Page 4A
OPINION
East Oregonian
Friday, September 8, 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
Tip of the hat;
kick in the pants
Tip of the hat to Echo and Stanfield city governments for working
together to find a solution to a long overdue wastewater problem.
Their cooperation allows Echo to find a simpler, more economical and
less painful way to solve that problem.
Previously, city councilors had considered
and recommended using eminent domain
to build their own system, which would
require 10 acres of property owned by Echo
resident Michael Yunker.
Luckily, Stanfield was alerted to the
issues that their just-across-the-interstate
neighbor was dealing with after it was
reported in this newspaper. As luck would
have it, Stanfield has a wastewater system
that is far from being maxed out — and
would welcome the additional discharge and resulting income.
It’s a good reminder that entities of all kinds, who tend to be secretive
with their problems, can benefit by putting those issues out in the open. The
more people who are working on a problem, the more likely a solution will
be found.
Yes, it sometimes makes the path more circuitous. But more often than
not, it leads in the right direction. It’s something other organizations — both
public and private — should take to heart.
A kick in the pants to those marauding turkeys in Pilot Rock.
Yeah we’re talking to you, ya turkeys!
With their constant pecking and pooping, the flock of more than 50 birds
is making a mess of the little Umatilla County town. And the birds haven’t
the least bit of respect for private
property.
Pilot Rock city councilors decided
to bring in the professionals — Oregon
Department of Fish & Wildlife — to
figure out how best to handle the birds.
ODFWs advice kind of boils down to:
kill ‘em, move ‘em or ignore ‘em. Or
maybe a mix of all three.
The EO story about the town’s
turkey predicament was picked up by
the Associated Press on Thursday and
made it onto the homepage of the Drudge Report and its 37 million daily
online visitors. So there’s no doubt that readers nationwide want to know
more about them, and have their own ideas on how to handle the problem.
(Most of those centered on Thanksgiving dinner.) So perhaps despite the
trouble they’re causing, Pilot Rock might still be able to turn those turkeys
into a positive —perhaps tasty — spectacle.
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
Hermiston’s Bounds a voice for
rural Oregon on the Ninth Circuit
T
communities. The summer of
he President’s nomination
2017 has once again choked
of Ryan Bounds to serve
Oregon with smoke from
on the Ninth Circuit Court
catastrophic fires, the risk of
of Appeals is welcome news
which could be prevented
for rural Oregon. Born and
through better management
raised in Hermiston, Ryan has
efforts that are often negatively
never lost touch with his roots
impacted by the courts.
and understands well the way
Rural Oregon deserves both
of life in our communities. He
Greg
knows firsthand the dominant
Walden a chance for a more balanced
judicial approach and a
role federal decisions can
Comment
talented legal practitioner who
make in our region where a
understands the impact these
majority of land is managed by
decisions have on our way of life. Ryan’s
the federal government. Ryan is also
deep roots in rural Oregon, respect for
a highly talented and accomplished
tradition, precedent, and deference to
legal practitioner, with a breadth
the political branches of the state and
of experience before both trial and
federal governments, will provide rural
appellate courts. I was glad to offer my
Oregon with that important voice on
strong recommendation of Ryan earlier
the bench. He is uniquely qualified for
this year.
this judgeship. His commitment to the
Across our part of Oregon, federal
court decisions have an outsized
rule of law, liberty and self-government
influence on many facets of our lives.
are, in my mind, beyond question. I
From operations of Columbia River
strongly support his nomination and look
hydropower and transportation systems
forward to the Senate moving promptly
to federal land management decisions,
to confirm him for this seat on the Ninth
the function of vital pieces of our
Circuit.
economy are often greatly hampered by
■
judicial and biological decisions issued
Rep. Greg Walden (R-Hood River),
from the bench. Litigation and judicial
chairman of the House Energy and
injunctions against forest management
Commerce Committee, represents
projects to reduce fuel loads and
Oregon’s second congressional district,
improve forest health have a real impact which includes 20 counties in central,
on the health of our economies and our
southern and eastern Oregon.
Can we talk about
Tom Brady’s brain?
A
nother pro football season
study published in July suggested that
has begun, and Tom Brady is
the longer someone stays with football,
again taking snaps for the New
the more likely he is to show signs of
England Patriots, and there’s chatter
degenerative brain disease later. In that
galore about how much longer that
context, Brady’s stamina isn’t just an
can last. He turned 40 on Aug. 3. In
admirable testament to his will. It’s a
quarterback years, he’s a fossil.
chilling token of his risk.
But isn’t he also above the laws
There’s a dark irony here, because
of nature? His performance in the
his brain is probably the most crucial
Frank
Patriots’ Super Bowl victory over
element of his record-breaking feats.
Bruni
the Atlanta Falcons early this year
What makes a truly great quarterback
Comment
suggested as much, and his every
— or, for that matter, a truly great
painstakingly plotted hour is part of a
running back or cornerback — is
campaign not just to cheat Father Time but to
mental keenness layered atop muscle and
cackle at him.
agility.
