OPINION
6A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • TUESDAY, AUGUST 29, 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
Trump’s team
needs to move
on trade deals
O
ur colleagues at Politico last week published an analysis
that showed the nation’s 11 former partners in the Trans-
Pacific Partnership are involved in 27 separate negotia-
tions with each other, with major international trading blocs and
regional powerhouses such as China.
It reports that seven deals that impact U.S. farmers have been
signed since the Trump administration pulled the United States
out of the TPP.
The TPP was seen by many, but not all, U.S. agricultural
groups as a boon. It included the U.S. and 11 other countries —
Japan, Canada, Mexico, Australia, Vietnam, Chile, Malaysia,
Peru, New Zealand, Singapore and Brunei. Japan, Mexico and
Canada are among the biggest trade partners for U.S. agriculture.
Negotiations on the pact began in 2008 under President
George W. Bush. A deal was reached in October of 2015.
President Barack Obama supported the final deal and sub-
mitted it to Congress for ratification. With an election looming,
Republicans and Democrats in Congress weren’t anxious to be
pinned down on a deal that had both support and opposition that
crossed party lines.
The pact’s critics included the Republican and the Democratic
presidential nominees.
Donald Trump said the deal would undermine the U.S.
economy.
As secretary of state, Hillary Clinton raved about the deal,
calling it the “gold standard” of trade pacts. Candidate Clinton
opposed the deal during the campaign and vowed to oppose it as
president.
So without ratification prior to the election, the U.S. was des-
tined to reject the TPP in its present form.
Following through on his campaign promise, President Trump
withdrew from the accord on Jan. 23.
Among the other parties in the pact there are differing opin-
ions as to what the TPP means without the United States. Shinzo
Abe, Japan’s prime minister, says the deal is meaningless with-
out the U.S.
Nevertheless, our trading partners around the Pacific Rim
aren’t wasting time. There are a host of bilateral and multilateral
discussions in the works. China, Trump’s campaign nemesis, is
trying to make deals with our trading partners.
Throughout the campaign, and since taking office, Trump
said he’d replace the 12-party pact with a series of bilateral trade
deals that would bring jobs and industry back to the United
States. That sounds great. When can we expect that to happen?
Farmers and ranchers, a group that largely supported Trump’s
election, have a lot riding on foreign trade. The U.S. exports
$135 billion in agricultural products each year. It could always
be better, but it’s pretty great as it is.
It’s hard to say what dumping the TPP and renegotiating the
North American Free Trade Agreement may mean for the econ-
omy in general, and for farmers and ranchers in particular.
But at the moment it’s fair to ask what happens next, and
when will it happen? We await a tweet, or any other appropriate
communication, from the Oval Office.
GUEST COLUMN
Regular attendance at school
is vital to academic success
By CRAIG HOPPES
Special to The Daily Astorian
A
s the start of the school year
quickly approaches, I would
like to take this opportunity
to personally
welcome returning
Astoria School
District students,
as well as new
students and their
families to the
school district.
The beginning of the school year
is always a renewed and exciting
time for students and we are excited
to welcome you to the 2017-2018
school year! Students are showing
tremendous academic growth in
numerous content areas including
reading and math. The school
district’s targeted strategic plan
and dedicated staff have not only
increased student learning, but have
also provided numerous student-cen-
tered learning opportunities for all
students. A few examples of these
opportunities are: a new program that
provides targeted instruction within
the regular elementary classroom
for all Spanish speaking students;
after-school programs designed to
provide extra academic support for
students in third to 12th grades, that
includes transportation; a new ele-
mentary-level report card designed to
better communicate student progress
in the lower grades.
The school district continues to
dedicate time each week for teachers
to collaborate and learn from each
other, as well as many other pro-
grams that are designed to help with
student learning.
Student attendance is an area of
improvement that the school district
continues to focus on. Nearly 1 out
of every 4 students is considered
chronically absent, which means
that a student would have to miss at
least 10 percent of all school days.
According to our enrollment, this
means that over 400 students are
considered chronically absent. Staff
continue to work with families to
provide assistance and support in
helping parents get their children to
school on a regular basis. Although
staff strive to support student
attendance, we have not been able to
improve student attendance over the
last five to years.
Regular student attendance is
vital in the overall success of student
academics, and in some cases has
a direct relationship with a student
graduating from high school. The
following is research from the
Attendance Works website:
• Absenteeism in the first month
of school can predict poor attendance
throughout the school year. Half the
students who miss two to four days
in September go on to miss nearly a
month of school.
• An estimated 5 million to 7.5
million U.S. students miss nearly a
month of school each year.
• Absenteeism and its ill effects
start early. One in 10 kindergarten
and first grade students are chron-
ically absent. Poor attendance can
influence whether children read
proficiently by the end of third grade
School staff
are anxious to
help families
who may need
assistance with
getting their
children to
school. Please
do not hesitate
to reach out
for help, if
needed.
or be held back.
• By sixth grade, chronic absence
becomes a leading indicator that a
student will drop out of high school.
• Research shows that missing 10
percent of the school year, or about
18 days in most school districts, neg-
atively affects a student’s academic
performance. That’s just two days a
month and that’s known as chronic
absence.
In an effort to better support
regular student attendance, the
Astoria School District has begun a
new program called “Strive for 5 —
Attendance Matters.” The school
district’s goal is for each student to
miss less than five days throughout
the 2017-2018 school year. Each
school has an attendance committee
that has gone through extensive
training about student attendance.
