A4 BAKER CITY HERALD • SATURDAY, JANUARY 15, 2022
BAKER CITY
Opinion
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Baker City, Oregon
EDITORIAL
‘Mandate’ a mostly misused word
T
he word “mandate” was mentioned
many times during the Baker
County commissioners’ work session
Wednesday aft ernoon, Jan. 12, at the
Baker County Events Center.
Th e word was used in reference to
the executive orders Oregon Gov. Kate
Brown has issued requiring people
to wear masks in indoor public spac-
es, and some people to be vaccinated
against COVID-19.
But this gathering was a blatant
example of how the “mandate” for
masks is hardly mandatory. Few of
the 40 or so people in the audience
wore a mask, even though the county’s
announcement for the event stated
that masks were required and that “all
individuals in attendance at meetings
under the control of Baker County are
expected to comply with this rule.” As
for vaccinations, aff ected employees in
many agencies, including Baker City
and the Baker 5J School District, were
allowed to avoid inoculation by claim-
ing a religious or medical exemption.
Th e ostensible topic of the work
session was a request by a local group,
YOUR VIEWS
Preserving the sanctity of
voting crucial to
democracy
Baker County United, for commission-
ers to adopt a resolution declaring a
“constitutional county.” Several speakers
contend that such a resolution would
give the county clout in fl outing Brown’s
mandates. It’s certainly reasonable to
emphasize the importance of elected
offi cials to fulfi ll their oath to uphold
both the state and federal constitutions.
But as Commissioner Bruce Nichols,
who participated in the work session
remotely, pointed out, the governor’s
executive orders, however onerous
and ineff ective they might be, have
so far withstood legal challenges. To
defy those orders, Nichols believes, is
to violate his oath. “I too do not like
mandates, forced vaccinations. and the
ongoing never-ending rules,” Nichols
wrote, a comment that was read aloud
during the work session.
At the same time that work session
was going on, hundreds of students in
Baker schools, and their teachers, were
in classrooms, wearing masks. Some
people who addressed commissioners
criticized the mask requirement for
schools. But medical experts say that
Vote Act and the John Lewis
Voting Rights Advancement
Act are important starting
points for securing our democ-
Voting is a fundamental con- racy. Kudos to our Senators Jeff
stitutional right, and the very
Merkley and Ron Wyden for
basis of a democracy. If you
supporting this important leg-
truly champion democracy and islation and, especially to Sen-
our constitution, I encourage
ator Merkley for championing
you to call national legislators fair and secure elections.
and encourage them to support
Barbara O’Neal
voting rights and safeguards.
Baker City
Everyone with the right to vote
deserves the kind of safe, open Thank you to Cpl. Dennis
and accessible voting we enjoy Lefever for helping a
here in Oregon.
stranger
All of us deserve to have our
vote counted and respected.
What a heartwarming “good
State legislators should not
deed” story told by the travel-
have the power to overturn the ing stranger, Steve McKibben,
vote of the people — that is not involving a Baker County Sher-
democracy.
iff Officer, Cpl. Dennis Lefe-
I have been following an
ver! Thank you, Cpl. Lefever,
organization called Represen- for being a good man, show-
tUs since its inception. Repre- ing caring for a total stranger
sentUs (at www.represent.us)
in need of help; for showing
brings together conservatives, concern to do the right thing,
progressives, and everyone in
for showing compassion to do
between to pass powerful laws even more! Thank you!
that end corruption and fix our
Cheryl and Richard
broken political system. They
Gushman
support fixing our election sys-
Baker City
tems, stopping political bribery,
and ending secret money. If we Why we’re opposed to
want a country by and for the
‘constitutional county’
people, we need to start by tak- proposal
ing multinational corporations,
foreign powers, “dark” money,
My husband and I had
and millionaires out of our vot- planned to appear in person at
ing processes. The Freedom to the Wednesday, Jan. 12 Baker
County Commissioners’
meeting where members of
Baker County United (BCU)
were to present a proposal to
change Baker County into a
“constitutional county.” None
of the BCU members wore
masks at the previous meet-
ing so we sent our response by
email. Here are our objections
to changing Baker County
into a “constitutional county”:
• We oppose the concept
that “constitutional sheriffs”
would have more power than
our state and federal govern-
ments in determining laws af-
fecting Baker County.
• The state and federal gov-
ernments provide oversight
that protects counties from
being politically hijacked by
a minority, fringe group with
one view. BCU fits that pro-
file.
• We are opposed to the fol-
lowing organizations: BCU;
the County Sheriffs and Po-
lice Officers Association
(CSPOA); and Oath Keepers.