I’ve read and heard scads about Brady’s
My team is the Denver Broncos. Its star is
all-organic, caffeine-free, anti-
the linebacker Von Miller. He
inflammatory dietary regimen;
has a fleet step and a fierce
his techniques for enhanced
grip. But what most separates
him from his peers is his talent
muscle pliability; and his
for assessing the configuration
injury-preventing, youth-
of the players lined up
preserving “body coach,”
opposite him, divining the soft
who’s apparently some Ponce
spot and strategizing — in
de León of the pectorals.
mere seconds — how to snake
Thanks to this sorcery, Brady
or shimmy through it. That’s
maintains the strength of arm
to throw downfield and the
— Malcolm Gladwell, intellectual.
Brady’s preparation
sturdiness of leg to sidestep a
author
involves more than the
blitz.
avocado ice cream and
But what about Brady from
soft-tissue massages that have become the stuff
the neck up? Even if he has the brawn to press
of incessantly rehashed myth. When a season
on, what are the risks to his brain?
finishes, he goes back and twice watches
In a May appearance on “CBS This
video of every play that he was involved in, to
Morning,” his wife, Gisele Bündchen, either
diagnose what went right or wrong.
sent a message to her husband through the
He has studied the Patriots’ offensive
television camera or made a slip, telling the
schemes well enough so that if the wide
world something that Brady certainly hasn’t.
receiver he intends to throw to isn’t free, he
“He has concussions pretty much every year,”
can, in an instant, turn his gaze and his arm
she said. “We don’t talk about it, but he does
toward another waiting target. That’s what
have concussions.”
She even claimed that he’d suffered one last Peyton Manning and so many of the sport’s
season. If that’s true, neither he nor the Patriots other legendary quarterbacks were also expert
at. And that, too, is intellectual.
disclosed it.
It’s funny, and sad, that for all the reverence
Bündchen’s comments received only
we accord athletes, we objectify them, casting
a fraction of the attention they deserved,
them as hunks and hulks. We do that in spades
as Malcolm Gladwell, who has written
with football players. Maybe that makes it
extensively about head trauma in football,
easier to treat them as disposable. Maybe that’s
noted on a podcast in June. “Why isn’t there a
stronger drumbeat for him to retire?” Gladwell why Patriots fans were worried more about
how Brady would perform in Thursday night’s
asked, adding, “I do not want to see Tom
season opener against the Kansas City Chiefs
Brady at 55 drooling into a cup.”
than about what kind of father he’ll be to his
Alarmist? I doubt that the recently retired
college football analyst Ed Cunningham would children a decade from now, or about how
intact his memories of his own glory will be.
see it that way. In The New York Times last
There isn’t a stronger drumbeat for him
week, Cunningham, 48, told my colleague
to retire mostly because he gives so many
John Branch that he had quit his high-profile
spectators so much pleasure — and seems to
TV job because he could no longer sanction
be having a blast himself. But there also isn’t
such a dangerous sport. “I just don’t think the
a stronger drumbeat because in the same way
game is safe for the brain,” he said.
that he and Bündchen don’t talk about his
His frequent on-air partner, Mike Patrick,
brain, the rest of us barely give it a thought.
concurred, telling Branch that football “can
■
turn 40-, 50-year-old men into walking
Frank Bruni, an Op-Ed columnist for
vegetables.”
Over recent years, more enthusiasts, former The New York Times since 2011, joined the
newspaper in 1995. Over his years, he has
players and scientists have been speaking out
worn a wide variety of hats, including chief
about the long-term wages of blow after blow
restaurant critic and Rome bureau chief.
and concussion upon concussion. A major
“I do not want
to see Tom
Brady at 55
drooling into
a cup,”
YOUR VIEWS
Boardman to Hemingway line
negatively affects Oregon Trail
When asked why an 81-year-old from
Bend was concerned about the Oregon Trail
and Idaho Power’s Boardman to Hemingway
power line, it is difficult to give an adequate
answer. Neither my wife nor I had anyone
who came of the trail — well, one on my
wife’s side came in 1849 to Utah.
I don’t count myself an environmentalist;
heck, I grew up in the oil fields of California.
As a kid, I went to the mountains a lot: church
groups, summer camps, and scouts. When our
family arrived, we always fished, camped and
hiked in the Sierra. All three continue to do
that today.
So now that I am 83-plus, it is easier to see
that the B2H is in direct opposition to what I
believe and have enjoyed all my life. I look at
the existing power line next to Interstate 84 in
Union County and the clear cut for the right-
of-way in the forest, and in the Baker Valley
near Flagstaff Hill and down through Durkee,
over to Huntington and across the BLM Birch
Creek Oregon Trail ruts, across farm fields of
alfalfa in Willow Creek in Malheur County. I
try to envision the B2H being twice as big in
a brand new route.
Idaho Power continues to press on.
They have presented Oregon Public Utility
Commission with 890 pages of their 20-year
Integrated Resource Plan, which includes
B2H, and they sent to Oregon Energy
Facilities Siting Council 13,000 pages for
their site application. They overwhelm
individuals with massive data and statistics.
Good folks are speaking up, Union County
and the city have held public meetings, so
has Baker County, and early on Malheur
County folks got IPC to move the line off of
agricultural lands. What if all these folks just
said: “Stop?”
I wonder what IPC could do if some effort
was spent trying to determine how to provide
20 years of service without B2H. I believe
there are some within Idaho Power who
would like that challenge.
Gail Carbiener
Bend
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.