Press "Enter" to skip to content

They ain’t real

January 14, 2025

Some may view the content of what I'm about to say as racist.  I assure you, in the most fundamental way, that's not the case.

But, I've been observing something that's made me look at television's vast advertising power in a different light.

First, a little background.  I don't live in a community with a large Black presence.  Aside from the military and some years in Washington D.C., I've not had a lot of experience with mixed-race living.  Or, thinking - in personal terms - of Black and White.  Until now.

Television, more than any other medium, has its difficulties from an advertiser's point of view.  But, also, it has powerful impact.  Yes, it reaches a vast audience.  Still, one of its drawbacks is the difficulty of using TV for targeted viewing.

Radio has Black-oriented stations.  And Cuban and Mexican and many others.  All aimed at specific target audiences.

While there are TV stations that try to do the same thing, they are few and far between.  My small community lies within the mass market coverage of one of the West's larger cities.  Yet, we're not served by an ethnically-oriented TV station trying to reach a single ethnic market.  Radio, yes.  TV, no.  And, that's true in most of the other parts of the continental U.S. as well.

Recently, it seems, in more and more commercials, there'll be - by design - one or more Black actors.  No matter the product.  No matter the ad campaign.  There will be a Black inclusion.  And, that inserted Black presence seems to be growing with advertisers.

If there are, say, three guys doing something together on television, one will be Black.  If the national ad depicts a baby shower, at least one woman will be Black.  If teens are the subject, same thing.  And, on and on.

I'm not sure why this is.  It may be sponsors - from Campbell's soup to Chevrolet - are trying to show their soups/cars are good for people of all races.   Kind of a crazy thought, I know.  But, that's all I can come up with.

Here in our Western states, White is, by far, the dominant race.  Look at your church - your service club - your favorite dining spot - the staff at the grocery store.  On a daily basis, most of us just never come into contact with someone who's Black.

Maybe that's why the inclusion of Blacks in so many television ads seems unreal to me.  While there may be such representations in social or business affairs in other parts of America, around here, not the case.  We have few mixed communities and, as a result, we don't usually have racial interactions.  There's absolutely nothing wrong with such interactions.  We just don't have them.

While TV ads mostly depict Whites and Blacks, another racial group is growing at a rapid rate.  Hispanics.  And, in our neighborhood, most of us can have regular interactions with members of that group.

For us, it's yard workers, for example.  Nearly all we've come in contact with.  Hard workers who do excellent work.  Starting to see some in local culinary, food service, wineries/vineyards, sales and other professions. Many bringing the flavors of their former home country to their new settings.  And, they are most welcome.

Sometimes I wish those ads were our "mirror" image.  That we did have such excellent inter-racial relationships on a regular basis.  That we did have brothers and sisters in our everyday life that brought their own heritage and style.

As I stated at the outset, I don't mean anything racist in these words.  Not a one of 'em.  And, there may be places in our world, where the racial mix of characters portrayed in those multi-racial commercials represents real life.

Just not around here.

 

Invitation to a lawsuit

January 13, 2025

Despite the fact that Article IX, section 5 of Idaho’s Constitution strictly prohibits using public funds for religious education, Idaho’s spendthrift legislators are at it again. They want to shower taxpayer money upon parents who are sending their kids to private schools, which would open the floodgates to subsidizing religious education.

Here is the grift. The US Supreme Court has twice ruled that if, and only if, states enact a program to subside private education, they must also make program money available for religious schooling. In the latest case, Carson v. Makin, Chief Justice John Roberts wrote: “A State need not subsidize private education. But once a State decides to do so, it cannot disqualify some private schools solely because they are religious.” The proponents of using public money to finance private and religious schooling totally ignore the words of the Chief Justice. Roberts’ words are a warning regarding the religious consequences of using public money to subsidize private education. So-called “school choice” legislation is a workaround to evade and subvert Article IX, Section 5.

Any scheme to divert taxpayer funds to subsidize private education, whether it is called a school voucher, a tax credit, a school choice payment, a savings account, or whatever else, would necessarily result in subsidization of religious schooling, in direct violation of our Constitution. Indeed, most of the public subsidy would go to religious education. There is solid evidence that about 91% of 2024 subsidy recipients across the country attend religious schools. That would likely be the case in Idaho.