Each school is in the process of cre-
ating an attendance plan that will be
used to monitor and support students
who have chronic absenteeism. It is
important for parents to know the
academic impact of missing school
is the same whether the absences
are excused or unexcused. School
attendance matters no matter why a
student misses school.
There are some important strate-
gies that parents can use to help with
student attendance. These strategies
include:
• Set a regular bed time and a
morning routine.
• Lay out clothes and pack back-
packs the night before.
• Introduce your child to teachers
and classmates before school starts to
help with the transition.
• Don’t let your child stay home
unless he/she is truly sick. Keep in
mind complaints of a stomachache
or headache can be a sign of anxiety
and not a reason to stay home.
• If your child seems anxious
about going to school, talk to
teachers, school counselors or other
parents for advice on how to make
them feel comfortable and excited
about learning.
• Develop backup plans for get-
ting to school if something comes up.
Call on a family member, a neighbor,
or another parent.
• Avoid medical appointments
and extended trips when school is in
session.
Student attendance is a priority
for school staff and the school board.
The school board has created a goal
concerning attendance for the 2017-
2018 school year. School staff are
anxious to help families who may
need assistance with getting their
children to school. Please do not
hesitate to reach out to school staff
for help, if needed.
Craig Hoppes is the superinten-
dent of the Astoria School District.
Arpaio brought fascism, American style, to Arizona
By PAUL KRUGMAN
New York Times News Service
A
s sheriff of Maricopa County,
Arizona, Joe Arpaio engaged
in blatant racial discrimina-
tion. His officers
systematically
targeted Latinos,
often arresting
them on spurious
charges and at least
sometimes beating
them up when they
questioned those charges. Read the
report from the Justice Department’s
Civil Rights Division, and prepare to
be horrified.
Once Latinos were arrested, bad
things happened to them. Many were
sent to Tent City, which Arpaio him-
self proudly called a “concentration
camp,” where they lived under brutal
conditions, with temperatures inside
the tents sometimes rising to 145
degrees.
And when he received court
orders to stop these practices, he
simply ignored them, which led to his
eventual conviction — after decades
in office — for contempt of court.
But he had friends in high places,
indeed in the highest of places. We
now know that Donald Trump tried
to get the Justice Department to drop
the case against Arpaio, a clear case
of attempted obstruction of justice.
And when that ploy failed, Trump,
who had already suggested that
Arpaio was “convicted for doing his
job,” pardoned him.
By the way, about “doing his job,”
it turns out that Arpaio’s officers were
too busy rounding up brown-skinned
people and investigating President
Barack Obama’s birth certificate
to do other things, like investigate
cases of sexually abused children.
Priorities!
Let’s call things by their proper
names here. Arpaio is, of course, a
white supremacist. But he’s more
than that. There’s a word for political
regimes that round up members of
minority groups and send them to
concentration camps, while reject-
ing the rule of law: What Arpaio
brought to Maricopa, and what the
president of the United States has
just endorsed, was fascism, American
style.
So how did we get to this point?
Trump’s motives are easy to
understand. For one thing, Arpaio,
with his racism and authoritarianism,
really is his kind of guy. For another,
the pardon is a signal to those who
might be tempted to make deals with
the special investigator as the Russia
probe closes in on the White House:
Don’t worry, I’ll protect you.
Finally, standing up for white
people who keep brown people down
pleases Trump’s base, whom he’s
going to need more than ever as the
scandals creep closer and the big
policy wins he promised keep not
happening.
But the Trump base of angry
white voters is a distinct minority in
the country as a whole. Furthermore,
those voters have always been there.
Fifteen years ago, writing about the
radicalization of the GOP, I suggested
the hard core of angry voters was
around 20 percent of the electorate;
that still seems like a reasonable
guess.
What makes it possible for
someone like Trump to attain power
and hold it is the acquiescence of
people, both voters and politicians,
who aren’t white supremacists, who
sort-of kind-of believe in the rule of
law, but are willing to go along with
racists and lawbreakers if it seems to
serve their interests.
There have been endless reports
about the low-education white voters
who went overwhelmingly for Trump
last November. But he wouldn’t
have made it over the top without
millions of votes from well-educated
Republicans who — despite the
media’s orgy of false equivalence or
worse (emails!) — had no excuse for
not realizing what kind of man he
was. For whatever reason, be it polit-
ical tribalism or the desire for lower
taxes, they voted for him anyway.
Given the powers we grant to
the president, who in some ways
is almost like an elected dictator,
giving the office to someone likely to
abuse that power invites catastrophe.
The only real check comes from
Congress, which retains the power
to impeach; even the potential for
impeachment can constrain a bad
president.
But Republicans control
Congress; how many of them
besides John McCain have offered
full-throated denunciations of the
Arpaio pardon?
The answer is, very few. Paul
Ryan, the speaker of the House, had
a spokesman declare that he “does
not agree with this decision” — not
exactly a ringing statement. Yet Ryan
did better than most of his colleagues,
who have said nothing at all.
This bodes ill if, as seems all too
likely, the Arpaio pardon is only the
beginning: We may well be in the
early stages of a constitutional crisis.
Does anyone consider it unthink-
able that Trump will fire Robert
Mueller and try to shut down investi-
gations into his personal and political
links to Russia? Does anyone have
confidence that Republicans in
Congress will do anything more than
express mild disagreement with his
actions if he does?
As I said, there’s a word for peo-
ple who round up members of ethnic
minorities and send them to concen-
tration camps, or praise such actions.
There’s also a word for people who,
out of cowardice or self-interest, go
along with such abuses: collabora-
tors. How many such collaborators
will there be? I’m afraid we’ll soon
find out.