Tag Archives: politics

NY21, This Is an Emergency!

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A farmer, not a politician.

A couple of nights ago, I attended a Zoom meet-and-greet with Blake Gendebien, the Democratic candidate to replace Trump toady Elise Stefanik in New York Congressional District 21 when she vacates it to be vetted by the Senate for her appointment as UN Ambassador. As you might expect, the voters in the mostly rural, 86% white NY21 in the far northeastern part of the state, are as far politically from the voters in New York City, where I live, as New York City is geographically from NY21. The district voted solidly for Trump in all three of his presidential campaigns.

The GOP believes it now owns the district, though Stefanik, who was first elected in 2014, was the first Republican to represent it since Hamilton Fish IV was redistricted out in 1992. A long-term holder of the seat before he, too, was redistricted out was the “staunch progressive” Paul Tonko, who now represents NY20.

To get an idea of how radically NYS and US politics have changed in recent times, before migrating north up the Hudson River, NY21 represented New York County, otherwise known as Manhattan. Back then (in the 1960s and 1970s), it was represented by actual liberal Republican (and Liberal Party member) Jacob Javits, who early in his Congressional career, as an example of his political inclinations, opposed Taft-Hartley because it threatened the strength of labor unions.

Who is Blake Gendebien?

Blake Gendebien (pronounced JEN-da-bean) is what is now known as a “moderate” Democrat. (Republican operatives call him “far left.” More about that in a moment.) He’s a dairy farmer and small businessman who with his wife Carmen, a Cuban immigrant he met while studying agriculture and business at Penn State, owns 500 cows and 1,500 acres near the St Laurence River. Like Kamala Harris’s running mate Tim Walz, Gendebien is a dad and a former coach. He says he wants to “strengthen the border” and get rid of regulations that hamper small businesses like his own.  He owns a gun, says he supports the Second Amendment and subscribes to Gun Sense Voter principals. It seems, so far, that only the Gun Sense part could possibly be controversial in his district.

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Republicans in Congress Are Fine with Musk Power Grab

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First phone lines in Kathmandu being laid in 1959 with help from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). This photo is from an archived USAID site. At the time of this posting, the USAID site itself was dark.

There are some extraordinary admissions from powerful Congressional Republicans in a NOTUS article by Haley Byrd Wilt, Shifra Dayak and Ben T.N. Mause :

In interviews on Monday night, Republican senators — including members of the Appropriations Committee tasked with setting funding levels — dismissed Musk’s moves to consolidate his power and seize sensitive government systems to shut down spending. They say that Musk, in rejecting appropriations laws passed by Congress, is simply following Trump’s priorities.

Some, like North Carolina Sen. Thom Tillis, even acknowledged that what Musk is doing is unconstitutional — but “nobody should bellyache about that.”

“That runs afoul of the Constitution in the strictest sense,” Tillis said. But “it’s not uncommon for presidents to flex a little bit on where they can spend and where they can stop spending.”

Other Republicans argued that Musk is making the government more efficient, and they said they’re glad — if nobody on Capitol Hill is going to slash spending — that someone has finally taken charge.

“The actions that have been taken with USAID are long overdue,” Sen. Bill Hagerty said. “The agency is out of control.”

And Sen. John Hoeven said “they need to be accountable.”

Yes, a Republican says, a US agency that has been at the center of foreign aid (and secret foreign policy) for more than half a century needs to be held accountable, but the party’s choice for effecting that? The world’s wealthiest man and his team of barely legal social media minions, none of whom has been vetted by Congress or any other Constitutionally empowered entity.

Or do they want to make the case that the Constitutionally-elected and seated president picked him to wield extraordinary powers over the government, so it’s virtually Constitutional somehow? No, they don’t say that. They admit it runs “afoul” of the Constitution–but who cares?

Adios, “strict constitutionalism.” Hello, interesting times.

David Graeber: “The democratic way of choosing officials, if you had to do it, was lottery.”

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One way to thoroughly clean up the corrupt election process: sortition: Election by lottery. All eligible and willing candidates would put their names in the system and, like jury duty, would be selected at random to serve for a limited time. I hope the democracy matures to the point where this becomes not just a crackpot idea but standard practice. David Graeber of OWS fame defends the position in this article the blog Equality by Lot.

Yoram Gat's avatarEquality by lot

David Graeber is an

American anthropologist, political activist and author. He is currently reader in social anthropology at Goldsmiths College, University of London, and was formerly an associate professor of anthropology at Yale University. David is a member of the labour union Industrial Workers of the World, and has played a role in events such as the 2002 New York protests against the World Economic Forum. His most recent book is Debt: The First 5,000 Years (2011)

He is also described as

a man of many talents. A longtime activist, a professor of anthropology at the University of London, and a prolific author, David also helped found the Occupy Wall Street movement in 2011. He even coined the phrase “We are the 99%.”

Graeber is not impressed with the electoral system:

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