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OPINION
East Oregonian
Tuesday, June 13, 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
For sake of solution,
Gov. Brown must
set aside campaign
Gov. Kate Brown faces a
Oregon Education Association and
their allies are continuing their push
legacy-defining choice as the 2017
Legislature enters its final weeks:
to dramatically increase business
taxes.
Will she put the good of Oregon
The SEIU contends that Oregon
ahead of her quest for re-election
next year?
should increase revenue for schools
The answer matters deeply
and human services before raising
taxes and fees for transportation
for Oregonians. For this year’s
projects. That is a rational viewpoint.
legislative session to succeed,
But it would be
Brown must stand
irrational to fight
up to public-
At stake are
the transportation
employee unions
package at the ballot
and their allies.
statewide
— as the SEIU
The unions and
transportation box
said it might do — if
some Democrats
preferred revenue
on the left seem so
improvements, its
plan fails in the
insistent on getting
taxes and cost Legislature.
their own way that
The Democratic
they would rather
savings in PERS. majority
in the
sink the ship of state
Legislature needs
than accommodate
Republican votes to
reasonable,
pass any tax package. Republicans
meaningful compromise. The
want meaningful cost savings,
difficulty for Brown is that she
including PERS reforms beyond the
counts on their money and grass-
meager proposal unveiled last week.
roots activism for her 2018 election
Republicans, especially in the
campaign, to which she already is
Senate, are steadfast against the
devoting considerable time.
unions’ preferred gross receipts tax
At stake in 2017 are statewide
— a commercial activity tax — to
transportation improvements, taxes,
replace Oregon’s existing corporate
and cost savings in the Public
income tax. That plan would create
Employees Retirement System and
such winners and losers that some
other areas.
companies could see their tax bills
As Scappoose Sen. Betsy
triple.
Johnson, a moderate Democrat, and
Centrist legislators are floating
other veteran legislators have noted,
this year’s big issues appear far more an alternative that deserves
consideration: Temporarily raise
intertwined than in the past.
corporate and personal income taxes
That makes it easier for any
to deal with the state’s budget hole.
interest group or partisan bloc to
That is not a long-term solution
thwart progress everywhere if they
to Oregon’s unstable, unpredictable
don’t get their way in one area.
tax system. But neither is it a
The latest example is the Service
wrong-way trip into the unintended
Employees International Union’s
tax consequences of a new business
threat to overturn the Legislature’s
tax that, even if it is doable, needs
transportation-infrastructure
far more work.
package, which has been a priority
Brown endorsed the
for Democrats and Republicans
transportation package this week.
alike, unless legislators pass a
That is a welcome step but by itself
suitable tax package to help schools
an inadequate one. Oregonians need
and human services.
her to campaign not for re-election
This is last fall’s ballot fight
but for a worthwhile transportation
being replayed. In the aftermath
package, meaningful PERS reforms
of its decisive but divisive defeat
and pragmatic tax decisions.
of Ballot Measure 97, the business
Success will require passion,
community has been unable to
persuasiveness and willingness to
coalesce and work with unions on
an alternative. As a result, SEIU, the defy her past allies.
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
Bill would make drug
prices affordable
I’m a pharmacist in Enterprise,
Oregon, at one of two places in town
where patients can get prescriptions. I
enjoy being a pharmacist because I like
to help people. But I don’t like seeing
how the prices of needed medications
gives my patients sticker shock.
I see patients in my community
often making choices between the basic
necessities of life and their medications,
and if nothing is done I know it’s likely
to get worse. It’s unhealthy for them and
frustrating for me, and it impacts the
whole community.
One of my patients has diabetes,
as do one in eight Oregonians. Insulin
prices have tripled in just the past
decade. In addition, she needs a higher
dosage to manage her condition – and a
higher dosage also means a higher cost.
She is lucky to have health insurance
but her out-of-pocket costs are still
about $600 per month and that’s after
her insurance covers two-thirds of the
cost. That means this drug costs almost
$22,000 per year.
Once, as I could see the will to live
draining from her face, she said, “Maybe
I should just die.” She tried to turn it into
a joke but it didn’t really work.
