Oh no, you are likely thinking, isn't this blog dedicated to architecture and the like? Sure, it crosses over into the law itself, from time to time, but . . .
Well, yes, we're departing from our normal programming to bring you this public service announcement.
And in doing so, I'll note, I'm typing this just a couple of days out of the hospital, too beat up from surgery to go back into the office yet.
More on that later.
On November 8th when you go to the polls, you will be voting on Constitutional Amendment B, which would increase the mandatory retirement age of Wyoming Supreme Court justices and District Court judges from 70 to 75. Circuit Court judges are not subject to a mandatory retirement age, oddly.
The Wyoming State Bar doesn't have an official position on it, but it's pretty clear that its unofficial position is vote yes. The Chief Justice of the Wyoming Supreme Court, who can openly come out on such matters, has, and her position is yes.
Vote No.
First, let's look at some material just released by the Wyoming State Bar.
Okay, there you have it.
Now, before we go on, let's note that the average Wyomingite is 38 years old, and that Wyoming is an "old" state. So, even as a state whose population is routinely analyzed as getting older and older, it's still less than 40 years of age.
Keep that in mind.
So the arguments in favor of raising the judicial retirement age? Well, as we all know, all Americans live free of bodily defect brought on by age, illness, or decline in mental faculties until they're 102 years old.
Right?
Not hardly.
Back the above reference to the hospital
This was my view for the last week. It's a view of the mountain, between the parking garage and an administrative building belonging to the hospital.
I took the photo from here.
I'm out now.
I was in as I had a robotic right colectomy. In other words, I had a large (very large) polyp in my large intestine that had to be removed. I learned this was there when I went in for a colonoscopy. This was the following surgery.
This turned out to be a bigger deal. . . a much bigger deal, than I wanted to admit it was. In my mind, I wanted to pretend that it would be in and out, or at least I'd be out by Friday. Nope. I did get out on Saturday, but I'm feeling rather beat up, and it's clear that it's going to take several days to get back to normal.
Army with two IV hookups. I had two, as I was so dehydrated when I came in, they had a very difficult time finding my veins.
I am on the mend now, however.
I ignored the current advice, which is to go in for a scope at age 50. You really should, and my failure to do so caused me to end up with this, probably. If I hadn't had this, I probably would have died from this right about the same time my father died from something sort of related, if not perfectly related. So my life has probably been extended by modern medicine, just like the State Bar notes has generally been the case society wide.
So the State Bar is right, right?
Well, only so far as people now "live longer" as things like colon cancer don't go undetected as much as they once did, so people tend not to die of them. We don't even think of death's like that as natural deaths, whereas at one time, we pretty much did. There's a reason, after all, that in the Middle Ages people prayed for "good deaths". Dying from colon cancer isn't a good death.
But living a "long", by historical standards, life doesn't mean living one free of deterioration of some sort. It's been often noted that in recent decades the incidents of dementia have been increasing, with seemingly little public understanding that the reason for this is tied directly to longer lives. Probably the incidents of cirrhosis of the liver have increased markedly since the Middle Ages as well, in spite of the huge amount of alcohol consumed at the time, for the simple fact that if you die when you are 40 years old you aren't likely to die by that means, in spite of your diet, as compared to its impact as you age past that point. Lavran is well portrayed as aged at the time of his death in Kristin Lavransdatter when he's probably not even 50, or just over it. Kristin is probably right about 50 when she dies. The book is a fictional work, of course, but an extraordinarily well researched novel. It catches that earlier era well.
Put another way, by extending the retirement ages of lawyers up, we're guaranteeing that the percentage of them that experience mental decline while in office also goes up. There's no doubt about it.
We're also guaranteeing that the average age of jurists will incline upwards, and their years on the bench will extend.
I've already noted that the median age in Wyoming is 38 years old. Anyone in business of any kind knows that the post Baby Boom generations, Gen, X, Gen Y, the Millennials, and Generation Jones, do not have the same views and attitudes that Baby Boomers do. For some period of time, Boomers expressed some contempt of that fact in regard to younger generations, and in more recent years younger generations have expressed contempt back. Perhaps missed in all of this is that younger generations have had a much harder time with much more limited resources than the Boomers have, with that generation being the most privileged in American history. This is not to pit one generation against another, but rather to point out that a person presiding in judgement over another ought to at least have some appreciation of where that younger person is coming from and what their experiences have been.
