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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 1, 2015)
Page 4A OPINION East Oregonian Thursday, October 1, 2015 Founded October 16, 1875 KATHRYN B. BROWN DANIEL WATTENBURGER Publisher Managing Editor JENNINE PERKINSON TIM TRAINOR Advertising Director Opinion Page Editor OUR VIEW Appointment of Boardman farmer adds to diversity The Oregon Board of Agriculture is a 10-person advisory body whose job is to provide a sounding board for state Agriculture Director Katy Coba on the many issues facing farmers and ranchers. To do that requires a board with expertise and a broad perspective. Current members run family IDUPVDJULEXVLQHVVHVGLYHUVL¿HG operations, ranches, urban farms and have even administered the state Department of Environmental Quality. They come from across the state — Klamath Falls, Portland and Eastern Oregon. It may be among the most diverse boards the Department of Agriculture has ever had. As such, it aptly and ably represents the state’s 35,439 farmers and ranchers. If we were asked our opinion about adding a member of the board, we would suggest someone who was involved in dairy production, organic crop production, alternative energy, labor relations, conservation set-asides and innovative cropping systems. Such a person could offer value to any agriculture-related advisory board. Gov. Kate Brown last week appointed Marty Myers, general manager of Threemile Canyon Farms in Boardman, to the board. The appointment was a master stroke. Myers brings with him a unique set of tools and experience WKDWFDQEHQH¿WWKHERDUGDQGWKH state Department of Agriculture by providing insight unavailable from other sources. Having worked on small farms during high school and college, Myers now manages one of the most diverse farms in the West. The farm’s 32,000-cow milking herd produces 2 million pounds of milk a day that is made into Tillamook cheese. The farm converts the manure into electricity using an anaerobic digester that produces a third of the farm’s power needs. The byproduct of that power production is used to fertilize the crops, which include 7,450 acres of organic vegetables and 6,100 acres of potatoes. Crops include corn, wheat, alfalfa, mint, peas, green beans, carrots and onions on a total of 39,500 acres. The farm also raises its own replacement heifers and 7,000 steers in addition to a nursery for its calves. It grows its own seed potatoes and has a 23,000-acre conservation set-aside. It also employs 330 people year-round — many of them union members — and 400 people seasonally with an annual payroll of more than $10 million. By any measure, Threemile Canyon is a unique and cutting-edge farm that has pioneered many aspects of sustainable production. Yet the appointment of Myers to the board has been criticized in some quarters as a sellout to “big ag.” The Friends of Family Farmers group was particularly vociferous in its complaints that the state would somehow “take agriculture in the direction of industrialization.” While we understand the group sees itself as an advocate of small farms, the appointment of a single person who manages a large farm cannot be characterized as pushing one type of farming any more than the appointment of an urban farmer denotes a shift toward plowing up the streets of Portland to plant crops. Decisions about the size and scope of individual farms are made by farmers, not in the Capitol in Salem or by the state board of agriculture. What other groups think of those decisions is beside the point. Large or small, organic or conventional, livestock or crops, farming is rapidly evolving. Many farms, large and small, are adopting cropping systems that involve a combination of crops similar to how Threemile Canyon operates. The Board of Agriculture met last week with Myers as its newest member. He will provide a needed voice on a diverse body that will help the state navigate the many issues facing agriculture in the 21st century. 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. 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 211 S.E. Byers Ave. Pendleton, OR 97801 or email editor@eastoregonian.com. EO should appreciate, not attack work of EOTEC board The East Oregonian’s Saturday editorial excoriated the Eastern Oregon Trade & Events Center Authority Board members for everything except supporting ISIS — without a word of encouragement or appreciation for their years of work, or the visionary endeavor itself. While the project is short of money, the EO editors totally ignore what the project has and eventually will accomplish: garnered $8.5 million of state (not local) grant money that would never have come to Umatilla County and Hermiston without this project; saved the Hermiston School District from having to build a second high school at an estimated $70 million cost to its