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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 18, 2017)
Page 4A OPINION East Oregonian Wednesday, January 18, 2017 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 Owyhee Canyonlands monument plan shelved? Oregon Sen. Jeff Merkley told of Malheur County voters opposed the monument proposal. OPB Sunday that Secretary of the We don’t know why the proposal Interior Sally Jewel told him the has been shelved, or if it really proposed Owyhee Canyonlands has been shelved. It could be the National Monument in Eastern administration thinks the designation Oregon’s Malheur County has been would be too shelved. inflammatory, given Merkley says he area’s proximity doubts President If Obama doesn’t the to the Malheur Obama will make proclaim Owyhee National Wildlife the proclamation Refuge, the site of before leaving Canyonlands last year’s armed office Friday. a national occupation by That’s of the encouraging, but monument, it’s followers Bundy clan. at this writing It could be Obama still has a near certainty Obama chose time to make the that Trump won’t. an easier target, proclamation. instead expanding Backed by the the Cascade- Oregon Natural Siskiyou National Monument in Desert Association and Portland’s Southern Oregon earlier this month. Keen Shoes, the proposed Owyhee If the president doesn’t proclaim Canyonlands wilderness and the Owyhee Canyonlands a national conservation area would cover 40 percent of Malheur County — about monument, it’s a near certainty that such a designation won’t be made 2.5 million acres of what is now during the Trump administration. controlled by the Bureau of Land The president has the sole Management. Residents believe the designation authority under the Antiquities Act of 1906 to designate land owned by would be accompanied by the federal government as a national restrictions and regulations monument. that would prohibit or severely We are encouraged that Congress complicate grazing, mining, hunting is considering curbing executive and recreation. authority under the Antiquities Act, While proponents say traditional if not repealing the law outright. uses of the land will be allowed, Congress, the affected states and local opponents don’t believe local residents should have more them. When the locals put it to a say over such designations and the non-binding vote — because locals really don’t get a vote — 90 percent restrictions that accompany them. 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 New cabinet must go through proper vetting Tahlequah (Okla.) Daily Press A ll U.S. presidents have the right to appoint members of their cabinets, and they should be able to do so without partisan harassment and preconceived notions. But congressional oversight is also part of the process, and regardless of which party holds sway, the nominees of one president should be treated the same as those of his predecessors. In theory, most Americans would agree. But theory has been turned on its head during this election cycle, and some of Donald Trump’s most ardent supporters are saying outright that his nominees shouldn’t be subjected to the same scrutiny as those of Barack Obama or George Bush. One of the officials operating on a revolving set of standards is U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe, R-Okla. When recently asked by a reporter whether Trump should be required to disclose income from foreign sources — the same information demanded in 2013 for Obama Secretary of Defense pick Chuck Hagel — Inhofe said no. Asked whether the difference in opinion is “because it’s Trump,” Inhofe said, “That’s just right.” Those who err on the side of justice for all might keep hoping Inhofe will at least pretend to curb his hyper-partisan ways, but his long history inside the Beltway suggests that’s not going to happen. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, who unsuccessfully challenged Trump for the presidential nomination last year, in 2013 led the charge for “full and complete answers” from Hagel to the question of whether he had “received compensation, directly or indirectly, from foreign sources.” Inhofe was a signatory of the letter, and Cruz was absolutely right to make this demand. Congress rightly ran all Obama nominees through the wringer. One might suggest racism is at the root of the stark change in attitude, had not the same been done for Bush’s picks. Why are so many eager to avoid taking too close a look at Trump’s nominees? If these folks have no potential conflicts or skeletons in their closet and they appear qualified, Trump and his supporters will be justified in calling foul if they’re not approved. But claiming Trump nominees should be given a pass suggests Inhofe and others like him are either afraid of the president-elect, or they hope to benefit personally from those in his lineup. Whatever the case, the attitude doesn’t bode well for the country. Inhofe’s press secretary tried later to walk back what her boss said, but it’s still out there, so it’s a good thing a few others on the selection panel are willing to do their jobs. And in a subsequent interview with NPR, Inhofe did acknowledge Russia is an adversary rather than a friend, but in his mind, Trump’s business connection with Russia — and those of others among his nominees — could mean a more productive and safer relationship between the two countries. He may be right, but that’s presupposing neither Trump nor any of his nominees are more intent on personal gain than improving America’s economy and security. There’s no way we can get a handle on the nominees’ thinking without investigation, and that’s why everyone charged with grilling the Cabinet appointments must do so with zeal. On NPR, Inhofe expressed a wistfulness for the days of the Cold War, when “we had two super powers... with mutually assured destruction.” He believes the U.S. is in more danger of full-scale war than we have been in many years. If he’s right, Congress can’t afford to put party over country, and neither can the rest of us. We need experienced, nuanced people running the show, and that’s why the vetting process is so important. Claiming Trump’s nominees should be given a pass suggests those people are either afraid of the president-elect, or they hope to benefit personally from those in his lineup. OTHER VIEWS The lord of misrule K ing David was most compelling holy fools, hapless fools, vicious when he danced. Overcome by fools. Fools were rude and frequently