The BulleTin • Friday, January 8, 2021 A5
EDITORIALS & OPINIONS
AN INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER
Heidi Wright
Gerry O’Brien
Richard Coe
Publisher
Editor
Editorial Page Editor
Disgrace at
the Capitol
A
mob stormed the Capitol intent on disrupting the
legitimate transfer of power and incited by the president
of the United States.
It was a pioneering event dragging
the nation in a direction it should
never go. It’s a disgrace. We are
heartsick.
At a moment of maximum dan-
ger, President Trump then chose to
provoke, unyielding in his nonsen-
sical claims that he won the election.
He told rioters who occupied the
Capitol: “We love you. You’re very
special.” After that, it seemed almost
vulgar for him to ask protesters to go
home. He should have urged law en-
forcement to find any who commit-
ted crimes and prosecute them.
The mob heard: “We love you.
You are very special.”
The results of the presidential
election were met with a steadily
stoked cloud of legal challenges
made of vapor, not substance. Dem-
ocrats and Republicans said the
challenges failed. There was abso-
lutely no justification to seize the
Capitol. None. Senate Majority
Leader Mitch McConnell warned if
the election was overturned,
“democracy would enter a death
spiral.”
This country has stood down ter-
rible enemies and terrible events in
the past. We have great faith it will
do so again now. Our freedoms will
not long endure if elections can be
decided by mobs.
As for President Trump, it is not
hard to know his heart. We cannot
wait to see him go.
Police chief is right to want
more health professionals
to improve police response
W
hat law enforcement in
Bend should look like gets
a lot of interest. So when
Bend Police Chief Mike Krantz
talked about it this week we paid
attention.
Krantz gave a presentation to the
county’s public safety coordinating
council. The council is made up of
representatives across the county’s
justice system who meet together to
help solve problems. Wells Ashby,
presiding judge for the Deschutes
County Circuit Court, leads the
meetings. District Attorney John
Hummel attends. There’s representa-
tion from law enforcement, juvenile
justice, city and county officials and
more. The meetings are public.
Krantz was giving a presentation
about a Bend community survey
and listening session on policing.
He wasn’t there to lay out his vision
for law enforcement in Bend. He did
mention a few things, though, that
could be important.
He wants more health profession-
als to serve alongside police. Bend
has a handful of officers dedicated
full-time to what is called its com-
munity response team. They are dis-
patched to certain calls by 911 and
have more training in how to deal
with mental illness and addiction.
Those officers have one licensed,
professional counselor embedded
with them who responds to calls
with a police officer. Krantz would
like to see a counselor embedded
with every member of the response
team, not just one. Of course, that
would take money. Does the new
Bend City Council want to make
that investment?
Krantz also believes his depart-
ment must do a better job of talking
about what it does and how it works.
Other officers in the department
have mentioned that to us, as well.
When there are incidents in the
community, it can be easy for some
to immediately assume the worst
about the police if there is not a
baseline of understanding. For in-
stance, do people in the community
even know about the community
response team? Do people have any
idea about police training and rules?
The department does have a pub-
lic information officer staffed by a
police officer. Does it need more?
Does that person need to be a police
officer?
Many people have different ideas
about what the police chief’s advi-
sory council should be, Krantz said.
Diverse. Independent. Transpar-
ent. Those are all words people have
used. There’s also been some discus-
sion that there should be some sort
of local, formal oversight authority
over the police. No final decisions
have been made.
There are finite limits to what po-
lice can do with increasing calls in-
volving mental health and addiction.
Police can’t solve that by themselves,
Krantz said. Police can de-escalate.
Police can put a Band-Aid on some
problems. Police can help. Solutions
take a community approach, he said.
And he’s right.
Editorials reflect the views of The Bulletin’s editorial board, Publisher Heidi Wright, Editor
Gerry O’Brien and Editorial Page Editor Richard Coe. They are written by Richard Coe.
My Nickel’s Worth
Bentz made a mistake
Bentz said in a statement Dec. 15,
“I have joined many of my colleagues
in asking for a congressional investi-
gation and review into what has hap-
pened in states where election irregu-
larities have been observed.”
