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About East Oregonian : E.O. (Pendleton, OR) 1888-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 8, 2018)
Page 4A East Oregonian Thursday, February 8, 2018 KATHRYN B. BROWN Publisher DANIEL WATTENBURGER Managing Editor TIM TRAINOR Opinion Page Editor Founded October 16, 1875 OUR VIEW The state of our state How is Oregon doing as a state? Gov. Kate Brown answered that question only in the broadest sense during her State of the State speech this week: “Oregon’s rising economic tide should be lifting all boats. Yet many hardworking families are still under water.” Her answer is a plan she dubbed “Future Ready Oregon,” including: • Focus the state’s economic development efforts on people of color and rural Oregonians. • Address Oregon’s housing shortage for working families. • Make it easier for construction workers to start their own business, especially if they will build low-income housing in rural areas. • Invest more in career-technical education and hands-on learning. • Expand apprenticeships in good-paying jobs that need workers — information technology, health care, advanced wood manufacturing and high-tech manufacturing. • Make it easier for individuals to enter the health care field, enabling them to train for various health-care sectors at once. These goals are worthwhile, and align with Eastern Oregon’s interests and needs. Anyone making these statements at the opening of a legislative session should be applauded. Rural Oregonians and people of color were left behind amid the economic boom experienced in Portland and other metro areas. Meanwhile, much of Oregon suffers from a shortage of housing for low- and middle-income residents. And certainly, Oregon’s education and training systems should better align with projected job opportunities. As Brown said, “The goal is to close the gap between the workforce that we have and the workforce that we need to fuel Oregon’s economy.” She went on to say, “Over the course of the next year, through a series of executive actions, policy positions and legislation, Future Ready Oregon will build these pathways for adults to get the right skills for the right jobs of Oregon’s future.” Brown spoke in broad terms that left many people in the Oregon Capitol, including some of her fellow Democrats, wondering what she had in mind. And despite Brown’s calling her plan “a new way of thinking about the economy,” previous governors, Molly J. Smith/Statesman-Journal via AP Gov. Kate Brown, center, greets members of the Oregon Senate as she arrives for the State of the State address Monday at the Oregon State Capitol in Salem. education officials and business leaders have said similar things. That’s where Brown must distinguish herself, and show rather than tell. It’s an election year and she would like to keep her job come November. Serving the greater good of all Oregonians won’t be of much interest to her urban Democratic base, but will define her credibility with the rest of us. In Umatilla and Morrow counties, we feel deeply the need for housing and workers in both the construction trades and health care. A defined and executed plan to improve both would be a welcome change. This was not a bold speech. But it was a pragmatic speech. Oregon — both rural and urban — will benefit if Brown can make these ideas stick. OTHER VIEWS Gulp. I’m guilty of treason. fter more than five decades are substantively dangerous. of reasonably virtuous living, Never has a president been I’m now told that I have so gifted at projection, the betrayed my country and committed psychological tic by which a person the ultimate crime. divines in others what’s so deeply I did not clap during President embedded in himself. Democrats, Donald Trump’s State of the Union he said, were “selfish,” putting their address. own feelings above the country’s Granted, my hands were welfare. The man who signed tax Frank otherwise engaged. They pounded legislation that benefits his business Bruni my laptop’s keyboard as I frantically empire and spends roughly one of Comment took notes: “clean coal,” “disastrous every three days at a Trump-branded Obamacare.” And I’m limited in property wouldn’t know anything my appendages and much too clumsy to about that. approximate applause with my feet. He doesn’t engage the substance of any But even if could, I wouldn’t have. opposition to him or investigation of him. That’s not because I’m rooting against He just invalidates the agents of it. That America. It’s because I’m rooting for diverts the discussion from facts to name- it — and believe that we deserve better calling, which is a game that nobody ever wins. than a leader who uses If journalists are language as sloppily and poisonously as Trump Maybe the president documenting his falsehoods, they does, who reacts to every is cheapening the themselves must be unwelcome message by fabulists. If judges rule smearing the messenger, term. When he against him, they must and whose litmus test for degrades language, be biased. If federal law patriotism is this and this enforcement officials alone: Do you worship he diminishes its have suspicions about me? On Monday afternoon potency against him. him or people who worked for him, they he visited a manufacturing must be corrupt hacks. plant outside Cincinnati, If Democrats don’t congratulate him for where of course he complimented himself, making America great again, they must be lavishly. He complained as he often does traitors. about the insufficient credit that he gets. Soon there is no one to trust but Trump, He mused with audacious selectiveness or no one to trust at all. That’s the point. about all the blessings he was bringing to He’s inoculating himself, and no price — us. No plummet of the Dow punctures his self-regard. not the reputations of individuals who have But something that he said stood out, not behaved honorably, not the viability of just because it went so ludicrously far, even institutions that are crucial to the health of by Trumpian standards, but because it so our democracy — is too steep to pay. perfectly captured his distinctive madness Treason: It’s a word that he has used and meanness. before, to characterize an FBI agent whose Recalling that many Democrats sat on text messages made his distaste for Trump their hands for much or all of his speech clear. Maybe the president is cheapening before Congress last week, he pronounced the term. When he degrades language, he them “un-American,” adding: “Somebody diminishes its potency against him. said ‘treasonous.’ I mean, yeah, I guess, But if you accept his loose definition why not? Can we call that treason? Why of treason, hasn’t he committed it? I’m not? I mean, they certainly didn’t seem to not referring to Russia; I’m referring to love our country very much.” his effort to delegitimize President Barack My favorite touch is the “somebody.” Obama by insisting, with no evidence, With Trump, the darkest and most that he was born outside the United conspiratorial notions are never his doing States. That’s infinitely more defiant and or responsibility. He heard it somewhere. destabilizing than Nancy Pelosi’s inert He read it someplace. And he’s merely hands and anguished mien as Trump assenting in his open-minded and agreeable delivered his big speech. But he doesn’t way. “I guess.” “Why not?” Far be it from mention it anymore, so we, as good him to challenge this unspecified wisdom Americans, are supposed to forget about it, out there. too. That meandering air masks a considered I think it does the country a greater ploy: As a distraction and deflection, he service to remember. I think it’s more routinely accuses his adversaries of the patriotic to withhold applause than to grant very wrongdoing that can more credibly be it too readily. attributed to him. “Treason” is a word too Do I wish for Trump to be an excellent grand to be thrown around casually, but it president? Yes, and I’ll clap heartily — applies better to a president who minimizes with my hands and my feet — if that and denigrates clear evidence that a foreign happens. Until then I decline, and if that’s power meddled in an American election treason, I plead guilty. — and makes no real effort to prevent that ■ from happening again — than it does to a Frank Bruni, an Op-Ed columnist for The New York Times since 2011, joined the bunch of lawmakers who decline to salute him. Their actions are largely theatrical. His newspaper in 1995. A YOUR VIEWS IPC over-forecasting their energy need After reading the article from Mitch Colburn of Idaho Power touting their analysis that shows a need for the proposed B2H transmission line, may I please remind them of the following: In a meeting in March of 2009, Mark Stokes, IPC’S power supply planning manager, stated that IPC had a need for increased transmission capability. Then on February 5, 2015 (six years later), that same company stated at a PURPA meeting in Idaho that there was no need, that IPC could meet their peak demands through 2021 and beyond ... they won’t need anything. It has been recently learned that IPC is consistently under-reporting their energy conservation and over-forecasting their energy need. From information gathered from the United States Energy Information Administration, the question was asked: “How fast is electric demand increasing in the United States?” Answer: “It isn’t. Electric sales are flat. Total electricity sales fell in 2015 for the fifth time in the past eight years.” They (IPC) also speak of their regional partners for this proposed B2H project, i.e., Bonneville Power Administration and Pacific Corp. As a participant in the video/phone conference before the Oregon Public Utility Commission on Thursday, February 1, 2018, it came to light again at that conference that, so far, neither Pacific Corp nor Bonneville Power have agreed to construction. Idaho Power is asking to start preliminary construction before a site certificate is issued. No rules being followed here. When the dams were built on the Snake River, one of the requirements was that fish ladders be constructed on these dams. Again, no rules followed here as IPC chose to build these dams without the required fish ladders. How they got away with the blatant disregard for those requirements is still very questionable. The proof is in the pudding. Everything sounds rosy and peachy-keen when presented by IPC, but, in light of the above, I question their integrity. JoAnn Marlette Baker City Habitats are being destroyed How much is enough? Regarding the newly-cleared area upstream from Riverfront Park and under the West Highland bridge: there was plenty of room, near the bridge, for entering the small area that used to belong to Oregon Fish & Wildlife, for parking, and for a new path to extend under the bridge west into the downstream park areas; even already in place, a put-in/take-out area for rafters. Who decided to slash and burn the entire area upstream to the boundary? Such a small area that could have been left wild! Public parks need the wild areas too. Clearing and burning that small upstream area changed it forever. You destroyed a red fox den with kits due soon. You cleared out and burned a number of California quail shelters, burned and cleared grazing areas for herds of mule deer and white- tails. You destroyed nesting sites along the banks that dozens of mergansers and wood ducks used for longer than any of us can remember. I know, because the neighbors along Quick Road have watched all that activity and protected it from human encroachment for at least 80 years! Just how much is enough? Janet Boyd Hermiston CONTACT YOUR SENATORS Ron Wyden 221 Dirksen Senate Office Bldg. Washington, DC 20510 202-224-5244 La Grande office: 541-962-7691 Unsigned editorials are the opinion of the East Oregonian editorial board. Other columns, letters and cartoons on this page express the opinions of the authors and not necessarily that of the East Oregonian. Jeff Merkley 313 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510 202-224-3753 Pendleton office: 541-278-1129 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. 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.
