The Rise of Brown Christian Nationalists

The mantra is simple: God, Country and Family. It is the new calling card of a rising Hispanic populist right-wing, a new member of the GOP MAGA constituency, filled with election deniers and populated by many once considered loyal Democratics. They are fiercely Roman Catholic (or evangelical) – adhering to the most traditional and fundamental tenets of their faith. They believe that it is the Democrats who deserted them, not the reverse. Even as some of these voting citizens struggle with English, representing their status as legal-immigrants-now-citizens, they decry the massive immigration they see on our southern border.

They followed the rules, mostly at a time when Ronald Reagan’s path to citizenship allowed them or their parents to achieve citizenship though a legal and predictable process, and do not want newbie immigrants, increasingly from countries south of Mexico, to have the same opportunity. It is noteworthy that Congress has not been able to pass meaningful immigration reform since that Reagan era. The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 and the resulting Reagan amnesty program a year later, were the last significant elements of immigration reform enacted by Congress. The law applied only to existing undocumented residents, not future immigrants.

No longer simply those male Latinos, attracted to the machismo they recognized and admired in Donald Trump, this new faction represents a national voting pattern that had 28% of Hispanics vote for Mr. Trump in 2016, rising to 32% in 2020. In elections where a single percentage point can be the margin of victory, this is beyond significant. Let me dissect the meaning of that God, Country and Family mantra that is at the core of this Hispanic vote. “God” means conservative Christianity, mostly Catholicism. They believe that abortion, homosexuality and anything other than a traditional “male/female” gender definition defile their faith. “Country” embraces the anti-immigration posture described above with a strong revulsion over governmental regulation and social programs. And “family” is a deeply anti-LGBTQ+ vision that completely rejects both gay marriage and the ability of gay couples to adopt children.

While most of this right-wing assemblage is comprised of older Hispanic voters, the shift in voting patterns noted above is increasingly a function of younger (Y and Z) generations now rising into political maturity. Like their older religious peers, they have never been comfortable with White candidates asking for their votes. But as fellow Hispanic candidates, embracing these ultra-conservative views, enter political races, this “brown like me” factor is making its mark.

They do not believe that the United States is a secular nation and join in fellow White evangelicals in a belief that Christianity should indeed be our recognized national religion, while accepting that other faiths could practice their beliefs. Many reject the notion that our First Amendment represents an official separation of church and state, a pattern that is now seeping into Supreme Court opinions.

The new face of this right-wing Hispanic movement – noting that she does not believe that prioritizing God, Country and Family is remotely right-wing – is the Congressperson from the South Texas 34th District, a 36-year-old deeply religious millennial, Mayra Flores. Her official Website reads: “Voters in District 34 have realized we no longer have to beg for scraps from Nancy Pelosi and the Washington liberals. As the first Mexican-born woman to serve in Congress, I am fighting for opportunity and security for all those living in our amazing district. Our America First policies resonate with the Hispanic community and others who live in this district. For over 100 years, the Democrat Party has taken for granted the loyalty and support South Texas has given them for decades. But they do nothing to earn our vote or our support. And meanwhile, President Biden is killing Texas jobs, weakening border security, and weakening our standing in the world. Enough is enough.”

Given the strong Democratic reaction to Dobbs vs Jackson Women’s Health Organization, which reversed Roe vs Wade this year, and the rainbow coalition the operates under the umbrella of Democratic politics and platforms, regaining traction among religiously conservative Hispanics seems a longshot for Democrats. Flores is now the darling of the GOP’s most conservative, right-wing faction, being pulled into their showcase events like this last August’s Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) event which featured speakers like Hungary’s White nationalist Prime Minister, Viktor Orbán, and even Donald Trump.

While Democrats are gaining some traction among women in general, particularly those with some higher education, unless they are able to recapture a meaningful segment of working-class Americans, who had migrated into MAGA land where they embrace GOP culture wars with passion, and pull in more politically disillusioned liberal younger citizens of voting age who traditionally do not vote, they are going to watch close elections, where, even if they win, they will be challenged in the courts… and perhaps by violent right-wing resistance. Uphill battles, particularly in a midterm election year where incumbent parties traditionally lose congressional seats… to say the least.

I’m Peter Dekom, and the Democratic tent needs to expand, on bread and butter issues in support of our democracy, to ensure that those that should indeed vote as Democrats… really do.

Prescription Drug Pricing Tilted to Support Greed

Let face a few harsh facts about American healthcare. We spend about 70% more per capita on average healthcare costs than the next most expensive country and double what is spent by the average developed country. The Affordable Care Act took a lot of people off the uninsured list, but that statute’s optional expansion of Medicaid (for our lowest economic tier) has been spotty at best in red states. Too many Americans are either not covered or are under-insured. How bad is it? Tens of millions of Americans fall into healthcare gaps. These hard numbers (from the September 13th COVID supplement to the LA Times) are just one clear example of our failed system: “The United States accounts for a little more than 4% of the world’s population, but it’s responsible for about 16% of the world’s COVID-19 deaths.”

Our record on the cost of prescription drugs, however, is worse. In order to get the ACA passed in 2010, the resulting healthcare exchanges were not permitted to negotiate what the pharmaceutical companies charged, so we have by far the highest prescription drug prices in the developed world.

We are also the only developed country without universal healthcare. Contrary to reports to the contrary, universal healthcare does not necessarily get rid of private insurance carriers. It is NOT “socialism” in any true meaning of the word. In Germany, for example, private carriers administer that nation’s uniform healthcare policy for a capped fee… and as for prescription drugs, no one pays more than €10/month. Healthcare there is first rate, also covering dental, hearing and vision. See also my January 9th Americans - The Biggest Healthcare Suckers on Earth blog.

What many Americans do not realize is that many US companies, particularly those manufacturers which provide union-mandated health insurance for employees, have to factor in those costs into the products and services they provide. And those companies have to compete against companies based overseas where companies do not need to factor in those costs in their pricing structure. Not to mention that international healthcare costs as vastly cheaper anyway. This is a strong negative for American businesses and workers.

Recent legislation addressing some of these issues passed Congress without any Republican support. Berkeley Lovelace Jr. writing for NBCNews.com, August 16th described one major issue and how that Inflation Reduction Act impacts drug costs, mostly for seniors facing the donut hole in their Medicare coverage: “Exorbitant drug prices in the United States are a key reason many people in the U.S. are forced to skip or delay filling their needed prescriptions. A Kaiser Family Foundation poll published last month [July] found that nearly 1 in 2 adults report difficulty affording their health care expenses, including their prescribed medications…

“Under the new law, the U.S. government is now able to negotiate prices on the costliest prescription drugs, cap costs at $2,000 per year for people on Medicare, limit the monthly cost of insulin to $35 for seniors, and extend subsidies for people buying their own health coverage through the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare. The law also provides free vaccines for seniors…

“Starting in 2026, Medicare will begin negotiating the price of 10 drugs [to be named in 2023], followed by an additional 15 drugs in 2027, and eventually an additional 20 drugs in 2029 and beyond. The negotiation process applies to drugs covered under Medicare Part D that lack a generic or comparable alternative, though drugs under Medicare Part B will eventually be included.” But there is still a huge “mega-fly” in our prescription drug ointment: greed.