Indeed, here's where the points made by the Bar's information sheet actually cut the other way. It notes:
By 2030, 9.5% of the civilian labor force is projected to be older than 65.
Citing for authority, the following:
Bureau of Labor Statistics, U.S. Department of Labor, The Economics Daily, Number of people 75 and older in the labor force is expected to grow 96.5 percent by 2030 at https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2021/number-of-people-75-and-older-in-the-labor-force-is-expected-to-grow-96-5-percent-by-2030.htm (visited June 06, 2022).
We'd note at first, that's not necessarily a good thing. That we've now returned to a condition in which the elderly have to keep working isn't a sign of a healthy economic environment, bur rather potentially the opposite. The population of the elderly working increasing society wide may mean they have to, not that they want to.
And beyond that, these are figures for the US as a whole, not Wyoming in particular.
Be that as it may, even on its face, it means that over 90% of the workforce, is age 65 or younger.
The Bar's sheet also unintentionally pointed out by something additionally cuts the other way:
Mandatory judicial retirement at age 70 has resulted in the loss of many eminently qualified Justices and Judges in Wyoming, including Justice Michael K. Davis, Justice Michael Golden, Judge Timothy Day, and Judge Thomas Sullins to name a few. If the mandatory retirement age were extended, not only could these members of the judiciary continue to meaningfully contribute to the law in Wyoming, longer service would also result in a net savings for the State.
First of all, these individuals were not "lost", they're all still living. While not mentioned in this list (which must be sort of deflating to them), I can easily think of four retired judges who are now mediators and arbitrators, at least one of whom is heavily called upon in that role. So, rather than losing them, we simply employed them, or they chose to employ themselves, in another role.
Additionally, each one of these jurists had a seat which was not abandoned, but occupied by a younger lawyer. At least one of the individuals mentioned retired years ago, and his replacement is now long serving. Why are we suggesting that he's some sort of flop? That is exactly, however, what this suggests, untrue though it would be.
Additionally, like to say, of course, that we're a nation of laws, not of men, but those laws are filtered through the experiences and eyes of men, no matter how a person might wish to believe it. The economic concerns, for example, of average Americans in their late 20s in the 2020s, who push marriage off for financial considerations, who have lived with their parents longer than any generation since World War Two, and whose attachment to careers are less stable, as the careers themselves are less stable, are considerably different than those for people who came of age in the 70s, when simply having a college degree meant while collar employment.
Experience, of course, counts, as we often here, but so does over experience. Staying in a place, including an occupation, too long will bring about some sort of stagnation. This is true in all things. Spots coaching, where a sort of rough rule of the jungle applies, provides an interesting example. Like the law, the occupation exist geared toward producing a definitive result, so perhaps it's analogous in more ways than one.
In the NFL, for example, the same being an institution which Americans regard as sacrosanct, the two oldest coaches are 70 years of age, before the ages all drop down to less than 65. The tenth-oldest coach is only 54. Only one MLB manager is over 70 years of age. The oldest NBA coach is 73, but in second position is one that's 65.
Another example might be the military, with it sometimes being noted that some aspects of the law are in fact substitutes for private warfare. For officers, the most analogous group, the following is provided:
CHAPTER 63—RETIREMENT FOR AGE
Sec.1251.Age 62: regular commissioned officers in grades below general and flag officer grades; exceptions.
1252.Age 64: permanent professors at academies.
1253.Age 64: regular commissioned officers in general and flag officer grades; exception.
1263.Age 62: warrant officers..
62 years of age, with exceptions up to 64.
