The Ghost of Blog Posts Past

As has frequently happened over the past few years, I have found myself unable to juggle work and blogging. Since September, that has been part-time work, but I still didn't make time to sit down at the keyboard.

In addition to an inability to deal with more than one job at a time, I was, and likely remain, a bit tired of typing the same five or six posts with a few different facts. You know the posts:

1. Trump is the worst mix of incompetence, incoherence and odiousness to occupy the Oval Office in my lifetime. 

2. Trump's evangelical base seems to ignore the Biblical injunction "Do not put your trust in princes, in human beings, who cannot save. When their spirit departs, they return to the ground; on that very day their plans come to nothing (Psalm 146). They also seem to have forgotten, "Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness (Isaiah 41). Finally, they pay no heed to the command  ". . . be ye therefore wise as serpents, and harmless as doves." (Matthew 10). 

I have no explanation for their deification of Trump, fear of  any idea that didn't appear on Ozzie and Harriet, and their braying of witless bromides as if those utterances contained the wisdom of Solomon. I just know people of the Book should know better. 

3. At the statewide level, South Dakota's Democrats need to organize something other than a circular firing squad. 

4. Then there's the post relishing the delicious irony that the same populists who destroyed the meaning of the word liberal have now basically destroyed the meaning of the word conservative. It's not clear what ideology Trump holds, but it's clear that it has nothing to do with the conservatism of Hayek, Buckley, or Reagan. 

5. There also is the post that education policies pushed by Daugaard, and I'm sure Noem, are designed to create folk who "may be a productive employee at work [but] a gullible consumer in the market and a docile subject of the state."

I'm not sure I have a solution to the problem about regular blogging. I will enjoy the pumpkin plachinda I baked this morning and the apple plachinda I will bake tomorrow.  Even though I plan to guilt trip the heck out of the young'un who made it home for Christmas, I'll  take pleasure in cooking her knoephla and country style sausage for Christmas Eve and spending some time with family on Christmas Day. After that I might get curmudgeony enough to put a few regular posts together. Until then, God bless us every one.

Trump, Kavanaugh, and Justice: A Minor Musing

Sometime today, the Senate will vote to confirm Brett Kavanaugh as a justice on the United States Supreme Court. His self-righteous outburst last week should have disqualified him because it demonstrated his lack of judicious restraint and sense of entitlement.  All Supreme Court justices ought to be judicious and restrained when their every word affects the course of history. No one should be entitled to a lifetime appointment. Apparently, a Wall Street Journal apology covers multitude of sins.

In the past few days, Donald Trump has taken to mocking Dr. Christine Blasey Ford, the woman who accused Kavanaugh of assaulting her decades ago. He has also mocked former Senator Al Franken for resigning from the United States Senate when Franken was accused of sexual impropriety.

It's impossible to know what cases will come before the Supreme Court two, five, or ten years from now. Three certainties exist, however. First, Republicans may have had cause to accuse the Democrats of falling prey to relativism and postmodernism over the past twenty or thirty years, but the events of the Kavanaugh hearings and the aftermath show Republicans, like all postmodernists, returning to the Sophists and giving full throat to relativistic arguments. The idea that justice is the rendering of due is no longer an operative principle for Republicans or this allegedly conservative court. Both are acting and will continue to act on Thrasymacus's argument that justice is "nothing else than the interest of the stronger." Only those with wealth and connections need seek relief in the courts or the legislatures.

Second, Trumpists will continue to confuse bellicosity with strength. President George H.W. Bush sought "a kinder, gentler nation." President Abraham Lincoln believed Americans would be governed "by the better angels of our nature." Trump throws tantrums and urges his base to throw them as well. Kavanaugh's contempt and anger was nothing but a tantrum without profanity. The fact that the tactic was successful presages more of the same

Third, public discourse will resemble Flint's water supply for the foreseeable future. Democrats are enraged at how Republicans treated Dr. Ford. Republicans are enraged at how Democrats treated Kavanaugh. Even if senators from both parties are merely posturing for the cameras and their respective bases, the rhetoric has reached a level where comity and reasoned political debate have become impossible at the national level.

Throughout the entire 2016 election season and on a weekly basis since, I have thought about the first stanza of Yeats's "The Second Coming." The following lines capture the current cultural climate:

Turning and turning in the widening gyre 
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere 
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst 
Are full of passionate intensity.

Yeats concluded by wondering

And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, 
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

Whatever curiosity I may have had about the answer to that question has given way to dread.

Sound, Fury, And The Signifying Of Nothing

I had seriously considered voting for Dusty Johnson. People I deeply respect support him. Further, in the 2018 primary he did not appear to be a Trump sycophant.

Recently, Johnson seems to have lost his ability to exercise any sort of judgement and has veered toward being a Trump cultist. Johnson asserts that Trump came to Sioux Falls and seemed "well-versed . . . in the nuances of the issues." (HT Dakota Free Press)

Yeah, about that. Last night, Daniel Dale tweeted this image of a partial transcript of Trump's remarks in Sioux Falls.

