Page 4A
OPINION
East Oregonian
Thursday, January 26, 2017
OTHER VIEWS
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
Getting Oregon
a Real ID
The mountain of bills the Oregon the lurch by 2020.
The biggest impact will be on
Legislature will consider this
those hoping to board a plane, which
session is certainly overwhelming.
isn’t allowed without approved
From minor rules to honorary
identification. In other words, it
proclamations to major policy,
lawmakers will be asked to consider would take a passport for an Oregon
resident to board a flight at PDX —
thousands of pieces of legislation
that add to the vast rulebook
even a domestic one.
Oregonians must play by.
Sen. Bill Hansell and Rep. Greg
We’d argue much — if not
Barreto have presented a bill that
would at least
most — of
put a bandage
the legislation
Without a REAL ID, it on the problem,
comes from
create a
a place of
would take a passport and
path to solving
political
the future.
posturing,
to board a flight at it in Senate
designed to
Bill 374
appease a few
PDX in 2020.
would allow
constituents but
Oregonians
not benefit the
state as a whole. We trust our elected to pay extra to go through the
additional steps and obtain a Real
representatives are wise enough
ID, while directing the Department
to not spend too much time on the
of Motor Vehicles to set up a
extraneous and focus quickly on
program to provide the enhanced
problems that really matter.
IDs.
We have a suggestion for a good
In short, it will give Oregonians
place to start.
who want to board a plane but not
The federal Real ID Act, passed
hassle with a passport the ability
in 2005, increased the required
to do so, and also push the state
documentation for issuing driver’s
closer to making the IDs available
licenses and identification cards,
with the goal of thwarting terrorism. to everyone. It’s not perfect — not
all Oregonians will be informed
But many states, including Oregon,
and many will be furious when they
balked at implementing changes
arrive at security and cannot pass.
because no federal funding was
But it’s better than nothing, and
available to cover the additional cost
perhaps all our cash-strapped state
for states to implement.
Since then the federal government can afford right now. We hope
this bill will be plucked from the
has been issuing waivers to Oregon
mountain of legislation piling up
and other states, but has indicated
at the Capitol and given thorough
those waivers will soon expire and
consideration.
leave card-carrying Oregonians in
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
Rapist who got off in Oregon
found guilty in Illinois
Belleville (Ill.) News-Democrat
S
ome would point to religion as the
root of many evils, from massacres
of those professing other faiths to
rationale for the subjugation of women
of your own tribe, plus everyone from
other tribes. But
when you get down
to it, faith is usually
less to blame than
the individuals who
interpret a tenet to
rationalize their
behavior.
James Lopes and
his “Rise Star Church”
certainly fit that
model. He argues that
his attempts to have
sex with prepubescent
girls in public is a religious teaching
entrusted to him by God, and that it isn’t
rape because they were wearing green
to signal their desire to have sex as his
child bride on a mini date.
He defended himself in front of a
jury as Madison County prosecutors
successfully argued that Lopes is
sexually dangerous, a civil proceeding
that will now put him away until he is
no longer a threat to little girls. Until
his sanity is determined and the threat
to children is eliminated, there is a hold
on the criminal felony counts stating
he tried to have sex with multiple little
girls in front of their parents at an ice
cream parlor, gas station, grocery store,
bowling alley and other public places.
Lopes did the same thing in 2012 in
Oregon, but essentially got away with
it when the Oregon
Supreme Court
declared the state
could not force him
to take medications
intended to get him
sane enough to assist
in his defense. They
ruled that forced
medication was not
guaranteed to work
and would not fulfill
an important state
interest because any
sentence for soliciting the 8-year-old
YMCA camper in a Portland park
likely would be less than the 18 months
he’d been in jail and a mental hospital.
Charges were dropped.
He’d say God was on his side. That’s
what the Nazis said. Same for Al Qaeda
and ISIS.
The Madison County jury disagreed.
They decided the high priest of the “Rise
Star Church” needed an extended retreat
for religious reflection.
Our daughters are thankful.
He’d say God
was on his side.
That’s what the
Nazis said.
Same for Al
Qaeda and ISIS.
Civility must endure
Y
ou know how Donald Trump
of insults and insulters, and tune out,
wins? I don’t mean a second
when there’s a contest — over what
term or major legislative
this country stands for, over where
victories. I’m talking about the battle
it will go — that couldn’t be more
between incivility and dignity.
serious.
He triumphs when opponents trade
After Rich’s tweet, “Saturday Night
righteous anger for crude tantrums.
Live” suspended her, and she was
When they lose sight of the line
broadly condemned, by Democrats as
between protest and catcalls.
well as Republicans, for violating the
Frank
When a writer for “Saturday Night
unofficial rule against attacks on the
Bruni
Live” jokes publicly that Trump’s
young children of presidents. Chelsea
Comment
10-year-old son has the mien and
Clinton, on her Facebook page, urged
people to give Barron space and peace
makings of a killer.
— something that wasn’t always done for her,
“Barron will be this country’s first
for George W. Bush’s daughters or for Barack
home-school shooter,” the writer, Katie Rich,
tweeted.
Obama’s.