Every legislator was fully advised on January 6 of the unconstitutionality of these subsidy schemes. If they write one into law, it will be a knowing and deliberate violation of the Idaho Constitution and an invitation to a lawsuit.

Idaho’s constitutional framers made it an overriding responsibility for the Legislature to properly fund the public school system, both for the instruction of Idaho kids and for the construction and maintenance of school buildings. They undoubtedly believed that future legislatures would honor that constitutional mandate, but our recent Legislatures have consistently failed on both counts.

Idaho consistently refuses to adequately fund the instructional side of public education.

Every state bordering Idaho provides more funding per student, giving their kids a competitive advantage over Idaho students. The most recent NEA report (2023-24) ranked Idaho 51st in the country with $9,808 per-student spending. Montana ranked 32nd with spending of $15,323 and Wyoming was ranked 14th with $22,032.

In 2005, the Idaho Supreme Court ruled  that the Legislature had utterly failed to fulfill its obligation to fund the construction and maintenance of school buildings, improperly placing the lion’s share of that burden upon local property taxpayers. Unless facilities funding is dramatically increased by the Legislature this year, school districts will either have to try educating kids in substandard, sometimes hazardous buildings, or hit up local property owners with hefty school bonds.

If legislators fork over $50 million tax dollars to pay the religious school expenses of primarily wealthy parents whose kids are not presently enrolled in public schools, that money will undoubtedly reduce the public school appropriation by a comparable amount. Subsidy programs have a voracious appetite, which will cause program spending to skyrocket, which will severely impact spending for public schools, which will make the state a prime target for a new school funding lawsuit.

Rural kids would bear the brunt of school choice schemes. Twenty-seven of Idaho’s 44 counties have zero or one private school. Just 3 counties–Ada, Canyon and Kootenai– have over 63% of private school kids in the state. What possible benefit would public school kids in rural Idaho receive from a voucher law, particularly if it resulted in their school district receiving less funding from the state?

Several religions in Idaho operate religious schools and quite a number do not. The lion’s share of subsidy recipients attend religious schools. Subsidy payments would allow those religions to advocate principles of their faith with public money. This would place churches that do not operate schools in a disadvantageous position. For instance, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints has a strong and historic presence in the State of Idaho. Church members have been stalwart supporters of public education, but the church does not operate a system of religious schools. Many Mormon communities are located in rural areas around the state. Mormon public school patrons would suffer disadvantages in a subsidized system–no public funding for church members and a diminution of support for public schools that their kids attend.

Unfortunately, Governor Little has given in to the out-of-state dark money interests and in-state tax-and-spenders. What next? Giving taxpayer money to favored churches?

 

It’s about the money

It’s about the money

January 10, 2025

The standard Idaho political rhetoric speaks of “school choice” - which sounds wonderful, doesn’t it? - and in his state of the state speech, Governor Brad Little added to that with the descriptor “education freedom.”

The suggestion underlying that language is that public education is somehow oppressing Idahoans, that what’s being pursued here is the ability to pursue non-public school options for education. That construct is a crock. Idahoans, like people in other states, have and always have had the ability to educate children in private schools or at home. The choice is and has been theirs. That’s unchanged. And no one is talking about changing it.

So what is “school choice/education freedom” about?

It’s about the money. Watch the money, in the session ahead, as legislators prepare to shift a large chunk of it - the debate likely will center on how much and when, more than if it happens - away from public schools to, well, somewhere else.

After all, roughly half of the general fund budget in Idaho (and across most states this is more or less true) goes to education, and that’s not all the money schools get. This is a large pile of money, and some people out there salivate at the thought of taking a personal or corporate bite out of it. It’s not that there’s no concern about actual, you know, learning among these people; some no doubt are committed to doing something better.

But a moment’s reflection should tell you it’s not that simple. Remember the old saying, that if someone tells you it’s about the principle of the thing, it’s probably about the money.

In his state of the state, Little - who may recognize the school voucher train coming hard at him from the legislature, which rejected past voucher plans but likely won’t this session - proposed spending $50 million “to further expand education options.” He said he will “ensure there is oversight” and “prioritize first and foremost our public schools.” (Don’t be fooled: Money used for vouchers or related programs is money that isn’t being spent on public schools.)

