Press "Enter" to skip to content

Posts published in February 2024

Idiots

February 8, 2024

Are we, or are they? Maybe they just think we are.

Megan Blanksma is no idiot. But her posture of protecting us from government intrusion makes me think she might think us so. Shame on her.

She wants to change how immunizations are recorded here in Idaho to “protect privacy”. She should set her sights on Google or Amazon, not the Immunization Registry.

I wish Representative Blanksma could have been with me in the ER on the weekends in Grangeville. I can’t tell you how many times folks showed up with a scratch or a cut from the rusty nail wanting a tetanus shot.

“I don’t need no stitches, doc, just the tetanus.”

When was your last shot?

“Heck, I don’t know. It’s been years.”

We will look it up. The nurse starts logging in.

“That shot keeps it from getting infected, don’t it?”

Well, no. Tetanus is a rare complication from an anaerobic wound. Last year in this country about seven people died from tetanus. But wound infections are much more common, and the tetanus shot does not keep you from getting a wound infection.

The nurse finds that his last shot was three years ago, recorded in the state registry.

It looks like you don’t need a shot, you are well protected from tetanus. But make sure you wash that wound, soak it, let us know if it gets red or painful. You don’t need another tetanus shot for another seven years. Though there is some evidence you only need them every thirty years. You’ll be fine.

The current immunization registry guidelines are that people can “opt out” at their request. If they don’t opt out, their immunization data is recorded in a protected data base. Identified health care providers can access the information.

Do you think your shopping data is protected? Are you an idiot?

When you Google 18 cubic foot refrigerators then log in to Fox News and see ads for 18 CF refrigerators, do you think this is just a coincidence? Then you’re an idiot.

It’s all about information. For some reason, our state does not have the capability to find people we have improperly disenrolled from Medicaid. But our DMV knows if you have car insurance. Why doesn’t Representative Blanksma go after that data base?

I think it’s because she knows an avid base when she sees one. Antivaxxers are at the head of any Trump rally. So why not combine the universal desire for privacy with the antivaxxer sentiment? It’s a win-win. But that’s just because she thinks we are idiots.

I don’t believe we are.

Opt in and opt out is a crucial pivot point.

Most of us don’t think about our retirement.

Nor about keeping up to date on our immunizations.

Good evidence shows that employees enrolled (opted in) into a retirement plan, with no cost to themselves, have more savings in the long run. When the retirement benefit is structured so they must “opt in”, some choose not to. Maybe they are suspicious of their employers’ motives, who knows. But the opt in, opt out pivot point is powerful.

Please, look in your wallet. Do you have a smudged immunization card?

Maybe you think this service of keeping track of immunizations is best done by the private sector. Make sure you give them your credit card information and email address.

Yes, you are an idiot.

Representative Blanksma described being shocked when she found out that her children’s immunizations were recorded in the state registry when she had “opted out” from that process years back. I can appreciate that affront.

But dismantling a good system is an idiotic response.

 

Idaho reps on impeachment

February 7, 2024

Idaho Congressman Russ Fulcher doesn’t watch much of the network newscasts, and generally he doesn’t think that he’s missing much. Since he lives and breathes congressional politics, Fulcher doesn’t need Lester Holt to tell him what’s happening on Capitol Hill.

But if Fulcher did watch the nightly news, he’d know that former President Trump doesn’t like the Senate’s bipartisan approach to the crisis at the southern border. Trump has been telling anyone with a microphone that the agreement would work in favor of Democrats in a presidential election year – and that is not good for Republicans.

None of that rings a bell with Fulcher, who spends many waking hours talking with his colleagues from both sides of the aisle about border security. But the Idaho Republican says that Trump’s name does not enter into the conversations, and he doesn’t need the former president to tell him that a bipartisan deal will be ashes if it gets to the House. House Speaker Mike Johnson has declared it as dead on arrival if it reaches the lower chamber.

House Republicans are going in a different direction – one that most likely will be dead on arrival if it gets to the Senate. They’re pushing for impeachment of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, and it will take almost all House Republicans to push that through. Ironically, many of the House Republicans are the same ones who labeled two impeachments of Trump as “political theater.”