I cringe at repeating it. But there’s no other
But the treatment of presidential progeny
way to take proper note of its
isn’t the real story here. And
ugliness.
that’s a complicated saga
That tweet ignited a
anyway, because so many
firestorm — and rightly
presidents and candidates
so — but it didn’t really
try to have things both ways,
surprise me. It was just
putting family on display
a matter of time. This is
when it suits them and then
the trajectory that we’re
declaring them off limits
traveling. This, increasingly,
when it doesn’t.
is what passes for
The larger, more pressing
impassioned advocacy.
issues are how low we’re prepared to sink
Look elsewhere on Twitter. Or on
in our partisan back-and-forth and what’s
Facebook. Or at Madonna, whose many
accomplished by descending to Trump’s
positive contributions don’t include her turn
subterranean level. His behavior has been
at the microphone at the Women’s March
grotesque, and it’s human nature to want to
in Washington, where she said that she’d
repay him in kind. It feels good. It sometimes
“thought an awful lot about blowing up the
even feels right.
White House,” erupted into profanity and
Many people I know thrilled to the viral
tweaked the lyrics to one of her songs so that
footage a few days ago of the vile white
they instructed Trump to perform a particular
supremacist Richard Spencer being punched
sex act.
in the head during a television interview. But
What a sure way to undercut the high-
that attack does more to help him than to hurt
mindedness of most of the women (and men)
him.
around her on that inspiring day. What a
Many people I know thrilled to BuzzFeed’s
wasted opportunity to try to reach the many
publication of a dossier with unsubstantiated
Americans who still haven’t decided how
allegations about Trump. But that decision
alarmed about Trump to be. I doubt that even
bolstered his ludicrous insistence that
one of them listened to her and thought: To the journalists are uniquely unfair to him. It gave
barricades I go! If Madonna’s dropping the F
him a fresh weapon in his war on the media.
bomb, I must spring into action.
If Trump’s presidency mirrors its dangerous
All of this plays right into Trump’s
prelude, one of the fundamental challenges
hands. It pulls eyes and ears away from the
will be to respond to him, his abettors and his
unpreparedness, conflicts of interest and
agenda in the most tactically prudent way and
extreme views of so many of his Cabinet
not just the most emotionally satisfying one.
nominees; from the evolving explanations for
To rant less and organize more. To resist taunts
why he won’t release his tax returns; from
and stick with facts. To answer invective with
his latest delusion or falsehood, such as his
intelligence.
renewed insistence that illegally cast ballots
And to show, in the process, that there are
cost him the popular vote; from other evidence two very different sets of values here, manifest
of an egomania so profound that it’s an
in two very distinct modes of discourse. If that
impediment to governing and an invitation to
doesn’t happen, Trump may be victorious in
national disaster.
more than setting newly coarse terms for our
There’s so much substantive ground on
political debate. He may indeed win on many
which to confront Trump. There are acres upon fronts, over many years.
acres. Why swerve into the gutter? Why help
■
him dismiss his detractors as people in thrall to
Frank Bruni, an Op-Ed columnist for The
the theater of their outrage and no better than
New York Times since 2011, joined the paper
he is?
in 1995. Over his years, he has worn a wide
And why risk that disaffected Americans,
variety of hats, including chief restaurant
tuning in only occasionally, hear one big mash critic and Rome bureau chief.
How low are we
prepared to sink
in our partisan
back-and-forth?
YOUR VIEWS
Watching Walden when it
comes to health care
A representative is defined as a person
chosen to act and speak on behalf of a wider
group. I am part of that wider group. Rep
Walden was elected to represent 798,161
people from Oregon. Eleven percent, or
approximately 89,000 of those constituents
currently have health care coverage through
the Affordable Care Act (stats from the
census.gov link on his website).
Walden has promised to repeal and replace
the ACA, also known as Obamacare. He and
his colleagues have said that their replacement
will be better than the ACA. I say: Hooray!
I am anxious to see him, or anyone, provide
better healthcare to the uninsured and under-
insured.
But I am also warning our Representative: I
Governor
am watching. What does “better” mean in the
context of healthcare? It could mean that 1)
more people will get coverage; 2) those who
are already covered will get better coverage;
3) recipients’ costs will go down, or, 4) the
government’s costs will go down. Based on
the hype, I expect all of these criteria to be
met.
If people who currently have healthcare
through the ACA lose coverage, get worse
coverage, or must pay more, then it is not
better. Walden will have lied and failed. They
should not repeal any parts of the ACA until
he has the promised “better” replacement in
place.
Good luck to him. I truly hope he and his
party can do it. I will be keeping a close eye
on their progress.
Nancy Noteboom
Odell
CONTACT YOUR REPRESENTATIVES
State Representatives
Kate Brown
160 State Capitol
900 Court Street
Salem, OR 97301-4047
503-378-4582
State Senator
Bill Hansell, District 29
900 Court St. NE, S-423
Salem, OR 97301
503-986-1729
Sen.BillHansell@state.or.us
Greg Barreto, District 58
900 Court St. NE, H-38
Salem, OR 97301
503-986-1458
Rep.GregBarreto@state.or.us
Greg Smith, District 57
900 Court St. NE, H-482
Salem, OR 97301
503-986-1457
Rep.GregSmith@state.or.us