Editorials from around New England

Excerpts of recent editorials of statewide and national interest from New England newspapers:

The Providence Journal (R.I.), April 2, 2016

Does Canada really believe that it’s not at war with ISIS?

Justin Trudeau, the country’s Liberal prime minister, seems to feel this way. Shortly after the Brussels terrorist attack, he told the media, “A war is something that can be won by one side or the other and there is no path for ISIL to actually win against the West.”

Foreign Affairs Minister Stephane Dion made a similar assessment. He said, “If you use the terminology ’war,’ in international law it will mean two armies with respecting rules and it’s not the case at all.”

Considering how strongly Trudeau’s Conservative predecessor, Stephen Harper, supported the war on terror, the current government’s quibble over terminology is surprising.

The bloodthirsty leaders of ISIS, who have formed armies in the Mideast, hate Western values such as democracy, liberty and freedom with a passion. They have reportedly used chemical weapons, imposed Sharia, tortured and executed Syrians and Iraqis, beheaded people, raped women and turned children into soldiers and sex slaves.

Trudeau and Dion are surely aware of some or all of these atrocities and war-related crimes. They must realize what the terrorist group’s modus operandi is, irrespective of terminology.

By contrast, French Prime Minister Manuel Valls, just after the terrorist attack on Brussels, made this short, direct and powerful comment about the state of our world: “We are at war.”

Valls argued that “we have closed our eyes throughout Europe, and also France, on the progress of extremist ideas.” His eyes are now wide open - and he realizes we’re at war against ISIS and all other terrorist groups who threaten our safety and security. The use of the word “war” implies that our side will fight back.

Perhaps the French prime minister could instruct his Canadian counterpart about the nature of the war the West confronts, and the threat posed by terrorism.

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Online:

https://bit.ly/1W0Ml9z

The Valley News (N.H.), March 31, 2016

The National Rifle Association has long specialized in fairy tales. Our favorites include “Obama is coming for our guns”; “Universal background checks will lead to a national gun registry”; and the classic “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.”

Now, however, the NRA has taken this affinity for the fantastic to a whole new level. The New York Times reports that the group is publishing online a series of reimagined fairy tales in which central characters “are now packing heat.” Indeed, the first two in the series - Little Red Riding Hood (Has a Gun) and Hansel and Gretel (Have Guns) - are available on the NRA Family website, alongside such useful consumer guides as “9 Concealed-Carry Purses for Summer and Spring” (“The weather is changing and so should your purses. Here’s our list of concealed-carry accessories, purses and bags you need to match your colorful, fun and fast summer lifestyle.”)

Anyway, the Brothers Grimm (the originals, not the Kochs) have been rewritten by Amelia Hamilton, who is identified on the website as a conservative blogger and “a lifelong writer and patriot.” In its introduction to the page, the NRA asks readers whether the fairy tales read to them as children ever made “them rest a little bit uneasy,” and whether they have ever wondered what those stories might sound like if the hapless victims had been armed. We suspect that for the vast majority of people, the answer to the first query is “yes,” and to the second, “certainly not.” Then again, the nightmares that trouble our sleep tend to be more complicated than specters of government agents seizing our firearms.

In any case, in the NRA version, the Big, Bad Wolf more than meets his match in Little Red Riding Hood and her grandmother, armed with a rifle and a shotgun respectively and equipped with knowledge of how to use them. As Hamilton tells it, the classic exchange “What big teeth you have!”; “The better to eat you with” concludes a colloquy between Grandma and wolf, after which the latter leans in menacingly, jaws wide open, only to be stopped dead in his tracks by the sound of Grandma clicking off the safety on her shotgun, which she has surreptitiously retrieved during their exchange.

Not surprisingly, taking liberties with the Brothers Grimm has incensed some interested parties, and not on literary grounds. Dan Gross, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, denounced the stories as “a disgusting, morally depraved marketing campaign,” especially in light of the fact that 50 children and teenagers are shot each day in the United States. Presumably the NRA rebuttal to this would be that fewer kids would get shot if more kids could shoot back, but Gross’ point is well taken.

