Coming Distractions-- Who Gets To Name The Next Supreme Court Justice?

To say that Judge Anthony Kennedy's resignation is a blow to the future of progressivism in the US for the next 20 years is to put it mildly. Because of the amount of laws and policies that end up being ruled on and over-ruled by SCOTUS, the next choice is likely to bend the court much further right than the more moderate on social issues Kennedy has allowed.

   With less than three months to decide who will have a majority of or retain the majority vote in the Senate and the House for the remainder of Trump's first (and hopefully only) term is anybody's guess. Of course it is in the interest of conservatives to name Kennedy's successor sooner than later and you will not need to be Nostradamus to guess how Republicans will be playing this. However, given the rulings handed down just this month, it is not in the interest of progressives to let that happen easily. But, since a super-majority is not required to approve a nomination nor to knock down a filibuster, it would seem that Republicans have all they need to do their worst.

   Aha! That is until you consider the Republicans who are retiring in January (Shout out to Jeff Flake and Bob Corker) who could exact revenge on a President with whom they have parted ways or an ailing John McCain who may not be up for a vote on a nominee. This would mean that an embattled Democrat like  Joe Manchin, Jon Tester, or Heidi Heitkamp would have to be pulled into the fracas and arm-twisted to go along with the Republicans. So it will be a drama to the end to see how cards are played and who ultimately wins or gets a stay of execution.

   Then it all gets real when, at best, the Democrats win the Senate and still have to negotiate with Trump for the Kennedy replacement. Or the President lives without the nominee knowing he has a deadlocked SCOTUS for the next two years and runs for re-election on the theme that Democrats are obstructionists. Or, the Republicans use the obstructionist angle now to attempt to win Senate seats outright and then name anybody that Trump or they desire.

   All this points to a challenging scenario wherein the blue line has to hold and the Democrats would need to run the table in November and again in 2020. This also points to a lot of dollars being spent trying to win the electorate over to the narrative each side will be promoting. Let the wedge issue framing games begin.  Note to Liberal SCOTUS members, please stay healthy.

Addendum: Over the weekend Senator Susan Collins said that an opponent of Roe v. Wade would be a deal breaker for her. Sen. Lisa Murkowski may also be in that camp. So there are a number of ways this could go past November.
1) Democrats hold, Murkowski and Collins join to block a nomination.
2) McCain, Flake, Corker  abstain from voting and nomination fails. Even if an embattled Democrat crosses over, the nomination fails.
3) Some combination of 1 and 2, the nomination fails.
4) The Senate leaves the SCOTUS with 8 justices through the lame duck session and Trump has to negotiate a moderate choice come January--if the Senate numbers hold or go slightly bluer.

Improvable Objects: Politics Not Sensitive to Concerns and Circumstance of People

Many years ago when I started this Blog, I thought about what to call it. At the time, I remember thinking about Paul Wellstone as he described what he believed politics should be about. He said, "A politics that is not sensitive to the concerns and circumstances of people's lives, a politics that does not speak to and include people, is an intellectually arrogant politics that deserves to fail." A failure I recognized in pure progressive politics is that it does not always account for the differences that wealth and values create for people. Populism, it seemed to me was the missing piece. Giving the people what they agreed they needed seemed to be inherently important to the success of a progressive movement.

   As we know, the progressive left pushed a type of populism under Bernie Sander's leadership that came up a day late and many dollars short of capturing the Democratic Party's nomination. He spoke to the pain that poor and middle class Americans were experiencing, but was running against Hillary Clinton. Clinton, while not the most progressive Democrat was seen as the right woman for the job by many party faithful (particularly after Elizabeth Warren thought better of running against her). The "I'm with Her" bankrollers and supporters, with the success of Barack Obama breaking through the color barrier that served as the glass ceiling for African Americans, believed it was the time for women to do the same.
 
