This edition is being released on Thursday, because of the Independence Day holiday. Happy Fourth, America!
Last Week in History
Last week was a remarkable one in many ways. Marriage equality. The Affordable Care Act made permanent. Symbols of the Confederacy recognized for the racist statements they really are, and torn down from places of honor. The nation's first black president imperfectly leading a church full of black Americans in hymn, and insisting, in so many words, that the African-American experience is part and parcel of the American experience--not separate- but-equal, but another thread in the ever-lengthening cord of our history.
At Bloomberg, Francis Wilkinson wrote, "This may be the week the 21st century really began in America."
He just may be right. Beginning this week felt like waking up in a new America, one in which the arc of the moral universe has bent a little further toward justice.
This Week in Looking Backward
President Obama announced this week that the US and Cuba will have formal diplomatic relations, including embassies in each other's capitals. Republicans in Congress immediately announced that they would block any such actions, including refusing to confirm anyone nominated as an ambassador to Cuba.
Presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz (R/TX), who is of Cuban descent, said, "I, for one, want the Cuban people to know that there are still those who stand with them, and who know the Castros for what they are. I will hold any nominee President Obama sends to the Senate to be ambassador to Cuba, and I will work to disapprove any new funds for embassy construction in Havana, unless and until the President can demonstrate that he has made some progress in alleviating the misery of our friends, the people of Cuba.”
Cruz might want to ask the actual Cuban people, who are in favor of normalized relations with the US. As are the American people, by 60%. Cruz and the rest are arguing to keep relations between the two countries the way they've been for the last half-century. Somehow, they imagine, continuing to do the same thing we've been doing will, any day now, produce different results. Logic tells us that's highly unlikely.
This Week in 2016
Chris Christie of New Jersey dove into the Republican primary pool this week, splashing all the water out of it. Unlike some--Bobby Jindal (LA), for instance, or John Kasich (OH) whenever he gets in--Christie has plenty of national name recognition. It's not necessarily positive name recognition, but it's there. Christie is tainted by the ongoing Bridgegate scandal and by his bullying personality, which comes across refreshing to some people but turns grating in a hurry. He's deeply unpopular in his home state (second in gubernatorial unpopularity only to Jindal), where his economic agenda has cratered the state's finances and he's responsible for more debt downgrades than any governor in the state's history.
New Jersey's biggest newspaper, the Star-Ledger, published an editorial the day before Christie's announcement, attacking him in a way we've rarely seen.
"Most Americans don't know Chris Christie like I do, so it's only natural to wonder what testimony I might offer after covering his every move for the last 14 years.
"Is it his raw political talent? No, they can see that.
"Is it his measurable failure to fix the economy, solve the budget crisis or even repair the crumbling bridges? No, his opponents will cover that if he ever gets traction.
"My testimony amounts to a warning: Don't believe a word the man says.
"If you have the stomach for it, this column offers some greatest hits in Christie's catalog of lies.
"Don't misunderstand me. They all lie, and I get that. But Christie does it with such audacity, and such frequency, that he stands out."
The editorial details several of Christie's more flagrant lies, and concludes thusly:
"And that's my warning to America. When Christie picks up the microphone, he speaks so clearly and forcefully that you assume genuine conviction is behind it.
"Be careful, though. It's a kind of spell.
"He is a remarkable talent with a silver tongue. But if you look closely, you can see that it is forked like a serpent's."
Judging from that, it sounds like with Christie in the race, Mendacious Mitt Romney might have competition for the most blatantly dishonest presidential candidate in our memory, if not in American history.
Christie also has the "benefit" of earning the first endorsement of the 2016 cycle by a sitting governor (yes, there are a few who aren't running for the nomination themselves)--only he was endorsed by the utterly insane Paul LePage of Maine, who might very well be facing impeachment.
Christie's one and only real shot at the presidency was four years ago, when mainstream and hardcore conservative Republicans, big donors and tea party pundits alike, were all begging him to get in the race (before he "betrayed" them by working with President Obama to clean up the mess Hurricane Sandy left behind). But he didn't want to run against an incumbent who was still broadly popular with the American people, and every bit as gifted a politician as Christie himself. Whether it was cowardice that kept Christie out, or the certain knowledge that he couldn't win, the ensuing years have ruined his reputation and cost him dearly in support from his own constituents. Nobody's asking him to get in now, except perhaps the cast of SNL, who pray that Christie and Donald Trump will wind up on debate stages together.
