KATHRYN B. BROWN
Owner
ANDREW CUTLER
Publisher/Editor
ERICK PETERSON
Hermiston Editor/Senior Reporter
TUESDAY, MArCh 15, 2022
A4
Founded October 16, 1875
OUR VIEW
Reviewing
two years of
COVID-19
O
n Saturday, March 12, the indoor
mask mandates imposed by the
governors of Oregon, Washing-
ton and California were lifted.
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown also
announced the state of emergency that
was put in place on March 8, 2020, will
expire April 1.
Huzzah!
Officially, the lifting of the mask
requirement reflects declining COVID-
19 cases and hospitalizations in the
West Coast states. Others suggest the
announcements were coordinated with
other Blue state governments to suggest
a return to “normalcy” before President
Joe Biden’s State of the Union address
and in advance of the midterm election
campaign.
Whatever the reason, we are nonethe-
less thankful for the reprieve — even if it
later proves temporary.
Two years and change into the
pandemic, it behooves us to take stock
of where we have been and offer some
observations.
• COVID-19 qualified as a clear and
present danger as it unfolded in the early
spring of 2020. Little was known about
the disease when it arrived in the United
States.
In that context, the “two-weeks-to-
flatten-the-curve” shutdown made some
sense. But as those “two weeks” dragged
into more than three months, this seemed
less like a thoughtful strategy and more
like a desperate effort to outlast the virus.
• While government can quickly shut
the economy down, starting it back up
again isn’t that easy.
• State government was unprepared
to deal with the impacts its measures
inflicted on working people and their
employers. Shuttering the economy left
more than half a million people on the
West Coast scrambling for a paycheck.
• We have been told to “follow the
science.” Being strong believers of facts,
we put a lot of stock in science.
But, the exhortation to “follow the
science” has too often been used as a
cudgel with which to beat critics.
Science is not religious dogma. It is an
open question, not a declarative state-
ment. We don’t say this to benefit crack-
pots and conspiracy theorists, but to
encourage reasoned debate.
Officials conveying science too often
have failed to concede the body of knowl-
edge is ever changing.
We always have been strong advocates
for vaccinations, and still are. Initially,
we were told the vaccines would prevent
infections and transmission in most
cases. Then we were told that in most
cases it would only keep people from
getting really sick. That’s still a worthy
outcome, but not what conveyors of
science promised in the beginning.
Policy makers have been the strongest
proponents of “the science,” but have
been willing to forego the science for
political expediency.
• No elected official should be allowed
to rule indefinitely by decree. Emergency
powers should be limited in duration and
subject to mandatory legislative over-
sight. A benevolent dictatorship in all but
name is nonetheless tyranny.
Most people learned to live with the
virus months ago. We are happy that the
governors are learning it, too. We hope
in future emergencies that they put more
trust in the instincts of their constituents.
Ukraine targeted mercilessly, without warrant
ALEX
HOBBS
PASTURES OF PLENT Y
his month I have vacillated back
and forth between whether or not
writing about Ukraine is a worth-
while endeavor. Whether or not I have
anything to contribute to what (for good
reason) is an ever expanding canon of
geopolitical analysis.
What can I add that the horrific video
footage and images coming from Kher-
son, Kyiv and Mariupol don’t already
tell us?
Ultimately, however, my mind keeps
drifting back to my own family; my
grandmother who spoke only Ukrainian
until she left for school, of her parents
who left the Ternopil Oblast to escape
centuries of serfdom. What it must
have been like to finally leave a piece of
earth where you, your parents and their
parents going back generations were
legally forbidden to depart from. After
serfdom — the Holodomor. A genocide
of ethnic Ukrainians. Intentional famine.
An event that still, shamefully, is a
source of much hand-wringing from the
intelligentsia.
My paternal family, their country
of origin, has always been shrouded in
shadow. Like many Slavic immigrants,
I imagine there was immense pressure
— especially during the Cold War — to
distance themselves from their language
and culture that to most Americans had
all the sounds and appearances of being
Russian in the face of Russophobia.
So they toiled where they settled,
T
erecting churches and sod floor homes,
keeping to themselves. Eventually
the names they gave themselves soft-
ened: from Todeskas and Anastasias to
Nicks and Steves. A Ukrainian diaspora
blooming in the plains of North Dakota
whose seeds then blew westward after a
time.
The last vestiges of this culture still sit
quietly in our family homes. It presents
itself to us as Pysanky resting in cabi-
nets, as a little jar of dill in a cupboard,
as vyshyvanka that hang in closets, as
varenyky rolled out on a countertop.
Strands of embroidery whose fountain-
head is now, at this current moment,
being bombed into obliteration at the
behest of a dictator. Whose people are
once again being targeted mercilessly
and without warrant.
The story we are seeing unfold in
Ukraine seems to write itself. The West
will flood the country with munitions,
proxies will develop, factions will form,
mercenaries will be deployed. We have
seen what Russia did to Chechnya,
to Syria. Humanitarian corridors are
being ignored. All of the pontificating
and scolding regarding NATO expan-
sion accomplishes nothing other than
to excuse the actions of a single, irratio-
nal actor. One who poisons his political
opponents, jails detractors and helms
what can only be described as a police
state.
