Page 6A
OPINION
East Oregonian
Tuesday, July 7, 2015
Founded October 16, 1875
KATHRYN B. BROWN
Publisher
JENNINE PERKINSON
Advertising Director
DANIEL WATTENBURGER
Managing Editor
TIM TRAINOR
Opinion Page Editor
OUR VIEW
Water funding
a huge win for
Eastern Oregon
We have been waiting with bated accomplished in a day, or even in
one Legislative session. Former
(but not held) breath for years now
Sen. David Nelson and Rep. Bob
IRUDVSHFL¿FSLHFHRIUHDOO\JRRG
Jenson worked throughout their
news about Columbia River water.
terms to lay the groundwork for this
That particular nugget came
deal. Sen. Bill Hansell and Rep.
Friday, as the Legislature’s capital
Greg Smith carried
construction
out the work in this
committee approved
As the
session.
$50 million for
One of the
water development
Legislative
biggest hurdles was
projects. The money
session comes to getting the west
will go toward
of the state
infrastructure
a close, it’s nice side
to see how much
to pump water
from the river
to know Eastern could be created
the extra
onto high-value
Oregon at least with
water, and how that
crops in Umatilla
and Morrow
got the top item value could come
further
counties, adding
from our wish without
damage to the
to what is already
river ecosystem.
an agriculturally
list.
bountiful region
By getting key
with plenty of room
legislators to
to grow.
actually visit us on the dry side,
The work is not done, to be sure.
our representatives acted as
Just because dollars are available
ambassadors to the cause.
doesn’t mean the H20 will start
We’ll watch carefully as the
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Northeast Oregon Water Association
only $11 million of the funds are
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earmarked for the Umatilla Basin,
We all know that clean water is a
though much more will likely be
precious resource that is becoming
coming this way.
more scarce, and it’s important to
This allotment will lubricate the
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wheels of progress, and should allow
As the Legislative session comes
the responsible draw of water from
to a close, it’s nice to know Eastern
the river in the near future.
Oregon at least got the top item from
Work like this doesn’t get
our wish list.
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
Greece’s mess won’t be
cleaned up easily
Those high and mighty souls who
exercise aegis over the European
Central Bank and over a variety of other
transnational economic institutions
apparently believe that they can
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Greece into submission to their diktat.
Rather than trying to meet the Athens
government and its people halfway,
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demanding that one of the continent’s
poorest economies be wrung of every
last bit of wealth in order for it to meet
debt payments and thereby make our
world’s powerful moneybags happy.
The theory behind these tactics on the
ECB’s part is, we can presume, that it
will somehow teach an irresponsible
population of modern day Hellenes not
to defy their alleged economic “betters”
in Germany and elsewhere in northern
Europe.
Greece is broke, and its people
can practice austerity no more. It is
immersed in a true economic depression
that is at least partly the result of
austerity measures imposed over the
past few years. Athens at present is run
by politicians who dare not submit to
any more austerity measures. We can
therefore see everything that is wrong
with today’s European political, social
and economic order on prominent
display. Anyone who thinks that the
current situation will resolve itself in a
benign manner is profoundly mistaken.
President Truman, worried about
Greece and Turkey possibly falling
into the Soviet orbit in 1947 and
1948, initiated a program of generous
assistance to Athens and Ankara that he
hoped would cement the two countries
into the “Free World.” That was then.
Sixty-eight years on, and as a result
of both economic mistakes in Athens
and a punitive attitude on the part of
Europe’s big banks, Greece has been
plunged headlong into Third World-style
penury. Stalin was kept out of Athens in
the 1940s, but there is no assurance at
all that Vladimir Putin will be kept out
in 2015.
What a terrible mess this is!
Frank W. Goheen
Camas, Wash.
Custodial fathers face
unfair bias
I am a custodial father of my two kids
since my divorce in 2007. It has been
a nightmare experience as a custodial
father.
It has been my experience that the
entire system of enforcement has bias
against custodial fathers. In attempting
to research support and legal help for
custodial fathers, I have found my
hundreds of hours in searching come
up empty. I have experienced Child
Support Enforcement to be dismissive
and unavailable to custodial fathers, and
the Department of Human Services to
provide aid to the non-custodial mother
without question. I have been charged to
repay the DHS twice now for services
provided to the non-custodial mother. I
have been required to show proof of my
custodial rights, both times, in order that
I not be held with child support by the
DHS.
My case is too involved to describe in
a short note. I challenge you to research
“Custodial Father’s bias” and to see
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prejudice, deceit, and bias. And like me,
other fathers are abused by the system in
spite of court orders, while non-custodial
mothers abuse the system and remain
free from contempt (as in my case) while
“deadbeat dads” wind up jailed for lesser
offenses.
I invite you to research my hell that
you might be enlightened on this corrupt
system.
OTHER VIEWS
Confederacy myth and reality
By WILLIAM PERKINSON
T
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viewed as a symbol of racism, yet on
occasion one sees it displayed outside
of a museum, even in Oregon. In response
to recent calls to eliminate its use, we have
heard the refrain of “heritage not hate.”