   What Democrats failed to see was the clapback that had been fomenting in the Age of Obama. Sure people were aware that angry people were saying and doing despicable things to showcase their bigotry, but conventional wisdom held that this was a relatively small group of disaffected people and that they were living life in the rear view window, living in America of their imagined past. Progressives and others dismissed these voices as they might anything they assessed as politically incorrect, as fodder for late night talk show monologues or assuring themselves that now that we had, in their estimation by electing Obama twice, accepted that "Black Lives Matter" as the new reality.

   What I and others did not count on was what would happen if populism came at us from the Conservative side of the yard. While we thought the Tea Party movement was "astroturf" as opposed to "grass roots" politics, it turns out that the righteous anger of unheard people could be turned into a type of populism/Nativism that found enough votes in the right places to elect Freedom Caucus members and eventually Donald Trump as our President.

   Paul Wellstone's voice reminds me that "intellectually arrogant politics that is not sensitive to the concerns and circumstances of people's lives...deserves to fail" is what generally what happens after the election. No matter which party wins. Before the election, people have been surveyed and focus-grouped to learn what will move them to vote this way or that.Then the communications are formed and framed around winning the vote--from the top of the ticket to the volunteer calling you at home. You, dear voter, are a fish to be caught in a net. In fact, if you vote early, that's even better, you are still in the net if the candidate says or does something stupid, like say what he or she really thinks.

But after the election, you are a form-letter recipient when the person who you elected does something that he or she told you they wouldn't. Because now, they don't work for you or even try that hard to represent you. Now, they work for special interest groups or self-interested groups. The most self-interested groups are the political parties that are trying to grab and maintain power and pulling the strings behind them are the business and issue groups who want to make sure their interests are properly looked after. There is a country club made up solely of elites and you and I are not invited.

   While those are politics Wellstone said "deserve to fail," the truth is that those politics fail us, not the practitioners of them. Hence a people-powered political base is the only possible solution to the poison in the well of politics. Not a small marginalized group of people, but a large, organized mob of people who realize they have been bamboozled by politics as usual and resort to politics that are unusual. They run for office independent of party bosses and win. Then they win some more. Until finally, the politics of the unusual become the usual politics when people see that their lives are improving by them.

   To be sure, the elite will not go quietly, they will use their resources and knowledge seeking to drive wedges into such a movement. But history tells us that if we have resolve and trust that we will win, even the most corrupting of forces will fail to hold sway against such an army of every day women and men.

    So, I hope you are finally getting a view of what I am seeing so clearly; politics where the "radicals" win is probably a better brand of politics for people when the only other options are supplication or bloody revolution. The radicals on the left and right share something very basic, these are people who want the power in the hands of the people versus the elite. Right or left, it is the same battle. Defeat the political elites and then a politics that is sensitive to the people is truly possible, both before and after the elections.

Lost Wages and Lost Perspective

On July 1, 2018, Johnson County would have enacted a $14.00 minimum wage. But, due to legislation passed in 2017, counties no longer have the authority to enact wage polices. Despite this, many businesses in Johnson County have held a $10.10 minimum wage in place as it was the going rate when the Johnson County Ordinance was in place.

According to the Corridor Business Journal, "Johnson County had a higher minimum wage than the state for 17 months, including three months when it was $10.10 per hour. Last year, the county's Minimum Wage Advisory Committee found that the  increase did not appear to hurt businesses - one suggested possible negative consequence. The committee also found the wage increase benefited low-wage workers, who saw a larger increase in their average weekly earnings."

 Sadly for workers in the area, Johnson County can only symbolically call for the raising of the minimum wage. The need for a higher minimum wage has not gone away. Remember that the state minimum wage is still $7.25 per hour and also remember this in November.

Sick Puppies Abusing Dogs in Iowa with No End in Sight

Iowa is a state that is known to be very lax where animal rights and protections are concerned. As the Quad-City Times reported recently, "Iowa has the third-most puppy mills in the country with 10. In total, Iowa has 260 licensed dog breeding facilities" and with it, groups trying to effect change in Iowa run up against pro-agriculture legislators who are unsympathetic and worse.

