HinesSight

Truth Bomb #8: the Statesman Journal is trying to trick Salem

The Statesman Journal is, as the saying goes, "dead to me." After 37 years of being a loyal subscriber to Salem's community newspaper, it pains me to come to this conclusion.

But for good reasons, I no longer trust the paper to report local news fully and accurately. I've got lots of company.

Confidence in the Statesman Journal seems to be at an all-time low, based on what I hear from a wide variety of people. Many have given up completely on reading the paper. Others, like me, continue to subscribe even though we've disturbed by the SJ's loss of journalistic integrity.

My new Strange Up Salem column in Salem Weekly is "Don't be tricked by the Statesman Journal." You can read it below.

Learn how Salemians are being deceived by the newspaper's recently-arrived Gannett executives whose allegiance is to making money for their corporate masters, not to informing citizens about what's really happening in this town.

Don’t be tricked by the Statesman Journal

I no longer trust our so-called “community newspaper.”

I’ve been a subscriber since 1977. Most of that time, I believed the Statesman Journal cared about reporting local news truthfully, fairly, completely.

No longer. Along with many others, I now see the paper as being one of the biggest obstacles to improving Salem. Without a well-informed citizenry, a town is easily hijacked by special interests.

I’ve experienced first-hand how the current crop of SJ executives hired by the Gannett Corporation have sacrificed their journalistic integrity.

Six months ago a Statesman Journal investigative reporter was enthused about my release of a tell-all report, “Outrage: Salem’s U.S. Bank tree killings.” 

Subtitle: “The true story of how City officials and the bank president cut down five large, healthy, beautiful downtown trees for no good reason, and misled citizens about why they did it. 

A story was written. It was scheduled for front-page publication. Then the piece was killed by the executive editor, Michael Davis, a Gannett newcomer to Salem. 

Earlier Davis had told me that my report provided a glimpse into how power was exerted in Salem. At least he was right about that.

Having forsaken its watchdog role, the Statesman Journal has become a cog in the machine that tries to run Salem. The paper aligns with the Chamber of Commerce types who are its main advertisers; it kowtows to City officials elected and appointed with Chamber support.

So I shouldn’t have been surprised when the newspaper squashed an investigative story that cast light on how the power game is played in Salem. 

I’ve also filed ethics complaints with SJ executives and the Gannett Corporation about important factual errors in editorials that were pointed out to editorial page editor Dick Hughes, but left uncorrected.

Never got a response about the errors. Wasn’t told why the tree story was killed. And Davis ignored invitations to meet with me and other disgruntled subscribers about the paper’s coverage of local issues. 

So the Statesman Journal not only refuses to shine a light on shadowy Salem politics and policies, it won’t look at its own shortcomings. 

What’s going on here is journalistic sleight-of-hand, like a magician who misdirects your attention to a shiny object while picking your pocket.

The Statesman Journal has become overly filled with “shiny objects.” Kid’s page. Human interest pieces. Outdoor articles. Reader responses. Volunteer and non-profit organization showcasing.

All this would be fine if the newspaper was fulfilling its journalistic responsibility to tell readers about what is going on with serious stuff in Salem.

Third Bridge shenanigans. Wasteful City of Salem spending. Back-room dealmaking at City Hall. A shamefully inadequate transit system. Incoherent police facility planning. 

There’s no commitment to local in-depth, analytic, and investigative reporting. Readers have learned more about the blind bison than the unneeded half billion dollar third bridge we’re being asked to pay for.

Find other ways to keep informed. Don’t be fooled by the Statesman Journal’s trickery.

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Strange Up Salem seeks to lift our city’s Blah Curse. Give us a Facebook like. Brian Hines blogs at hinesblog.com

Salem likes legal recreational marijuana, voting "yes" on Measure 91

Thankfully, Salem's reputation as a conservative town has been undermined further with the recent release of November 2014 election results by precinct.

We now know that Salem resoundingly said Yes! to legalizing recreational marijuana via Measure 91: 53% vs. 47%. 

Remember that this was a midterm election with a lower turnout than general elections, especially among liberal leaning folks. Thus these results likely underestimate Salem's support for Measure 91.

Here's a chart showing how Salem compared with Marion and Polk counties, plus Oregon.
Given the very strong Yes vote for Measure 91 in the Portland area, 90% in one precinct according to an Oregonian story that mapped the results, it isn't surprising that Salem lagged a bit behind Oregon as a whole in its support for legalizing marijuana.

However, Marion and Polk counties each rejected Measure 91 by a 48/52 vote. So as noted in my previous post, "Salem, Oregon is more liberal than many people think," (also made possible by results given me by a fellow political junkie):

Salem appears to be almost as liberal as all of Oregon, while being more liberal than the two counties that contain it. 

This conclusion is borne out by Measure 91 results by ward in Salem.

As with the Obama/Romney vote in 2012, only Ward 4 and Ward 8 (far south Salem and west Salem) bucked the liberal trend in the other six wards. Wards 1 and 2 were the progressive hot spots in Salem this election also. Here's a ward map.

We can draw a couple of conclusions from these election results.

First, our so-called "community newspaper," the Statesman Journal, is out of touch with how Salemians feel about recreational marijuana. As I noted in a blog post, the paper's editorial opposing Measure 91 was so bad, it actually made the case for legalizing pot.

The times are a'changing, but not at the Statesman Journal -- which is part of the Gannett media empire and has become a near-clone of Gannett's USA Today: shallow and frothy with little substance, especially when it comes to local news.

Second, Salem's Mayor and City Council also don't reflect the views of the citizens they claim to represent. Medical marijuana dispensaries are being charged onerous fees by the City of Salem, which only recently lifted a ban on new dispensaries.

Yet it seems clear that if Salem voters were in favor of legalizing marijuana for all adults by a 53%/47% divide, making marijuana available for medical purposes probably has considerably more support.

Soon, I hope, Salem will have City officials who truly represent the majority of residents here. 

New York Post features us in story about hippie retirement communities

Yes, that's us, Brian and Laurel Hines, displayed in all our 60'ish glory (both age and decade) in a New York Post story this month: "When I'm 64. Tie-dyed-in-the-wool hippies are redefining retirement homes and end-of-life choices."

Download When I'm 64 story PDF

After being asked for a photo of us, I'm pleased that the Post went with the one I sent them that a friend took of us at the 2014 Oregon Country Fair. 

We were leaving this marvelous annual counter-cultural celebration in Veneta when I spotted a perch that seemed perfectly suited for my non-humble unsoul. Laurel is clearly enjoying being "blessed" by her exalted husband, though I admit her expression can be interpreted in other ways.

The piece was written by Joseph Gallivan, a freelancer who has done a lot of writing for the Portland Tribune. Gallivan phoned me after discovering my blog post, "I'm 65. Where's my 'Aging Hippie' retirement community?" 

My interest in his story perked up when he told me that it was being written for the New York Post. This newspaper has a circulation of around half a million, so I figured it was time for my fifteen minutes of fame.

I'm still waiting. 

I'd cleared my busy retirement schedule so Laurel and I could fly first class to New York to appear on various morning shows after they sent us interview expense money. But so far not a single person has responded to the story, which appeared in the Post a few weeks ago.

It took this long for Gallivan to get a PDF file of the story from his New York Post contact person.

Sadly, the piece doesn't seem to have made it online, perhaps because it appeared in the Post's magazine section. Thus my best chance to squeeze at least a few milliseconds of fame out of the story is for me to publicize it myself, which I'm doing here.

All of the story is worth reading, but for some (obvious) reason I start to lose interest in it after mentions of me fade away. Most of the quotes in the story are from my 2013 blog post. Since, I've given up skateboarding/ longboarding for an outdoor elliptical bike. 

Here's the "good part." Click on the link for the whole thing.
Download When I'm 64 story PDF

Baby boomers — the post- World War II generation born between 1946 and 1964 — are hitting retirement age, and in the same way that they changed the world, many are looking to do the same with the last stage of their lives.

Some will still be content to watch TV and putter — but what about the hippie subset? The Woodstock originals and alternative lifestyle lovers? How will they fit into retirement homes, and how will their lives end?

Brian Hines is one such boomer. A self-confessed hippie living on 10 acres near Oregon’s capital, Salem, he recently hit 65 and started wondering where he and his wife, Laurel, would end up when their property became too much to handle. 

He decided to watch a DVD for a retirement home near Olympia, Wash. To him that state has at least two things going for it: recreational marijuana and assisted suicide. [Note: so does Oregon now!] However, the nursing home video was a turn-off. As he blogged:

“We aren’t interested in living a golf course and bingo retirement. Watching the DVD made us realize that we won’t be in a continuing care retirement community — or not until they pull my skateboard out of my land-paddling, senior citizen arms.”

