Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 11, 2016)
OPINION 4A THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, JANUARY 11, 2016 Defy US, pay no price Founded in 1873 By CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER Washington Post Writers Group 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 President Obama does heavy lifting He moves the center on gun violence resident Barack Obama has committed an unspeakable political sin. He has dared to speak truth about America’s epidemic of gun deaths. What the president has said and done is what any responsible parent would do. There are plenty of such politicians who are smart enough to get that, but they are cowered by the 1ational 5iÀ e Association. P There is a ridiculous fear, fed by the gun lobby, that any strengthening of background checks or sales of assault weap- ons is a precursor to taking guns away from responsible gun owners. The stark reality of America’s tide of gun violence is easily understood from the vantage point of our northern neighbor, Canada, or our industrialized ally, Japan. To people living in those countries, America ap- pears barbaric in its willingness to tolerate massacre after mas- sacre, knowing that children are prey in many of them. The president stated the case succinctly in a column published by The New York Times last Friday. “Gun deaths and injuries constitute one of the greatest threats to public health and to the safety of the American people,” wrote the president. “Every year, more than 30,000 Americans have their lives cut short by guns. Suicides. Domestic violence. Gang shootouts. Accidents. Hundreds of thousands of Americans have lost brothers and sisters, or buried their own children. We’re the only ad- vanced nation on earth that sees this kind of mass violence with this frequency.” One could say Mr. Obama has merely stated the obvious. But in the upside down world the NRA creates, anyone who says we don’t need to live with all this gun violence is deemed a dangerous person. Consequential presidents do heavy lifting. That is what this president’s actions and words were. A decade from now, Americans will recognize this moment when the center of gravity on gun violence shifted. Crab is back; cash begins to À ow Partnerships between crabbers, the &RDVW*XDUGDQG¿VKHU\DJHQFLHVDUHD SOHDVDQWFRQWUDVWWRHQPLW\HOVHZKHUH 35-day delay in the start of crab season was a loud reminder of the continuing importance of this ¿ shery for our region’s economy and the well-being of local families. Two decades ago, a lengthy crab closure was highly trau- matic, putting many crab-indus- try families on the charity soup line. Impacts this time were less visible, though still painful. Local crabbers were unable to capitalize on Christmas de- mand. Paychecks for boat own- ers and crews similarly were long delayed, suppressing en- thusiasm for December spend- ing. In some cases, this lack of cash continues, as processors don’t immediately pay for de- liveries — in effect borrowing from already cash-strapped ¿ sh- ermen. It is a cause for real celebra- tion to see crab boats coming and going in the river. Our story this week with accompanying amazing photographs by Joshua Bessex was a tribute to the U.S. Coast Guard’s starring role in keeping the À eet safe. A drop in marine toxin lev- els that permitted crab season to proceed also provided a green light for the start of razor clam- A ming this week on the Long Beach (Washington ) Peninsula. A three-month delay subtracted as much as $3 million in con- sumer spending from Paci¿ c County retailers, restaurants, gasoline stations and others. In turn, this meant business own- ers and employees didn’t have as much money to shop with at Christmastime at regional retail magnets like Warrenton, Astoria and Seaside. Understanding, tracking and potentially mitigating the down- sides of algal blooms will re- quire a greater state investment in marine biology. Adaptive management that allows crab- bers, clam diggers and other resource users to maximize har- vests at times when toxins are low will be key to our economic well-being this century. Coastal partnerships and col- laborations between crabbers, the Coast Guard, ¿ shery agen- cies and others are a pleasant contrast to the enmity in the news in southeast Oregon. All is not always perfect in citi- zen-government relations here, but by working together we’ll have a better chance of deal- ing with a changing environ- ment and other 21st century challenges. The editorials on this page are written by Steve Forrester, editor of 7KH'DLO\ Astorian (sforrester@dailyastorian.com) and Matt Winters, editor of The Chi- nook (Wash.) Observer (mwinters@chinookobserver.com). ASHINGTON — If you’re going to engage in a foreign policy capitulation, might as well do it when everyone is getting tanked and otherwise occupied. Say, New Year’s Eve. W Here’s the story. In October, Iran test-¿ res a nuclear-capable ballistic missile in brazen violation of Security Council resolutions prohibiting such launches. President Barack Obama does nothing. One month later, Iran does it again. The administration makes a few gestures at the U.N. Then nothing. Then ¿ nally, on Dec. 