Or at least that’s the governor’s opening move. One floor above in the Statehouse, a crop of voucher-adjacent measures is arising, with many possible price tags. One of them, backed by two legislators in top leadership positions, would offer $5,000 tax credits for students who attend school other than the public kind. Spending on this is said to be limited to $50 million.

Last month, one of the co-sponsors of that measure, Representative Wendy Horman, faced off at an event sponsored by the Idaho Falls City Club against Rod Gramer, former president of Idaho Business for Education, which has opposed vouchers. Gramer pointed out that once voucher payments in other states have begun, they have sometimes exploded, as in Arizona and Indiana. He said, “Out-of-state billionaires and their front organizations never stop pushing vouchers until they have universal vouchers with no income limit and no accountability.”

Horman said that the legislature would have to approve any future increases. That would be true, but it was true in Arizona and Indiana too.

Something in this area, or maybe more than one option, feels like a slam dunk to emerge from the legislature, a probability signified by a big pro-voucher event held just hours before the launching of this year’s session, by the Mountain States Policy Center.

There are complexities, of course. Much of the national discussion about vouchers (incoming President Trump last year proposed a federal voucher program) has centered on schooling options for lower-income or special needs students; the Idaho options seem not to focus on those areas. And there’s the geographic difficulty, that many Idaho students live far from the nearest private school option, or maybe near only one that might not be a good choice.

Follow the money.

 

(image)

Who are these guys?

January 9, 2025

Well, I’m sure you’ve realized by now that the Idaho legislature is in session.

I forgive you if you haven’t.

Most Idahoans don’t even know who represents them in the legislature. I know this from experience.

Prove me wrong. Say out loud, right now, your Idaho legislators by name.

I did this cheap parlor trick at a luncheon where I was asked to speak at when I served in the Idaho legislature. It was a “Day at the Capitol” for Idaho physicians, sponsored by the Idaho Medical Association. At the time, there were three physicians in the legislature. Now there are none. Maybe I’m to blame.

The docs in the room had some gripes and some issues, and the two veteran legislator doctors who spoke before me did a good job of laying out the political landscape so these doctors could know what to expect from certain bills. At the time, Medicaid Expansion was the big issue, and it was going nowhere. The two old veterans did a good job explaining why. I took a different tack.

“Okay, so you guys want to make a change in policy in this state.” I stood up and started walking amongst the round tables with rubber chicken on their plates. I got into my football rallying mode.

There were some quiet nods, but no “Hell yeah!” from anyone. So, I damped down.

“Medicaid Expansion makes sense to you, to me, and our two previous speakers. It makes sense for our counties, our hospitals, our patients. But as they have told you, our legislators don’t see this sense.”

My less aggressive tone got less slumps and more attention. So, I went stronger.

“So, who needs persuasion? It’s not me. It’s not my veteran fellow legislators. It’s your representatives.”

I posed to the woman to my right. “Name your representatives and senator.” She gave me a blank look. “Where do you live?” She told me. I named them for her. I asked the next guy. He was blank too. The fourth guy knew one of his three legislators.

“If you want to have any influence on this process you have to have a relationship with the person representing you. You should have their phone number in your contacts. You need to meet with them in the summer, when they are not down here in Boise, and let them know what is important to you.” I sat down. Since then, no doctor has run for the legislature. I don’t know if I helped anybody do this work.

Healthcare is a big part of Idaho’s economy. More, it’s a big part of our communities, our culture. There are plenty of wacko doctors out there, and it seems the wackos like to run for office. Maybe it’s not all my fault we have little healthcare representation in our Capitol.

But we have representation as the State Constitution and law requires. But who are these guys?

I can name all my legislators. And I can tell you which have been in the local news. One has been at forums and responded to questions from local reporters. Two have not. Two of the elected representatives who vote for me in the Idaho statehouse have avoided public comment.

I didn’t vote for any of them. But they represent me. They vote for me.

I feel like Butch and Sundance after they robbed the Harriman rich guy’s train. They are running from a pack of paid hunters they can’t shake. “Who are these guys?”

I know there are issues that are coming up before the legislature that I care about. I don’t think I have much influence on their vote.

I don’t think they would listen to me.

And that right there is the end of this representative democracy. I will try harder. I wish they would too.

