Page 4A
OPINION
East Oregonian
Saturday, October 8, 2016
Founded October 16, 1875
KATHRYN B. BROWN
Publisher
DANIEL WATTENBURGER
Managing Editor
TIM TRAINOR
Opinion Page Editor
MARISSA WILLIAMS
Regional Advertising Director
MARCY ROSENBERG
Circulation Manager
JANNA HEIMGARTNER
Business Ofice Manager
MIKE JENSEN
Production Manager
EO MEDIA GROUP
East Oregonian • The Daily Astorian • Capital Press • Hermiston Herald
Blue Mountain Eagle • Wallowa County Chieftain • Chinook Observer • Coast River Business Journal
Oregon Coast Today • Coast Weekend • Seaside Signal • Cannon Beach Gazette
Eastern Oregon Real Estate Guide • Eastern Oregon Marketplace • Coast Marketplace
OnlyAg.com • FarmSeller.com • Seaside-Sun.com • NorthwestOpinions.com • DiscoverOurCoast.com
OUR VIEW
Five choices,
only four chairs
After a major shakeup four years ago, it seems the tone of Hermiston
politics is back to where it was before.
In the at-large city council election of 2012, when four seats were up for
grabs, a ield of eight candidates iled for the job.
There was displeasure about the handling of former police chief Dan
Coulombe, who resigned in February of that year after 13 months of paid
leave and was found by an outside investigator to have fostered a culture of
fear within the department that went unaddressed for
years.
On top of that, there was frustration about a city
council that met for just a few minutes every other
week to perform the perfunctory duties of a public
body, but didn’t discuss, much less disagree, on any
aspect of the city’s operation.
A recall was attempted in 2012 against half the
council and the mayor, but failed. In the November
election four newcomers made the case that change
was needed, and two — John Kirwan and Doug
Primmer — were elected to the council.
The culture shifted. Council meetings became a
more potent discussion of the city’s path forward.
Manuel Gutierrez
New committees formed to get the public involved
with the process. New initiatives and ideas were
publicly championed and debated by councilors instead of merely approved
by them.
But as much as things are different, at least one thing is back to the way
it was: our at-large election is a choice between ive
people — four incumbents and one newcomer. In the
three elections prior to 2012, the ballot also included
just four or ive options for four seats.
Voters will be asked to select four of the ive,
effectively making this an odd-man-out ballot. The
East Oregonian editorial board sat down with the
ive candidates this week, but didn’t feel any of
the candidates rose to the “must-elect” category, or
earned the “don’t elect” tag.
So instead of endorsing which four to put on the
council — or which candidate to toss — we’ll give a
brief synopsis of each and how they would it on the
Rod Hardin
council if elected.
• Manuel Gutierrez has become an important
voice on the council as a surrogate for poor citizens,
often asking aloud at meetings what the effect of
new costs and fees will have on those with small or
ixed incomes. He said he believes the city has been
warranted in its aggressive approach to development
in the last four years with projects such as the Eastern
Oregon Trade and Event Center, Harkenrider Center
and Northeast Oregon Water Association. If you’re
looking out for the little guy in this growing city,
Gutierrez is your man.
• Rod Hardin is the longest serving councilor. He
is looking to take on one last term to complete the
transition from former city manager Ed Brookshier to
Byron Smith. He’s deeply knowledgeable and widely John Kirwan
connected (nearly three decades on the council will
do that), and said he is concerned that if too many
councilors had individual agendas it would bring
a stalemate to the “team.” But he was also silent
member of that “team” when Hermiston government
was facing serious problems. If you’re looking for
experience, plenty good and some bad, Hardin should
get your vote.
• John Kirwan came onto the council ready to
tangle, and for the irst part of his term butted heads
as he learned the process. But as he has developed
in his seat, Kirwan has been more careful to pick his
battles and learned to work as part of a team while
maintaining a unique viewpoint. He said the next nine
months are crucial to EOTEC’s success, and he wants
the city to be a more active and engaged participant
Doug Primmer
in that process. If you want a more hands on and
impassioned approach to city governance, Kirwan
its the bill.
• Doug Primmer represents the everyman, and goes out of his way to
set aside personal views for what the voters want.
For instance, despite his wariness about marijuana,
he agreed to put retail sales to the voters this fall. He
told us he wants to make the city what people want
it to be. He’s most proud of the city’s planned bus
agreement with Kayak coming in January, and the
fact that he has only missed two council meetings in
four years. If you’re looking for that kind of show-up-
and-do-the-job ethic, Primmer is your man.
• Mark Gomolski is the newcomer to the ield,
and to Hermiston. He spent his career in government
in Chicago and surrounding Cook County and retired
to Hermiston in 2015, quickly joining the political
arena here as Umatilla County Commissioner Bill
Mark Gomolski
Elfering’s campaign manager. He indicated he’s
more than willing to vote against the majority.
Gomolski said he voted against the West Umatilla County Fire District
consolidation in the spring, and said he has serious questions about the
recently approved city bus service and another Hermiston schools bond. If
you’re looking for a councilor who is somewhere on the spectrum between
contrarian and cynic, Gomolski its.
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
Intimacy for the avoidant
O
ver the past generation there
by the web.
seems to have been a decline
“By rapidly substituting virtual
in the number of high-quality
reality for reality,” Sullivan wrote, “we
friendships.
are diminishing the scope of [intimate]
In 1985, most Americans told
interaction even as we multiply the
pollsters that they had about three
number of people with whom we
conidants, people with whom they
interact. We remove or drastically
could share everything. Today, the
ilter all the information we might
majority of people say they have about
get by being with another person. We
David
two. In 1985, 10 percent of Americans
Brooks reduce them to some outlines — a
said they had no one to fully conide
Facebook ‘friend,’ an Instagram photo,
Comment
in, but by the start of this century 25
a text message — in a controlled and
percent of Americans said that.
sequestered world that exists largely
All of this has left people wondering if
free of the sudden eruptions or encumbrances
technology is making us lonelier. Instead of
of actual human interaction. We become
going over to the neighbor’s house, are we
each other’s ‘contacts,’ eficient shadows of
sitting at home depressingly suring everybody
ourselves.”