Again according to the Q-C Times:

"When the Animal Rescue League of Iowa proposed amendments to the state law that seeks to protect dogs and cats, Illinois law was their guide.

The amendments approved this year by the Iowa Senate would have increased penalties for crimes that sicken most Iowans. For those convicted more than once of abuse or neglect of a dog or cat, causing serious injury or death, the penalty would increase from an aggravated misdemeanor to the more serious class D felony.

For torturing a companion animal, a felony charge automatically would result. A second offense of torture would lead to a more serious felony.

But the bill didn't make it to the Iowa House. It was hijacked by House leadership and the powerful agriculture lobby."

In yesterday's The Daily Nonpareil, it was reported that a Council Bluff's area man was arrested and change with "36 counts of animal neglect — a simple misdemeanor — and four counts of animal neglect as a serious misdemeanor" when his breeding and training business was  reported to the Pottawattamie County Sheriff's Office. When officers arrived on the scene, their investigation revealed that at least 4 dogs were dead, the facilities were covered in feces and urine, and many of the dogs were malnourished. A total of 25 dogs and 13 puppies were removed and sheltered.

The owner of the kennel was released on a $20,000 bond. Each simple misdemeanor carries the possible sentence of up to 30 days in jail and a fine of up to $625. Each serious misdemeanor charge carries the possible sentence of up to a year in jail and a fine of up to $1,875.

This is the latest case in Iowa, it won't be the last. It is time for Iowa legislators to improve the inspection process and levy more severe charges against poor operators such as this one.

Fear and Loathing of Human Rights

In the latest blow toward America as arbiter of global human rights, the Trump Administration's Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, is expected to announce that the US is walking away from the UN Human Rights Council for alleged anti-Israel bias. At the same time, the US government is arresting asylum seekers and their children and interring them for an indeterminate period of time on our borders.

This march toward isolationism is directly attributable to the Trump Administration's nationalistic bent in which people who are not "patriotic" Americans, i.e., don't walk in lock step with Trump's ideology are to be dismissed or destroyed. Policies are replacing the rule of law to make this happen at an alarming rate.

The important thing to keep in mind is that we all need each other because we are all on planet earth.
There is a good reason that propaganda and wedge politics are so closely entwined, the goal is singular. For ideology to prevail, it must be seen as the only sensible game in town. If we allow our own government to dismiss the world community, people seeking asylum, or even our own citizens to be dismissed, democracy has ceded to demagoguery. God save us all if our shared humanity fails us.

Updated: The US has now officially withdrawn from the U.N. Human Rights Council, Haley "saying the group should make it easier to expel states with poor human rights records. She said the U.S. withdrawal came after the desired reforms were not fulfilled.

“We take this step because our commitment does not allow us to remain a part of a hypocritical and self-serving organization that makes a mockery of human rights,” she said, adding that the U.S. would be “happy” to rejoin the council if it is reformed."

John Bolton added this morning via The Hill:

“Getting off the U.N. Human Rights Council is an assertion of American determination to stick by its Constitution and not to recognize that there is some higher authority at the U.N., whether it is the Council or the High Commissioner for Human Rights, to judge our performance or to give us advice on how to implement the Constitution,” Bolton told "Fox and Friends."

“We’re perfectly capable of doing that ourselves. We make our share of mistakes and we correct our mistakes. That’s what this is about, self-governance,” Bolton added.

Editor's note: How conspicuously contradictory is this move in light of separating immigrant/asylum seeking children from their parents and interring them in Texas and other places?

Welcoming Sky Sprawl to Johnson County, IA

Years ago I spoke to a friend of mine who was concerned about urban growth and outward sprawl. He said, "I'd much rather watch building get taller than for them to continue to spread out further and further into the county." And that made sense to me--the more you can build upward, the less you'd have to spread outwardly. However, as I fast-forward to today, I failed to see a fatal flaw in our agreement. What if we ended building both up and out? When you use that context, you now see every city and suburb that was ever built.

