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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Dec. 7, 2017)
Page 4A OPINION East Oregonian Thursday, December 7, 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 Tax bill passes in the dead of night In the wee hours of Saturday Democrats) were left out. The tax bill includes a tax morning, Senate Republicans passed break for people who own private what could be one of the most airplanes. There is also a tax break important bills in recent history. for parents whose children attend If it becomes law, it will revamp the national tax code, disrupt the private school. While those clearly help upper- national health care system, add income Americans, they also hurt trillions of dollars to the national poor and middle-class homes. Cuts debt and impact every pocketbook to state and local tax deductions will in America. So why did it pass just reduce funding to public schools, before 2 a.m., in the dark of night where most middle-class and poor and with nary a public hearing? Americans are educated, while Everybody knows that most 2 private school parents now save a a.m. decisions are boneheaded, few extra dollars. and something we There is no regret in the morning Everybody economic rationale light. So why are we for this kind of thing. passing important knows that Rich Americans legislation at that donated to the hour? most 2 a.m. It didn’t have to Party, decisions are Republican and the Republican happen like this. There is plenty boneheaded, Party is giving them they want. It’s to like about the tax and something what that simple. bill. Reducing the promised to corporate tax rate we regret in the keep We you informed from 35 percent to 20 morning light. about the bill as it percent, a number in moved — at that we line with other first- failed. How could world countries, is long overdue and will help American we not? Not even the senators who voted on the 479-page bill, which companies compete in a global included hand-written notes in the marketplace. Most lawyer-heavy margins, knew what was in it more corporations were finding ways than a few hours before it was around the paying the 35 percent approved. rate anyway — many by parking That’s problematic for democracy. billions of dollars in offshore tax shelters — so perhaps the lower rate But it’s also problematic for the law itself. will actually increase tax receipts. In the rush to pass the bill, the Yet there is plenty wrong with the Senate GOP accidentally nullified bill, too. The tax code was crying out for simplification, modernization many corporate deductions, among those most important to their and real reform — things the GOP corporate donors. bluffed at tackling. They came up The Wall Street Journal reported short. that a research credit was forgotten, The final Senate bill (and the House bill, for that matter) is deeply which could cost corporations up to $10.3 billion in tax write-offs. unpopular with voters. That is the That may get taken care of most obvious reason why it was through reconciliation by the House squeezed through in the dead of and Senate, or by the hundreds night. of lobbyists who will sneak their The Trump tax cuts had a 48 wishes into the bill before it percent disapproval rate and just arrives at the president’s desk for a 32 percent approval through much signature. of November, making it the least The American tax system is far popular tax cut in recent history, from being broken, and far from according to FiveThirtyEight. Yet being fixed. Tax policy swings back those numbers are remarkably and forth with the pendulum of similar to Trump’s approval and partisan control, and Republicans disapproval ratings — and are had their chance to create a more probably more tied to the President fair, open taxation system that himself than his tax bill because, lowered rates for many Americans. again, nobody knew the details of On that, the Grand Ol’ Party the bill until the final hour. fell short. And once they no longer Much of the disapproval rests on hold the power in both houses of the fact that rich Republican donors Congress and the White House, and lobbyists seemed to get direct expect much of this tax plan to be access to writing the bill, while rescinded. middle-class voters (and elected 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 Welcome different religions as holidays approach The (Frankfort, Ky.) State Journal C ommentators on both the left and the right have praised this newspaper’s efforts to promote transparency in government — and with good reason. To paraphrase Kentuckian and former Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis, sunlight is the best disinfectant. With public scrutiny, policies, procedures and ideas grow stronger. We find laughable the notion that public business should remain cloaked in secrecy for the public’s own good — whether it’s the drafting of public pension reform legislation or the selection of Frankfort’s Capital Plaza developer. Yet, when it comes to religion, some who would praise us for this stance may fall prey to a fallacy similar to the idea that darkness is a better disinfectant than light. In our predominantly Protestant community, the fear of exposure to denominations or religions different from our own is real — if rarely articulated in mixed company. That fear is both misguided and troubling. It is misguided because a person’s beliefs — or non-beliefs as the case may be — mature only in the crucible of exposure to differing viewpoints. (You don’t truly know what you believe until a debate has forced you to check your premises.) It is troubling because in our relatively homogeneous community, this ignorance of others’ beliefs can potentially lead us to dehumanize our fellow man whether we realize it or not. This holiday season, don’t just pay lip service to the importance of understanding other denominations or religions; live it. Talk with a