 

Change works, sometimes

January 7, 2025

As we age, one of life's hardest lessons to deal with is change.  Seniors can have a hell of a time with it because change often means leaving behind comfortable habits and beliefs created over many decades.  Re-education, it seems, is unlearning or leaving behind something you know - or even feel - so you can accept the new.  The different.

One example for me was when "Newsweek" magazine ended its print edition after more than 80 years of continuous publication.  I'm a former employee of the Post-Newsweek Corporation when it was in its heyday with newspapers, radio/television stations and the legendary newspaper and magazine.  The boss was Katherine Graham, a brilliant and legendary person.  When you could put "Post-Newsweek" in a byline or on a resume, you got attention.

But now, change.  Damned change!  Starting in 2013, "Newsweek" went digital - like Slate and Huffington Post. The corporate decision to go digital was probably a good one.  A necessary one.  But, I miss the ink-and-paper weekly that was.  Now the digital version is gone, too.

On another change, I'm being forced into a mental corner on a political issue.  Like the magazine change, this one may seem unimportant - even esoteric - but it's not for me.  Because it means change for all of us in the fundamental way we decide who's going to run our national government.

That issue is term limits, which I oppose.  For very sound reasons.  Former Idaho Gov. Cecil Andrus - a friend and former employer whose political judgments I had great faith in - put his position this way: "It may be necessary to break the rules of incumbency that allow politicians to reward themselves with privileges no other citizen receives.  Job security."

Another political pro, whose counsel I value - Dr. Norm Ornstein of American University.  He noted gridlock, unbridled anger and stalemate in congress when he said "Political euthanasia may be the only way to end it."

In other words, everybody out!  Over a period of two or three elections. Under term limits, replace 'em all.  The good and the bad.  Cleanse the place from wall-to-wall and gradually seat 535 new ones.  Stagger terms so there is continuity and some institutional memory.  But do it!  Guarantee fresh blood and new ideas coming from the people at each election.  No more career politicians.

It sounds good.  You can make a workable model on paper.  But the hurdles to make such a basic change in our national and state governance are many.

The most difficult to overcome would be a change in our federal constitution.  Congress - made up entirely of the people you are trying to replace - would have to approve it.  You'd need a two-thirds majority of states to adopt it.  Next,  the same sort of administrative/political steps in approving changes to the 50 state constitutions.  Or, conversely, you could start in the 50 states, then tackle the federal document.  Nearly impossible either direction.

All of that would take years.  Maybe so many years no one now alive would live to see it completed.  No easy task.  You'd have to get an overwhelming show of national public support, create many new entities to carry the message and assure the proper changes are made, then find office seekers willing to participate in their own demise.

Hardest of all would be dealing with the politicians who would have to put a gun to their own heads.  And an end to their own careers.  Many years ago, the wise, late Rep. "Mo" Udall (D-AZ) told me "You've got to keep in mind everybody back here got here by learning the rules and winning by them.  Don't look for winners to change the rules."

And, therein may lie the Achilles heel to this whole term limits business.  Much as a lot of people - right and left - would like to implement it, they may be just barking at the moon because of the legal requirements it would take to chance the Constitution.  I've never forgotten Udall's words.  Those who would make term limits their passion should remember them, too.

While admitting the system needs change - and even agreeing in principle term limits could lead to something positive - I think of the good works of a guy like Andrus as four-term Idaho governor and the Carter Administration's Secretary of the Interior.  When you term limit a Marjorie Taylor-Green, you also lose a legacy-creator like Andrus.  And the "Mo" Udall's.

Facing the huge task and costs of changing the electoral system - and with the certainty that you'd probably shut out some new and very bright minds with much to contribute to our national gain - I'm still hearing the idea of change.  But, maybe we're just not quite up to making the trade-offs.

 

The judge shortage

January 6, 2025

Very few well-qualified lawyers have applied for Idaho district court positions in recent years. District courts handle trials of felony cases, as well as all types of civil cases affecting the lives and property of individuals and businesses.  Putting these disputes in the hands of judges without substantial experience is risky business.

The problem of recruiting experienced candidates for positions on our district courts has reached crisis proportions. Periodic surveys disclose that quite a few smart, capable, middle-aged lawyers, both men and women, are interested in serving in a judicial position. However, the low pay is always named as a substantial roadblock. Almost any seasoned lawyer would have to take a pay cut of well over 50% to be a judge.