Click to enlarge. No amount of enlarging will enable one to see nuance

Asserting that China and India are big doesn't reflect nuance. Neither does asserting that Japan and India "called." Conflating the size of a country's population with the size of it's economy is hardly nuanced analysis.

By far my favorite part of this "nuanced" analysis is Trump's view of the miraculous.

What's happened has been very much a miracle, but they haven't seen the miracle yet. The miracle is going to start , because now we're getting things ready.

So, there's a miracle that "has happened" but no one "has seen the miracle yet" because it "is going to start." That language may work for a cult leader but let's not call it nuanced.

We've all heard the silly question "If a tree falls in the forest, but there's no one who hears it, does it make any noise?" With Trump, one can adapt the question about noise to a statement: When Trump talks about miracles that have happened but are going to start, one can be certain it's only noise. In fact, one can adapt a famous Shakespearean quotation to all of Trump's utterances: they are "full of sound and fury signifying nothing."

Some Minor Musings About 2018 Election Season

It's been a bit since I posted. There are a couple of reasons. First, in July I transitioned from full time to retired. I am currently transitioning from retired to part time. I hope to get a regular schedule going again soon. Second, I have been musing a lot about the 2018 election season and have come to a couple of conclusions.

The musings began with this Tom Nichols tweet.

The Republicans are acting like a parliamentary party. So you have to vote as though they are a parliamentary party, by voting against the party to get rid of the leadership.

I have long blamed Newt Gingrich for moving the United States Congress in the direction of a parliament when he introduced his Contract With/On/For America campaign in the 1990s. Treating congress and the president like a parliament and prime minister distorts the American system that was designed to avoid factions and divide powers among the branches. Nichols makes the point in a September 4 Washington Post column:

. . . one of the great virtues of the American system of separated powers is that voters, usually, can ignore party affiliation if they feel a candidate is worth their support. Our model forces the legislative and executive branches to seek separate mandates from the electorate. In our system, voters can separate the party from its leader. They can split their tickets regionally, nationally and by party. They can even vote for divided government, and choose to place the executive and legislative power in opposing hands.

In the Post column, Nichols doubles down on his premise that the only way to cure the distortion that the Republican Cult of Trump has caused is to vote for the opposition as one does in a parliamentary system. As a ticket splitter of long standing, I am generally skeptical of the "break it worse in order to fix it" method, but I see few other avenues to reining in megalomaniac who has more in common with a Mafioso than he does with being a President of the United States. I will likely be voting straight Democrat in November.

The qualification "likely" comes from another series of musings about the changes that digital technology has caused. These widespread changes alter not only the ways in which people work and communicate; they also change how people view their neighborhoods and the wider world. More importantly, if my former students are any indication, the technologies change how people think.

Quite frankly, I am not certain that anyone older than I am can understand how to successfully navigate the world digital has created. Posting pictures on one's grandkids on Facebook or ranting on Twitter does not necessarily indicate the ability to navigate that world. It merely indicates that users have learned how to use an app and fooled themselves into believing they are able to keep up with the younger folk.

The belief that older folk may not be able to deal with results digital technology has produced has led me to conclude that I cannot vote for folks older than I am. In fact, I may not vote for anyone older than 55.

Finally, the United States's political season traditionally begins with the Labor Day weekend. Although Republicans have an edge among South Dakota's humans who vote, bovines seem rather displeased with Republican attorney general candidate Jason Ravnsborg. While travelling home from a visit to my mother, my wife and I witnessed a black bovine of unknown gender destroying one of his campaign signs in a pasture bordering I-90. That beast expressed more political certainty than I feel about the choices I will be forced to make in November

If We Can't Fix Stupid, Are We Permanently Broken?

All should be well. It's Sunday morning; the cats have been fed, and coffee is being consumed. This John R. Schindler article entitled "‘Idiocracy’ Come True: Even Pentagon Says Morons Are Inheriting the Earth", however, has been sticking in my craw for a couple of days.

Schindler points to the Dunning-Kruger effect as a cause for the nation's declining intellect.

Over the last dozen years, evidence has mounted that Judge’s argument was grounded in a painful degree of reality. The dumb do seem to be inheriting the earth with distressing frequency of late. President Trump himself seems like a near-parody of psychology’s Dunning-Kruger effect, which in lay terms is dumb people thinking they are smarter than they actually are. Indeed, Trumpism itself may be a collective manifestation of Dunning-Kruger in action, with masses intentionally, gleefully spurning the counsel of experts.

While Trumpism may be a defining symptom of the decline into "idiocracy, the article's troubling conclusion points out that no part of the political spectrum is offering a solution.

But there’s a bigger issue here, namely that Idiocracy exposed a problem which needs public discussion, but which neither the Right nor the Left want a serious discussion of. All we can say for certain is that America is, in fact, getting dumber, and the future belongs to those who show up for it.

As troubling as the conclusion is, Schindler may be understating the near term consequences. First, stupidity exacerbates political and cultural divisions. No one should be debating whether social media platforms are mistreating Alex Jones because Jones should not have an audience unless he marketed himself as a irony challenged comedian who spouted illogical conspiracy rants and hyperbolic fear mongering with full knowledge that his audience knows his bleating is, to use Joe Biden's terminology, malarkey.

