TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2021
Baker City, Oregon
A4
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EDITORIAL
A thin
exception
The Oregon Health Authority has created a COVID-19
Religious Exception Request Form. It’s for people who are — you
guessed it — requesting a religious exception to the vaccination
requirement for religious reasons.
There’s not much to it. Name. Phone number. Date of birth.
Employer name. Job title. There’s a box to tick if: “Receiving the
COVID-19 vaccination confl icts with my religious observances,
practices or beliefs as described below.”
There’s a small space for people to explain. Might be room for
two sentences. And then there’s a place to sign it and date it. It
almost fi ts on one page.
If people have religious beliefs that prevent them from being
vaccinated from COVID-19, well, that is their belief. But this reli-
gious exception is similar to the ones Oregon already has in place
for school vaccinations. And by that we mean, you could drive
busloads of people through it who don’t have any real religious
belief about vaccinations and could use it as an excuse to not be
vaccinated.
Employers can take steps to protect their employees if they
know an employee is unvaccinated.
Employers are actually not required to if “doing so would
pose a direct threat to the excepted individual or others in the
workplace or would create an undue hardship,” according to the
Oregon Health Authority.
The burden will likely fall in large part on employees. So if you
are around other employees at work, please don’t let your guard
slip, as awkward and unfortunate as it may be. Vaccination is the
best weapon we have against COVID-19. Distancing and mask-
ing help.
Unsigned editorials are the opinion of the Baker City Herald.
Columns, letters and cartoons on this page express the opinions of
the authors and not necessarily that of the Baker City Herald.
YOUR VIEWS
Stand up for Baker
and get vaccinated
I’ve lived in Baker County 56 years, including 45 years in the
communities of Richland and Halfway. One of the things that
always made me feel so proud was how these communities rallied
around any crisis that befell their neighbors. Whether it was cloth-
ing, housing, monetary support or any other thing that would alle-
viate the suffering, it was always there. North Powder, Huntington,
Unity, Oxbow and any other collection of people in small locations
of Baker County always made headlines in local papers of the sup-
port they showed their neighbors in times of need. If you’ve lived
here any amount of time you have seen and heard these stories.
Baker County is in a crisis right now and leading the state in
COVID case rates. We can’t continue to deny the statistics, vaccina-
tions help! I don’t need to repeat the news you read or see on TV.
Hospitals are full of COVID cases and there is now not room for
patients who may need urgent medical attention for other causes.
These people are our neighbors. Where is the community outreach?
Do we continue to let people die or get deathly ill when we can help
prevent the catastrophe going on? Have we given up on the values
that made Baker County special? It is not a case of individual free-
dom when it affects all of us.
9/11 reminded me that 3,000 people were killed before we could
do anything. 600,000, and rising, have already died in the U.S. —
200 times as many as 9/11! We have the ability to stop this killing.
We all just need to do the right thing for all our neighbors. Our
community depends on it. Get vaccinated now.
Chuck Peterson
Baker City
Milley’s arguably treasonous
acts set dangerous precedent
By ANDREW BACEVICH
A new book by journalists
Bob Woodward and Robert Costa
contains a singularly startling
allegation. In the waning weeks of
the Trump administration, Gen.
Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint
Chiefs of Staff, twice called his
counterpart, Gen. Li Zuocheng, of
the People’s Liberation Army, of-
fering assurances that the United
States was not about to launch an
attack against China.
“If we’re going to attack,” Milley
told Li, according to Woodward
and Costa, “I’m going to call you
ahead of time. It’s not going to be
a surprise.”
The surprise turns out to be
the revelation of Milley’s actions.
Some in the Defense Department
may have known about the calls,
but one thing seems clear: Presi-
dent Donald Trump, the U.S. com-
mander in chief, did not. Milley
acted of his own volition, without
prior presidential approval. On
that point, Christopher Miller,
then serving as acting Defense
secretary, is emphatic, describing
Milley’s actions to Fox News as a
“disgraceful and unprecedented
act of insubordination.”
