OPINION
4A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 1, 2016
Founded in 1873
DAVID F. PERO, Publisher & Editor
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
OUR VIEW
As political season
ramps up, so
should questions
T
his weekend will mark another Labor Day holiday that
not only celebrates the workforce but is also symbolic
for the seasonal changes it’s come to represent. The
lazy days of summer are quickly turning into the bustling
days of fall and folks are moving from backyard barbecues to
the busy routines of back to school.
But this year especially, it also marks the true ramp up
of election season. Look for more chutzpah-illed speeches,
more candidate postcards and voter pamphlets in your mail-
box, and lots of programming on your TV channels sponsored
by sometimes dubious political advertising. Amid that noise,
we all should be unabashed about posing the question of
“what have you done for me lately” to those politicians who
are now asking for our votes.
While the slates of candidates for the national and state-
wide ballot have long been in place, the iling deadline for
city races here in Clatsop County occurred earlier this week
and there are a number of important contested races that need
close inspection.
One issue that needs to be addressed and is central at all
three election levels — federal, state and local — is the econ-
omy with its continuing but doggedly slow recovery from the
Great Recession and the disruptive changes it brought across
the country and here at home.
Nationally, as we head into Labor Day, the good news is
a number of economic indicators are trending upward while
unemployment is trending downward. The U.S. Bureau of
Labor Statistics recently reported the jobless rate was down
to 4.9 percent in July, a far cry from the 10-plus percents of
the recession. Despite these positive trends, many simply
say it just doesn’t seem to feel as good as the politicians and
bureaucrats say it is.
Why?
Across the country and here at home, many workers were
negatively affected by the recession and are now unhappily
underemployed. Others are struggling in jobs with wages
far less than they made previously. Still others caught in the
recession’s wrath were forced from full time to part-time
work. Some stopped looking for work altogether, which low-
ers the unemployment rate statistically but does nothing to
help from a human standpoint. Nationally, reports show, the
wage gap is continuing to widen.
Additionally, health care and retirement beneits that once
came with many middle class jobs are no longer a guarantee,
and in many cases the beneits are now far less than they once
were. That puts even more pressure on families and retirees
trying to make ends meet. For those who can’t afford health
insurance, the Affordable Care Act that was designed to pro-
vide that care isn’t meeting expectations and faces future
challenges as insurers cut back on coverage options and raise
rates.
And while the housing sector is recovering from the dark
days of the crisis that led to the recession, affordability is
now much more of an issue.
Statewide, indicators show the economy is also back on
the upswing, but additional economic development, pub-
lic employee pension funding, transportation improvements,
health care, and educational funding are constant issues amid
the background of a limited tax base. Oregon faces a loom-
ing $1.4 billion deicit and a vociferous controversy covers
proposed statewide funding solutions like a heavy fog that
shrouds the coast.
Here in Clatsop County the issues are far more localized,
but also economic related. Housing availability and afford-
ability, aging infrastructure, improvements for public facili-
ties and more funding for schools all need to be addressed.
Responsibilities
So whose job is it to address the issues? It’s ultimately all
of ours.
The politicians who present proposals, solutions and seek
to enact policies depend on our votes to put them in ofice.
It’s their responsibility to be transparent, to tout their stances
on the issues, to tell us all how and where they will ind cre-
ative and fair solutions, and explain how they will use scarce
tax dollars in the best and most eficient ways.
It’s our job collectively to register to vote, to analyze the
candidates, to ask demanding questions that keep the hope-
fuls on the issues, and to thoroughly investigate their claims
before we ill out our ballots.
Now that the season is changing and the politicians want to
harvest our votes, it’s up to us all to separate the wheat from
the chaff.
Donald Trump’s
tumescent twin
By FRANK BRUNI
New York Times News Service
I
t’s rich, as the English would
say, that Donald Trump is try-
ing to proit from Anthony
Weiner’s latest mortiication,
because Trump is to his persever-
ing supporters what Weiner was to
his long-suffering wife: a scoun-
drel undeserving of so many sec-
ond chances; a head case inca-
pable of the
redemption that’s
supposedly just
a few extra mea-
sures of discipline
away; someone
selling himself as
a servant of the public although
he’s really a slave to his own rag-
ing ego and unquenchable needs.
When Trump looks in the mir-
ror, there’s a whole lot of Weiner
staring back at him.
The details are tawdrier in
Weiner’s case, and the stakes far
smaller. But both men are crea-
tures of potent want and pure com-
pulsion who lucked into forgiv-
ing audiences. Weiner’s inally
stopped forgiving: Huma Abedin
announced that she was formally
separating from him after six years
of marriage.
Trump still has legions by his
side. But for how long?
On the home page of The
Times’ website on Monday, coin-
cident with the news story about
Weiner’s latest sexting and Abe-
din’s break with him, was a chart
documenting when and why 110
GOP leaders gave up on Trump.
The left side of the chart pre-
sented a timeline of his apostasies
and indecencies, and it alone was
transixing: a reminder that any
other candidate at any other time
would have been undone by just
one or two of these outrages; an
illustration of the way they keep
coming, no matter how ardently
his inner circle pleads with him
for calm, no matter how furiously
the outside world reacts. He can’t
help himself.
The right side of the chart pre-
sented another timeline, this one
showing the points at which each
of the 110 Republicans bolted. The
surprise was how delayed their
departures were. Hope is a stub-
born thing.
