Page 28 - Flathead Beacon // 12.9.15

LIKE I WAS SAYIN’
TWO FOR THOUGHT SAME TOPIC, DIFFERENT VIEWS FIGHTING TERRORISM
KELLYN BROWN
BAD DRIVERS
ACOWORKER OF MINE’S VEHICLE WAS DENTED in our parking lot by another coworker’s vehicle last week. The next day a teenager slammed into the same vehicle while this same coworker was driving to work. The air bags deployed, and his sedan may be totaled.
He’s OK, but this is the same coworker who earlier this year was hit by a car at a crosswalk while riding his bike to work. That accident sent him to the hospital. Also, I’m not making this up, this same coworker was forced o a rural road west of Kalispell and had to get his vehicle towed out of a ditch not even a month ago.
That’s a lot of vehicle accidents over the course of one calendar year. He’s lucky none of his bones broke, or worse. His plight made me reread a few recent sto- ries about Montana’s driving habits – a common theme among them is that we are bad behind the wheel. I once sco ed at that idea, but not so much anymore
Like nearly everyone, I’ve always considered myself a good driver. However, on a recent trip to Calgary, Alberta, a passenger in my car disputed that notion. There are some good views between here and there, and I tended to look at those instead of the road in front of me.
I’m a mostly cautious driver, which, I’ve also been told, doesn’t make me a good one. My tentativeness is espe- cially poorly suited for large cities, like Calgary or Seattle, where I tend to miss exits and drive in circles. I must have picked up some of these bad habits in Montana, because this state’s driving statistics are scary.
Recently, a car-insurance study ranked us the worst drivers in the country. This was not an anomaly. The same study ranked us the worst in the country last year, too.
The rankings, compiled by carinsurancecomparison. com, factored in several categories, from drunken driv- ing to speeding. We rated poorly in all of them, and rst in fatality rate. Tyler Spraul, who directed the study for the website, told USA Today, “Montana has the potentially deadly combination of high speed limits and severe win- ter weather that could really be driving up fatality rates.”
Many locals are familiar with dangerous drivers and hairy stretches of highway. The length of U.S. Highway 93 that winds through the Flathead often has the highest number of crashes of any primary rural corridor in the state. In the late ‘90s, a common slogan was, “Pray for me, I drive Highway 93.”
Plenty of e orts have been made to improve safety, especially by law enforcement. Last year, Montana Department of Transportation Director Mike Tooley launched a state initiative, “Vision Zero,” aimed at shak- ing Montana’s dubious reputation as a dangerous place to drive. But the laws, or lack of laws, are stacked against him.
In another measurement of Montana’s driving habits, the Washington D.C.-based Advocates for Highway and Auto Safety gave Montana a failing grade in its annual report on highway safety laws. The reason: our state has no primary seatbelt law, all-rider motorcycle helmet law, booster seat law, ignition interlock law, or all driver text messaging restriction. Proposals to add statewide restrictions have gained little traction at the Legislature. Some cities, like White sh and Columbia Falls, ban cell phone use while driving. Others, like Kalispell, don’t.
Combine the lax rules with inclement weather and animals wandering onto roadways and a heavy-drink- ing population, and there’s bound to be some bad driv- ing, even if we don’t think we’re as bad as people think. In fact, the state just raised the speed limit on interstates from 75 mph to 80 mph. Go gure.
BY TIM BALDWIN
President Barack Obama said on Dec. 6 that the
“threat from terrorism is real, but we will overcome it.” Obama said we will ght terrorism abroad by hunting terrorists, training Iraqi and Syrian forces, cooperating with peaceful Muslims, and pursuing cease res in the Middle East. At home, Obama wants to impose stricter gun laws in America. To beat terrorism, Obama said we should draw from “every aspect of American power.” Notably, however, Obama failed to recognize the pri- mary source of home defense against terrorists: an armed citizenry.
Terrorism, as the world has seen, is unique: there are no uniforms or borders identifying the enemy and no warning. Military and police cannot instantly defend against terrorism in the homeland. Citizens are the only protectors ready and able to rst respond in self-defense.
Thankfully, county sheri s throughout the states recognize this and are openly appealing to citizens to be presently armed. Unfortunately, Obama does not see the value in this crucial line of defense but only gave lip service to how great Americans are and important free- dom is.