Jones is but the tip of the iceberg. Even if the United States had not descended into idiocracy, Russia and other hostile powers would likely have attempted to weaponize social media to deepen red/blue, urban/rural, economic, and racial divides. They would have been far less successful.

Closer to home, Kristi Noem won her 2012 race against Matt Varilek by painting him as an overeducated person who left the state, received an education, and lost touch with "real" South Dakotans. As a reminder,

Varilek has a master’s degree in environment and development from the University of Cambridge, England, where he was funded by the Gates Cambridge Scholarship established by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. He has a master’s degree in economic development from the University of Glasgow in Scotland, where he was funded by the Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship established by Rotary International. He holds a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Carleton College in Northfield, Minn....

In short, Noem played the "idiocracy" card and voters rewarded her.

I would like to forget that South Dakota's Constitution Party's respective dueling factions were led by a person who wonders if robotic bees are corporate threat to the food supply and a person who is an anti-vaxxer who believes jet contrails prove Americans are being sprayed by chemicals, experts' refutation be damned

I was a young'un during the height of the Cold War;  my father would tell me "the Russians are going to take over without firing a shot." Fifty years later, no one has to take over anything or worry about who's shooting at whom. Americans are on the verge of making themselves too stupid to matter.

A Minor Musing On Governor Daugaard's Declaration Of Christian Heritage Week

Dakota Free Press points to Governor Daugaard's declaration of Christian Heritage Week. I have no problem with Christian Heritage Week as a principle, probably because today is National Relaxation Day. Also, the week doesn't conflict with Fountain Pen Day which is observed on November 2

That said, the proclamation's list of faith practitioners is heavily male and protestant. It includes only one woman, Abigail Adams. It contains no African Americans or Native Americans. One would hope that a religion predicated on the belief that ". . . God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life" would not be practiced mostly by males of European descent.

There are a few other oddities. Given that Native Americans are approximately 10% of the South Dakota's population, including Andrew Jackson on the list seems particularly tone deaf. Jackson's treatment of Native Americans was nothing short of barbaric.

This is apparently the 24th celebration of the Christian Heritage Week. It might be time to add people from the 1970s and 1980s to the list of names. As it stands now, the last notable practicing Christians held office in the 1950s.

On a more entertaining note, including Harry S. Truman, a man well known for using salty language is a refreshing reminder that Christians retain their foibles. Dwight Eisenhower may well be my favorite member of this list. When a pastor began bragging that Eisenhower was a member of his church, the President told his press secretary, "You go tell that goddamn minister that if he gives out one more story about my religious faith I won't join his goddamn church."

That sentiment might be the best summation of the United States's combination of Christianity and individualism, but I doubt it's what Governor Daugaard was thinking of when he signed the proclamation.

Stolen from Dakota Free Press because downloading is faster than screenshoting

Post-Truth America: A Minor Musing

Today's Argus Leader reports that several Sioux Falls residents have found plastic bags containing candy and a Klu Klux Klan recruitment flier. This tactic seems similar to one the Klan is apparently using in upstate New York. The Southern Poverty Law Center lists only one Klan group in South Dakota, the Traditionalist American Knights of the Ku Klux Klan which is headquartered in Custer.

There was a time when I thought the best way to deal with groups like the Klan was to treat them like this tuba player treated some neo Nazis a few years back. Since then however, a man fired a gun inside a pizza restaurant because he was investigating whether the pizzeria was "the home of a Satanic child sex abuse ring involving top Democrats such as Hillary Clinton." Earlier this summer a man blocked  traffic on Hoover Dam demanding the release of a report that had already been released. His focus seems to have been Hillary Clinton's email server.

Meanwhile, the Holy fire  burning in California was allegedly set by Forrest Clark, Clark seems to share multiple versions of the truth that diverge from reality. This JJ MacNab tweetstorm gives the particulars, but the short version should suffice:

Based on his social media pages, Clark is a sovereign citizen who believes in just about every kooky conspiracy out there, including QAnon, Pizzagate, Jade Helm 15, flat earth theories, NESARA, Jesuit conservancies, shape-shifting lizard overlords. You name it, he believes it

It may be a long jump from candy on the end of the driveway to arson'', but the Klan denies the truth that all are created equal. If one denies what is essentially the nation's core creed because of some allegedly hidden, arcane knowledge it becomes easy to believe a high level official calling himself Q is using 4chan to send messages about an impending political storm that will destroy the "deep state," that the nation's elites use a public pizza parlor to perform Satanic rituals and abuse children, or that the American Republic ended in the 1870s.

The term post-truth seems frequently applied to Donald Trump who has as of this writing said 2291 false things as President. Philosopher Simon Blackburn contends that the phrase post-truth may be problematic because no one doubts that bus in bearing down him or her. Blackburn does, however, admit a danger in the political and realm:

It’s a bit like conspiracy theorists, who actually thrive on the fact that all the evidence points against their theory, because that just shows that the establishment is clever enough to conceal what’s really going on. People get attached to certain ideas and nothing will shake them. And when convictions start to live in opposition to reason or truth, that’s a very dangerous thing.

