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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Oct. 14, 2017)
VIEWPOINTS Saturday, October 14, 2017 East Oregonian Page 5A America isn’t yet, but will be n 1986, the year of the first Martin Luther King Jr. holiday, I was teaching in a small rural Oregon high school. The students and I had talked quite a lot about “the American Dream,” since that was the title of the first unit in their literature textbook. I said I thought the dream meant more than economic opportunity—owning your own home, or doing a bit better financially than your parents. It meant trying to live up to our ideals, those words they repeated every time they recited the pledge of allegiance: Liberty and justice for all. Equality was not so wild a dream, I thought. A few days before I had left for college, Martin Luther King Jr. had spoken from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial: “I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.’” My friends and I were growing up and our nation was maturing too, I remember thinking. Ending racism, sexism, even classism — that would be the work of our generation. It seemed natural, inevitable. I was an American Dreamer, all right. Many of us were, we children of the Sixties. But even by 1986 not everyone was ready to celebrate the life of Martin Luther King. I Our principal wanted to avoid controversy. “Just mention it briefly,” he instructed faculty. “Don’t change your lesson plans.” How could I help students understand this holiday? I read them a timeline, the major events of King’s life. The silence that followed seemed profound, but I couldn’t be sure until the next day, when a boy in the front row raised his hand. “Can we talk about it? Please?” Why had no one told them this stuff? they wanted to know. Riots in 23 cities after the assassination? It was hard for them to imagine. What happens to a dream deferred? We turned to Langston Hughes’ poem near the back of our literature book. “Does it dry up / like a raisin in the sun? / Or fester like a sore— / And then run? / Does it stink like rotten meat? / Or crust and sugar over— / like a syrupy sweet?” Heads were bent over books. “Maybe it just sags / like a heavy load.” Then that last line. “Or does it explode?” We looked at another Hughes poem, too. “Let America be America again—The land that never has been yet—and yet must be—the land where every man is free.” That’s the American Dream, I told them. Maybe your generation can make it happen. Now, in 2017, Dreamers are in the Equality was not so wild a dream, I thought. Quick takes Stanfield still stinks I was in Stanfield today, visiting my parents, and I couldn’t believe the stench. What was once a welcoming smell of mint fields or freshly harvested hay (that I refer to as “the smell of my childhood”) is replaced by the smell of rot. Why so close to a residential community? Why not out in the middle of nowhere? — Linda Thompson Shut it down. I am so sick of gagging in my own back yard. It has been like this all summer. — Chloe Harding Every time I go out there they have done something new to help. They are at least trying. — Justin Heller Horrible smell! Definitely not a welcoming odor to have in your hometown. — Brian Faro Last season at BMCC pool? Grateful for another season for the swim team and their families. I hope the commu- nity figures our a permanent solution to this. It would be a shame for the swim athletes to not be able to swim as a school sport any longer. — Becky Cecil Too bad Hermiston planners couldn’t understand that we should have built an indoor pool, instead of one can use only two months a year. — Tina Dreher There seems to be a pattern in this town of deferring maintenance until the infrastruc- ture becomes unusable, and then wanting a bailout bond or just shutting something down. They did it with the grade schools, streets and the fire station. It is happening with the Vert. Now the BMCC pool. — Mike Navratil Crazy Mike’s video closes Sorry you have to close but there will be more like you with people demanding higher and higher wages. — Jim Garrou Yeah, for sure higher minimum wage killed a video store’s business. Couldn’t have been Netflix, Hulu and the million other streaming services. — Nicholas Lee One of the great lessons of the Twitter age is that much can be summed up in just a few words. Here are some of this week’s takes. Tweet yours @Tim_Trainor or email editor@eastoregonian. com, and keep them to 140 characters. news. The president has rescinded DACA — Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals — and the “DREAM Act” (Development, Education, and Relief for Alien Minors) still hasn’t passed. Will those 800,000 young people be allowed to define and pursue their own American dreams? When I hear about the Dreamers, I think about another group of Dreamers, the followers of Smohalla. We can read their story in “Drummers and Dreamers” — Native Peoples whose descendants still worship in Northwest longhouses. They were also considered a threat, though their dreams were spiritual and of course they were already here. I wonder: Are they kindred spirits, these two kinds of Dreamers, both wanting and needing home? But I’ve been reading Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz’s “An Indigenous People’s History of the United States” and despite of the ideals of America’s dreams, I know that settler colonization is an ongoing and painful reality. Sometimes, with questions like these spinning in my mind late at night when I can’t sleep, I think about my former students. Do they remember that day in our classroom? Did they grow up to believe that Black Lives Matter? Did they vote to Make America Great Again? “Oh, yes, I say it plain,” wrote Langston Hughes in the poem I showed them. “America never was America to me, And yet I swear this oath—America will be!” B ette H usted FROM HERE TO ANYWHERE I find it hard, in these dark days, to hang on to such optimism. Maybe it’s the teacher who needs to return to the lessons of that classroom moment. ■ Bette Husted is a writer and a student of T’ai Chi and the natural world. She lives in Pendleton. Dear restaurant: Please tell me the story of my grass fter a tour of his ranch, Lon learn about the role of grass in this