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OPINION
East Oregonian
Saturday, February 11, 2017
Founded October 16, 1875
KATHRYN B. BROWN
Publisher
DANIEL WATTENBURGER
Managing Editor
TIM TRAINOR
Opinion Page Editor
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OUR VIEW
Congress must act to
fix immigration laws
The decades-old debate on illegal
immigration has been renewed with
President Trump’s executive order
of Jan. 25 — “Border Security
and Immigration Enforcement
Improvements.”
The order sets administration
policy on illegal immigration. In short,
it seeks to detain those suspected of
violating immigration law, to expedite
their claims and to quickly remove
those whose legal claims have been
rejected.
While they work hard at jobs
“Americans” often don’t want, by
their numbers the undocumented
workers have changed the dynamics
of the entire U.S. workforce. Their
repatriation would have a sizable
impact on our economy, leaving
many industries without viable
replacements.
Presidents have wide discretion
as to how to enforce immigration
laws passed by Congress. Trump’s
order indicates he intends to enforce
the statutes. The administration says
it will prioritize the deportation of
criminal aliens, the 300,000 or so
who have committed crimes either
in the United States or in their home
countries. But the order does not make
that distinction.
Trump needs no additional
authority to deport illegal immigrants.
He might need additional money
to fully implement his order, but
existing law provides a process
for the repatriation of anyone who
has entered the country illegally or
violated a visa.
Driven by crushing poverty,
immigrants seeking opportunities
impossible at home have illegally
flooded across the border — 12
million by most counts. They have
placed strains on public education,
healthcare and law enforcement.
Once here and armed with
forged papers they have found
ready employment on farms and
construction sites, and in hotels,
restaurants, processing plants and other
places eager for cheap, reliable labor.
While most are not violent or
dangerous, all have violated federal
law by entering and remaining in
the country. Millions have further
submitted fake papers to employers,
and have assumed other identities for
the sake of employment.
They are also real people — real
families — with real ties to the United
States. They have children, many who
are citizens born in the United States,
who have never known another home.
We return to what we’ve always
seen as the two legal options facing
their dispositions: Make them go, or
let them stay.
Only Congress can change the law.
And it’s time it did.
Congress must offer illegal
immigrants temporary legal status
and a path to permanent residency,
but not citizenship, after 10 years if
they can be properly vetted and meet
strict requirements — no prior felony
convictions, no violations while
awaiting residency and pay a fine and
back taxes.
The border should be secured.
A viable guestworker program
must be established, and employers
must verify the work status of their
employees.
We respect the rule of law, and
do not lightly suggest rewarding
those who have flouted it. But we
are reluctant to disrupt the lives of
otherwise harmless people who have
done what we would do — whatever
it takes to ensure the safety and
welfare of our families.
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.
YOUR VIEWS
Fire bond more expensive
than advertised
I do support our Pendleton police
and fire departments. I am in favor of
improvements to the existing fire station
or a less-expensive solution. The city has
a lot of things that need repaired or fixed.
We cannot afford to spend $10 million
on only one problem.
There is a fact sheet put out that has
the Pendleton Fire Department emblem
on it. The fact sheet says “the net
increase would be 14 cents per $1,000.”
This is not true. The real increase on
your property tax would be 62 cents per
$1,000 of assessed value. The average
assessed value of a home in Pendleton
is $155,000, which would mean an
increase of $96.10 per year for 20 years.
How can this be if two bond issues
were paid off? The answer is both bond
issues were paid off in May 2016. The
tax for the fire bond will show up on
your tax bill starting in November 2017.
Both bond issues are not on your taxes
for 2016-2017. I know property taxes are
confusing, which makes it easier to fool
the taxpayers.
With the college bond issue, school
district bond, school district override
levy and the 3 percent raise taxing
districts can levy on your assessed
valuation every year, your property taxes
will go up way more than $96.10 if the
fire bond passes in May 2017.
The city council could review this
bond now that there are new members.
They could come up with a better plan.