The salary concern came front and center in 2022 when the Legislature gave every state employee, except for judges, a 7% cost-of-living pay increase. Idaho judges were already at the bottom of the national pay scale. Comments in the Legislature indicated that the denial of a pay raise was in retaliation for the Idaho Supreme Court’s decision striking down a 2021 bill that would have essentially made it impossible for voters to use their constitutional power to conduct initiatives and referendums.

Some legislators have done everything in their power in these last two sessions to make district and appellate court positions unappetizing–trying to politicize the Idaho Judicial Council selection process, trying to limit or totally do away with a useful retirement option and trying to force contested elections, among other things. Those discouraging efforts have been remarkably successful in reducing the number of highly-qualified candidates who apply for district court positions.

The crux of the problem is that candidates for the district court must have ten years of legal experience–just when talented lawyers start climbing the compensation ladder. Not many of them would opt for a district court position without assurance of a favorable and reliable compensation package.

The current annual salary for district judges is $155,508 or $77.76 per hour for a 40-hour work week. Most of those judges find it necessary to devote 60-80 hours per week to adequately handle their workloads. Seven deputies in the Idaho Attorney General’s office are paid more on an hourly basis than district judges. The Legislature routinely hires lawyers in private practice to represent it in litigation on specific issues at rates exceeding $400 per hour. The district court pay level may seem high to many folks, but lawyers who take cases to court are paid much more for their work. Hiring judges is kind of like getting any other good or service, the cheapest is not usually the best. To get good value, we must generally pay a bit more.

The other judges in our judicial system are also seriously underpaid. The annual pay of Supreme Court Justices is $169,508, which equates to $81.49 per hour, comparable to the pay rate for those seven deputy AGs. Court of Appeals judges are paid $161,508, or $77.65 per hour, and magistrate judges receive $147,508, or $70.92 per hour. Those salaries all need to be increased, but the real crisis is in the district judge ranks. The appellate courts have not been as seriously impacted because those positions are more sought-after for a variety of reasons. Magistrate judge openings currently produce numerous qualified applicants, partly because magistrates do not face election contests.

The solution to the scarcity of seasoned lawyers seeking district court positions is obvious–the Legislature must substantially increase judicial salaries. In the last legislative session, the Supreme Court put forth a bill calling for a 25% increase in judicial salaries over a four-year period–!0% the first year and 5% in each of the next three years. After that, salaries would be set by a nonpartisan citizen commission, just like legislative salaries are handled. It is a worthy proposal.

Idahoans can do a big favor for the courts, and themselves, by vigorously supporting such legislation during the next legislative session. People have much to lose if our courts are deprived of trial judges who understand and can competently decide difficult suits involving the rights of individuals and businesses. Legislators need to know that penny-pinching on judges will endanger the rights of all Idahoans.

 

Three concerns for Oregon legislature

Three concerns for Oregon legislature

January 5, 2025

In contrast to the national scene, Democrats in Oregon have moved into a powerful position. Oregon’s government has returned to something you might call super-control, beyond even what’s often called a trifecta: control of the two legislative chambers and the governor’s office.

They dominate all three and even have a supermajority by holding 60% of the seats in the Legislature. That means they can adopt new taxes or raise taxes without Republican support. The Democrats in the Legislature and Gov. Tina Kotek, a former House speaker, are also likely to be aligned on most of the major issues, which could give them broad ability to do as they wish.

Their supermajority this year also comes at a time when the Republican ability to stage long-term walkouts to block legislation has been curtailed: A still-new constitutional provision penalizes legislators who have 10 or more unexcused absences by banning them from serving a subsequent term.

With few brakes on Democrats in Oregon and with frustrations over the national political scene, they may have an urge to try to fulfill long-standing wish lists.

But as the legislators and governor put together their game plan for the next session, they should maintain some discipline and not push their advantage too far because it could backfire.

To prevent that, the governor and legislators should ask themselves three questions as they prepare to decide how ambitious to be in the upcoming legislative session and beyond.

First, are you leaving enough space to deal with whatever is coming down the road from the new Trump administration?

Messages from the president-elect have been mixed and have changed with time. No one, probably including Trump himself, can say exactly what the next year of his administration will bring. But its policies and actions are highly likely to clash with the ideals and plans of the bluer parts of the country. Many people in states like Oregon have begun to prepare, but the effectiveness of their response will depend in part on what resources, time and effort are brought to bear.

