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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 19, 2015)
OPINION 6A THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2015 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 What are they waiting for? Another major Oregon school massacre? W hen Kip Kinkel killed his parents, two children and wounded 25 at Thurston High School in 1998, Oregon was a novice at gun massacres. Then we had the Clackamas Town Center 2012 shootings (two dead, one wounded). And now the Umpqua Community College shootings. Former Gov. John Kitzhaber set the model for how Oregon elected of¿cials respond to such incidents. Following the Clackamas Town Center shoot- ings, Kitzhaber was scheduled to deliver a State of the State address. In that talk, Kitzhaber expressed sorrow but offered no plan of action. That was more than remarkable, because Kitzhaber — as he so often re- minded us — was an emergency room physician. Continuing in the trend of putting off substantive response, legislative leaders have struck a “What, me worry?” pose. Here is how Hillary Borrud reported the story in last Friday’s Oregon Capital Insider. “A couple of rep- resentatives, both former police of¿cers, wanted to form a legis- lative committee to work on pos- sible legislation aimed at prevent- ing similar shootings in the future, but so far there does not appear to be enough interest in the idea. “‘State Rep. Andy Olson, R-Albany, reached out to our of¿ce with that idea,’ /indsey O’Brien, communications di- rector for House Speaker Tina Kotek, D-Portland, wrote in an email Oct. 8. ‘At this point, the speaker is focused on support- ing the immediate needs of the victims and their families, the emergency responders, and the greater Roseburg community.’ Olson worked 29 years for the Oregon State Police. “Rep. Jeff Barker, D-Aloha, also worked for the Oregon State Police and for the Portland Police Bureau. Barker sent his request to form a legislative committee to House 0aMority /eader Jennifer Williamson, D-Portland. “‘I spoke with her and she wants to have some research (university level) done so we have something to work with before we just try to ‘do some- thing,’” Barker wrote in an email this week. Obviously this will be a tough issue or we would have solved it already.’” Malcolm Gladwell in the cur- rent issue of The New Yorker, notes that, “Since Sandy Hook, there have been more than 140 school shootings in the United States.” Those include two in Oregon. What are Speaker Kotek and Rep. Williamson waiting for? The next big Oregon massacre? ‘Anything goes’ is not an acceptable standard Border Patrol should have high standards F ewer than 4 in 10 U.S. citi- zens ever have direct contact with U.S. Customs and Border Protection. An even smaller proportion come into contact with border enforcement agents along the nation’s land bound- ary with Mexico, where the eco- nomic composition of travelers tends to skew downward. For most of us, the Border Patrol is a vague concept, generally charged with keeping undocu- mented workers from crossing into the U.S. at will, while also working under the umbrel- la of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security to protect citizens from drug smugglers and terrorists. With tacit permission from Congress, the Border Patrol has for decades been granted broad latitude to carry out its mission with a mini- mum of oversight — almost amount- ing to a kind of “Don’t ask, don’t tell” approach. Internal documents disclosed this year as a result of tenacious litiga- tion by the American Civil /iberties Union suggest a need for federal lawmakers and the Department of Homeland Security to take a more proactive role in making sure the Border Patrol adheres to high stan- dards and does not permit agent misbehavior at odds with American laws and values. According to a New York Times summary (tinyurl.com/ NYTBorderPatrol), border check- point agents have been repeatedly accused by drivers of “improper gunplay, racial pro¿ling, excessive roughness and verbal abuse.” For example, “/ast year, in south- eastern Arizona, a military veteran said his children shuddered with fear in the back seat as agents repeatedly asked him if the children were really his. Since Jan. 1, 2010, 33 people have died in encounters with bor- der and customs agents, according to the Times. Only one agent faces criminal charges. While pursuing accountability, family