These groups are considered
far right extremists with an-
ti-government platforms by
Southern Poverty Law Center.
They believe state and federal
governments are subordinate
to the power of local “consti-
tutional sheriffs.”
• We believe BCU should
follow the required protocol
masks, though far from perfect pro-
tection, can potentially help reduce the
spread of the virus. Masks certainly
don’t hurt. And one thing is indisput-
able — Baker students have been in
their classrooms for the entire school
year so far. Which is where they ought
to be, regardless of the pandemic.
Yet the biggest threat to continuing
in-person school, as well as sports and
other extracurricular activities, isn’t a
government mandate. It’s the omicron
variant, which, though less virulent
than previous strains, is more infec-
tious. More than a dozen school em-
ployees missed work on Jan. 12, some
of them due to COVID-19 infection or
exposure.
Th ere’s reason to be optimistic that
the current surge in infections won’t
last as long as previous trends. And
statistics show that omicron is less likely
to cause severe illness or death — espe-
cially in people who are vaccinated. In
that respect, omicron is similar to the
delta variant. Brown seems to under-
stand that, despite record numbers of
cases this month, the situation isn’t so
of obtaining signatures and
creating a Charter before their
proposal is allowed on the
November ballot.
• Finally, we believe
strongly in our state and fed-
eral Constitutions, the right
for each person’s vote to
count, the importance of op-
posing views, and, the neces-
sity of the difficult process of
compromise. In essence, we
believe in our democracy.
Karen and David Andruss
New Bridge
dire as raw numbers might suggest.
Th e governor hasn’t issued any new,
restrictive executive orders in response
to omicron.
And as the Jan. 12 work session
made clear, individuals are still deciding
whether or not to wear masks, never
mind the governor’s putative “man-
dates.” Th e government isn’t sanction-
ing people for their decision, either.
But wearing a mask, in situations
where doing so might reduce the risk
of transmitting this virus, isn’t capitula-
tion to a draconian government edict.
Baker students and school staff aren’t
supplicants — they’re doing what they
can to keep schools going and, poten-
tially, spare themselves and others from
illness.
If the county doesn’t intend to en-
force the mask “mandate,” then it ought
to cease implying that it will do so by
posting signs or stating, in announcing
public events, that it expects attendees
to comply.
— Jayson Jacoby,
Baker City Herald editor
Baker County needs to
approve a constitutional
county resolution
I was not able to attend the
work session Jan. 12 because
I had to work. But I want to
make my voice heard to the
Baker City Herald that I am
absolutely behind the consti-
tutional county resolution. We
must have that resolution in
place because the illegal and
unconstitutional mandates,
which I remind you are abso-
lutely not laws, are trampling
on our rights in the guise of “it’s
for your own good” rhetoric! If
you are unfamiliar with history,
I remind you that Hitler, Stalin,
Mao and other dictators and
murdering “leaders” did the
same thing to control the peo-
ple. Enough is enough! Landers
County, Nevada, has already
proven our cowardly commis-
sioners wrong. We can and
should follow their example!
Shannon Watt
Baker City
The simple pleasure of going to the movies
T
he epiphany arrived while I
was lounging in a well-padded
chair in the Eltrym Theater,
watching Spider-Man soar around
the Statue of Liberty, attached by gos-
samer threads.
Spider-Men, actually.
The latest film to feature the ac-
robatic arachnid-human hybrid su-
perhero — “Spider-Man: No Way
Home” — in fact boasts a trio, bring-
ing together the three actors who
have portrayed the character in the
cinematic series — Tobey Maguire,
Andrew Garfield and, most recently,
Tom Holland.
I have seen only a few of the sev-
eral films during their nearly two-de-
cade run, but I’m familiar enough
with the story to not feel especially
befuddled as the plot progresses.
It was an entertaining movie that
seemed to pass, as engrossing films
do, much more rapidly than its run-
ning time of more than two and a
half hours suggests.
My bladder, alas, which has con-
siderably less patience than it did
during its carefree youth, reminded
me, with its customary urgency,
about the soda I had guzzled even
before the previews were finished.
(Ice-chilled and carbonated liq-
uid being, of course, a necessary
chaser when you’re gobbling the
salty, slightly greasy popcorn with-
out which no trip to the theater is
complete.)
As I watched the three red-and-
blue suited actors perform their
computer-aided heroics during the
film’s predictably spectacular cli-
max, it struck me, with a slightly
jarring suddenness, that Baker City
residents have been seeing similar
rousing conclusions to big screen
epics, in this very space, for the bet-
ter part of a century.