If the council does not revise the bond,
the best course of action is to vote no on
this bond in May 2017.
Rex Morehouse
Pendleton
OTHER VIEWS
A gift for Trump
f you could give Donald Trump
if he sees the world as dangerous
the gift of a single trait to help his
because it justifies his combativeness.
presidency, what would it be?
Either way, Trumpism is a posture
My first thought was that prudence
that leads to the now familiar cycle
was the most important gift one could
of threat perception, insult, enemy-
give him. Prudence is the ability to
making, aggrievement, self-pity,
govern oneself with the use of reason.
assault and counterassault.
It is the ability to suppress one’s
So, upon reflection, the gift I
impulses for the sake of long-term
would give Trump would be an
David
goals. It is the ability to see the
Brooks emotional gift, the gift of fraternity.
specific circumstances in which you
I’d give him the gift of some crisis
Comment
are placed, and to master the art of
he absolutely could not handle on his
navigating within them.
own. The only way to survive would
My basic thought was that a prudent
be to fall back entirely on others, and then
President Trump wouldn’t spend his
to experience what it feels like to have them
mornings angrily tweeting
hold him up.
out his resentments. A
Out of that, I hope,
prudent Trump wouldn’t
would come an ability to
spend his afternoons
depend on others, to trust
barking at foreign leaders
other people, to receive
and risking nuclear
grace, and eventually a
war. “Prudence is what
desire for companionship.
differentiates action from
Fraternity is the desire to
impulse and heroes from
make friends during both
hotheads,” writes the
good and hostile occasions
French philosopher André
and to be faithful to those
Comte-Sponville.
friends. The fraternal
But the more I
person is seeking harmony
thought about it, the
and fair play between
more I realized prudence
individuals. He is trying
might not be the most
to move the world from
important trait Trump
tension to harmony.
needs. He seems intent
Donald Trump
on destroying the postwar
didn’t have to have an
world order — building
administration that was
walls, offending allies and
at war with everyone but
driving away the stranger and the refugee.
its base. He came to office with a populist
Do I really want to make him more prudent
mandate that cut across partisan categories.
and effective in pursuit of malicious goals?
He could have created unorthodox coalitions
Moreover, the true Trump dysfunction
and led unexpected alliances that would have
seems deeper. We are used to treating
broken the logjam of our politics.
politicians as vehicles for political
He didn’t have to have a vicious infighting
philosophies and interest groups. But in
administration in which everybody leaks
Trump’s case, his philosophy, populism,
against one another and in which backstairs
often takes a back seat to his psychological
life is a war of all against all.
complexes — the psychic wounds that seem
He doesn’t have to begin each day
to induce him into a state of perpetual war
making enemies: Nordstrom, John McCain,
with enemies far and wide.
judges. He could begin each day looking for
With Trump we are relentlessly thrown
friends, and he would actually get a lot more
into the Big Shaggy, that unconscious
done.
underground of wounds, longings and needs
On Inauguration Day, when Trump
that drive him to do what he does, to tweet
left his wife in the dust so he could greet
what he does, to attack whom he does.
the Obamas, I didn’t realize how quickly
Thinking about politics in the age of
having a discourteous leader would erode
Trump means relying less on the knowledge
the conversation. But look at how many
of political science and more on the probings of any day’s news stories are built around
of D.H. Lawrence, David Foster Wallace and enmity. The war over who can speak in the
Carl Jung.
Senate. Kellyanne Conway’s cable TV battle
At the heart of Trumpism is the perception du jour. Half my Facebook feed is someone
that the world is a dark, savage place, and
linking to a video with the headline: Watch
therefore ruthlessness, selfishness and
X demolish Y.
callousness are required to survive in it. It
I doubt that Trump will develop a capacity
is the utter conviction, as Trump put it, that
for fraternity any time soon, but to be human
murder rates are at a 47-year high, even
is to hold out hope, and to believe that even
though in fact they are close to a 57-year
a guy as old and self-destructive as Trump is
low. It is the utter conviction that we are
still 0.001 percent open to a transformation
engaged in an apocalyptic war against radical of the heart.