30, the White House announces a few sanc- tions. They are weak, aimed mostly at in- dividuals and designed essentially for show. Amazingly, even that proves too much. By 10 p.m. that night, the ad- ministration caves. The White House sends out an email saying that sanc- tions are off — and the Iranian presi- dent orders the military to expedite the missile program. Is there any red line left? First, the Syrian chemical weapons. Then the administration insistence that there would be no nuclear deal unless Iran accounted for its past nuclear activ- ities. (It didn’t.) And unless Iran per- mitted inspection of its Parchin nuclear testing facility. (It was allowed self-in- spection and declared itself clean.) And now, illegal ballistic missiles. The premise of the nuclear deal was that it would constrain Iranian actions. It’s had precisely the opposite effect. It has deterred us from offering even the mildest pushback to any Ira- nian violations lest Iran walk away and leave Obama legacy-less. Just two weeks ago, Iran’s Revo- lutionary Guards conducted live-¿ re exercises near the Strait of Hormuz. It gave nearby U.S. vessels exactly 23 seconds of warning. One rocket was launched 1,500 yards from the USS Harry S. Truman. Nimr, that has brought the Obama’s response? region to a boil. Iranians None. torched the Saudi Embassy. The Gulf Arabs — rich, The Saudis led other Sunni weak and, since FDR, de- states in breaking relations pendent on America for with Tehran. security — are bewildered. The Saudis feel sur- They’re still reeling from rounded, and it’s not para- the nuclear deal, which noia. To their north, Iran Obama declared would be dominates a Shiite crescent unaffected by Iranian mis- stretching from Iraq, Syria behavior elsewhere. The Charles and Lebanon to the Mediter- result was to assure Tehran Krauthammer ranean. To the Saudi south, that it would pay no price Iran has been arming Ye- for its aggression in Syria and Yemen, subversion in Saudi Ara- men’s Houthi rebels since at least 2009. The danger is rising. For years, Iran bia and Bahrain, and support for ter- has been supporting anti-regime agi- rorism. tation among Saudi Arabia’s minority Shiites. The Persian Gulf is Iran’s ul- Obama timate prize. The fall of the House of Saud would make Iran the undisputed seems not to regional hegemon and an emerging global power. understand For the United States, that would be the greatest geopolitical setback since that China fell to communism in 1949. Yet disconnecting Obama seems oblivious. Worse, he appears inert in the face of the three the nuclear great challenges to the post-Cold War American order. Iran is only the most issue gave glaring. China is challenging the sta- tus quo in the South China Sea, just the mullahs last week landing its ¿ rst aircraft on license to an arti¿ cial island hundreds of miles beyond the Chinese coast. We deny hunt in the China’s claim and declare these to be international waters, yet last month we region. meekly apologized when a B-52 over- À ew one of the islands. We said it was Obama seems not to understand inadvertent. The world sees and takes note. As that disconnecting the nuclear issue gave the mullahs license to hunt in it does our response to the other great the region. For the Saudis, however, U.S. adversary — Russia. What’s hap- it’s not just blundering but betrayal. pened to Obama’s vaunted “isolation” From the very beginning, they’ve seen of Russia for its annexation of Crimea Obama tilting toward Tehran as he and assault on the post-Cold War Eu- fancies himself Nixon in China, turn- ropean settlement? Gone. Evaporat- ing Iran into a strategic partner in man- ed. John Kerry plays lapdog to Sergei Lavrov. Obama meets openly with aging the Middle East. This is even scarier because it Vladimir Putin in Turkey, then in Par- is delusional. If anything, Obama’s is. And is now practically begging him openhanded appeasement has encour- to join our side in Syria. There is no price for defying Pax aged Iran’s regional adventurism and Americana — not even trivial sanc- intense anti-Americanism. The Saudis, sensing abandonment, tions on Iranian missile-enablers. Our are near panic. Hence the reckless enemies know it. Our allies see it — execution of the ¿ rebrand Shiite in- and sense they’re on their own, and surrectionist, Sheikh Nimr Baqr al- may not survive. The self-reliant generation By DAVID BROOKS New York Times News Service ast month Fox News re- leased a poll showing Hillary Clinton leading Bernie Sanders in Iowa by 14 points. But the amazing part of the poll was the generation gap. Among likely caucusgoers under 45, Sanders was crushing Clinton 56 to 34 percent. Among the older voters, Clinton was leading 59 to 24. L When you look at numbers like that you get the impression that this millen- nial generation, having endured the ¿ nancial crash and stagnant wages, is ready to lead a big leftward push. Indeed, a Harvard Institute of Pol- itics poll of Americans 18 to 29 found that 56 percent want a Democrat to win the White House while only 36 percent favor a Republican. The left- ward shift is striking even within the GOP. According to the Pew Research Center, young Republicans are much more