The people in the promotional video looked nothing like him and his wife; he felt they looked aged.

“We have money, but we’re very liberal and we damn sure don’t enjoy acting like we’re old. We dress as youthfully as Social Security recipients can get away with. We enjoy the MTV Video Music awards. In short, we’re aging ex-hippies who still embrace the Flower Child dream. We know some people from Oregon are trying to put together a community in Eugene; the problem is we’re not communal living people — we like our privacy.” 

So what do they want?

“Dog-friendly. Not only allow skateboarding; encourage it. Multi-use paths in natural settings. Coffee house. brew pub. Movie theatre that does not show “On Golden Pond.” Tai Chi, yoga, and meditation classes. Intellectual stimulation.”

Their needs were echoed in the blog’s comments section.

“I want ‘70s music, tie-dye, liberal politics, recycling, and a community!” wrote 60-year-old Julie Mason Lacey. 

As a post-script to this story, for the moment my wife and I have given up the notion of moving from our non-easy-care house in the country. It may kill us in the end, but until we feel otherwise, we've come to the conclusion that city life (or even suburban life) isn't for us.

We are, though, still interested in aging hippie-friendly retirement communities. The Vermont one mentioned in the piece sounds appealing. However, we love Oregon and can't imagine living anywhere else.

Well, life has a way of bringing about changes in the right way, at the right time. We either will move one day, or we won't.

Curses on DirecTV and Pac-12 Network after I miss Mariota's last home game

This being a halfway family-friendly blog, I'll let readers of this post mentally fill in their favorite profanities to shower on DirecTV and the Pac-12 Network after... 

Once #%!@#! again yesterday, I missed a U of O football game that I #%!@#! wanted to see because you two #%!@#! corporate idiots have persisted in your pissing match over DirecTV being able to show Pac-12 Network games, which has now gone on for three #%!@#! years!!!!!!!

That said, I readily admit that I too may be a #%!@#! idiot.

Because, as noted in this post, I renewed our DirecTV subscription last August even though I knew, or at least strongly suspected, it again wouldn't carry Pac-12 Network games this football season.

So I missed a couple of early University of Oregon football games that were only shown on the Pac-12 Network. That didn't bother me hugely (just considerably), because they were early season blowouts -- the reason the games weren't picked up by ESPN, Fox, or a channel I can actually watch on DirecTV.

But yesterday the Ducks played Colorado at home.

It almost certainly was quarterback Marcus Mariota's last home game, since he likely will turn pro after his junior season. Mariota is the leading Heisman Trophy candidate at the moment. He's a big part, no, the main part, of the reason why the Ducks are the #3 team in the country.

I love to watch him. I would have loved to see the emotional farewell he got at Autzen stadium after the Ducks coach pulled him out of the game after the first play of the fourth quarter. However, because of the #%!@#! DirecTV and Pac-12 Network contract dispute, I couldn't see the game.

All I could do was read Jason Quick's piece in the Oregonian today, "Marcus Mariota leaves Autzen Stadium, but not without a shower of love and a final word."

EUGENE — On a cold and wet November evening, in an otherwise forgettable game, a moment to remember was burned into Oregon football lore Saturday during the Ducks' 44-10 victory over Colorado.

Marcus Mariota, the greatest player in program history, joined the huddle on the Ducks' first drive of the fourth quarter, and in an orchestrated move was replaced by Jeff Lockie after one snap.

...Autzen Stadium erupted in an outpouring of love.

Inside the press box, where media is prohibited from cheering, a writer for a Eugene website stood up and applauded.

As play resumed, the crowd began chanting MAR-I-O-TA.

If there has ever been a more special farewell, long time athletic department officials can't remember it.

"It will be one of those things I will hold close to my heart for the rest of my life,'' Mariota said.

Hey, that's great, Marcus. I just wish I and other DirecTV subscribers could have had the opportunity to see your farewell ovation and be able to hold it close to our hearts also.

Instead, what's in my heart is this: f__k you DirecTV, and f__k you Pac-12 Network!!!!!

For three years you've been squabbling over the equivalent of corporate pennies while subscribers and fans get screwed over by not being able to see Pac-12 games that aren't carried by other broadcasters. I hope all of the DirecTV executives responsible for this mess get fired when AT&T completes its acquisition of DirecTV.

As for Pac-12 Network executives, you guys are equally responsible for my pissed-off mood, so I'll extend to you the Yiddish curse that I directed to DirecTV in a previous rant. 

May you get passage out of the old village safely, and when you settle, may you fall into the outhouse just as a regiment of Ukrainians is finishing a prune stew and twelve barrels of beer.

Here's my previous posts on this irritating subject.

2014. Still no Pac-12 Network on DirecTV. Am I an idiot to renew?
DirecTV Pac-12 Network excuses are annoying
Tell DirecTV how you feel about not getting Pac-12 games
2012 Oregon-OSU Civil War game not on DirecTV. Curses!
Trying to be positive as DirecTV lacks Pac-12 Network
DirecTV raises rates 5%. Still no Pac 12 Network 

Global warming is real, David Titley tells Salem City Club

If there were any global warming deniers in the room at today's Salem City Club meeting, I don't see how they could have listened to Rear Admiral (Retired) David Titley and not been persuaded that climate change is happening; it poses a huge threat to humanity; and we need to combat it.

Titley was crisp, organized, humorous, entertaining, and thoroughly believable. The guy's credentials are impressive. 

David W. Titley is a professor of meteorology at Pennsylvania State University and the founding director of their Center for Solutions to Weather and Climate Risk. He is also NOAA's chief operating officer. Before assuming these positions, he was formerly a rear admiral in, and the chief oceanographer of, the U.S. Navy, in which he served for 32 years. He also initiated the Navy's Task Force on Climate Change, and serves on the CNA Corporation's Military Advisory Board.

He talked quite a bit about how climate change threatens national security, the theme of his 2014 op-ed in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. 

Climate change is an accelerating threat to national security. That’s the finding of a recent report by the CNA Corporation’s Military Advisory Board, a panel I serve on along with some of our country’s most senior retired military leaders.

Each of us is a hard-nosed leader with decades of experience evaluating national security risks. We have been keeping an eye on climate change for years, first reporting on it as a potential national security threat in 2007.

Since then, we have seen the scientific consensus continue to develop and solidify, while signatures of a warming world — from global temperature trends to severe weather events — strongly suggest that our climate is already changing. And we are increasingly worried about the lack of comprehensive action by the United States and the global community.

Sitting in the back of the room, scribbling away in a notebook as Titley spoke, I was left with these personal most-important takeaways from his talk -- which I'll express a bit more bluntly than Titley did.

(1) Global warming is just about as proven as gravity. The science supporting climate change is solid. We know that the Earth is warming, and why: greenhouse gases emitted by human activity. Anyone who doesn't accept this either hasn't educated themselves, or has a self-centered reason to deny the scientific reality of global warming.

(2) Local officials need to be pressured on global warming. Titley urged action on all fronts to combat climate change: global, national, state, local, individual. Seeing that at least one Salem city councilor was present (Warren Bednarz), I welcomed Tiley's call for citizens to keep asking local officials, "What are you doing to stabilize the climate?" (Check out my Salem Weekly column, "Do global warming deniers run City Hall?")

(3) Civilization is at risk if we don't act. Modern humans, Homo sapiens, have been around for about 100,000 years with essentially the same brain capabilities as we have today. So why did civilization take off around 8,000 years ago? Because, Titley said, we entered an era of climate stability that allowed humans to spend less time and energy on simply surviving. Now human actions are making the Earth's climate unstable -- not good, not at all.

(4) The climate always has changed, but over much longer time periods. Titley showed a graph of how temperature (or carbon dioxide level) has gone up and down over geological time scales, tens or hundreds of thousands of years. Zeroing in on the recent past, he showed how rapidly human-caused climate change is happening. Very unnatural; very dangerous. 

(5) The oceans are sucking up most of the increased heat. I got to ask the last audience question of Titley: "Skeptics say global warming has ceased during the past ten years or so. But isn't it true that the oceans are taking up a disproportionate share of the warming, not the atmosphere?" Yes, that's true, I was told. Eight percent of the increased heat is going into the atmosphere; 92% into the oceans. That's why it is called global warming. Eventually that ocean heat will be emitted into the atmosphere.

