TUESDAY, JUNE 2, 2020
Baker City, Oregon
4A
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news@bakercityherald.com
EDITORIAL
Another
life lost,
needlessly
George Floyd should be alive.
Derek Chauvin, the Minneapolis police offi cer
who kneeled on Floyd’s neck while arresting him on
May 25, including for nearly 3 minutes after Floyd
stopped moving, according to court records, should be
prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
Chauvin has been fi red, as have the three other
offi cers involved.
Rightfully so.
Chauvin was arrested on Friday and charged with
third-degree murder and second-degree manslaugh-
ter
Also rightfully so.
Even more serious criminal charges against
Chauvin might be warranted; the available evidence
suggests this is so. The three other offi cers could be
accused of crimes as well.
The police station in Minneapolis that was burned
by arsonists on Friday should still be standing. So
should the other buildings damaged or destroyed in
the Twin Cities, in Portland, in Chicago and in every
other city where such things have happened.
This is not a case of moral equivalencies.
Floyd’s life is infi nitely more valuable than any
number of buildings.
But none of these actions is defensible, even though
Floyd’s murder is far worse than the others. To say so
in no way diminishes the tragedy of Floyd’s death, or
takes away even a scintilla of Chauvin’s culpability.
It’s eminently logical to believe both that people
shouldn’t die needlessly and that buildings shouldn’t
be destroyed or damaged needlessly.
We don’t have to choose only one event to lament.
People are angry about Floyd’s death. And about
the deaths of other people, many of them black men,
who died at the hands of police when they shouldn’t
have over the years.
People should be angry.
They have taken to the streets of Minneapolis and
many other cities, as is their constitutional right.
Their message is a powerful one, and it should
be broadcast as widely, and as loudly, as righteous
people can muster. To solve this problem — and it
has no simple solutions — we must acknowledge
that it exists.
Those relatively few who seem to be responsible for
the arson fi res and the looting turn down the volume
on that message. They defl ect attention from where it
should be focused, and where most of the demonstra-
tors are trying to focus it, which is on the deaths of
Floyd and others.
— Jayson Jacoby, Baker City Herald editor
Digital giants should pay up
If you are a newspaper subscriber
or you pick up a copy at a local retail-
er, you pay for the news and informa-
tion you receive in your paper’s print
edition or digital outlets.
But it may surprise you to learn
that the multi-billion-dollar digital
behemoths Facebook and Google
don’t pay for the enormous amounts
of news content they scoop up from
newspapers every second. Facebook
doles out a little bit of money through
grants and funds to a few publishers
— and Google provides some small
grants through its News Initiative.
While these are positive steps, they
in no way make up for the use of the
news content they are using for free.
Newspapers’ original reporting, es-
pecially on the community news and
information that only local papers can
provide, drive traffi c to Facebook and
Google, keeping people on their sites
longer and attracting advertisers.
And news is a rich source of rev-
enue for the Big Tech platforms. A
2019 study conducted by the News
Media Alliance concluded that news
publishers’ content makes up 16% to
39% of Google’s search results, which
goes largely uncompensated. That
fi gure doesn’t include the more intan-
gible benefi ts that news content, and
the data that comes with it, provide
the search giant, such as using it for
new product development.
The irony is that the news and
content that newspapers pay journal-
ists to provide is used by Google and
DEAN RIDINGS
Facebook to steadily drive advertising
revenue away from newspapers, and
into their coffers. The two digital gi-
ants now gobble up 60% of all online
advertising in the United States
— an amount certain to increase
with the cratering of newspaper ad
revenue caused by the coronavirus
pandemic. Facebook and Google
don’t have reporters or the associ-
ated expense. They rely on small and
large newspapers to feed their search
results.
Here’s why this patently unfair
situation should concern you and
your community: It now threatens
the existence of some local newspa-
pers, the source of news and informa-
tion that underpins democracy and
civic life itself.
It’s long past time for Google and
Facebook to do what newspapers and
their subscribers do: Pay for the local
news that benefi ts them so richly.
There are ways for that to hap-
pen. Ideally, Google and Facebook
would take the responsibility and
voluntarily propose a method to share
revenue with newspapers and other
news organizations. They already pay
licensing fees to music publishers, for
instance.
