OPINION
4A
THE DAILY ASTORIAN • MONDAY, OCTOBER 16, 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 attacks
on the media
risk freedom
‘W
ords spoken by the president of the United States
matter. Are you tonight recanting the oath you
took on Jan. 20th to preserve, protect and defend
the First Amendment?” U.S. Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Nebraska,
asked this important question of President Donald Trump last
week.
Trump said NBC should be punished for a story he didn’t
like by having its Federal Communications Commission
license revoked. The president didn’t understand the broad-
caster doesn’t rely on such a license. The threat is nevertheless
deeply objectionable.
Trump’s tweets and comments often are empty provoca-
tions, mainly intended to inflame his true believers. However,
his many threats and insults thrown at working journalists and
media organizations have real-world consequences. They must
not go unchallenged by any American who genuinely cherishes
our own democracy and cares about the pursuit of freedom in
the rest of the world.
Trump’s current target is NBC News. It is not the most
revered member of the journalistic profession, being widely
accused of wimpiness last year in covering the president’s sex-
ual assault admission to “Access Hollywood” host Billy Bush
and this year’s allegations of sexual predations by movie pro-
ducer Harry Weinstein. The network’s former news anchor
Brian Williams was demoted for lying about his experiences
covering the Iraq War.
The president’s rant centers on an NBC report that Trump
wanted a nearly tenfold increase in the U.S. nuclear arsenal.
The network implied it was this proposal in a July 20 meeting
that led Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to call Trump a moron.
There is no indication the network’s report was incorrect.
Adversarial relationship
Everyone understands why politicians get frustrated at the
news media. It often is an adversarial relationship. Our tradi-
tions place the press in the role of independent watchdog over
government. Because of this, some politicians regard the news
media with the same loathing heaped on police internal-affairs
divisions in stereotypical cop shows. Trump has taken this idea
and ramped it up, trying to immunize himself against legitimate
news by painting all journalists as liars and traitors — smart
alecks out to get him.
The president’s disdain for national media is ironic, con-
sidering how his celebrity status led to his election. Without
the lavish coverage of him by television, magazines, radio and
newspapers, he might still be nothing but a bankrupt casino
owner. Most politicians implicitly realize they have some form
of symbiotic relationship with the press. Hopefully, this usually
is in the public interest by sharing information and building a
sense of national unity, but other times it simply derives from a
shared desire to ride the publicity train to fame and fortune.
Many politicians indulge in ritual complaints about vic-
timization by the press. Trump far oversteps normal bounds.
Calling major news outlets “the enemy of the American peo-
ple” and saying journalists are “sick people … trying to take
away our history and our heritage” places honest news report-
ers at risk. There have been 20 arrests and 21 physical attacks
on U.S. journalists this year, according to Columbia Journalism
Review. Trump’s bullying words also have dangerous conse-
quences beyond our borders. Worldwide, there are 259 journal-
ists currently imprisoned for doing their jobs, CJR reports. In
Turkey, Mexico and elsewhere, strongmen attack the indepen-
dent press. Reporters doing their jobs by shining a light into the
dark recesses of criminal enterprises and political repression
too often pay for their courage with their lives. By attacking
America’s press, the world’s biggest strongman provides inspi-
ration for all who aspire to dominate others.
‘American identity’
In a column in CJR, Columbia University President Lee
Bollinger notes the First Amendment guaranteeing freedom of
speech and the press “is a core part of the American identity.
As much as it is about ‘rights’ — the right of dissent, of sover-
eignty residing in the citizenry and not in the government, and
so on — it is also about the character of the society. To listen to
people speak of free speech and press is to hear about fortitude,
bravery, magnanimity, self-doubt, and the capacity to reason
and respond; to recognize the importance of compromise, and
to learn to live with some degree of chaos, uncertainty, and dis-
cord; and to value creativity and change over always trying to
preserve the status quo.”
As Sen. Sasse said, words matter — especially those of the
U.S. president. Some are taking his words to heart. Freedom
suffers as a result.
Trump swore to uphold the Constitution. He must endeavor
to keep his word, even when it comes to freedom of the press.
SOUTHERN EXPOSURE
Learning from the
‘McMinnville model’
O
ne of the best writers I ever
worked with was a 17-year-
old intern. She was a Lake
Oswego High
School senior stay-
ing with her aunt
over a summer
in suburban New
York City, where I
edited a newspaper.
Olivia wrote
more stories a week than full-time
staff — and the material sparkled.
No wonder she won a Northwest
Excellence Award for high school
journalism that year.
Employers from throughout the
North Coast are hoping to find that
sparkle in their interns, and compa-
nies including Martin North, Lum’s
Auto Center, Providence Seaside
Hospital and Fort George Brew-
ery came together in September at
the South Campus of Clatsop Com-
munity College in Seaside to learn
more.
“School district leaders were
saying we want to engage with their
industry partners, and our indus-
try partners were saying they want
to engage more with the school dis-
trict,” Kevin Leahy of Clatsop Eco-
nomic Development Resources, the
host of the event, said. “It was a gap
everybody voiced.”