(6) Rising oceans threaten military bases and ordinary people. Titley showed a slide of how ocean flooding in a Virginia neighborhood has become much more common the past few decades. The Navy (obviously) has its bases at sea level. Thus both military planners and insurance-reinsurance companies are much concerned about rising sea levels. As should we all be.

(7) Republicans are being idiotic about global warming. OK, Titley didn't say "idiotic." That's my word. But what else could you call the GOP-backed House bill that requires the military to ignore climate change? 

The House passed an amendment to the National Defense Authorization bill on Thursday that would bar the Department of Defense from using funds to assess climate change and its implications for national security.

Titley gave other examples of how military planners such as himself have to avoid using scientically correct terms like "global warming" in reports and funding requests that are read by Congressional Republicans. It's crazy that science committees in both the House and Senate are now run by legislators who are clueless about scientific realities.

(8) The battle against global warming can be won. On the positive side, Titley ended his talk on an optimistic note. He believes that the tide is turning in favor of the truth about what humans are doing to our one and only planet.

I agree. Truth has a way of winning out over lies and falsehoods. It just takes a while.

He alluded to the rapidity of social/cultural change when a tipping point is reached. Though Titley didn't give any examples, I thought "gay marriage." Who would have thought that this nation would have come so far, so fast, on the issue of equal rights for homosexuals?

Optimistic me sees the same thing happening with global warming.

Before too long head-in-the-sand'ers like today's GOP leadership will be laughed at if they persist with their "I'm not a scientist..." bullshit. Hey, you guys aren't gynecologists either, but you sure claim to be experts in what women should do with their bodies. 

As Titley said today, gravity is real no matter if someone claims "Gravity is made up."

Likewise, global warmng is real. It is beginning to bite humanity in the butt. When the pain gets undeniable, even climate change deniers will be forced to acknowledge it.

Lastly... Titley said he met with the Salem Statesman Journal editorial board. I hope they took as many notes as I did. And then will decide to join other newspapers who refuse to publish letters to the editor from global warming deniers. 

The Statesman Journal does this a lot -- publish anti-scientific rants that have zero credibility. Would the SJ print letters claiming the Earth is flat or gravity doesn't exist? I doubt it. So it shouldn't give global warming deniers a forum to express their craziness. 

My brilliant can't-miss prediction about Obama's immigration executive order

I love writing blog post titles like this one. I make myself sound so absolutely great! 

I spent a few milli-seconds wondering whether I should leave out the "can't-miss" and just go with "brilliant," but then I thought, To hell with it; let's go for the egocentric gusto. 

Tomorrow President Obama is going to talk to the nation about his plan that could allow five million undocumented immigrants to stay in this country and get work permits. 

This sounds like a great idea to me.

After all, the Senate has passed bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform, but the Republican-led House has never taken up the bill. Speaker Boehner realizes that if a vote was taken, the Senate legislation likely would pass with mostly Democratic and some Republican support.

That would freak out the Tea Party wing of the GOP, along with others who are automatically against anything Obama and the Democrats are for -- even if it makes good sense and benefits this country.

So Obama is doing the right thing: get the immigration reform ball rolling through his entirely lawful executive action. If Congressional Republicans want to improve and expand upon what he's done, they can pass a bill the President is able to sign that supplants the executive action.

So says a Chicago Tribune editorial:

The president is going to do what he's going to do. How will Republicans respond? We've heard a lot of angry threats about shutting down the government, suing Obama, even impeaching him. Most of that is coming from what our friends at The Wall Street Journal call "the blow-a-gasket caucus." Let them blow.

The adults in the party, meanwhile, should recognize this as an opportunity to lead. They should stop arguing about what the president can or can't do to fix the immigration system, and fix it themselves.

My view, though, is that the "blow-a-gasket caucus" in the GOP will prevail over the "adults" in the party. This will have some short-term ill effects, but likely will be great news for progressives.

Here's my brilliant can't-miss prediction about what will happen after Obama reveals his plan tomorrow:

Republican leaders will go bat-shit crazy. To put it mildly. There will be a lot of talk about impeachment, but eventually the crazies will realize going this route is too crazy even for them.

So they'll decide to stop Obama from carrying out the executive action by blocking funding for it. The GOP will attach this condition to a budget bill needed to fund the government. Obama will refuse to sign the bill after it passes the Republican-led House and Senate next year.

This will create a government shutdown. Just like the last time this happened, most people in this country will blame the Republicans.

After all, they just took control of Congress.

They promised to get government working again right after the mid-term election. And now here we are: the stock market plummeting, consumer confidence shrinking, government services increasingly unavailable, gridlock in Washington even worse than before.

As polls show Americans getting more and more pissed off at the GOP, Republican leaders will find a face-saving way to send Obama a budget bill he can sign.

But the damage will have been done: the year before the Hugely Important 2016 Presidential Election, Republicans will have shown the country that if you give them a chance to lead, they'll blow it.

The government shutdown debacle helps put HIllary Clinton in the White House. Democrats also retake the Senate in 2016. We're right back where we started: a GOP House and Democratic Senate/President. 

All isn't exactly right with the world again; it's a hell of a lot better than it looks today, though. So take heart, progressives.

 The angrier and crazier Republicans get after Obama makes his announcement tomorrow, the better it will be long-term for this country, since their over-reactions will help pave the way for a Democratic resurgence. 

Salem Statesman Journal hit with journalistic ethics complaints

Time for another Truth Bomb!

Salem's community newspaper, the Statesman Journal, no longer cares about accuracy in its reporting and editorializing.

I've got good reasons for saying this after filing several ethics complaints with both the Statesman Journal and the Gannett Corporation -- which owns the paper.

Remember when the newspaper had a "corrections" feature? And Statesman Journal staff wanted to make stories as accurate and truthful as possible? As a long-time subscriber (37 years), I sure do.

Those days are gone. Below you can read solid evidence for this conclusion. 

In May of this year I filed an ethics complaint with Garrett Flynn, an attorney who handles complaints about ethics violations for Gannett.

I did this after getting no response from Statesman Journal executives about my well-documented September 2013 complaint that editorial page editor Dick Hughes had knowingly and willfully published false information about the proposed "land grab" of part of Riverfront Park for an access road to a Pringle Square apartment complex.

Before and after Hughes' editorial appeared, I'd told him that National Park Service approval of this proposal wasn't a maybe; it was a must. I knew this because I'd talked with the state government official who coordinates the applications, and the City of Salem had stated this in a staff report.

Because Hughes ignored the fact that the "6-f conversion process" would take 1-2 years or more, during which the Pringle Square developers would be unable to use any portion of Riverfront Park for access to the development, the editorial's insistence that construction of the apartments could start immediately was clearly wrong. 

Yet Hughes, executive editor Michael Davis, and other members of the editorial board were utterly uncaring about having this error pointed out to them. I got some dismissive comments back from Dick Hughes, but he didn't offer any evidence that I was wrong and he was right. 

So when someone told me that he'd made his own journalistic ethics complaint to Gannett about another instance of Statesman Journal flawed reporting, I learned how to contact Garrett Flynn. Here's my first email to him, sent in May 2014.

Mr. Flynn, 

...I asked _______ how he made his complaint. I was directed to a Gannett website page that says you are the person who deals with journalistic ethics complaints.

 

This spurred me to share my own ethics complaint that was made directly to Statesman Journal executives in September 2013. I never heard back from them. At that time I wasn’t aware that an ethics complaint could be filed with you. So now I am sharing a PDF file of three email messages regarding what, in my view, is a clear violation of the Gannett Code of Ethics. Consider this a formal complaint.

 

Download Emails sent to SJ staff

 

In short, editorial page editor Dick Hughes and other Statesman Journal staff refused to correct serious factual errors in a 2013 draft editorial that were repeatedly pointed out to them — both before and after publication in the print newspaper. 

 

Among other principles of ethical conduct in the Code of Ethics, I pointed out these in my third email to Statesman Journal staff where I requested an ethics inquiry:

We will hold factual information in opinion columns and editorials to the same standards of accuracy as news stories.

 

We will correct errors promptly.

I have attached a seven page PDF file that contains the content of the three emails sent to Statesman Journal staff. I added emphasis to the content in boldface to make it easier for you to pick out the most pertinent parts. 

Download Emails sent to SJ staff

 

You will note that I begin my first email with a mention that I have been a critic of the Statesman Journal because I care about the newspaper, having been a subscriber since 1977. I am not eager or pleased to be making this complaint to you, but I am concerned about a pattern of news and editorial page problems that seemingly violate journalistic ethics — where factual errors are pointed out to Statesman Journal staff, but corrections aren’t made. 