That is his first mistake, and he
made the decision over 2 weeks be-
fore being sworn into his position as
U.S. representative for the 2nd District
of Oregon. Apparently, Rep. Bentz
wasn’t planning on taking his oath to
uphold the Constitution seriously. He
has aligned himself with a number of
right-wing politicians who are think-
ing about their careers’ and not their
constituents. There are no proven
election irregularities — yes, there
have been many allegations, and none
of them have been substantiated.
Vice President Pence, Senate Ma-
jority Leader Mitch McConnell and
former U.S. Rep. for Oregon’s 2nd dis-
trict Greg Walden have all stated that
the November election was a fair elec-
tion. Our country is in the middle of
a pandemic, and we need our elected
officials to be working together. The
far right is far wrong, Mr. Bentz,
please work to help your district and
not just establishing yourself with the
far wrong.
—Joe Craig, Bend
Subverting an election
Welcome Cliff Bentz. Your partic-
ipation in the GOP attempt to sub-
vert a fair and legitimate election is a
choice to sanction attacks on our de-
mocracy. It is clear now and should
have been clear before this, that join-
ing in this act has fueled the domestic
terrorist attack on our Capitol. To call
it a “demonstration gone bad” as you
have, is deeply irresponsible just as it
is to ignore that the POTUS has en-
couraged violence for years.
Your record as a legislator has
started with a significant choice to
align with party leadership that has
welcomed and propagated support
from the lawless, the pathologically
angry and the violent. In contrast,
Mitt Romney provides rational and
honest GOP leadership. Mr. Romney
very clearly describes your choice of
leadership and accountability in this
situation when he asks “Has ambition
so eclipsed principle?” There is a way
forward through the deep divisions in
our state and our country. As Rom-
ney says: “The best way we can show
respect for the voters who are upset is
by telling them the truth. That is the
burden, and the duty, of leadership.”
Please tell us the truth Mr. Bentz.
— Jean Sullivan Carlton, Bend
Bentz should be ashamed
Rep. Cliff Bentz should, at the very
least, be ashamed he and other Re-
publicans fell under Trump’s spell and
were more interested in their personal
gain than in their constituents’ inter-
ests. It is time to denounce Trump’s
treasonous speech and actions as well
as call for his removal from office im-
mediately through Article 25.
— Bonnie Kenner, Redmond
Promoting lies brought
Capitol assault
The insurrection Wednesday was
the inevitable result of promoting
Trump’s lies that the election was
stolen. The news media somewhat
misstate the case when they call the
rioters at the Capitol “Trump sup-
porters.” Rather, they are Trump be-
lievers — they believe themselves to
be patriots; they sincerely believe the
presidential election was stolen. Their
love of country is being manipulated
by people who know better, such as
our congressional Rep. Cliff Bentz.
Mr. Bentz, like myself, is an attorney.
He is perfectly capable of reading the
numerous court opinions rejecting
Trump’s challenges to the Pennsylva-
nia election; he certainly understands
they had no merit. Instead of tell-
ing his constituents the truth, he has
knowingly and deliberately affirmed
Trump’s lies by voting to question the
Pennsylvania vote.
This insurrection, this loss of life,
was the inevitable result of such con-
duct. Mr. Bentz, and all the other
Trump supporters who persist in per-
petrating this fraud, have blood on
their hands.
— Karon Johnson, Bend
COVID and Mayor Endicott
Thank you, Richard Lance, for your
“My Nickel’s Worth” on Jan. 7. You
question how seriously Redmond’s
Mayor George Endicott takes this
COVID-19 health crisis. I think it best
to let Mayor Endicott answer that in
his own words. In a recent Bulletin,
Mayor Endicott is quoted as saying,
“In some respects, losing your liveli-
hood is akin to losing your life.” Too
bad we can’t get a response to that
quote from some of the many Ore-
gonians that have lost their lives to
COVID-19.
