Posts published in August 2009

We've seen the mixed audiences - and they have been mixed - at congressional town halls in the western part of the Northwest. But what was it like in Boise on Saturday night, at a meeting set up by the tea-bagging crowd?

Not violent or riotous, by all accounts. But some of the points made are worth some revisiting here, for a look at current Idaho conservatism and the situation Democratic Representative Walt Minnick is working within.

Blogger Joel Kennedy (a retired submarine officer (and "moderate realist. In Idaho, that makes me a Democrat") wrote that "one [participant] suggested that the whole concept of insurance was the cause of all the country's ills, and that if there was no insurance people would be a lot more personally responsible. There was lots of cheering for the concept of putting people in jail who tried to use the emergency room and not pay, but they also complained about the high cost of incarcerating people and wanted frequent use of the death penalty. Combining the two, it seemed the only logical solution to their conundrum was to execute poor people who couldn't afford to pay their hospital bills."

Welcome to Idaho. Assuming your pockets are stuffed sufficiently full of cash.

There were other concerns raised. A blog on the right, Free in Idaho, reported that "there are legitimate differences in opinion about the constitutionality of many of the things the government has done lately. Mr. Minnick seemed content that most are legitimate actions of government, but if not, the Supreme Court will eventually sort it out and make it all right. This stance brought boos every time he went there."

More specifically on health care, Jill Kuraitis at New West wrote about the concerns of veteran Bill Ripple, Boise, about “all this euthanasia of the greatest generation that ever lived.” Minnick responded (later in the meeting) "that nine years ago he had been in a serious car crash, and spent 24 hours on a respirator, fully conscious. 'And let me tell you the quality of life was not that great. I’d like to be able to provide some directions to my caregivers about my wishes.' A murmur of doubt and some suspicious words said that the audience was wary of the statement."

In favor of personal choice and responsibility, then, except when they weren't.

More generally, how did Minnick (the one member of Congress there in person) make out?

Kuraitis: "He paid too much homage to his Republican colleagues to please some Democrats, but not enough to please the crowd. Liberals won’t like it that he thought it was a 'useful suggestion' when someone shouted 'close the borders!' Republicans who crossed the party line to vote for him hated hearing of his support for President Obama."

For some reason, a closing line from an old Bob Dylan song plants itself, and refuses to go away: "He said his name was Columbus, and I just said, good luck."

Challis McAfee/Ada Co

A man in western Ada County was in his house late afternoon on Tuesday when he noticed a man outside taking pictures of his place. When he stepped outside to inquire why, they argued briefly -the man said he was on foreclosure business for a bank - and then the photographer reached into his vehicle and pulled a .357 magnum on him.

The man, Challis McAfee, is a local Republican official (precinct chair) and member of the state Republican central committee, and active in Boise-area Tea Party activities. He was taking pictures, he said, as part of a foreclosure investigation; a contractor hired through Wells Fargo confirmed that.

Meridian police arrested McAfee and charged him with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.

You could say all sorts of things about this incident. Here, we'll just note how perfectly it seems to encapsulate so much of the moment . . .

The press announcement from Idaho Governor C.L. "Butch" Otter about his new appointment to the state Court of Appeals somehow managed to leave out the most significant aspect of it: The new appointee, 5th District Judge John Melanson, is also presiding judge of the Snake River Basin Adjudication.

That's not a disqualifier, of course; and on the merits, Melanson is a solid choice. His work on the adjudication has been even-handed and steady.

Which leads to, more or less, the matter of: The next judge will be the fifth to preside over the SRBA. So far, Idaho has experienced something of a miracle that the adjudication has progressed as smoothly and as (yes) quickly as it has. Will this continue until judge number five?

That person, presumably, will be chosen by the Idaho Supreme Court. Thus far, all presiding judges have come from the ranks of 5th district judges. In this case, one of them (Barry Wood), who happens to have been a former SRBA judge, is effectively disqualified for the same reason he was removed from the case: His brother in law, Daniel Eismann, is on the Supreme Court.

Believe it was from Idaho . . . activist? not sure what label to put on him these days . . . . Dennis Mansfield, some years ago, we first heard about YouTube, when he suggested that this new thing might have some real impact in politics. That was a couple of years before, well, it did. Obviously in recent years, it has.

Today he (with his son Colin) are up (on Mansfield's site) with a new tool called Screenr.

It uses Twitter to very quickly and easily post videos.

Not sure we've absorbed yet what it's capable of. But it sure looks like something to keep a watch on. And the political possibilities seem very real.

Robert Kustra

Considering the nature of the political heat at the moment, and the political environment he works in, Boise State University President Robert Kustra's statement on health care ought generate some shocks.

A while back, Kustra's son Steve, who was insured, developed cancer. He was treated, and it went into remission. Afterward, his health care rates grew to the point that he dropped insurance. When cancer returned, he was uninsured and had trouble finding a physician to treat him.

In his state of the university talk today, the elder Kustra reflected on this:

“Over the course of the last 15 months, that we fought this battle, we saw close up what’s at stake in the current health care reform debate. We are living proof of how for-profit insurance companies and HMOs target people who are sick and who are ill and raise their premiums and raise their premiums until they can effectively kick them off of the rolls. . . . When we hear the 'public option,' and we hear the president thinking about dropping it from the plan, it worries me greatly that we would leave health care to the profit motive in America.”