Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (June 3, 2015)
Page 4A OPINION East Oregonian Wednesday, June 3, 2015 Founded October 16, 1875 KATHRYN B. BROWN Publisher JENNINE PERKINSON Advertising Director DANIEL WATTENBURGER Managing Editor TIM TRAINOR Opinion Page Editor OUR VIEW Beware a law misinterpreted Ding-dong, the Patriot Act is completely contradictory way to the dead. true meaning of the law. Major provisions of the You can argue that Sensenbrenner 14-year-old act expired Sunday was hoisted by his own petard, that at midnight, thanks to Oregon the Patriot Act was such a powerful Democratic senator Ron Wyden, and sweeping measure (and required Kentucky Republican senator Rand so much secrecy) that it was bound Paul and 77 others who voted to be a corrupted and exploited. against extending the provision. There are local parallels, whether The controversial bill was passed it be recent Hermiston ordinance in the frantic days after 9/11, when about teenagers in parks, or in the country was Pendleton regarding awash in panic and teens on Bedford Local laws patriotism. Thus Bridge or another the Patriot Act regulating the smell can be was born. It was marijuana. They misinterpreted of one of plenty that, are rules that attempt bowing to political and corrupted, to address one thing, expediency, wasn’t but — if interpreted just as the read by 99 of the differently — could 100 senators who used for Patriot Act was. be voted for it. completely ulterior The text of the motives. To be bill, had senators actually read it, is against these recent ordinances remarkably restrained given that it doesn’t mean we lack trust of current was created by a nation under attack. law enforcement leaders or city Sure, there is plenty of expansion RI¿FLDOV,WGRHVKRZHYHUPHDQWKDW of government power and reduction we can see how these laws could of personal liberties in the name be misinterpreted. In Hermiston, it of national security. But there is wasn’t that long ago that residents no mention of bulk collection of were policed by a man who had a Americans’ data, for instance. different interpretation of what was The Foreign Intelligence right than many in his city. Surveillance court, however, offered To summarize: In Pendleton, a widely different interpretation of 17,000 residents are now under a the law, and in that there was little widely criticized ordinance because restraint. It allowed the country’s two neighbors couldn’t get along. In intelligence agencies (CIA, FBI and Hermiston, thousands of people who this recently invented thing called enjoy their park are subject to fuzzy the NSA) to have extraordinary rules because of a few bad apples latitude on what records it could who damaged equipment. get its hands on and what corners We shouldn’t punish the many it could cut to get that data. Jim responsible, law-abiding citizens for Sensenbrenner, who not only read the sins of a few. That was a lesson the Patriot Act but wrote much of that was hard to learn in the wake it, has in recent years been railing of 9/11. It should be much easier against the FISA court interpretation, to learn here in the calm and safe saying that it was being used in a sanctuary of Eastern Oregon. Unsigned editorials are the opinion of the East Oregonian editorial board of Publisher Kathryn Brown, Managing Editor Daniel Wattenburger, and Opinion Page Editor Tim Trainor. Other columns, letters and cartoons on this page express the opinions of the authors and not necessarily that of the East Oregonian. YOUR VIEWS Too many mistakes to trust the administration This letter is in response to a recent editorial written by the Pendleton city manager. For openers, why does the city council feel compelled to always hire an outside consulting company to perform tasks that can be done here locally? Here is an example: “In 2005, the city heard a consultant report on an assessment of the city’s pavement condition. This process gave the city council concrete information to determine the current overall condition of the city’s road system. The process included a visual inspection of the roads.” I’m sure that we could have had local residents report on the status of the streets in their neighborhoods free of charge. Consultants were also hired to develop the RiverWalk economic development plan. How has that worked out? To my surprise that document, as well DVWKHQHZXQL¿HGGHYHORSPHQWFRGH UHÀHFWWKHSHUVRQDOLQWHUHVWRIRXUELNH centric city planner, Evan McKenzie. This plan includes requirements for extensive bicycle parking capability for our downtown area. How many bikes have you seen secured to the many “Let ‘er Bike” racks? Corbett mentioned the failure of extending the gas tax by public referendum. $10 million for the “road to nowhere” was a complete disaster and voters demonstrated their disgust with the project. The purchase of 40 acres for ZDVDOVRD¿DVFREHFDXVHWKH land has no infrastructure. Corbett also mentioned that money can’t be borrowed from other budgets for road repair. I recall that $650,000 was taken from the library budget and transferred to lower the airport debt. Here are some other examples from an EO story in May 2014: “In another vote, $162,700 was moved from the community development fund to the airport fund to pay for drone test range development and fees for unmanned aircraft consultant Peak 3.” That HQWHUSULVHKDV\HWWRJHQHUDWHDSUR¿WDQG has become a money pit. Their recently announced $1.7 million grant could turn into a loan that has to be paid back if it doesn’t meet its goals. The city funded $700,000 for infrastructure for the Olney Housing Project. Where did that money come from? Let’s not forget the deal the city made with the county