A4 BAKER CITY HERALD • TUESDAY, MAY 24, 2022
Opinion
BAKER CITY
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Baker City, Oregon
EDITORIAL
One spark
can lead to
mayhem
M
ay is Wildfire Aware-
ness month, and while the
weather the past few weeks
delivered wet and cold conditions it
is wise for residents to remember the
hot and dry days of summer are just
around the corner.
Warnings about fire danger are now
nearly routine because of the danger-
ous, overgrown state of our forests.
The climate isn’t helping much either.
Add drought to the bigger picture
and a recipe for potential disaster is
mixed and ready.
Yet the climate can’t take all the
blame for dangerous wild and forest
fires. Blazes accidentally — or other-
wise — ignited by humans continues to
be a growing problem.
That means those of us who want to
take advantage of the great vistas and
mountains that are near to our com-
munities need to be aware about the
danger from fire.
Fires start with a spark, and that
means campers, hikers and anyone else
trudging throughout the great expanse
of wilderness around us should take
heed to minimize the potential for an
inadvertent miscue with fire.
Sparks from equipment — especially
motorized equipment — such as cars,
trucks and all-terrain vehicles can seem
easy to dismiss, but just one can create
mayhem in terms of fire.
Sparks also are generated by such
things as electricity, chainsaws or even
target shooting.
Last year, more than 1,000 fires
scorched huge swaths of land in Ore-
gon, and while many were sparked by
Mother Nature — such as from light-
ning strikes — the source of other fires
could be traced back to human error.
Now, with rainy, cold weather, the
threat of wildfire seems like a distant
concern. Yet, the weather will shift —
as it always does — and the local cli-
mate will be warm and dry. Once we
enter into the summer months the
threat of wildfire is a real one, and all of
us should be mindful a major blaze can
erupt quickly.
We should all expect to enjoy our
great outdoor recreation spots this
summer. But with our privilege to
tromp around the area’s forest comes
the responsibility to be careful and to
always use caution.
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.
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. office: 313 Hart Senate Office
Building, U.S. Senate, Washington, D.C., 20510; 202-224-3753;
fax 202-228-3997. Portland office: One World Trade Center,
121 S.W. Salmon St. Suite 1250, Portland, OR 97204; 503-326-
3386; fax 503-326-2900. Baker City office, 1705 Main St., Suite
504, 541-278-1129; merkley.senate.gov.
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden: D.C. office: 221 Dirksen Senate Office
Building, Washington, D.C., 20510; 202-224-5244; fax 202-
228-2717. La Grande office: 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. office: 1239
Longworth House Office Building, Washington, D.C., 20515,
202-225-6730; fax 202-225-5774. Medford office: 14 N.
Central Avenue Suite 112, Medford, OR 97850; Phone: 541-
776-4646; fax: 541-779-0204; Ontario office: 2430 S.W. Fourth
Ave., No. 2, Ontario, OR 97914; Phone: 541-709-2040. bentz.
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.
COLUMN
America’s Army: ‘equitable’
but not ready for combat
BY THOMAS SPOEHR
A
mericans are used to picturing Army
combat soldiers as incredibly tough
individuals, able to run faster and do
more pushups than most people. In today’s
Army, though, that notion is officially passé. At
a recent Senate hearing, we learned that Army
physical fitness has been sacrificed on the altar
of gender equity, a move that former infantry-
man Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., noted, will “get
soldiers killed.”
Army Secretary Christine Wormuth ad-
mitted to Cotton that the service had aban-
doned efforts to ensure that soldiers’ fitness
in physically demanding Army career fields
— such as artillery — was being continuously
assessed to ensure they met the standards. A
subsequent exchange revealed that the Ar-
my’s minimum fitness standards have been
dramatically compromised.
This wasn’t what we were sold when Pres-
ident Barack Obama’s Secretary of Defense,
Ashton Carter, opened all combat posi-
tions to women seven years ago. He directed
that “leaders assign tasks and career fields
throughout the force based on ability, not
gender.”
Obviously, not all Army career fields require
the same levels of physical fitness. A cyber ser-
geant doesn’t need to run a seven-minute mile.
But an artillery crewmember must be able to
lift and carry a 90-pound artillery shell. Most
Americans can’t meet that standard. So, to en-
sure readiness of the force, the Army needed a
way to make these continuing objective assess-
ments to meet Carter’s guidance that soldiers
have abilities necessary for their career fields.
Enter the Army’s new Combat Fitness Test
or ACFT. Designed over 10 years, it consists of
six events, all chosen as a proxy for the types
of strength soldiers need on the modern bat-
tlefield. The standards were gender-neutral to
objectively assess who could serve in which
Army positions.
The Army spent years studying the stan-
dards necessary to succeed in its 190 different
career fields.
Unlike previous fitness tests, the ACFT had
no categories for male and female. Color-coded
scoring bands were established for each of the
six ACFT events. For artillery crewmembers,
the level of performance required were the
highest, coded “black.”
To achieve the “black” standard for a two-
mile run time, for example, a soldier needed
to finish in 18 minutes and deadlift 200
pounds. Similarly high scores were required
in the other four events.
It was a tough but science-based system
that ensured soldiers who held these physi-
cally demanding positions were able to con-
tinue to contribute effectively and succeed.