Project goals
Myronda Schiding, a curricu-
lum coordinator with the Northwest
Regional Education Service Dis-
trict, said the district visited Yamhill
County, where she began conversa-
tions about internship programs and
grant opportunities.
The goal is to develop an intern-
ship program for the county, Schid-
ing said.
“As we kept talking about it,
we realized an internship project
that is comprehensive and commu-
nity-based like the McMinnville
model would thrive here,” Schid-
ing said.
She was referring to the McMin-
nville Works Internship Program,
developed by Jody Christensen,
executive director of McMin-
nville Economic Development
Partnership.
Christensen was invited to Clat-
sop County by a coalition of CEDR,
industry partners, local school dis-
tricts and the Northwest Regional
Education Service District to share
her experience.
McMinnville Works
In McMinnville, businesses were
shutting down production facilities,
Christensen said.
“Businesses were flying out of
our community,” Christensen said.
“They were not filling positions for
eight months. It was a problem, so
we knew we had to have a grow-
our-own work approach.”
One of the items industry part-
ners wanted to explore was intern-
ships, she said. “They wanted us to
take the mystery out of it, the com-
plexity and simplify it. So they
came on board and we developed
the McMinnville Works Program.”
The program is in its sixth year,
she said.
“Every community is looking
at ways of attracting and retain-
ing homegrown talent, and to take a
grow-your-own workforce approach
is the right thing to do,” Christensen
said. “While industry wants longer
connections with the school districts
in the academic world, the academic
world wants stronger connections
R.J. Marx/The Daily Astorian
Jody Christensen, Myronda Schiding and Kevin Leahy at the intern-
ship workshop in Seaside.
with industry, so they are putting
resources to making those things
happen.”
Programs defined
Employers from Cannon Beach,
Warrenton, Seaside and Astoria par-
ticipated in hands-on exercises to
define the intern’s role.
Should internship opportunities
be paid or unpaid? Part time or full
time? What are the expectations of
employers?
Well-delineated career path
opportunities help interns learn
“people and parts,” Christensen
said.
Clatsop County has an extraor-
dinary opportunity, Christensen
added.
“You already have people who
are engaged in the conversation,
you have a comprehensive support
system, you have an industry and
employers who want this program
to be successful, so that’s all you
need,” she said. “Today what we are
doing is uncovering some of the ele-
ments to help make that happen.”
A pilot launch
Project descriptions, age ranges,
paid or unpaid programs are yet to
be determined in the crafting of the
program.
“This is going to be Clatsop
County’s internship program,”
Christensen said. “They can develop
it to be all different shapes and
sizes. Let’s create the basic founda-
tions and then build from there.”
Internships were originally
designed for students 18 and older,
Leahy said, but the program was
expanded to include younger
students.
How will the program’s success
be judged?
“This is considered a pilot
launch,” Christensen said. “I
wouldn’t judge it on numbers, I
would judge it on year two, who
returns … and then you can start
having your benchmarks.”
The goal is to develop a frame-
work for an ongoing internship pro-
gram in the county, she said. The
program could be tailored to indi-
vidual communities.
Both students and employers
need to be part of the conversation,
Christensen said.
“They’ll help develop the pro-
gram where they can,” she said.
Internships could span busi-
nesses large and small.
“Every industry in your commu-
nity, every sector should be able to
play in this space. They should be
able to have an internship.”
What a company’s internship
program looks like in a year or
five years could be very different,
Christensen said.
Students graduating internship
programs can share their experi-
ences with future participants.
“We want multiple touch points
with industry, with families, with
community members with young
children, so they know that this
internship model is something that
they can grow into,” Schiding said.
“Part of this is marketing to local
industry, to families, to the com-
munities and growing that local
workforce.”
Retaining talent
The September workshop was
the first step in reaching out to
employers, Leahy said.
An employer-led steering com-
mittee meets with CEDR’s core
planning group monthly, he said.
The steering committee plans to
attend an upcoming meeting of
Clatsop County school superinten-
dents to review funding needs for a
countywide internship coordinator
to move the program forward.
“We want to have more expo-
sure,” Leahy said. “We want the
kids to know about us.”
The program may offer oppor-
tunities who may not do the tradi-
tional four-year college route, he
said, and it may draw graduates to
jobs in Clatsop County.
“As a small rural county, we
want to keep all of our talent,”
Leahy said.
Port of Astoria Executive Direc-
tor Jim Knight said he planned
involvement in the program. He
proposed tasks in the Port’s envi-
ronmental programs such as col-
lecting samples or stormwa-
ter testing. Interns could perform
administrative tasks, security or
marketing roles. “It really runs the
gamut,” Knight said.
As for my journalism intern
from Lake Oswego, 10 years later,
what is she doing now? Not in jour-
nalism, alas, but her career path
hasn’t been too shabby. She gradu-
ated from Stanford University and
is now an analyst at a prestigious
investment bank in New York City.
I like to think I’ve always been
good at spotting new talent!
R.J. Marx is The Daily Astori-
an’s South County reporter and edi-
tor of the Seaside Signal and Cannon
Beach Gazette.