At saturation level, social
else’s perfect lives on
media reduces the amount
Facebook?
of time people spend in
Over the past decade, the
uninterrupted solitude,
best research has suggested
the time when people can
that no, technology and
excavate and process their
social media are not making
internal states. It encourages
us lonelier. These things are
social multitasking: You’re
tools. It’s what you bring
with the people you’re
to Facebook that matters.
with, but you’re also
Socially engaged people
monitoring the 6 billion
use it to further engage;
other people who might be
lonely people use it to mask
communicating something
loneliness.
more interesting from far
As Stephen Marche put
away. It lattens the range of
it in The Atlantic in 2012,
emotional experiences.
“Using social media doesn’t
As Louis C.K. put it in a TV appearance,
create new social networks; it just transfers
“You never feel completely sad or completely
established networks from one platform to
happy. You just feel kinda satisied with your
another.”
But recently, people’s views of social media products. And then you die.”
Perhaps phone addiction is making it harder
have grown a bit darker. That’s because we
seem to be hitting some sort of saturation level. to be the sort of person who is good at deep
friendship. In lives that are already crowded
Being online isn’t just something we do. It has
and stressful, it’s easier to let banter crowd out
become who we are, transforming the very
emotional presence. There are a thousand ways
nature of the self.
online to divert with a joke or a happy face
Earlier this year, Jacob Weisberg had a
emoticon. You can have a day of happy touch
ine essay in The New York Review of Books
points without any of the scary revelations,
reporting that, according to a British study,
or the boring, awkward or uncontrollable
we check our phones on average 221 times a
moments that constitute actual intimacy.
day — about every 4.3 minutes.
When Montaigne was describing the
A decade ago almost no one had a
smartphone. Now the average American spends accumulating intimacy he enjoyed with his best
friend, he described an emotional interaction
5 1/2 hours a day with digital media, and the
that was full and progressive: “It was not one
young spend far more time. A study of female
special consideration, nor two, nor three, nor
students at Baylor University found that they
four, nor a thousand; it was some mysterious
spent 10 hours a day on their phones.
quintessence of all this mixture which
A lot of this trafic is driven by the fear
possessed itself of my will and led it to plunge
of missing out. Somebody may be posting
something on Snapchat that you’d like to know and lose itself in his; which possessed his whole
will and led it, with a similar hunger, and a like
about, so you’d better constantly be checking.
impulse, to plunge and lose itself in mine.”
The trafic is also driven by what the industry
When we’re addicted to online life, every
executives call “captology.” The apps generate
moment is fun and diverting, but the whole
small habitual behaviors, like swiping right or
liking a post, that generate ephemeral dopamine thing is profoundly unsatisfying. I guess a
modern version of heroism is regaining control
bursts. Any second that you’re feeling bored,
of social impulses, saying no to a thousand
lonely or anxious, you feel this deep hunger to
shallow contacts for the sake of a few daring
open an app and get that burst.
plunges.
Last month, Andrew Sullivan published a
■
moving and much-discussed essay in New York
David Brooks became a New York Times
magazine titled “I Used to Be a Human Being”
Op-Ed columnist in September 2003.
about what it’s like to have your soul hollowed
The average
American spends
5 1/2 hours a
day with digital
media, and the
young spend far
more time.
YOUR VIEWS
Trump’s immigration policies
would make country safer
Donald J. Trump in his campaign for
president has identiied illegal immigration
and the crimes committed by illegal
immigrants as signiicant problems facing
our country. Trump has an immigration plan
centered on national security and public
safety.
Any concerned citizen voter who wants to
validate Trump’s stand on illegal immigrant
crime can simply go to the U.S. Federal
Bureau of Prisons inmates statistics website
and add up the most recent numbers on inmate
citizenship.
It indicates 42,401 prisoners in the federal
prison system were foreign nationals; that’s
over 22 percent of federal prison population.
In the federal prison system there were 28,264
Mexican nationals incarcerated; they were
66.7 percent of the foreign nationals in federal
prisons.
The U.S. Federal Bureau of Prisons
breaks down the federal prison population
into 13 types of offenses. Federal prisons had
15,990 inmates, 8.8 percent, incarcerated for
immigration crimes.
The U.S. Department of Homeland
Security has two components, U.S.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement
and U.S. Customs and Border Protection
that are at the forefront of enforcing federal
immigration law.
Two groups, the National Immigration and
Customs Enforcement Council, the union of
ICE oficers, and the National Border Patrol
Council, the union of CBP Agents, have
endorsed Donald J. Trump for President of the
United States of America.
David Olen Cross
Salem
Oregon residents should
receive Oregon TV stations
As a subscriber to a satellite television
provider in Wallowa, my “local” stations
come from Spokane. This provides me with
zero information as to what is important
in Oregon. If not for OPB radio, not TV, I
would get no information concerning what is
happening in my state.
I have looked to elected oficials and
others that I thought were in position to do
something to ix this but have only been
disappointed.
Two questions: Am I the only person
effected by this blackout who cares? And what
is it going to take to get this corrected?
Roger Eagan
Wallowa
LETTERS POLICY: The East Oregonian welcomes original letters of 400 words or less on public issues and public policies for publication. Submitted letters must be signed
by the author and include the city of residence and a daytime phone number. Send letters to 211 S.E. Byers Ave. Pendleton, OR 97801 or email editor@eastoregonian.com.