Experiences like this happen every
day and are why the Oregon Pharmacy
Coalition is part of the broad coalition
working to pass the Oregon Affordable
Drug Prices Act for affordability,
fairness, and transparency in drug
pricing.
HB 2387, the Oregon Affordable
Drug Prices Act, helps patients by
capping prescription drug co-pays at
between $100 and $250, which will
provide immediate relief for hundreds of
thousands of Oregonians. This Act will
also benefit all Oregonians by bringing
transparency to drug pricing and making
the market more competitive. Pharma-
ceutical manufacturers will be required to
justify large price increases to the Depart-
ment of Business and Consumer Affairs.
If the drug price increase is determined
to be unjustified, the pharmaceutical
manufacturer must pay a rebate into a
Premium Protection Fund, which will
ensure that the high prices they charge
don’t drive up insurance rates.
Learn more about how HB 2387 will
help Oregonians and get involved at
www.affordablerxnow.org. The powerful
pharmaceutical industry has spent a lot
of money in Oregon to stop HB 2387
and protect their profits. Please join us
today in standing up to Big Pharma to
lower prices and bring transparency and
accountability to drug pricing.
Sean Murray
Enterprise
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.
OTHER VIEWS
Can Democrats save themselves?
O
n a recent weekend at the
elitist optics at odds with the lessons
farmers market in Halcottsville,
of 2016. Although new research
New York, Fred Margulies sat
commissioned by Priorities USA, a
under a “Vote Where It Counts” sign
Democratic super PAC, concluded
and beckoned second-home owners to
that many Obama-to-Trump voters
re-register in this area upstate instead
believed that Democrats are out of
of wherever their main residences
touch with less affluent Americans,
were — New York City, most likely.
a recent, high-profile Democratic
To win the House in 2018 and
brainstorming session in Washington
Frank
buck President Donald Trump’s worst
was held at the opulent Four Seasons
Bruni
impulses, Democrats don’t need more
Hotel.
Comment
votes in Manhattan and Brooklyn.
Then there are the candidates,
They need them around Halcottsville,
who sometimes step forward, or are
in the 19th Congressional District, where
elevated, independent of any master plan.
the party should be able to prevail but keeps
Democrats in the 19th haven’t been riding
falling short.
optimal ones.
Its optimism grows with Trump’s woes.
Their horse in 2014 was a pampered foal,
But will Democrats put forward the right
Sean Eldridge, then 28, who is married to
candidate for a largely working-class region
Facebook multimillionaire Chris Hughes
whose barns need paint, whose town centers
and qualified for the race by purchasing a $2
want for bustle and whose manufacturing
million country house just an hour from the
plants are too few and far between?
$5 million country house the couple already
Margulies told me that a man might fare
owned.
best, especially someone who doesn’t feed
His bid was cast as a tale “of nouveau
residents’ fears that they’re “under the thumb
riche liberal ambition, real-estate excess and
of the city.” But in the Democratic primary
carpetbaggery run amok,” Michael Barbaro
last year, Margulies spurned a male contender
wrote in The New York Times, and, shockingly,
with unquestioned local ties in favor of
he never captured the hearts of the region’s
Zephyr Teachout, a Manhattan law professor
dairy farmers. Although the district is almost
who’d just moved to the district to run. She
evenly divided between Democrats and
got the nomination, then lost by about 9 points Republicans, and Barack Obama won it by
in the general election.
about 8 points in 2008 and 6 in 2012, Eldridge
“I liked her mind,” Margulies said. “I guess suffered a 30-point defeat.
I’m not practical.”
He ran against a popular, deft incumbent
Well, the time for romance is past. The
who then decided to retire from the House
2018 midterms could hinge on how ruthlessly
after 2016, so Democrats nursed renewed
pragmatic Democrats are.
hopes in last year’s congressional election.
From the scandalous look of the last week,
Party chieftains in Washington put the Hudson
dominated by James Comey’s testimony,
Valley high on their wish list of House seats to
Democrats are beautifully positioned to
turn blue.
trounce Republicans wherever Republicans
Teachout was the favorite of the local
are trounce-able. But the party has done an
progressives who held sway in the primary.
ace job of sabotaging itself before. The 19th
She had been anointed by Sanders. She had
District, also known as the Hudson Valley,
attained some celebrity by challenging Gov.
tells that story well.
