OPINION
6A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, AUGUST 21, 2017
Founded in 1873
DAVID F. PERO, Publisher & Editor
JIM VAN NOSTRAND, Managing Editor
JEREMY FELDMAN, Circulation Manager
DEBRA BLOOM, Business Manager
JOHN D. BRUIJN, Production Manager
CARL EARL, Systems Manager
OUR VIEW
Seniors should
snap up passes
to national parks
S
eniors 62 and older have less than a week left to take
advantage of a great deal — a lifetime pass to national
parks and recreation for only $10. On Aug. 28, the price
jumps to $80, a seven-fold increase.
The price hike was approved during the final year of President
Barack Obama’s term, and the National Park Service announced
last month that it would become effective this month. The $10
pass, known as the America the Beautiful National Parks and
Federal Recreational Lands Senior Pass, has been available
since 1994. It was free before that. The National Park Service
says money generated from the increase will be used for badly
needed deferred maintenance and to enhance programs and
services.
While the increase is hefty, especially for those on fixed
incomes, it’s still a great deal for anyone who misses out on the
$10 deal or doesn’t yet qualify for a pass. Seniors can also opt to
purchase an annual pass rather than a lifetime pass for $20. Four
annual senior passes purchased in prior years can be traded for a
lifetime pass.
Both passes provide free access to more than 2,000 recre-
ation sites managed by six federal agencies: the National Park
Service; the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service; the Bureau of Land
Management; the Bureau of Reclamation; the U.S. Forest
Service; and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. While the life-
time pass favors frequent visitors, both types of passes cover
entrance and standard day-use recreation fees and provide dis-
counts on other fees.
Of the nation’s 417 national parks, 118 — including the
Lewis and Clark National Historical Park — have an entrance
fee. But either pass grants its holder and up to three other adults
in a non-commercial vehicle free admittance. At the Lewis and
Clark park, that alone would represent a savings of $20, the cost
of an annual pass, and at many sites it provides the pass owner
with additional discounts on fees for amenities such as camping,
swimming, boat launching and guided tours.
At Lewis and Clark, Superintendent Jon Burpee says the
demand for the passes has been “incredibly high,” and that while
the park is currently out of passes, it is issuing rain checks to
those who purchase them before the deadline. They can be pur-
chased at the Fort Clatsop Visitors Center.
The passes are a great deal now, and despite the cost, it’s still
a good deal after Aug. 28 for those who qualify.
Port of Astoria should
think of progress when
making appointment
storia Port commissioners will make a choice Tuesday
that will directly impact the board’s makeup after inter-
viewing seven candidates who seek to fill an opening
created by Robert Mushen’s recent resignation.
The interviews begin at 4 p.m. and commissioners will make
the appointment afterward. While interviewing, the candidates
need to clearly articulate their vision for the Port, and in making
their selection, commissioners must seek leadership qualities that
will help reverse the Port’s problems of the past.
That past has been plagued by divisiveness and a lack of direc-
tion, but the May election put the Port on a new heading. In the
election, the seats of commissioners James Campbell, Stephen
Fulton and John Raichl were up for grabs. Raichl didn’t seek
re-election, and Fulton ran against Campbell rather than try to
retain his seat. Campbell soundly defeated Fulton, and voters
decidedly chose Frank Spence and Dirk Rohne over opponents
Pat O’Grady and Dick Hellberg, whose platforms aligned with
Fulton’s. Spence, Rohne and Campbell are joined on the commis-
sion with Bill Hunsinger, who was also an ally of Fulton.
O’Grady, a longshoreman, farmer and mechanic, is seeking
the appointment. Others are: John Lansing, a former longtime
Port budget committee member whose background is financial
services; Robert Johnston, advocacy coordinator for NorthWest
Senior & Disability Services in Astoria, who has served as a
McMinnville city councilor and Yamhill County commissioner;
Robert Stevens, a retired U.S. Coast Guard captain and for-
mer commander of the cutter Resolute when it was stationed in
Astoria; Pamela Wev, a land use planner and economic develop-
ment consultant who moved to Astoria in 2014; Russ Earl, a land
developer and former Clatsop County commissioner and Seaside
planning commissioner; and Ronald Meyer, 87, a retired machin-
ist, inventor and designer of lighting and hospital equipment.
The Port is poised for progress, and commissioners should use
the opportunity to take another step toward it with the choice they
make.
A
A real American heritage
AP Photo/Matt Slocum
In this photograph taken with a long exposure, protesters march down North Broad Street in Philadel-
phia Wednesday in response to a white nationalist rally held in Charlottesville, Va.