The Eltrym opened on June 27,
1940, at the northwest corner of First
Street and Valley Avenue.
Its unusual name, so unlike the
Rios and Roxys and Rivaltos that
littered smalltown American down-
towns during the 20th century, hon-
ors Myrtle Buckmiller. With her
husband, Frank, Myrtle planned
the theater’s construction. Sadly, she
didn’t see its grand opening. Myrtle
— Eltrym is her name spelled back-
ward — died on Jan. 3, 1940.
A building 81 years old is not, to
be sure, especially ancient by the
standards of Baker City, which dates
to 1864.
Several venerable structures, in-
cluding St. Francis de Sales Cathe-
dral, the Geiser Grand Hotel, the
Baker Tower, Baker City Hall and the
Baker County Courthouse, are each
older than the Eltrym — by several
decades in some cases.
Like the Eltrym, all of those, with
the exception of the Baker Tower
(which I find difficult to refer to as
anything but Hotel Baker), serve es-
sentially the same functions today as
when they were built.
Yet theaters, it seems to me, are
different — unique even.
Jayson
Jacoby
Movies are a shared experience
— the residents of a remote city in
Northeastern Oregon watch the
same scenes as New Yorkers. The
Baker City native might have pre-
cious little in common otherwise
with the Manhattanite, but when
they each settle into their respec-
tive seats, and the house lights dim,
the 3,000 miles between them, and
the perhaps even greater gulfs in
their backgrounds and their fu-
tures, disappear in the glow of the
images that appear on the screen.
It wasn’t this cultural bridge,
though, that I was thinking of as
I watched the Spider-Men defy
gravity (and, indeed, logic, but of
course the temporary suspension
of reality is among the great attrac-
tions of the cinema).
Rather I was pondering all those
years and decades that have passed
since 1940, that purgatorial year
between the start of the great cata-
clysm in Europe and America’s de-
scent into the maelstrom.
I imagined, as I crumpled my
popcorn bag, entombing the drift
of unpopped kernels before my
urge for one more savory mouth-
ful left me with an aching molar,
about how many thousands of peo-
ple had sat where I was sitting. I
thought about how many movies
they had watched, how many gasps
of surprise at some plot twist, how
many tears were shed during par-
ticularly poignant scenes, how
many ounces of soda were expecto-
rated during a comedic interlude.
(I have a distinct memory, while
watching one of the “Austin Pow-
ers” movies at the Eltrym, of learn-
ing what it feels like to have 7-Up
travel through the nasal passages.
Cold. And tickly.)
The Eltrym’s history doesn’t
quite extend back to the transition
from silent films to “talkies,” but
it’s close.
Most of the movies that are
widely acclaimed as classics made
their debut here, in the hinterlands
of Oregon, just as they did in the
great metropolises.
I imagine the marquee and all
the titles that have appeared be-
tween its garishly colored lights, on
warm summer nights and on win-
ter evenings when the gleam strug-
gled to penetrate the shifting flakes
of a blizzard.
That one modest space, hanging
over the sidewalk on the west side
of First Street, marks the passage of
time in its inimitable way, and wel-
comes us to come inside, where we
know it will be dark and warm and
smelling pleasantly of popcorn.
From “Citizen Kane,” which came
out the year after the Eltrym opened,
through “The Godfather” and “Star
Wars” in the 1970s, “Harry Potter”
a couple decades later, and so many
dozens of others, before and since.
(A movie scene which perfectly
captures this concept is in “Field of
Dreams,” when Ray Kinsella, played
by Kevin Costner, is strolling the
downtown of Chisholm, Minnesota,
at night. The movie is set in 1988, but
Kinsella realizes he has, as a person
can do in the fictional world of film,
gone back in time. First he sees a
poster for Richard Nixon’s reelection
campaign, and then the camera fo-
cuses on the theater marquee — the
Plaza, alas, not nearly so interesting
as the Eltrym — which is advertis-
ing “The Godfather.” Both place the
scene indubitably in 1972.)
The small town theater is not so
common today as it was in decades
past, supplanted in some cases by
anodyne suburban multiplexes that
have all the architectural charm of
an East German apartment com-
plex, and in others by the inexorable
changes in the economy.
Lucky we are that the Eltrym per-
sists.
In this one building, generations
have joined in a grand American
tradition. And it’s a tradition which,
unlike so much else which has been
rendered unrecognizable to our fore-
bears by technology, in particular
the digital sort, still bears its original
name, so rich and so enticing in its
possibilities.
Going to the movies.
Jayson Jacoby is editor of the
Baker City Herald.