Yet, there is no legislation on most of the rest of our nation’s drug pricing. When it comes to highly specialized life-saving drugs, pharmas are increasingly pricing those prescriptions based on the cost of the process that the drug is replacing. No reference to actual costs even with a substantial mark-up. Because they can. Michael Hiltzik, writing for the September 11th Los Angeles Times, tells us about one niche product – with a 90% cure rate for rare a blood disorder (beta thalassemia that impacts only about 1500 Americans) that otherwise requires transfusions as often as every two weeks – where the price for the treatment drug (Zynteglo) is outrageous!

“[The above 90% Zynteglo cure rate is] a life-changing development for those with the inherited condition, many of whom are otherwise condemned to receiving blood transfusions as often as every two weeks. The median age of death of those with beta thalassemia, which is typically diagnosed within a few weeks of birth, is 37… Zynteglo is remarkable for another reason, not so happy. At the price of $2.8 million set by its developer, Cambridge, Mass.-based Bluebird Bio, it’s the most expensive single-treatment drug ever approved in the U.S.

“That makes it ‘one hell of a policy challenge,’ in the words of health insurance expert David Anderson of Duke University… The reason, Anderson explains, is that although Zynteglo might be cost-effective over the long term and from a social perspective, even at $2.8 million, the one-year charge for it can bring ruin to an insurer’s profit-and-loss statement… The previous standard cure involved finding a matched donor of healthy red blood cells — typically a sibling. The donor’s healthy cells could be transplanted into patients to supplant the inherited cells, which can’t efficiently carry oxygen, leading to severe anemia.

“Fewer than 1 in 4 patients have access to a matched donor, according to a report on Zynteglo issued in July by the Institute for Clinical and Economic Review, or ICER, an independent nonprofit that evaluates data to help healthcare stakeholders decide on prices and access to treatments… Others require transfusions every two to five weeks as well as regular chelation treatment, which removes iron from the blood… Their average life expectancy is far below that of healthy people…

“Bluebird has rationalized the high price of Zynteglo by referring to the lifetime cost of transfusions and chelation therapy, which the company says can run as high as $6.4 million… ‘Prices just keep getting higher and higher,’ says Rita F. Redberg, a UC San Francisco cardiologist and an expert in assessing new medical technologies for effectiveness. ‘It used to be that $5,000 sounded high, and now we’re at $2.8 million. It’s wild.’… In our system, insurers saddled with the one-time cost of a treatment aimed at creating economic benefits in the future can’t be assured of reaping those benefits themselves, because of the possibility that the patient will be covered by a different insurer in the future… Perversely, that’s less of an issue for drugs aimed at large populations of disease patients.” It also an argument for why affording treatments that cost so much is easily amortized within a national healthcare system, noting that so much underlying research is funded in whole or in part by the government anyway.

I’m Peter Dekom, and it is time for Americans to wake up to a government that has no issue with deregulation and tax cuts for the super-rich but finds consistent GOP resistance to programs like universal healthcare – available in every other developed nation on earth – for the rest of us.

The Fraudulent War Against Immigrants

 

Let’s start with the proposition that with the lowest unemployment rate since those statistics have been reported, no one is losing jobs because of any influx of migrants, even as most undocumented migrants to the United States are sent back across the border anyway. Let’s add that fact that there is a severe shortage of affordable childcare workers due to low pay, alternative job opportunities, and our dramatic departure from the norms of other developed nations that do provide genuine subsidized childcare to their residents. We also need workers in the fields to harvest crops that often rot for lack of migrants that once performed those backbreaking tasks. Every time we have tried to induce U.S. citizens to perform the low-pay, physically demanding work done by immigrants who have crossed our southern border, those jobs remain unfilled. Reality! And still our elected leaders complain… but refuse to pass the needed legislation. Americans are losing out at every level.

Busses recently sent from Texas dumped misled immigrants, legally and legitimately in the U.S. as bona fide asylum seekers, into New York City, to Biden’s home state of Delaware and even to Washington, D.C. near the Vice President’s residence. This was but one small part of a pattern of GOP efforts, led by Governors Doug Ducey (Arizona), Greg Abbott (Texas) and Ron DeSantis (Florida) in open collusion with each other, to move asylum-seekers, those qualified and protected under an international treaty signed by the United States years ago, from red states to big cities in blue states. Unfortunately for the governors, immigration policy under our Constitution, rests with the federal government, not the states. But then, as we have seen repeatedly, the Constitution is merely an inconvenience to those with more autocratic goals and values.

“Florida's Republican governor on Friday [9/16] defended his decision to fly dozens of migrants [from Venezuela, a socialist dictatorship] to the wealthy vacation island of Martha's Vineyard from Texas, and said similar actions could follow as a political dispute over border security deepened in the run-up to U.S. elections in November… DeSantis claimed credit for a pair of chartered flights on Wednesday [9/15] that carried around 50 migrants to Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, as part of a broader Republican effort to shift responsibility for border crossers to Democratic leaders.

“At a news conference in Daytona Beach, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis blamed Democratic President Joe Biden for what he portrayed as a failure to stop migrants from crossing the U.S.-Mexico border, as a record 1.8 million have been arrested this fiscal year… DeSantis said the Florida Legislature set aside $12 million to transport migrants out of the state and that his government would likely use the funds ‘to protect Florida.’… ‘There may be more flights, there may be buses,’ he said to cheers and applause from backers in the crowd.” Reuters, Sept. 16th.

A Florida governor sending migrants from Texas to Massachusetts is not game playing? Millions of Florida taxpayer dollars to move people to and from states that have nothing to do with Florida? For persons legally in the United States? Oh, and Massachusetts welcomed the misled migrants and provided immediate food and shelter. Like blue states don’t have migrant border issues too? Welcome to California and New Mexico! They aren’t sending busses to red states!!! But they are open to provide abortion services to those women denied in red states!

Could DeSantis’ effort also be criminal human trafficking? Or worse, given that these migrants were lied to when they were recruited to travel, could it actually be kidnapping? “Whoever, without lawful authority, forcibly or secretly confines or imprisons another person within this commonwealth against his will, or forcibly carries or sends such person out of this commonwealth, or […] kidnaps another person, with intent either to cause him to be secretly confined or imprisoned in this commonwealth against his will, or to cause him to be sent out of this commonwealth against his will or in any way held to service against his will…” Massachusetts General Laws chapter 265 section 26. Courts have interpreted fraudulent inducement to cause transportation as enough.

At least, DeSantis faces a civil lawsuit: Those Venezuelan legal migrants flown to the upscale Martha's Vineyard sued Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and his transportation secretary in federal court in Boston on September 20th, for engaging in a “fraudulent and discriminatory scheme” to relocate them… The lawsuit says that that the migrants were told they were going to Boston or Washington, “which was completely false,” and were induced with perks such as $10 McDonald's gift certificates. Plus, such abusive treatment of asylum seekers almost assures their being granted legal residence.