Providing adversaries with
advance notice of U.S. military
actions does not number among
the prescribed duties of the chair-
man of the joint chiefs. Arguably,
the Woodward-Costa allegations,
if accurately reported, qualify as
treasonous. At the very least, they
raise serious doubts about Milley’s
respect for the bedrock principle
of civilian control of the military.
To state the matter bluntly, when
adherence to that principle raised
the possibility of an outcome not
to Milley’s liking, he seemingly
granted himself an exemption.
Of course, all of this happened
in a specifi c context: Woodward
and Costa’s chilling account
is only the latest to depict the
unraveling Trump presidency
following the November election.
Unwilling to accept defeat, the in-
cumbent all but ceased to govern
and instead devoted himself to
overturning the election’s results
by any means necessary, violat-
ing the rule of law and waiving
the Constitution.
Milley’s response, however,
shouldn’t have been to do likewise.
By statute, the chairman of the
Joint Chiefs of Staff advises the
commander in chief. Choosing to
accept, amend or disregard that
advice, the president then decides,
with military leaders obliged
to implement those decisions.
Through his communications
with the Chinese general, Milley
signaled his intention to forestall
or undermine a presidential deci-
sion not to his liking. Opposing a
possible war with China, Milley
exerted himself to prevent Trump
from starting one, communicating
his intentions to Chinese authori-
ties while the American people
were kept in the dark.
Was Trump contemplating an
attack on China? We don’t know;
Trump himself denies it. Would
any such attack have produced di-
sastrous results, as Milley seems to
have feared? Almost certainly. Yet
while allowing that Milley’s inten-
tions may have been honorable, his
actions were categorically wrong
and set a dangerous precedent.
But let’s be clear about where
the problem lies: It’s with the
existing U.S. system for controlling
the use of nuclear weapons. That
system placed Milley in a diffi cult
predicament. Since the dawn of
the nuclear era, Americans have
entrusted presidents with the
authority to initiate Armageddon
on their own. Even though held
in abeyance since Hiroshima and
Nagasaki in 1945, that authority
may well stand as the ultimate
symbol of the power invested in the
U.S. presidency.
The practice is also bizarre
and dangerous in the extreme, as
the meltdown that concluded the
Trump presidency should remind
us. And to suggest that Trump’s
departure from offi ce eliminates
that danger overlooks the very real
possibility that another Trump-like
fi gure — or Trump himself — may
win the White House again. Ameri-
cans are not immune from confer-
ring the presidency on fi gures who
may not be models of stability and
good sense.
If the United States is intent on
maintaining at the ready a large
nuclear strike force, as is appar-
ently the case, the nation needs
comprehensive safeguards to
prevent reckless and ill-considered
decisions regarding their use. We
should not have to rely on Ameri-
can generals exerting themselves
to check presidents who appear to
have gone off the rails.
The essential fi x is clear: Con-
gress should act to curb the presi-
dent’s authority to employ nuclear
weapons, requiring decisions on
the use of nuclear weapons to be
made collectively rather than by
a single individual, with senior
military offi cers still obliged to stay
in their lane.
A useful fi rst step would be for
the Senate and House to pass the
Restricting First Use of Nuclear
Weapons Act of 2021, sponsored by
Sen. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.)
and Rep. Ted Lieu (D-Torrance).
The bill would not prevent actions
to defend the United States, but it
would prohibit any president from
launching a nuclear fi rst strike
without a prior congressional
declaration of war. Sadly, there are
few indications that our legislators
with their pronounced aversion to
collective responsibility will take
up this issue anytime soon.
Milley’s questionable regard for
the principle of civilian control was
wrong and should be condemned.
Yet given what we are learning
now about Trump’s state of mind
during the last weeks of his presi-
dency, Milley’s actions also quali-
fi ed as prudent. “It is breathtaking
to think of the lengths that Milley
and others went to avert the disas-
ters Trump was creating at the end
of his presidency,” Sen. Richard J.
Durbin, D-Ill., told reporters.
Perhaps so. But Milley’s audac-
ity is hardly less breathtaking. It
could well be that the nation owes
the general a considerable debt of
gratitude. Although President Joe
Biden has expressed his continuing
confi dence in Milley, his clear duty
is to fi re the general forthwith.