If Americans are great and freedom is important, we should recognize the necessity and importance of allow- ing citizens to have the power to protect themselves and others against terrorists who attempt to damage and destroy our natural and constitutional liberties as American citizens. Freedom and life are important, so let citizens protect them.
BY JOE CARBONARI
If you are not already paying attention to the
threat from extremist Islam, it’s time to do so, thoughtfully. While we appear to be close to revers- ing the Islamic State’s physical, territorial gains in what remains of Iraq and Syria, its international terrorist activities are likely to be expanded and intensi ed. It will hit us at home, if it can. Its aim is to incite fear, hatred and overreaction. Our job is to show restraint and courage.
We must stay calm, maintain perspective, and remain true to ourselves and to our values. We must tighten security where it is most needed, and bal- ance the convenience and privacy that may be lost against the degree of safety that will be attained. Common sense will override some personal sen- sibilities; political “correctness” may be reviewed.
The battle against extremists cannot be won mil- itarily. Yes, the Islamic State must be contained, defeated, and disbanded ... militarily. The overall battle, however, is an ideological, intellectual one. It is the thinking that must be reversed, contained, and largely exterminated. The thought that some- one’s “creator” requires the killing of non-believ- ers is neither rational nor acceptable. Islam must cleanse itself.
We cannot, should not, must not, vilify Islam as a whole, nor its peaceful adherents. It would fuel their re and belie our own values and humanity. We must lead, and win, by example.
GUEST COLUMN BOB BROWN
BALANCING IMMIGRATION POLICY AND
NGATIONAL SECURITY
children. Perhaps so, but in the long term that is of lit- tle relevance to our national security. In the 1960s, in order to reduce a severe labor shortage, the nation of Belgium recruited large numbers of workers and their families from Northern Africa. Two generations later those immigrants, now greatly multiplied, continue to live apart from the rest of the Belgian population, and their community is the acknowledged breeding ground for terror in Europe.
The minimum 10,000 well vetted innocents the president proposes to allow into our country will not assimilate into our population as past generations of immigrants were proud to do. As in Belgium, France, and other countries including ours, they will congre- gate in their own communities. Radicalized by mod- ern communications systems and reinforced by each other, homicidal zealots will incubate in these self-im- posed ghettos. The United States will surly face what Europe faces now. We have already experienced a tell- tale example in the case of the Boston bombers, immi- grant kids legally here who were converted to killers.
President Obama has resisted being a war presi- dent, but that is what he has become. He might want to be remembered as a visionary, a worldly philosopher and a great humanitarian, but unlike governors and members of Congress he is, in fact, our Commander in Chief. While there is no constitutional right to enter this country, presidents have a clear constitutional obligation to defend it from enemies foreign as well as domestic. Our near and long term national security depends on this president’s unambiguous acceptance of that responsibility.
Bob Brown is Montana’s former secretary of state
OV. STEVE BULLOCK SAYS HE WILL LOOK favorably on Middle Eastern refugees settling in Montana unless there are concerns about
them posing a threat to our safety.
Other governors have also made their opinions
known regarding Middle Eastern refugees in their states. The reality, though, is that state governors have little actual authority in terms of foreign refugees.
We are one nation in terms of foreign policy, which includes immigration. That is why states don’t have ports of entry. They don’t conduct comprehensive background searches to adequately “vet” foreign immi- grants because people are only residents of states. They have legal status only in the United States.
If refugees attempting to enter our country appear to pose a threat, and are discovered, they are kept out at the national level. Requirements of entry are set forth in federal law. According to President Barack Obama, the vetting process for refugees and immigrants seek- ing to enter the United States is adequate, and legisla- tion to make it more restrictive, which recently passed the House of Representatives by an overwhelming bipartisan majority is something he intends to veto.
The president’s position is that the legislation “con- tradicts our fundamental values.” Our laws pertain- ing to legal entry have been changed many times, and re ect no particular tradition in our history. Even if they did, these are not traditional times, whereas con- cern for our national security has always been funda- mental to who we are.
The president’s defenders argue that the great majority of asylum seekers to the United States from Syria and Iraq are nonthreatening elders and little
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DECEMBER 9, 2015 // FLATHEADBEACON.COM