Speaking of “Agendas”

A friend sent me a copy of this year’s American Family Action Pac political questionnaire. Rather than characterize it, I decided to let it speak for itself. (The odd numbering and format are original.)

Indiana Family Action PAC  2012 Questionnaire for State Candidates

Please circle the response that most accurately reflects your position on the following issues.

(SF=Strongly Favor; F-Favor; U=Undecided; O=Oppose; SO=Strongly Oppose; Y=Yes; N=No)

  1. 1.   Education – Protect and expand parental choice options provided in current law to allow all parents

the opportunity to receive a voucher to send their children to any public, private, religious or home

school of their choice.                                                                                                                  SF     F     U     O     SO

  1.  Education – Allow parents dedicated to their children’s education to home-school their children

without imposing additional state regulations, other than that which is already required in state law.   SF     F     U     O     SO

3. Education – Redefine “bullying” so that students who express opposition to the public promotion of

homosexuality in public schools will be guilty of “bullying” if they offend students who have taken

 on a homosexual identity.                                                                                                                     SF     F     U     O     SO

4.Academic Liberty – The teaching of evolution is currently an educational requirement for teachers in

Indiana public schools.  Protect Indiana teachers within state law so that they can also discuss the

problems and weaknesses of evolutionary theory.                                                                                   SF     F     U     O     SO

5.Business – Some Indiana cities have increased regulations on businesses by adding “sexual orientation” and

“gender identity” to the list of protected classes that get special rights. State law does not require businesses

to treat these groups as protected classes.  Require all levels of government to recognize the list

 of specially protected classes within state law in order to give businesses uniform regulations. SF     F     U     O     SO

6. Faith – Jesus Christ is my personal Lord and Savior.  I believe the God of the Bible is sovereign

over all of life, including public policy, and I will use biblical principles to guide how I vote.                       Y              N         

7. Homosexual agenda – Change state discrimination law to protect an employee’s sexual

    preferences in the same way that race, religion, age, gender and ancestry are protected.                  SF     F     U     O     SO

8. Marriage – Increase the time a married couple with minor children must wait for a divorce

(current law is 60 days) in order to give them a longer opportunity to work toward reconciliation.          SF     F     U     O     SO

9. Marriage – Amend the Indiana Constitution as follows:   “Only a marriage between one (1) man

and one (1) woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in Indiana. A legal status identical or

substantially similar to that of marriage for unmarried individuals shall not be valid or recognized.”     SF     F     U     O     SO

10. Abortion – Prohibit abortion by law except when the life of the mother is in danger.                         SF     F     U     O     SO

11. Abortion – As the medical abortion field explodes (abortion pills like RU486), make Indiana law apply

the same standards for dispensing abortion pills as it does for surgical abortions (i.e., define it in the law,

require licensing and regulatory standards, require key health and safety standards, and require

informed consent/patient information standards).                                                                 .                    SF     F     U     O     SO

12. Taxes – Increase state taxes in order to provide more services.                                              SF     F     U     O     SO

13. Taxes – Discontinue all direct and indirect state support of the Kinsey Institute

 (controversial “sex research” organization in Bloomington, IN)                                                    SF     F     U     O     SO

14. Gambling – Prohibit Casinos in Indiana.                                                                               SF     F     U     O     SO

15. Sex industry – Require strip clubs to close at midnight and make them ineligible for

Liquor licenses.  Require dancers to remain at least 6 feet away from customers at all times.             SF     F     U     O     S

Anyone who “favors”  numbers 5, 7 and 12  will clearly be opposed; the language of the others–especially #6–is simply jaw-dropping. These folks are the ones with an “agenda”– and it is anti-science, anti-gay, anti-sex and deeply, profoundly un-American.

When the American Family folks endorse someone, remember that these are the positions that candidate has promised to support.

As another friend put it–so many Christians, so few lions….

 


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…With A Little Help from My Friends

On my way to work this morning, WFYI informed me that today is the day Mark Massa will be sworn in as the newest Justice of the Indiana Supreme Court.