He offers a solution that may work at an individual level:

. . . I’m very cautious in matters of truth. If there is no evidence for a belief and lots of evidence against it, it should not matter what you would like to be true or hope or wish to be true. Follow the probabilities and put up with the inconvenience.

That’s an academic or a scholar speaking, but it has always been the only hope for human progress.

But Blackburn also tempers that optimism:

Of course, people are good at shirking the facts and threatening and bullying anyone who challenges them; this has always been the case. But I believe that all decent people eventually reject this kind of behavior, and want to see liars held responsible for their lies. 

I can’t say whether or not this will happen ... but I sure hope it does.

I too hope will happen, but I have more dread than hope. Too many are claiming a special truth that only they or their confederates can share, and too many are unwilling to look at the evidence that conflicts with their worldview. I hope we won't see more candy mixed with Klan fliers but I fear we're just seeing constitutes the beginning a long battle with dangerous lies.

Plains Pops: Potpourri Edition #101*

The following are brief points that don't seem to deserve a full post, but the subject seems worthy of mention.

The Constitution Party of South Dakota: They're doing nearly everything wrong. It's not just the dueling factions that can't seem to decide who's in charge or who should run a state convention. The idea that people who have lost statewide elections or legislative races can somehow come together to challenge the Republican monopoly from the right is ludicrous.

I know some CPSD members, if not all, are Bible believing folks but none look like the Old Testament's Gideon. He routed a few thousand with 300; no one is going to rout 200,000 Republicans with 500, no matter how hard one blows on the party favors or how many flashlights with a strobe function one has. Put some folks on county commissions. Win some legislative races. Pass a popular bill or two. Voters will choose the devil they know over the lesser imps and demons they don't.

Finally, history is replete with colorful politicians; the Longs in Louisiana and Wild Bill Langer of North Dakota spring immediately to mind, but most people find conspiracy theorists something less than colorful.

The New Coke new Lance Russell legislative candidacy:  For those using their summer wisely and waiting until after Labor Day to start thinking about politics, Lance Russell won a legislative primary, and resigned his candidacy to run for attorney general at the Republican Convention. He was then  renominated by the District 30 Republicans even though state law makes the second nomination more than a little questionable.

The Democrats need to get a precedent established. They may well face an identical situation in the near future, and the mere fact that Russell was on the ballot, then off the ballot, and then on the ballot would not have established that precedent.  No matter what happens in this situation, precedent is established unless the courts rule that Heather Boche, the voter bringing the suit, lacks standing. Were one a complete cynic who believes that South Dakota's Republican appointed judiciary is less than impartial on political matters, that might be the outcome one would expect.

The spy who loved someone in South Dakota or who worked hard for her money: South Dakota novelists who specialize in the mystery and political thriller genres are probably still recovering from the bacchanalia they organized after the story broke. While the South Dakota literary world has a whole new direction, the South Dakota political world will remain unchanged.

*I really don't know what number it is but if Marvel and DC comics can renumber issues at will, then I can number blog posts however I desire.

Quotation Of The Day: Bonhoeffer On Stupidity

A frighteningly prophetic for observation for the current zeitgeist:

Found Here
Context around quotation found here
Click to enlarge

Funny, Kristi Noem Doesn't Look Anything Like Heimdall

For those unfamiliar with Norse mythology, Heimdall is the Norse god who stands at the edge of Bifrost, the rainbow bridge that stretches between Earth and Asgard, the gods' home. His chief task is to sound the alarm when the frost giants begin their assault on Asgard, an attack that will lead to Ragnarok, the twilight or death of the gods.

Yesterday, Kristi Noem's campaign claimed a scheduling conflict prevented her from debating education issues at an event to be hosted by  the Associated School Boards of South Dakota, the School Administrators of South Dakota and South Dakota Public Broadcasting.

According to the Rapid City Journal, 

[Campaign manager Justin Brasell] did not divulge the scheduling conflict, and did not immediately return later messages from the Rapid City Journal asking what Noem planned to be doing today that precluded her from accepting the debate invitation.  

Noem made public appearances in Madison and Sioux Falls on Wednesday, and she was scheduled to attend a fundraiser for her campaign Thursday night in Sioux Falls. As of Thursday afternoon, Noem’s campaign Facebook page showed one future event: a Saturday morning parade in her hometown of Castlewood.

I admit I'm speculating as to Noem's undisclosed location, but Bifrost seems a logical conclusion because later in the day, Noem's campaign warned of a threat Republicans fear almost as much as the Asgardians fear frost giants: organized labor.

'. . . unions are undertaking a massive nationwide effort to overturn right-to-work laws, which protect workers from being forced to join labor unions. Earlier this week, unions were successful in overturning Missouri’s right-to-work law, which Billie Sutton’s Democratic Party touted as a “huge win” before calling on South Dakota to “follow Missouri’s lead.”

Just like Fenrir, the wolf that will swallow Odin whole, organized labor will, according to Noem, eliminate all worker freedom in South Dakota.