A legislature and a state administration that’s tangled up with extensive internal ambitions may not be well equipped to cope with any national threats.

Second, are you sure you can properly manage what you’re seeking to do?

Oregon’s state government has been better over the years with its aspirations than with execution. The state in recent years has made major policy decisions — often highly defensible — which sounded good in theory but fell short in execution.

Oregonians could point to the Measure 110 drug initiative, public defender structuring and other efforts as examples. The dissatisfaction registered in many polls about Oregon’s government often seems to have more to do with how policies were managed than whether the core idea was sound.

And a third question, with specifically political implications: To the extent you press new ambitious efforts in this session, are you sure you have the real and effective backing of the people who cast the ballots?

Even though Oregon is classed as a blue state, the partisan margins here are tighter than they seem. Kotek, who prevailed in a thin win two years ago, might be among the first to acknowledge that.

Unlike some deeper blue states, legislative supermajorities have been fleeting and fragile. In the legislative term before the election just two decades ago, Democrats did not control either chamber of the Legislature. They have grown their leads only slightly and often have been on the edge of losing control in the Senate.

In the Senate, Democrats held a supermajority after the 2004 election, then lost it after one term. They regained it in 2008, lost it again after one term and regained it in 2018. But then they lost it after two terms. In the House, Democrats have had the supermajority only in the terms after the 2008 and 2018 election cycle — and they lost control of the House in 2010 when the chamber was split.

Democrats would be wise not to give Republicans material — especially on taxes — that they could use to claw back seats in the House or Senate, the latter of which could be slightly more favorable to Republicans in 2026.

The biennial agenda Kotek has proposed calls for serious spending, but it does place some guardrails on it. And it has focus: housing and homelessness, education and behavioral health.

It does not include all things for everyone, and is a starting point as legislators file their legislative proposals for the next session. They, too, will have their focus and desires. Both Republicans and Democrats have their own priorities and while they’re likely to meet on some issues, they’re certain to diverge on others.

It’ll be up to Democrats to shape their agenda so that it retains voter support while working through details that result in policy successes. That’s never simple, but in this term, as holders of all the executive and legislative power they need, it’s on them to do it.

Originally appeared in the Oregon Capital Chronicle.

Jimmy Carter’s forecast

January 4, 2025

The presidential historian Robert Dallek, author of books on Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson, among others, contends that it takes decades after any president leaves office to begin to assess their historical importance.

With his death on December 29 at age 100, and with Jimmy Carter having been out of office for more than 40 years, his White House tenure is ripe for reassessment, and we’ve seen plenty of that this week.

Carter’s is a complicated legacy, and making his presidential assessment even more difficult is the near universal acknowledgment that Carter was the best “former president” ever.

Two recent biographies by Jonathan Alter and Kai Bird reassess Carter as a much underappreciated president. Bird’s assessment that Carter’s “presidency was ahead of his times” is persuasive given his emphasis on human rights as a cornerstone of American foreign policy, his environmental leadership – he placed solar panels on the White House roof which Ronald Reagan later removed – and his dedication to an anti-imperial presidency.

Yet, much like Joe Biden, Carter stumbled badly in understanding the power of inflation to inflame voter resentment, and Carter’s prickly tendency to present himself as the smartest guy in every room turned off many, including fellow Democrats.

Like all presidents, perhaps save the one about to return to the White House, Jimmy Carter was a complicated guy, a rock and roll fan who taught Sunday school for 40 years, a devoted husband who admitted to lust in his heart, a nuclear submariner who spoke constantly of peace.

Yet, who among us is without contradictions, so I come to praise the late president as perhaps the most genuinely decent man to ever hold the job and one who was right on many big issues.

Most of the Carter obituaries, maybe not surprisingly, have omitted Carter’s role (and that of his Interior Secretary Cecil Andrus) in pulling off what is arguably the greatest single piece of conservation legislation ever – the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act.

The unsurprising part of the Alaska omission reflects the reality that all national politics are Washington-centric. Being a great conservation president who mastered the details of legitimate Native American claims to The Last Frontier and measured them against what Andrus called “the rape, ruin and run crowd” was lost on most political obit writers.