moderate than older Republi- cans. Among millennials who lean Republican, only 31 percent have con- sistently conservative views. About 51 percent have a mixture of liberal and conservative views. But philosophically millennials are harder to pin down. According to the Harvard Public Opinion Project, 37 percent of 18- to 29-year-olds identi- fy as liberal and 35 percent identify as conservative. If you look at how millennials ac- tually live, you certainly don’t see a progressive counterculture. In fact, you see what you’d expect from a gen- eration that lived through a ¿ nancial crisis, family instability and political dysfunction. You see an abstract cele- bration of creative transformation but a concrete hunger for order, security and stability. According to data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, millennials change jobs less frequently than people in oth- er generations. And a study of 25,000 plan to have kids. They are millennials in 22 countries also having less sex. A study by Jennifer J. Deal and Alec in the Archives of Sexual Levenson found that at least Behavior projected that mil- 40 percent expect to stay lennials would have eight with their current employer sexual partners by middle for at least nine years. For- age while boomers had 10 ty-four percent said they or 11. According to a survey would be happy to spend from the online dating ser- the rest of their career at vice Match, 49 percent of their current organization. people in their 20s have not Millennials travel and David had sex in the past year. move less than earlier gen- Brooks The general impres- erations. They are less like- ly to have cars, and their relative lack sion one gets is of a generation that is of driving time is not compensated for stressed, energetic, creative, skeptical by the use of other modes of transpor- and in the middle of rede¿ ning, and thinning out, the nature of af¿ liation. tation. Another glaring feature of millen- Its members have been thrust into a nial culture is they have been forced to harsher world where it is necessary to be self-reliant and to take a loosely net- be guarded, and sensitive to risk. They worked individualism as the normal want systemic change but there is no order of the universe. Millennials have compelling form of collective action extremely low social trust. According available. Their only alternative, which to Pew Research, just 19 percent say is their genius, is to try to ¿ x their lives most people can be trusted, compared themselves, through technology and new forms of social interaction, rather with 40 percent of boomers. than mass movements. Their attitudes toward Social Secu- rity perfectly reÀ ect this stance. Most If you look millennials expect to see no Social Security bene¿ ts by the time they re- at how tire. But they oppose reforms to take millennials money away from older workers to distribute it downward. They just ¿ g- actually live, ure they’ll take care of retirement indi- vidually, often using algorithm-based you certainly investment vehicles like Wealthfront. Politically, this means that millen- don’t see a nials may lean Democratic, but unless progressive Barack Obama (or Bernie Sanders) is the ticket, they don’t strongly at- counterculture. on tach to the party and it is not clear that they will vote. They didn’t in the 2014 This leads to detachment from midterm elections. It could be they large entities. Just 32 percent of mil- are more interested in improving their lennials say America is the greatest lives by having richer experiences, and country on Earth, compared with 50 not through the sort of income trans- percent of boomers. Millennials are fers that come out of Washington. My own guess is that millennials very suspicious of organized religion. Thirty-¿ ve percent say they are unaf- will be a muted political force, at least ¿ liated with any religious group, com- in 2016. But there will be some giant pared with 23 percent of Generation X cultural explosion down the road. You just can’t be as detached from solid (born between 1965 and 1980). Just 26 percent of millennials are supporting structures as millennials married, compared with 48 percent of now are and lead a happy middle-aged boomers at that age. Only 42 percent life. Something is going to change. Where to write • U.S. Rep. Suzanne Bonamici (D): 2338 Rayburn HOB, Washington, D.C., 20515. Phone: 202- 225-0855. Fax 202-225-9497. District of¿ ce: 12725 SW Millikan Way, Suite 220, Beaverton, OR 97005. Phone: 503- 469-6010. Fax 503-326-5066. Web: bonamici.house. gov/ • U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley (D): 313 Hart Senate Of¿ ce Building, Wash- ington, D.C. 20510. Phone: 202-224- 3753. Web: www.merkley.senate.gov • U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden (D): 221 Dirksen Senate Of¿ ce Building, Washington, D.C., 20510. Phone: 202- 224-5244. Web: www.wyden.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@state.or.us • State Rep. Deborah Boone (D): 900 Court St. N.E., H-481, Salem, OR 97301. Phone: 503-986-1432. Email: rep.deborah boone@state.or.us District of¿ ce: P.O. Box 928, Can- non Beach, OR 97110. Phone: 503- 986-1432. Web: www.leg.state.or.us/ boone/
