VIEWPOINTS
Saturday, March 12, 2022
East Oregonian
A5
J.D.
SMITH
FROM THE HEADWATERS
OF DRY CREEK
A pair
of tales
about
cigarettes
H
ere are two cigarette stories. The
first I heard in a front yard full
of chickens along French Creek,
3 miles above the River of No Return
in central Idaho. The second was told in
my own front yard by a gray-haired food
photographer and motorcyclist.
ONE
“No thanks, don’t want no damned
cigarette and I’m gonna tell you just
exactly why. See that tower up there? 67
feet tall. Right at the top is what in 1965
was the world’s finest and most sensi-
tive television antenna, 10 feet long with
more metal than a brand new Honda car.
Has the remote control attachment too.
You can spin the thing and zero right in
on the signal.
“It took a long time’s worth of egg
money to buy that tower, antenna, and
the Magnavox console that came with
it. Better part of eight years to save 10
quarts of coins. I figure maybe a couple
thousand dozen eggs.
“All my life I wanted to watch the
Kentucky Derby. What with trying to
keep all these birds alive in a part of
the world populated with coyotes and
cougars, and me and the wife being
scared of flying, there was no way in
hell that we were ever going to make it
to Churchill Downs. So, when we heard
that Lewiston and Moscow and Pullman
were going to get television stations, we
figured that we should get a system that
would bring the Derby right into our
home. So we put up the tower, plugged
everything in, and by God we could get
a picture even down here in this hole,
mostly skip signals and fuzzy, but better
than you would think.
“On Derby day, Momma popped a
big old bowl of corn and squeeze fresh
lemons into two jars and we plopped
ourselves into our BarcaLoungers right
up close to the set. We even had TV
trays.”
“After all the falderal and carry-
ings-on about who had the nicest
bonnets and prettiest dresses and
after all the horses were saddled and
led around the paddock and after Old
Kentucky Home was sung and after the
jockeys had saluted the Governor of
Kentucky, after all this foreplay I was
so excited I couldn’t do anything but
squirm.”
“So, just as the horses were loading
into the starting gate, I reached out on
the TV tray, shook a Pall Mall out of
the pack, fumbled around and found a
match and fired up the butt. Just as the
gate flew open I started coughing, and
I hacked and wheezed and blew snot
for every step of that race. I know that
Willie Shoemaker rode Lucky Debonair
for the win, cause Momma told me so,
but I never saw a thing but the inside of
my handkerchief. That’s the day I quit
smoking and I ain’t looking back.”
TWO
“I was in Vietnam. Joined. Still not
sorry I did. It was after Tet sometime,
the rainy spring of 1968. I’d been over
there a little more than a year, had been
coughing a little, so I had laid off smok-
ing tobacco for maybe 30 days.”
“We were pinned down. There had
been a pretty nasty firefight all night.
Intelligence said we could be toast by
daylight. I was butt-deep in water in
a hole, watching the brush moving all
around me, when this regular Army
picket fence private jumps down there
with me, pulls out a smoke, squats down
and cups the fire so he won’t be sniped
and lights up. He shakes the pack and
offers me one. I say, “No. Thanks. I
figure those things are not good for you.
I quit a month ago.”
I wish I had a picture of the look
on his face. It was the most deliber-
ate show of disbelief I have ever seen.
Here we were, for Christ sake. We were
pinned down in deep doo-doo. We were
together in a dank hole in the ground
6,000 miles from home. There were
tracer rounds buzzing around us like
fireflies. There was a good chance we
might not live to see lunch, and I was
concerned about the health risks of ciga-
rette smoke. He shook the pack one more
time and I became a cigarette smoker
again. Haven’t quit yet.”
———
J.D. Smith is an accomplished writer
and jack-of-all-trades. He lives in Athena.
Carrots, sticks, COVID-19 and herd immunity
ANDREW
CLARK
SLICE OF LIFE
he “carrot-and-stick” approach was
used with donkeys pulling carts
in the 1800s. Which works best?
Beating the donkey with a stick, or having
a carrot dangling on a string held in front
of the donkey?
