Page 4A
OPINION
East Oregonian
Saturday, October 28, 2017
Founded October 16, 1875
KATHRYN B. BROWN
Publisher
DANIEL WATTENBURGER
Managing Editor
TIM TRAINOR
Opinion Page Editor
MARISSA WILLIAMS
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Circulation Manager
JANNA HEIMGARTNER
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MIKE JENSEN
Production Manager
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OUR VIEW
Steps needed to
restore health
care predictability
Open enrollment for Affordable
Care Act coverage starts Nov. 1
and runs through Dec. 15 for health
care policies starting Jan. 1, but it
would be understandable if many
Americans are unaware of these
important dates. They should at
least review their current coverage,
in order to avoid being locked into
something they don’t like.
The Trump administration has
cut back on efforts to inform people
about deadlines and other matters
pertaining to the ACA — part of a
strategy of sabotaging the national
health care system sometimes called
Obamacare. The White House
also has axed billions in funds to
subsidize insurance policies for
Americans covered by the act,
suggesting the payments amount
to a taxpayer-funded subsidy for
insurance companies. (This is a
valid point; the ACA was modeled
on a Republican-designed system
in Massachusetts that was highly
accommodating to private insurers.)
None of this should come as a
surprise, considering Donald Trump
and congressional Republicans ran
for office on a platform of undoing
Obamacare. Unfortunately for
ordinary citizens, the haphazard
way they are going about it is
making matters worse instead of
better. There are so many changes
and uncertainties, it’s hard to keep
straight what to do, what will be
covered and what it will cost. Since
insurance depends on sophisticated
analysis of facts and risks, the
marketplace is reacting to all these
open questions by raising prices on
the policies some Americans are
legally obliged to buy.
The good news in Oregon is
that coverage options and financial
assistance remain available. The
president’s elimination of subsidies
— apart from causing insurance
companies to raise premiums in
anticipation — isn’t expected to
have a dramatic impact on those
who make up to 2 1/2 times the
federal poverty level. For a family of
four, that comes to $60,750 in 2017.
What they lose in more expensive
premiums, they will make up in
income tax credits.
This will end up costing the
U.S. Treasury even more. “The
nonpartisan Congressional Budget
Office forecast that ending cost-
sharing reductions would increase
the federal deficit by $194 billion
over a decade, because the tax credit
amounts would increase and because
more people would receive them,”
the Washington Post reported.
People in the next income tier —
up to four times the federal poverty
level — also make out OK in the
short run. It is Americans in the
highest tier — those ineligible for
tax credits — who will be hurt the
most directly by rising premiums.
These premiums are becoming more
and more crushing, at the same time
coverage becomes more limited.
It’s hard to imagine this trend being
sustainable for the relatively small
percentage of people who buy their
own policies, rather than being
covered through their employer or
by Medicare or Medicaid.
Last week, U.S. Sens. Lamar
Alexander, R-Tennessee, and Patty
Murray, D-Washington, proposed
a two-year extension of subsidies
in order to stabilize the insurance
marketplace. This is a smart idea,
but the president appears to be
against it.
Besides all the angst this causes
for Americans wondering what our
health care laws will be from one
year to the next, the real significance
of all these political gyrations is
how it discombobulates a huge
segment of the U.S. economy,
one on which we rely for essential
services. Hospitals like St. Anthony
in Pendleton and Good Shepherd
in Hermiston — and all their
individual medical providers —
depend on predictable payments
by private and public insurers.
Medicare reimbursements have
declined and slowed for years. And
now the private leg of the health care
platform is getting more and more
shaky. We all face a steep price for
incompetent management of this
literally life-and-death business.
Speaking about Trump’s decision,
an industry expert said: “I think it
will create a lot of uncertainty —
and it’s a cumulative uncertainty
created not only by this decision of
this administration, but the executive
order, the question of will Congress
step in, what will the agencies do.”
The ACA is far from perfect, but
most people were getting used to it.
But jerking it all around is making
it more expensive and less reliable.
This is not what any sensible person
wants to happen. It’s time for
responsible steps to restore health
care predictability for all.