— Carla Gullickson, Redmond
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One image from the Capitol riot highlighted smugness
BY MONICA HESSE
The Washington Post
I
don’t know what the lasting images
are going to be from Wednesday’s
breach of the U.S. Capitol, but the
one seared in my mind is the man ca-
sually lounging behind a desk in Nancy
Pelosi’s office.“I wrote her a nasty
note, put my feet up on her desk and
scratched my balls,” the man, 60-year-
old Richard “Bigo” Barnett, later
boasted to Matthew Rosenberg of the
New York Times. The note, he recalled:
“Nancy, Bigo was here you bitch.”
As his fellow insurrectionists roamed
the complex breaking windows, scal-
ing balconies and attempting to replace
American flags with Trump flags, Bar-
nett somehow meandered through
the maze of corridors into the House
speaker’s personal office. Once there,
he settled into the position in which he
was photographed: His booted foot was
propped atop the desk — which wasn’t
actually Pelosi’s. He leaned back in the
chair. With one finger he proudly ges-
tured to himself, as a fisherman might
while posing with the big catch. In his
other hand, his cellphone. At that mo-
ment an Agence France-Presse photog-
rapher snapped the picture.
The photo was arresting for a few
reasons, but primarily this: Violence is
easy enough to picture in a coup. The
heaving bodies, the smashed glass, the
chants, the rants — all of those are the
easily identifiable markers of civil un-
rest that we see when CNN covers Be-
larus, or apparently, Washington.
What you never picture is the
smugness. The gleeful entitlement on
individual faces.
The Trump supporters who
stormed the Capitol believed were
owed this opportunity to terrorize
their elected representatives. They
were allowed. They were the true
guardians of democracy, not the offi-
cials whom voters had chosen for the
job. After a summer of hearing their
leader harangue Black Lives Matter
protesters for “lawlessness,” the rioters
broke a dozen laws without batting
an eye and claimed that it was their
right and duty. And then? They were
praised for it. “We love you,” President
Donald Trump told his supporters by
video, in an anemic feint at quelling
the violence after a woman, who died
later, had been shot in the Capitol.
“You’re very special.”
In six words, the president managed
to encapsulate and exacerbate the prob-
lem. The men and women who had
come to storm the Capitol had spent
five years being told by their leader that
they were very special — that their dis-
trust and anger were very special. They
were more special than the immigrants
Trump said would take their jobs, more
special than the “low-income people”
he said would ruin their suburbs, more
special than the pollworkers he said
would steal their elections and, above
all else, more special the liberals he said
would destroy their country.
Their country.
He took their grief, their grievances
and their woundedness and he sold
them a fantasy in which all of it was
those evil people’s fault. He deemed
them special snowflakes, every one.
Indoctrination like that doesn’t
go away with an election, no matter
how sincere President-elect Joe Biden
sounded when he went on television
and insisted that the scenes from the
Capitol “do not represent who we are.”
With apologies to the president-elect,
they apparently do represent some of
us, and we are well beyond the point of
healing platitudes.
We are in for a reckoning that is go-
ing to last for years, or until we can
drum in the lesson that should have
been taught in preschool: Nobody is
more special than anyone else.
I’m not sure we can do it.
I don’t hold this pessimistic view
because people were angry at the Cap-
itol. I don’t even believe it because
they stormed the Capitol.
I believe it because of what hap-
pened when they got inside.
Did they release a detailed manifesto
to the news media? Did they set up an
immediate shadow government, with a
mock vote?
No. They did none of this. They in-
stead aimlessly wandered the halls,
taking selfies with law enforcement of-
ficers, poking around, grabbing stuff.
Some of them were shirtless or in
loungewear, like night owls who had
wandered into their own kitchen for a
snack rather than members of a mob
that had stormed the U.S. Capitol.
And Richard Barnett found a desk
that he believed belonged to the most
powerful woman in the country and
smugly kicked up his boots between
her coffee mug and her bowl of paper
clips. Bigo was here you bitch.
Lawmakers have rushed to explain
that these people don’t represent Amer-
ica. Frankly, I don’t think these people
want to represent America — a coun-
try full of immigrants and liberals
and low-income people, a majority
of whom voted to boot Trump out of
Washington. They couldn’t represent
America if they tried. I think they just
want to act like they own the place.
e e
Monica Hesse is a columnist
for The Washington Post’s Style section.