East Oregonian : E.O., August 11, 2015, Image 4

Page 4A
OPINION
East Oregonian
Tuesday, August 11, 2015
Founded October 16, 1875
KATHRYN B. BROWN
Publisher
JENNINE PERKINSON
Advertising Director
DANIEL WATTENBURGER
Managing Editor
TIM TRAINOR
Opinion Page Editor
OUR VIEW
OTHER VIEWS
Staff photo by Jonathan Bach
The Hermiston High School marching band plays at Saturday’s Umatilla
County Fair parade.
Fair thee well
In 1935, Umatilla County saw
its fair move to a plot of land in
Hermiston that can now be described
as careworn.
Through the decades, many a
foot has trampled its dirt, leading
fairgoers to the next whirly ride or
animal exhibit. Many a child has
undoubtedly begged their parents
for just one more walk through its
cow pens, or one more spool of
cotton candy from a stand set atop
its grounds.
Now, it’s time to say goodbye.
Make sure to make your way to
this year’s Umatilla County Fair,
held Tuesday through Saturday.
It’s the last to be held at these
fairgrounds before the big move next
year to the $12.9 million Eastern
Oregon Trade and Event Center in
Hermiston.
While there won’t be a formal
send-off for the event’s last year
at its location on West Orchard
Avenue, 2015’s entertainment sure
won’t disappoint. For the ¿rst time
— but certainly not the last — you’ll
be able to snap a sel¿e with Frank
Rendon’s Legendary Longhorns,
two gigantic steers who showed
themselves to be docile as doves
when they strode down Main Street
during Saturday’s parade. Also
keep an eye out for Curtis Carlyle,
the Portland-based showman who
has juggled and joked his way over
the last 15 years, performing at the
Kennedy Center in Washington,
D.C., to ports-of-call like Belize and
Hawaii.
Feeling nostalgic for the early
1990s? Head over to Warrant’s
main stage gig on Saturday. (Hint
hint: there will a pie-eating contest
the same day at 5 p.m. on the Coke
stage, and rumor has it there may be
cherries involved.)
Eighty years ago, the fair moved
to a new home. West Orchard
has been a good host those eight
decades, so fairgoers should take
the opportunity this week to give a
heartfelt, Umatilla County send-off
to the fairgrounds.
Fare thee well, fair.
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.
OTHER VIEWS
County can rescind
marijuana ban
East Oregonian editorial board is not privy to
committee’s hard work in recommending ban
O
nce again, in their “Tip of
the sand” decision to ban sales
the hat; kick in the pants”
of the drug in Umatilla County
of August 7, the editorial
rather than allowing them to
board of the East Oregonian
be able to purchase the drug
presents themselves as experts
anywhere they wish including,
on all things marijuana holding
perhaps, the produce section of
the only possible correct opinion
the neighborhood grocery store.
on the establishment of retail
I regret that neither the editors
marijuana stores and medical
nor their representatives attended
Bill
marijuana dispensaries. How
Elfering the Board of Commissioners
naïve.
meeting at the Umatilla County
Comment
The committee that was
Courthouse August 5, when the
formed to study the use of
matter was deliberated, discussed
medical marijuana dispensaries and
and determined.
make recommendations to the Board of
They complain about the Board of
Commissioners was not “stacked” as the
Commissioners lack of compassion.
editor might want one
Were they there?
to think. It consisted
Were they privy to
both of people who
the conversations
support and oppose
with constituents over
the use of marijuana,
the many months
people who know how
that this matter was
to draft regulations,
pending? Were they
people who would
at the conferences
need to enforce the
where pro’s and con’s
regulations and general
and legal implications
members of the
were discussed? How
community.
can they whine about
Hundreds of hours
a determination made
of work were given to
when they weren’t even
the task by hardworking, conscientious
there to hear the considerations upon
committee members; a 4-inch thick
which it was based? Nor have the editors
notebook detailing their study and
of the East Oregonian bothered to call and
deliberation was compiled in the process.