Indeed, impeachment proceedings against Mayorkas are great material – perhaps for the Canned Film Festival. Fulcher acknowledges that the secretary’s ouster is unlikely, but he sees justification for impeachment.

Cabinet members, such as Mayorkas, serve at the pleasure of the president. “But they are required to administer according to the constitutional law of the land, and that’s set by Congress,” Fulcher says. “Not only he (Mayorkas) has not done that, but he’s the guy who is saying that the border is secure. That’s absolutely not true by any metric.”

Fellow Idaho Congressman Mike Simpson agrees and raises the ante.

“For the last three years, our country has endured an unprecedented border crisis,” he says. “American families are suffering from the flood of fentanyl that’s entering our communities, border security agents are overwhelmed with that influx of migrant crossing the border, and human trafficking is worsening at an alarming rate. This is a direct result of Secretary Mayorkas willfully and systemically refusing to enforce the federal immigration laws. Secretary Mayorkas deserves to be held accountable for his negligence of our southern border.”

Again … Mayorkas isn’t going anywhere. If bad policy decisions were the standard for impeachment, we’d be without a president and a Congress. Simpson and Fulcher, who often come under fire for their actions, would be harvesting potatoes somewhere.

But as Fulcher sees it, impeachment proceedings – even if they are ultimately fruitless – send a message about the urgency of resolving the border crisis.

“The No. 1 concern that comes through my office is the open border,” Fulcher says. “The No. 1 failure of this Congress is that we have not been able to get it closed. You also could look at it the other way, and it’s also true, is that the No. 1 policy failure of the Biden administration is to keep it open. If they wanted it closed, they would have done it a long time ago.”

Fulcher says he has empathy for migrants and families who are looking for better lives and go through the legal process. But that’s not what’s coming across to the tune of 10,000 people per day.

“What we’ve been told through bipartisan channels is that we are spending approximately $150 billion a year on immigration, and that’s on health care and education,” Fulcher says. There’s also a cost for sex trafficking, human trafficking, fentanyl, the illegal drugs and the lawlessness that comes with it.”

More serious danger looms if Fulcher is right about what comes next. “I believe in the bottom of my heart that we are going to have another 9/11 this year. That’s because of the bad entities that are coming through the southern border. I hope I’m wrong here.”

Amen to that.

Chuck Malloy is a long-time Idaho journalist and columnist. He may be reached at ctmalloy@outlook.com

 

Dangers of loss

Dangers of loss

February 6, 2024

Something's been happening to us the last 40-years or so.  A rather sad change for we who are trying improve the world around us.

If you belong to a branch of organized religion - participate in a civic organization - give of your time for a community project - encourage others to do the same - congratulations!  Keep up the good work.

Because, what we're seeing now is more and more people being unwilling to do the same.  Unwilling to give "time-talent-treasure" for the better good.  To share in support of community.

Everywhere you look these days, churches, schools, community organizations and others are seeking volunteers.  Ads in the paper.  Pleas in a worship bulletin.  Emails and other communications from schools.  "Volunteers needed."

And, in large part, the need is going unmet.  People with jobs.  People with kids.  People with other demands on their time.  People feeling they're too busy.  Just not enough time.

All too often, those "excuses" are pure B.S..  Our parents spent more of their time trying to make a living than we do these days.  Many often had two jobs.  Our parents didn't have I-Phones, computers and other aids to get their work done.

They had more demands on their time and still managed to volunteer at church - at schools - at service organizations - at endless community events.  They had more demands on their lives yet they still managed to pitch in when necessary.  When asked.  When they saw a need.

As you consider those examples, think also of the current loss of many civic clubs, diminished congregations at mainline churches, granges, lodges, local business groups like chambers of commerce.  Disappearing.  Many just - gone.

Those were the "fiber" of our communities that brought people together, tackled civic needs, kept the lines of communications open and kept people busy and healthy.  Now, many of them are no more.

Social media has had a lot to do with that.  Very much so.

Rather than dress up a bit for church, we can now "zoom" the service from home - watching the service in our 'jammies.'  Rather than go to a lodge or regularly attend service club meetings, we can text some of the people we used to see face-to-face.  Rather than pitching in to undertake the completion of a community need, we can write a check.  Pay someone to do what we used to do ourselves.  As volunteers.  I know.  I've done it.