 

...I’ll also take the liberty of sharing links to some blog posts I wrote about an earlier editorial episode regarding Dick Hughes which fits with the pattern of him ignoring factual information in his editorials. In fact, in the third blog link below I document that when Hughes was presented with clear factual errors, he yelled “This is just opinion!” At the time, as now, this struck me as a serious violation of editorial page writing.

 

I’ve been an avid regular blogger for ten years. I’ve written thousands of posts over that time. I always do my best to insure that what I write about is based on accurate factual information. Then my opinions are based on those facts. It deeply bothers me, as a “mere” blogger, to see the Statesman Journal failing to live up to those ethical standards. Here are the links:

 

“Statesman Journal allows errors in Measure 49 editorial"

http://hinessight.blogs.com/hinessight/2007/10/statesman-journ.html

 

“Salem’s newspaper gets an ‘F’ in journalism ethics”

http://hinessight.blogs.com/hinessight/2007/10/salems-newspape.html

 

“Statesman Journal endorsement of Romney: pathetic editorial”

http://hinessight.blogs.com/hinessight/2012/11/salem-statesman-journal-endorsement-of-romney-pathetic-editorial.html

 

I look forward to hearing from you. I’d be glad to clarify anything that isn’t clear in the material I’ve shared with you, or answer any questions you might have.

 

Sincerely,

Brian Hines

 

A few weeks later I added on another ethics complaint after Dick Hughes again mangled facts in an editorial. This time it was personal, because he screwed up a statement about me.

 

Garrett [Flynn], yesterday Dick Hughes, the editorial page editor at the Statesman Journal who is the focus of my previous ethics complaint, misquoted me in a lead Sunday editorial.

 

As before, I informed Mr. Hughes of the error and asked that a correction/apology appear in the newspaper. And as before, Mr. Hughes refused to correct an obvious factual error.

 

The nature of the error and Hughes’ refusal to acknowledge it is described in a blog post I wrote last night: "Giddily, I catch another Dick Hughes journalistic ethics violation"

 

...Please forward this message to the Gannett headquarters staff who are dealing with my previous complaint about the 2013 failure of Mr. Hughes to acknowledge and correct another factual error in a Statesman Journal editorial.

 

Also, won’t I be hearing something back from Gannett staff, since my ethics complaints aren’t anonymous? When a customer contacts “customer service,” he/she expects to get a response. In my case, I consider that my Statesman Journal subscription entitles me to factual news and opinion. Yet I’m not getting when I paid for when SJ staff refuse to correct factual errors — hence, my complaints.

 

Thanks,

Brian Hines

 

Irritatingly, I never heard anything about the outcome of either Gannett ethics complaint. Mr. Flynn explained that the staff who handle these aren't obliged to tell the person making a complaint how it was handled. Hopefully Dick Hughes was required to get some remedial education in editorial writing, but I have no way of knowing if this happened.

 

This is ridiculous. But such is the sorry state of Gannett journalism these days.

 

I pointed out factual errors to Statesman Journal executives and was brushed off. I then complained to the Gannett central ethics coordinator, and heard nothing back. Apparently the policy at Gannett and the Statesman Journal is that truthfulness and accuracy in reporting/editorializing doesn't matter -- only maximizing revenue does.

 

Pathetic. 

 

As a continuation to this post I'll copy in my emails to Statesman Journal staff. Blunt words, but richly deserved.

Salem, Oregon: I hate this town. I love this town.

My new Strange Up Salem column in Salem Weekly is "My dyfunctional relationship with Salem." 

After 37 years of living in or near Salem, I seem to be settling into a pleasantly dysfunctional relationship with this town. Like Sharon Stone’s character in “Basic Instinct,” Salem allures me. Even when she is out to destroy me.

But that word, dysfunctional...

Note that I prefaced it with "pleasantly." I really don't think it is unusual, wrong, or undesirable to both hate and love something or someone. This is how we are, how the world is. 

Multiple. Changeable. Capricious. 

To cast a philosophical/neuroscientific patina over my piece in Salem's alternative paper, here's an excerpt from a book I'm re-reading, "The Ego Trick: What Does It Mean to be You?," by Julian Baggini. 

The best [philosophers], to my mind, are precisely those who manage to be no less precise than necessary, but no more precise than is possible. Paul Ricoeur is a rare example of a philosopher who seems to appreciate the unsuitability of applying logical identity to persons.

His central idea is captured in the phrase 'selfhood is not sameness.' Ricoeur uses the Latin terms idem and ipse to distinguish between sameness and selfhood.

Sameness, idem, is unique and recurrent: one thing continuing to exist as exactly the same thing over time... But selves do not have this sameness over time. It is in their nature to change, never exactly the same from one day to the next.

The trouble is that we tend to use the word 'identity' in relation to persons, unclear as to whether we mean sameness (idem) or selfhood (ipse). What we need to be clear about is that persons retain a sense of selfhood over time, but this is not a precise sameness.

For sure. My feelings about Salem change yearly, monthly, weekly, daily, hourly, minute'ly. Here's my full column.

My dysfunctional relationship with Salem

Hopefully I don’t have a brain tumor that’s making me lose touch with reality to a greater degree than I already am.

I’ve been having some inexplicable sensations. They’re coming more often. Out of the blue I’ll be somewhere in Salem and have an unfamiliar feeling.

“Hey, this town is pretty damn cool. Maybe my wife and I should live here for the rest of our lives.”

Weird! Freaky!

I’ll check to make sure my mind is still inhabiting the body which has been so critical of this town for so long. Yes, the guy who is having warm fuzzy thoughts about Salem sure looks like the dude who is out to strange it up.

Reminds me of Walt Whitman: “Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes).”

There’s a lot to like about Salem. Everyone has their favorites. I love downtown, Minto Brown Park, coffeehouses and brewpubs, Capitol Mall, the Willamette River, Progressive Film series. Plus so many likable people.

There’s also a lot not to like. A minimally vibrant urban core. Lack of mass transit and decent bike lanes. Clueless city leaders. Ugly strip mall sprawl.

After 37 years of living in or near Salem, I seem to be settling into a pleasantly dysfunctional relationship with this town. Like Sharon Stone’s character in “Basic Instinct,” Salem allures me. Even when she is out to destroy me.

Salem and I, we’re becoming like those charming elderly couples who gripe at each other constantly.

“I would have been better off never getting married to this old coot. Should have gotten hooked to my high school boyfriend and saved myself from fifty years of grief.”

Then they smile, hug, kiss with wrinkled lips. These lovers always will be together. Bitching and complaining about their partner’s faults all the way.

The plain truth is, there’s no such thing as “Salem.”

This word is an abstraction, a place-holder for stuff that actually does exist. Salem’s reality lives within the awareness of everyone who is conscious of this place, just as the love of an old married couple is within themselves, not anywhere outside.

So there are as many Salems as the people living here, 160,000 or so. And inside each of them are, as Whitman said, multitudinous viewpoints of this town.

I’ve been asked, “Since you hate Salem so much, why do you still live here?” To which I reply, “Because I love Salem.” If they say, “Then why do you criticize this town?” the answer is easy. “Because I hate Salem.”

Imagine yourself without your flaws, shortcomings, foibles, weaknesses, paradoxes, quirks, dark side. You wouldn’t be you. You’d be someone else.

Same with Salem. The good comes with the bad, the enticing with the bland.

How about celebrating our uncool side with an annual So-Lame Festival? Let’s embrace our putdown nickname. Salem’s lameness is an attraction as well as a turnoff.

I’ll be the first to enter a watching paint dry contest.

Strange Up Salem seeks to lift our city’s Blah Curse. Give us a Facebook like. Brian Hines blogs at hinesblog.com

Salem, Oregon is more liberal than many people think

Salem is Oregon's capital, the seat of state government. But no one would call it the capital of Oregon's vaunted liberalism/progressivism. 

(In the 2014 midterms we were the only state that added to its Democratic majorities in the state House and Senate; we reelected a Democratic governor and U.S. Senator; and we legalized recreational marijuana. Yay, us!)

Rather, Salem lies between two cities with much stronger liberal reputations, Portland and Eugene. Salem has just about the same population of Eugene, but nowhere near its blue cool'ness. Portland kicks our butt in this regard to an even greater extent.

Which is kind of depressing for progressives like me who live in or near Salem. I was cheered up, though, after a fellow political junkie sent me some charts about how Salemians voted in the 2014 presidential election.

Obama rocked it over Romney by 10%! Not even close. 