taxpayers; saved Umatilla County from wasting $8 million, which would have been necessary to replace failing underground infrastructure at the old fairgrounds; will jump start development on the south side of Hermiston; and will remove a 27-acre chain link fenced blighted area in the middle of Hermiston, eventually to be replaced by new high school buildings and grounds. $V,KDYHVDLGVLQFH,¿UVW became involved in this endeavor, “It will change the face of Hermiston forever.” The EO editors completely overlook the overwhelming support this project has received from the city of Hermiston, Umatilla County, Hermiston School District, Umatilla County Fair Board, Farm City Pro Rodeo, State Representative Greg Smith and Senator Bill Hansell, and all the other people who have worked long and hard to make the fair move and EOTEC a reality. Only the EO editors seek to drag it down — as they have from the beginning. As the EO editors savage EOTEC and its visionary and hard-working board, I remember what Joe Burns once told me when I was being attacked in a worthy endeavor: “When an elephant walks through the forest, does it heed the chattering of monkeys in the trees?” George Anderson Hermiston Abortion videos were doctored, are frauds This is a response to a letter in the weekend edition of the East Oregonian last week. One seldom reads a newspaper letter so well crafted and written, and my hat is off to the writer for using “whom” OTHER VIEWS Hillary Clinton’s pajama party S he had a law career, an ambitious added, referring to progressive young DJHQGDDV¿UVWODG\DQLQGXVWULRXV women. “But if they’re not already stint in the Senate, those years getting Lena Dunham and her cohorts, and miles as secretary of state. they’re in even bigger trouble than I And it has come to this: In a bid to thought.” seem less stuffy and turn the page on I think that Clinton is actually a beleaguered (yet again) presidential in less trouble than we sometimes campaign, Hillary Clinton is chatting speculate. She remains the with Lena Dunham about singer Lenny overwhelming favorite for the Frank Kravitz’s penis. Democratic nomination. Bruni You can watch the video yourself. But her campaign so far is an Comment It’s a jokey promotion for an interview unimpressive dress rehearsal for the of Clinton just published in a new general election. It’s devoid of soul newsletter that Dunham is putting out. You and sweep, a series of labored gestures and can also see a comedic sketch of Dunham’s precisely staked positions. Constituency by arrival at Clinton’s campaign headquarters in constituency, leftward adjustment by leftward Brooklyn and the make-believe adjustment, she and her aides refusal of a Clinton gatekeeper slog and muscle their way to let her in. There’s even a forward. cameo by Amy Schumer. And they contradict The interview itself covers the adage that a politician Clinton’s biography and some campaigns in poetry and serious terrain, including governs in prose. Clinton feminism and the relationship campaigns in something more between African-Americans like a PowerPoint presentation. and the police. Prose would be an upgrade. But it’s in large part a Poetry is light years away. Dunham-Clinton love-in, That’s what Democratic a pajama party minus the strategist David Axelrod was pajamas, ostensibly in keeping getting at when, about two with the Clinton campaign’s weeks ago, he tweeted: “It’s recent pledge to roll out a still HRC’s to lose, despite warmer, funnier version of the candidate. I’ve new polls. But it’s hard to inspire w/grinding, lost count of which version we’re on. tactical race. ‘Hillary: Live With It’ is no In the promotional video, Clinton kids that rallying cry!” because Dunham’s newsletter and the website No it isn’t, not even if Dunham and associated with it are called Lenny, she half Schumer put funny faces on it. It’s to expected that the person coming to question Dunham’s shrewd credit that she grabbed a her might be Kravitz. piece of the action. It serves her well. Dunham then mentions some viral footage But for Clinton? It’s a contrivance. of a Kravitz wardrobe malfunction: “His stuff Earlier this month, The New York Times’ fell out of his pants.” Amy Chozick interviewed her aides and Clinton feigns fascination. “I’ll look for reported that there would be “new efforts that,” she says. to bring spontaneity to a candidacy that I blame us in part. For years we’ve sometimes seems wooden and overly demanded that she show us something more cautious.” raw, that she weep or bleed or chirp or quip, An effort at spontaneity: that’s the prompt that a policy wonk isn’t enough, that a résumé for sitting down with Dunham — who assures is only the start. Clinton that she’s a fashion icon and implores We’ve reminded her of how nimbly her her to wear dresses that show her shoulders husband pivoted from noonday speech to — and it’s the oxymoronic story of Clinton’s late-night saxophone. We’ve insisted that our political life. presidents and would-be presidents not only She is routinely reintroducing herself, inspire but also divert us. And we’ve pumped forever trumpeting the real Hillary this time, up the scandals, ratcheting up the pressure on constantly promising the unguarded Hillary. her to feed us distractions. But the real Hillary has always been there, %XWVWLOO,¶PEDIÀHG+RZFDQKHUUHVSRQVH the thread running through all the changes in to charges that she’s too packaged and costumes and hairstyles and campaign events. 