Islamic terrorism, even though there are
■
probably several foreign policy problems of
David Brooks became a New York Times
greater importance.
Op-Ed columnist in September 2003. He has
It’s not clear if Trump is combative
been a senior editor at The Weekly Standard,
because he sees the world as dangerous or
and is currently a commentator on PBS.
I
The gift I would
give Trump would
be an emotional
gift, the gift of
fraternity.
I’d give him the
gift of some crisis
he absolutely
could not handle
on his own.
OTHER VIEWS
The possibility and importance of making changes to PERS
The (Corvallis) Gazette-Times
T
here was a promising sign
last week out of Salem as
the Legislature settled down
to work: Lawmakers appear to be
serious this session about trying
to find money-saving options to
the state’s troubled public-pension
system.
PERS issues grabbed the
spotlight as the Senate Workforce
Committee met on Wednesday, the
official first day of the 2017 session.
And the committee’s chair,
Portland Democrat Kathleen Taylor,
made it clear that the committee
would entertain any PERS proposal
from legislators.
“All bills will be treated
equally,” Taylor was quoted as
saying in a story in The Oregonian,
“and all will be brought out into
the public light so everyone can see
what we’re grappling with.”
In fact, Taylor and her
Republican co-chair, Sen. Tim
Knopp of Bend, have invited
legislators to submit
any of their own
PERS proposals
by the end of the
month. In a memo
they issued last
week, they even
listed the nine
criteria they would
use to evaluate the
proposals: They
include items such
as constitutionality, cost savings,
impact on employer contribution
rates, the impact on the public
workforce, and so on. (The online
version of this editorial includes a
copy of the memo.)
The idea is that the committee’s
staff will evaluate each proposal and
prepare a summary.
For his part, as we’ve noted in
previous editorials, Knopp already
has filed a pair of PERS bills,
Senate Bill 559 and 560. One of the
bills would change
the calculation of
members’ final
average salaries
used in benefit
calculations to an
average of five years
instead of three.
The other would
redirect employees’
6 percent retirement
contributions,
which now go into supplemental
retirement accounts owned by the
employee, to pay for their pensions.
The committee also heard the
first of two scheduled presentations
by Steve Rodeman, the executive
director of the Public Employees
Retirement System, that served
notice that substantial PERS reform
won’t be an easy task.
It’s becoming
increasingly
clear that
there is no
magic bullet
Rodeman emphasized that the
2015 Supreme Court decision
that invalidated most of the PERS
reforms approved by the Legislature
in 2014 made it clear that benefits
can only be changed going forward.
And, he noted, any changes the
Legislature makes to PERS in this
session are certain to be challenged
in court.
All that, obviously, increases
the degree of difficulty legislators
face in coming up with meaningful
PERS reform. And, as we have
noted before, it’s becoming
increasingly clear that there likely
is no magic bullet solution — one
answer to all of our PERS issues.
Still, it was gratifying to see the
committee take up the PERS issue
on the session’s first day, especially
in light of the Legislature’s general
reluctance to tackle the topic at all in
its last couple of sessions. Proposals
to reform the system didn’t get
much traction at all in the 2015 and
2016 sessions, as the PERS deficit
ballooned to $22 billion and state
and local governments dealt with
the prospect of steep rate increases
that will take a bigger and bigger
bite out of their budgets. Legislative
leaders seemed to think that they
had taken their best PERS shot, and
it had been rejected by the Supreme
Court, so there was really nothing
they could do.
Of course, it still could be
that these new legislative efforts,
promising as they seem today,
still could come to naught: These
sessions are long and twisty affairs,
and we still don’t sense much
enthusiasm among Democratic
legislative leaders to tackle PERS
reform. But the Senate Workforce
Committee appears to be off to a
good start, and the committee’s
efforts could well be one key to a
successful session.