discuss the issue with a member of the
The editorial board did not attend a
Board of Commissioners. What can they
committee meeting nor have they read
really know of “the attitude of the three”
the notebook. Perhaps, they did not want
commissioners? They must consider
to hear conÀicting facts to their opinion.
themselves clairvoyant or, I guess, fact
The “kick” was a blatant slap in the face
doesn’t really matter for an editor.
to dedicated people who worked very
The editors don’t think “the ban
hard and very diligently on the matter; it
will last long.” It may not; the study
shamefully and wrongfully impugns their
committee remains active and decisions
integrity. They deserve the thanks from all can be changed as more is known. State
of us for the work they did.
regulation is vague and weak. And, they
The committee studied the issue
conÀict with federal regulations. When
extensively, debating concerns, often
those imperfections are corrected and
times emotionally, and, ultimately,
the board can come to a conclusion that
reaching a unanimous conclusion
medical or recreational marijuana is in the
in recommending to the Board of
best interests of the citizens of Umatilla
Commissioners that the drug not be sold
County, the matter can and may be
in Umatilla County for recreational or
revisited.
medical purposes.
Ŷ
The editor portrays the Board of
Bill Elfering is a Umatilla County
Commissioners as making a “head in
Commissioner.
The Umatilla
County
marijuana
committee
studied the issue
extensively.
America, no more the
land of opportunity
Y
AMHILL, Ore. — We like to
the medicine. That’s what put him in
boast of America as the “land
the hospital.
of opportunity,” and historically
And, yes, that was for his EX-wife.
there is truth to that.
Last year, I wrote a series titled
“We have never been a nation of
“When Whites Just Don’t Get It,”
haves and have-nots,” Sen. Marco
about race gaps (the reaction was not
Rubio once declared. “We are a nation
entirely enthusiastic!). I also think that
of haves and soon-to-haves, of people
many successful Americans “don’t
who have made it and of people who
Nicholas get” the income gulf.
will make it.”
Sean Reardon of Stanford
Kristof
That’s a lovely aspiration, the
University has calculated that the
Comment
vision that brought Rubio’s father to
race gap in student test scores has
the United States — and my father,
diminished, but that the class gap has
too. Yet I fear that by 2015 we’ve become
widened. A half-century ago, the black-white
the socially rigid society our forebears Àed,
test score gap was 50 percent greater than the
replicating the barriers and class gaps that
gap between the richest 10 percent and the
drove them away. That’s what the presidential poorest 10 percent. Now it is the other way
candidates should be debating.
around, with the class gap almost twice that of
Researchers have repeatedly found that in
the race gap.
the United States, there is
Consider that 77 percent
now less economic mobility
of adults in the top 25
than in Canada or much of
percent of incomes earn
Europe. A child born in the
a B.A. by age 24. Only
bottom quintile of incomes
9 percent of those in the
in the United States has only
bottom 25 percent do so.
a 4 percent chance of rising
Yet as Tim Wise notes in
to the top quintile, according
a forthcoming book, “Under
to a Pew study. A separate
the AfÀuence,” there’s an
(somewhat dated) study
“increasingly vituperative
found that in Britain, such a
narrative of cruelty” to those
child has about a 12 percent
at the bottom.
chance.
The musician Ted
By another measure,
Nugent once suggested that
“intergenerational income
the “takers” in society are
elasticity,” social mobility is
“entitlement chumps” and
twice as great for Canada as
“gluttonous, soulless pigs.”
for the United States. Alan
The conservative author
Krueger, a Princeton economist, has noted
Neal Boortz compared the poor to toenail
that in the United States, parents’ incomes
fungus.
correlate to their adult children’s incomes
Sure, entitlements are a legitimate issue
roughly as heights do. “The chance of a
for debate. But if you’re troubled by publicly
person who was born to a family in the bottom subsidized meals, what about the $12 billion
10 percent of the income distribution rising
in annual tax subsidies for corporate meals
to the top 10 percent as an adult is about the
and entertainment? And if you want to see a
same as the chance that a dad who is 5 feet 6
real scam, how about those zillionaires who
inches tall having a son who grows up to be
claim huge tax deductions for donating art to
over 6 feet 1 inch tall,” Krueger observed in a
their own nonpro¿t museums, which aren’t
speech. “It happens, but not often.”
even open to people dropping by?