When Governor Daniels announced that he had chosen Massa, there was a good deal of criticism. Some observers expressed surprise that–once again–the Governor had ignored an opportunity to diversify the Court, that–once again–he had declined to appoint an eminently qualified woman. Adding insult to injury, Daniels claimed that his choice was based upon the candidates’ relative qualifications for the job, a manifestly bogus excuse.

I was not surprised by the choice, which I’d predicted well before the commission charged with winnowing the field even sent three names to the Governor. Nor do I believe it had any more to do with sexism than it did with merit.

This is Indiana–the crony state.

There’s a pretty robust academic literature dealing with political culture. Some states (Massachusetts, say) have a liberal culture that promotes public service; others (Arizona, Texas) take a considerably more conservative, parochial approach to the role of government. When I was researching state differences in political culture for a book on the Faith-Based Initiative, I asked George Geib–past Dean of History at Butler University and a long-time Indianapolis Republican operative–how he would describe Indiana’s political approach. His answer was that the framework within which we conduct our affairs is quid pro quo. 

Look around at the so-called “privatization” initiatives. Lucrative deals for parking and welfare intake have gone to well-connected ACS. The developer of the parking garage being built in Broad Ripple used to work for the Ballard Administration. A PR firm that gets city business just “happens” to employ Ballard’s son. These are just a few examples that come readily to mind; there are literally hundreds of others.

This isn’t new in Indiana, and it isn’t the exclusive provenance of Republicans. Both parties have practiced politics as spoils system, both have favored their cronies with appointments and contracts.

The problem women have in a crony system is that we are late to the party, and less likely to play the game–less likely to be one of the favored cronies. Nothing against our gender–if we were playing by the good old boys’ rules, we’d probably be equally likely to be rewarded with the plum jobs and/or contracts.

Mark Massa was counsel to the Governor; by all accounts, the two are friends. And in a state where doing business with your friends is the way business is done, his appointment was a foregone conclusion.

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Cowboys and Enablers

I haven’t posted about the Trayvon Martin tragedy because, really, what could I say that hasn’t already been said?

In my opinion, whatever happened between George Zimmerman and Trayvon immediately before Zimmerman shot him–whether there was an altercation or not– is legally and morally irrelevant to the question of guilt; when Zimmerman intentionally ignored the police dispatcher’s order not to follow Martin, he became responsible for what happened next.

As evidence has emerged, the one thing that seems indisputable is that George Zimmerman is a cowboy–one of those all-too-common sheriff/policeman wannabes with short fuses and delusions of righteousness. It is the role of public safety and public policy to reign in such people–indeed, protecting citizens from those who would harm them is the most basic function of government.

The passage of “Stand Your Ground” laws has enabled, rather than impeded, the cowboys. In 2010, a survey by the Tampa Bay Times found that Florida’s rates of “justifiable homicide” had tripled since the law’s passage. Kendall Coffee, former U.S. Attorney for Southern Florida, has condemned the law as “a license to kill.”

“Stand Your Ground” laws are part and parcel of what seems to be an effort to recreate the “justice system” of the wild West–at the same time we are choking off resources for law enforcement, we’re passing laws that protect vigilantes.

And young men like Trayvon Martin pay the price.

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Fifty-One Percent

In a recent New York Times column, Gail Collins observed “the thing that makes our current politics particularly awful isn’t procedural. It’s that the Republican Party has become over-the-top extreme.”

She left out “mean-spirited and patriarchal.”

I was an active Republican for 35 years, but the party I belonged to no longer exists. There is no more striking evidence of that fact than the poisonous brew of policies that have been collectively dubbed the “war on women.”

The party I belonged to made at least some room for good-faith disagreements about abortion. Today’s GOP not only uses opposition to reproductive rights as an absolute litmus test, it proposes to deny thousands of poor women access to basic health services provided by Planned Parenthood, because that organization spends 3% of its own money on abortions.

Sorry you’re dying of breast cancer, sister, but hey—we’re “pro-life.”

Recently, the extremists have ventured well beyond attacks on reproductive choice. The recent fight over access to contraception was a wake-up call. The fact that Rick Santorum has been taken seriously as a Presidential candidate by a major political party, despite criticizing both birth control and women who work outside the home, is simply chilling.