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
The national crackup
I never cared for the “melting pot”
black occupant of the White House
metaphor, in part because it treats a
had fathered five children with three
nation of immigrants like a stew with
women, attacked grieving combat
all the cultures cooked out of it. Nor
widows and exploited the office for
was I a fan of “gorgeous mosaic,”
personal gain.
which sounds fine coming from a
But when people shame fellow
kindergarten teacher but is flat as a
citizens with the blunt edge of identity
political rallying cry.
politics, they only encourage the
I prefer “the American experiment.” Timothy backlash that gave us Trump.
It’s just as inartful, yet closer to the
White people who are not
Egan
truth. The audacious idea that people
privileged — the poor, the uneducated,
Comment
from all races, ideologies and religious
the struggling — feel belittled when
sects would check their hatreds at the
elite whites scorn their “privilege.”
door after becoming citizens is our sustaining
What’s privileged about living paycheck to
narrative.
paycheck? About 8 million citizens voted for
Within our borders, Protestants don’t
Obama — twice — and then flipped their vote
fight Catholics, Sunnis don’t go after Shiites,
for Trump. Most of them, surely, are not racist.
Armenians share neighborhoods with
What they heard from Obama was the best
Turks, and a family that can trace much of
American music. “In no other country is my
its ancestry to slavery
story even possible,” he
occupied a White House
said in his 2008 speech
built in part by slaves.
on race. After noting
But that tenuous
that he won some of the
construct is breaking
whitest counties in the
apart. We are retreating
country, he criticized a
to our tribal, ethnic and
view “that sees white
primitively prejudicial
racism as endemic, and
that elevates what is
quarters. Everything is
wrong with America
about race and identity.
above what we know is
We come from privilege,
right with America.”
or oppression. We choose
To dismiss white concern over busing or
politicians based on whether they help our
affirmative action as racist “only widens the
tribe or hurt People Like Us.
This is President Donald Trump’s legacy.
racial divide and increases misunderstanding,”
He has shattered the idea, eloquently
he said. Yet, that is exactly what many liberal
expressed by President Barack Obama, that
whites and blacks are doing now. Ta-Nehisi
we are not “irrevocably bound to a tragic
Coates, in his new book of essays, compares
past.” In the Trump era, we are neck-deep in
gentrification, which comes in many colors, to
that tragic past.
“a more pleasing name for white supremacy.”
Stupidly, the left is playing its part in this
He’s been getting pushback from African-
crackup, perhaps ensuring that Trump will
Americans with a more expansive view.
stay in office. When people shout, “Check
“Coates has convinced me that his particular
your privilege” at a speaker at a public event,
brand of anti-racism does more political harm
what they’re saying is, “Shut up, your opinion than good,” wrote Cedric Johnson, a professor
doesn’t matter because of the color of your
of African-American studies at University of
skin.”
Illinois at Chicago, in an essay last year.
Trump is a master divider. He tweets
Certainly Steven Bannon knows that. He
against football players because he wants
has repeatedly said that the more Democrats
people to resent rich black athletes. Instead of
talk about identity and race, the more it helps
sports being our last unifying diversion, it’s
his white nationalistic cause.
just another platform for hate.
If all cultural appropriation is bad —
He tweets about saying “Merry Christmas
extending even to, say, an Italian-American
again,” because it puts people of other
chef becoming expert in North African
faiths on alert. As Newt Gingrich, a master
food — then we are doomed. If everyone is a
demagogue himself, said, “He intuits how he
racist, then no one can be saved from an awful
can polarize.”
destiny at birth.
Trump opened the door to overt
Most Americans now feel their own
expressions of hatred. Investment adviser
group faces discrimination, according to
Marc Faber recently made this observation
a new NPR poll. A majority of whites say
in his newsletter: “Thank God white people
that discrimination exists against whites,
populated America, and not the blacks.
even though a majority have not personally
Otherwise, the United States would look like
experienced it.
Zimbabwe.” For good measure, he defended
This is a tragic result of the retreat to tribal
Confederate generals, “whose only crime was
quarters, pushed by extremists on both sides.
to defend what all societies had done for more If it persists, the United States that Obama
than 5,000 years: keep a part of the population celebrated cannot hold. The breaking point is
enslaved.”
now.