“South Dakota has been a right-to-work state for more than 50 years, and Kristi Noem will keep it that way,” said Justin Brasell, Kristi for Governor Campaign Manager. “That’s why we’re seeing out-of-state union heads investing thousands into Billie Sutton’s campaign. He’s their best bet to repeal the state’s decades old right-to-work laws and force South Dakotans into labor unions they don’t want to be a part of.” 

South Dakota is one of the nation’s earliest adopters of right to work protections, passing legislation in 1946 to protect people from being denied employment “on account of membership or nonmembership in any labor union.”

Soon, Noem, from her perch atop Bifrost, will warn that Medicaid expansion will destroy South Dakota's economy just like the Midgard Serpent drenched Thor in its venom and killed him. If her campaign is in real danger, Noem will probably conjure visions of giants riding on Naglfar, the ship of death, and resort to telling voters about threats posed by illegal immigrants, ISIS, and MS-13. God forbid, South Dakotans may even be threatened by National Football League players kneeling during the national anthem.

It's going to be a long campaign season if Noem stays on Bifrost and warns of series of impending Ragnaroks.Voters need to know candidates' policies on education and other important issues. They don't need politicians to create contemporary apocalyptic tales warning of events that will never happen.

With Friends Like These...: A Musing About Dollar General Expanding In South Dakota

My grocery shopping options consist of three soulless corporations: HyVee, Walmart, and Amazon. The former offers both a "helpful smile in every aisle" and home delivery. The latter delivers to my door products not available locally, and Walmart lets me buy both the rice cooker and the rice in one trip.

There is one other option, Dollar Tree. It's never been clear if their cheap offerings offer the value that they appear to. This article about the Dollar General chain expanding in South Dakota, therefore, creates both curiosity and ambivalence. On the one hand, the stores, which sell "affordable" products, may offer shopping opportunities to communities without a grocery or clothing stores. On the other hand,

Once Dollar General picks a town for its next location, local business owners and city officials can do little to stop the chain from becoming a neighbor. 

If Dollar General can't find a spot in city limits, Colby picks a location nearby on county land. 

A store still opens, except it doesn't contribute any sales tax back to the community it serves until the land is annexed.

Forcing someone to be a neighbor doesn't square with the behavior Mr. Rogers taught especially when "smaller retailers who compete with Dollar General [lose] business because of an inability to compete with the national chain's prices."

Dollar General 's "aggressive growth plan" in South Dakota creates another concern because one of the chain's target customer base is "[p]eople who live closer to the poverty line and [shop] at Dollar General stores out of necessity. " These company calls these customers who live paycheck-to-paycheck and [rely] on government assistance their "best friends forever"

Dollar General's efforts have two likely outcomes. First, the corporation has done its homework and its new South Dakota stores will be successful. Given the chain's marketing strategy, South Dakota will, therefore, see an increase of people living at or near the poverty line, and Dollar General will have a host of new BFFs.

The second possibility is that many of the stores will fail. While that eventuality may mean that fewer South Dakotans are living in dire straits, it may also portend a larger number of towns without local grocery or clothing store because Dollar General forced local owners out of business.

Neither result bodes well for South Dakota's smaller communities.

A Post Wherein I Reveal My Inner Cassandra

For those unfamiliar with mythology, Cassandra was a princess of Troy with the gift of accurate prophecy. She was cursed, however, so no one would believe her prophecies. The current definition of cassandra is "one who predicts misfortune or disaster."

In light of the contemporary definition, I hope the Democrats who will be reconvening at the end of the week  for what they call "a small procedural step in the process of certifying our Constitutional candidates" follow both party bylaws and state law fully.

It beggars belief that Republicans would force Democrats to reconvene merely for a public relations win in July and August. The undecided or unaffiliated voters that the Democrats need in order win a statewide race will have forgotten about the incident by late October or early November when they decide whom to support Although the unforced error that necessitated reconvening is nothing like the Constitution Party's dramedy, Republican Party Chairperson Dan Lederman claims he "reviewed their bylaws" as part of the Republicans' challenge to the Secretary of State's decision about that party's dueling slate of party officers and competing conventions. If Republicans are making the extra effort to review bylaws to keep a party with fewer than 500 registered voters off the ballot, they will certainly look for another mistake from the Democratic Party.

Despite my complaints about Democrats' failure to develop legislative candidates, it's obvious that they face an uphill battle against Republicans in South Dakota. The urban-rural divide continues to become more pronounced. South Dakota is a rural state, and Republicans dominate in rural areas. South Dakota's Democrats should take care to avoid another unforced error that increases the advantages that South Dakota's Republicans enjoy.

This Is Why We Can't Have Nice Things

I am so old I can remember that people of the generation of the men pictured here vilified young folk for wearing Che Guevara T shirts, wouldn't support anyone who was "soft on Russia," and loved freedom fighters who fought murderous dictators.

I'm also old enough to remember when folks like these gentlemen would scream "America, love it or leave it!" at anyone who wore a t-shirt like those worn in the picture. In 2018, however, these gentlemen seem to believe that "owning the libs"  means that people old enough to know better indicate that they prefer a corrupt dictator propped up by corrupt oligarchs over an American political party.