6KHLV¿HUFHO\LQWHOOLJHQWEXW\HVZLOGO\ calculating be this packaged and calculated? defensive. She does her homework with And to counter her image as entrenched uncommon diligence and earnestness but can political royalty, why would she enlist stars be a dud on the stump. She’s impressively whose presence merely emphasizes her pull with, and membership in, the glittery world of controlled. She’s distressingly controlling. There’s more than enough good in that celebrity? PL[IRUYRWHUVWRPDNHSHDFHZLWKLW%XW¿UVW “Insane,” said one Democratic operative Clinton has to make peace with it herself. when I sought his reaction. Ŷ “It’s a transparent and ham-handed Frank Bruni joined the New York Times in attempt to appeal to a niche audience that the FDPSDLJQKDVLGHQWL¿HGDVDFULWLFDOWDUJHW´KH 1995. YOUR VIEWS correctly. Whom is nearly dead, and I do enjoy seeing it used, and especially used correctly. The writer makes it clear that she is a Republican, and she manages to let us know that she has little like for those liberal Democrats. She does, however, point out that she agrees with Democrats on global warming and on the need to help refugees from the unrest in the Islamic world. But the real point of her letter is her concern about the “calloused brutality” related to abortion that is shown in some videos; and I’d like to clarify something about the main video, which Carly Fiorina discussed in the second Republican presidential debate. It shows an aborted live fetus on a table while voices discuss keeping it alive in order to harvest its brain. Abortion, I realize, is a touchy issue, and I have no intention of taking either a pro or a con position here. I can say that, in the course of my life, I have known several women who have had abortions, but I have never known one who had a second. Abortion seems not to be something that most women resort to lightly or without anguish. It seems normally to be the result of some drastic situation, so I would KRSHWKDWWKRVH¿UPO\RSSRVHG to abortion would also keep in Her campaign so far is ... devoid of soul and sweep, a series of labored gestures. mind the needs of those women who feel themselves forced by circumstances into such a procedure. But the video under discussion is a fraud. This has been laid out in great detail by PolitiFact, and one can read the entire discussion by going to www.politifact.com. The evidence is too voluminous for me to attempt to present it within the limits of a letter like this, but one of the most telling points is that there is no way to know whether what one sees is an aborted fetus, a miscarriage, or a premature birth. The whole thing is a pastiche of different images and discussions. Lest Republican readers of this page think that PolitiFact is some nefarious liberal lying blog, let me point out that it regularly catches President Obama expanding — VRPHWLPHVVLJQL¿FDQWO\²WKH amount of success that his various policies have. The journalistic undertaking is politically neutral and seeks only the truth. I recommend that people interested in politics consult it regularly. Jack T. Sanders Pendleton Next Speaker can improve government There was two opinions published in a recent East Oregonian that dealt with two of the problems of our current government. One was about representative Walden and how he might deal with the labor problem of agricultural operations that require intensive seasonal help. Since most of the help is temporary and seasonal, it is ¿OOHGPRVWO\E\LPPLJUDQWODERU that requires working through immigration programs. This requires much time and sometimes the crops spoil before labor is obtained. The other opinion article by Paul Krugman was about John Boehner’s resignation of being Speaker of the House. It has been suggested that in order for citizens to be properly informed that they must be aware of both opinions of Democrats and Republicans. Paul Krugman represents the liberal viewpoint, which is big government with much spending, and John Boehner was the leader of the opposing viewpoint. Many of the Republicans became anxious about the direction of government and blamed Boehner for slowing things down. The election of the next speaker of the house will hopefully improve our government. Don Peterson Pendleton
