A4
Opinion
wallowa.com
November 2, 2016
Wallowa County Chieftain
Oregon must
comply with
Real ID Act
T
he Oregon legislature is in a stare down with the
federal government, one it is likely to lose.
At issue is the adoption of federal standards
for driver’s licenses and state-issued identification
cards in Oregon that can be used at secured areas,
including airports.
The law requiring it, the Real ID Act of 2005,
was enacted as a result
of the 9/11 attacks and
the subsequent war on
terrorism. It requires higher
standards of proof of U.S.
citizenship or proof of
lawful status in the U.S.
From the Capital Press
in order for state-issued
IDs to be valid for federal
purposes, such as at airport security points or when
entering federal courthouses or other secure federal
facilities.
The Transportation Security Administration,
which oversees airport security, has said it intends to
stop accepting noncompliant IDs on Jan. 22, 2018.
States that are still noncompliant — but have been
granted deadline extensions — will face a hard
deadline of October 2020, when Homeland Security
has said it will require all air travelers to carry a Real
ID-compliant license. At that point, residents from
noncompliant states will be required to present other
identification which does meet Real ID requirements,
like a passport, to fly domestically or to enter federal
courthouses or other secure federal facility. Passports
are already required for international air travel.
Across the country, 21 states currently comply, but
others including Oregon have fought the law, saying
it is an overreaching, unfunded federal mandate. In
2009, Oregon lawmakers prohibited the Department
of Motor Vehicles from spending state funds to
comply with the act. They have argued that many of
the requirements were too expensive to undertake, and
they have asked for extensions each year, which have
been routinely granted. Just this month, the state was
granted another extension, but this time only until June
2017, essentially just enough time for the Legislature
to reconsider its position. Oregon lawmakers have
said they will continue to seek extensions, which if
granted, would make its deadline for full compliance
in 2020.
While we understand Oregon’s initial reluctance to
comply, it’s time to start implementing the changes.
Congress enacted the law more than a decade ago
and aviation safety remains a deep concern. The Real
IDs will help ease some of the worries. The security
measures also make the licenses and ID cards harder
to replicate and they have the potential to reduce fraud
and identity theft.
Additionally, technology and expense issues that
existed in 2005 along with security concerns about
the cards’ data shouldn’t be a factor today. Experts say
better technology and security now exists at far less
cost than it did then. And on some of the concerns, like
data security, the states should already be addressing
those issues regardless of the Real ID requirements.
Failure to take the needed implementation steps
will eventually force all residents who want to board
a plane or enter a federal courthouse to spend the time
and money themselves to obtain a compliant ID when
one could easily exist otherwise through state-issued
driver’s licenses.
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Election season: all tricks, no treats
Scary stories being told, people
dressing themselves up, skeletons on
display and the promise of sweet treats.
It’s election time — yay!
Halloween and voting season falling
so close together on the calendar made
me notice a few similarities between the
two, which has turned into what I like
to call The Reverse-Halloween The-
ory of Politics. Check this out. With
Halloween you have a whole bunch of
eager folks approaching strangers with
the expectation of receiving a reward
for presenting themselves in a certain
way. Elections are pretty much the mir-
ror image. There’s a few people care-
fully fine-tuning their appearance and
promising good things while knocking
on doors, robo-calling, running TV and
radio ads, mass mailing and such. Both
can result in indigestion and even decay,
but asking for votes in big down-and-
dirty campaigns essentially is just back-
wards Halloween.
Here is the Political Halloween Theo-
ry applied to ballot measure advertising:
“Vote yes on Ballot Measure Bla-
hty-Blah. It’s a king-size candy bar.”
“No on Measure Such-and-Such. Pro-
ponents would have you believe it’s a
candy bar, but really it’s a stale popcorn
ball packaged around a wormy apple that
may or may not have razor blades inside.
Not even new razor blades. They might
be old ones. And rusty. You can believe
AND
FURTHERMORE
Jon Rombach
me because I’m standing in a hazelnut
orchard wearing gloves, apparently just
taking a brief moment out of my hazelnut
gathering to film an ad.”
The Yes crowd comes back with
someone in a flannel shirt, or otherwise
sensibly dressed, sitting relaxed at a
kitchen table enjoying a soothing cup of
tea and/or coffee, depending on the de-
mographic, pointing out that hazelnuts
can be in the candy bar — and it just
goes on and on until election coverage
finally ends, which is like Thanksgiving.
And if your candidate or cause wins it’s
like Christmas, and let’s just stop there. I
don’t want to wander any further toward
the neighborhood of political science
with this hard-hitting politics-as-holiday
analysis.
But hold on a tick. About that political
science. What is even remotely scientific
about politics? I don’t get that matchup.
It’s like real things were being paired up
for teams and the coach or PE teacher in
this example took a look at what they had
to work with and said, “Business, you
and Administration are a team. Sports
and, uh … Medicine. You two team up.”
Politics is jumping up and down, all
excited, saying “pick me, pick me.” Sci-
ence is busy thinking about dark matter.
Coach runs out of logical combos and
just gives up and says, “Politics and Sci-
ence, you’re together.” Everybody laughs
because they know there’s no way Pol-
itics and Science are going to win. But
Politics loves it. “Oh yeah, me and Sci-
ence? We’re good buddies. Played dodge
ball together. Matter of fact, I’m going
as Science for Halloween. I know this
neighborhood where every house gives
out king-size candy bars. Used to be folks
that gave out popcorn balls, but me and
my other buddy, Jerry … you met Jerry
Mander? Well, we adjusted the boundar-
ies and now it’s nothing but sweet, sweet
caramel, nougat, tax breaks and hazelnuts
at every door. It’s my favorite holiday.”