It’s not just the unremitting attack on women’s right to control our own bodies.  A larger message is that women and children (at least those no longer in utero) are simply unimportant.

In Washington, the GOP defends subsidies for big oil while it proposes deep cuts to social programs that primarily serve women and children.

Speaking of sending a message: in several states, Republicans have championed deeply offensive bills requiring women to submit to demeaning trans-vaginal ultrasounds before terminating a pregnancy, and they have proposed “personhood” amendments that would redefine most widely used birth control methods as abortion, and outlaw their use.

These and literally hundreds of other efforts—silly and serious—convey a breathtaking condescension to those who comprise 51% of the voting population. That condescension was perfectly captured by Rush Limbaugh—he of the “if you want birth control you’re a slut” rant—when he dismissed the idea of a war on women by protesting that Republican men simply want to “protect” us.

When I first went to law school in 1971, I encountered this sort of patronizing, belittling attitude everywhere. But I have news for today’s smug lawmakers: women are no longer willing to smile sweetly and seethe internally.

Pundits talk a lot about the gender gap. It is going to grow.

Here in Indiana, a group of Democratic women did some electoral research, and discovered that over 400,000 Hoosier women who had voted in the 2008 Democratic primary failed to vote in 2010. Had they done so, a number of results would have changed.

There is always a fall-off in voting in non-Presidential years, and a significant number of those women will probably return to the polls in 2012, but this group isn’t taking that for granted. They have formed a “51% Club,” with the express purpose of making sure women vote in May and November. The 51% Club held its first event last week.

I go to lots of fundraisers, but I have rarely been to one as well attended as this one. There are a lot of angry women—and men—right now.

Gail Collins was right. “You can try to fix that [GOP extremism] by working from within to groom a more sensible pack of future candidates, or from without by voting against the Republicans’ nominees until they agree to shape up.”

Those are the choices. A lot of us have made ours.

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Speaking of Gushers….

American taxpayers subsidize the giant oil companies to the tune of 4 billion dollars a year.

The American tax code contains a variety of provisions that make oil production one of the most heavily subsidized businesses in the country, with tax breaks available at virtually every stage of the exploration and extraction process.

According to the most recent study by the Congressional Budget Office, released in 2005, returns on capital investments like oil field leases and drilling equipment are taxed at an effective rate of 9 percent, significantly lower than the overall rate of 25 percent for businesses in general and lower than virtually any other industry.

For many of the smaller oil companies, the tax on capital investment returns is so low that it is more than eliminated by various deductions and credits. Incredible as it may seem, some companies’ returns on investment are higher after taxes than before.

In fact, oil profits are gushing. According to the organization Public Citizen, from the time George Bush became President in 2001 through the first quarter of 2007, the top five oil companies in the United States recorded profits of $464 billion. By 2011, those numbers were beginning to look like small change: in the second quarter of 2011 alone, the big five oil companies made 36 billion in profit.

That’s profit, not total revenues.

Meanwhile, you and I–together with other American taxpayers–continue to provide the industry with subsidies that have been estimated at between 4 and 8 billion dollars a year.

The various tax breaks enjoyed by big oil probably made sense when the industry was in its infancy. They make no sense at all when the industry is not just profitable, but obscenely so. Nevertheless, a move to eliminate those subsidies failed yesterday in the Senate, despite strong support from President Obama. While the proposal received support from a majority of the Senate, it failed to garner the filibuster-proof 60 votes that are required in order to get anything done in this era of Republican intransigence.

I suppose there is something admirable in the GOP’s loyalty to the 1%–those George W. Bush once called “his base.”   They refuse to tax the rich (and by “tax,” I mean raising the top marginal tax rate by 3% to the still historically low levels of the Clinton administration). They refuse to eliminate or reduce subsidies for obscenely profitable oil companies–indeed, Paul Ryan’s budget proposal would visit a world of hurt on people who depend on Medicaid, Medicare or other social programs, but it reportedly increases subsidies to big oil.

So much for the GOP’s purported concern about deficits.

From a fiscal policy perspective, these positions are simply unfathomable. And it is really difficult to believe they are politically palatable. Maybe the theory is that if they raise enough of a fuss about transvaginal probes and contraception, no one will notice.

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