Nevertheless, Congress has shot down one immigration bill after another; the last major reform occurred decades ago during the Reagan administration. Republicans have even voted down proposals from their own GOP presidents. We desperately need a guest-worker provision, to deal with the DACA kids, to bolster our Border Patrol with more staffing and to develop a viable asylum/path to a green card and even citizenship.

As nations that did not generate big migrant issues in the past – recently Nicaragua, Cuba and Venezuela – add people to the mix, Republicans claim (DeSantis above) the Biden administration is offering nothing more than an open door to the undocumented. Somehow, that the Biden administration routinely expels 100,000 of these undocumented per month, gets ignored in a flurry of convenient but wildly inaccurate myths, promulgated by GOP bigwigs vying for Trump endorsements or a shot at the presidency.

That these efforts to remake federal immigration law, without any clear mandate from a Congress that refuses to deal with this nightmare, represent the worst of the worst, cruel and manipulative inhumanity, from a nation of immigrants, one that violently displaced indigenous peoples to take their land. It is remarkable that the purportedly Christian values of tolerance, charity, kindness and non-judgmentalism are now considered morally objectionable “woke” beliefs, a position embraced by a vast cadre of evangelical preachers who must find the New Testament an inconvenient truth… or perhaps a menu from which they can pick and choose.

America has long since lost the moral high ground in the eyes of most of the world. But if we do not change our ways, we move from being an open democracy to joining that assemblage of pariah nations seeking illiberalism, autocracy if you will, as the only path forward for the United States. Is this what made America great? Is this the course to make America great again?

I’m Peter Dekom, and we face too many religious leaders who find the Bible to be an inconvenient truth and GOP candidates and elected officials who find the Constitution to be an inconvenient speed bump.

Is Italy the Next Hungary?

Is Italy the Next Hungary?

An EU Wave of White Christian Nationalism

We’ve watched serious, right-wing populist movements rise across Europe, all with deeply racial, ethnic and religious bias at the core. Sometimes gender-issue intolerant as well. Immigration is often the focus, particularly as wars, resource scarcity and climate change are pushing escalating numbers of people to leave their native homes, businesses and farms simply to survive. Back in June, Marine Le Pen’s far-right Rassemblement National made such historic gains in France’s second round parliamentary election so as to deny President Emmanuel Macron a clear majority needed to control the legislative process.

At the core of her platform is and was a powerful anti-immigrant posture, very much reflecting the supremacy of French cultural and religious values. White Christian nationalism. Blaming immigrants and people “not like us” is increasingly good politics and terrible policy, perhaps a terminal infection to democracy itself. But that blame game is growing fast globally.

Poland’s President, Andrzej Duda, and the prevailing Law and Justice Party also reflect this trending European bias against racial, ethnic and religious minorities, particularly immigrants. But Duda’s politics are relatively mild when compared to the policies and practices of Hungary’s PM, Viktor Orbán, whose self-declared illiberalism has hoisted racial, religious and ethnic purity as the primary guiding doctrine in his country. A darling of the American right, Orbán’s repressive extremism has drawn the official wrath of the European Union itself, which declared that “Hungary can no longer be considered a full democracy,” but “an electoral autocracy” in which basic democratic norms aren’t observed. See also my September 22nd blog, To the Viktor Belong the Spoils. White Christian Nationalism.

What is also common to these leaders is also a proclivity either to avoid a hardline or lockstep NATO condemnation of Vladimir Putin… often even supporting the Russian dictator… in addition to their extreme exclusionary beliefs about people not “born” of the home country. “Hungary’s governing party says it wants to poll citizens on whether they support European Union sanctions imposed on Russia over its war in Ukraine … The Fidesz [Orbán’s party] caucus leader, Mate Kocsis, said at a news conference Thursday [9/22] that the party plans to call for a ‘national consultation’ on energy sanctions that he said had been decided on by the EU’s ‘Brussels elite.’” Associated Press, September 24th.

The next nation falling prey to this insidious European MAGA-equivalent is Italy. In a country facing severe economic peril that has been unable to create a stable government in over a decade – there have been seven elected governments in eleven years – right-wing populism is rising again. Indeed, a coalition led by the Brothers of Italy (Fratelli d'Italia) party, reflecting a right-wing movement that had elected radical right-wing Italy Forward (Forza Italia) party Sylvio “bunga bunga” Berlusconi PM three times, just swept Giorgia Meloni into office – Italy’s first female PM. Also the farthest right of any elected Italian leader since WWII. While a center right party slightly moderated her message as part of her 4-party coalition, Meloni’s group won 44% of the vote to take control of Italy’s Senate and the Chamber of Deputies.

She’s been labeled a fascist, an extremist and a de facto heir to 20th century dictator Benito Mussolini… consistent with the White Christian nationalist policies at the core of the alliance between Hitler and Mussolini. While she has criticized Putin, she has also supported his party line. She is way too comfortable with Berlusconi’s recent statements; he’s still a prominent player in national politics.

According to the BBC (September 23rd), Berlusconi recently “said the reporting, pushed by separatist forces and nationalist politicians in the Russian government, had left Mr Putin with no choice but to launch a limited invasion… ‘Putin was pushed by the Russian population, by his party and by his ministers to invent this special operation,’ he said… ‘The troops were supposed to enter, reach Kyiv in a week, replace the Zelensky government with decent people and a week later come back,’ Mr Berlusconi added. Meloni is a radical cut of the same cloth.

Writing for the Associated Press (and set out in the September 23rd Los Angeles Times), Tom Kington and Tracy Wilkinson note: “Traditional democracy is taking hits, from Europe to Asia to the United States, where rogue politicians are whittling away at trust in a democratic system… These trends are fueled, analysts say, by anti-immigrant sentiment, disaffection with traditional politics and general unhappiness with the economy and prospects for the future. In countries such as Italy, there is an easy reach back to a fascist past for historical foundation.

“Meloni, 45, has won backing with her hard-line anti-immigrant positions, a trend in several right-wing political parties making gains in parts of Europe, which has seen the arrival of hundreds of thousands of people fleeing Syria and elsewhere. She was roundly criticized for using in her campaign a video of an immigrant purportedly raping a woman in an Italian city… Promoting what she calls traditional Christian values, Meloni opposes abortion and same-sex marriage and parenting. ‘Yes to the natural family!’ she says at rallies.

“She has pledged to cut taxes and this week [pre-election] said she would put a cap on gas prices, saying she was ready to govern and planned to keep her right-wing coalition together despite some differences. She has attempted to moderate her positions to become more palatable to a broader Italian electorate — though she often switches back to more radical positions.

“‘For the last decade the left has managed to stay in power ... not by winning election ... but through under-the-table deals,’ she said in a video recorded in Italian, English and French to respond to those who would call her a threat to democracy — a narrative, she said, promoted by the left… Supporters describe her as charismatic and sensible.”