The chart above shows how Salem compared with Marion County, Polk County (the two counties comprising the Salem city limits), and Oregon. Salem voted for Obama by just 2% less than the state as a whole, 53% vs. 55%. Marion and Polk county voters as a whole went for Romney. 

Thus Salem appears to be almost as liberal as all of Oregon, while being more liberal than the two counties that contain it. 

Above you can see the 2012 presidential election results by ward -- which is how Salem's eight city council seats are divided by district. Each ward had about the same population in the 2010 census.

Six of the eight wards went for Obama, two of them (wards 1 & 2) overwhelmingly. Only two wards, 4 and 8, cast a majority of votes for Romney. Yet even in conservative-leaning South Salem and West Salem, Obama got 46% and 48% respectively.

So Salem is more liberal/progressive than many people give the city credit for.

If Salemians voted for local officials such as the Mayor and City Councilors in the same political fashion as they voted in the last presidential election, this town would have a much more liberal-leaning city government than it does now.

I can only hope... for 2016.

Republican denial of global warming makes me hate the GOP

Progressive Democratic me actually is a pretty moderate guy.

I was raised by a very conservative mother. I grew up reading Bill Buckley and National Review. I have right-leaning friends. As a long-time Oregonian I fondly recall our state's Governor Tom McCall, along with Senators Mark Hatfield and Bob Packwood -- Republicans.

I can forgive today's GOP for taking misguided stands on the Affordable Care Act, immigration reform, and other domestic issues. I can accept their hawkishness on Iran, the Palestinian issue, and other foreign policy matters.

But there is one thing that makes me freaking angry when I hear Republicans spout off about it: denial of the scientific consensus that global warming is happening; humans are responsible for climate change; and the consequences of doing nothing will be catastrophic.

The GOP cannot be allowed to wreck this planet for future generations. It's that simple: CANNOT. 

I'm fine with political game-playing, horse-trading, and other forms of the usual Washington D.C. bullshit. I've got a high tolerance for politicans throwing their weight around after an election victory like the GOP enjoyed in the 2014 midterms. 

However...

I'm infuriated by "Republicans Vow to Fight E.P.A. and Approve Keystone Pipeline." 

The new Republican Congress is headed for a clash with the White House over two ambitious Environmental Protection Agency regulations that are the heart of President Obama’s climate change agenda.

Senator Mitch McConnell, the next majority leader, has already vowed to fight the rules, which could curb planet-warming carbon pollution but ultimately shut down coal-fired power plants in his native Kentucky. Mr. McConnell and other Republicans are, in the meantime, stepping up their demands that the president approve construction of the Keystone XL pipeline to carry petroleum from Canadian oil sands to refineries on the Gulf Coast.

I'm outraged by "China Tries to Save Earth; Republicans Furious." 

In a surprise announcement, the United States and China, which combine to produce nearly half of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, struck a deal to reduce their emissions. The U.S., which has already pledged to reduce its emissions by 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020, now promises to reduce them by 26 to 28 percent by 2025. China promises to cap its emissions by no later than 2030 and to produce one- fifth of its energy from zero-emissions sources by then.

...It would be nice to think that evidence like today’s pact would at least soften the GOP’s unyielding certainty about the absolute impossibility of a global climate accord. The near-total refusal of the right to reconsider its denial of the theory of anthropogenic global warming sadly suggests otherwise. James Inhofe, the incoming chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee and a fervent climate science skeptic, has quickly dismissed the deal as a “hollow and not believable" and a “non-binding charade.”

Political and religious craziness is one thing. Anti-scientific craziness that threatens the ability of humans to live safe, happy, and prosperous lives, not only now but for many, many generations to come -- that cannot be tolerated.

I am an extremist when it comes to standing up against this sort of Republican insanity. Take all the money you want from the Koch Brothers and BIg Oil. But GOP, you can't be allowed to drag this country, and indeed our entire planet, into an environmental hell hole. 

I'm confident that a majority of Americans would agree with me that keeping the Earth habitable for humanity is Job #1.

If the GOP doesn't realize this, their 2014 election victory is going to backfire on them big time.

A variety of polls show that a majority of American voters now believe that climate change is occurring, are worried about it, and support candidates who back policies to stop it. In particular, polls show that majorities of Hispanics, young people and unmarried women — the voters who were central to Mr. Obama’s victories in 2008 and 2012 — support candidates who back climate change policy.

Truth Bomb #7: Salem City Manager's disturbing Eugene past

"You should look into what Linda Norris did in Eugene, when she was City Manager there." When somebody told me this, naturally my curiosity was aroused. 

Currently Linda Norris is Salem's City Manager.

This is an important position, arguably more powerful than the Mayor. The Mayor hires the City Manager, then the City Manager is responsible for hiring other employees. Plus, of course, managing city business.

I wasn't even aware that Norris had been Eugene's City Manager prior to coming to Salem. I asked the person who made the you should look into comment what Norris had done in Eugene that was disturbing.

"I'm not sure," I was told. "I just heard that it didn't make Norris look good." Well, after some Google research I can confirm the truth of that.

Linda Norris did indeed do some distrubing stuff during her stint as Eugene's interim City Manager. In my opinion, those actions throw light on the City of Salem's current corporate-friendly and ordinary citizen-unfriendly policies.

But as the saying goes, I'll report in this most recent Truth Bomb of my series, you can decide.

Here's the step-by-step facts the Great God Google revealed to me. 

(1) According to a Eugene Weekly story, Linda Norris was interim City Manager for less than a year. She left to take an executive position with Hyundai, which had a semiconductor plant in Eugene. Later, in 2001, Huyndai changed its name to Hynix.

Here's how Eugene Weekly summed up part of the City Manager history in a 2007 article (when Hyuyndai had become Hynix):
Download Eugene Weekly : Coverstory : 7.26.07 | eugeneweekly.com

Mike Gleason, 1981-1996, 15 years. Resigned after widespread criticism that he was ignoring council direction, providing biased or inadequate information and pursuing his own pro-development agenda, especially in giving huge tax breaks to Hynix. 

Linda Norris, 1996, less than a year. The interim manager left for a management job at Hynix.

Warren Wong, 1996-1997, one year. The interim manager also went on to a manager stint at Hynix. He now manages the Lane County Fairgrounds.

(2) So Norris, along with her Eugene City Manager successor, went to work for Hyundai before the company changed its name to Hynix. Who knows the reason why? We can say, though, that Linda Norris did a big favor for Hyundai while she was interim City Manager. 

Here's a portion of a December 28, 1995 Eugene Register-Guard story:

Hyundai chalked up another victory with regulators on Wednesday, winning permission to work around-the-clock at its west Eugene site, despite protests by neighbors who could be disturbed by nighttime excavation and construction.

Acting City Manager Linda Norris signed the noise variance late Thursday, ending a two-week public comment period that drew seven letters in opposition to Hyundai's plan to work 24 hours a day and one letter supporting the company's request.

The variance lets Hyundai operate bulldozers, backhoes and other equipment at night, overriding a city ordinance that bans noisy work between 7 pm and 7 am.

Norris' ruling is important for Hyundai, which has said it needs to work nonstop to complete its computer chip factory in 12 months -- six months quicker than originally planned. Each day the factory is up and running it will rack up $6.7 million in chip sales, the company has said.

(3) Let's make that a big controversial favor for Hyundai, because people who lived near the construction site complained vociferously about the nonstop construction. See:
Download Hubbub over Hyundai hubbub

Here's a photo of how the piece starts (wasn't able to copy this "ancient" 1996 file). Click the image to enlarge.

That piece says the variance was extended until July 4,1996. I'm not sure what happened between then and April 20, 1997. On that date the Register-Guard reported the noise variance had been overturned by a hearings officer after an appeal by the disturbed neighbors of the Hyundai plant.

All is quiet on Eugene's western front, thanks to a hearings official's decision to ban noisy nighttime work on Hyundai's computer chip factory at the end of West 18th Avenue. 

In a ruling released Thursday, Milo Meacham turned down Hyundai's request for a six-month variance from the local noise ordinance. That means contractors can't operate trucks or other noisy equipment between 7 pm and 7 am.

The ruling overturns Assistant City Manager Linda Norris' Feb. 7 decision to issue the variance. And it upholds appeals by 10 people worried that Hyundai's nighttime noise disturbs west Eugene residents.

(4) In August 1997, Linda Norris left her City of Eugene job and became the human resources director for Hyundai. This was after, as we've seen, Hyundai had been able to construct its computer chip plant non-stop around the clock for quite a few months because Norris had issued a noise variance in favor of Hyundai.