I can even remember when age connoted a bit of wisdom. That's no longer the case either. We were promised a republic if we could keep. With reasoning skills like this, we may not keep it much longer.

People who are stupid an proud of it are a chief reason we can't have nice things.
Photo from here.

A Musing About Fundraisers, Power, And Access

A bit of South Dakota political blogosphere angst has arisen over the Billie Sutton fundraiser sponsored in part by Republican Ryan Maher and the Kristi Noem $500 a plate fundraiser. Lost amid the comments about personal loyalty, hypocrisy, and the alliterative "cowboy caucus" is this trenchant admission: [t]he world is run by the people who show up."

The verb "run" connotes the projection of power despite the fact that people elected to office claim to "serve." A fundraiser, therefore, is about who has access to power or service that others will not receive. In one case, a person can show up and drop $25 in the hat. In the other one must have $500.

There's no logical reason in a country premised on the idea that all are created equal that a person who shows up at a fundraiser with $500 should have more access to those in power than someone who has no money to contribute or someone who contributes only $25. Literature, as it often does, provides an illustrative answer to the conundrum. In Flannery O'Conner's short story "Revelation," the protagonist Ruby Turpin is in a doctor's waiting room. After a brief exchange with a woman Turpin finds undesirable, O'Connor describes Turpin's alliance with another waiting patient: "The look that Mrs. Turpin and the pleasant lady exchanged indicated they both understood that you had to have certain things before you could know certain things." (emphasis mine) In Noem's case, it boils down to you have have $500 before you can know certain people.

In fairness, Suttion will likely have $100, $200, or $500 fundraisers. No one can win a statewide campaign passing the hat, even one as impressive as Sutton's. He has, however, sent the message that his door might be more open to those who can't contribute $500 at a single event whereas Noem has confirmed that under her watch, the state will be run by those who show up with money because only those with money can know certain things or certain people.

A Post Wherein I Grumble About The South Dakota Democratic Party's Failure To Develop Legislative Candidates

Pat Powers is chortling about Democratic ballot placeholders dropping out and allowing Republicans to run unopposed. Were I in his place, I probably would celebrate every uncontested win too.

I can also empathize with the South Dakota Democratic Party. Recruiting candidates willing to do fundraising, walk in parades, knock on every door in the district, and deal with public scrutiny of every past action must be difficult. The fact that South Dakota is a deeply red state compounds the difficulty exponentially. That said, Democrats have ensured their minority party status for at least 14 years by not developing candidates to run for the legislature since 2012.

Let's go step by step. First, Republicans will likely maintain legislative majorities similar to the ones they currently enjoy following the 2018 elections. Second, even if Democrats develop some great candidates, it's unlikely they will be able to significantly reduce the Republican majority, let alone take control of one house of the legislature during 2020 elections. Third, the census will be conducting in 2020. Fourth, The census report will be delivered during the 2021 session. Fifth, the Republican controlled legislature will deal with redistricting in 2022. Even with the current stipulations about protecting "communities of interest" and respecting "geographical and political boundaries," it will not be that difficult to create a few more Republican strongholds or turn a few currently safe Democratic districts into competitive districts.

There aren't may wave elections that magically sweep a dominant party out of office. It takes a methodical step-by-step effort to chip away at a dominant majority. Maybe the 2020s will see that effort.

I'm So Old I Can Remember When The Trump Base Cared About The Debt

Those were the good old days.

In the here and now, The Constant Commoner takes Senators Rounds and Thune along with Representative Noem to task for peddling the economic snake oil that tax cuts will grow the economy and therefore pay for themselves. The Commoner sums up his case with an excellent  analogy: "If President Trump is indeed the "King of Debt" that he once claimed to be, Senators Thune and Rounds, along with Congresswoman Noem, are his complicit vassals."

Rounds's, Thune's, and Noem's servility has not served benefited their constituents. The nation's debt has risen $800 million this year and totals $23 trillion. Within the next five years, the interest payments on the debt will be more than the United States spends on defense. While discussing defense it is worthwhile to point out that China holds $1.2 trillion of the U.S. debt.

A CNN piece points out that the long term outlook is bleak at best..

Several weeks ago, the Congressional Budget Office laid bare in its annual long-term outlook the dire picture, and the next 15 years won't be pretty. Here is how it will play out, if nothing is done. 

In 2022, the Highway Trust Fund will run out of full funding. In 2026, the Medicare Hospital Insurance Trust Fund follows. In 2032, the Social Security trust fund surpluses run dry, and all beneficiaries regardless of age or income level will face a 21 percent across-the-board benefit cut. Before 2030, we could have trillion-dollar annual interest payments. Interest rates have been low until now, but that is changing. As rates go up, we have to pay more on new debt and on all accumulated debt. 

The amount we pay in interest on the debt is set to triple over the next ten years. But if interest rates rise just 1 point higher than expected, the government will owe an extra $1.9 trillion over 10 years.