Unlike Germany, with uncensored high school textbooks and mandatory visits to concentration camps, which has admitted its guilt, Mussolini was just a nasty blip in Italy’s complex and often checkered past. There is no local universal revulsion against that fascist leader. In fact, Italy has elected several pro-fascist leaders following defeat in WWII. Meloni is only the latest, coming at a time when radical right-wing politics is rapidly infecting democracies the world over, including the United States.

How many of these Western shifts to the autocratic right does it take to wipe democracy from a meaningful position in global governance? Is the same reality happening here in the United States, as GOP values amplify White Christian nationalism? As I watch elected politicians lure asylum seekers, legally in the United States, with false promises, using these migrants as political pawns, as right-wing militia and overt conspiracy theorists champion the autocratic vectors of election deniers, and as our former President continues to poke and goad extremists, I wonder if our democracy will be the next to fall.

I’m Peter Dekom, and if you ever believed that democracy was indestructible, it’s time for you to make a major reset recalculation.

Hydro and Go Seek

Glen Cyn Dam on the Upper Colorado

Hydro and Go Seek

When Climate Change Slams Green Energy Too

This summer Glen Canyon Dam (at Lake Powell) was about 32 feet away from shutting down its ability to generate electricity. In what used to be normal times, with a total capacity of 1,320 megawatts, Glen Canyon Powerplant produces around five billion kilowatt-hours of hydroelectric power annually which is distributed by the Western Area Power Administration to Wyoming, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, and Nebraska. Government sources suggest that the new normal would produce about half of what that “old normal.” The story is not dissimilar from other major regional dams, like the Hoover Dam on the lower Colorado River (at Lake Mead), which seriously impacts power for Nevada, Arizona and California.

The irony is that hydroelectric power is a highly touted green energy source that is part of our climate change solution. To give you an idea of the impact, during its periods of “old normal” operation, Glen Canyon generates enough power to offset 6.7 billion pounds (3 billion kg) of carbon dioxide emissions each year. But as the water flow drops, so does the offset. How bad can it get? Let’s take a look at Sichuan China, where massive hydroelectric capacity has been a Godsend to weaning off demon coal-fired electrical power. So bad, it seems that demon-coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel of them, just might make a huge comeback in the People’s Republic.

China’s story is mission critical for us all. Still heavily dependent on coal-fired electrical power generation (literally half of its electricity), China alone is responsible for a third of the planet’s greenhouse gas emissions. So as China strives to shift into alternative power, avoiding fossil fuels, its successes are gratifying… but its failures are deeply disappointing. A massive power outage recently impacted not just Sichuan (particularly China high tech-city, Chengdu) but other major urban centers, like Shanghai, that depend on Sichuan’s hydroelectric power to meet their basic electricity requirements.

In other words, when a massive investment in hydroelectric power (generators powered by water in a controlled pour through a large dam) results in a huge regional power failure – because water levels have fallen below the level needed to move sufficient water through those dams – the world takes notice. It is also a lesson for those of us in the United States, particularly those in the regions noted above, as to what can happen as global warming, and the resulting rising human demand for water, reduce dammed water supplies to dangerously low levels.

Writing from the September 14th Los Angeles Times, Stephanie Yang tells us: “With 80% of its electricity coming from hydropower, the province of Sichuan in southern China has been lauded as a model for a clean-energy future in the nation most crucial to the global fight against climate change… The province usually has such an abundance of power that it sends a surplus east to Shanghai and other cities…

“As the world strives to wean itself from fossil fuels to stave off the worst effects of climate change — including sea level rise, more severe storms and more frequent droughts — it has become clear that renewables are not without their own shortcomings. Transitioning to them as the planet continues to warm is far from painless.

“The danger is that energy crunches such as the one in Sichuan could push China — the world’s biggest emitter of heat-trapping greenhouse gases — to revert to burning more of its massive coal reserves. Other countries, most notably India, face the same temptation as their electricity demands grow.

“Though the Chinese government has committed to ambitious carbon reductions, the turmoil from more power shortages is the last thing President Xi Jinping needs as he prepares to break precedent and begin a third five-year term… ‘Any power cuts or limitations would create potential social instability. That’s what the Chinese government doesn’t want,’ said Hongqiao Liu, a Paris energy policy consultant. ‘This Sichuan event really exposes all the bottlenecks in the current system.’

“This summer’s drought and intense heat wave have killed crops and livestock, threatening the country’s food supply. Factories halted operations because of power cuts, further hurting industrial output at a time of sluggish economic growth… On Chinese social media, electric vehicle drivers complained of hourlong lines at charging stations. Office workers toiling away without air conditioning posted pictures of large ice blocks stationed around desks and in front of electric fans.

“Others shared photos of small bottles of an herbal liquid, used in traditional Chinese medicine to alleviate the effects of summer heat… More than 1,000 miles away, skyscrapers along Shanghai’s downtown waterfront went dark for two days too as a result of the power shortage in Sichuan.” Think it cannot happen here? It’s more than just losing electricity. Even here in sizzling Los Angeles, 30% of rental apartments lack air conditioning. Local county supervisors, city councils and even the state legislature are considering new regulations requiring landlords to provide cooling for apartments that hit certain maximums.

Red alert to the seven western states that signed the Colorado River water allocation pact in 1922: “The compact — essentially an interstate treaty — set the rules for apportioning the waters of the river. It was a crucial step in construction of Hoover Dam, which could not have been built without the states’ assent… The compact stands as a landmark in the development of Los Angeles, San Diego, Denver, Phoenix and other Western metropolises. But it is also a symbol of the folly of unwarranted expectations… That’s because the compact was built on a lie about the capacity of the Colorado River to serve the interests of the Western states — a lie that Westerners will be grappling with for decades to come” Michael Hiltzik, Los Angeles Times, September 21st.

Need more proof? Between global warming and the unrealistic expectation of the Colorado River’s water capacity, the “ ultimate danger is that Lake Mead reaches the ‘dead pool’ stage. At the end of [August], Lake Mead was at 1,044.28 feet of surface elevation above sea level. That’s about 100 feet below its level in August 2003 and about 180 feet below its record elevation of 1,225 feet, reached in July 1983. When the level falls to 950 feet, the lake can no longer generate hydroelectricity. At 895 feet, the dam can’t release water downstream.” Hiltzik.

Combine these realities with a recent mid-August week+ of consecutive temperatures over 100 degrees in California, the future of climate change induced killer heat waves has scared us all. Water resources are dwindling. California has also banned gasoline powered vehicle sales after 2035. What we do not know, what has been made more complicated as exemplified by Sichuan’s recent outage, is exactly how we are going to get there… particularly as large corporate interests, backed by intense GOP resistance to government spending on alternative energy, resist the obvious stepped-up construction of alternative energy sources. Back to coal?!!!

I’m Peter Dekom, and the worst alternative would be to lapse back to increased reliance on fossil fuel (particularly never-clean-coal) power generation, which will only make a really bad climate change reality absolutely intolerable.

Politically Motivated Lying Has a Rich History

                                    

“Tell a lie loud enough and long enough and people will believe it.” 

Adolph Hitler

“With satanic joy in his face, the black-haired Jewish youth lurks in wait for the unsuspecting girl whom he defiles with his blood, thus stealing her from her people.” 