Still, that law, signed by Carter on December 2, 1980, nearly a month after he lost the presidency to Ronald Reagan, more than doubled the size of the national park system, while creating wildlife refuges, national monuments and preserves. It was a truly historic achievement ranking Carter with Teddy Roosevelt as a visionary in protecting American land for generations far into the future.

The New York Times printed the Alaska story on page A20.

What the obits have not omitted is the so called “malaise speech,” a televised address Carter delivered from the Oval Office on July 15, 1979. Carter titled the speech “A Crisis of Confidence,” and the word malaise was never used.

Nonetheless, the speech has taken on outsized influence as a kind of shorthand for Carter’s “weakness” as a president or, for some, televised evidence of his off putting preachiness. Carter biographer Jonathan Alter saw the speech differently, and I agree, as “the most curious, confessional, and intensely moral television address ever delivered by an American president.”

Knowing that many writing now about Carter’s legacy simply don’t have memories of his presidential period, or even more likely have accepted the conventional wisdom that the speech is evidence of some huge political miscalculation, I decided to go back this week and re-read that speech.

Viewed through the lens of the pending return of Donald Trump to the presidency – Carter called Trump a “disaster” during his first term – the 1979 speech was both a warning and a plea.

While the speech from a policy standpoint was about energy it was really about values and responsibility. Carter spoke of a “crisis of confidence,” and called for individual citizens to rededicate themselves to the nation’s enduring ideals.

“The erosion of our confidence in the future is threatening to destroy the social and the political fabric of America,” Carter said. Remember that was 45 years ago.

“The confidence that we have always had as a people is not simply some romantic dream or a proverb in a dusty book that we read just on the Fourth of July.

“It is the idea which founded our nation and has guided our development as a people. Confidence in the future has supported everything else – public institutions and private enterprise, our own families, and the very Constitution of the United States. Confidence has defined our course and has served as a link between generations. We’ve always believed in something called progress. We’ve always had a faith that the days of our children would be better than our own.”

And then this:

“We always believed that we were part of a great movement of humanity itself called democracy, involved in the search for freedom, and that belief has always strengthened us in our purpose. But just as we are losing our confidence in the future, we are also beginning to close the door on our past.

“In a nation that was proud of hard work, strong families, close-knit communities, and our faith in God, too many of us now tend to worship self-indulgence and consumption. Human identity is no longer defined by what one does, but by what one owns. But we’ve discovered that owning things and consuming things does not satisfy our longing for meaning. We’ve learned that piling up material goods cannot fill the emptiness of lives which have no confidence or purpose.”

Those were not the words of a weak president, but a moral one, and given where we sit today a prophetic one.

“As you know, there is a growing disrespect for government and for churches and for schools, the news media, and other institutions. This is not a message of happiness or reassurance, but it is the truth and it is a warning.”

In the best tradition of political leadership, Carter called for individual Americans to buck up, take more responsibility, and believe in themselves and the country.

“First of all, we must face the truth, and then we can change our course. We simply must have faith in each other, faith in our ability to govern ourselves, and faith in the future of this nation. Restoring that faith and that confidence to America is now the most important task we face. It is a true challenge of this generation of Americans.”

Given that Americans have again chosen Trump, a profoundly flawed man who has done more than anyone in our lifetimes to denigrate American institutions, while basing his fundamental appeal on division and the worst instincts of his supporters, Carter’s plea in 1979 could well be made today. It remains profoundly relevant.

“All the traditions of our past, all the lessons of our heritage, all the promises of our future point to another path, the path of common purpose and the restoration of American values. That path leads to true freedom for our nation and ourselves.”

By the time Carter gave his most famous speech his approval ratings were in the dumpster, inflation was running high and political change was in the air. The man who made Carter a one-term president, Ronald Reagan, dismissed the speech saying he didn’t see anything wrong with America or Americans. And that explains a lot about The Gipper and his nearly infallible sense of what a politically advantageous position looked and sounded like.

Reagan would later declare it “morning in America,” a country that was a shining city on a hill, but which man, given where we find ourselves, had a better grasp on the “real America?”

Carter, as close to a 20th Renaissance Man as has ever occupied the White House, was really calling, Lincoln-like, for our better angels to assert themselves. That they did not was, at least not entirely, his fault – “The fault dear Brutus,” as Shakespeare wrote, “is not in our stars but in ourselves.”