Dr. Anthony Fauci was recently on the "telly" talking about how these changes - and a few others - have made loneliness the number one national illness.  People being separated from each other.  People being alone.

Suicides rates are up.  Divorces, too.  The ills of lost "community" reaching ever higher numbers.

We are poorer - much poorer - for the passing of these fraternal, civic and religious attachments.  We're losing touch with one another.

Many of us have noted the decline.  With more than four-score years of life, I've seen the success of many of these community organizations in the past.  Been a part of them.  Realized the benefits of "pressing the flesh."  Of participation.  Of volunteering.

Now, we elders are seeing the reductions in membership - of regular face-to-face interplay with others - of fewer offering 'time, talent and treasure' for the common good.  We're often experiencing pangs of loneliness - of separation.  Exactly what Dr. Fauci talked about.

Maybe younger generations - the Z-er's, X-er's, millennial's and whatever comes next - maybe conditions of the lives they'll lead will offer a sort of community involvement in a new and different direction.

Maybe.

They'll have to!  Because, if we lose more contact with one another - if we live lives of individuality rather than community - if we lose the common bond - the common connection - the very nature of a nation and its future will be at stake.

(image/Wikimedia Commons)

 

A moving experience

February 5, 2024

Many people have literally been moved by the ugly performance of Idaho’s Republican extremists in recent years. That is, significant numbers of teachers, librarians, doctors and others have moved out of the Gem State to escape the false claims and oppressive legislation conjured by the dysfunctional branch of Idaho’s GOP, now presided over by Dorothy Moon.

On the other hand, that same wretched conduct has caused like-minded folk from across the country to move to our state, attracted by headlines that portray Idaho as a sanctuary for political zealots of every stripe.

Extremist legislators have been relentlessly and unjustifiably attacking libraries and librarians since out-of-state dark money groups placed them on the target list a couple of years ago. The Idaho Freedom Foundation (IFF) and its faithful legislative acolytes recognized the vote-getting potential of this fake culture war issue and jumped on the bandwagon. They have been cheered on by Moon and her minions.

False claims that libraries were dishing out filth to young kids resulted in passage last year of a bill imposing a $2,500 bounty for making “available” books deemed “harmful to minors.” The bill had obvious constitutional problems, but that was beside the point. The purpose of the bill was to intimidate libraries into purging their shelves of anything that might be in any way suspect. Governor Little rightfully vetoed the bill, but libraries and librarians are being targeted again this year.

The grief that librarians have faced from the continual sniping has taken its toll. The Idaho Library Association recently disclosed that more than half of Idaho librarians are thinking of leaving library work and many are moving out of state. I’m aware of a couple that just left for library jobs in Pennsylvania.

The radicals have also chased off Idaho teachers with a laundry list of trumped-up charges, including that they are grooming kids, indoctrinating them with critical race theory and exposing them to pornography. When Idaho’s 2023 Teacher of the Year was attacked, she moved to Illinois where people would appreciate her excellent work.

We have all heard of medical doctors, particularly OB-GYNs, leaving Idaho because its toughest-in-the-nation abortion laws have intimidated them out of treating women with troubled pregnancies. Thanks to Attorney General Raul Labrador, a woman cannot receive care for a dangerous pregnancy in a hospital emergency room until she is on death’s doorstep. In the words of the statute, the doctor can only act “ to prevent the death of the pregnant woman.” No wonder Idaho doctors are moving away.

Idahoans, particularly in our northern climes, will have an additional reason to hire a mover if a pending bill is enacted into law. Senate Bill 1220 would essentially gut Idaho’s domestic terror law. That law was passed in 1987 in response to the bombing of Father Bill Wassmuth’s home in Coeur d’Alene by members of the violent white supremacist Aryan Nations group. The law made it a serious felony for those who commit criminal acts that are “dangerous to human life” and intended to “intimidate or coerce” either the general public or governmental policymakers. The law announced to the world that Idaho would not put up with violent political zealots.