Adolph Hitler, whose purges and concentration camp slaughter claimed the lives of 6 million Jews.

“Cigarette smoking is no more ‘addictive’ than coffee, tea, or Twinkies.”

 In 1994, what James W. Johnston, CEO of R.J. Reynolds, told a congressional committee, after millions of American had perished from cigarette-caused heart disease and lung cancer.

“We are not about to send American boys nine or ten thousand miles away from home to do what Asian boys ought to be doing for themselves.” 

President Lyndon Johnson, in the fall of 1964, less than 6 months before he began sending US troops to Vietnam. Aside from the damage to America’s reputation and the untold numbers of civilian casualties, 58 thousand American lives were lost.

“There is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction.” 

W’s VP, Dick Cheney, before thousands of Americans and hundreds of thousands, if not more, of Iraqis have died in a war that lasted eight years and cost $2.4 trillion.

“In today’s regulatory environment, it’s virtually impossible to violate rules.” 

Fund manager Bernie Madoff addressing potential investors in 2007. After bilking 4,800 clients of billions of dollars over decades, he was sentenced to 150 years in prison.

"These are the things and events that happen when a sacred landslide election victory is so unceremoniously & viciously stripped away from great patriots who have been badly & unfairly treated for so long… Go home with love & peace." 

Donald Trump in the late afternoon of the January 6, 2021 Capitol insurrection. The death toll and damage are continuing, and he has publicly decried a “stolen election” well over a hundred times.

These are just a few of the most damaging lies in the last century. There are thousands more, a proclivity that seems to afflict autocrats more than those favoring democracy… but lies have become the most widely disseminated political currency in the modern world. On all sides. Not that the ancient world was bereft of mendacity. As Mark Kurlansky, writing for the September 11th Los Angeles Times, notes: “Lying is as old as the human race. And every advancement in communications has facilitated it.” His piece, A history of the ‘Big Lie,’ from Plato to TikTok, goes on to say:

“The year was 375 BCE, the critic was Plato and the still relatively new medium was the written word, which, despite his many reservations, he used to circulate his oral dialogues with Socrates… Plato, though he was concerned about the written word, wasn’t actually opposed to lying under all circumstances. In fact, he believed societies needed what he called ‘a grand lie,’ a deception intentionally spun to serve a civic purpose, a great national myth that would help forge a nation’s identity.” Except it did not work out that way.

“The printing press, invented in the 15th century, helped spread lies too, just as the written word had. After the English Civil War in the 17th century, lies defaming Oliver Cromwell kept the presses busy. In 1665, a fake cookbook, supposedly by Cromwell’s wife but full of fraudulent attacks on her husband, was published. The lying cookbook was invented.

“One of the most successful examples of lying in print was a pamphlet first circulated in Russia in 1905. It was so clumsily written and so obviously untrue that it should have died quickly. Instead ‘The Protocols of the Elders of Zion’ has been translated into many languages, is still being published and is widely available on social media today… The ‘Protocols’ claimed to be the stolen notes of a meeting of a secret organization of Jewish leaders conspiring to take over the world. There never was such a meeting because there never was such an organization. That the ‘Protocols’ still survives proves the durability of unconvincing lies and the utter unoriginality of today’s liars.

“With the growth of newspapers, new opportunities for lying emerged. Now a liar needed only to convince a reporter in order to spread a lie to a mass audience. At the beginning of World War One in August 1914, the French spread false reports of atrocities in German-occupied Belgium to motivate allied soldiers. A London Times correspondent reported that a German soldier had ‘chopped off the arms of a baby which clung to his mother’s skirts.’…

“[Next,] Radio was a big step forward for lying. Father Charles Coughlin, a Catholic priest in Michigan whose antisemitic radio broadcasts were extremely popular in 1930s America, referred to the ‘Protocols’ as evidence of a Jewish conspiracy. Coughlin was a pioneer in talk radio, spewing out lies on the radio with no one to contradict him.” Kurlansky. Then, with lots of visuals, television, particularly television news, became less news and more opinion as multiple channels telecasting 24/7 became the norm.

There was a time in the United States when outlandish conspiracy theories were relegated to small pockets of extremists, often scattered across the land. But once these pockets of mendacious perception became linked via the Internet, actually social media, their power and numbers exploded, accelerated by the post-2004 lifting of the assault weapons ban followed by the introduction of upwards of 20 million semiautomatic assault rifles into civilian hands, disproportionately, extremists. Mass shootings and armed intimidation has followed. You have to wonder what Adolph Hitler would have been able to perpetrate if he had had access to the Internet. All he had was radio, newsprint and propaganda films that did not travel well.

“[T]he great master of radio lying was Hitler’s propaganda minister, Joseph Goebbels. ‘It would not have been possible for us to take power or to use it in the ways we have without the radio,’ he once said. He distributed radios to the public. Having one of these official radios was a sign of being a good Nazi, not only because they were decorated with swastikas, but because they were capable of picking up only Nazi Party frequencies… But all sides were using the radio to get their stories out. In 1945, as World War II ended, Alexandre Koyré, a French philosopher and science historian, commented, ‘Never has there been so much lying as in our day. Never has lying been so shameless, so systematic, so unceasing.’

“The exact same thing is being said today about the rise of social media. But there are differences now… Social media celebrates amateurism. Any idiot can weigh in… And it’s easy to use effectively. Donald Trump can put out an immense volume of lies on his own and dispatch them to tens of millions of people in a moment. Goebbels, however, required a staff of nearly 1,000 professional liars.

“And there is something else: Only a small portion of listeners believe a lie when they hear it. If you lie to 100 people you might get two or three believers, and if you lie to thousands, you might get hundreds. So what happens when you lie to millions on the internet?” Kurlansky. Do lies cause wars? Do they support brutality to install autocrats? The answers litter history.

Many have posited that we are highly unlikely to have an American civil war over this polarizing force. But then, they define a civil war as two opposing armies living in distinctly separate geographical areas shooting at each other. Such an old-world view. Perhaps outbursts of regional violence, refusals of large pockets of citizens to follow the law (except as they “interpret it”), plus rolling protests and counter protests are the modern face of civil war. Stuff like trying to kidnap Michigan’s governor or storming the Capitol to reverse the outcome of an election.

I’m Peter Dekom, given the combination of a rogue Supreme Court, a corrupt ex-president unconcerned for the integrity of a nation, uncontrolled proliferation of arms and the unbridled power of social media… we just might be in a civil war already.

How Trump Finally Found a Way to Pay His Legal Fees – Political Donations

 

How Trump Finally Found a Way to Pay His Legal Fees: Political Donations

“The Art of the Steal” – NY AG Letitia James

“It was my experience that Mr. Trump inflated his total assets when it served his purposes, such as trying to be listed among the wealthiest people in Forbes, and deflated his assets to reduce his real estate taxes.” 