Realistically, though, the two
behemoths will have to be forced to a
solution. America’s Newspapers, an
association of some 1,500 newspapers
including many operated by families
for multiple generations, along with
the News Media Alliance and other
media associations have urged Con-
gress to pass the Journalism Competi-
tion and Preservation Act, allowing
newspaper publishers as a group to
negotiate rates with Big Tech.
Other nations around the world
have taken notice of the ill effect the
market dominance of Google and
Facebook has on the viability of inde-
pendent journalism. Australia is now
developing a code that would require
Google and Facebook to compen-
sate news organizations when their
content is used in the digital giants’
news products. Similarly, France just
ordered Google to negotiate with news
publishers over pay for news content.
This public health crisis has
demonstrated the importance of the
reporting of local newspapers, even
as it has wreaked economic havoc on
them, forcing layoffs and even silenc-
ing printing presses on some days.
Requiring Google and Facebook to pay
their fair share for news would go a
long way to restoring the long-term
health of your local newspaper.
Dean Ridings is CEO of America’s
Newspapers, which is committed to
explaining, defending and advancing the
vital role of newspapers in democracy
and civil life. Learn more: www.
newspapers.org
Your views
Letter criticizing other
writers missed the mark
Recently, the Herald printed a letter
written by an author who I refer to
as Simple Sig. The letter attempted
to ridicule the authors of two letters
previously written to the Herald. Those
letters were well written and the au-
thors clearly presented their ideas in an
intelligent and understandable manner.
What Simple Sig’s letter did is show us
is that he is a simple-minded troll with
minimal reading comprehension skills.
Joshua Dillen
Baker City
OTHER VIEWS
Trump administration right to say
Hong Kong no longer autonomous
Editorial from The Dallas Morning
News:
The last time we fl ew out of Shanghai,
China, it was 2015 and we stumbled across
a sign hanging from the airport ceiling that
seemed like an historical relic even then.
It gave instructions — in English — for all
travelers on domestic Chinese fl ights to head
one direction and for all international travel-
ers (which included those headed for Hong
Kong and Taiwan) to head in the other direc-
tion. At the time, we smiled at the admission.
The people of both places would appreciate
that sign, but Beijing likes to think that both
should be brought under its control.
Fast-forward a few years, and it is becom-
ing increasingly clear that Hong Kong is
slipping behind the curtain of dominance of
mainland China. On May 27, the U.S. State
Department declared that Hong Kong is no
longer an autonomous region in China. The
declaration by Secretary of State Mike Pom-
peo has real implications for trade with the
commercial center, and it will also have re-
percussions for our relationship with China.
We should make no mistake. This declara-
tion — coming as it does amid a pandemic
and after years of increasing trade tensions
— will redefi ne our relationship with China.
This declaration will harden views and strip
away the remaining patina that Hong Kong
was a special region that should enjoy a
different approach on trade than China as a
whole. It’s also a declaration that will sting
a little more for the fact that is based on a
factual recognition that China is working to
subvert a culture of individual liberty and
a desire for democracy in Hong Kong. It’s
the sort of leadership we’d asked Washing-
ton to provide in standing up for liberty in
Hong Kong, so it’s one we hope Americans
welcome. It’s a hard truth, but one we can no
longer deny: Beijing’s promise of “one country,
two systems” has been revealed as false.
We hasten to add that the declaration will
likely be felt across the U.S. as Chinese inves-
tors rethink direct investment in the United
States. Real estate seems benign, but it’s
already one place where Chinese investors
in U.S. assets have pulled back. Such shifts
will continue as the underlying relation-
ship between our two countries continues to
change. Our advice is for all of us to recognize
the larger picture. We are engaged in a battle
of ideas on the world’s stage. And in that
struggle, we should wish for Hong Kong’s
democracy advocates to prevail and press
back against the ideology emanating out
from Beijing. In that struggle, we need smart
thinking and the smart use for soft power
and diplomacy to aid our natural allies and
push against our adversaries. The United
States’ declaration this week is one such step.
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Mail: To the Editor, Baker City Herald,
P.O. Box 807, Baker City, OR 97814
Email: news@bakercityherald.com