The sponsor of SB1220 argued that it would protect the speech rights of groups like Moms of Liberty. Pardon me, but if that group were to engage in violent acts of intimidation, like the terror bombing of a civil rights icon’s home, wouldn’t most decent Idahoans hope the state’s laws could deal with it? Besides, Moms for Liberty has its hands full nowadays, dealing with the admitted three-way sex scandal in Florida among its founder, her husband and another woman.

While these appalling political actions by IFF and the Dorothy Moon enablers have caused many decent Idahoans to move out of the state, the same actions have attracted an inward movement of like-minded extremists into the state. David Neiwert, a distinguish Idaho journalist, has written a must-read article titled “Idaho's traditional Republicans realizing their new far-right transplant overlords are radicals” disclosing that the in-migration of radicals from other states has been happening for years. They will continue to come in droves because out-of-staters are reading the ugly headlines and taking them as a sign that Idaho has put out the welcome mat for practically every brand of political and religious fanatic. At least the moving companies are profiting.

 

Not a boon for OR Democrats, though

February 4, 2024

The Oregon Supreme Court decision barring 10 Republican state senators from another term after the current one was quickly assailed by Republicans, as you’d expect.

Republican Sen. Suzanne Weber of Tillamook responded, “I’m disappointed, but can’t say I’m surprised that a court of judges appointed solely by Gov. (Kate) Brown and Gov. (Tina) Kotek would rule in favor of political rhetoric rather than their own precedent. The only winners in this case are Democrat politicians and their union backers.”

That’s not quite right. Democrats and their backers aren’t likely to gain much out of it, though in a couple of years Weber’s district could be an exception.

The court decision grew out of a dare and a long-shot bluff. After a series of extended walkouts during legislative sessions by enough Republican legislators to bring statehouse business to a halt, voters in 2022 passed a constitutional amendment providing that any legislator with 10 or more unexcused absences in a session could be barred from serving a subsequent term. Republicans challenged it on grounds that the ban could be read to refer to a future term after a walkout happens; the secretary of state and high court said that interpretation was contrary to voter expectations.

In the 2023 session, 10 Republican senators absented themselves regardless: Minority Leader Tim Knopp of Bend, Weber of Tillamook, Kim Thatcher of Keizer, Lynn Findley of Vale, Dennis Linthicum of Klamath Falls, Art Robinson of Cave Junction, Bill Hansell of Athena, Daniel Bonham of The Dalles, Brian Boquist of Dallas and Cedric Hayden of Fall Creek.

That might sound like a huge boon for Democrats, since legislative seats usually are easier to flip if they’re open than if an incumbent is defending them. But it’s not that simple.

Of the 10, six senators are serving terms that expire after this year’s election. But two of those, Findley and Hansell, had announced their plans to retire from the Legislature anyway. (Their districts are very strongly Republican and highly unlikely to switch parties.)  Two more appeared to be paving the way for successors, with Robinson’s son and Linthicum’s wife filing to take their seats.

That leaves only two seats specifically impacted this year. Knopp represents a Bend-area district which has developed a significant Democratic voter registration edge, and whether he or someone else is the Republican nominee, they’d probably face an uphill climb to keep the seat. Last month, Knopp – possibly anticipating what was coming from the Supreme Court – said he would back Downtown Bend Business Association Executive Director Shannon Monihan, who filed about the same time, for his seat.

That leaves only Boquist, a four-term senator who quit the Republican Party but recently rejoined it. He represents a district centered on Yamhill and Polk counties which overall is strongly Republican; his weakest Senate vote, in 2020, has been 58.3%. Democrats would need an unusual candidate or environment, and more than a little luck, to flip his seat this year.

With a March 12 filing deadline fast approaching, Democrats would have a hard time developing competitive campaigns for most of these seats in this election cycle.

That does leave the question of the four other impacted senators whose terms won’t be up until after the 2026 election: Weber, Bonham, Hayden and Thatcher. They still have a couple of years left in the chamber, and any of them could simply decide to retire, or maybe run for another non-legislative office at the next election.

As election results and voting registration numbers suggest now, at least one of those seats – Hayden’s in rural eastern Lane and Douglas counties – is very likely to stay Republican.

