Updated 2 July 2009. The attacks on Flathead County's planning office verge on a witch hunt. Not only do the Flathead’s libertarian capitalists, the laissez-faire and don’t-tread-on-me boys, want chief planner Jeff Harris’ head on a pike, they want the planning office rendered powerless and irrelevant. If they prevail, the planning department will be a one-person operation staffed by a blind clerk with a rubber stamp.
Updated, 2 July 2009, to further clarify the difference between clandestine Yahoo Group and the privately owned but available to all website used by the planning committee. Never hand your enemies a sword. Ancient wisdom, that — and because they forgot or ignored it when they conducted official business on a members only Yahoo Group, Flathead County planning director Jeff Harris and his staff are bleeding from wounds inflicted by critics of the Lakeside planning process.
The Montana Pride parade in Kalispell yesterday was peaceful, colorful, and provocative — and meant to be provocative. So was the rally in Depot Park that followed, with, according to Michael Jamison’s story in the Missoulian, the crowd chanting “We’re here, we’re queer, get used to it!”
I’m sure the participants found marching drag queens down main street and chanting “We’re here, we’re queer, get used to it” deeply soul satisfying — but that angry, in-your-face, taunting approach is as much a mean-spirited attempt to make the community feel uncomfortable, to inflict punishment, as it is an appeal for tolerance or acceptance. That approach is Montana Pride’s right, but in my opinion it’s neither smart politics nor good manners.
Want to let Senator Baucus know you support a single-payer system? Please join me and others tomorrow, Friday, 19 June, at 1300 hrs in front of Baucus’ field office at 8 Third Street East in Kalispell. Signs will be available (or bring your own).
Given the extent to which Big Pharma and Big Insurance seem to control congressional Democrats, you may well ask, “what’s the point of waving a flag that Max may never salute?” The point is that it’s our duty as human beings. The greater the threat of injustice, or catastrophic stupidity, the greater our moral obligation to stand up for justice and our enlightened self-interest; to bear witness.
There may be times when we are powerless to prevent injustice, but there must never be a time when we fail to protest. Elie Wiesel
For more information, please get in touch with David Brothers at happyvikings43@yahoo.com.
Revised. I’ve reluctantly concluded that President Obama and congressional Democrats expect — and intend — to inflict on the nation a health care system based on the Massachusetts plan (private health insurance, a requirement to buy health insurance, and subsidies for those the government thinks cannot afford insurance), which for all intents and purposes is Richard Nixon’s plan for preventing a single-payer system.
I’ve also concluded that the so-called “public option” that Democrats who should be smarter have embraced is what will be sacrificed on the altar of bipartisanship. Obama is stumping for a public option not because he expects, or even wants, it enacted into law, but because it’s a worthless bargaining chip unless the Republicans think he really wants it.
Goodby real health care reform. President Obama delivered a 6,000-word speech (PDF) on health care reform to the American Medical Association earlier today. In it, he rejected a single-payer system — the only health care system that can (a) cover everyone, (b) control costs, and (c) not require cruel rationing.
Will President Obama fight for meaningful health care reform — or will he attempt to appease the unappeasable? We’ll find out today when he addresses the American Medical Association, which opposed health care reform initiatives by Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Lyndon Johnson, and Bill Clinton. Only Johnson, who brought us Medicare and Medicaid, and was as handy with the stick as he was with the carrot, prevailed.
Updated 11 June. Is the announcement that the aluminum smelter at Columbia Falls will be shut down at the end of July in part a ploy to improve CFAC’s position as it negotiates power prices with the Bonneville Power Administration? That’s a fair question — and I think the answers are (a) yes, and (b) it won’t make any difference. The price of aluminum, which reached $2,968 per metric ton (tonne) a year ago, but fell to $1,338 in February, is on the rebound. If markets continue to improve, and if CFAC can secure electricity at a price that makes operations profitable, the plant could resume operations.
The kingdom of Saudi Arabia exports oil, airliner hijackers, and murderous jihadists. Within its borders, it beheads — and, as this AP dispatch reports, sometimes crucifies — those found guilty of homicide. “Friends” like these are one more reason to wean ourselves from foreign oil.