After neighbors complained the construction noise and lights were driving them, their animals, and wildlife crazy, a hearings officer eventually overturned Norris' variance. But, as noted above, every day Hyundai saved by shortening the construction period was estimated to bring the company $6.7 million in chip sales.

Quite a coincidence -- if you can call it that. Linda Norris does Hyundai a big controversial favor, then becomes the Human Resources director of Hyundai. Well, such is the way the world works these days. 

(Footnote: in 2008 Hynix closed the Eugene computer chip plant after getting many millions of dollars in tax breaks and other incentives, putting more than 1,100 employees and 300 contractors out of work. After wrecking the environment, some in Eugene said. This also is how the world works these days.)
Download Eugene chip plant Hynix will close, erasing 1,400 jobs | OregonLive.com
Download Eugene Weekly : Coverstory : 7.31.08 | eugeneweekly.com

Five takeaways from Ed Dover's Salem City Club talk about 2014 election

Almost always, the Salem City Club has highly enjoyable noon hour presentations. Last Friday's was especially interesting for a political junkie like me.

Ed Dover, a professor of political science at Western Oregon University and chair of the department, spoke about "Election 2014: Outcomes and Implications." 

Here's my top takeaways from his talk -- based on my scribbled notes and memory.

(1) The 2014 mid-terms were more of the same "trench warfare." 
Just as World War I the opposing armies were dug in with little movement on either side, despite massive fighting and casualities, elections in this country don't result in lasting wins for either Republicans or Democrats.

Much of the populace was barely aware of the mid-term election, which is akin to soldiers being hidden in the trenches. "Is there an election underway?" "Where's the battle?" Being a progressive, this made me feel better about what just happened. 

Only about a third of registered voters took part in the election (twice that in Oregon, in part because we have vote by mail). This was a continuation of the prior trench warfare, Dover said, not a Republican victory or Democratic defeat.

(2) A few battleground states saw most of the action.
Per usual, a small number of "purple" states (not blue, not red) received most of the national attention. In 2012, I believe it was, Dems and the GOP each spent a billion dollars on the presidential campaign. Half of this was for television advertising in just nine battleground states. 

So even though the 2014 mid-terms have been called a wave election for the Republican Party, most of the country wasn't washed much by the wave. Meaning, by and large voters cast their ballots as they usually do. In the House of Representatives, which elects all members every two years, 96% of incumbents were re-elected.

(3) Suburbs often are the deciding electoral factor.
Urban areas tend to be reliably Democratic; rural areas, reliably Republican. The suburbs can bounce either way.

For example, California is mostly urban and Democratic. Wyoming is mostly rural and Republican. Colorado, though, is mixed. There, three suburban counties typically decide the outcome of a statewide election. Thus suburbs are the trenches in which today's political trench warfare is fought. 

(4) The "silent generation" is a big political influence now, but not for much longer.
Being 66, a baby boomer, I found this age-related analysis by Dover to be fascinating. Often polls and election results talk about the over-60 vote. However, Dover said there is a big difference between how those born between 1929 and 1941 vote, and how the post-war baby boom generation I'm a part of votes.

Members of the so-called silent generation generally were in high school in the 1950's. Now they are aged 70-80, or thereabouts. They are much more likely to vote than young people, and are considerably more Republican. In a mid-term they have an outsized influence, since 37% of those over 60 voted in 2014 compared to 12% of those under 30.

A national election, which will occur in 2016, brings a higher turnout among young people. And, obviously, the oldest people are steadily growing older. So before too long the "silent generation" will be truly silent: dead. This demographic change will affect the political landscape.

(5) Paul Evans vs. Kathy Goss race reflected national politics.
Dover worked on the Paul Evans campaign for state representative, so he said his comments about the race were in the spirit of participatory involvement. Nonetheless, his observations made a lot of sense.

District 20 is one of the most evenly balanced in Oregon between Democrats and Republicans. In 2014 it was the only state house district that changed parties. (Previously the district representative was a popular Republican who didn't run for re-election.)

In some ways District 20 is a suburban district as it includes West Salem and Monmouth/Independence. A million dollars was spent by both sides on this race. It was fiercely fought, whereas in many parts of Oregon with non-competitive state house races, voters barely knew an election was going on.

Character and policy are both important in a candidate's campaign. Ideally, personal characteristics and policy positions align. This is one reason Evans won, Dover said. For example, Evans had a military background and he advocated for treating veterans better. Goss, on the other hand, didn't have clear policy positions, in Dover's view. 

Well, these are some key points I recalled. Ed Dover had more to say, naturally. I believe his talk will be on Salem's CCTV eventually. It'll be well worth watching.

Salem has its own $400 million Bridge That's Going Nowhere

Salem, Oregon has its own version of the infamous $320 million "Bridge to Nowhere" boondoggle -- except our unneeded bridge is estimated to cost even more, $350 to $400 million.

The original Alaska bridge debacle sounds a lot like what is trying to be foisted on Salemians. (emphasis added in boldface)

Dubbed the "Bridge to Nowhere," the bridge in Alaska would connect the town of Ketchikan (population 8,900) with its airport on the Island of Gravina (population 50) at a cost to federal taxpayers of $320 million, by way of three separate earmarks in the recent highway bill. At present, a ferry service runs to the island, but some in the town complain about its wait (15 to 30 minutes) and fee ($6 per car). The Gravina Island bridge project is an embarrassment to the people of Alaska and the U.S. Congress. Fiscally responsible Members of Congress should be eager to zero out its funding.

Well, actually Salem's boondoggle is better termed the Bridge That's Going Nowhere.

It deserves that name because there aren't federal or state transportation funds to pay for it; the bridge plan doesn't comply with key state land use goals; local residents aren't going to accept paying tolls or having their taxes raised substantially; and the bridge location doesn't solve Salem's minimalist downtown rush hour problem.

But since money talks in this town, as everywhere in these corporation-controlled United States, millions of dollars keep being spent by the Salem City Council and other groups enamored with an unneeded, unwanted, and unpaid-for third bridge across the Willamette River.

The No 3rd Bridge folks have been doing a great job keeping Salem-area residents informed about this slow-motion taxpayer-funded train car wreck. The Statesman Journal newspaper, not so much. Our so-called community newspaper hasn't done any indepth stories on the bridge planning.

Yesterday, though, the paper had a story about how several Salem city councillors are rebelling against the current super-atrociously awful bridge design (as contrasted with the merely atrociously awful "Salem Alternative" design favored by the council, but now modified by the bridge planning group).
Download Salem councilors on third bridge design: Meh

The design chosen for the third bridge across the Willamette River in Salem drew sharp criticism on Monday at a Salem City Council workshop.

Councilors Chuck Bennett and Diana Dickey raised objections to the twin concrete structures, which would provide two lanes of traffic in both directions. They asserted that the bridge failed to address the "Salem Alternative"— a plan put forth by city council to reduce the repercussions of a new river crossing.

"We were talking about a single bridge, and now we're looking at a double bridge," Bennett said. The councilor said the design appeared to lay the groundwork for a potential freeway cutting through neighborhoods.

But this little kertuffle is a sideshow, a distraction from the Big Question: Why the hell is the Salem City Council supporting a third bridge at all?

It really doesn't matter whether an unneeded $400 million bridge is local, regional, or interstellar; small and pretty, or large and ugly; two lanes, four lanes, or twenty lanes. The damn thing shouldn't be built, given the overwhelming reasons to improve the current bridges rather than waste gobs of money on a new one.

Traffic counts across the existing bridges have been constant. Nationally, as locally, people are driving less. Given the location of the planned third bridge, it would do little or nothing to ease rush hour (more like rush minutes) congestion between downtown and West Salem.

And crucially, the Salem City Council should be focused on making the two existing bridges earthquake proof. This would cost hugely less than a new third bridge -- $37 million rather than $400 million.

I'm not sure how much traffic flow improvements to the current bridgeheads would cost. I've heard this would be in the tens of millions, not hundreds of millions.

So let's say that the two existing bridges could be seismically upgraded to withstand the Big One earthquake (that is a matter of When, not If), along with modifications to the approaches to ease congestion, for $100 million or thereabouts. 

That's one quarter, or less, of the cost of what the Salem City Council wants to spend on a brand spanking new unneeded third bridge, whose reason for potentially being has never been explained. Last year I asked Public Works Director Peter Fernandez why a third bridge was needed. 

His answer showed why one isn't needed.

I asked for the single most important reason. Numero Uno. #1. The words most likely to make opponents of a Third Bridge think, "whoa, maybe we really doneed this thing!" 