Andrew Cuomo’s 2014 re-election bid. So
Next year, Democrats should pick
they passed over Will Yandik, a relative
up many seats in Congress, given the
moderate whose family farm went back several
usual midterm correction and the unusual
generations and who had graduated from a
melodrama in the Trump administration.
local high school before getting bachelor’s and
Control of the Senate is probably beyond
master’s degrees in the Ivy League.
the party’s reach, because Democrats have
“I don’t know that I would have won,”
to defend two states to every one that
Yandik told me. “I would have come closer
Republicans do, on turf that’s plenty red.
than Zephyr Teachout.” Looking ahead, he
Control of the House, though, is entirely
said that “in a swing district where every
possible, even with all the gerrymandering
single percentage point matters, the inability
that has occurred. But that presumes that
to demonstrate a cultural connection to the
Democrats can get their act together.
district is a liability.”
They’re still not sure how much of Trump’s
He’s taking a pass on 2018 but is watching
victory had to do with Hillary Clinton’s flaws
to see whether Democratic primary voters “are
versus the party’s poor grasp of America, and
going to be strategic and pick a centrist and
the more they focus on the former, tattling for
someone with deep roots — someone who can
the tell-all book “Shattered” and then tittering
beat John Faso — or whether they are going to
over its revelations, the less they own up to the adhere to their progressive principles and put a
latter.
firebrand like Zephyr Teachout up again.”
They’re still searching for a concise,
■
coherent message. They’re still feuding: the
Frank Bruni, an Op-Ed columnist for
Bernie Sanders/Elizabeth Warren wing versus The New York Times since 2011, joined the
the moderates. And they’re still indulging in
newspaper in 1995.
Climate crimes won’t go untried
I
had a dream. At first I thought I was
scientists who warned action was
at the Nuremberg trials watching
needed to protect future generations?”
attorneys for the Allied forces
He scoffed but again said nothing.
prosecute Nazi leaders who carried out
I glanced at the other defendants
the Holocaust.
awaiting their turn. The former
But the defendants didn’t have
Speaker of the House looked as cold
the look of hardened soldiers. On the
and clueless as ever. I recognized a
contrary, they looked soft and surly,
handful of the congressmen who had
offended at being inconvenienced by
urged for withdrawal from the Paris
Hal
the proceedings.
McCune climate accord — and not coinciden-
As the dream sharpened, I noticed
tally had taken millions of dollars in
Comment
charts on the walls depicting the
oil company donations.
The prosecutor was now playing an
fading of the polar ice caps, the
excerpt from another former president about
steady temperature rise of the oceans, the
relentless increase in carbon dioxide and other his travels around the world. “… you talk to
leaders of governments and the opposition,
greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. The
and they are arguing about a whole bunch
prosecution was surrounded by tables brim-
of things,” he said. “One thing they’re not
ming with studies and reports, peer-reviewed
journals, clippings, satellite photos and NASA arguing about is whether the science of
climate change is real and whether or not
research.
we’re going to have to do something about it.”
This clearly wasn’t Germany or a post-war
He then asked the judge to direct the
tribunal. I wasn’t dreaming about the past but
defendant to answer the question — why his
rather the not-so-distant future.
political party was the only one in the advanced
“Are you aware that NASA first briefed the
Senate in 1988 that it was 99-percent certain that world that still denies climate change?
The defendant added a half smile to his
rising global temperatures were caused by the
sneer, and lazily lifted a hand and rubbed his
burning of fossil fuels?” the prosecutor barked
thumb back and forth over his finger tips.
at the defendant slouched on the witness stand.
I saw a woman juror mouth the unspoken
I couldn’t tell for certain but his familiar “Mr.
answer: Greed.
Burns” smirk reminded me of Scott Pruitt, the
As the dream faded I realized why
guy who fought the EPA’s efforts to protect air
and water while an Oklahoma politician only to I initially thought of Nuremberg. I was
witnessing another trial of crimes against
be appointed to lead the agency.
He didn’t answer the question, just sneered. humanity.
■
“Did you ever think about your children
Hal McCune is a longtime Pendleton resi-
and grandchildren when you refused to act
on the unprecedented consensus of climate
dent and former editor at the East Oregonian.