ry he would later die from — in a park surfaced exonerating him from the all- Friday as she laid out the case and an- as he played with a toy gun. white jury’s decision in the murder of According to The Washington Post: a nearly blind Shreveport watchmaker, nounced the charges: “To the people of Baltimore and the demonstrators across ³,QWKHFRXUW¿OLQJZKLFKZDVDIRUPDO Isadore Rozeman.” America: I heard your call for ‘No jus- response from the city to a federal law- The lead prosecutor in the Ford tice, no peace.’” She continued: “Last suit by the Rice family, city attorneys case, A.M. Stroud III, apologized in but certainly not least, to the youth declare that Tamir and his family ‘were a column published by The Shreve- of the city. I will seek justice on your directly and proximately caused by port Times, saying: “In 1984, I was 33 behalf. This is a moment. This is your their own acts ...’ and added that Tamir years old. I was arrogant, judgmental, moment. Let’s ensure we have peace- caused his own death ‘by the failure ... narcissistic and very full of myself. I ful and productive rallies that will de- to exercise due care to avoid injury.’” was not as interested in justice as I was And after Anthony Ray Hinton sat in winning. To borrow a phrase from velop structural and systemic changes on Alabama’s death row Al Pacino in the movie And Justice for for generations to come. for 30 years — “one of All, ‘Winning became everything.’” You’re at the forefront of Faith the longest-serving death He concluded: “How totally wrong this cause and as young row prisoners in Alabama was I.” people, our time is now.” in the history,” according to the Mosby seemed to rec- After last month, NPR reported that ognize in that moment that system Equal Justice Initiative, Mayor Rahm Emmanuel of Chicago which won his release was supporting a $5.5 million repara- this case and others like it is the last month — for mur- tions package for victims of a former are now about more than ders he didn’t commit. He SROLFH FRPPDQGHU DQG KLV RI¿FHUV LQ individual deaths and indi- was arrested and charged that city. As MSNBC’s Trymaine Lee vidual incidents, but about bedrock based on the assertion that put it, they “for decades ran a torture restoration — or a forma- of the a revolver taken from his ring that used electrical shock, burning tion — of faith for all of mother’s home was used and beatings on more than 100 black America’s citizens in the system. in two capital murders and men.” American justice system a third uncharged crime. Even after ex- itself. All of this and more eats away at Faith in the system is the bedrock perts found in 2002 that the gun didn’t SXEOLFFRQ¿GHQFHLQHTXDOMXVWLFHXQGHU of the system. Without it, the system is match the crime evidence, prosecutors WKH ODZ DQG UHDI¿UPV SHRSOH¶V ZRUVW drained of its inviolable authority. This refused to revisit the case. fears: that the eyes of justice aren’t It took more than a decade of ad- blind but jaundiced. is the danger America now faces. After George Zimmerman shot ditional litigation before a judge threw As Langston Hughes once wrote: Trayvon Martin through the chest and RXW WKH FDVH 3URVHFXWRUV ¿QDOO\ FRQ- “That Justice is a blind goddess / Is a walked free. After there was no indict- ceded that the crime bullets couldn’t be thing to which we black are wise: / Her PHQWRIWKHRI¿FHUZKRFKRNHGWKHOLIH matched to the Hinton weapon. bandage hides two festering sores / That “For all of us that say that we be- once perhaps were eyes.” out of Eric Garner on video. After an By CHARLES M. BLOW New York Times News Service L Call it a stroke of fate from a tree, a basketball doctor’s words or Chris’s ex- coach who was running up pression scared me more.” and down the court looking The next months were back and forth, and a preg- DGEWATER, Md. — The the worst of her life. “I didn’t nant woman who swerved go through a day without thing that’s easy to miss about crying,” she said. She was KHUKHDGWRFKHFNWUDI¿FEH- Tara is how competitive she is. afraid to exercise or even fore crossing the street. Dis- In a big Irish family of gabby, ar- turn her head. sections can be caused by “At some point,” she sneezing, coughing, vom- gumentative people, my niece is a iting, sex or even leaning lovely, willowy brunette with an easy said, “I got really angry about, why the hell do I do back to get your hair washed Maureen laugh and quiet manner. everything right and then at a salon. And sometimes Dowd the only symptom is a head- Her parents had a love match on almost die? From playing the tennis courts at Catholic Universi- tennis? The thought of not being able to ache or neck ache. Caplan is not sure if strokes are in- ty, when my brother Martin was coach do anything more than what I’d already creasing among younger people or if of the men’s team and his future wife, done was so sad to me.” Tara was part of a disturbing health doctors are just getting better at realiz- Jone, was coach of the women’s team. They are not the overindulging side trend, according to a Washington Post ing “it’s not just old folks.” of the family. Tara never smoked or did piece that ran a month after she had the He said stroke experts have had a hard drugs, and two glasses of wine on a stroke. After years of declining in the time getting the message across to ER elderly, the paper reported, strokes are personnel that if a stroke is suspected, a weekend is a bacchanal. Tara