Finally, we might also wish to note, the cost of passing this amendment is opportunity costs, in terms of lost opportunities, for the profession. Recent appointees to the bench have been relatively young, often being in their 40s if in their 40s. These individuals will already occupy these positions for up to three decades, meaning that they will fill them to the exclusion of other, also qualified, individuals. While some may be great judges, we can never hope for that, and if most judges are adequate judges we are doing well. What we do know, however, is that some great judges will never get to be that, as their chance will be taken up by the aged. Lawyers who in their late 40s and early 50s still have a chance of being judges will lose that chance as occupants of the bench stay on, with everyone knowing that no matter how respected a lawyer may be, nobody is going to choose them for a judicial position after they are in their late 50s.
The one and only reason, therefore, to pass this amendment is the cost savings one noted by the State Bar, but that's a bad reason. It reduces this, like so many other things in American life, to dollars and cents to serve economic interests alone. The logical extension of it is simply to discourage retirement in general, something the larger American society in fact already does.
Catholics, according to the Church, are obligated to vote, and to do so in an informed manner.
And, I'll add to that, those who like to say that religion should stay out of politics are grossly misinformed, at least to the extent they mean that religion should be held personally and not influence a person's vote. A truly held set of religious beliefs ought to inform everything a person does.
This year is simply agonizing for the well-informed, thoughtful, Catholic voter.
In my area, where I will vote, two women contest for the position of Congressman.
The Republican expresses pro-life views, and views which suggest that she holds traditional views on the definition of marriage, two positions which are taken very seriously, even definitively so, by serious Catholics.
She also holds a mix of conservative views on various other issues, some of which I agree with, and some of which I do not, but none of which are moral issues, or at least not closely so.
The Democrat holds pro abortion and "progressive" views on the definition of marriage, and a host of other liberal views, some of which I agree with, and some of which I do not, but none of which are moral issues, or at least not closely so.
So, no dilemma, in weighing the voting scale, eh?
Well, the Republican has also expressed the view that the election was stolen, and her entire campaign was basically a stab in the back on the incumbent who stood by principals. In order to advance her campaign, she went from doubts, to being certain of election theft, and is now expressing views regarding the current administration which might charitably be described as nutty, even going so far as to suggest that inflation is a Democratic plot designed to bring about a liberal "Utopia". If I'm to take her asserted positions as actually held, it would mean she's believing in wild flights of dangerous fantasy, thereby making her a scary potential office holder. If I am to assume that they're taken for the purpose of being elected, she's lying and an enemy of democracy.
And there are no viable third party choices, really. One is from the far right, and the other from the Libertarian Party.
The far right candidate, running on the Constitutional Party ticket, is probably every bit as far right as the Republican, but with a very obvious Protestant Evangelical bent to her campaign. She doesn't say the vile things that the Republican does, and to the extent that her positions sound nutty, they sound nutty in the way that a position expressed by a person with little experience in the world and little education might voice them. Innocently, in other words.
Maybe I haven't listened enough to her, however. Frankly, I've disregarded her all along as a candidate that will obviously make no impact in the current election. (I subsequently listed to the debate she was in, and it's relatively clear that she's in the "coup didn't happen camp", although as noted, she probably genuinely feels that way, as opposed to Hageman, whom may not).
The Libertarian is a Libertarian, and there's no point in even going there.
A person could protest vote for the Constitutional Party candidate, but that's all it would be, a protest. But then, in order to make that protest, a person ought to know what she really believes. Perhaps I should go back and listed to her in the recent debate, which the GOP candidate skipped out on.
The only realistic hope of defeating the candidate that's either lying or coming off the rails is to vote for the Democrat, which is voting for a position which is normally gravely morally objectionable.
And then we have the Secretary of State's office, where a co-religious is running unopposed based on a stolen election theory along and is otherwise not a candidate which I'd prefer to consider. A protest is surely mandated there, but it'll have to be a write-in protest.
And so the state's politics have come to this. It feels like being a German going to the polls in 1932.
Wyoming doesn't need a coward. Wyoming needs a leader, Wyoming needs a voice, Wyoming needs people who are able to stand up to anybody and anyone.
Lynette Gray Bull.
The candidates for Wyoming's lone seat to the Congress, less Harriet Hageman, debated last night.
October 14, 2022
A debate of candidates for the U.S. House, save for Harriet Hageman, occurred last night.