An AP dispatch reports that President Obama says that if health care reform is not enacted this year, it never will be enacted. Conventional wisdom, and some history, suggests that controversial legislation cannot pass in an election year (unless it’s a bailout for Wall Street), so his comment is not entirely without basis. Nevertheless, I think its mostly an attempt to (a) light a fire under Congress, and (b) deter criticism from supporters of the only genuine reform that is fair and affordable: a single-payer system in which the government pays for medicine delivered by private physicians and hospitals.
The Flathead’s self-appointed guardians of public morality are not happy. On 20 June, Montana Pride will march up Main Street in Kalispell, showing the gay flag — a flag that Barry Brubaker and friends do not want flown in the Flathead. Last week, he presented Kalispell’s city council with a petition demanding the revocation of Montana Pride’s parade permit, arguing that the march would “…further erode morality and set precedence for future lasciviousness and lewd displays that other communities have experienced.” Ten days ago, the petition had approximately 200 signatures.
President Barack Obama explains his choice of Sotomayer.
Law professors Jack Balkin (Yale) and Michael Dorf (Cornell) explain why they think Obama picked Sotomayor. Balkin focuses on the politics, Dorf on why her mastery of the technical side of law is important.
I have no idea whether Sonia Sotomayor is a top rank jurist who has the intellect and power of expression to serve as an ideological counterweight to Antonin Scalia. We will find out soon enough.
It appears, however, that gender and ethnicity (her family immigrated from Puerto Rico), played a major part in her selection. That’s troubling in and of itself, although not surprising given the Democratic Party’s love affair with identity politics. What’s more troubling is that she seems to believe that being a Latina woman gives her superior wisdom:
Judge Sotomayor has said her ethnicity and gender are important factors in serving on the bench, a point that could generate debate. “I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life,” she said in a 2002 lecture. Obama Selects Sotomayor, NYT.
That’s arrogance. And truculence. Neither quality is desirable in a Supreme Court justice.
That’s the F Hill to the southwest. The sun was below the horizon, but the clouds, the leading edge of an advancing front, were still illuminated. Left, no polarizer. Right, the polarizer at full strength.
Our blessings in the Senate, Max Baucus and Jon Tester, are at it again, this time voting against establishing a national interest rate ceiling for credit cards that would protect consumers from usury. Earlier this spring they voted against giving bankruptcy courts the authority to modify mortgage contracts to help consumers stay in their homes.
Wondering how many Democrats voted “No” on the final vote on HB-468, Rep. Mike Jopek’s bill to mitigate the impact of rising assessments on property tax bills (see Jopek’s commentary on the legislature’s failure on this issue)? You’ll need a data set of floor votes that identifies each legislator’s political party and Zip Code. Go to http://data.opi.mt.gov/bills/2009/reports/ for the official data set of floor votes sans party information. But if you need a data set that includes information on political parties, Zip Codes, and legislative districts, you’ll want to download Flathead Memo’s Extended Legislative Floor Votes Data Set.
So, how many Democrats voted for the final version of HB-658?
We’re in the spring rainbow season, and this double rainbow near Kalispell was one of the best yet. Photographing the full span of the secondary rainbow, which subtends 100–106 degrees of arc, requires either a super-wide-angle lens or making two or more overlapping images that are stitched together using photo merging software. I used the latter method.
Montana’s 61st legislature accomplished many things — but equitable tax relief for property owners in the Flathead was not one of them. Now Whitefish legislator Rep. Mike Jopek has issued a warning: prepare for pain in your pocketbook. Here’s his oped explaining the situation:
In the spring of 1942, John Vachon, a young photographer for the Farm Security Administration, brought his camera and eye for light to Kalispell. His photographic record of that visit now is online at the Library of Congress.
Yesterday, I found the approximate spot along Kalispell’s main drag where Vachon made the image (metadata PDF) to the right. A couple of buildings have disappeared, replaced by a parking lot, and huge street light poles sprout from the sidewalk like Jack’s beanstalk, but, as this comparison shows, much remains as it was 67 years ago. Yesterday’s image.
President Obama and most Democrats want to help homeowners by empowering bankruptcy courts to order modifications in the terms of mortgages. But not Senators Baucus and Tester. Although the House passed a similar measure earlier this year, yesterday Max and Jon joined ten other banker friendly Democrats in voting against Sen. Durbin’s amendment to S.896 to help homeowners save their primary residence:
PDF for printing.
Earlier this week, our Air Force conducted a low level overflight of New York City by an Air Force VC-25, the military variant of the Boeing 747-200B that becomes Air Force One when the President is on board. Escorted by two F-16 fighters, the flight was a “mission” to obtain photographs of the jumbo jet against the metropolitan panorama.
