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OPINION
East Oregonian
Tuesday, December 6, 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 Office Manager
MIKE JENSEN
Production Manager
OUR VIEW
A legacy of
statesmanship
Hardy Myers was a gentleman.
That is a too-rare quality in
today’s political climate, but it was
more of the norm during Myers’
long tenure as a legislator, speaker
of the Oregon House and attorney
general. Myers, who died Tuesday
at 77, will be
remembered as
one of the last of
his breed, as well
as a statesman in
his own right.
For
generations, “The
Oregon Way”
— innovation
and collaboration
despite partisan Hardy Myers
differences —
governed state politics.
Remnants of that time, when
the common good often trumped
party affiliation and political ego,
still remain. For example, Oregon
candidates rarely indicate their party
affiliation on their lawn signs and in
their fliers, whereas in neighboring
Washington state, political party is
featured prominently in campaign
materials. And in contrast with other
states, Oregon officials don’t plaster
their names all over “Welcome to
Oregon” signs; they usually drive
their own cars instead of being
chauffeured; and they commonly
are on a first-name basis with
constituents, as was “Hardy.”
In that spirit of commonality
a decade ago, Democratic state
Senate President Peter Courtney and
Republican House Speaker Karen
Minnis worked together to improve
the antiquated conditions at the
Oregon State Hospital, where “One
Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest” was
filmed, and to lay the groundwork
for new psychiatric hospitals in
Salem and Junction City.
It’s no surprise that Courtney
reacted to word of Myers’ death by
saying that the news broke his heart:
“He taught me everything. … He
taught me to respect other people
and other viewpoints. … He was a
genuinely nice
human being.”
Myers was
raised in central
Oregon, and
following his
conscience was
more important
than his ideology
as a Democrat.
As a state
representative,
he succeeded
— for a short time — in blocking
reinstatement of the Oregon death
penalty. His conscience stood up to
intense political pressure inside and
outside the Capitol.
Republican U.S. Sen. Gordon
Smith would later take a similar
stand of conscience at the federal
level, refusing to support physician-
assisted suicide even though
Oregon voters twice approved the
process. Myers was on the other
side, fighting to uphold the Oregon
law.
In the days since Myers’ death,
he has been lauded for his national
work on school safety after the
Thurston High School shooting in
1998, his legal fight against tobacco
companies and his tenacity in
strengthening Oregon laws against
domestic and sexual violence.
But above all, Hardy Myers
should be remembered as a true
Oregonian.
A man who kept his word.
A statesman.
A gentleman.
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
Monuments and presidents
The Oregonian, Dec. 3
wo separate fights to protect two
extraordinary patches of Oregon
have in recent months escalated as
President Barack Obama’s term comes
to a close. That’s because he could, by
the authority Congress granted to him in
a far less populous time, singularly issue
sweeping protections
to the Owyhee
Canyonlands in
southeastern Oregon
and the Cascade-
Siskiyou Mountains
in southwestern
Oregon and northern
California.
The drive to
limit development and resource use in
both areas makes sense but for different
reasons. Oregonians will never get back
the lightless skies at night or the lonely
beauty of ancient, eroded terrain cut
through by wild rivers in the Owyhee if
given over to mining or highway-building.
Separately, Oregonians risk losing
some of the site-specific, mind-bending
biodiversity that makes the forested
Cascade-Siskiyou realm a delicate
universe requiring limits on use.
But Obama should say no to desig-
nating national monument status to the
2.5-million acre Owyhee Canyonlands.
And he should say yes to doubling the
already successful Cascade-Siskiyou
National Monument.
Selective wilderness designations, river
protections and broad prohibitions on
mining would be strategic, consequential
steps Congress could take to protect
the Owyhee Canyonlands, the largest
undeveloped expanse of land in the lower
48 states. Significantly, doing so would
ensure that an economically vital and
long-established ranching culture goes
unthreatened by monument designation.
By contrast, in the more populated
realm anchored by Ashland and Medford,
the fish-bearing waterways and exotic
flora that make the Siskyous distinct
face potential threat from fragmented
lands and warmer temperatures from
climate change. Immediate monument
expansion would connect fragmented
lands within and outside the monument,
T
offering lifelines to potentially marooned
species, and help preserve what the 2000
presidential decree called an “ecological
wonder ... of rare and beautiful species
of plants and animals, whose continued
survival ... depends upon its continued
ecological integrity.”