   Currently in Johnson County, Iowa, we are in the midst of a housing/building boom. Places that used to be farm fields are now new large single-family housing subdivisions. In the urban core, buildings that used to be two or three stories tall are now at least 4 stories and most new developments in the 10+ story category. We are beginning to see sky sprawl near the campus where I work as smaller buildings are beginning to look out of place in the shadows of the behemoths that stand above them. Naturally some of the growth is welcome, but as other amenities are being built simultaneously, the "charm" of the city is taking a hit as barricades and orange cones are cutting off streets and sidewalks.
 
   Progress, as it were, is impeding traffic. But, the visionaries tell us, a small price for a future of gleaming cities and high-rise dwellings for the well-heeled urbanites who will assuredly move in and make our city more prosperous and increase the tax base so the city government can make ends meet (and the rest of us can enjoy the new amenities, even if the ones we are near fall into decay). But we are also building canyons which will make it windier and hotter and potentially dangerous to traverse. I experienced a version of this first-hand while walking by a construction site on a particularly blustery day and watching parts of the construction blow off the building.

   Our brains years ago forgot that builders build any way that they are allowed to build. Up, down, or out, it really doesn't matter that much. As we imagine our city growing, we have a hard time imagining it morphing into something we hardly recognize because each of us comes to it at a different point in time. This means that what I see as my "ideal" town is different from what a person seeing it for the first time today may experience it. Hence we keep growing until we have reached capacity and that may be aesthetic capacity, or real estate capacity--which are generally not the same measure.

   So, we will continually welcome sky sprawl, as we did urban sprawl. We see it as part of democracy. As human beings, we like to believe that we watch out for nature and give it its due. As it turns out, nature has no friends and must fend for itself. As I watched the piece of the building sail off into the middle of the street, I wondered if it was a warning shot or just poor construction.

(photo credit: Alan Light)

The Army Turns 243 and It Shows

As of June 14th, the US Army celebrated its 243rd birthday which predates the US as a country. Approximately 1,016,000 men and women serve in the US Army, Reserves and National Guard. 24 of our Presidents served in the US Army and for many soldiers it is a noble calling. As less than 1% of American households have a family member in active service, and only 22% of US senators and congressional representatives have served in the military, all members of the US military and their families deserve our respect. 

However, there are facts about the Army that may surprise you.

According to AL.com:

• During World War II, supporting one soldier on the battlefield took one gallon of fuel per day. Today, the Army uses more than 22 gallons per day, per soldier.
• The Army has 158 installations worldwide; more than 132,000 miles of infrastructure for electric, gas, sewer and water; and over one billion square feet of office space.
• The Army owns more than 15 million acres of land across the United States, or about 24,000 square miles which, if the Army was a state, it would be the 42nd largest.
• The U.S Army is the second largest employer in the U.S.

Business Insider and other sources also have these interesting facts: 

• If the US Army were a city, it would be the 10th largest in the United States.
• The Army owns so much land that if it were a state, it would be larger than Hawaii and Massachusetts combined.
• The US Army Special Forces has 450,000 soldiers deployed to 135 of the 195 recognized countries of the world. 
• President Trump has asked for a budget of $186,403,156,000 for the US Army for FY 2019 which is a 16% increase from the year before.

Food Insecure About to Become More Insecure

Summertime and the living is not so easy for the 12% to Iowans who are experiencing food insecurity. Summer months mean that many children who are fed breakfast at schools are sometimes going without. I worked on a mobile food pantry and saw about a dozen people gathering up groceries for their families. One was a parent of a family of eight whose daughter was a student in the classroom of one of the other volunteers who is a teacher.

     I helped an person with disabilities to gather up food for a the week who relies on the food pantry to fill the gap that her disability check does not cover. There are many stories of people who hold jobs, who make do with what they have got and still can't make ends meet. At this time, Congress is looking at making qualifying and maintaining services through the SNAP program based on meeting minimum work thresholds. While the intention may be to keep people from defrauding "the system"--the truth is, it is likely to make it so more people are food insecure, also known as hungry.