Death threats. Some Democrats who voted against HR-3, the right wing’s figurative shot at Fort Sumter, reportedly have received death threats. Over at 4and20blackbirds, jhwygirl has the details.
Insurance & abstinence. Today we learn how Democrats secured full funding for the implementation of I-155. They agreed to strip the legislation of Republican Sen. John Brueggeman’s amendment to fund contraception for teenagers covered by the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP), thus keeping Montana one of five states with this imbecilic policy. Brueggeman’s Republican colleagues demanded the removal of his amendment to protect family values and promote abstinence. Mike Dennison has the details — and juicy quotes — at the Billings Gazette.
Updated. That was 22 April. The vote, 50-50, was 100 percent partisan. All Republicans voted for it — and all Democrats voted against it, even Deb Kottel, who my sources report was the Democrat in the judiciary committee who broke ranks and joined the Republicans to send the resolution to the floor. No further action has occurred, so it’s increasingly unlikely that the resolution will be resurrected this session. On a relative scale, that’s a relief — but it’s disturbing that the entire Republican membership of the house voted for a resolution that panders to crackpots and zealots who want to lay a legal and political foundation for Montana’s secession from the United States. These legislators have willfully ignored history and stiffarmed common sense.
Updated (update 1). Figuratively speaking, that’s the question posed by HR-3, the second of Rep. Michael More’s state sovereignty resolutions, which escaped the house judiciary committee on a 10-8 vote today (and an 11-7 vote yesterday). The first, HJ-26, failed on a tie vote in committee on 23 February (an attempt to blast it out of committee failed the next day).
No student of the Civil War can read these resolutions without experiencing a chilling moment of deja vu…
The Flathead Beacon has an excellent story, by Dan Testa, and photo essay, by Lido Vizzutti, the Beacon’s outstanding photographer, on the 15 April 2009 Tea Party in Kalispell. And in his Looking Glass blog, Vizzutti discusses a Danish photography contest controversy that raises important questions of journalistic ethics and photographic interpretation. This is worth visiting just to view the impressive Photoshop skills of the photographer who ran afoul of the contest’s judges.
Update, 21 April 2009. Beck, Reichner, and Sonju voted for the bill on its third reading in the house today. Should we be calling this trio the Zebra Mussel Three? That’s a fair question: they’re the only Flathead representatives who voted against SB-343, the Montana Aquatic Invasive Species Act, on its second reading in the house yesterday. SB-343 was introduced by Kalispell Republican Sen. Verdell Jackson, and received strong support from Flathead area senators. So why did Beck, Reichner, and Sonju part company with Jackson and all but three members of the senate (Balyeat, Esp, and Juneau)?
Initiative 155, the “Healthy Montana Kids Plan Act,” was approved by almost 70 percent of Montana’s voters last fall, a fact to which I’ve pointed previously. That victory, however, was not, as some I-155 supporters and Democrats suppose, a sign of strength. Instead, it was a confirmation of political weakness.
UPDATE, 13 April 2009, on Windy Boy’s defection.
Yesterday, the Republican controlled Montana senate voted not to fully fund the Healthy Montana Kids Plan Act, the ballot measure (I-155) that voters approved last fall by a margin of better than two to one. Earlier in the session, the house found a way to fully fund the program, which provides health insurance for low income children. The difference between the two chambers amounts, say Democrats, to 15,000 children who could be covered, but won’t if the GOP prevails.
UPDATED. I wondered whether I’d encounter pitchforks and howling mobs. Instead, the 200 or so who gathered in Depot Park yesterday — I suspect most voted for Ron Paul — comprised an often grim-faced, but subdued, crowd, various members of which gladly smiled for my camera. President Obama’s name was conspicuous on many signs, Scott Moore’s request, “A sign that is non partisan but makes your point clear (please no Obama or Bush Bashing),” not withstanding. The award for the most mind arresting slogan goes to the fellow wearing the sweatshirt on which Prepare the Horse for Battle is scrawled.
HB-619, Mike Jopek’s Sudan Divestment Act, died in the appropriations committee last week. There is no possibility of resurrecting it this session. But the issue is not going away — and neither am I nor the others who support divestment. I’ve therefore moved all posting to the Sudan Divestment Special Report.