Despite its heritage, the hatred represented
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unacceptable.
Way down yonder where I was born, in a
city that was the site of an epic siege ended
by a crater caused by a Union bomb, just
south of Dixie’s capital, my childhood home
was surrounded by Civil War memorials
and museums, abandoned and undiscovered
earthworks and artifacts and many, many
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historians regularly re-enact battles and retell
war stories that took place in the area of what
would become the strip mall and the barbecue
restaurant in the neighboring town. No one
has an accurate count of the number of this
era’s ghosts still haunting the South.
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visiting these places throughout Virginia and
learning about our state’s rights against our
nation’s eventually successful preserving of
the Union. Family reunions always included
storytelling about my great-great-grandfather,
who fought for the Confederate Army of
North Carolina, a true tarheel. He was injured
twice prior to later dying in the Battle of the
Wilderness, a grisly event where one was
lucky to be shot dead. The lives of those
merely gravely injured over the four days of
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entire area of battle.
One of his earlier battle injuries consisted
of being shot in the chest, but the minié ball
struck and lodged in the Bible he carried in
his front shirt pocket, breaking his ribs but
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accompanied by the very Bible with the bullet
still in it, which my grandmother displayed on
her living room shelf.
My experience was not wholly unique.
Many Southerners grew up hearing stories of
predecessors’ valor and bravery, and many
Americans have been indoctrinated that
the Civil War was primarily about states’
rights under federalism, even today a very
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romanticized by artists, sold as a toy and
decorated the most famous orange Dodge
Charger in history. You know the tune: Just a
good ol’ boy, never meanin’ no harm.
In this context, many white Southerners
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tree. Many white Americans have adopted it
as a symbol of the right to rebel, to dissent,
or to be free within a larger society. Each
perspective is based on myth and revisionist
history.
The cause of the Confederacy and the
very states’ right at issue was enslavement of
human beings of a particular race. Perhaps
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institutionalized and systematic abuse of
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and still is one of the worst human rights
violations possible.
The cause of states’ rights and tales of
courage about one’s ancestors diminish and
conceal the South’s sins that prompted the
“war of Northern aggression.”
Confederate leaders’ true purpose can be
viewed in their response to losing the war.
By crafting new methods of racial oppression
in the reconstruction era that later evolved
into Jim Crow laws, Southern states’ leaders
managed to maintain legal subjugation of
slave descendants for over a century. Allowing
all children simply to attend school together
had to be instituted by force. Fear was
maintained through a campaign of terrorism
by lynch mobs and the KKK, all the while
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these actions can still be seen and felt in the
South and, frankly, throughout the U.S. in
both social and legal contexts.
As a child I never deeply considered how
my African-American classmates viewed
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adult, I cannot understand how they or their
families endured the institutional elevation of
this chapter of U.S. history and whitewashing
its rationale.
Despite the treasonous vintage and
subsequent adoption by hate groups, some
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and on their vehicles, even in this state whose
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a person that acknowledges both the heritage
and the hate, I have often had a hard time
determining what the person displaying a
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The recent, racist-motivated mass shooting
in Charleston was done under the banner of
the stars and bars.
A symbol can mean many things to many
people. My childhood experience permits
me to recognize why some still defend the
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represents racism far more than it represents
anything else.
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racist, domestic terrorism in the South, many
white Southerners, their African-American
neighbors, and the rest of the U.S. are calling
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from use. Blind to most of U.S. history or
harboring ulterior motives, some slow moving
white Southerners are resisting the call.
Regrettably, I am sure that we will still see it
from time to time on our city streets.
Each Independence Day, we celebrate all
Americans’ freedom from oppression, yet
some resist letting go of a symbol of the most
insidious oppression in our nation’s history,
perpetuating its impact. It has long been time
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the ghosts of the era that it represents.
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William Perkinson is a lawyer in Pendleton.
Michael Williams
Heppner
Pendleton leaders have
lack of vision
I was stunned when I read that the
Pendleton City Council denied a group
of businessmen time to come up with
a plan to repurpose the Blue Mountain
Recovery Center. I don’t know any
more about their idea than what I read
in the paper, and clearly there would
be some major hurdles to overcome in
repurposing the building. I do know the
McMenamin Brothers have been very
successful in creating themed tourist
attractions from old properties just like
this.
I don’t know if this group can come
up with a plan that in the end will make
sense or not, but I do know that once
the building is gone, the opportunity is
lost forever. The city council has thrown
literally millions of taxpayer dollars
away at failed or moribund projects
with less merit than this, and to deny
the group the opportunity to even put
together a business plan is unbelievably
short-sighted.
Mike Navratil
Pendleton
LETTERS POLICY
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. The newspaper
reserves the right to withhold letters that address concerns about individual services and
products or letters that infringe on the rights of private citizens. Submitted letters must
be signed by the author and include the city of residence and a daytime phone number.
The phone number will not be published. Unsigned letters will not be published. Send
letters to Managing Editor Daniel Wattenburger, 211 S.E. Byers Ave. Pendleton, OR 97801
or email editor@eastoregonian.com.