Hageman was castigated by the other candidates for her failure to appear, which is either rude, arrogant, or cowardly. At least one candidate called her actions cowardly.
Hageman needs to be heard from on her failure to debate, and not with the excuse that she has other more effective means of communicating with Wyomingites. So far, more or less, her campaign has been limited to the fact that she supports now subpoenaed Donald J. Trump no matter what, whereas Liz Cheney has the courage of her convictions. Other than having united herself to Trump no matter what, there's nothing really known to distinguish her from Cheney, but the voters really haven't heard much from her otherwise in a widespread way. Public forum's she's attended to date have been principally populated with Hageman Fans/Cheney Haters, so that does not suffice.
How do we answer the question posed in the title of this post?
Well, the short answer is because Harriet Hageman has said "no" to a debate, but that obviously doesn't suffice.
Lawyers, which Hageman is, generally are regarded as liking to debate, or at least being comfortable with it. Indeed, a common unthinking reply to "why should I become a lawyer" or "why did you become a lawyer" is 1) well I like to debate, and to get paid for debating, or the related 2) well I like to argue, and to get paid for arguing. . . In truth, lots of lawyers like to do neither, but Hageman has boosted herself in her campaign by portraying herself as a wild vigilante jurist gunning down the horrible agents of Federal repression.
Harriet Hageman stopping agents of the United States Fish & Wildlife Service.
Truth be known, as a native Wyomingite, a lot of the big evil enemies she cites as having been taken on by her in her role as Litigator of the Golden West are agencies I like. I have a hard time hating, for example, the United States Fish & Wildlife Service. And the two times I've encountered her in a legal setting since 1990 didn't involve the Federal Government at all, although one did involve the super wealthy, who happened to be her client. But I digress.
My point is, here, that abstaining from debating requires some sort of reason, and the reasons are few.
Before we look at those reason, we should consider something.
Hageman hasn't campaigned on any issues at all.
Her campaign was based solely on attacking Liz Cheney for voting to impeach Donald Trump and then going on to be his opponent in Congress. Cheney stood on principles and on that, Hageman used the opportunity to advance herself, and successfully, so far.
In the process, for months she was actually very reluctant, unlike her opponents in the House race, to say that Trump won the election, which he didn't. When pressed, she took refuge in having "questions".
Missed in that response is that it's a lawyer witness answer. It's the classic Clintonesque "It depends on what the meaning of is, is." It's a hair-splitting dodge. Literally every single person on Earth can claim to have questions about the election as life is uncertain, and a person can harbor doubts about literally anything human's do, which doesn't mean they're reasonable. A person can have questions if the sun will explode today, if you will die of a heart attack tonight, if your Welsh Corgi will suddenly remember he descends from wolves and rip your throat out, or whatever.
Bulldog editor, or perhaps as he would have preferred Irish Wolf Hound editor, of the Tribune in its glory days, Phil McCauley. Photo linked in from his 2009 obituary.
Unfortunately, in this day and age, there isn't the Fifth Estate muscle to really run that to ground. The Tribune in the days of Phil McCauley would have harassed her on that to the point of tears, but that didn't of course occur. She had "questions".
Well, anyhow, only at the bitter end, after being endorsed by Trump, and pressed at a Casper Politics In The Park did she relent to fully selling her soul and saying the election had been stolen. She handily beat Cheney on that topic alone, with her enthusiastic supporters believing that she believes what they believe, thereby feeding into their beliefs for her personal advantage.
One is reminded of the classic line from A Man For All Seasons when Richard perjures himself:
Sir Thomas More: Why Richard, it profits a man nothing to give his soul for the whole world... but for Wales?
She's been really quiet since the Primary.
This assumes, of course, that she knows the truth, which frankly is my assumption.
Since that time, and after the primary election, she received a letter from forty-one Wyoming lawyers asking her to stop lying about the election being stolen. Quixotically branded the "Wyoming 41" by the Democratic primary candidate Steve Helling, who ran as a pro Trump Democrat (his campaign made next to no sense and received next to no support), they asked her, in a private letter, to quit lying. Her reply was practically unhinged, accusing them of being part of a nationwide plot to discredit Trumpite candidates by holding them to their oaths. The Wyoming 41 denied that, and frankly the accusation was absurd, and in turn wrote her back, this time with 52 signators on the letter.1 She didn't reply to that one.
