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OPINION
East Oregonian
Tuesday, June 14, 2016
OTHER VIEWS
Founded October 16, 1875
KATHRYN B. BROWN
DANIEL WATTENBURGER
Publisher
Managing Editor
JENNINE PERKINSON
TIM TRAINOR
Advertising Director
Opinion Page Editor
OUR VIEW
Make certain
drinking water is safe
Some believe lead contributed
Many homes and commercial
buildings in rural Oregon date from a
to the fall of the Roman Empire.
time before there was much concern
Heavily used in ancient times for
about lead. Even some relatively new
many purposes including sweetening
homes have the potential of exposing
wine, it caused an array of illnesses
residents to unacceptable levels of
— everything from neurological
lead and copper — the latter also can
damage to sterility. Added to paint
and gasoline in 20th century America, cause health problems. It wasn’t until
it is thought lead’s corrosive effects on 1991 that the federal Safe Drinking
brains and bodies contributed to youth Water Act began heightening
awareness of the
violence and poor
issue. The federal
school performance
Testing and prompt Centers for Disease
by inner-city kids.
The quantity of
Control and
remediation of
lead found in drinking
Prevention suggests
water in some Oregon
“only cold
plumbing systems using
schools is far below
water from the
the astronomical
that leach lead into tap for drinking,
levels that once
cooking, and making
water is essential — baby formula. Hot
caused devastating
diseases. But parents,
water is more likely
children and oficials the sooner the better. to contain higher
are right to exercise
levels of lead. Most
great caution when it comes to
of the lead in household water
lead. Even a cursory search on the
usually comes from the plumbing in
internet for information about lead
your house, not from the local water
exposure turns up literally millions
supply.”
of frightening references. Symptoms
Lead paint was commonly used
include everything from learning
until 1978, and children can absorb
dificulties and loss of appetite to
it by eating cracked and peeling
hearing loss and constipation.
paint or playing in rooms or soil
Modern-day Oregon parents aren’t contaminated with paint dust. Take
inclined to take such news sitting
precautions to avoid having children
down, particularly after shocking
spend time in pre-1978 houses that
news of widespread lead exposure
are in the midst of renovation, which
and oficial indifference in Flint,
can spread lead dust. In all pre-1978
Michigan.
buildings, assume that the paint has
Eastern Oregon schools are at
lead unless tests show otherwise. The
various stages of conducting tests of
CDC advises, “Because household
drinking water. Statewide, Gov. Kate
dust is a major source of lead, you
Brown has recommended tests by
should wet-mop loors and wet-wipe
school districts and licensed child care horizontal surfaces every 2-3 weeks.”
facilities — the state doesn’t have
None of this is panic-worthy.
legal authority to insist on these tests. Rational precautions by families and
It’s obvious that everyone who
school oficials will substantially
looks after children should make
lower any risk that might stem
certain drinking water is safe. Testing from low-level lead exposure. But
and prompt remediation of plumbing it is worth paying attention to, and
systems that leach lead into water is
making certain authorities follow
essential — the sooner the better.
through on their promises.
The scope of the
Orlando carnage
T
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.
hese locations are never
complaints on social media about
random. These targets aren’t
his own lack of support for issues
accidental. They’re the very
important to LGBT people. Those
vocabulary in which assailants like
complaints have merit.
the Orlando gunman speak, and he
But this isn’t a moment for
identity politics, which could muddle
chose a place where there’s drinking.
the signiicance of the carnage.Yes,
And dancing. And where LGBT
that carnage exposed the special
people congregate, feeling a sense of
vulnerability of LGBT Americans to
welcome, of belonging.
Frank
violent extremists, recommending
That last detail is in the
Bruni
special levels of security. And there
foreground of the deadliest mass
Comment
was a frightening coda to it on the
shooting in American history — and
opposite coast, in the Los Angeles
rightly so.
area, where a man with an arsenal of
But let’s be clear: This was no more
weapons was arrested en route to gay pride
an attack just on LGBT people than the
festivities.
bloodshed at the ofices of Charlie Hebdo in
But the threat isn’t only to LGBT
Paris was an attack solely on satirists.
Americans, as past acts of terror have shown
Both were attacks on freedom itself.
and as everyone today must recognize.
Both took aim at societies that, at their best,
All Americans are under attack, and not
integrate and celebrate diverse points of
view, diverse systems of belief, diverse ways exclusively because of whom we drink,
dance or sleep with, but because of our
to love. And to speak of either massacre
bedrock belief that we should not be
more narrowly than that is to miss the
subservient to any one ideology or any
greater message, the more pervasive danger
one religion. That offends and inlames the
and the truest stakes.
zealots of the world.
We don’t yet know all that much about
Often our politicians can’t ind their
Omar Mateen, who pulled the trigger,
voices. Sometimes their words are
again and again, in a nightclub whose name
poignantly right.
connotes life, not death: Pulse. We’ll be
President Barack Obama, speaking about
learning more in the hours and days to come,
the victims Sunday afternoon, said: “The
including just how potently homophobia
place where they were attacked is more
in particular factored into his actions, how
than a nightclub. It is a place of solidarity
much ideological inluence the Islamic
and empowerment where people have come
State or other extremists had, how extensive
together to raise awareness, to speak their
his planning was, how far back he began
minds and to advocate for their civil rights.
plotting this, and how much he knew about
So this is a sobering reminder that attacks on
Pulse itself and the speciic composition of
any American, regardless of race, ethnicity,
its crowd on different nights of the week.