Below the fold: More 2016, jobs, religious liberty, SCOTUS, and bears!
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Maybe it's a Maine thing. Maine Sen. Susan Collins (R) also made her pick public this week, endorsing former Florida governor Jeb Bush.
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In what might be a historical first among presidential candidates, Louisiana governor Bobby Jindal wrapped up his first week as a candidate with a suggestion that the nation do away with one-third of its Constitutionally established system of checks and balances. The federal government, as all schoolchildren know, comprises the executive, legislative, and judicial branches--or as they're more popularly known, the presidency, Congress, and the Supreme Court.
But Jindal, opposed to SCOTUS's same-sex marriage ruling, has a new idea. "The Supreme Court is completely out of control, making laws on their own, and has become a public opinion poll instead of a judicial body. If we want to save some money, let’s just get rid of the court.”
Sorry, Gov. Jindal. An unpopular governor can't do that. Neither can a president, which you'll never be. But you've wrecked Louisiana's economy sufficiently that voters there might want to save some money by getting rid of you.
Jindal also repeated what's rapidly becoming a common--but absurd--talking point, in right-wing circles. "Hillary Clinton and the Left will now mount an all-out assault on religious freedom guaranteed in the first amendment.”
That's nonsense, of course. There is no such assault on religious freedom. There is a push-back against the idea that religious preferences (of certain, Republican-approved religions) should trump the laws of the land. Jindal should know better than to stoke that fire, which could easily turn into a conflagration.
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Back in 2008, a certain half-term former governor and failed vice-presidential candidate accused then-Sen. Barack Obama (D/IL) of "palling around with terrorists."
We haven't heard her complain this week, when presidential candidate Sen. Rand Paul (R/KY) "palled around" with domestic terrorist and deadbeat rancher Cliven Bundy. Lest anyone forget, Bundy's the guy who owes our federal treasury more than a million dollars in grazing fees--fees every other rancher in the country who grazes cattle on federal land pays--and who, in his desperation to keep mooching off the rest of us, amassed a force of gun-wielding stooges to aim loaded weapons at officials of the United States government. You know, the people who work for us.
If that's not terrorism, we don't know what is.
Rand Paul, of course, supported Bundy's rebellion, right up until the point that Bundy was revealed to be--surprise!--also a racist nutjob. Which anybody with half a brain knew right from the beginning. Paul's trying to woo the black vote, despite having hired a well-known white supremacist to ghost-write his book, then keeping him on staff until public outcry grew too fierce. So he was on Bundy's side right up until "I want to tell you one more thing I know about the Negro" escaped Bundy's lips in the presence of a reporter.
While in Nevada, Paul answered some questions on land use for the Associated Press. "I think almost all land use issues and animal issues, endangered species issues, ought to be handled at the state level," he said.
Which only shows that we need to add land use and endangered species issues to the long list of things Paul doesn't understand. Plants and animals can't read the signs at the state line. Most of the time, they're not even following the roads, and that's where the signs are. Everywhere else, there are only imaginary lines, demarcated by surveyors but without actual barriers. Federal lands allow for continuity of ecosystems, and endangered species would only become more endangered if they were protected in, say, New Mexico, but not in Arizona.
Cliven Bundy is an un-American leech, and Rand Paul would be far more useful cleaning up after his cattle than taking up a seat in the US Senate. Somebody hand him a shovel.
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Donald Trump shows up at #2, behind Jeb Bush, in recent Republican primary polling. He won't stay in that position, and he won't win the nomination. But if his numbers stay up, he'll be on stage for the first debate. Republican Party leaders are desperately afraid of that happening. It's kind of like having a debate with a live grenade on stage. No one knows when it'll go off, they just know it'll cause a lot of damage when it does.
It's entirely possible that the real Donald Trump has been kidnapped by Democrats and an impersonator released into the world with a script by comedy writers who lost their jobs when David Letterman went off the air. Somehow, though, Trump's incoherent babbling is catching on with some Republican voters, and even with conservative pundits like Rich Lowry of the National Review. Lowry writes:
"As for his instantly notorious Mexico comments, they did more to insult than to illuminate, yet there was a kernel in them that hit on an important truth that typical politicians either don’t know or simply fear to speak. “When Mexico sends its people,” Trump said, “they’re not sending their best.”