Regardless of the route, the desta-
bilization of Ukraine is already well
and truly underway. A country that
has historically been a feast for crows
will continue to sacrifice itself, against
its will, to imperialism and ethnic
erasure. Ghosts of the Bush Doctrine
will continue to haunt innocent people,
just as it did in Iraq. When phrases like
“preemptive strikes” are bandied about
by Belarus’ Lukashenko, you begin to
understand that Ukraine, like other states
before it, is being dragged into total war.
It will experience the push and pull
of asymmetrical warfare and tradi-
tional interstate conflict. I am afraid
of non-governmental actors (militias)
taking advantage of power vacuums as
the Ukrainian state scrambles to mobi-
lize its populations against a Russia that
understands the anarchic nature of inter-
national relations very well.
A Russia that understands Ukraine
will be left to defend itself. That state
sovereignty will win out against the
responsibility to protect.
I am not Ukrainian. Nor am I Afghan,
Yemeni, Congolese or Syrian. I watch
these atrocities unfold from the comfort
of my home an ocean or a continent
away. I think of the tenacity of these
people and the resilience I wish they did
not have to foster. Human embodiments
of Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s final lines in
“Ulysses:” “Made weak by time and fate,
but strong in will to strive, to seek, to find
and not to yield.”
Please consider donating to the
United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees as they continue to provide
basic necessities for so many displaced
peoples. The ones caught between state
actors, madmen and the fallout of war.
The ones who could have so very
easily been my grandmother, my father,
myself, my own children.
———
Alex Hobbs is a former educator turned
full-time homeschooling mom. She has a
degree in political science from Oregon
State University.
The reporter should dig a little deeper
and find out what this Atkinson is really
doing. And how many other complexes
in this town will this happen to? This
should be against the law.
Nancy Patrick
Hermiston
In an emotional plea, Brittney Jack-
son, director of the nonprofit Pendleton
Children’s Center, asked the Pendleton
Development Commission to redraw the
borders of the Urban renewal District,
making the center eligible for various
urban renewal grants. The PDC would
be missing a golden opportunity if their
request was denied.
During the subsequent discussion,
and although the PDC had previously
stated nonprofit organizations would not
be eligible for grants, it seemed amia-
ble to the idea that an exception could
be made since exceptions had been
made in the past for the Horizon Project,
the Underground Tours and the Rivoli
Theater. The discussion continued with
Kathryn Brown explaining that large
donations already were pouring in and
government grants would be available
to support the staffing requirements.
Government grants mean a lot more
administrative red tape and comply-
ing with their standards. Changing the
borders, however, was a whole different
matter as there were state restrictions.
Additionally, two other businesses
also were requesting the same treat-
ment. Given the current job atmosphere,
assembling a qualified staff to support
an eventual 150 clients is simply unre-
alistic. Without additional support from
local businesses, this program has the
potential to morph into another giant
welfare program.
Rick Rohde
Pendleton
YOUR VIEWS
Concerned about Highland
Manor Apartments
In regards to a recent front page story
(“hermiston apartment complex offers
buyouts to tenants willing to vacate,”
Feb. 9, 2022), are there any citizens in
Hermiston besides the tenants in The
Highland Manor Apartments that are
upset about the evictions taking place?
Clover housing Group/Atkinson Staff-
ing is a supplier of migrant workers.
We need migrant workers for the food
we put on our tables. There is no prob-
lem with migrant workers, but Atkinson
Staffing is going to turn highland Manor
into migrant housing, which owner Mike
Atkinson will get government subsidies
for.
Atkinson has made a lot of money
off hard working migrant workers over
the years. My question is: why hasn’t he
built housing for workers over the years
instead of evicting people who have
lived in Highland Manor for many years,
now they have nowhere to go? He calls
this an “inconvenience” and he “sympa-
thizes,” those two words I don’t think fit
the situation this man is putting on these
tenants.
Highland Manor is one of the older
apartment complexes in Hermiston, but
it has been one of the best maintained
places. They have been updated. There
is very little if anything Atkinson will
have to do to this complex. All it is, is a
smoke screen to hide what he is really
going to do.
Spend it while you got it
When it comes to government spend-
ing, be it federal, state or local, that
phase is pretty common. Our recent
legislative session in Salem bares that
out when, come hell or high water, our
representatives had to spend $1.5 billion
in a very short time.
Andrew Picken was able to convince
State Sen. Bill Hansell, who recently
complained about the frivolous spending
in this most recent legislative session, to
push for the approval of a $1.5 million
grant by our Legislature for the Rivoli
Theater Restoration Coalition. Resto-
ration of historical buildings is an admi-
rable cause, but if you’ve seen their plan,
this isn’t a restoration or preservation
project as about the only thing being
preserved is the Rivoli name.
When you continually listen to
city management trying to justify our
outrageous water rates and other public
projects the city has neglected because
they lack the funding, it’s really hard to
justify such an expenditure. Is the sena-
tor that far out of touch with local city
infrastructure issues? Where were our
city officials?