Few dispute that President-elect
Donald Trump might bring to the nation
a different ethic about
development and land
use, and it remains true
that roughly half of
Oregon is owned by
the federal government
and run by agencies
such as the U.S. Bureau
of Land Management
and the U.S. Forest
Service. While most folks in rural Harney
County and surrounding areas objected
to the armed takeover of the Malheur
National Wildlife Refuge, simmering
resentments across the American West
about public lands management came
to the fore. So Oregon must have a
voice in deciding what’s right for the
extraordinary landscape that Oregonians
call home. That means the Owyhee and
the Siskyous warrant bolstered protections
only by actions that honor on-the-ground
sentiment, essential to declaring shared
destiny and preserving democracy.
Years ago Idaho withstood fears that
its Owyhee lands would win monument
designation and dodged it by creating
518,000 acres of protected wilderness.
It has worked well, among other things
limiting mechanized uses of sensitive
lands.
But Oregon Senators Ron Wyden and
Jeff Merkley in June proposed legislation
that would shield more than 2 million
acres of the Owyhee Canyonlands from
mineral exploitation, including oil and
gas drilling. It was a clear call to leave
the ground the way it is and do so in
such a way that supports farmers and
ranchers who work in an environmentally
sustainable fashion. They should press
Congress to approve the legislation while
citing a report released just last month
from the Oregon Department of Geology
and Mineral Industries showing plenty
of untapped riches beneath the surface in
southeastern Oregon.
Roughly half of
Oregon is owned
by the federal
government.
OTHER VIEWS
Trump’s agents of idiocracy
L
opportunity.
ast week when Donald Trump
Resistance is not about some sort
began his so-called Thank
of clairvoyant condemnation of acts
You Tour in Cincinnati, he
yet uncommitted, but rather about the
had yet another opportunity to be
resilience of memory, the rigidity of
magnanimous and conciliatory, to step
morality and the depth of wounds.
beyond the division and acrimony of
The truest measure of a leader is
his campaign and into the unity and
as much about how he or she attains
healing necessary to be president of a
strained nation.
Charles power as how he or she wields it;
As is his wont, he declined, instead
while the latter is yet to be determined,
Blow
gloating and boasting, playing to the
the former has been revealed in
Comment
minority of U.S. voters who chose
devastating clarity.
him, relishing his own impenitence.
A Pew Research Poll released last
He is choosing to push the United States
month found that “voters’ ‘grades’ for the
further apart rather than bring it closer
way Trump conducted himself during the
together.
campaign are the lowest for any victorious
And be clear: It is not the job of the defiant candidate in 28 years.” The report continued:
to conform to a future president who makes
“For the first time in Pew Research Center
them completely uncomfortable. The burden
postelection surveys, voters give the losing
of unity lies with Trump, not his detractors.
candidate higher grades than the winner.”
“Just wait and see.” “Give him a chance.”
Furthermore, Nate Silver responded to
But what if what you’ve already seen is so
one of Conway’s tweets: “Trump will soon
beyond the pale that it’s irrevocable? What if
become the first president who failed to win
Trump has already squandered more chances
a majority of the vote either in the general
than most of us will ever have?
election or in his primary,” meaning the
What if Trump has shown himself beyond
Republican primaries. He added, “That is to
doubt and with absolute certainty to be a
say, since 1972. Primaries weren’t widespread
demagogue and bigot and xenophobe and
before that. 45/46% of the vote can go a long
given space and voice to concordant voices
way under the right circumstances.”
in the country and in his emerging Legion
And there are disturbing signs about how a
of Doom Cabinet? In that reality, resistance
Trump administration will conduct itself, from
isn’t about mindless obstruction by people
the early diplomatic blunders that signal a
blinded by the pain of ideological defeat
worrisome break in the continuity of protocol,
or people gorging on sour grapes. To the
to his team nursing vendettas and continuing
contrary, resistance is an act of radical, even
to dangle the threat of jail in front of his
revolutionary, patriotism. Resistance isn’t
opponents. Last week Conway appeared to
about damaging the country, but protecting it.
waffle on whether Trump or a federal agency
There is no Electoral College clause that
during his term might still pursue prosecution
blunts ferocious opposition to the demeaning
of Clinton; Trump lackey Corey Lewandowski
of women and racial, ethnic and religious
forthrightly said of the executive editor of The
minorities in this country; there is no Election
New York Times: “He should be in jail.”