But the NRA’s effort does inspire us to indulge in a fairy tale of our own imagining. In this one, the next mass slaughter of innocents by a deranged shooter is followed not by NRA lamentations that it all could have been prevented had the victims only been armed and returned fire, but by a honest conversation about what sensible measures might rein in the reign of terror inflicted by indiscriminate gun violence in America.

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Online:

https://bit.ly/1MJAPgE

The MetroWest Daily News (Mass.), April 1, 2016

Last week, the Food and Drug Administration, after an apparently exhaustive review, determined that immediate-release prescription painkillers, such as Vicodin and Percocet, should carry a strong warning on their packaging - perhaps setting a record for the longest lag time between an actual crisis and the underwhelming federal government response to it.

The fact that these prescription drugs have been laying the foundation for the current heroin epidemic for more than a decade provides deadly insight into the costs associated with an inefficient and ineffective bureaucracy.

The FDA effort involves the mandatory inclusion of a boxed warning on all of the approximately 175 immediate-release opioid painkillers available. The message calls attention to the fact that the use of such medications can lead to addiction, overdose, and even death. Pharmacists dispensing such drugs are also urged to offer a brochure that details the potential risks.

About three years ago, the fleet-footed FDA required a similar warning on extended-release painkillers, including OxyContin. One could reasonably ask why, in its infinite wisdom, the FDA felt compelled to wait until 2016 to issue such a directive. After all, if three years ago it realized that long-acting painkillers posed the threat of addiction, why would the collective brain trust not realize that their immediate-acting counterparts would represent, at the very least, a comparable danger?

The FDA, in the classic style of someone who is so unclear on the concept that they are only tangentially grounded in reality, heralded the move as a significant element of a multifaceted approach to rein in the increasingly deadly epidemic that has already claimed tens of thousands of lives, especially among those who have migrated to heroin after becoming addicted to opioid painkillers.

“Today’s actions are one of the largest undertakings for informing prescribers of risks across opioid products, and one of many steps the FDA intends to take this year as part of our comprehensive action plan to reverse this epidemic,” Dr. Robert Califf, FDA commissioner touted in a press release.

What Califf and his ilk seem to not understand is that this so-called comprehensive action plan is shutting the barn doors long after the horses have escaped. The heroin epidemic that has only recently captured national headlines has been moving inexorably toward being the tidal wave that it is today because too many people at the FDA and elsewhere took a myopic view of the problem until it was too late to stem the tide.

Law enforcement officials from across Cape Cod began seeing the impact of a rising tide of opioid problems about 20 years ago, when OxyContin first began migrating from prescription painkiller to common addiction. Despite the warning signs, physicians continued to prescribe, drug mills continued to process, and regulators continued to turn a blind eye toward what many recognized even then as a growing problem.

Today, enough white suburban young people have died to ensure that addiction stories regularly receive top-of-the-hour and front-page attention. As a result, the federal government feels compelled to act, pledging more than a billion dollars toward treatment programs and committing itself to eradicating a problem that it seems to have only just recognized as even existing.

The FDA’s new labeling approach is not in and of itself a bad thing; the warnings may help reduce the likelihood of new cases of addiction in the years ahead. But that comforting news likely comes as little solace to the families of the nearly 30,000 individuals who did not live long enough to see it arrive.

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Online:

https://bit.ly/1W0Tmat

The Times-Argus (Vt.), March 30, 2016

Bernie Sanders’ big wins in caucuses over the weekend have breathed new life into his campaign, keeping alive the hopes of millions of followers.

At this point, they are hoping for a miracle, which would be partly mathematical. Analysts say that after winning the Democratic caucuses in Washington state, Hawaii and Alaska, Sanders still needs to win 57 percent of the remaining delegates. With big, Clinton-friendly states such as California and New York still to vote, it is a daunting task.

