Month: October 2016

by William Skink

While people are consumed by this election charade, much more serious things are brewing that will affect our ability to live on this planet.

CNN reported over a week ago that the first US nuclear reactor to go live in 20 years just went online. What virtually no one is reporting on, though, is how bad the nuclear disaster in Fukushima continues to be, so bad that even robots can’t approach the radioactive cores, or even locate where they are. Counterpunch has been one of the few places I’ve gotten any information from regarding this disaster. From the link:

It is literally impossible for the world community to get a clear understanding of, and truth about, the Fukushima nuclear disaster. This statement is based upon The Feature article in Columbia Journalism Review (“CJR”) d/d October 25, 2016 entitled: “Sinking a Bold Foray Into Watchdog Journalism in Japan” by Martin Fackler.

The scandalous subject matter of the article is frightening to its core. Essentially, it paints a picture of upending and abolishing a 3-year attempt by one of Japan’s oldest and most liberal/intellectual newspapers, The Asahi Shimbun (circ. 6.6 mln) in its effort of “watchdog journalism” of the Fukushima nuclear disaster. In the end, the newspaper’s special watchdog division suffered un-preannounced abrupt closure.

The CJR article, whether intentionally or not, is an indictment of right wing political control of media throughout the world. The story is, moreover, extraordinarily scary and of deepest concern because no sources can be counted on for accurate, truthful reporting of an incident as powerful and deadly dangerous as the nuclear meltdown at Fukushima. Lest anybody in class forgets, three nuclear reactors at Fukushima Diiachi Nuclear Power Plant experienced 100% meltdown, aka The China Syndrome over five years ago.

The molten cores of those reactors melted down to a stage called corium, which is a lumpy hunk of irradiating radionuclides so deadly that robotic cameras are zapped! The radioactivity is powerful, deadly and possessed of frightening longevity, 100s of years. Again for those who missed class, TEPCO (Tokyo Electric Power Company) has no idea where those masses of sizzling hot radioactive goo are today. Did they burrow into the ground? Nobody knows, but it is known that those blobs of radioactivity are extraordinarily dangerous, as in deathly, erratically spewing radioactivity “who knows where”?

A nuclear disaster worse than Chernobyl, and it’s barely a blip on people’s radar. It’s truly amazing how a crisis this threatening can be disappeared just like that.

The fukushima disaster will only worsen the ongoing mass extinction we are witnessing, with 2/3 of animal life possibly gone in 50 years:

The world is facing the biggest extinction since the dinosaurs, with seven in 10 mammals, birds, fish, amphibians and reptiles wiped out in just 50 years, a new report warns.

The latest Living Planet report by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) and the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) estimates that by 2020 populations of vertebrates will have fallen by 67 per cent since 1970.

Extinction rates are now running at 100 times their natural level because of deforestation, hunting, pollution, overfishing and climate change.

The only way anything will happen is if those who control the vast consolidation of wealth decide to do something. Because of the scale of the problem, they are the ones who must choose between geopolitical domination games or keeping the planet inhabitable.

The kind of wealth that has amassed, though, may have permanently disconnected these people from the capacity to see the rest of the global population as anything but useless eaters.

62 of the richest individuals now control as much wealth as half the global population. That is insane. What will they do to protect their wealth if it’s threatened by the demands of the useless eaters?

by William Skink

While I still greatly appreciate the independent blogging of James Conner at Flathead Memo, his condemnation of my choice not to vote gives me another opportunity to defend my decision.

The problem starts with how my choice is framed in the title of the post: Burning your ballot to keep your hands clean is a bad choice.

No American who pays taxes has clean hands, myself included. Half of every tax dollar is directed to the American killing machine deployed across the globe, protecting corporate investments and making the world less safe for those without private jets and islands getaways.

After the opening paragraphs, where Conner writes approvingly of Australia’s mandatory voting policy, he begins to make his case on why I am wrong in choosing not to vote:

Those who are eligible to vote, but choose not to cast ballots, may think they are keeping their hands clean by not using their vote to bless an unworthy candidate. Or they may think they are denying scoundrels political legitimacy. But by not voting, by refusing to make a choice, they are saying that all of the choices are acceptable, and that no one choice is less acceptable than any other choice. Which is nonsense.