 Former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen to the House Oversight Committee in February of 2021

Even if Donald Trump, in the ordinary course of business well before he ran for President, overstated his net worth by billions of dollars in applications for huge bank loans to finance his real estate investments (as alleged in New York’s civil lawsuit for fraud against the Trump family), he is a rich man who can easily afford paying the legal fees of the many attorneys he has engaged over the years. But Trump’s pre-election reputation as an honorable businessman had been tainted for years. Trump University settled a fraud claims for $25 million. His companies have avoided paying creditors and employees over the years by declaring bankruptcy multiple times. He and his companies have been sued thousands of times. Just ask the lawyers he didn’t pay.

In December of 2019, while Donald Trump was President of the United States, New York shut down the Trump Foundation for its misconduct. In a settlement with the state, Trump individually was forced to pay $2 million for misusing charitable funds for his own political gain. The NY Attorney General then stated: “Trump was ordered to pay $2 million, or $250,000, a piece to eight different charities. Those charities are Army Emergency Relief, the Children’s Aid Society, Citymeals-on-Wheels, Give an Hour, Martha’s Table, the United Negro College Fund, the United Way of National Capital Area, and the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. Additionally, Trump was forced to reimburse his namesake foundation $11,525 for sports paraphernalia and champagne purchased at a charity gala, which was added to $1,797,598.30 already in the foundation’s bank account. The combined $1,809,123.30 was split evenly and recently transferred to the eight agreed upon charities. Each charity ended up receiving a total of $476,140.41.” Donald Trump was no longer able to set up charitable foundations in New York without extreme scrutiny of the NY AG.

Trump then left his residency in New York and moved to Mar-a-Lago in Florida (his home away from the White House… and after his term expired). We are all aware of the investigations of the House January 6th Committee, and the parallel investigation by the Department of Justice, into the connection between Donald Trump, his administration and his associates relating to the Capitol Insurrection (causes and aftermath). We are aware of the Fulton County investigation into Donald Trump’s recorded attempt to cause the Georgia Secretary of State to “find” 11,780 votes to reverse the 2020 election result in that state. We know about the DOJ’s ongoing investigation into Trump’s seemingly unlawful possession of classified documents in his post-presidency residence. Most of us are aware that the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office is investigating Trump’s possible criminal violations in connection with financial information in bank loan applications and tax filings, but civil lawsuit by the NY AG’s office, alleging major business fraud filed on September 20th, is the latest legal action, a possible massive financial slam to the net worth of Trump and his three older children, who were involved in the cited businesses.

“Atty. Gen. Letitia James’ lawsuit, filed in state court in New York, is the culmination of the Democrat’s three-year civil investigation of Trump and the Trump Organization. Trump’s three eldest children, Donald Jr., Ivanka and Eric Trump, were also named as defendants, along with two longtime company executives, Allen Weisselberg and Jeffrey McConney.

“The lawsuit seeks to strike at the core of what made Trump famous, scrutinizing the image of wealth and opulence he’s embraced throughout his career — first as a real estate developer, then as a reality TV host on ‘The Apprentice,’ and later as president… ‘Donald Trump falsely inflated his net worth by billions of dollars to unjustly enrich himself, and cheat the system, thereby cheating all of us,’ James said at the news conference [announcing the suit].” Associated Press, September 21st. A quarter of a billion dollars’ worth.

So much of the above-cited investigation and related criminal and civil litigation (actual and potential) is based on the personal actions of Donald Trump, much of it even before he ran for office. Notorious for not paying his lawyers – often publicly trashing them when their services are ended – Trump recently had difficulties retaining competent attorneys in connection with his current turmoil. But paying them was no longer an issue.

Very few people in this country, involved in serious legal controversies, have a blank check to pay for their legal difficulties. Oh sure, indigent criminal defendants can get an overworked public defender, who will almost always try and work a plea deal with the prosecution, but getting first rate lawyers… essentially for free?! Unless you are Donald Trump. He no longer has to fund his lawyers himself.

Writing for the September 21st Yahoo!news, Michael Isikoff fills in the details: “As he faces a major new lawsuit from the New York attorney general that could shut down his business, former President Donald Trump will have one advantage that is unavailable to most well-healed defendants: He won’t have to pay for much, if any, of his legal defense… The reason: His political donors are doing it for him.

“Recent filings by Save America, Trump’s political action committee, show the group has shelled out $1,128,020 this year to lawyers who have spearheaded his and his family’s defense in their legal battle with New York Attorney General Letitia James… These include $942,277 to the law firm of Alina Habba, the New Jersey-based lawyer who has been Trump’s lead lawyer in the case. The total includes $207,827 paid just last month. In addition, Alan Futerfas, another longtime Trump lawyer who is representing the former president’s children in the case, received $184,743 from Save America in July.

“‘It’s an outrageous abuse of his donors to Save America,’ said Saurav Ghosh, director of federal campaign finance reform at the Campaign Legal Center, a Washington-based nonprofit, about the use of political committee funds to defend Trump and his family in a lawsuit that is largely focused on his business activities long before he became president or even a candidate.” Some have complained that Trump’s solicitation of some of these donations had nothing to do with funding his legal woes.

And if these donations seem abusive, I should remind you of the Republican National Committee picking up a seven-figure tab for Trump’s legal fees. “Since October 2021, the Republican National Committee has paid nearly $2 million to law firms representing Trump as part of his defense against personal litigation and government investigations.” ABC News, July 27th. The RNC has also informed Mr Trump that if he becomes formal candidate for the 2024 election, they will have to stop funding those fees. No worries, because Trump’s donors are picking up the slack though Trump’s Save America political action committee.

I’m Peter Dekom, and not only does Mr. Trump truly believe he is above the law, that he can delay and manipulate the system to his singular advantage, but where he faces massive legal fees from his personal misconduct, his MAGA donors are throwing money at their billionaire leader to pick up that legal tab.

Has Putin’s War Destroyed the United Nations

Russian tanks abandoned in Ukraine

“We are in rough seas… A winter of global discontent is on the horizon. A cost-of-living crisis is raging. Trust is crumbling. Inequalities are exploding. Our planet is burning. People are hurting — with the most vulnerable suffering the most…. The United Nations Charter and the ideals it represents are in jeopardy. We have a duty to act. And yet we are gridlocked in colossal global dysfunction. The international community is not ready or willing to tackle the big, dramatic challenges of our age. These crises threaten the very future of humanity and the fate of our planet. Crises like the war in Ukraine and the multiplication of conflicts around the globe. Crises like the climate emergency and biodiversity loss.”

U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres, addressing the General Assembly on September 20th.

“The territorial integrity of our homeland [claiming Ukraine], our independence and freedom will be ensured, I will emphasize this again, with all the means at our disposal… And those who try to blackmail us with nuclear weapons should know that the prevailing winds can turn in their direction… To those who allow themselves such statements about Russia, I want to remind you that our country also has various means of destruction, and some components are more modern than those of the NATO countries… we will certainly use all the means at our disposal to protect Russia and our people… This is not a bluff.” 

Vladimir Putin announcing a general mobilization, in a recorded message on September 20th.

“A permanent member of the United Nations Security Council invaded its neighbor, attempted to erase a sovereign state from the map… Russia has shamelessly violated the core tenets of the United Nations Charter.” 