    Thankfully, because of food banks and other programs, people are are able to get by. But, because of hardline governmental policies, more and more pressure is being placed on these agencies to handle the overflow when programs like SNAP are adding restrictive rules designed to "save the taxpayers money" at the expense of those truly in need such as the 14 million children who  live in food insecure households.The current Farm Bill expires Oct. 1, and a number programs will lose funding if a bill is not passed before then. Let your Representatives know that this not something you support. 

Open To All

Let Them Eat Cake

Earlier this week the Supreme Court of the United States made a decision that favored the cake baker in Colorado who chose not to bake a cake for a same-sex couple. Unfortunately, some people did not get the memo about what they decided and why. For instance, a hardware store owner, Jeff Amyx, in Tennessee who took down a sign in 2015 that said "No Gays Allowed" has rehung it stating "Christianity is under attack. This is a great win, don't get me wrong, but this is not the end, this is just the beginning," Amyx said. "Right now we're seeing a ray of sunshine. This is 'happy days' for Christians all over America, but dark days will come."

The question of what is under attack is equal rights under the law. The case that SCOTUS decided was that the baker from Colorado's rights were not treated equally under the law by the Colorado Civil Rights Commission. One commissioner on the panel during a public hearing disparaged the baker’s faith as “despicable” and another member compared his sincerely held religious beliefs to defenses of slavery and the Holocaust. “This sentiment is inappropriate for a commission charged with the solemn responsibility of fair and neutral enforcement of Colorado’s anti-discrimination law — a law that protects discrimination on the basis of religion as well as sexual orientation,” Justice Kennedy wrote.

The court said Colorado law can protect gay people from being discriminated against by businesses that are open to the public, but the law must be applied in a manner neutral toward religion.So, in essence, the Court found for the baker because of the treatment he received by the Commission, which has a degree of irony in that the gay couple seeking to buy a cake from him had a similar experience, thought to his credit, without the degree of contempt.

Back to the hardware store owner, though. If he makes duplicate keys and a gay person wishes him to make keys for his home, Mr. Amyx will be hard pressed to defend 1) limiting access to his store to that person 2) refusing to make a key because of his religious beliefs. Mr. Amyx owns a hardware store and sells hardware. Keys are hardware. If Mr. Amyx makes keys for anyone, he must make them for everyone. Mr. Amyx must allow people to buy his hardware regardless of his beliefs because he cannot refuse service based on race, creed, color, gender, or sexuality under federal law.

"All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

Sadly, Mr. Amyx and others will be looking for opportunities to test the degree to which they can discriminate owing to religious beliefs.  For instance if the customer who is gay wanted a house key for his spouse to be made, Mr. Amyx might argue that for religious reasons he won't do it because his faith does not support gay marriage. The Supreme Court and/or lower courts would have to decide if their is precedent to support that viewpoint. More to the point, the courts will be constantly barraged with how free freedom actually is within the walls of a nation that seem to be closing in and minds with them.

Iowa Women Do Well

After taking a break to visit Des Moines, I caught up with the results of Iowa state contests which were very good for the women candidates of Iowa. With the exception of the Governor's race and the 4th Congressional district, Democratic women candidates were the choice in the Iowa 1st and 3rd Congressional district, the Secretary of States's race, and also many House and Senate seats.

In the Senate 16 women from Democratic, Republican, and Libertarian parties out of 18 who ran were victorious in their primaries and in the House races, 58 out of 62. The positive is that the Iowa House and Senate may be more equally represented by gender in November than ever in the history of the state. If women won all the races that they are in, they would have 12 of 25 senate seats and 59 out of 100 House seats. However, though gender equality may be achieved, the politics would still be shaped down party lines as in the Senate 6 Republicans and 10 Democrats who are women are in contention for the seats and in the House, 16 and 46 respectively and also 2 Libertarians.

While top of the ticket women remain the domain for Republicans, the Democrats have fielded quite a few future party leaders. Anyway you look at the outcome of the primaries, change will come to the Iowa Legislature, the question is will that change be decidedly more progressive or conservative?