I don’t think I’m keeping my hands clean, and I don’t presume to deny individual scoundrels political legitimacy. BUT the political SYSTEM–comprised of corrupt primaries, problematic technology (voting machines), skewed polling, biased media, and unlimited cash-speak–has created this crisis of legitimacy, and my choice not to vote is simply how I have decided to respond to this crisis.

Here is Conner continuing his lecture:

There is no legal penalty for opting out — but there is a moral penalty. Because not voting is a backhanded blessing of the election, those who chose not to vote lose the moral right to complain about the outcome of the election. That won’t stop them from complaining, or from asserting that not voting makes them more moral than those who stoop to voting. But it will, and should, stop others from listening to them or taking them seriously.

Because of my moral transgression, I should no longer have the right to complain, in addition to not being listened to and/or taken seriously. Got it. But instead of just getting all butt-hurt, I’d like to take a quick look at the notion of compulsory voting:

Supporters of compulsory voting generally look upon voter participation as a civic duty, similar to taxation, jury duty, compulsory education or military service; one of the ‘duties to community’ mentioned in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.[4] They believe that by introducing an obligation to vote, it helps to overcome the occasional inconvenience that voting imposes on an individual in order to produce governments with more stability, legitimacy and a genuine mandate to govern, which in turn benefits that individual even if their preferred candidate or party isn’t elected to power.

Another argument for compulsory voting systems is that it confers a high degree of political legitimacy because they result in high voter turnout.[5] The victorious candidate represents a majority of the population, not just the politically motivated individuals who would vote without compulsion.

Legitimacy of the rulers to govern the ruled is the big orange-faced elephant in the room, and to mix metaphors, Trump is the raging bull in the China shop of American electoral legitimacy. He has claimed the process is rigged, and he’s right. Voting machines, and the billionaires who control them, can’t be trusted. And the over-sampled polls can’t be trusted. And the media whores can’t be trusted. And the candidates?

Down-ticket, state and local candidates, along with voter initiatives, have been the main reason I have continued voting after The Great Scam of 2008. But this cycle, I just can’t do it. The entire political system, imho, has lost legitimacy by being unresponsive to the concerns of 99% of the people who want the partisan divisiveness to end and legitimate efforts to rebuild this country to begin.

James Conner ends his post with this:

Elections seldom offer easy choices. All candidates have flaws. All ballot issues have drawbacks. But George Wallace’s assertion that “there’s not a dime’s worth of difference between the major parties” was not true in 1968, and is not true now. There are differences, significant differences. Electing Donald Trump or Greg Gianforte results in one kind of nation or state. Electing Hillary Clinton or Steve Bullock results in another, very different, kind of nation or state. Denying that denies reality. Refusing to vote is a selfish, misguided, abdication of one’s civic obligation to chose how and by whom we are led.

If you’ve burned your ballot, hike on down to the elections office and get another ballot. There’s still time to do the right thing.

I’m thankful that I’m not obligated to vote for a political system that no longer responds to the majority of its constituents. If I was obliged, I would take the penalty for refusing to participate.

So burn your ballot, because any electoral impact you think you have went up in smoke years ago.

By William Skink

The FBI announced today that its investigation has been reopened after the discovery of new emails on a device from what is being called an unrelated case.

Thoughts? 

by William Skink

It would be nice to have a representative democracy, just like it would be nice to have some justice within our criminal justice system, but it’s becoming increasingly obvious we have neither.

Yesterday the news came down that the Bundy clan was mostly acquitted on charges related to their armed takeover of federal land in Oregon. Both the media attention of this fiasco, and law enforcement’s use of kid gloves during the occupation, stand in stark contrast to what’s happening with the Dakota Access pipeline, where yesterday the police state escalated its crackdown on the protectors.

On the democracy front, Carol Williams has a message to millennials, imploring them to abandon their principles and forget the corrupt primary debacle in order to support Hillary Clinton. Let’s take a look at Carol’s pitch:

I understand that not all younger voters share my enthusiasm for Hillary Clinton. Some of you may still be disappointed that Sen. Bernie Sanders lost the primary. I sure get that because I have been in your shoes so many times. Not voting is abandoning democracy and voting for a third-party candidate is throwing away your vote.