"This is obviously correct. We aren’t raiding the top 1 percent of Mexicans and importing them to this country. Instead, we are getting representative Mexicans, who — through no fault of their own, of course — come from a poorly educated country at a time when education is essential to success in an advanced economy."
Of course, Trump and Lowry mischaracterize the whole issue. Mexico isn't "sending" anyone here, and we're not "raiding" the country, picking and choosing those we'd like to see sneaking across the border under cover of darkness. Mexicans who come across--and remember, we're around net zero right now, with just as many leaving the country as coming in--do so because they believe they can find better work here than they can at home. Many of them are correct. Many of them also do jobs that companies can't get Americans to do, at least without paying prohibitively high wages. There's a shadow economy that runs on immigrant labor, and it undergirds whole sectors of the overall American economy.
Very few of those coming over are what Trump described in his announcement monologue: "When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best... They're sending people that have lots of problems, and they're bringing those problems with us [sic]. They're bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They're rapists. And some, I assume, are good people." Even Lowry concedes that they're no more criminal than anyone else (though data tell us that the immigrant population commits fewer violent crimes than US citizens do). But he--and Trump--are wrong to imply that those who do cross over are simply going to add to the ranks of the poor. Without that shadow economy, Trump's hotel business would probably collapse--or room rates would spike so high that only people like Trump could afford them.
But we think they should keep it up, amplifying Trump's inanities to make sure everybody hears them. Winning the Hispanic vote will be important in 2016, and calling all immigrants criminals and rapists (except for those few "good people") is a surefire way to push them toward the Democratic candidate.
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On the Democratic side, decorated Vietnam vet, former Secretary of the Navy, and one-term senator (and novelist!) Jim Webb joined the race this week, bringing the count up to five (serious) Democratic contenders. To say that he faces an uphill battle is to severely understate the case. At best, he, Lincoln Chafee, and Martin O'Malley will likely split the anti-Hillary vote between them, ensuring that no one can get within shouting distance of Bernie Sanders, who's still trying to get within shouting distance of Clinton.
This Week in the Economy
Speaking of the economy, we're occasionally reminded of candidate Mitt Romney's promise in 2012: “I can tell you that over a period of four years, by virtue of the policies that we’d put in place, we’d get the unemployment rate down to 6 percent, and perhaps a little lower.” When he said that, unemployment was at 8.1%.
As of this week's Bureau of Labor Statistics report for June, we're now--less than three years into Obama's second term--at 5.3%. Good thing we didn't elect Romney.
This Week in "Liberty"
Jindal isn't alone in his misguided belief in an assault on religious freedom, unfortunately. Even though the US Supreme Court has ruled that same-sex marriage is legal in all 50 states, over in Texas, Attorney General Ken Paxton--who is supposed to uphold the law--is pushing county clerks to refuse to grant marriage licenses if they feel it goes against their religious beliefs.
Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo explains what this really means:
"Religious liberty is not only the simple freedom to believe and worship following the dictates of your conscience. Particularly in its American form it has been an application of special deference, a limit on the state's and society's ability to intrude into an individual's private sphere - even in ways which might be permitted if religion and conscience weren't involved.
"Here though we have the idea that an individual can change the application of public law based on whatever they call their religious belief. People might be offended by seeing two people of different races marry. And they wouldn't be compelled to marry a person of a different race. But by this theory a county clerk could effectively ban interracial marriage in their county based on 'religious liberty'. The simple fact is this: religious liberty is a shield against the exactions of public law. This new Frankenstein religious liberty is a free right to change public law for everyone else. It really is nullification, with all its rotten history of racism and bigotry remodeled to fit the fashion of the day."
As Marshall points out, those Texas county clerks weren't forced by their religion to take that job. Neither was Paxton. Those positions exist to serve the public in accordance with the law, not to impose their particular religious beliefs on the public. If they're offended by having to obey the law, they should quit their jobs and let people who want to do the job right have them. That includes Paxton, who should be removed from office for promoting widespread law-breaking*.
Presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz (R/TX) thinks all that law-breaking is a dandy idea. We believe that Denton County Clerk Juli Luke's approach is much more admirable. She said, "Personally, same-sex marriage is a contradiction to my faith and belief that marriage is between one man and one woman. However, first and foremost, I took an oath on my family Bible to uphold the law, and as an elected public official, my personal belief cannot prevent me from issuing the licenses as required."