 Joe Biden addressing the U.N. General Assembly on September 21st.

“A crime has been committed against Ukraine, and we demand just punishment.” 

 Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky, in a Remote Video to the U.N. General Assembly on the 21st.

There are some harsh realities facing the world by reason of Russian treachery. But Russia also produces oceans of natural gas and just about the same amount of oil as does Saudi Arabia. Europe, particularly Germany, has been slow to wean itself from dependence on Russian fossil fuel, particularly in northern areas that use Russian natural gas to stay warm during the winter. Yet, however you look at Russian invasion of neighboring Ukraine, it has been an abysmal failure, killing at least 10,000 Russian soldiers (suggesting an overall casualty rate of 25,000).

Putin has been forced to rely on mercenaries recruited from Russian prisons (in exchange for release) and is now calling for a general mobilization of his regular reserves, expecting 300,000 fresh troops to plunge forward in his next assault against Ukraine. More than a few Russian men quickly fled the country. Claiming NATO troops are now in active assignments within Ukraine, Putin’s unsubtle nuclear saber-ratting is clearly escalating. Further, now that he has cleared much of eastern Ukraine of resident loyalists – either by death (often by torture), capture or expulsion, Putin is calling for a “referendum” on direct Russian annexation of captured eastern territory. Exactly how desperate is Putin?

Can Russia crank up a new offensive, rely on weapons resupply from North Korea (which denies its supply efforts) and Iran plus perhaps mercenary troops from Syria, to resume his offensive in Ukraine? Has the current lull, the Russian withdrawal from large sections of eastern Ukraine that have been retaken by Kiev, given Putin time to regroup with renewed vigor… or is he simply trying to save face and amplify a negotiated settlement, as Turkish President Recep Erdogan suggests based on his recent meeting with the Russian dictator.

Seven months into what President Biden has called a “brutal… reckless… and unwarranted” invasion of Ukraine, more “than 29,000 people have died and another 14 million have been displaced, according to Reuters’ latest figures. And though Russia has already taken over a fifth of Ukraine, a recent Ukrainian counterattack has pushed Russian troops back, allowing Ukraine to retake control of more than 2,300 square miles from Russia. Since the war began in February, the U.S. has sent more than $15 billion of military aid to Ukraine for equipment and weapons… Biden used Wednesday’s [9/21] speech to encourage allies at the U.N. to further arm Ukrainian forces, whose active military personnel of 500,000 soldiers is nearly one-third the size of Russia’s 1.35 million troops.” Marquise Francis, writing for the September 21st Yahoo!news.

But what exactly can the United Nations itself do against a clear military invasion of a member nation by a founding partner in the U.N. itself, Russia, one of those few member states with a permanent seat in and veto power over the governing Security Council? And while China is clearly concerned with Russia’s failing war against Ukraine, she is likely to join with a Russian veto in any attempt to secure approval for Security Council actions, military and otherwise, against Putin.

What can happen, even if Putin sues for peace, about the blatant war crimes committed under his personal military control by his generals, his troops… and even by Putin himself? Is there a way out of this mess with ethical dignity? Or is the United Nations relegated to an impotent platform for international speechmaking… with little in the way of tools to stop one of the most flagrant violations of its most fundamental principles? Is Zelensky’s plea for punishment in vain?

What if Putin crosses a purported red line and uses weapons of mass destruction against Ukraine, possibly even a tactical and thus limited nuclear strike? Is that really on the table? Dmitry Medvedev, Putin’s deputy head of his Security Council, just made the threat of using nukes more explicit… “Referendums will be held, and the Donbas republics and other [Russian occupied] territories will be accepted into Russia,” Medvedev posted on Telegram (a major Russian social media site), warning on September 21st that Russia would be willing to use “strategic nuclear weapons” for the “protection” of those territories. This is also a clear acknowledgement that the “referendums” are just window dressing. Would NATO respond? As a unified defensive body?

NATO state leaders like Turkey’s Erdogan and Hungary’s PM Viktor Orbán seem more like Putin admirers than severe critics of his outlandish behavior. Would the United States provide Ukraine with a genuine ability to retaliate? Perhaps supplying longer-range missiles to strike directly and deeply into Russia itself? How would Putin respond to that? While it is unlikely that Putin would risk a direct strike, nuclear or otherwise, against Europe itself, but with unbalanced autocratic leaders with powerful weapons awaiting a command to deploy… you never know. But the U.N…

I’m Peter Dekom, and even if you believe that a clear military end to Putin’s war is possible, even necessary and probable, exactly what would that path look like… and when could it happen?

To the Viktor Belong the Spoils

“If you separate Western civilization from its Judaeo-Christian heritage, the worst things in history happen… Let’s be honest, the most evil things in modern history were carried out by people who hated Christianity. Don’t be afraid to call your enemies by their name. You can’t play safe but they will never show mercy… Politics are not enough. This war is a culture war." 

 Hungarian PM Viktor Orbán, above, at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Dallas, Texas on August 4th.

It’s no secret the democracy is under assault all over the world. But to find that clearly in a NATO ally, a member of the European Union, with an autocratic leader with exceptionally close ties to the American Republican Party, is very disturbing. After all, this move to autocracy began with the free election of Hungarian PM Viktor Orbán, who has presided over his nation for twelve years. His close relationship to Vladimir Putin – evidenced by his many visits with the Russian leader, his rejection of EU caps on natural gas imports and his statements that Europe (particularly Germany) may change its tune on Ukraine after a cold winter without sufficient Russian natural gas to keep warm – continue to chafe at NATO’s hardline support for Ukraine.

The love affair from Fox News’ Tucker Carlson and the radical extreme of the Republican Party, championing Orbán’s autocracy (which Orbán calls “illiberal democracy”), is clear in GOP visits to Budapest, followed up with Orbán’s keynote speech at CPAC (excerpt above) in Dallas earlier this summer. Hungary has become Orbán’s right-wing fiefdom in Europe. Hungarians actually voted for Orbán. This misuse of democracy to end democracy should be a warning here to the efforts being mounted by the Republican radical right, which openly embraces illiberalism, fundamental Christianity and culture wars: Rule by a White Christian minority.

Orbán reconfigured Hungary’s judicial system, from top to bottom, to sustain his term of office and his illiberal policies. He shut down media that opposed his policies. A fierce opponent of immigration, particularly non-White and non-Christian, Orbán set programs to encourage “pure Hungarian” women to have “pure” babies, with a variety of state incentives. But the exceptionally close and open ties between the GOP and Orbán go well beyond CPAC. From an August 4th report from NBC: “Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, 59, is widely criticized around the world for systematically dismantling his country’s nascent democracy during his 12 years in power — but that hasn’t stopped him from emerging as a darling of many on the right in America…

“Former President Donald Trump and his onetime chief strategist Steve Bannon are also speaking at CPAC, America’s top conservative conference. And both are fans of Orbán’s. Trump endorsed Orbán in January, three months before he was re-elected to a fourth term, and Bannon called the Hungarian leader ‘Trump before Trump’ in a speech in Budapest in 2018… While Trump was voted out, Orbán, the first European Union leader to speak out in support of Trump’s campaign in 2016, looks unassailable, with control over the media, the legislature and the judiciary in Hungary. Meanwhile, the [Hungarian] fractured left-wing, centrist opposition is marginalized.”