Approximately 9 of 10 people in
hospitals and the vast majority of deaths
with COVID-19 are unvaccinated people
(non-vaxxers). Vaccinated people are 97
times less likely to die than non-vacci-
nated. These are very important statistics.
How and why?
The COVID-19 virus affects multiple
organ systems. The virus damages the
interior lining of blood vessels (endo-
thelium) and blood carrying the virus
can damage your entire body right down
to the level of each single cell that is
serviced by your blood, which is all of
them. Lungs are significantly harmed as a
primary site of infection.
There is damage to the brain (brain
fog, headaches), heart, kidneys, liver,
spleen, reproductive organs (blood
vessels that cause erection are damaged
and men can become impotent), women
can produce damaged oocytes (eggs)
and loss of senses of taste and smell.
There also is immune system malfunc-
tion, impaired blood clotting capability,
potential PTSD and other mental health
problems.
Some people with COVID-19 develop
abnormal blood clots, including in the
smallest blood vessels, and these clots
may also form in multiple places in
the body, including in the lungs again.
This unusual clotting may cause several
types of complications, including organ
damage, heart attack and stroke. And
additionally, it all may end as the “long-
COVID-19” syndrome too. This is really
serious stuff with lifelong complications.
Back to donkeys and sticks. Trying to
beat those who will not be vaccinated into
submission to do the right thing — for
both themselves and for society in general
— has not worked. All the begging and
pleading with the vaccine denying contin-
gent still has still left us Americans with
an estimated 20%-36% unvaccinated
people. That group will be responsible for
keeping the pandemic rolling along for
T
months and/or years with virus mutations
and new variants popping up and threat-
ening us even more, and all the things we
have been doing to prevent infection, the
masking and distancing and isolating and
on and on will have gone to waste.
Are the vaccines safe? Yes. More than
9.87 billion of doses have been adminis-
tered all around the world with negligible
side effects, so safety is well proven. Do
vaccines have side effects? Yes, of course
— tiny ones. In relation to dying of
COVID-19, those side effects are less than
miniscule. You may have the right to die,
but you do not have the right to transmit
infection and kill other people as well.
Non-vaxxer (that is a technical term)
people are plugging up hospitals and
other people in need cannot be served.
In a hospital and/or anywhere else, a
non-vaccinated person is a threat to
everyone around them and they should
not be allowed to threaten everyone else
in the medical facility.
Nationwide, more than 400,000 health
care workers — let me repeat that —
400,000 nurses and respiratory thera-
pists and physicians — have quit. They
are burned out. 400,000 of them. What
a horrendous number and loss of medi-
cal expertise. In addition to the stress,
fatigue and potential for themselves being
infected and then infecting their fami-
lies, the emotional impact of working so
diligently and then seeing so many people
suffer and die needless deaths has left
them devastated.
But here’s an idea — a carrot — that is
easy to implement and gives the unvac-
cinated population a reason to reconsider
their position. Medical facilities of all
sorts admit only people who can show
proof of vaccination. At hospitals, if a
person is not vaccinated and has COVID-
19 they are allowed entrance only once
into the emergency room, are treated and
sent home to quarantine there.
The option of telemedicine is offered
for recuperation at home. This should be
a law, but if not could potentially be an
enforced policy for protection of hospi-
tal patients and staff. The carrot simply
is availability — or not — of in-hospital
health care. It is yes or no. But telemedi-
cine is always available. I know denying
people medical treatment is currently not
legal, so this suggestion is spurious but
laws are subject to change if need be.
The only exception to vaccination is
acute life-threatening medical conditions,
with appropriate documentation from the
attending physician. To prevent frauds,
before admission that physician will be
contacted for confirmation. Religious
exception is not allowed.
I am not aware of any basic reli-
gious book — the Bible, the Koran, the
Torah, others — that says anything about
COVID-19 vaccination, but the Bible
does say things about your body being a
“temple of God” and taking good care of
your body. Anything said about religious
objection to vaccination is from men who
have concocted up spurious opposition
that has nothing to do with religion.