constantly challenges herself. rising among younger adults. vascular image must be taken as well as Because they are accustomed to be- DEUDLQLPDJHEHFDXVHLWVKRZVXS¿UVWLQ She played on her mom’s tennis team at Catholic, helping it earn a Division III ing healthy, younger stroke victims of- the vessels that supply and drain the brain. national ranking, and, at 25, joined the ten deny or ignore the symptoms, lead- “You have to be pushy,” he ex- California National Guard, winning the ing them to miss treatment in the critical plained to me later. “There are a lot of hours and days afterward. And, because organs ER people have to deal with WRSZRPHQ¶V¿WQHVVDZDUG Tara had already done several triath- they look young and healthy, doctors quickly, but they get little neurology lons, but approaching her 40th birthday often don’t consider stroke as a cause. training. The brain is the Rolls-Royce Tara lost 30 percent of her peripher- of the system. Would you run your two years ago, she began training two hours a day to compete in a Half Iron- al vision. Doctors told her to cut back Rolls-Royce into the local gas station? man, cheered on by her husband, Chris on physical activity. If you have problems with the brain, “So I was going to walk gingerly ask for a neurologist. If you live in a big O’Kieffe, who runs a successful Kona Ice franchise in their Chesapeake Bay and turn my head slowly and do what I FLW\ ¿QG DQ DFDGHPLF PHGLFDO FHQWHU town. After 16 years teaching kids with needed to do to see Kasey grow up, and that has a specialization in stroke. disabilities, Tara — mother to a pretty that was my battle,” she said. “I was liv- “I’m afraid to go to the emergency 9-year-old, Kasey — now helps Chris ing like I was made of glass.” room,” he added. “I think it’s dangerous.” I urged her to get with the business. Caplan dryly admitted that it’s a another opinion, and contradiction: You have to worry about Last spring, she also Some she booked an ap- getting to the ER fast and then wor- decided to start playing pointment with a na- ry about the quality of treatment once tennis again. She was younger tional stroke expert, you’re there. nervous that, because Dr. Louis Caplan, a of her tennis family, people have He assured Tara that her stroke was Harvard professor of not caused by nerves or a weakness in her friends would have neurology who works her arteries and said that there was only high expectations. strokes at Beth Israel Deacon- a 1 percent chance of recurrence for this Her shoulders from ess Medical Center. tensed up through her NLQGRIVWURNHDIWHUWKH¿UVWPRQWK+H When I met Tara at told her he was going to play tennis and HQWLUH ¿UVW PDWFK EXW WKHDLUSRUWWRÀ\XSWR advised her to do the same. she was elated when recreational Boston, I walked past she won. By the time “Unfortunately, doctors and patients drugs. her. In four months, put too many restrictions on them- she drove home and she had lost 15 pounds, selves,” he said later. “They’re told, got in the shower, how- ever, she had a throbbing pain in the and her spark was gone. ‘Don’t lift your baby,’ ‘Don’t have in- $W&DSODQLVJUXIÀ\DQJHOLFOLNH tercourse.’ Because movement brought back of her head above her neck. She took some Advil and got into a Frank Capra character. He showed this on, they think they cannot have any bed. She looked at her phone, but the Tara picture cards to test her memory movement. That overprotectiveness letters were moving. She tried to watch and speech, checked her visual abilities can be worse than the dissection itself.” TV with Chris, but it was “like looking and looked at her brain and vascular im- When Tara got home, she ran a mile through a really thin layer of water, rip- ages. They had been misinterpreted by and a half, crying all the way. the Maryland doctors, who thought that pling and sparkling.” “It was like I realized I don’t have to She assumed that she was having Tara’s vertebral artery had closed when throw me away and try to develop this KHU¿UVWPLJUDLQHDOHWGRZQDIWHUEHLQJ it had just narrowed, meaning it could new person,” she said. open and heal. so amped up. 2Q$SULOWKH¿UVWDQQLYHUVDU\RI Some younger people have strokes her stroke, she ventured back onto the The headache was still there in the morning, and the morning after that. from recreational drugs. But others — court for a cardio tennis class. She was Her husband teased her about being “a even children and teenagers — have WHUUL¿HG DQG KHU IULHQGV ZHUH MLWWHU\ ELJEDE\´DQGKHOGXSKLV¿QJHUVWRWKH strokes after dissections, a tear in the picking up balls for her. wall of an artery that unleashes a clot. right of her face to test her vision. “I was nervous for a few hours af- “It can happen with a sudden ev- terwards,” she said. “I would look in “I can’t see your hand at all,” she eryday movement that stretches the the mirror and smile and make sure I told him. “We need to go to the emergency artery,” said Caplan, who sees dissec- wasn’t drooling.” tions on a regular basis. “The arteries room,” Chris said. As we drove in her neighborhood She had some tests. “The doctor came are more elastic with younger people.” one recent afternoon, she marveled at He has treated a doctor who lurched how wonderful it was to see the spring. in and said, ‘Well, it turns out you had a stroke,’” she recalled. “I don’t know if the when he thought his kid was falling “I missed the last one,” she said. By MAUREEN DOWD New York Times News Service E