By TIMOTHY EGAN
New York Times News Service
B
efore they die, before they dis-
appear into the opaque mist of
history, the last Americans to
fight Nazi Germany
have to face one
more blast of some-
thing they thought
they’d eliminated in
the bloodiest war of
all time.
Every day we
lose an average of 362 World War II
veterans — the boys from the Bronx,
the farmers from Nebraska, the kids
yanked from late-adolescent languor
to fight a monster. I asked one of
them, Caesar Civitella, Nazi-killer
and son of an Italian immigrant, how
it felt to see Hitler’s flags paraded
over our soil last weekend.
And make no mistake, those were
the flags of a genocidal force in the
Charlottesville, Virginia, rally last
weekend, the one in which some
“very fine people,” in President
Donald Trump’s infamous words,
participated. The polo-shirt fascists
were brandishing Othala rune and
Black Sun symbols — both used
by the SS, the paramilitary muscle
behind the slaughter of 6 million
Jews.
“These neo-Nazis, whatever you
call them — I thought we’d ended all
that,” Civitella said, sounding both
mournful and feisty. “These people
have nothing to do with American
values.”
I found this soldier of World
War II at his home in St. Petersburg,
Florida, where he is a local hero for
living a life that deserves a movie.
He will be 94 on Aug. 21, the day
of the total solar eclipse — “Jesus
Christ’s way of saying happy birth-
day,” he said.
Within a generation’s time, nearly
all of the 16 million American veter-
ans who served in World War II will
be gone. And the biggest insult, the
gravest disservice of Trump’s giving
comfort to Hitler sympathizers, is to
those who fought to save the world
from evil more than 70 years ago.
“Because I’m old, now 94, I
recognize these omens of doom,”
wrote Harry Leslie Smith, a Royal
Air Force veteran, in an essay this
week in the Guardian. “Chilling
signs are everywhere, perhaps the
biggest being that the U.S. allows
itself to be led by Donald Trump, a
man deficient in honor, wisdom and
just simple human kindness.”
To those grave deficiencies, you
can add one more: historical illiter-
acy. In his grievance-burst of a news
conference this week, Trump had this
to say about those who showed up to
protest the neo-Nazis and neo-Con-
federates: “You are changing history,
you’re changing culture.”
‘These
neo-Nazis,
whatever you
call them — I
thought we’d
ended all that.
These people
have nothing
to do with
American
values.’
Caesar Civitella
World War II veteran
In truth, it was the raising of
statues in the early 20th century —
when the Lost Cause whitewash of
the confederacy of slaveholders was
in full swing — that tried to change
both culture and history. George
Washington will be next, Trump said,
using a line that neo-Nazis throw
around at their hate fests.
The founders, flawed but brilliant
men, put their lives at risk to create
a nation built on principles that took
a long time to realize. Robert E.
Lee was a traitor, the best general
of a war that killed more Americans
than any other. His statue no more
belongs on a pedestal than does that
of Hitler’s most proficient military
man.
History and culture are what
Civitella embodies, for his story is
the American story. His father, an
immigrant from Italy, died when
Caesar was young. With the call of
war, he volunteered for jump school
at Fort Benning, Georgia. Then the
Office of Strategic Services, a spy
service that did much more than
snoop and decode, selected him for
especially dangerous duty. Civitella
jumped into occupied France.
Working with the French Resistance,
he killed his share of Nazis, he said,
and helped capture 4,000 of them.
Next up was a mission to go
after Mussolini. But as the son of an
Italian immigrant, his loyalty was
challenged. “I was asked if I would
hesitate to kill an Italian who worked
with the Nazis. I said, nope.”
His generation includes George
H.W. Bush, another war hero, the
exact age as Civitella. This week
Bush, with his son George W.,
released a simple, decent statement
on the toxicity of racial hatred.
No such message came from
the empty shell of Donald Trump, a
man who once said his own personal
Vietnam was avoiding sexually
transmitted diseases in the wilds of
Manhattan. Warming the hearts of
the little Hitlers this week, Trump
claimed to have looked carefully at
the hatemongers in Charlottesville
and found many good citizens.
He must have missed the chants
of “Jews will not replace us!” and
“blood and soil,” a favorite of
Hitler’s murderous legions. Or he
must have overlooked the thugs
brandishing semi-automatic rifles
and chanting “sieg heil” outside the
Congregation Beth Israel synagogue
in Charlottesville.
It doesn’t take much to find the
sources of the best American culture
and history. You won’t find them
in the “beautiful statues and monu-
ments” — Trump’s words this week
— of slaveholders and traitors. Look
instead to those like Civitella, who
are not yet cast in bronze but deserve
to be — the living memory.
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