And she's not replying much to anyone else in any really visible fashion.
Her current quietness may simply because she knows she's almost certain to be elected, and she just doesn't want to bother. But if that's the case, what would it hurt. Sure, she may very well have no need to debate, but if that's the case, debating can't possibly hurt her.
Or maybe it can.
Lynette Gray Bull is a very effective speaker and preformed very well against Cheney two years ago. At that time, she received 25% of the vote, and she'll receive more this time. It's difficult to imagine her adding another 25% to defeat Hageman, but maybe Hageman is worried that in a debate that will bring the difference between the two into sharp focus, she might.2 3
Since the primary, the January 6 committee has resumed and Trump is going to receive a subpoena to go to the Committee. That will appear on prime-time television, and he'll look like a strange liar. He's going to resist going, of course. Maybe being Trump's anointed will have just as much cache a month from now as it now does, but it's not guaranteed.
But beyond that, maybe Hageman's real career history and the issues that raises would also come up. She's been an enemy by her own statements of the things most Wyomingites love. An ally only of development and use, she's unlikely to be seen as a friend of hunters, fishermen and people who just love the outdoors. A product of southeastern Wyoming, which has generally been a hard core "it's my property stay off" portion of the state, she may well fear what that would mean.
She has the social issues of course, with Gray Bull being much to the left of her, and presumably outside the main from where most Wyomingites are, but she might also recall, given her age, a Wyoming which really wasn't very conservative on those issues. Maybe being pro gun doesn't mean much in a state where the Democrats are also pro gun. Maybe the remaining social issues like abortion and gender issues don't have as much cache with rank and file voters as presumed. Maybe just raising those issues, in a public forum, on a stage in which the one candidate has children and the other doesn't, where one candidate is young, and the other isn't, and where both affect Native items in their dress, but one is indigenous, and the other isn't, creates problems she doesn't care to have come up.
And maybe she's not confident in her in own debating skills in front of an audience that isn't canned against a debater who has no choice but to debate, and who is good at it.
Anyway it's looked at, it's inexcusable. Hageman should debate.
Footnotes:
1. The fifty-two signatures actually reflects more than 52 lawyers actually supporting the overall effort, as some of the original "Wyoming 41" didn't sign the second time as their noted public roles with various institutions was causing those institutions to receive complaints.
2. If Grey Bull doesn't pull in 33% this time, I'd be surprised. That would really be only a modest increase in her toll. Imagining 35%, or even 40%, isn't unreasonable.
3. Hageman has given Grey Bull a gift in that Grey Bull can now accuse Hageman of being an outright coward and Hageman can do little about it. Calling somebody out for a verbal duel can't really be adequately responded to except by engaging in a verbal duel, at which point your prior decline amounts to an admission of sorts.
Hard to believe that we're up to the 12th installment of this thread.
And for many, it's hard to believe that this is a "race". Indeed, for many, for that matter most, of the elected positions in the state, the race is over, with the Republican Primary having determined the winner.
Which is a tragedy for multiple reasons.
Democracy can't really survive in a one party state atmosphere is the primary one, and that's sort of what we have right now. Indeed, rather than one party, which is what we at least facially have, we'd be better off, in terms of elections to have no parties at all, which would be simple enough to do. I've noted it before, but there's really no good reason for party affiliation to take on a semi governmental function, as it has. A case can even be made that it's unconstitutional. Rather, the primary could, and in my view should, simply weed out the lesser candidates so the contest goes on in the fall. If we did that, for example, quite a few of the legislative races that were seemingly decided would be going on to the Fall election, and some of the big statewide races, such as that for Secretary of State, would be down to two candidates.
Another reason it's bad, however, is that it creates the oddity of polarization within the parties themselves, which is occurring in a major way inside the GOP, but which gets sorted out, at least partially, in a non-democratic way. The GOP's central leadership right now, for instance, has been heavily at odds with the leadership in Natrona and Laramie County, with the result being that those two counties, the most populous in the state, have been pretty much sidelined.