The reality of the corrupt primary process indicates democracy has already been abandoned by Democrats who preferred to impose coronation through underhanded, anti-democratic tactics. Not validating this corrupt system by abstaining from voting is a legitimate response, as is voting for a third-party candidate.

When I burned my ballot I didn’t expect accolades, and sure enough at Impotent Discontent, Pete Talbot responded, generally, to the sentiment of not voting with this:

To the anarchists out there who would like to see the whole, corrupt system crumble and aren’t voting, well, there’s some appeal in that. But it’s always a crapshoot in what might follow: could be utopia or could be totalitarianism. I’m not ready to take that gamble.

This is such a load of bullshit. Not voting doesn’t make someone an anarchist, and assuming that those not voting want to see the corrupt system crumble is crap. Personally, I would prefer we fix our corrupt system, but I don’t see the political will materializing amidst the corrupting influence of cash that drowned our democracy.

In the comments, James Conner joined the chorus with this familiar condemnation of non-voters:

Those who do not vote lose their moral right to complain about the results.

I vehemently disagree with this. I voted in 2000 when the election was gifted to George Bush by the Supreme Court. And I voted in 2004 when the election was again handed to Bush with rigged voting machines in Ohio. I voted in 2008, and 2012, and all the midterm elections. I’m done lending my consent to this fraudulent system. That doesn’t mean I’ve lost any moral right to complain about the results. If I don’t believe the results matter, why waste my time validating this system with my vote?

The situation in this country is analogous to the conditions that fueled the American Revolution: taxation without representation. While I can choose not to vote without legal consequence, I can’t choose not to pay taxes (with half of every tax dollar going to fund America’s imperial killing machine).

My vote, and the results of elections, no longer have much of an impact on policy. Money, and those who have a lot of it, are what impact policy. This isn’t just my opinion, it’s an evidence-based conclusion derived from studies like this:

In their paper, Gilens and Page use a dataset Gilens compiled for his 2012 book, Affluence and Influence, which includes 1,779 policy cases between 1981 and 2002 as well as poll data measuring citizens’ preferences regarding those policies. They used the responses of the poorest 10 percent as the poor, median income individuals to represent average voters and the preferences of the richest 10 percent as a proxy for “economic elites.” They also compiled the policy preferences of interest groups like the NRA and Chamber of Commerce. They then compared the preferences of individuals across the economic spectrum to actual political outcomes. When they ran the preferences of each group separately, as the sole predictor of policy change, they found strong congruence with the policy preferences of average citizens, elites and interest groups and outcomes (though the elite group had the strongest congruence). However, when they ran the model with all the preferences combined, they found that the preferences of the middle class no longer predicted effects on outcomes. They report that when the preferences of ordinary Americans and elites differ, “economic elites and organized groups representing business interests have substantial independent impacts on U.S. government policy, while mass-based interest groups and average citizens have little or no independent influence.” In short, the rich get what they want.

Despite this reality, politicians like Carol Williams desperately want young people to believe their vote matters. After a rigged primary, it’s a tough sell. And with all the evidence of what Hillary Clinton has actually done in 30 years of whoring servitude to her corporate overlords, Williams’ message to millennials is necessarily rife with illusionary smokescreen statements like this:

To implement the platform and guarantee the appointment of a Supreme Court that will align with our progressive values, repeal Citizens United and protect Roe v. Wade, we need Hillary Clinton in the White House and Sanders in a Democratic-controlled Senate. Plain and simple.

As she has done her entire adult life, Clinton will move progressive values forward. The other presidential candidates are unstable and temperamentally unfit to be commander in chief or are openly hostile about progressive values. Third-party candidate Gary Johnson does not even believe in climate change. And Jill Stein is peddling conspiracy theories and promoting a narrative that the vaccine regulation process in the U.S. is corrupt and untrustworthy.

To believe any of this crap, one has to remain willfully and aggressively ignorant of the Clinton neoliberal sellout of the 90’s, the complicity in promoting climate-destroying wars during the Bush years, and the core-deep corruption of monetizing the State Department during the Obama years, which included pimping fracking around the globe.