Trump, of course, has never apologized
■
for giving comfort to people who marched on
Timothy Egan worked for 18 years as a
behalf of a confederacy of slaveholders. And
writer for The New York Times, first as the
we all know that race would be an issue if a
Pacific Northwest correspondent.
We choose
politicians based
on whether they
help our tribe or
hurt People Like Us.
OTHER VIEWS
Clean Energy Jobs bill will help rural communities and tribes
s a fishery biologist, I have
on a daily basis. The salmon run
worked on Columbia River
sometimes arrives late — or not at
salmon restoration for
all. The migration patterns of birds
more than 30 years. As an enrolled
and elk, which we have hunted for
member of the Confederated Tribes
generations, are changing. The native
of the Umatilla Indian Reservation,
roots in the foothills and mountains
I grew up on the reservation hunting
that we have relied on for food arrive
elk and deer and fishing for salmon.
earlier and for a much shorter period
My work has involved studying
of time. Last year the huckleberries
Don
changes to our river system. The
Sampson were few, arrived early, and the
impact of climate change became
window of time they were available
Comment
apparent almost 20 years ago as our
decreased from three months to
tribes studied the flow of water in the
two and a half weeks. These native
river at different times.
foods have great cultural and ceremonial
Since then, our Tribes have worked
significance, and to lose them due to climate
extensively to document the impact of
change means losing part of who we are.
climate change on our salmon and Oregon
We’re working on adaptation strategies,
but many tribes have also begun to focus on
rivers due to reduced snowpack and
how to prevent and mitigate climate impacts
increased drought. For many of you reading
by reducing carbon pollution, increasing the
this, you know summer wildfires fill our
use of wind and solar energy, and developing
skies for weeks with smoke — affecting our
innovative projects like at the Tamástslikt
air, our children, our elders. It is projected
Cultural Institute, which is so energy
the intensity and magnitude of wildfires in
the West will increase due to climate change. efficient it produces nearly as much energy
as it uses.
We are seeing it now.
The Clean Energy Jobs bill, a policy
Native Americans and rural communities
in Oregon are affected by climate impacts
I’m advocating that the legislature passes
A
in 2018, is important to tribes and rural
communities like Pendleton, because it will
reduce climate pollution by making large
emitters pay for what they pollute, and
use the proceeds to invest in clean energy
solutions. Investments will be prioritized
to help Native American communities and
other low income, rural and communities of
color that are hardest hit by the impacts of
climate change and air pollution.
The Clean Energy Jobs bill will also
help tribes protect the forest. Trees absorb
carbon dioxide, and companies can “offset”
some of their contributions to global
warming by paying to protect the trees. The
Warm Springs Tribe in central Oregon just
completed a 20,000-acre forest land project
on the east side of Mount Jefferson.
This project will help mitigate carbon
emissions for the next 100 years while bring
millions in revenues to be reinvested the
reservation’s rural economy. But this project
is being developed under California’s cap
and trade program. With Clean Energy Jobs,
tribes could participate in the offset program,
right here in Oregon benefiting the tribe and
all Oregonians.
Most tribes in Oregon are developing
climate mitigation plans, and the
reinvestment resources from Clean Energy
Jobs would create an exciting opportunity
for tribes to implement those plans. These
plans are being developed with our local city,
county, and state partners. We could invest
in expanding renewable energy like wind
and solar and in land preservation, which
creates jobs and protects our culture, food,
and watershed.
Our lives and our way of life are
interconnected with the climate. It’s time
to transition Oregon from dirty to clean
energy while creating jobs and business
opportunities. On Nov. 4, we will have a
kickoff rally statewide, so please join us and
find out how you can help at RenewOregon.
org. When the legislature convenes in
February, they should pass the Clean Energy
Jobs bill.
■
Don Sampson is the former Chairman
and Executive Director of the Umatilla
Tribe. He currently serves as the Climate
Change Project Director for the Affiliated
Tribes of Northwest Indians.