members ¿nd it extremely dif¿cult to learn the names of agents involved in deaths. There have been some improve- ments, along with a dawning aware- ness by department administrators and Congress that “anything goes” is not an acceptable way of greet- ing citizens and others arriving in the U.S. This Tuesday, Customs and Border Protection reported a 26 per- cent decline in use-of-force incidents — 68 in the 2015 ¿scal year that ended Sept. 30, down from 1,037 in the 2014 ¿scal year. Though there will be those who approve of or don’t care about ob- noxious of¿cial behavior along our borders, this is a case when too much bad-acting threatens to undercut public con¿dence in an agency that is vitally important to national secu- rity. Game over for Clinton primary rivals cornered the high-mindedness market. ¿rst). His “damn emails” thunderbolt Sanders was right to call this move is the ¿rst such immortal line to be dumb politics. His declaration simply delivered by one candidate that seals and de¿nitively conceded the race to victory for another. The other three candidates hardly repeat: Unless she’s indicted, Clinton. /eo Durocher said nice guys registered. /incoln Chafee, currently ¿nish last. Sanders will ¿nish second, Hillary Clinton will win the polling at 0.3 points (minus-10 Celsius), which in this case is the same thing. Democratic nomination. I Clinton won the debate because it played Ross Perot’s 1992 running mate, wrote that six weeks ago, didn’t change the dynamic. Adm. James Stockdale, who opened his It froze the race and she’s vice presidential debate with: “Who am amid fevered dreams of far in the lead. It doesn’t I? Why am I here?” a Clinton collapse and a matter that her lead has Democratic National Committee Joe Biden rescue. That shrunk from 50 points to Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz 20. Twenty points is a land- came out a winner. She insisted, de- those were a mirage is slide. spite the squawking of Martin O’Mal- all the more obvious She remains a lousy can- ley and others, on no more than six after Tuesday’s debate. didate but she is an excel- debates. Who needs the other ¿ve? The reason, then as now, lent debater — smart, quick, Tuesday night settled the issue. When strategic and extremely there’s a knockout in the ¿rst round, is simple: Clinton has no practiced. Eight years ago you stop the ¿ght. Charles competition. she debated Barack Obama This is not to say that by objective Krauthammer She’s up against three 25 times. Tuesday night, standards — i.e., against minimally ciphers and one endearing, she successfully bobbed and weaved competent competition — Clinton did gesticulating, slightly unmoored old and pivoted. She was at her most im- so brilliantly. After all, to prepare the man. If Joe Biden was ever thinking pressive, however, when she whacked ground and pre-empt any attack from of getting into the race, he’d be crazy Sanders upside the head — twice — the left, she preceded the debate with right out of the box. He didn’t know a supremely cynical abandonment of to do so now. It’s over. what hit him. both the Keystone At the very ;/ pipeline and Indeed, even before the debate, She’s up the Trans-Paci¿c Clinton’s numbers had stabilized. It start, she attacked Partnership, which began with Kevin McCarthy’s gaffe from the left on against three as secretary of state of the decade. That gave her a perpet- gun control, from she’d pronounced ual get-out-of-jail-free card that she the right on cap- ciphers and adroitly deploys whenever the email italism. She sim- “the gold standard” issue arises. Her technique is Àawless: ply said the magic one endearing, of trade deals. a few meaningless phrases about hav- words — small did smooth gesticulating, her It debate ing made a mistake, taking responsi- business, too? — night. bility and being transparent, blah blah, and he beat an un- But by so transpar- slightly followed by (I paraphrase) “but look at steady retreat. In ently compounding the larger picture, even Kevin McCar- general, Sanders unmoored old her inauthenticity thy admits it’s a partisan witch hunt.” was wild and wavy problem, the Àip- man. and loud and not QED. Àops will cost her At the debate, Bernie Sanders very nimble. Af- in the general elec- sealed the deal with a thunderous “the ter all, how much practice do you get tion. American people are sick and tired of when for 35 years you’ve been cam- But that’s for later. Right