Editorial Roundup: Idaho

Recent editorials from Idaho newspapers:

Fix our undemocratic election processes

Idaho Mountain Express

Nov. 4

National changes that should be made too often happen slowly, if at all. Google founder Eric Schmidt noted at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic that dire circumstances can bring “10 years of change instantly.”

This presidential election, held in the midst of a reality altered by a new and deadly virus, has brought America’s electoral process into sharp relief. The country must adopt Schmidt’s observation about how quickly changes can come if America hopes to remain a democracy.

The Electoral College must go. This intensely nondemocratic system reflects the founders’ assumption that landed, aristocratic white men were the only people worth listening to and that a true democracy of undisciplined voters would be dangerous.

Their invention has produced presidents favored by the loser of the popular vote twice in the last two decades alone. The disconnect in 2016, when the Electoral College vote went to Donald Trump, was the largest since 1876 when Rutherford B. Hayes was actually chosen by an election commission.

The winner-take-all way in which most states allocate their electors allows campaigns to focus on only a handful of states. The voters in most other states, from the biggest to the smallest, get zero visits from either the candidates or their surrogates. Democrats don’t go to California and Republicans don’t go to Texas, except to raise money. Rarely does anyone bother with Oklahoma or Kentucky or Idaho.

Difficult though it may be, the Electoral College should be eliminated by constitutional amendment. The popular vote, tallied as a whole, should pick the president and vice president.

The voting window when ballots may be cast should be formally extended and nationally consistent. Voting in person on a Tuesday serves only to suppress access. While that outcome might be favored by a minority trying to hold on to power, it is anathema to any belief in democracy.

Early voting and voting by mail work. There is no evidence that opening up access to voters results in election fraud. There is unlikely to be any this year. Instead, the pandemic-motivated expansion of ways to cast a ballot has helped produce a historic turnout.

With instant communication and a culturally, racially and economically diverse population, America should fulfill its dream as a democratic model for the world and fix its election processes.

Online: Idaho Mountain Express

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Idaho squandered early pandemic successes

Post Register

Nov. 1

There’s an old truism that insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly, expecting the outcome to change. By that measure, Idaho’s pandemic response has degenerated into madness.

Our neighbors are dying because of it — at least 618 at time of writing, certainly more by time of publication.

Idaho’s early pandemic response, because of a combination of luck and good policymaking, was excellent. Idaho was lucky because it was one of the last states in the nation to have an outbreak, so Gov. Brad Little could look at the fate of other states.

And Little used that opportunity. Early into Idaho’s outbreak, he put the state into an economically painful but necessary lockdown that saved countless lives.

But since reopening, Idaho has failed to maintain that early advantage. Idaho remained in Stage 4 even as cases surged and hospitals were stretched unbelievably thin — children in the Magic Valley now have to travel hours to receive care, and in Kootenai County hospitals may have to ship patients out of state.

Eastern Idaho’s hospitals have come close to being overwhelmed at times. And neighboring Utah says it may not be able to accept patients. Local doctors say they really don’t have anywhere to send patients if capacity is exceeded.

We are dangerously dancing on the edge of the catastrophe we avoided early on. This time not because we were taken off guard, but because we have not had the fortitude to fight the pandemic effectively.

Little’s decision to move the state back to Stage 3 is a baby step in the right direction, but it is far from sufficient. It changes relatively little with regard to the status quo. Most specifically, it neither imposes a statewide mask mandate nor gestures toward enforcement of local mandates. The governor is trying the same thing, expecting a different outcome.

Little correctly observed that he doesn’t need complete masking adherence to get the pandemic under control, but he does need a higher level of compliance. He conjectured that people will be more likely to comply with local orders than with statewide ones.

Idaho has relied on local mandates since reopening. That strategy has netted Idaho:

• One of the nation’s lowest percentages of residents saying they always or usually wear masks

• One of the nation’s highest percentages of residents saying they know someone currently suffering COVID-19 symptoms

• A death toll more than 10 times Thailand’s (population 69 million, compared to Idaho’s 1.8 million; eastern Idaho’s death toll alone will soon surpass Thailand’s)

Little doesn’t need to look far to find better strategies. Oregon did not have Idaho’s early luck. It was one of the first states to experience a major COVID-19 outbreak.

Today, Oregon’s per capita COVID-19 death rate for the entirety of the pandemic, including the early uncontrolled outbreak Idaho was mostly spared, is half that of Idaho’s. The most significant difference is a statewide mask mandate, with at least some enforcement.

The available research suggests the same thing.

Studies in Germany indicate that voluntary mask policies achieve lower levels of compliance while also increasing the level of social strife. In the absence of enforcement, social stigmatization of those who refuse to wear masks becomes the predictable norm. Enforced mask orders, by contrast, increase compliance not only with masking but with other pandemic mitigation strategies like distancing and handwashing.

In Arizona, mask mandates were local, but there was some level of enforcement and other mitigation strategies. Two weeks after the mask mandates, new cases had plateaued. Two weeks after that, they declined by 75%. In Idaho, by contrast, every agency in charge of mask mandates has had the same message: Don’t worry. If you break the rules, there are no consequences at all.

Enforcement doesn’t have to be harsh to significantly increase compliance. When someone is pulled over for speeding, they tend to pull away going the speed limit even if an officer lets them off with a warning. But they do that because you can’t always count on the cop letting you off. Sometimes you get a ticket.

Gov. Little, is it so hard to do again what you did during the onset of the pandemic? Look around. See what is effective. Cast the politics aside, and save Idahoans’ lives.

Put in place a mask mandate and direct enforcement.

Online: Post Register