Democrats fear an enthusiasm gap if Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee. She has not inspired the same sort of devoted following that has rallied to Sanders. Instead, her supporters tend to be dutiful and pragmatic, insisting that she is progressive, like Sanders, but more experienced and knowledgeable.

Clinton labors beneath the widely shared suspicion that she is not honest, which makes a recent article in The Guardian a bracing pick-me-up for Clinton supporters. Jill Abramson, former managing editor of The New York Times, spent many years covering Clinton and the politics and scandals that have surrounded her and her husband. Contrary to the prevailing wisdom, Abramson says in The Guardian: “Hillary Clinton is fundamentally honest and trustworthy.”

Abramson acknowledges the many ways that Clinton makes life difficult for herself. She has a yearning for privacy that is difficult for any politician to maintain, and when her sphere of privacy is violated by nosy journalists, it is her instinct to withhold information. Thus, mini-scandals such as Whitewater or her private emails have a way of mushrooming into major issues. The entire process gives her an extremely jaundiced view of the press. Abramson, who had a hand in the coverage of Whitewater back in the 1990s, admits that she herself is not a favorite in “Hillaryland.”

Abramson has been an investigative reporter looking at the “nexus of money and politics,” and she says she knows of no instance where a donor or benefactor has received anything from Clinton in exchange for money. That goes for the Wall Street banks that gave her generous speaking fees.

As for the truth of her statements, Abramson cites the fact-checking website Politifact, which ranks Clinton as the most truthful of the remaining candidates - more so than Sanders or Republican John Kasich. (It is probably no surprise that Donald Trump is the biggest liar.)

Years ago, Clinton famously blamed the proliferation of lies and scandal that have followed her on a “vast right-wing conspiracy,” and she was derided. Since then, we have learned that there actually was a vast right-wing conspiracy, fueled by the money of billionaires who have systematically spread absurdities about her and her husband (the murder of Vincent Foster) and created scandals out of thin air (Whitewater, Travelgate). Candidates who appear defensive or paranoid or thin-skinned even in the face of lies and character assassination tend to make things worse for themselves.

Clinton has changed her positions over time, but as Abramson notes, there is nothing dishonest about that. Times change. Thanks in part to Sanders, Clinton now has greater latitude for stretching her progressive wings. For someone who began her career working for the Children’s Defense Fund in South Carolina and for the Nixon impeachment committee, her liberal instincts should not be so surprising.

Democrats worry that Sanders supporters will shy away from supporting Clinton if she should emerge as the nominee. She does not inspire the thrill of political revolution, and legions of Sanderistas continue to doubt her authenticity. Abramson is a tough-minded and experienced journalist who has dealt with Clinton at close range and through some of the messy so-called scandals that have followed Clinton like a perennial cloud of dust. That Abramson is vouching for her honesty is worthy of note. If Sanders fails to win that 57 percent that still remains to be won, Democrats may want to give Clinton a break - especially when they have a glance at the opposition.

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Online:

https://bit.ly/1M8aI2S

The Portland Press Herald (Maine), March 28, 2016

In what is becoming a familiar scene, Gray-New Gloucester High School was evacuated Friday following a bomb threat.

The evacuation came three days after a similar incident at the middle and elementary schools in Cape Elizabeth, which in turn came less than three weeks after a bomb threat closed Augusta schools.

It’s not only happening in Maine. Throughout the United States, schools are receiving threats of violence at a rate unheard of just two years ago, a result of the ease, distance and anonymity the Internet provides.

Though the vast majority are hoaxes, threats of all kinds force school administrators and public safety officials to weigh safety against the disruption caused when the school day is interrupted. But as the threats increase in regularity - Augusta schools have been shut down four times in less than a year - those determinations become even more difficult.