gratitude to God, he stripped unabashed liars. They were willing to down to his linens and whirled about make idiots of themselves. The point before the ark of the covenant — his of the fool was not to be admirable in love and joy spilling beyond the himself, but to be the class clown who boundaries of normal decorum. had the guts to talk back to the teacher. His wife, Michal, the daughter People enjoyed carnival culture, the of King Saul, was repulsed by his feast of fools, as a way to take a whack David behavior, especially because he was Brooks at the status quo. doing it in front of the commoners. You can see where I’m going with Comment She snarked at him when he got home this. We live at a time of wide social for exposing himself in front of the inequality. The intellectual straitjackets have been getting tighter. The universities servants’ slave girls like some scurrilous have become modern cathedrals, where social fellow. hierarchies are defined and The early Christians reinforced. seem to have worshipped the way David did, with We’re living with exactly ecstatic dancing, communal the kinds of injustices that joy and what Emile lead to carnival culture, Durkheim called “collective and we’ve crowned a fool effervescence.” In her book king. President-elect Donald “Dancing in the Streets,” Trump exists on two levels: Barbara Ehrenreich argues the presidential level and the that in the first centuries fool level. On one level he of Christianity, worship makes personnel and other of Jesus overlapped with decisions. On the other he worship of Dionysus, the tweets. (I honestly don’t Greek god of revelry. Both know which level is more Jesus and Dionysus upended important to him.) class categories. Both turned water into wine. His tweets are classic fool behavior. Second- and third-century statuettes show They are raw, ridiculous and frequently Dionysus hanging on a cross. self-destructive. He takes on an icon of the But when the church became more official culture and he throws mud at it. hierarchical, the Michals took over. Somber The point is not the message of the tweet. priest-led rituals began to replace direct access It’s to symbolically upend hierarchy, to be to the divine. In the fourth century, Gregory of oppositional. Nazianzus urged, “Let us sing hymns instead The assault on Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga., of striking drums, have psalms instead of was classic. He picked one of the most frivolous music and song, … modesty instead officially admired people in the country of laughter, wise contemplation instead of and he leveled the most ridiculous possible intoxication, seriousness instead of delirium.” charge (all talk and no action). It was a tweet When elites try to quash the manners and devilishly well crafted to create the maximum impulses of the people, those impulses are official uproar. Anybody who writes for a bound to spill out in some other way. By living knows how to manipulate an outraged the Middle Ages the cathedrals were strictly response, and Trump is a fool puppet master. hierarchical, so the people created carnivals The sad part is that so many people treat where everything was turned on its head. Trump’s tweets as if they are arguments when During carnival (Purim is the Jewish version), in fact they are carnival. With their conniption men dressed like women, the people could fits, Trump’s responders feed into the dynamic insult the king and bishops, drunkenness and he needs. They contribute to carnival culture. ribaldry was prized over sober propriety. The first problem with today’s carnival As Ehrenreich puts it, “Whatever social culture is that there’s an ocean of sadism category you had been boxed into — male or lurking just below the surface. The second female, rich or poor — carnival was a chance is that it’s not real. It doesn’t really address to escape from it.” the inequalities that give rise to it. It’s just Sometimes the celebration took on an combative display. enthusiasm that is hard for us to fathom. In This is a resolution I’m probably going to 1278, 200 people kept dancing on a bridge break, but I resolve to write about Trump only in Utrecht until it collapsed and all were on the presidential level, not on the carnival drowned. level. I’m going to try to respond only to what The carnivals were partly a way to blow he does, not what he says or tweets. I really off steam, but in hard times they served as wish some of my media confrères would do occasions for genuine populist revolts. In the same. 1511, a carnival in Udine, Italy, turned into a ■ riot that led to the murder of 50 nobles and the David Brooks became a New York Times sacking of more than 20 palaces. Op-Ed columnist in September 2003. He Carnival culture was raw, lascivious and has been a senior editor at The Weekly disgraceful, and it elevated a certain social Standard, a contributing editor at Newsweek type, the fool. and the Atlantic Monthly, and is currently a There were many different kinds of fools: commentator on PBS. Carnival culture was raw, lascivious and disgraceful, and it elevated a certain social type, the fool. YOUR VIEWS Hard to be optimistic about an America led by Trump To use Trump’s own words: “I think it’s disgraceful!” What I think is disgraceful is that our nation is expected to support a leader who deserves no respect as shown by his behavior in the past campaign. He, himself, is a disservice to the values of democracy. We are instructed to have a sense of optimism. A sense of optimism? Where is that supposed to be coming from? Even his billionaire nominees for cabinet posts can’t agree with him. He is so secretive and erratic he can’t commit to making any plans. Although Trump hammers away with the same old song and dance “we must all come together ... make America great again,” that has only accomplished the opposite — driving the population apart with hatred and bigotry inflamed by his choice of vocabulary and negative rhetoric. With the world in such a dangerously fragile situation as it is, the election of an unstable and conflicted individual for president of a world power is taking a risk we can’t afford. As one commentator said: “Tweeting flattery to Putin isn’t foreign policy.” Are we just one temper tantrum away from World War III? And it may be a nuclear war. Janet F. Langton Sonora, Calif. (formerly of 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 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. Be heard! Comment online at eastoregonian.com