now, hearing about your damn emails.” That paigning as a social democrat in Ver- game over. Amid the playacting be- rendered the issue of¿cially off-limits mont, America’s Denmark? tween today and Clinton’s coronation Sanders is good on an empty podi- next summer, we can joyfully savor to all Democrats. File closed. End of story. Of course, it will be featured in um taking on invisible billionaires. Put the most delightful moment of the de- the general election, but we’re talking him up against a Clinton and he’s lost. bate, when we were reminded by An- He did make history of a sort, how- derson Cooper that Sanders had hon- here about her getting the nomination. In gratuitously granting her abso- ever. Every debate has its moment — eymooned in the Soviet Union. lution, Sanders garnered points for the sound bite that lives forever (or un- Springtime for Brezhnev in Yaro- high-mindedness. But he’d already til the next debate, whichever comes slavl. Attention: Mel Brooks. By CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER Washington Post Writer’s Group I Seaside the winner in Hood to Coast accord T he Aug. 29 weather was frightful, with a windstorm that shut down the coast, but the runners persevered. I can only imagine what it was like for them trudging at midnight and later through mud, lightning and high winds, on mountain paths and farmers’ ¿elds, and up and over that monumental engineer- ing feat, the Roosevelt Drive overpass. In Seaside, the beach was cor- doned off because of the gusts and runners were funneled up Broadway. By late Saturday morn- ing, the streets were crowded with race teams taking group sel¿es and comparing race times. Teams from 50 states and 39 countries partic- ipated in the annual 197-mile re- lay from Mount Hood to Seaside, bonding in what everyone we spoke with described as an unforgettable life experience. They were soaked through but exhilarated. They shared high-¿ves and hugged it out. But what I saw as a journalist that day was not what many businesses in Seaside experienced. Only a few weeks later, 74 mer- chants delivered a petition asking for a date change for the event. “Al- though the Seaside Chamber of Com- merce and many of the area’s lodging facilities bene¿t ¿nancially, many of SOUTHERN EXPOSURE B Y R.J. M ARX us year-round business owners feel that the overall impact of hosting this massive event during the busy sum- mer tourist season is negative,” busi- nesses wrote. That number grew to 87 by the start of October. Complaints Àowed about race organizers closing down streets, vendors setting up in front of stores, and a dearth of business from runners who had no interest in “shop- ping Seaside.” These were people who were us- ing Seaside as “a day-and-a-half des- tination and a party time.” On Facebook, Seaside residents took to the message boards and lay- ered criticism on the race: “Please send them packing. That’s what the citizens of Seaside want.” The city’s love-hate relationship with Hood to Coast seems not so much like anything as a marriage, in this case, a 25-year relationship. For a sense of the historic dynamic, I went back to the archives. “Most of these runners are adven- turists,” wrote the Seaside Signal’s sports editor in 1991. “Not even the winners reap monetary rewards. These die-hards run this purely for fun. For the camaraderie along the route. For the beautiful and inviting Oregon scenery. Rest up and we’ll look for you next year.” Five years later, crowd control, traf¿c and safety concerns led to a proposed race ban in 1996. It was kisses again in 2000. “Wel- come Hood to Coast!” read a banner headline. “Hood to Coast gets ultimatum,” I read in 2005. In 2007, the newspaper ran a local and toll-free complaint line. “Area braces for Hood to Coast,” warned the 2010 headline. Variations on this theme have continued on and off for the past ¿ve years, with more breakup rumors than Kanye and Kim. This year, Seaside and Hood to Coast came to the brink of ending it all. But like a broken marriage, there would have been fallout, in this case, blows to our health system, city parks and potentially the tourism dollars this city depends on. And there is the race’s internation- al cachet: Hood to Coast is perhaps the only time a visitor from Bonn, Paris, Ankara or Sydney may ever hear of Seaside. R.J. Marx is the South County re- porter for The Daily Astorian and the editor of the Seaside Signal and Can- non Beach Gazette.