Andrew Bacevich, a retired
Army colonel, is president of the
Quincy Institute for Responsible
Statecraft. His most recent book is
“After the Apocalypse: America’s
Role in a World Transformed.” he is
a contributing writer to Opinion.
CONTACT YOUR PUBLIC OFFICIALS
President Joe Biden: The White House, 1600 Pennsylvania
Ave., Washington, D.C. 20500; 202-456-1111; to send comments, go
to www.whitehouse.gov.
U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley: D.C. offi ce: 313 Hart Senate Offi ce
Building, U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C., 20510; 202-224-3753; fax
202-228-3997. Portland offi ce: One World Trade Center, 121 S.W.
Salmon St. Suite 1250, Portland, OR 97204; 503-326-3386; fax 503-
326-2900. Baker City offi ce, 1705 Main St., Suite 504, 541-278-1129;
merkley.senate.gov.
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden: D.C. offi ce: 221 Dirksen Senate Offi ce
Building, Washington, D.C., 20510; 202-224-5244; fax 202-228-2717.
La Grande offi ce: 105 Fir St., No. 210, La Grande, OR 97850; 541-962-
7691; fax, 541-963-0885; wyden.senate.gov.
U.S. Rep. Cliff Bentz (2nd District): D.C. offi ce: 2182
Rayburn Offi ce Building, Washington, D.C., 20515, 202-225-6730; fax
202-225-5774. La Grande offi ce: 1211 Washington Ave., La Grande,
OR 97850; 541-624-2400, fax, 541-624-2402; walden.house.gov.
Oregon Gov. Kate Brown: 254 State Capitol, Salem, OR
97310; 503-378-3111; www.governor.oregon.gov.
Oregon State Treasurer Tobias Read: oregon.treasurer@
ost.state.or.us; 350 Winter St. NE, Suite 100, Salem OR 97301-3896;
503-378-4000.
Oregon Attorney General Ellen F. Rosenblum: Justice
Building, Salem, OR 97301-4096; 503-378-4400.
Oregon Legislature: Legislative documents and information
are available online at www.leg.state.or.us.
State Sen. Lynn Findley (R-Ontario): Salem offi ce: 900
Court St. N.E., S-403, Salem, OR 97301; 503-986-1730. Email: Sen.
LynnFindley@oregonlegislature.gov
State Rep. Mark Owens (R-Crane): Salem offi ce: 900
Court St. N.E., H-475, Salem, OR 97301; 503-986-1460. Email: Rep.
MarkOwens@oregonlegislature.gov
Baker City Hall: 1655 First Street, P.O. Box 650, Baker City,
OR 97814; 541-523-6541; fax 541-524-2049. City Council meets the
second and fourth Tuesdays at 7 p.m. in Council Chambers. Mayor
Kerry McQuisten, Councilors Jason Spriet, Shane Alderson, Joanna
Dixon, Heather Sells and Johnny Waggoner Sr.
Baker City administration: 541-523-6541. Jonathan Cannon,
city manager; Ty Duby, police chief; Sean Lee, fi re chief; Michelle
Owen, public works director.
Baker County Commission: Baker County Courthouse 1995
3rd St., Baker City, OR 97814; 541-523-8200. Meets the fi rst and
third Wednesdays at 9 a.m.; Bill Harvey (chair), Mark Bennett, Bruce
Nichols.
Baker County departments: 541-523-8200. Travis Ash, sheriff;
Noodle Perkins, roadmaster; Greg Baxter, district attorney; Alice
Durfl inger, county treasurer; Stefanie Kirby, county clerk; Kerry
Savage, county assessor.
Baker School District: 2090 4th Street, Baker City, OR 97814;
541-524-2260; fax 541-524-2564. Superintendent: Mark Witty. Board
meets the third Tuesday of the month at 6 p.m. Council Chambers,
Baker City Hall,1655 First St.; Andrew Bryan, Jessica Dougherty,
Chris Hawkins, Travis Cook and Julie Huntington.