Day reset on the coddling of white supremacy.
And to add insult to injury, Trump
Furthermore, the emergence of Trump as
surrogate Scottie Nell Hughes uttered this
a political figure has threatened to kill many
jaw-dropping line last week on The Diane
of the ideals that we hold dear: decency and
Rehm Show:
decorum, inclusion and empathy, truth and
“One thing that has been interesting this
facts.
entire campaign season to watch is that
Trump and his agents of idiocracy are now
people that say facts are facts; they’re not
engaged in an all-out crusade to exaggerate
really facts. Everybody has a way, it’s kind
the scope of his victory, rewrite racial history,
of like looking at ratings or looking at a
justify their vendettas and hostilities and erase glass of half-full water. Everybody has a
the very distinction between true and false.
way of interpreting them to be the truth or
At a fiery exchange during a panel at
not true.” She continued: “There’s no such
Harvard, Hillary Clinton’s communications
thing, unfortunately, anymore of facts.” Folks,
director, Jennifer Palmieri, rightly accused
Dimwit-ism is a disease easily spread and
the Trump campaign of emboldening “white
denigrators of the absolutism of truth are its
supremacists and white nationalists.”
vectors.
The Trump campaign manager, Kellyanne
This is why resistance isn’t only principled,
Conway, barked back: “Do you think I ran
but essential and even existential.
a campaign where white supremacists had a
We are not in an ordinary postelection
platform? You’re going to look me in the face
period of national unity and rapprochement.
and tell me that?”
We are facing the potential abrogation of
“It did. Kellyanne, it did,” said Palmieri.
fundamental U.S. ideals. We stand at the
Yes Kellyanne, that is exactly what you did
precipice, staring into an abyss that grows
and no amount of personal outrage about
darker by the day.
being called out on it is going to rewrite that
■
history. Furthermore, everyone who sees
Charles M. Blow is The New York Times’s
you should say that to your face at every
visual Op-Ed columist.
YOUR VIEWS
No more half-baked plans
It’s decision time at Pendleton City
Hall. Had an ADA-compliant sidewalk
been included in the rebuild of the 15th to
13th Street project, the waste of time and
money discussing the 13th Street stairway
would never have occurred. Now, rather
than admitting a mistake and proposing a
permanent solution, the public works director
is suggesting a temporary fix, a gravel path
that is not ADA-compliant, without lights or
hand rail, and may be paved at a later date.
Wouldn’t it be nice to get a project done right
the first time rather than a half-baked plan that
is not a permanent solution?
An issue like this is what’s important to
taxpayers, rather than how many trees are
needed in the Crabby’s parking lot to replace
dead or dying crabapple trees — trees that
seem so important to one council member, yet
whose maintenance has been ignored by the
city. Take a look next time you pass that lot.
Unfortunately this is all too common on city
trees throughout city property.
Will the city council make the right
decision or kick the can down the road for a
future generation to deal with? Tune into the
next city council meeting and see if the right
choice is made.
Rick Rohde
Pendleton
The tale of two cities
The front page of a recent East Oregonian
repeated the narrative of where two cities are
going. One article described a new business
coming to Hermiston (Ranch & Home),
purchasing land, building a new facility,
increasing the city’s tax base and employing
people. The other article was another
meandering diatribe regarding Pendleton’s
UAS range up by the Road to Nowhere, and its
new, highly experienced range manager. After
all the glowing suppositions about the future,
the proverbial bottom line comes when our
range manager states his “GOAL” is to make
the range “self-sustaining, and he believes it’s
well on its way.” It’s well on its way to being
self-sustaining, even with a skeleton crew?
“Self-sustaining” means you generate just
enough income to cover your expenses. How
about generating enough income to provide
for a couple dozen family-wage jobs at the
UAS range, plus turning a profit for the
city? If that’s not possible, I’d suggest our
part-time economic development director
broaden his search for economic growth for
our city.
Also this week the EO reported Hermiston
is considering a bond election to build more
school facilities. It stated they are bursting at
their seams. And for the last several years the
number of students in Pendleton’s schools
has been declining. That is another sign of
the health of your community. Do you have
more families moving to your community, or
moving away from your community?
Bill Bridges
Pendleton
LETTERS POLICY
The East Oregonian welcomes original let-
ters of 400 words or less on public issues
and public policies for publication in the
newspaper and on our website. The news-
paper 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.