The European Union, still smarting from Brexit, has grown increasingly uncomfortable with Orbán’s open repudiation of so many of their underlying law and principles. Despite warnings from EU leadership, Orbán’s defiant illiberalism has only solidified. He has openly flaunted his veering away from true democracy, and other than harsh words, the EU has pretty much done nothing against Orbán’s defiance… until perhaps now. The September 19th Associated Press tells us that this EU position just may change:

“The European Union’s executive branch recommended Sunday that the bloc suspend about $7.5 billion in funding to Hungary over concerns about democratic backsliding and the possible mismanagement of EU money… The European Commission, which proposes the bloc’s laws and ensures that they are respected, said it was acting ‘to ensure the protection of the EU budget and the financial interests of the EU against breaches of the principles of the rule of law in Hungary.’

“EU Budget Commissioner Johannes Hahn said that despite measures Hungary has proposed to address the deficiencies, the commission is recommending the suspension… The money would come from ‘cohesion funds’ granted to Hungary. This share of money, one of the biggest slices of the bloc’s budget, helps countries to bring their economies and infrastructure up to EU standards.

“EU countries pay about 1% of their gross national income into the budget. Hungary is slated to receive at least $50 billion in all from the 2021-27 budget, according to commission estimates… Any action to suspend the funds must be approved by the EU member countries, and this requires a ‘qualified majority,’ which amounts to 55% of the 27 members representing at least 65% of the total EU population… They have one month to decide whether to freeze Hungary’s funds, but can in exceptional circumstances extend that period to two months. The commission is recommending that the member countries take until Nov. 19 to allow Hungary more time to address the concerns.

“The commission has for nearly a decade accused Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban of dismantling democratic institutions, taking control of the media and infringing on minority rights. Orban, who has been in office since 2010, denies the accusations… Speaking after a meeting of EU commissioners in Brussels, which unanimously endorsed the move, Hahn welcomed Hungary’s offer to fix the problem, saying that its proposed remedial action goes ‘in the right direction.’” Indeed, Orbán not only provides solace to Vladimir Putin, evidence of some disunity among NATO allies, but his autocratic actions show how fragile true democracy is. Especially here in a wildly polarized America.

I’m Peter Dekom, but that Orbán has become the darling of MAGA Republicans is particularly disturbing… and tells us that Hungary has become a GOP model for governance.

Rent-a-Cell

 

“I’m about to be homeless… I just don’t think it’s right, because I feel I already paid

my debt to society. I just don’t think it’s fair for me to be paying twice.”

58-year-old Connecticut inmate, Theresa Beatty, being required to pay for her 2 ½ years of incarceration… 2 decades after release.

The entire country is dealing with the bumbling Federal Reserve, belatedly responding to inflationary pressures by continuing to raise interest rates. Despite the labor shortage, companies like Google are already instituting wage freezes and perk cutbacks in anticipation of a more pronounced period of stagflation. The Fed does not care. One of the results of that agency’s actions has been a doubling (and up) in mortgage rates, resulting in an increase in homeowners, wanting to sell, pulling back. Prices continue to fall, but more people are realizing that renting is their only real option. Unfortunately, so many people flooding the rental market has driven rents through the stratosphere, particularly in major tech/financial cities where the “educated” jobs are. Assuming you can even find available rentals at any price.

For those entering or recently having enter that job market, for those who benefited from now-expired COVID rent deferments facing eviction, the news is anything but good. Particularly in these job centers, renters are facing the biggest “renter wage gap” – the difference between what the typical worker can afford and average rental costs – in recent memory. For those at the bottom of the economic ladder, the reality is much worse, with many facing insolvency and homelessness. But there is a class of individuals facing an entirely difference form of horrific “rental costs” that they never expected: even years after release from prison, many ex-inmates facing a state invoice for the cost of their incarceration. States don’t go after everyone, but…

As reported in the September 6th Associated Press, “When [Theresa Beatty’s (quoted above)] mother died two years ago, the state of Connecticut put a lien on the Stamford home she and her siblings inherited. It said she owed $83,762 to cover the cost of her 2½-year imprisonment for drug crimes [at $249/day]… Now, she’s afraid she’ll have to sell her home of 51 years, where she lives with two adult children, a grandchild and her disabled brother…

“All but two states have so-called pay-to-stay laws that make prisoners pay for their time behind bars, though not every state actually pursues people for the money. Supporters say the collections are a legitimate way for states to recoup millions of taxpayer dollars spent on prisons and jails.

“Critics say it’s an unfair second penalty that hinders rehabilitation by putting former inmates in debt for life. Efforts have been underway in some places to scale back or eliminate such policies… Two states — Illinois and New Hampshire — have repealed their laws since 2019… Connecticut also overhauled its statute this year, keeping it in place only for the most serious crimes, such as murder, and exempting prisoners from having to pay the first $50,000 of their incarceration costs.

“Under the revised law, about 98% of Connecticut inmates no longer have to pay any of the costs of their incarceration after they get out, said state Rep. Steve Stafstrom, a Bridgeport Democrat and a sponsor of the repeal legislation.” But inmates across the land still do. How many people facing a felony conviction are aware of this little cost when they enter a plea bargain? Beatty is at least challenging the law in court.

One of the reasons these laws are anything but uniformly enforced is that a prison conviction usually destroys the ability of ex-felons to make a decent living. Recidivism is often the result of ex-inmates facing rejection from prospective employers… and believing that resorting to criminal activity is their only economic choice. Or face desperate homelessness. Do inmates know that part of their sentence just may be the obligation to pay retroactive rent? Most do not. That the law is not uniformly applied, for obvious reasons, only exacerbates the unfairness.

“‘It just drags you back to despair,’ said Beatty, who has had other brushes with the law over drug possession since her release from jail but has also become a certified nursing assistant. ‘That’s where I feel like I’m at. ... All of this work and it feels like I’ve done it in vain.’

“Pay-to-stay laws were put in place in many areas during the tough-on-crime era of the 1980s and ’90s, said Brittany Friedman, an assistant professor of sociology at USC who is leading a study of the practice… As prison populations ballooned, Friedman said, policymakers questioned how to pay for incarceration costs. ‘So, instead of raising taxes, the solution was to shift the cost burden from the state and the taxpayers onto the incarcerated.’

“Laws vary from state to state. Many, like Connecticut, go after inmates for the cost of incarceration only if they come into money after leaving prison. A few, such as North Carolina, have laws on the books but almost never use them, Friedman said.” Much like the failed “three strikes” laws now being repealed across the land, the unfairness is beyond obvious. A kind of “double jeopardy” I suspect few taxpayers/legislators anticipated or understood when these laws were passed.

I’m Peter Dekom, and more than the invoiced inmate are paying twice; taxpayers are paying twice from the resulting recidivism and social welfare costs that are also a result of such statutes.