The other three are a little less certain. Bonham, Thatcher and Weber personally all have won by solid margins, but all three represent areas that are among the most politically marginal in Oregon, places where a strong candidate from either party cannot be discounted. Their departure from the Senate will throw a real challenge at Republicans to hold on to those seats in another couple of years.

The Supreme Court decision didn’t – at least immediately – change the partisan outlook for the Oregon Senate much, at least for this year, and it could spur senators who will barred from a subsequent term to walk out over an issue they care about, like reinstituting criminal penalties under Measure 110. Knopp voiced a veiled threat about that on Wednesday.

Nevertheless, the Supreme Court decision reinforced the blunt message voters sent in 2022: Extended legislative walkouts in future will have consequences, even if those most directly hit individuals rather than parties.

This column first appeared in the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

Don’t break it, fix it

February 3, 2024

A sizeable number of Americans have given up on democracy. And in their surrender they have remade the Republican Party – and the country.

Many have tried to explain the motivation of fellow Americans who continue to support a man facing 91 indictments, including a case centering on whether he stole classified documents as he left the White House and after he incited an insurrection. Many wonder why so many Americans profess loyalty to a candidate who has been convicted of sexual assault and then twice more convicted and fined $88 million for repeatedly defaming the woman he assaulted?

It is impossible not to conclude that the vast evidence of criminality, confirmed by separate prosecutors and judges and juries in numerous jurisdictions just doesn’t matter to the MAGA crowd. What’s a little crime when you have a country to plunge further in chaos?

“Our system needs to be broken,” a Donald Trump voter in New Hampshire recently told Politico’s Michael Kruse in an insightful look into the mind of an angry, hurting, confused American, “and he is the man to do it.”

Can’t argue with that logic. Except you must.

Because “our system” doesn’t need to be broken. It needs to be repaired; urgently and carefully.

To believe that Donald Trump possesses the magic elixir to “Make America Great Again” is to descend to a tooth fairy level of gullibility. There is no fix to “our system” short of Americans voting to support democracy over the chaos and the personal villainy of a man convicted of sexual assault who also happens to be a Constitution shredding charlatan.

You can fret and worry about America and not believe it needs to be broken. Let’s review – briefly – what ails the America most of us continue to love in spite of its obvious flaws.

Disinformation on a grand scale is causing some Americans – and not an insignificant number apparently – to believe conspiracies lurking in dark corners of the Internet. One of the latest and most laughable holds that popular singer Taylor Swift, as the New York Times put it, is some kind of “a secret agent of the Pentagon; that she is bolstering her fan base in preparation for her endorsement of President Biden’s re-election; or that she and [Kansas City Chiefs boyfriend Travis] Kelce are a contrived couple, assembled to boost the N.F.L. or Covid vaccines or Democrats or whatever.”

Falling for such blatant garbage when there is so much else worth concentrating on is what’s wrong with “our system.” Being hoodwinked by elected con men and Fox News is what’s wrong with America.

Bad faith actors in political positions are what’s wrong with America. There is a reasonable, bipartisan deal to be had to put in place much needed immigration reforms, but the very people who have long insisted on changes are on the verge of killing any deal. The leader of the GOP is hoping to use American concerns about immigration to his advantage, so a legislative deal becomes out of the question. That is what is wrong with “our system.”

A political culture of distraction and deflection is what’s wrong with “our system.”

Vast income inequality is what’s wrong with “our system.” When an Elon Musk can demand a $56 billion pay day (a Delaware judge just voided that obscenity) to run an electric car company that is what is wrong with “our system.” As Reuter’s reported, an executive pay research firm “estimated in 2022 that Musk’s [compensation] package was around six times larger than the combined pay of the 200 highest-paid executives in 2021.”

What is also wrong is that women still make on average 85% of what men make. It’s wrong that American health care costs so much more than any other “developed” country. It’s wrong that many younger Americans simply can’t afford to buy a home of their own. It’s wrong we have so much gun violence. It’s wrong that were are not really dealing with the impacts of a changing climate. It’s wrong that there are too many drugs and too much homelessness. It’s wrong that some radical conservatives want to abandon a democratic Ukraine and embrace authoritarians in Hungry and Russia.

None of these wrongs will be righted by breaking our democratic system. They just won’t.