Anyone who trusts Hillary Clinton is either stupid or self-interested, and I don’t think Carol Williams is stupid. I think her family will monetarily benefit if Hillary wins, which to me invalidates anything Williams has to say, like this concluding appeal to millennial power:

Your decision will affect our country for years to come. This is your time and your year. Your vote is important. You have a voice and you have power. Please use it wisely. Consider voting for Hillary Clinton. You will look back and be proud you elected the first woman president of the United States and an extraordinary leader for all Americans.

Ask yourselves some questions, millennials. Do extraordinary leaders attack victims of sexual abuse in defense of rapists? Do extraordinary leaders celebrate the execution of heads of state? Do extradorinaiy leaders lie to the American public and the FBI while obstructing justice by destroying evidence?

If you don’t have enough life experience to understand how worthless your vote has become, then go ahead and bloody your hands by voting for the least evil sociopath to occupy the White House for the next 4 years. This GenX’er won’t be joining you, though, because I’m done participating in this fucking charade.

by William Skink

The sharper the focus gets on housing and wages in Missoula, the more Missoula looks like a uniquely terrible place to relocate hundreds of refugees. Will this reality ever be acknowledged by the do-gooders? Doubtful.

The latest economic peek into Missoula offers some stark numbers on how quickly the cost of housing has risen in the last two and a half decade:

Since 1990, Missoula’s population has grown 142 percent, or 1.5 times the U.S. population growth rate. To Ward, that proves that Missoula provides a high quality of living, one that’s been noted in many national studies and magazine articles.

Using 1990 as a benchmark, Ward said housing prices in Missoula have risen 114 percent when adjusted for inflation. That makes the city the third fastest growing metro area in the nation when it comes housing costs, outpacing the likes of Seattle, Portland and San Francisco.

With mountains constraining sprawl, and the natural beauty blipping like a beacon to deep pockets, Missoula is booming, for some. For everyone else trying to get by in playground Missoula, it’s getting more difficult every year as housing goes up and up and up. Here’s another little tidbit from the article:

According to data presented Tuesday, a Missoula resident holding a bachelor’s degree makes on average $31,189 a year. The national average is $50,515.

“If you have a bachelor’s degree only in Missoula, you earn 63 percent of the U.S. level,” Ward said. “In the average metro area, someone with a bachelor’s degree earns 60 percent more than someone with a high school degree. In Missoula, you earn 23 percent more.”

If the problem goes unresolved, Ward cautioned, the city will continue to see its college graduates leave for opportunities elsewhere. That has implications for economic growth, hurting the city in terms of business recruitment and retention.

“You just end up as a recreation community – a place where people come who already have money, and there’s a bunch of people who do service industry jobs to serve them,” Ward said. “That has implications for what it is we’re trying to do in our community, or what we can do in our community.”

Yep, sounds about right. I have my bachelor’s degree, and my last job didn’t even bring in Missoula’s shitty average of $31,189, and the jobs I have so far applied for also track below that average.

I don’t see how Missoula can become anything other than a recreation community where people come who already have money. There is no incentive for employers to bump up wages because people are willing to settle for less pay in order to live here. Those who aren’t willing, like pretty much everyone I knew in college, will move away because they can’t afford to stay. This is increasingly seen as problematic, so what kind of solutions does the article recommend?

On the housing front, Grunke added, “It’s one thing to attract workers here, but we have to have a place where they can actually live.”

To explore the issue further, Grunke said, MEP will launch two major studies in the coming months, one to look at the city’s available workforce and another to look at housing. BBER also plans to follow with a more in-depth report in January that includes possible solutions to the city’s lagging wages.

Wow, not just one study, but TWO MAJOR STUDIES will be coming in the next few months. I know Missoula loves to study things, and then study them some more, but at some point there needs to be some GODDAMN ACTION to actually implement the findings of these studies.

We have studied homelessness and come up with a ten year plan that is currently stalled on the key recommendation of wet housing. We have studied jail overcrowding and maybe something will happen at the next legislative session. Lots of stuff gets studied, but does anything ever change? Or do the trends just keep trending?

People on fixed income, people with barriers to housing–like bad credit or a criminal conviction–they will keep getting squeezed and squeezed until they get the hint and go somewhere else, if they can. Then another study will be launched to explore why people leave. And what will happen then?

Nothing. My hunch is that change will have to come from some kind of significant, external disruption, like another economic collapse. And that kind of change might be closer than many realize.