But we can assume — no, we can be sure religion or sexual orientation, is an attack
on all of us and on the fundamental values
— that he was lashing out at an America
of equality and dignity that deine us as a
at odds with his darker, smaller, more
country.”
oppressive mindset. The people inside Pulse
And this was Eric Garcetti, the Los
were citizens of it. More to the point, they
Angeles mayor, at a news conference:
were emblems of it. In Pulse they found a
“Today we know that we are targeted as
refuge. In Pulse they found joy. To him they
deserved neither. And he communicated that Americans, because this is a society where
we love broadly and openly, because we
with an assault rile and bullets.
have Jews and Christians and Muslims and
The Islamic State and its ilk are
atheists and Buddhists marching together,
brutal to gay people, whom they treat in
because we are white, black, brown, Asian,
unthinkable ways. They throw gay people
Native American. The whole spectrum and
from rooftops. The footage is posted online.
every hue and every culture is here.”
It’s bloodcurdling, but it’s not unique. In
It was a perfect description of the country
countries throughout the world, to be gay is
to be in mortal danger. To embrace love is to I love.
And it was an equally perfect description
court death.
of what the Orlando gunman couldn’t bear.
That’s crucial context for what
■
happened in Orlando, and Orlando is an
Frank Bruni is a New York Times
understandable prompt for questions about
columnist and the author of the bestseller
our own degrees of inclusion and fairness
and whether we do all that we should to keep about George W. Bush called “Ambling into
History” and the co-author of “A Gospel
LGBT people safe. We don’t.
of Shame: Children, Sexual Abuse and the
As Florida Gov. Rick Scott spoke
Catholic Church.”
publicly of his heartache Sunday, I saw
YOUR VIEWS
Trees a bane of Main Street
The clean water act sets a standard for
storm sewer wastewater, which evidently
can no longer be dumped directly into rivers
and streams. The city of Portland has run
into a stumbling block attempting to comply.
The culprit is leaves from the many trees
throughout the city. Recently our sewer rates
in Pendleton have been raised and more
increases are expected to come as the city
attempts to comply with the storm sewer
requirements. Now we’ve been told by the
public works director that the street sweeper
is not intended to clean streets, but to clean
debris from the gutters so as not to enter the
storm drain system. That doesn’t seem to be
working, since many of the gutters are being
missed because of vehicle and RV parking.
Down yonder in the Parks Department,
we’ve formed a Tree Committee to ensure
that we plant more trees and establish a
street tree program so we can be listed as
a “Tree Friendly Community” like Echo.
It’s pretty evident that from the experience
we’ve had with street trees on Main Street
that one of the worst enemies of sidewalks
and streets is in fact street trees. Now, our
beloved Public Works Department, the one
that has meticulously maintained our streets, is
proposing to plant street trees along Southeast
Eighth Street with the replacement of the
bridge, street and sidewalks with no intention
of maintaining the trees. Think 25 years down
the road what those property owners will be
left dealing with. I get the feeling the public
works director simply doesn’t care because
he’ll be long gone. Is being listed as a “Tree
Friendly City” that important?
Personally, I’d just like to drive down
Main Street and see all those fancy street
lights working for longer than a month. Last
Thursday evening, nine of the lights were not
working if you count the one in Brownield
Park and one in front of the arts center.
Rick Rohde
Pendleton
Birth defects a red herring
in transgender debate
The East Oregonian and Ron Gavette have
both twisted my May 25 letter, which the EO
mis-titled “When people switch gender, good
becomes evil.” My words were: “To force a
policy on our youth where boys who in their
own eyes think they are girls are encouraged
to use girls’ bathrooms and locker rooms is to
call evil good.” The innocent kids are not evil
but the policy is.
In an effort to justify the genderless
anti-God bathroom policy of the socialist
progressives, Gavette documents those
born with “ambiguous genitalia” claiming
scripture “does not address this issue” and
“a fundamentalist like Stuart Dick will not
acknowledge (this) reality.”
Fundamentalists like Stuart Dick do
address scripture, the inerrant word of a
loving Heavenly Father, to answer issues
Ron Gavette cannot. Ambiguous genitalia is
a birth defect that affects 1 of 4,500 births.
Jesus was asked who caused these kinds of
birth defects (in this case blindness). “Neither
has this man sinned, nor his parents, but that
the works of God should be made manifest
in him.” (John 9:3) All human beings are
precious to God and even those with birth
defects like ambiguous genitalia are created
in His image and precious in His sight. With
parental counseling, doctor support (including
genetic and endocrinologist) support groups
and proper counseling these children can have
fulilling, productive and satisfying lives.
Unfortunately, those that force genderless
bathroom and locker room policies that
put men in women’s bathrooms use rare
birth defects like ambiguous genitalia as
justiication to make confused kids believe
they are transgender. This is unconscionable,
Mr. Gavette. Presently three states, California,
New Jersey and Massachusetts, have
passed laws barring psychiatrists even with
parental permission from striving to restore
gender feeling to a transgender person.
The only transgender counseling allowed
in government schools today is sex change
operations. Documented studies have
discovered 70 to 80 percent of children that
experience transgender feelings spontaneously
lose those feelings over time.
The truth is, those that would
fundamentally change American moral values
concerning gender, marriage between one man
and one woman and sexual idelity could care
less about ambiguous genitalia or other birth
defects. Two thirds of women are screened for
such birth defects and 70 to 80 percent will be
persuaded to abort that precious baby made in
God’s image. Doctors that fail to detect such
birth defects can be sued.
Stuart Dick
Irrigon
Gas tax debate lowers prices
I feel the city of Pendleton should put the
gas tax on the ballot again. At least while it
is being debated locals could enjoy the lower
gas prices surrounding communities do.
Pendleton’s gas was cheaper than anyone’s
back then.
Robert Doherty
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 newspa-
per reserves the right to withhold letters that address concerns about individual ser-
vices 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.