Do I sound cynical? Of course I’m
cynical. I’ve been state veterinarian of
Oregon and that position is responsible
for the exact same things for livestock as
the public health officials are for humans
— surveillance for disease, sample taking
and laboratory diagnostics, epidemiol-
ogy to understand the dynamics of the
disease and where/how the disease is
spreading, disease control in livestock it
is either culling (slaughter) or vaccination
and constant emergency preparedness for
rapid response to disease outbreaks.
I know the amount of work it takes
to make large-scale disease control
programs work, and we all should be
honoring our public health personnel and
cooperating with them.
Vaccination is the most basic of all
tools for establishing population-wide
“herd immunity” (a veterinary term
originated in 1894) and universal protec-
tion of the population. Cattle get vacci-
nated 100% because if the rancher wants
to succeed he has to prevent disease and
he does it. So, concerning COVID-19, if
a person wants to succeed they will be
vaccinated. If they will not participate in
elimination of the disease and the disease
eliminates that person, that’s fair play as
far as the virus is concerned — viruses do
not have souls that grieve and mourn at
the loss of your life.
But it is very sad that spouses and chil-
dren and friends will grieve and mourn,
and in many thousands of needless deaths
are doing so, right now as you read this
message. The worldwide death toll stands
at 6.04 million as of March 9 and 961,000
in the U.S. We in the U.S. have nearly
20% of worldwide death. How can this
be?
May I suggest that you get vaccinated,
please?
———
Dr. Andrew Clark is a livestock veter-
inarian with both domestic and inter-
national work experience who lives in
Pendleton.
Transforming Pendleton’s Historic Rivoli Theater
ANDREW
PICKEN
THE EDUCATION CORNER
he Rivoli Theater will be returning
to Pendleton.
Last week State Sen. Bill Hansell
called to say the Rivoli Theater Resto-
ration Project will receive a $1.5 million
dollar grant from the state of Oregon.
This is the single largest grant ever to a
Pendleton Main Street historic restoration
project. With this funding, the Rivoli
Coalition will be able to complete basic
concrete and steel work, begin second
stage architectural planning and leverage
additional funding.
We established the Rivoli project in
2011 as a 501c3 nonprofit corporation with
this mission: To transform Pendleton’s
Historic Rivoli Theater into the North-
west’s premiere showcase for excellence in
arts, information and entertainment.
In the intervening 11 years, the coali-
tion completed a project feasibility study,
T
obtained title to the Rivoli building,
removed 50 tons of material from the
building and sealed the roof. In addition,
we have removed all asbestos, two obso-
lete oil tanks and a 3,500 pound beam
from the building. Portions of the beam
will be used in another local historic reno-
vation project, and an instrument maker
has repurposed some of the wood as beau-
tiful custom-made guitars.
The Rivoli funding story is one of
public, private and nonprofit partnership.
The project enjoys the support of a
wide range of organizations, individuals,
nonprofits and companies. There are too
many to list here; we are deeply grateful to
everyone who has contributed.
As of today, the Rivoli project has
raised $2,203,743. Donors include corpo-
rations, foundations, government and indi-
viduals.
Of this total, $262,306 — 12% of total
— was raised in Pendleton. The remain-
ing $1,941,307 — 88% of total — is from
sources outside this community.
This means that for every $12 invested
by the local community, we have brought
in an additional $88 from outside Pendle-
ton. This translates into a matching ratio
— also known as return on investment —
of 7.3 to 1. This proves that local support
and investments can draw significant
funding from outside of Pendleton.
The Pendleton Development Commis-
sion has led the way from the begin-
ning, providing critical funding for the
Rivoli Theater feasibility study, build-
ing purchase and roofing. So far, the
total investment of the PDC is $165,106,
which is 7.5% of the total. For every $7.50
invested by the PDC, we have raised an
additional $92.50. This translates into a
matching ratio or return on investment of
12.3 to 1. This is proof of the economic
value of Pendleton Development Commis-
sion investments.
Thank you to the citizens, foundations,
businesses and government of Pendleton,
the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla
Indian Reservation, Umatilla County and
the state of Oregon. We still have a lot of
fundraising and work ahead, but together
we will restore and transform Pendleton’s
Historic Rivoli Theater into a community
treasure.
———
Andrew Picken, of Pendleton, is the pres-
ident of the Rivoli Coalition.