to get the Eighth Street bridge repaired. The city volunteered to maintain 10.6 miles of county roads. That is laughable. Time to quit complaining and support a recall election. Jerry Cronin Pendleton OTHER VIEWS The campus crusaders E very generation has an a safe room because she “was feeling opportunity to change the world. bombarded by a lot of viewpoints Right now, college campuses that really go against” her dearly and around the country are home to a closely held beliefs. moral movement that seeks to reverse Today’s campus activists are centuries of historic wrongs. not only going after actual acts of This movement is led by students discrimination — which is admirable. forced to live with the legacy of sexism, They are also going after incorrect with the threat, and sometimes the thought — impiety and blasphemy. David experience, of sexual assault. It is led Brooks They are going after people for simply by students whose lives have been IDLOLQJWRVKRZVXI¿FLHQWGHIHUHQFHWR Comment marred by racism and bigotry. It is led and respect for the etiquette they hold by people who want to secure equal GHDU7KH\VRPHWLPHVFRQÀDWHLGHDV rights for gays, lesbians and other historically with actions and regard controversial ideas as marginalized groups. forms of violence. These students are driven by noble impulses Some of their targets have been deliberately to do justice and identify oppression. They want LPSLRXV/DXUD.LSQLVLVDIHPLQLVW¿OP to not only crack down on exploitation and professor at Northwestern University who discrimination, but also eradicate the cultural wrote a provocative piece on sexual mores environment that tolerates these things. They on campus that was published in February. want to police social norms She was hit with two Title so that hurtful comments are IX charges on the grounds, no longer tolerated and so without evidence, that her that real bigotry is given no words might have a “chilling tacit support. Of course, at effect” on those who might some level, they are right. need to report sexual Callous statements in the assaults. mainstream can lead to Other targets of this hostile behavior on the edge. crusade had no idea what That’s why we don’t tolerate they were getting into. Holocaust denial. A student at George But when you witness Washington wrote an essay how this movement is on the pre-Nazi history of actually being felt on the swastika. A professor campus, you can’t help at Brandeis mentioned noticing that it sometimes a historic slur against slides into a form of zealotry. Hispanics in order to criticize If you read the website of it. The scholar Wendy the group FIRE, which defends free speech on Kaminer mentioned the N-word at a Smith campus, if you read Kirsten Powers’s book, College alumni event in a clearly nonracist “The Silencing,” if you read Judith Shulevitz’s discussion of euphemism and free speech. essay “In College and Hiding From Scary All of these people were targeted for purging Ideas” that was published in The Times in merely for bringing unacceptable words into Sunday Review on March 22, you come across the public square. As Powers describes it in tales of professors whose lives are ruined “The Silencing,” Kaminer was accused of because they made innocent remarks; you see racial violence and hate speech. The university speech codes that inhibit free expression; you president was pilloried for tolerating an see reputations unfairly scarred by charges of environment that had been made “hostile” and racism and sexism. “unsafe.” The problem is that the campus activists We’re now in a position in which the have moral fervor, but don’t always have students and the professors and peers they settled philosophies to restrain the fervor of target are talking past each other. The students their emotions. Settled philosophies are meant feeling others don’t understand the trauma to (but obviously don’t always) instill a limiting they’ve survived; the professors feeling as sense of humility, a deference to the complexity though they are victims in a modern Salem and multifaceted nature of reality. But many witch trial. Everybody walks on egg shells. of today’s activists are forced to rely on a There will always be moral fervor on relatively simple social theory. campus. Right now that moral fervor is According to this theory, the dividing lines structured by those who seek the innocent between good and evil are starkly clear. The purity of the vulnerable victim. Another and HVVHQWLDOFRQÀLFWLVEHWZHHQWKHWUDXPDWL]HG more mature moral fervor would be structured purity of the victim and the verbal violence of by the classic ideal of the worldly philosopher, the oppressor. by the desire to confront not hide from what According to this theory, the ultimate source you fear, but to engage the complexity of the of authority is not some hard-to-understand world, and to know that sometimes the way truth. It is everybody’s personal feelings. to wisdom involves hurt feelings, tolerating A crime occurs when someone feels a hurt difference and facing hard truths. triggered, or when someone feels disagreed Ŷ with or “unsafe.” In the Shulevitz piece, a David Brooks became a New York Times Brown student retreats from a campus debate to Op-Ed columnist in September 2003. The essential conflict is between the traumatized purity of the victim and the verbal violence of the oppressor. The East Oregonian welcomes original letters of 400 words or less on public issues and public policies for publication in the newspaper and on our website. Submitted letters must be signed by the author and include the city of residence. Send letters to 211 S.E. Byers Ave. Pendleton, OR 97801 or email editor@eastoregonian.com.