Cleburne (AR) County Clerk Dana Guffey is also living up to her principles, albeit in the other direction--she's resigning rather than compromise her religious beliefs. Other Arkansas county clerks, including Sherry Bell, Rhonda Blevins, and Susie Williams, are staying at their posts and obeying the law. We salute them.
Those are really the only two legitimate responses, in light of the SCOTUS ruling. Do your job, or quit your job.
*Paxton might well be removed from his job for different law-breaking. He's about to be taken before a grand jury on first-degree felony fraud charges. If convicted, he could get life in prison. Maybe he can share a cell with indicted former governor and presidential candidate Rick "Oops" Perry. They sure know how to pick 'em in Texas.
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In Alabama, apparently, the first amendment is not meant to apply. State employee Win Johnson, director of the legal staff of the Administrative Office of Courts (who reports to Chief Justice Roy Moore, who's had his own problems with the first amendment in the past) wrote in a letter to Gov. Robert Bentley (R), "Public officials are ministers of God assigned the duty of punishing the wicked and protecting the righteous."
Yeah, no. Public officials are employed by the taxpayers and assigned the duty of performing their jobs without consideration to religion. We hope a resignation is forthcoming.
This Week in Arizona
Among the more noteworthy rulings by the Supreme Court in this session, possibly the most politically important one received relatively little notice. Back in 2000, Arizonans voted to put an independent commission in charge of redistricting the state, to correspond to the latest census, rather than letting whatever political party controlled the legislature to do so. The legislature, being reliably Republican lo these many years, eventually decided they didn't like what the commission came up with, because it might have allowed a few Democrats to win. So they sued, and the case wound up at the Supreme Court.
And the court decided the legislature was wrong. The voters could indeed choose how that redistricting would be done. The people would decide; they wouldn't let the party in charge pick and choose the voters they wanted.
Wonkblog explains, with a few handy charts, why this matters. A lot. Now that SCOTUS has spoken, we hope many other states--red and blue alike--adopt independent commissions (or other means, like data-driven models) break out the districts.
The next day, having decided that the independent commission process is Constitutional, SCOTUS agreed to hear another case in its next term, about whether the districts themselves, as drawn by said commission, are Constitutional. This case, like the last, was brought by Republicans who are afraid the heavily Republican bent of Arizona's elected officials isn't Republican enough.
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Without comment, SCOTUS also upheld a lower court's decision that Arizona could not require proof of citizenship when registering to vote in federal elections. This was particularly a problem for Native Americans, who are less likely to have "acceptable" documentation than most other Arizonans.
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Not related to SCOTUS--as a wave of criminal justice system reform sweeps many states, causing them to rethink their positions on incarceration, Arizona continues to throw people in prison at rates far above most of the country. Only five southern states have higher incarceration rates. This is not only expensive, but counter-productive, as the data show that reducing incarceration also reduces crime. The Arizona Daily Sun reports:
"In 2013, Arizona averaged 429 violent crimes per 100,000 residents, compared to the national average of 387 per 100,000 people, data from the Federal Bureau of Investigation show. The state also had more property crimes, at 3,540 per 100,000 people compared to the national average of 2,800 per 100,000.
"The states with the biggest declines in incarceration rates since 2000 — New Jersey, New York and California — have seen the most significant drops in crime, The Sentencing Project found. With less money going to prisons, those states are doing more to keep people from being sent back behind bars.
"That's a critical issue for Arizona, where 49 percent of prisoners have served time in the state before, DOC data shows.
"'If your recidivism rate is high, you don't have public safety,' says Caroline Isaacs, program director for the American Friends Services Committee in Arizona, which advocates for criminal justice reform.
"Also, putting more people in prison increases the likelihood that the cycle will continue. Children who grow up with an incarcerated parent are five to seven times more likely to end up in prison as adults, says the National Center for Children of Incarcerated Parents."
This Week in Gun Safety
This week, sawed-off shotguns became legal in Indiana. No, really. What do you hunt with a sawed-off? Pretty much just people. Sometimes hogs, if you don't mind them being cut in half before you get what's left of them to the freezer.
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A Gallup poll tells us that 63% of Americans think having a gun in the home makes them safer. Reality tells us they're wrong.