Catholic about his or her church’s understanding of the Immaculate Conception and how that shapes Catholic views on the Virgin Mary. Brush off Maccabees and remember why it is that Jews celebrate Hanukkah. You might even be tempted to light a candle or spin a dreidel yourself. Embrace it. Your own faith will only benefit from the experience. OTHER VIEWS Donald Trump could really use a friend S how me a person who has no true His conclusion? “I’ve never needed friendships and I’ll show you anything from him,” Barrack told someone with little if any talent Kranish. “I was always subservient to for generosity, which is a muscle built him.” That’s obviously how Trump through interactions with those who prefers the people around him. On have no biological or legal claim to you bended knee. In full genuflection. but lean on you nonetheless. The Trump biographer Michael Show me a person who has no true D’Antonio told me, “He has friendships and I’ll show you someone hangers-on and he has employees and Frank who can’t see the world through he has other dependents, but I don’t Bruni another’s eyes. A novel or movie think he has friends.” He’s too twitchily Comment gets you only so far down the road to suspicious. Too vain. And so that empathy; to go the distance, you need twitchiness and vanity go unchecked. more intimate, immediate experience of hurts They metastasize. and aspirations not your own. You need friends. “He had no friends in his military academy Show me a person who has no true who stuck,” D’Antonio said. “He had no friendships and I’ll show you someone with friends in college who stuck. He was a USFL no adequately moderating influences on his owner, and all the other owners wound up whims, no sufficient cushion for his moods. I’ll hating him.” show you a full-blown narcissist or full-throttle I ran D’Antonio’s assessment by Mike paranoiac or some combination of both. Tollin, who produced and directed a I’ll show you the president of the United documentary about the USFL, a short-lived States. competitor to the NFL. He told me that Trump On Tuesday, two of his campaign aides, “showed no interest in, and seemed largely Corey Lewandowski and David Bossie, incapable of, genuine friendship.” published a book about their time with him, I asked Tollin what a person unschooled “Let Trump Be Trump.” It’s a cunning volume, in friendship might also be unpracticed at. adulatory on the surface but with just enough “Compassion?” he responded. “Compromise? grime underneath to promote sales. Those are things you learn from friendship.” Racing through it, I had three main Chris Christie was supposedly a friend of thoughts. One, Trump needs fiber. Trump’s. I think I can end this paragraph here. (McDonald’s isn’t so much his guilty pleasure The real estate tycoon Richard LeFrak is as his daily trough.) Two, Trump needs friends. ostensibly friendly with Trump. He told The Three, so much of Trump can be explained Times’ Alan Feuer in early 2016, “If we’re both through the absence of them. His rages and in Florida, Donald might call and say, ‘Come rampages are fruits of his friendlessness. have dinner at Mar-a-Lago.’” But if LeFrak In the book he doesn’t have people he suggested that Trump instead come to his communes and commiserates with in any place? “He probably won’t do it.” raw, real way. He has people he yells at and For Trump, “friendship” isn’t a two-way people he sucks labor and favors from. He has street. It’s a cul-de-sac. You can spin round and minions, Lewandowski and Bossie among round there, in the shadow of his castle, or you them. can take your vehicle somewhere else. They gush about the pleasure savored by Is he all that much different with his kids? Trump’s dinner companions: “He would regale When Ivanka and the crew sat with CNN’s them with stories from his amazing life.” Anderson Cooper last year to give testimonials “Friends” are his rapt audience when there’s no about Trump’s presence and parenting back other audience around. in the day, they repeatedly (and perhaps And they’re replaceable. Trump bluntly told inadvertently) noted that for quality time with Lewandowski that someone else could easily him, they went to his office, his construction be put in his job. Soon enough someone was. sites. They met him on his terms and terrain. Lewandowksi and Bossie crow of having Everyone does, and that’s anathema to observed the man up close, but Trump, cold decency and good governance. He gathers and and monarchic, exists across a moat of his own discards allies at will. He acts to sate his own making. needs, unworried about the impact on others. I’ve been struck by this before. For him they don’t fully exist. There’s no space In October, The Washington Post published for them, because he has never forced himself a fascinating profile of Thomas Barrack, a to carve it out. billionaire real estate investor described as “I think of it as an absolute void,” “one of President Trump’s oldest friends.” The D’Antonio said. It’s no way to live, and it’s no profile’s author, Michael Kranish, wrote that way to lead. Barrack often wonders how he has lasted 30 ■ years with such a tempestuous, egomaniacal Frank Bruni joined the New York Times in man. 1995. YOUR VIEWS Walden’s support for tax bill cost him support of local voter Through no fault of my own, I have been dealing with a chronic health condition these past 10 years. My annual medical expenses have typically approached $10,000, with a few years nearly hitting $15,000 — and that is with good health and prescription drug insurance. Knowing now that Greg Walden, our Oregon representative to the House of Representatives in Washington, D.C., voted for legislation that eliminates my ability to try and recover some of my medical expenses through my taxes has me ripping the “Walden for Sportsmen” bumper sticker off my pickup. Does anyone have a “Walden for Healthy Sportsmen Only” bumper sticker? Rich Zita Pendleton