It was scheduled for implementation for Oc-
tober 2021. Then Congress and advocacy
groups intervened.
Alarmed that women were scoring lower
than men were on trial tests of the ACFT, Con-
gress passed a law delaying the test and requir-
ing an independent assessment.
Months later, Rand, who performed the
study, returned with shocking news: Males and
females score differently on fitness tests. Thus,
greater numbers of women than men would
not be eligible to serve and remain in the Ar-
my’s most physically demanding career fields.
Under heavy pressure, the Army surren-
dered. They threw out the gender-neutral
ACFT, effectively abandoning any effort to link
continued physical fitness to career fields and
simultaneously watering down the baseline fit-
ness standards.
Asked “why” by Sen. Cotton, Secretary
Wormuth replied: “We wanted to make sure
that we didn’t unfairly have standards for a
particular subgroup that people, you know,
couldn’t perform. We didn’t want to disad-
vantage any subgroups.”
So now the entire Army is disadvantaged, its
readiness degraded in the name of “fairness.”
The desire to put “equitable” outcomes first is
reducing elite combat units to the lowest com-
mon denominator. It is a recipe for defeat.
Worse, not only did the Army remove any
link between continuing physical fitness and
career fields, it also significantly lowered the
minimum scores necessary to pass.
The new ACFT passing standard for a fe-
male age 17-21 for the two-mile run is over
four minutes slower than the old standards. A
female soldier can take a leisurely 23 minutes, a
male 22 minutes, and still pass. The number of
required pushups went down by nine, to a total
of 10. Cotton, unable to hide his disgust during
the hearing, called the lowered standards “ab-
solutely pathetic.”
This is not to say no women can meet the
physical standards to serve in combat units.
More than 100 women have graduated from
the Army’s grueling Ranger School, its most
physically demanding course.
One of the first graduates, Cpt. Kristen Gri-
est, recently expressed strong views on the
subject: “While the equity question must be
addressed, the answer is not to implement
gender-based scoring or reduce the minimum
standards for combat arms. Doing so would
have both immediate and insidious impacts
on combat effectiveness, as well as on women’s
credibility and potential.”
Some may think this doesn’t matter — that
modern combat is all about “pushing buttons.”
Think again. In Ukraine today, soldiers are lug-
ging 90-pound shells and 50-pound Javelins all
across the country to defeat Vladimir Putin’s
brutal invaders.
Cotton concluded his questioning by warn-
ing, “I’m not going to let it stand.”
For the sake of America’s Army, let’s hope he
doesn’t.
█
Retired Army Lt. Gen. Thomas Spoehr is the director of
The Heritage Foundation’s Center for National Defense.
OTHER VIEWS
Focus on reducing unwanted pregnancies
Editorial from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:
As contentious as the issue of abortion rights
is at the moment, it would be easy to assume
there’s no overlap between those who believe
women have a right to biological self-determi-
nation and those who believe that terminating
a pregnancy at any stage is murder — an argu-
ment that some lawmakers in red-state Amer-
ica are already attempting to press into law.
But there’s actually one area where the two
sides of this fraught debate should be able to
agree: The ideal solution to the abortion co-
nundrum is fewer unwanted pregnancies to
begin with. If abortion-rights activists are se-
rious about helping the women who are most
vulnerable in this debate, and if anti-abortion
activists are serious about reducing the number
of abortions taking place, both should work to-
gether — maybe just this once — to make oral
contraceptives available over the counter.
The American College of Obstetricians and
Gynecologists and the American Academy
of Family Physicians have said for years that
standard birth control pills could be safely sold
over the counter without prescriptions. Daily
birth control pills work with hormones to pre-
vent fertilization from occurring. The pills also
can thin the walls of the uterus to make it less
likely a fertilized egg will attach. No embryo,
no pregnancy.
Some anti-choice activists argue that pre-
venting a fertilized egg from implanting in
the womb is a form of abortion. That’s a med-
ically specious argument that, if anything,
confirms that pregnancy is a complex process
that doesn’t fit neatly into black-and-white
moral structures. Using that logic, leaving a
fertilized egg in a test tube also would be a
form of abortion.
Two birth control manufacturers, HRA
Pharma and Cadence Health, have been
working toward Food and Drug Administra-
tion approval of over-the-counter birth con-
trol for several years now, but the apparent
approaching overturn of Roe v. Wade gives
the issue new urgency.
There have been hints from the anti-abor-
tion side, however, of potential resistance —
including opposition to intrauterine devices
and so-called “morning after pills.” Those are
distinct from the debate over abortion medica-
tion, which actually ends pregnancies that are
already in progress. It is perfectly legitimate to
defend the right to abortion pills, as this news-
paper does, while recognizing it is a fundamen-
tally different process in need of different argu-
ments than birth control.
The argument regarding birth control is
fairly simple. While abortion should remain
an option for women, prevention is a prefer-
able approach to unwanted pregnancies —
and should be an uncontroversial one. If an-
ti-choice voices now expand their argument
to limiting contraceptive access, it will only
confirm what in truth has long been obvious:
The movement that claims to be based on pro-
tecting life is more accurately described as one
dedicated to diminishing women’s control over
their own bodies.
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