The way to get after our shortcomings is to double down on a politics of decency, compromise, common sense and good faith. You double down on real, hard to accomplish solutions advanced by serious people working to make the country genuinely better. You double down on democracy. You do not strengthen democracy by breaking it. You just don’t.

To say you must destroy what remains of the American system in order to save it is nonsense. Dangerous nonsense.

Democracy requires work. It requires commitment. It requires patience, as difficult as that can be. In this big, complicated and very diverse country there are no quick fixes. There just aren’t. And the millions of Americans who think another go round with Trump is going to fix “our system” are more delusional than the man himself.

If he had real answers to our real problems he’d be sharing them. He’s got nothing beyond the instincts of an orange bull in a very small shop filled with the fragile elements of democracy. He’s running to stay out of jail and keep his dwindling fortune. He’s running in order to pardon himself and others who committed crimes at his behest. He could care less about democracy, the little guy or anyone’s future beyond his own.

Fifty-nine years ago this week the world said goodbye to Winston Churchill, arguably the 20th Century’s indispensable man, who had died at 90. Churchill, warts and all, was a democrat. He believed in democracy with all its messy and difficult processes, the two steps forward and one back. During the darkest days of World War II he never gave up on democracy.

One of the great ironies of Churchill’s story is that he courageously and correctly led Great Britain – and the freedom loving world – through that awful war and once the Nazis were beaten to surrender he lost re-election. Still, Churchill never gave up on democracy. It would not have occurred to him to say we have the break “our system.”

What he did say was profound and powerful and worth remembering as too many around us embrace the politics of chaos and division.

“Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe,” Churchill said in 1947. “No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed it has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time …”

Forget the fearmongers and those giving up on democracy. They are the ultimate losers. We can and must do better than to think we can fix the country by breaking it.

 

Schooled on guns

February 2, 2024

Idaho House Bill 415 fits so neatly into a central piece of political rhetoric that the surprise is that its progress at the legislature has been slowed as much as it has; which is to say, not much.

The bill provides that any public school employee - who obtains an enhanced concealed weapons permit, not terribly hard to get - who wants to carry a firearm or other “deadly weapon” to school can do it, whether local administrators and school boards like it or not. The sponsor, Representative Ted Hill of Eagle, said, “These select school employees will provide an armed force to protect children in the first minutes of an attack. We don’t want to have a stack of 20 kids dead in a classroom because we didn’t do anything.”

The National Rifle Association couldn’t have put it more simply.

After what looked like a short pause, the Idaho House passed it this week (53 to 16, veto-proof), to the Senate for consideration there.

Here are some of the things it does.

Any pistol-packing school employee would have absolute state clearance to carry, regardless whether school principals, teachers, parents, boards or anyone else likes it, “as long as the firearm or deadly weapon is concealed and the school employee maintains immediate control” of it. I’m trying to imagine how that would work in a high school environment. What does that imply about the handling and carrying of guns by staff?

I say “school employee” here because the packers can include not only teachers but, “an officer, board member, commissioner, executive, elected or appointed official, or independent contractor.” Imagine someone who isn’t an educator but has some business relationship with the district … who maybe has a history of domestic or other violence … and obtains an enhanced license. You doubt that could ever happen? Think again. And think as well about how much easier a real shooter would find infiltrating a school already accustomed to seeing adults routinely carrying firearms.

Think too about the school employees who may be well trained to teach but maybe less well schooled on emergency tactical response. The bill has that inexperience question covered this way: “No school employee shall be held civilly or criminally liable for deciding to engage or not to engage in an armed confrontation during a lethal threat to safety inside of a school or on school property. The decision to use a firearm or other deadly weapon during a life-threatening incident inside of a school or on school property lies solely within the school employee and is a personal decision.”

So: If a covered school employee simply decides to pick up their gun - and start firing - the immunity is apparently absolute, regardless who was injured or killed. I can hear right now a smart defense attorney defending a murder charge using this provision as a shield. The beweaponed employee’s personal belief is enough for a shield against any kind of legal action, civil or criminal.

These employees will not be compelled to disclose to anyone but a school administrator (and maybe board: it’s unclear there) and local law enforcement that a gun is in the classroom. In fact, the bill adds a new exemption for Idaho public records law: Any records relating to a school employee who’s carrying. A mere parent would be unable to find out if there’s a gun in their child’s classroom.