Researchers from Boston's Children's Hospital and the Harvard School of Public Health have just released a new study showing, once again, what all the other studies show--states where there are fewer guns have less violent crime. The states with the highest levels of gun ownership (including TWiA's home state of Arizona, along with Wyoming, Montana, North and South Dakota, Idaho, Arkansas, Alabama, Mississippi, and West Virginia average "6.8 times the rate of firearm assaults, 2.8 times the rate of firearm homicides, and twice the rate of overall homicides than states with the lowest gun-ownership levels."
Some argue that those places have more guns because there's more crime. The data show that that's not true--you can predict where crime will increase by looking at where there are more guns, but you can't go the other way. Another argument, that you need a gun to protect yourself from sinister strangers, falls apart when you see that "Nearly 70 percent of homicides involve guns, and the majority of all homicide victims know their killers; among female homicide victims, 93 percent are killed by a familiar person." As gun ownership rises, the fastest increase in violent crime is in nonstranger homicide. Having a gun in your house just puts you at more risk of being killed with a gun.
Got a gun? Get rid of it, and give everyone in your household a chance to live longer and die peacefully someday.
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In a rare instance of a gun actually being used for self defense, we cite the story of two former CNN reporters. The moral seems to be, don't mess with them--they've had to carry the stigma of being CNN reporters for so long, they're armed and ready to shoot.
This Week in the Environment
Justice Antonin Scalia has shown himself, over and over again, to be a tool of the far right, willing to twist his logic however is necessary to rule in favor of corporations and the wealthy, never putting regular Americans--or indeed, the Constitution--ahead of his extremist agenda.
This week, writing for the majority in a case that beat back an Environmental Protection Agency rule on incredibly dubious grounds, he made the argument (though he didn't explain his "logic") that a rule restricting mercury pollution from coal-fired plants might cause "harms" to "to human health or the environment."
No, Tony. Sorry. Not instituting the rule would certainly cause harms to those things. According to the New Republic, "Meanwhile, the EPA claims the rule would prevent as many as 11,000 premature deaths and 130,000 cases of asthma annually. The power plant sector is responsible for half of all U.S. mercury emissions and 62 percent of arsenic emissions, which can irritate the eyes, skin, and breathing and causes diseases and birth defects in the long run."
Scalia's argument was that the regulation would cost too much, at $9.6 billion, without taking any of those health benefits into account, or considering that the health advantages of regulating that poison would save "$37 billion to $90 billion each year." But that savings would be in health care dollars not spent, work days not missed, hospital costs not incurred, productivity not lost, etc., while the money to modernize those plants comes from industry. And industry, to Scalia, is far more deserving than kids with asthma or workers with cancer.
Scalia's fears have already proved groundless. The vast majority of plants affected by the EPA rule have already complied with it. Out of 200 plants, only 22 are not yet fully compliant. As Vox.com notes, "Oh, but, by the way, while we were debating this, the power sector went ahead and complied with the regulations. Notice any blackouts? Any big bankruptcies in the power sector? Any economic devastation? No. As usual with air pollution rules, when the power sector quits complaining and starts complying, the costs turn out to be much lower than anyone anticipated. This case was a fight over a question that's already been settled by facts on the ground."
Scalia isn't a stupid man. A cruel one, yes. Petty. But not stupid. He knows what he is, and what his role on the Court is. Because he knows--but won't step down in hopes that someone with at least a shred of human decency might be appointed in his place--he proves himself to be truly despicable, a real-life super-villain with incredible power. The harm he does to Americans every year is without measure. If only his noxious emissions could be restricted.
This Week in How You Can Help
Former Congresswoman and friend of TWiA Gabby Giffords and her husband, Capt. Mark Kelly, are long-time gun owners and shooters. But they also believe in commonsense restrictions on gun ownership, and their life story is an obvious lesson in why that's important. Their organization, Americans for Responsible Solutions, is dedicated to countering the influence of pro-gun death groups like the NRA, and pushing lawmakers to consider gun laws that don't violate the Second Amendment, but also don't violate the human right not to be shot. They could use your help, if you have a few bucks you can spare.
And we hope you guys enjoyed REO, Gabby and Mark!
This Week in Bears
The Katmai, Alaska bear cam.
And a month late, but worthwhile for the adorable--a fifth birthday party for one of our favorite places, Bearizona.
Happy Birthday, Bearizona and America!
And a Happy 4th of July to you, Jeff!
Posted by: Marcy | 07/03/2015 at 06:38 AM
Thanks, Marcy!
Posted by: Jeff Mariotte | 07/05/2015 at 11:11 AM