Early next year, expect Thune and Rounds to start asserting that the retirement age will need to be raised and that Medicare benefits will need to be cut. Other elements of the social safety net will be fodder for the cries of waste, fraud, and abuse. Posts like this one and the Constant Commoner's will be decried as "class warfare" and "fake news." Meanwhile, Trump will offer the circus of his rallies where he can assail Muslims, Central American immigrants,  and the media while his cult ignores the fact that he and his" vassals" are pursuing policies that make it more difficult to afford the bread.

About That Billie Sutton Poll....

I distrust internal polls, so I ignored the Democratic candidate Billie Sutton's tweet that announced Representative Kristi Noem's lead in the gubernatorial race was within the margin of error. I ignored  Sutton's emailed press release with the bold print announcement that indicate Sutton might have lead if voters are given information about both candidates.

When balanced profile information about both candidates is presented, Sutton takes a 6 point lead (48% Sutton / 42% Noem / 11% undecided). emphasis in original]

I smiled and did a "from your lips to God's ears" prayer when I read Dakota Free Press's enthusiastic post about the poll results.

But then, this tweet from political forecaster Harry Enten came across my feed. Enten claims that he was told in 2017 that Sutton was a candidate to watch. I became a bit less skeptical because Enten's job is political forecasting. As an aside, Enten  later tweeted a picture of a business card that he got from the conference with his note about Sutton handwritten on the back.

Can't believe I found this, but this was the back of a business card from last year where a South Dakota state legislator told me Sutton was running for governor and had a good shot of beating Noem who would run. pic.twitter.com/3DQyxppm4z

— (((Harry Enten))) (@ForecasterEnten) August 1, 2018

Later, friends forwarded a link to an article entitled "Billie Sutton Will Not Be Out-Cowboyed." The title comes from conversations the reporter had with Democrats at two Sioux Falls events:

At both events, I meet dozens of loyal Democrats, most of whom clearly identify as far to the left of Sutton, but I'm unable to find anyone who's particularly perturbed by the candidate's more centrist positions, even on abortion or guns. They like his education plans. They like his chances to win. They are realists about the political make-up of the state where they all reside, and no one outside the campaign is wholly confident of victory. "There's nothing as brutal as a Wednesday in November," one supporter remarks wryly, remembering years of Democratic defeat. But she's optimistic. At least no one is going to out-cowboy Billie Sutton.

Before one gets to that paragraph, however, there's a report about a newspaper publisher who declared his support for Sutton after decades of supporting Republicans. The anecdote looked familiar as it should have. Dakota War College had covered the same article. In that post Pat Powers took issue with the newspaper publisher and opined that a brief mention of Obamacare might prove problematic for Sutton. Powers did not, however, challenge the article's conclusion that Noem will have to do more than ride a horse and demonstrate that she can shoot a gun to defeat Sutton or that economic issues might turn the race.

That line of attack, though, isn't going to work well against Sutton, the former rodeo rider. And, as the summer wanes, it seems likely that the race will shift to bigger economic factors. President Donald Trump's global trade war is affecting core South Dakota products like corn, beef, and especially soybeans. Soybean prices have fallen 16 percent in the last few months. If a blue wave hits the prairie, it will be because of frustration about global commodity prices linked to foreign retaliatory tariffs.

Powers, a connected partisan, rarely misses any chance to dismiss Democrats' chances in a South Dakota race, so it seems odd that his response to the conclusions about Sutton's chances or Democrats' optimism was subdued.

Finally, there's yesterday's news that the South Dakota Republican Party intends to sue to keep Constitution Party candidates off the 2018 general election ballot. It's a move that seems too heavy-handed by half. In fact, it smacks of fear. The Constitution Party, which has only 489 registered members, resembles a circular firing squad more than a political party. Republicans apparently fear  the loss of some social conservative voters who might find the Constitution Party appealing more than they fear looking like a high school bully kicking a kindergartner.

I remain doubtful that enough South Dakota Republicans will end their infatuation with Kristi Noem and vote for Sutton even though Noem's political career is a case study for the Peter Principle. The South Dakota Republican Party, however,  through its actions and inaction leads one to believe that the Sutton poll might be more accurate than a skeptic might have thought. 

What Does It Take To Get A 0 On Rotten Tomatoes?

One post discussing Dinesh D'Sousa's most recent propaganda piece would usually be sufficient. But D'Sousa has infected some parts of South Dakota's blogosphere and some South Dakota politicians with his foolishness.

Take for example this comment on the Dakota War College post that announced a recent Sioux Falls showing: "Putin would like nothing better than for the US to become embroiled in a civil war, and the Democrats are doing everything they can think of to start one." No serious Democrat wants a civil war, D'Sousa's hyperventilating to contrary. Then of course there are state senator Stace Nelson's tweets that ignore the Dixiecrat migration to the Republican party, another of D'Sousa's favorite tactics.

Given the corrosive effect of D'Sousa's propaganda, it gave me great pleasure to learn that Rotten Tomatoes shows Death of a Nation as certified rotten with 0% positive reviews as of this writing.

0% How does that happen?

In addition to being terribly inaccurate propaganda, the move is apparently boring. The Hollywood Reporter's Frank Sheck writes, "No one expects, of course, that D'Souza would make a thoughtful, balanced or historically accurate documentary. But is it unreasonable to hope that he make one that doesn't bore the pants off us?"