Private schools would be specifically exempted from the requirement. The bill’s opening paragraphs seem to endorse carrying guns there too, but a later section says: “Nothing in subsection (4) of this section shall limit the right of an owner of private property, including a private school, from permitting or prohibiting the carrying of a concealed firearm or other deadly weapon on his property.” If it’s such a good idea for public schools, then why not their private counterparts?

There’s also this curious if minor punitive provision: “No public school shall display any signage whatsoever indicating that school property is a gun-free zone, and any violation of this subsection shall result in a fine of three hundred dollars ($300), enforced by the county prosecuting attorney.”

Current state law already allows local school districts to set their own policies, and some Idaho districts do allow some heat-packing by staff. But a Post Falls police detective has pointed out that conditions are different in the various school districts. "In the Post Falls School District, we have a very close relationship with our police department. We’re able to have responding officers at any location in the district within three minutes or less than that. … We need to talk about what’s best for each individual school district."

That’s a problem when legislation devolves to the level of a bumper sticker. As it has here.

As it is, the Idaho Legislature may well pass this thing; it can be labeled “pro-gun” and therefore hard to oppose. But be aware: Extra warnings may be needed in future when you send the kids off to school.

 

Remote work

February 1, 2024

I guess remote work is the new library porn for the Idaho legislature. It seems the Republican legislative leadership has decided it can manage state employees better that the administrators watching their work product.

A couple bills have been introduced to limit remote work by state employees. I guess we all gotta have something, don’t we?

For me, it the jerks who don’t signal their turn. But there’s already a law about that. In my brief time in the legislature, I didn’t look around for laws to pass to make my nonsignaling citizens suffer. I never thought about bumping up that penalty. But I was an Idaho Democrat. I couldn’t engage in culture wars. Despite what Dorothy Moon says, most Idaho Democrats in elected positions know the political landscape, and work with it. We can’t afford to be culture warriors.

But Idaho Republicans seem to be doing just that.

There indeed may be some evidence that Democrats are more accepting of remote work than Republicans.

Why don’t they go after Subarus? It’s a well-known fact that progressive folks in this northern clime buy all wheel drive Subarus, not 4WD Ford F150’s.

A North Idaho Republican State Senator griped to me about how he was getting grief that his wife drove a Subaru. “They’re great in the snow and they get good mileage. Why can’t a Republican drive a Subaru?” He’s no longer in the legislature.

The Culture Wars of the Idaho legislature are pitiful. Except, they get to write our laws. Please, never forget that. And the legislature has the hubris to tell the executive branch how to run government.

The endless culture wars bills come out early in the legislative session. I will skip past the abortion and anti-gay and transexual laws. Because this one seems so silly.

Why can’t state employees in this day and age work from home?

Is it because while they are at home, doing work through their internet connection they might also get the laundry done?

Is it because they might be more likely to vote Democratic?

Is it because they might have progressive ideas about how things should be happening?

Maybe it’s been shown in some Koch Brothers data mining that people that work at home are more likely to favor solar panels and Subarus, thus vote Democratic.

In any event, the Idaho Legislature has decided it is in our, the taxpayer’s best interest to micromanage state employees.

These early introduced bills are often just a locating shot, for their pals back home to know where they stand. But in this case, they have received significant traction.

The interim Director of the Department of Health and Welfare has instituted a policy to restrict all DHW workers so they can only work 20% of their time from home.

Working from home might make good sense. If you are screening data on Medicaid claims, why do you need to drive in from Meridian, park in your spot, and log in? Does the state have an interest that you have to commute for another hour and a half each day? Is the state better served that you can’t do the laundry between reviewing claims?

If the work is not getting done, we have a management problem, not a policy issue.

But the Idaho legislature seems to think that protecting us taxpayers from these “home workers” serves us.

They aren’t protecting us from home schoolers.

I don’t get it. It doesn’t make any fiscal sense.

If moms or dads are great to teach their kids at home, why can’t state employees do such work for us from their homes?

It’s just another culture war. Give it up. Fight for all of us, not just for those that vote for you.