So how did Fernandez respond?

By saying that the single most important reason is that there is only one way into and out of West Salem. Redundancy and safety were the top reasons a Third Bridge is needed. He said that the bridges are seismically unfit. Currently serious accidents on the bridge tie up traffic for long distances into neighborhoods on both sides of the river.

Well, Fernandez made a great argument for improving the current bridges, rather than building a new one.

Redundancy and safety are best served by making sure both the existing bridges remain functional after an earthquake. It's a relatively simple matter to make the current bridges two-way, rather than one-way, if an accident blocks one of them for a while.

However, No 3rd Bridge has learned that some of the municipalities pushing for a third bridge aren't really interested in easing Salem's traffic problems or making sure people in West Salem can cross the river after an earthquake.

No, they want a "regional" bridge that speeds people through Salem more quickly on their way to Portland, the coast, or wherever. Which makes it all the more outrageous that the Salem City Council is backing a $400 million bridge that minimally benefits Salem and maximally benefits Polk County, Keizer, and other areas.

It's time to put an end to this waste of taxpayer dollars. 

Post-election thoughts from a mostly upbeat progressive Oregonian

Like I said in a recent blog post, "What we pay attention to determines our reality," last night I tried to heed my own November 3 advice while keeping track of both the national and local election returns. 

There will be so many ways to look upon tomorrow's election. Nationally. State by state. Local, as in right here in Oregon. It is impossible to pay attention to everything that will happen. It isn't Polyannaish to choose to focus on certain results that please you.

Why not? It makes sense to see the glass of life as half full, rather than half empty. Or even better, completely full.

Nationally, the 2014 mid-term election sucked big-time for us progressives. But here in Oregon, mostly everything went great -- as a Blue Oregon post said in "A bloodbath. But not in Oregon!"

Oregon once again proved that things look different here.

Absolutely. 

We re-elected our Democratic governor, one of our two Democratic U.S. Senators, our four (out of five) Congressional representatives, and expanded Democratic majorities in both the state Senate and House.

And super-pleasingly...

Oregonians passed Measure 91. Legal recreational marijuana is coming soon! Well, July 2015 before possession is legal; early 2016, likely, before pot can be bought in stores.

This is a major accomplishment, especially since weed was legalized here in a mid-term election. Some pro-pot types criticized Measure 91 leaders for not waiting until 2016, arguing that a presidential election year would bring out more of the progressive base.

So a big leafy thumbs-up to Anthony Johnson and the rest of the super-competent Measure 91 team. They ran an amazingly skillful professional campaign that was hugely better than the 2012 Oregon marijuana legalization effort that failed to garner enough votes.

Since I'm writing this blog post, I'll also give myself a pat on the back (and maybe some other places too, when nobody is watching) for contributing what knowledgeable observers, a.k.a. Me, call the best philosophical neuroscientific reason to legalize marijuana ever penned by an Oregonian.

It can be marveled at here. 

Locally, it was great to see that Peter Courtney whipped Patti Milne's lying ass in their race for a state senate seat. Even Dick Hughes, the normally clueless editorial page editor of the Statesman Journal, called out the Milne campaign for its shameful falsities.
Download The politics of fear, Republican style

I also was glad to see that Democrat Paul Evans beat Republican Kathy Goss in a state representative race. Goss was a dreadful candidate who refused any more debates with Evans after he thoroughly embarassed her in their first head to empty-head matchup. 

Goss achieved instant Oregon notoreity for referring to bicycle lanes as "fringe things." Brilliant move, Kathy, in a state with so many avid bicyclists of all political persuasions. You clearly have the political skills to be elected to something, someday, somewhere, somehow.

Soil and Water Conservation District board member, maybe? They often only have one candidate running, which would give Goss a decent chance of winning. 

I never really thought Jeff Merkley would lose to Monica Wehby, but it still was a surprise to see how much he beat her by. Wehby's demeanor and style showed that even pediatric neurosurgeons can look like idiots.

In a Facebook post today I read that Wehby said after the election something like, "God wanted me to continue being a physician." I took pleasure in leaving a comment: "No, God wanted you to not be a god-awful U.S. Senator."

It would have been a nightmare I wouldn't have woken up from for four years if Republican Dennis Richardson had somehow become governor rather than John Kitzhaber. Thankfully, Oregonians realized that Kitzhaber's fiancee, Cylvia Hayes, wasn't running for governor; he was. 

Personally, I found that Hayes' "scandals" introduced some pleasing interest into Oregon's political scene. Gosh, the wife-to-be of a leading politician is a savvy, scheming, intelligent woman who sometimes rubs people the wrong way and takes a few ethical short-cuts. 

Anyone who is offended by that should watch House of Cards to see real Machiavellian wifely goings-on. Plus, I found it endearing that Hayes tried to set up a marijuana growing operation quite a few years go. You just were ahead of your time, Cylvia.

Give it another try now, with the passage of Measure 91.

Lastly, this is one of the best explanations I've come across for why Democrats did so much crashing and burning on the national level: "Democrats only have themselves to blame for upcoming losses."

Right on, Steven Pearlstein.

I’m going to go out on a limb here and predict that Tuesday will not be a good day for Democrats. The reason isn’t Ebola or the Islamic State or that the country has suddenly become more conservative. It’s not because of Fox News or all the outside money that is being spent. What we have here is a failure of brand management — in this case, the Democratic brand.

...What’s true for companies also applies to political parties. And from that standpoint, the performance of the Obama White House and his party’s congressional candidates has largely been a case study in how to destroy brand equity: Democratic candidates begging the Democratic president not to campaign for them and, in one memorable instance, refusing even to say whether she voted for him.

The president and candidates rarely mentioning, let alone defending, their landmark health reform legislation. Party leaders pleading with the president not to take executive actions on immigration or climate change before the election. A Democratic Senate willing to put off action on urgent or popular issues out of fear that Republicans will force tough votes on controversial amendments.

Now, on the eve of the election, Democratic candidates find themselves caught in a vicious cycle in which their refusal to embrace and defend their party’s brand is discouraging the faithful and turning away the undecided, threatening their election prospects still further. What Benjamin Franklin said of revolutions also applies to political campaigns: Those who don’t hang together will surely hang separately. 

What we pay attention to determines our reality

After tomorrow, everybody in this country will have a lot to be potentially pleased about, and a lot to be potentially upset with. This is the nature of a mid-term election.

And more importantly, life. 

The good news is this: we can choose what to pay attention to, what to focus on, what our experience of reality is. In other words, the good news is that we can create our own good news, no matter what happens in the world.

This is the core message of Winifred Gallagher's fascinating book, "Rapt: Attention and the Focused Life." I've been re-reading it. Since I'm a political junkie, Gallagher's words have helped me realize that I don't need to feel like the election results will control my mood come Wednesday and thereafter.

Here's some quotes (indented) from the first few pages of her book, along with my commentary.

That your experience largely depends on the material objects and mental subjects that you choose to pay attention to or ignore is not an imaginative notion, but a physiological fact. When you focus on a STOP sign or a sonnet, a waft of perfume or a stock-market tip, your brain registers that "target" which enables it to affect your behavior.

There will be so many ways to look upon tomorrow's election. Nationally. State by state. Local, as in right here in Oregon. It is impossible to pay attention to everything that will happen. It isn't Polyannaish to choose to focus on certain results that please you.

Why not? It makes sense to see the glass of life as half full, rather than half empty. Or even better, completely full.

In contrast, the things that you don't attend to in a sense don't exist, at least for you. All day long, you are selectively paying attention to something, and much more often than you may suspect, you can take charge of this process to good effect.

Indeed, your ability to focus on this and suppress that is the key to controlling your experience and, ultimately, your well-being.

Neuroscientists point out to us that what we are aware of at each moment is just a minute fraction of the reality available to us. Our sight, for example, zeros in on a small well-focused patch of what surrounds us. The rest is a blur.

So since it isn't possible to be aware of everything in the world, we might as well choose to pay attention mostly to what uplifts us and gives us pleasure.

If you could look backward at your years thus far, you'd see that your life has been fashioned from what you've paid attention to and what you haven't. You'd observe that of all the myriad sights and sounds, thoughts and feelings that you could have focused on, you selected a relative few, which became what you've confidently called "reality."

You'd also be struck by the fact that if you had paid attention to other things, your reality and your life would be very different.

Interesting observation. It is kind of disturbing, if one looks backward, focusing on how much better life would have seemed if we'd paid more attention to stuff other than what we actually did. But the past is, well, past. 