process? helps to show how they contribute Reukauf sat restlessly at When it comes to imparting a message of to the quality of the final product. the front of a banquet room sustainability, isn’t it better for a menu to He could talk about which in Terry, Montana, waiting for the say that a certain steak is nurtured by, say, conditions make the grasses thrive panel discussion to start. He was western wheatgrass than by the individual and which leave them vulnerable surrounded by experts from the rancher who manages to invaders. Montana Stockgrowers Association that grass? And likewise He seemed and the World Wildlife Fund. The for vegetarians, that these particularly groups had combined to give Lon particular lentils are pleased that the John an environmental stewardship nurtured by soil tillage, Clayton World Wildlife award and then invited a bunch of phosphorus levels, and — Fund had endorsed Comment us here to see why. at the risk of completely well managed Lon knew that most eyes in turning the menu into a cattle grazing, the room were on him, and — like most dictionary — Rhizobium because for decades some microsymbionts? ranchers I know — the attention made him environmentalists have Such a strategy would uncomfortable. He’s not a public speaker, clashed with ranchers over also keep the spotlight off doesn’t seek the spotlight and prefers to public-land grazing. At this a bunch of agriculturalists spend most of his time surrounded by cows, get-together, though, all who would rather people with their heads down and grazing. agreed that good grazing — Lon Reukauf, knew about their struggles “Sitting here in front of 50 strangers, I’m can promote good grass. Rancher than recognized their certainly out of my comfort zone,” he said. As he talked about names. So he concentrated on what he knew best. grass, Lon relaxed. The After Lon and some He spoke about grass. spotlight was no longer others talked, they asked for feedback, and It’s the native grasses, in a healthy shining on him but rather through him — variety, that make for the best beef, he said. onto the complex systems that he spends his a chef on our tour summarized how the day had changed his thinking. “We tend to The soil does better by them too, he added, life observing and nudging. focus on the animal,” he said, referring to as do other species, especially the grassland “The grasses and other plants are the his buying process and the qualities he tries birds that have been declining in population. foundation of everything we do,” he said. Western wheatgrass, blue grama grass, to convey to diners, “but I’m learning that it The cattle were just harvesters, and he was green needle and the needle-and-thread goes back much farther and deeper.” just trying, in one corner of Montana, to grasses growing on his ranch offer a better That was what I had learned as well, and make that process a little more productive. spectrum of nutrients than exotic species what I wouldn’t mind learning from the He didn’t seem to care much for the word such as crested wheatgrass, which was menus of farm-to-table restaurants. sustainability, but his humble view of that widely planted during the 1930s as a way to large process certainly brought the concept ■ fight erosion. John Clayton is a contributor to Writers to my mind. Like a chef showing off the qualities of on the Range, the opinion service of High Indeed, his talk reminded me of those marble in a steak, Lon could compare the Country News. He is a writer in Montana menu listings: What’s on your plate is part characteristics of various grasses, noting, whose new book is Wonderlandscape: of a larger process here. Let’s push the for example, how they differ in the timing Yellowstone National Park and the credit upstream. of their period of fastest growth, which Evolution of an American Cultural Icon. But why did I have to go to a ranch to A “The grasses and other plants are the foundation of everything we do.” Trump must support rural voters who elected him By DAN JOYCE, DON HODGE AND LARRY WILSON Malheur County W atching the national news networks, it’s still fairly easy to see why so many political elites were caught off guard by the election results last year. The topics that seem to grab and hold the attention of national leaders are chronically disconnected from the kitchen-table issues facing middle-class families outside of a few major cities. In contrast, President Trump nurtured his relationship with rural communities and vowed to unleash the economic productivity of America’s great agricultural heart. He was rewarded. Pundits in Washington called it the “revenge of the rural voter.” Leaders from both parties should take note, especially in states like Oregon, where so many of our communities rely on and benefit from ranches, farms, biofuel plants, and forestry operations. According to the Department of Agriculture, U.S. farm income has fallen for three straight years. The latest forecast, released in August, shows that 2017 might finally mark a turning point, with incomes beginning to tick back up. But progress is far from certain, and we need leaders who will keep Congress and the White House focused on opening new markets for U.S. farm goods, lifting needless government restrictions, and promoting investment in rural economic growth. And we need to protect proven policies, like the 12-year old renewable fuel standard, which ensures that U.S. farmers can compete at the gas pump, offering homegrown biofuels made from agricultural feedstocks in states like Oregon. Competition from American-made biofuels not only provides a vital market for surplus grain, it reduces emissions, and it protects drivers from efforts by Russia and others to jack up the cost of gasoline. The biofuel industry alone supports about 16,000 Oregon jobs. As one might expect, special interests are working hard to undermine the RFS. We’re thankful for Oregon champions like Congressman Greg Walden that work hard to represent us and that we can count on to push back and ensure that rural America continues to benefit from new growth opportunities. ■ Judge Dan Joyce, Commissioner Don Hodge and Commissioner Larry Wilson represent Malheur County. According to the Department of Agriculture, U.S. farm income has fallen for three straight years.