And at some point, it’s too rosy
a word for what’s really going on,
which is denial, delusion.
There’s also brutal calculation:
Does Trump’s function as a bar-
rier against a Democratic presi-
dent — against Hillary Clinton,
in particular — outweigh his cru-
elty, his incivility, his bigotry,
his utter fraudulence? Too many
Republicans have convinced them-
selves of that, in part by mini-
mizing those vices, seeing them
as ephemeral, or simply averting
their gazes.
Some of these Republicans are
When Trump
looks in the
mirror, there’s
a whole lot of
Weiner staring
back at him.
living in the same fairy tale that
some spouses are. They’re telling
themselves the same lie: that idel-
ity matters more than dignity and
common sense. But if a crucial
part of wisdom is knowing when
to invest, an equally crucial part is
knowing when to let go.
The Weiner-Abedin marriage
had apparently devolved, even
before the latest revelation of fresh
sexting, into a blunt parenting
arrangement, with Weiner’s care
of their 4-year-old son making her
heavy travel schedule with Clinton
possible.
That’s an implication from
recent comments that she made
to Vogue magazine. It’s the clear
takeaway from a Monday-night
story in The New York Post, which
quotes him telling his sexting part-
ner that he doubted he’d be relo-
cating with his wife to Washington
from New York if Clinton were
elected president and Abedin made
the move.
And it undercuts Trump’s com-
plaint that national security might
have been endangered by the
“close proximity to highly clas-
siied information” that a “very
sick guy” like Weiner had through
conversations with Abedin. There
probably wasn’t much pillow talk
there.
If Trump wants to make Abe-
din an issue, he’s on fairer, stur-
dier ground with the extra pay
from outside sources that Clin-
ton arranged for her when they
worked together at the State
Department.
He’s on dangerous turf when
he goes after Weiner as a “sicko”
and a “pervert.” He’s no par-
agon of rectitude, no pillar of
restraint.
This is someone who once
joked to Howard Stern — on the
air — that his own Vietnam was
the danger he courted as a libid-
inous man in an era of sexually
transmitted diseases. This is some-
one who publicly drooled over his
daughter Ivanka, saying that he
might date her if he hadn’t sired
her.
Weiner sent strangers pic-
tures of his bulge. Trump assured
the viewers of a nationally tele-
vised debate that he was amply
endowed.
These impulses — these boasts
— aren’t unrelated.
A scene in the documentary
“Weiner,” about his ill-fated run
for New York City mayor, depicts
him at a computer, raptly watch-
ing and reliving one of his appear-
ances on MSNBC. Trump is
famous for marinating in all of the
television time devoted to him. He
tallies it. He crows about it. He’s
Weiner with extra traction, Weiner
with added gilt.
It forces an important ques-
tion: Have we constructed a pol-
itics with such bright, invasive
lights that those who ind it more
attractive than repulsive include
an unhealthy number of insecure
exhibitionists out for afirmation
above all else?
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
Racial facts
A
recent article about diversity
in the Lower Columbia region
(“‘White out’: Talking about race
is a challenge,” The Daily Astorian,
Aug. 22) included a gem by Asto-
ria City Councilor Drew Herzig,
who recently prepared a brochure on
what to do when stopped by police:
“There’s no avoiding it — If you’re
a person of color and you get pulled
over, you could die.”
While at irst the comment seems
to exhibit concern for the welfare
of young, black men, even a casual
study unleashes the pungent aroma
of political race-baiting and shame-
less pandering.
Some excellent research has
begun to accumulate on police use of
force. If Herzig would take a momen-
tary pause in the breathless hyper-
bole, he might be interested to look
at the number of unarmed black cit-
izens killed during interactions with
police, while not involved in crimi-
nal activity at the time of encounter.
When you sort by unarmed suspects
and race, and read the circumstances
of each encounter, you’ll ind it is a
very, very, very small number indeed
(http://bit.ly/1SQhWZa)
The indisputable evidence,
regardless of race, is that the con-
duct of suspects when stopped by
police is the nearly singular determi-
nant of the end of the encounter. In
fact, according to FBI crime data, the
chance of a black male in the U.S.
being killed by police during a use of
force is roughly 0.00078 percent of
one percent. About 1/20 the chance
of being hit by lightning.
Will Councilor Herzig be printing
a brochure to address the “Systemic
Lighting Strike Problems” in our
area? Or will he just be satisied in
sullying the name of the many good
oficers and departments that serve
our North Coast communities?
Herzig should apologize, or
resign.
D. MILLER
Manzanita, Washington
Herzig one of the best
storia City Councilor Drew
Herzig is leaving us. He and
his life partner, Charlie Schwei-
gert, will be missed. As a council-
man, Drew has been one of the best.
At council meetings, he actually lis-
tened and considered what speakers
had to say. He absolutely was not a
member of the “old boys’ school of
thinking.”
Drew is the only council mem-
ber I know, past or present, to have
monthly public meetings, where he
kept us abreast of city plans and
welcomed our opinions. It is inter-
esting to note that about half of
those in attendance were from other
wards. Their council people appar-
ently don’t need input from the
public.
Drew and Charlie are moving to
Massachusetts to begin a new chap-
ter in their lives. My best wishes go
with them.
MARGE PECK
Astoria
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