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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
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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
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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
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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
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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
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marred by racism and bigotry. It is led
and respect for the etiquette they hold
by people who want to secure equal
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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
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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.
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must be signed by the author and include the city of residence. Send letters to 211 S.E.
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