Unfortunately, the threats may be a fact of life in a culture where people use technology to lash out at others over a simple grudge, or just to get a response. That makes it imperative that schools be prepared to accurately assess threats so that disruption is kept to a minimum. Otherwise, schools may find themselves disrupted often.

While police dogs were searching Augusta schools March 4, officers were doing the same at dozens of schools in Northern Virginia and New Jersey, all as a result of threats apparently from the same source.

It was similar to an incident in January, when dozens of schools in at least seven states were targeted.

Like many others that day, Gardiner Area High School received a computer-voiced “robo-call,” similar to those sent to voters during election season, except instead of touting a candidate, they say a bombing or shooting is imminent.

The superintendent of schools in the Taunton, Massachusetts, area kept schools open after receiving one of the January threats, saying it was “non-specific.” But she was in the minority. Most administrators erred on the side of caution and closed schools.

When that happens, students lose a day of classes, parents are forced to arrange rides and supervision, there’s often a costly police response and everybody is subjected to what can be an anxiety-ridden process. That’s not much of a problem when it happens infrequently, but that is not always the case anymore.

Services that send robo-calls can be found easily on the Internet, and tech-savvy individuals can send tough-to-trace messages in any number of ways. And while some threats have a connection to their target, many others are from people who just like to provoke a reaction from afar.

A study of the first half of the 2015-16 school year found 745 bomb threats nationwide, a 143 percent increase over the same time frame the year before. Another found a 158 percent increase from 2013-14 to 2014-15. Security experts do not see the trend slowing down.

Harsher penalties are necessary to make perpetrators think twice, but technology may keep them a step ahead of police. So schools must work with police to prepare for threats, and to create assessment teams to determine if a closing is necessary.

They also should be able to adjust security to appropriate levels so that threats can be investigated without disrupting school, and so that they can communicate easily and effectively with parents, students and staff if they must cancel classes.

It’s a shame that threats are on the rise, but now schools at least know they have to be ready.

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Online:

https://bit.ly/1RS2drT

The Bulletin (Conn.), March 28, 2016

The lead headline in The Bulletin’s Monday sports section - “Coach not sorry for dominance” - was accurate but jarring. It was referring to the UConn women’s basketball coach Geno Auriemma, who again finds himself defending his program’s sterling record of athletic accomplishment.

No, Auriemma is not sorry for coaching a winning team. Nor should he be. What coach in his right mind would apologize for putting his student-athletes leaps and bounds ahead of the competition?

But that’s just the position the Huskies occupy in the NCAA tournament - they are three wins short of their fourth straight national championship, an unequaled achievement in the sport. And as has been the case in recent years, there seem to be no comers capable of overcoming the UConn women’s collective prowess - not by a long shot.

UConn broke the standing record for margin of victory on Saturday, clobbering Mississippi State by a staggering 60 points in a Sweet Sixteen matchup. And double-digit wins have become the norm, not the exception, for the team.

Is there a point at which a program is too good? Boston Globe columnist Dan Shaughnessy thinks so, and he provoked the discussion Saturday when he tweeted that the Huskies “are killing the women’s game.”

It is indeed true that it’s not as fun to watch players who badly outmatch their opponents. And there’s something to be said for the Huskies’ effect on the women’s tournament on the whole - and fans’ interest in it.

But, as Shaughnessy said in a column published Monday, it’s not because fans don’t like dynasties or women athletes. It’s because there’s no competition. That, however, is more of an indictment of the other prominent teams in the NCAA - who fail to rise to the challenge of a dominant team - than of the Huskies.

Ideally, the UConn women will eventually lift the standard of competition to their level instead of routinely occupying the vaunted space so far above everyone else.

The Huskies are winning because they have, in Auriemma, a dynamic coach who gets the best players then pushes them hard. Other programs will need to gain all three of those ingredients - or UConn will need to lose one or two of them - before the playing field levels off.

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Online:

https://bit.ly/22XGJyP