In the next moment, as in all the rest to come, we can decide what fills our attention, and what doesn't. That choice determines the sort of life we will fashion.

Attention has created the experience and, significantly, the self stored in your memory, but looking ahead, what you focus on from this moment will create the life and person yet to be. Since Sigmund Freud, psychologists have mostly examined our pasts to explain and improve our lives.

If you think in terms of the present and future instead, you might encounter an intuition lurking in the back of your mind, as it was in mine: if you could just stay focused on the right things, your life would stop feeling like a reaction to stuff that happens to you and become something that you create: not a series of accidents, but a work of art.

No matter what happens nationally tomorrow in the mid-term election, I'm confident there is going to be some good news here in Oregon not only for me, but for everybody who cares about politics. 

Some candidates I like will win; others will lose. Some ballot measures I favor will be passed by voters; others will be rejected. 

I'm going to do my best to focus on the positive and downplay the negative. Not because I want to ignore much of reality -- because I have to. It simply is physiologically impossible, as Gallagher says, to attend to everything happening around us.

So choose happily tomorrow, and every day thereafter. Life is too short, too precious, to put a lot of attention on what disturbs us. 

Gallagher writes:

Some decisions about what to focus on, such as what profession to pursue or person to live with, automatically receive serious attention.

Other choices may be less obvious but are just as important to the tenor of your daily experience: deciding to concentrate on hopes rather than your fears; to attend to the present instead of the past; to appreciate that just because something upsetting happens, you don't have to fixate on it.

Still other targets may seem inconsequential: focusing on a book or guitar instead of a rerun; a chat instead of an e-mail; an apple instead of a doughnut. 

Yet the difference between "passing the time" and "time well spent" depends on making smart decisions about what to attend to in matters large and small, then doing so as if your life depended on it.

As far as its quality is concerned, it does. 

Why a photo of a dead deer makes me feel hunting is wrong

It wasn't a great way to wake up today: checking my Facebook feed while still in bed and seeing a photo of a deer a relative had shot in Indiana. I felt sad for the dead buck.

But my relative was pleased he'd killed the deer. A bunch of comments from his Facebook friends were universally congratulatory. Nice job. Great looking deer. Congrats and yum! Excellent. What a beautiful rack...

There were more along those lines. My Facebook comment was decidedly different. 

Sad, and even disgusting, says this animal loving vegetarian. Hunting for sport is cruel. Got to speak my mind.

After getting a response from another relative defending killing the deer in the name of wildlife management, I left another comment.

I'm just telling you how I feel. That photo made me feel terrible. OK, maybe killing beautiful wild animals is necessary at times. But humans should do it sparingly with sadness, not gleefully. Other commenters are happy when they see a dead deer photo. I'm saddened.

Here I want to explain why I feel the way I do.

Well, insofar as I know the why. Feelings are mysterious creatures. Much like wild animals do, emotions roam freely within our psyches, arising from hidden places and departing to unknown realms. 

There's obviously a wide gulf between the way I feel about this photo, and how others do. That's fine. We're all different. I didn't intend to be moralistic or judgmental in my comments. Just honest. Which I'll continue to be now.

I'm not out to change hunters' minds. I'm simply sharing what's on my mind.

My first and only kill for sport.
I grew up in Three Rivers, a small rural town in the foothills of California's Sierra Nevada mountains. Deer hunting was common. The usual progression for a boy was bb-gun, pellet gun, .22, deer rifle. I'd progressed to pellet gun.

A neighbor boy and I were playing around with ours. I aimed at a song bird sitting in a bush. It fell down. Dead. Walking over to it, I remember feeling terrible. A moment ago it had been alive. Now it wasn't. I had killed it for no reason.

After that I never fired a gun at a creature that didn't need killing.

I own several guns now, including a shotgun that is used for doing away with ground squirrels who were burrowing under our home's foundation and wrecking our garden. I never feel good when I kill one. Once I shot a gray squirrel by mistake.

When I realized what I'd done, I felt just like I did when I shot the songbird. Terrible. Nobody taught me to feel this way. My mother wanted me to learn how to hunt. I was an avid meat eater. I'd never been exposed to animal rights ideas (this was the early 1960's). 

Killing an animal for no good reason just intuitively seemed wrong to me. Did then. Does now.

I became a vegetarian at the age of 20. Before that, for a while I had continued to eat fish. Then I was served a prawn, all curled up on my plate. As with the bird, I thought, "This animal was alive until it was killed because of me."

I never ate meat or fish again. Forty-six years later, I've got no urge to. Because...

Other animals have conscious lives, just like us. 
It bothers me when people de-animalize themselves.

Humans are animals. After billions of years of evolution, we are related to every other living entity, including bacteria, insects, fish, and other animals. There isn't any sort of gulf or divide between us and them. Life on earth is a continuum.

I've read a lot of books about neuroscience and the philosophy of consciousness. This can be complicated stuff. A key simple idea, though, is that what it means to be conscious is this: there is something like to be a conscious creature, something it is like for that organism. 

This seems undeniable.

I know there is something it is like to be me. You know this also, for you. Every dog or cat lover understands their pets also have conscious lives. Farm animals too. And wild animals. Including deer. 

Before being killed by my relative, the buck was going about its life as a conscious being. Just like we do.

Sure, we don't know what it is like to be a deer. Or a bat. Or any other human, for that matter. It is entirely possible, though, to feel empathy and compassion for other conscious organisms even if we can't know what their consciousness is like.

My wife and I live in rural south Salem, Oregon. Deer abound in our neighborhood. Recently we were about to turn into our driveway when I saw a young buck standing by the side of the road, munching on grass. I stopped the car. 

The deer looked at us. We looked at the deer.

Again, I have no idea what being a deer is like. But looking into its eyes, albeit from afar, it seemed obvious that it was like something to be that deer. To kill that something for no good reason, just for sport -- I could never do that. 

Science fiction films such as "Predator" show us what it would be like to be hunted by aliens who consider humans to be creatures worthy of being killed for sport. I wonder how a deer hunter would feel as his wife, children, and then himself were killed one by one.

Hey, the aliens are just harvesting us for food, or fun, or any reason they come up with.

They're more intelligent than us, with a better ability to kill. So what if we're conscious, as they are? The morality of deer hunting says, "It is OK to kill another highly-evolved conscious creature for no good reason."

It's not all about us humans. 
Look, I understand the argument hunters make about killing deer and other wildlife being necessary to maintain animal populations at a desirable level. This makes some sense. But not a whole lot.

Because the argument is centered on humans. One species, Homo sapiens. The species which is destroying the planet on which it, and every other life form, depends for existence. We are in the midst of a Sixth Extinction caused by us. 

There are many reasons for this ecological disaster, which is being exacerbated by global warming -- another example of the human propensity to wrongly believe, "It's all about us." Meaning, we can do whatever we want to other life forms and the planet, and everything will turn out fine.

Wrong. It won't.

Thoreau wisely said, In wildness is the preservation of the world.

With every bit of wildness destroyed, so is the world. A wild deer is priceless. I'm no Thoreau, but whenever I sense deer, coyotes, racoons, cougars, and the many other animals that live in and pass through our rural neighborhood, I feel enriched.

I can't understand how anyone feels that a dead deer is more valuable to humanity, and the world, than a live deer. I look at the photo of the buck killed by my relative and feel a deep sense of loss. 

Wildness has to be preserved. Or we won't be.

It isn't possible to draw a line and say, "It's OK to destroy wildness up to this point, but no further," because history tells us that this line keeps on being pushed in the direction of more destruction.

One dead wild deer. No big deal. There's plenty more beautiful majestic bucks where that one came from.

That's the attitude of hunters. Humans know best. Killing wildness is fine. It's all about us. Other animals exist to serve our needs, not to exist as conscious creatures on their own.

I disagree. I have since I killed that song bird at age 12 or thereabouts. I'm pretty damn sure I always will. 

Lastly, my wife wants me to mention this additional truth.

If some deer need to be killed to "cull the herd," it makes no sense to kill the best specimens with the best genes and largest antlers. This is exactly opposite to what happens naturally.

Wolves and other top predators kill the weakest animals, not the strongest. This leads to a healthier herd, a natural balance of nature. But we humans jump in and interfere with nature's wisdom. We irrationally fear and hate top predators like wolves and cougars, killing them needlessly almost to extinction.

Then humans complain, "There are too many deer."

Or, if the population of top predators has been allowed to recover, hunters gripe, "There are too few deer." Either way, we've messed around with nature's wildness, and nature is telling us Back off, you idiots. Understand that you are part of nature, not separate.