Carter understood, certainly understood better than most who found his presidency wanting, that all great nations, as Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. would later write in The Cycles of American History, undergo “patterns of alternation, of ebb and flow, in human history.”

We are in the midst of one of Schlesinger’s cycles right now – an ebbing of faith in democracy – a cycle of immense division where character and competence in public officials counts less than their ability to keep us riled up, anxious about our place, and hating someone or something. The rightwing denigration of democratic institutions, the utter disdain for “elitist” expertise, is now the defining characteristic of our time. The threat this presents to the country is surely in keeping with the central warning of Jimmy Carter’s much maligned speech.

If Carter’s message of the need for unity and sacrifice and coming together was too much for Americans to absorb in 1979 it could just be that the timing of his departure was close to perfect. We’re reflecting on Carter’s good and productive life, and his lifelong striving to do good, while waiting – again – for a man with vastly different inclinations.

Carter’s life – and his “malaise speech” – remind us what’s at stake when we trust our government, and indeed our future, to genuinely unserious, hateful and petty people.

The next months will tell us just how unserious we have become. Jimmy Carter, one might say, saw it all coming a long time ago.

 

Carter and Idaho

Carter and Idaho

January 3, 2025

The last time a Democrat won Idaho’s vote for president was 60 years ago, in 1964, when Lyndon Johnson prevailed in a landslide nationally and narrowly in Idaho, and Republicans have won the state easily since. In these last six decades, the highest Democratic percentage for the office, 37.1%, was won by Jimmy Carter, who died at 100 on December 29. (Barack Obama in 2008 came next highest, at 36.1%.)

Carter’s numbers fell by about 12 points four years later, a drop more severe than he experienced nationally. Some of that may relate to the candidacy of Ronald Reagan, who was almost preternaturally popular in Idaho.

But Idaho, and its politics, changed during those Carter years in various ways, and probably more than the nation’s did. Not all of it - not most of it, for that matter - was directly attributable to Carter himself. But the Carter era, with all it entailed in Carter’s own action and the opposition to him, was something of a pivot for Idaho, as it would be in many other places. And a president famously unconcerned about the political impacts of his actions was not well positioned to oppose a wave rising up against him.

The Carter Administration did have an effect on Idaho directly in a number of ways, in some places economically but not least its environment. Carter’s Interior secretary - the only cabinet member to serve all through that administration - was Cecil Andrus, plucked from the Idaho governorship. He had a real impact on federal lands policy, most famously perhaps in Alaska, but to a great degree in Idaho as well. Carter signed the Central Idaho Wilderness Act (pushed by Andrus and Senator Frank Church) in 1980, and it formed the basis of what has become the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness.

Carter may, in fact, have had a closer connection to Idaho in a practical way than any president in the last century. As a naval officer, he worked with the National Reactor Testing Station at Idaho Falls. (The Carter Administration years were a growth time for the site.) He vacationed for several days on the remote Middle Fork of the Salmon, and visited Grand Teton National Park.

Carter took a lot of blame for the reversals in those years in Idaho’s timber industry, though most of the trends that saw its diminishment both predated and followed his time in office. (Northern Idaho’s mining industry cratered during the Reagan years, though Reagan never was blamed for that.) This was on top of the many other complaints against Carter of a national scope, from the economy to the hostages in Tehran to the Panama Canal treaty.

But Carter’s unpopularity in Idaho was something remarkable to see, a ferocious anger out of degree and proportion with whatever disagreements many Idahoans may have had with him, and of a different kind than was normal for Idaho. It was a kind of dismissive fury new to politics in the area, probably made possible by the broader disillusionment of the Vietnam and Watergate periods. And it has carried through over time. Democratic presidents since have been able to gain no traction except in the diminishing blue sectors of the state; the mention that a person or candidate is Democratic often is enough to shut down the listening before another word is said. This was not true a half-century ago.

That change in the social environment was an opportunity for political activists, many of them national rather than local in origin, who fed on a growing sense of cynicism to develop a politics of antagonism - one of far less interest in what one’s own party or preferences could do, and bitter anger toward the other guys, who over time became redefined from loyal opposition to deadly enemies.

These are some of the reasons the Carter years were among the central turning points taking our politics from what was to what is, unfortunately, today. And Idaho turns out to be one of the best case studies for it.