I’ve been reÀecting on this because
I hear from people who say something like:
of a friend in my hometown, Yamhill,
I grew up poor, but I worked hard and I made
Oregon. Rick Goff was smart, talented and
it. If other people tried, they could, too. Bravo!
hardworking, but he faced an uphill struggle
Sure, there are extraordinary people who have
from birth; I wrote about him last year as
overcome mind-boggling hurdles. But they’re
an example of the aphorism that “talent is
like the NBA centers with short parents.
universal, but opportunity is not.”
Remember that disadvantage is less about
And now Rick is dead. He died of heart
income than environment. The best metrics
disease last month in his home in Yamhill at
of child poverty aren’t monetary, but rather
age 65.
how often a child is read to or hugged. Or,
I visited him the day before he died, as he
conversely, how often a child is beaten, how
was pained and struggling to walk, and I keep
often the home descends into alcohol-fueled
thinking of his prodigious talents that were
¿st¿ghts, whether there is lead poisoning,
never fully deployed because, in the United
whether ear infections go untreated. That’s a
States, too often the best predictor of where
poverty that is far harder to escape.
we end up is where we start.
Some think success is all about “choices”
Rick, who thought he was one-eighth
and “personal responsibility.” Yes, those are
American Indian, pretty much raised himself,
real, but it’s so much more complicated than
along with his brother and two sisters. His
that.
mom died when he was 5, and his dad — “a
“Rich kids make a lot of bad choices,”
professional drunk,” Rick once told me
Reardon notes. “They just don’t come with the
— abandoned the family. A grandmother
same sort of consequences.”
presided, and the kids hunted and ¿shed to put
Rick acknowledged that he had made
food on the table.
bad choices. He drank, took drugs and was
School might have been an escalator to a
arrested about 30 times. But he also found
better life, for Rick had a terri¿c mind, but as
the strength to give up alcohol when he
a boy he had an undiagnosed attention de¿cit
felt he was turning into his father. What
disorder and teachers wrote him off. In the
distinguished Rick wasn’t primarily bad
eighth grade, the principal punished Rick for
choices, but intelligence, hard work and lack
skipping school by suspending him for six
of opportunity.
months. Rick was thrilled. By 10th grade he
So let’s just drop the social Darwinism.
had dropped out for good.
Success is not a sign of virtue. It’s mostly a
Rick worked in lumber mills and machine
sign that your grandparents did well.
shops, then became a talented custom painter
Meanwhile, more children in America
of cars. After his hand was mashed in an
live in poverty now (22 percent at last count)
accident, he survived on disability and odd
than at the start of the ¿nancial crisis in 200
jobs. His phone worked when he had enough
(1 percent). They grow up not in a “land of
money to pay the bills.
opportunity,” but in the kind of socially rigid
He married twice and divorced twice,
hierarchies that our ancestors Àed, the kind
raised children as a single dad, and was a
of society in which your outcome is largely
loyal friend to everyone around. A few years
determined by your beginning.
ago, Rick was slowly mending from a serious
Now, that’s what the presidential candidates
illness, dependent on a crucial medicine.
should be discussing.
Then he abruptly weakened and had to be
Ŷ
hospitalized.
Nicholas Kristof grew up on a sheep and
It turned out that his ex-wife’s car had been cherry farm in Yamhill. A columnist for The
towed and she had needed to pay a fee to get it New York Times since 2001, he won the
back. So Rick had given her $600 and skipped Pulitzer Prize two times, in 1990 and 2006.
A friend
in Yamhill
was smart,
talented and
hardworking,
but he faced an
uphill struggle
from birth.
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.