This has been the 2016 edition of the
“And Furthermore” Voters Guide. Re-
member to fill in the bubbles on your bal-
lot carefully and do no put frowny faces
in the little ovals next to things you don’t
like, as was recommended in previous
versions of this guide. One final tip: Bun-
dle all political mailings into large bales.
They are useful as retaining walls. Now
get out there and pick through the candy
bars and stuff you don’t care for as much
and don’t forget to vote.
Jon Rombach is a quasi-political
scientist and local columnist for The
Chieftain.
‘Busy’ is how we roll in this county
A friend texted me recently, apolo-
gizing for not getting in touch sooner
because she had been so busy.
I responded, “’Busy’ is how we roll
in Wallowa County.”
I’m learning how to hunt and had a
whitetail doe tag. As we drove around,
a friend who has lived and breathed this
Wallowa Land for decades spent a lot
of time teaching me about the habits of
deer and their movement during the fall.
Of how they are driven by their need for
water and feed, and how weather condi-
tions are a big factor.
We mostly stayed on the backcountry
roads. I didn’t always know where I was.
That is, I couldn’t show you on a map,
but when we would top out on a ridge,
I could make a mental note, “Okay, Fin-
ley Buttes are over there.” Or “There’s
the Divide.” Chief Joseph Mountain was
my main bearing point.
Interspersed in these stories were
comments about my driving. “Slow
down, Katherine.” By day 5 I wasn’t
hearing that so often.
I never realized how much hunting
can keep a person busy. Hours and hours
are devoted to scouting. Nor did I real-
WALLOWA
GAL
Katherine Stickroth
ize how much work comes with success.
The field dressing, loading, hanging,
then cutting and packaging of meat —
lots of work.
Much was taught to me, some was
learned — mostly that I don’t have any
idea what I’m doing most of the time.
At least that keeps me teachable. And a
great deal could be said on the value of
a patient friend.
My most favorite time of this hunting
season was one afternoon, somewhere,
we were scouting on foot. He showed
me tracks of deer and elk who had just
walked that trail. I heard the pounding
hoof beats of departing elk, just before
he told me to sniff and smell the musky
odor of those elk.
We hiked for about a mile, gaining
on elevation. After the sun dropped over
the mountains, we turned back. I was
watching for tracks again, then looked
up and stopped.
It was a “freeze-frame” moment.
I heard the creek murmuring below
us, hidden within a velvet carpet of pon-
derosa pine sprinkled with bright yellow
tamarack spires. Beneath a near-full
moon, the Seven Devils were gold-tint-
ed against a clear blue sky. My friend
was still walking ahead of me. Just then
a hawk rose to become airborne, bank-
ing in flight to where its white under-
side was fully exposed just above my
friend’s white cap.
The beauty of this wildness, of the
freedom to be here, and this time with
a treasured friend all hit me at once and
caught my breath away.
At the end of my hunting season, I
was pretty tired. I soon forgot that fa-
tigue. In a few months, the meat will
be gone, and I’ll forget about that while
next summer I eat mostly garden glean-
ings.
Yet never, ever will I forget the im-
age of that captured moment in Wallowa
County. I like where “busy” takes me.
Katherine Stickroth is a freelance
writer and blogs at awallowagal.com.
Misleading opposition to Measure 97
A serious lie is being told about Mea-
sure 97 that anyone with basic logic
must scratch their head over. The pur-
pose of Measure 97 is to remove the cap
on the corporate gross sales tax for sales
greater than $25 million. One argument
used in opposition to the measure is that
higher tax costs will be passed along to
the consumer. But aren’t state and local
taxes deductible from federal income
taxes?
In short, a corporation affected by
Measure 97 will actually be reducing its
federal tax liability with an increase in
Oregon taxes. Yes, overall they will pay
more taxes regardless of whether it goes
LETTERS to the EDITOR
to the state or the federal government,
but right now these $25 million gross
sales accounts are being taxed with the
“minimum tax.”
One study shows that of the compa-
nies “that make over $100 million in
Oregon sales a year, about half pay min-
imum taxes (0.02 percent)
It is an old question: where do you
get your tax revenues? Large corpo-
rations in Oregon suggest if the state
needs more revenue, tax the consumer
(sales tax) and leave our profits alone.
There are approximately 960 corpora-
tions out of 400,000 that will be affected
by Measure 97.
Multi-billion dollar corporations (ex-
amples Walmart, Chevron, Wells Fargo)
are paying for the “No” on Measure 97
campaign, not the small businesses that
won’t be affected.
Keep in mind the stipulation that rev-
enue from Measure 97 is to be used to
provide additional funding for educa-
tion, health care and services for senior
citizens.
Patrick Dunroven
Enterprise
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Contents copyright © 2016. All rights reserved. Reproduction
without permission is prohibited.
Volume 134
etters to the Editor are
subject to editing and
should be limited to 275
words. Writers should also
include a phone number with
their signature so we can call
to verify identity. The Chief-
tain does not run anonymous
L
letters.
In terms of content, writ-
ers should refrain from per-
sonal attacks. It’s acceptable,
however, to attack (or sup-
port) another party’s ideas.
We do not routinely run
thank-you letters, a policy
we’ll consider waiving only
in unusual situations where
reason compels the excep-
tion.
You can submit a let-
ter to the Wallowa County
Chieftain in person; by mail
to P.O. Box 338, Enterprise,
OR 97828; by email to edi-
tor@wallowa.com; or via
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newspaper’s website, locat-
ed at wallowa.com. (Drop
down the “Opinion” menu
on the navigation bar to see
the relevant link).