To give the D'Sousa his due, he does know his audience even if he can't do history or make a good propaganda. Writing for the Arizona Republic, Bill Goodykoontz says, "D'Souza fans and Trump apologists will flock to this, misguided moths to a misleading flame. In that way, it's a perfect representation of the current climate. In every other way, it's a mess."

Unfortunately, some South Dakotans will continue to repeat D'Sousa's propaganda, but others who prefer facts to ahistorical histrionics should feel blessed to have not seen a boring, misguided mess.

A Minor Musing About Who Should Pay For Job Training

Governor Daugaard continues to insist that education's primary purpose is preparing one for the workplace over preparing one to participate in broader public square as a citizen. Over at Dakota Free Press, Cory does an excellent job of pointing out the error in that, dare I say, philosophy. Cory concludes,

Unaccounted for in the Governor’s argument is what those aspiring engineers, accountants, nurses, and welders will do with their job-specific high school curriculum twenty years from now when economic forces, experiences, and unforeseen changes of plan render the jobs they thought at age 15 they would do forever untenable, or what knowledge and skills they might find helpful in leading purposeful, fulfilling lives during the two thirds of their working life and the three thirds of their retirement when they won’t be on the job. Those liberal arts still be darned; we’ve got cogs to mill for the economic machine!

If students are to be prepared solely to be chewed up by cogs of the economic machine, Libertarian gubernatorial candidate Kurt Evans throws the proverbial monkey wrench into those cogs by taking Daugaard's premises to their logical ultimate conclusion and then prompting a question that the Governor seems to ignore.

We may need a social consensus for state government to teach elementary students literacy and basic arithmetic, but if a vo-tech does things you don’t like, no government should force you to pay for it.

If the goal of education is to create citizens who can reason and knowledgeably participate in discussions in the public square, then the public should pay for education. If, however, the purpose is solely to prepare someone for a specific job, the public requires only basic literacy and arithmetic. After all, no one wants people holding up the line in the grocery store incorrectly arguing that the person behind the counter gave them the wrong change. In a world of economics uber alles, people still need to read the advertisement copy.

The question then becomes who should pay for the rest. Daugaard never entertains the question. Evans, the consistent Libertarian, hints that the duty should fall on the workplace. Instead of "Our Town Public School" we could have "Fast Food High School" or "Welders and Assemblers Private Institute." A chain of entities called "The Walmart Superschools" could dot the landscape. Whether Daugaard admits it or not, his educational philosophy will eventually lead to the same result only with public funding. It seems reminiscent of the medieval guild system rather than a system to take on 21st Century challenges.

The purpose of education should remain developing citizens who can think creatively and communicate effectively. Schools can improve, but turning them into institutions that create workers prepared for a job that will disappear in 10 years is not going to provide that improvement.

A Minor Musing On The Cult Of Trump

Trying to compare Donald Trump to his predecessors is always a difficult task. I have preferred comparisons to Richard Nixon or Warren Harding, usually the latter. Others prefer to group him with impeached Presidents Andrew Johnson and Bill Clinton.

Recently, comparisons have gone beyond former Presidents. For example,  some have taken to likening him to Joseph McCarthy.

A recent CBS News poll, however, has a new statistic that prompts a new comparison. According to the poll "strong Trump supporters" trust Trump more than their family to deliver the accurate information. The margin is not even close. Among his "strong' supporters Trump has a 28% advantage over friends and family when it comes to "who do you trust for accurate information?'

From CBS News poll.

These results are not partisanship; they're cult like. True believers trusting their leader or irrationally revering their leader is one of the first identifiers of a cult. Trusting a distant leader who communicates without speaking in complete sentences more than one's friends or family fits that category.

This is hardly the first sign that Trump's true believers venerate Trump as others have venerated cult leaders. Salena Zito who is one of the main apologists for Trump supporters has co-authored The Great Revolt: Inside the Populist Coalition Reshaping American Politics. (I will buy the paperback and try to review it.)  Zito also writes a regular opinion column for The Washington Examiner. Several weeks ago, she published "'Not a morally upstanding guy,' yet Trump has the love of millions of Christian conservatives," a piece which profiles Jill Gilmore, "a college-educated, gun-owning female conservative Republican who voted for Donald Trump"  Gilmore "is also a devout Evangelical Christian" whom Zito views as a "King Cyrus Conservative." Cyrus was the Persian king who allowed the Jews to return Jerusalem.

In short, Trump's true believers assign him a prophetic role beyond that of regular mortals. Therein lies the cliched rub; no debate is now possible. If 91% of his strongest supporters trust him for accurate information above anyone else, then my argument that he's like a cult leader will be dismissed. So will the possibility that North Korea is building new missiles; Russia has the potential to take down the U.S power grid, or that nations are signing trade deals without the US. Trump after all has said that North Korea is no longer a threat, that he trusts Putin, and that trade wars are easy. Trump has already said that his supporters shouldn't "believe what you're seeing," so they no other choice but to believe their cult leader.