This latter feature, I'd note, is a common one for one party systems. Mexico's PRI, for instance, had very conservative and very radically left elements, all within one party. The Soviet Union's Communist party had factions within it. Other examples abound, but the point is that in such systems factions, as George Washington termed them, develop anyhow, but the means of determining who comes out on top is not decided at the ballot box. As we are, of course, a democratic system, they do still get partially sorted out by the voters, but only partially. Most voters have little participation at all with party organizations, if they are in a party at all.
Let's now look at the "races"
United States House of Representatives
Republican Party
As everyone on the entire globe knows, former Cheney supporter Harriet Hageman played Brutus to Cheney's Caesar in the general election.
Et tu, Harriet?
She now goes on to the general election as the overwhelmingly favored candidate. So much so, that she's basically being treated as though she is already elected, which she is not.
We'll address this below, but in order to leap over the top of her former political friend, Hageman boarded the "Trump Train" and acted as his stalking horse. While this seems likely to propel her into the halls of Congress, it also means that Wyoming is going to the bottom of the barrel in the upcoming Congress. If the Republicans regain the House, it means that Hageman will be part of a right wing crowd that will basically be directed by Trump, through Kevin McCarthy. If the Democrats retain control, which is becoming an increasing likelihood, Hageman will have no voice at all.
Not that this seems to matter in the contemporary Congress. The GOP has marginalized itself in this session in hopes of regaining power via Trump. The problem they'll face with that, rather obviously, is they'll be completely indebted to him.
This is raising the issue of whether the GOP of earlier decades is essentially dead, and is now a new type of party, and indeed not the old party at all. Increasingly, this looks like it is in fact the case.1
Democratic Party.
Lynette Gray Bull, who pulled in an impressive performance in the 2020 general election when she ran against Cheney, when put in context (25%) comes back for a second crack at the bat.
Gray Bull, is of Sioux and Arapaho lineage and a resident of the Wind River Indian Reservation, faces long odds, but frankly they may be better this year than last, even though she's a dark horse candidate. Horrified Democrats and Independents, many of whom switched to the GOP to vote for Cheney, will likely roll back to the Democratic Party and vote for Gray Bull. Self-satisfied Republicans, feeling their work is done in the election, may not bother to go to the polls in November. Added to that, horrified Republicans, of which there is a fair number, may go over to Gray Bull on democratic principles, seeing as Hageman is fully invested at the present time as an anti-democratic Christian Nationalist candidate.2
It's been noted that Hageman is really an establishment Republican, but a legitimate question at this point is whether she used to be an establishment Republican and no longer is, or whether the establishment Republicans, including Hageman, have been so duped that there's really no escaping for them. Either situation is more likely that Hageman and the GOP reemerging the party that it once was. I'm not as optimistic as former legislator Tim Stubson is on this score.
Anyhow, some Republicans will vote for Gray Bull as a protest. Some will vote for her on democratic principles. If she took 25% of the vote in 2020, which she did, and Democrats and Independents come out in strength this go around, that alone ought to take her to 30%, which is far below what she would need to win, of course.
However, the gap to winning, an added 20%, isn't really all that much. Hageman, this year, took about 70% of the vote. Of the 30% that voted against her, the question is how many are really upset Republicans.
Operating against this is that Gray Bull is very liberal on social issues, which may cause Republicans to hold their noses and vote for Hageman in spite of their disgust, or to just not vote at all.
Governor
Republican
This race really is over. Mark Gordon won.
Democrat
Theresa Livingston, a former employee of the BLM from Worland won the Democratic primary, but it really doesn't matter.
Secretary of State
Republican
In an upset, Chuck Gray, who has only been in the state for a decade, and who has plenty of strikes against him as a candidate for this office, won due to being the Trump backed far right Christian Nationalist candidate.
Gray, who wasn't universally popular in the legislature, focused on bogus election concerns in his campaign. It's deuce difficult to figure out how the voters thought he was qualified for this office, but he has it.
Democrat
631 Democratic write in votes were cast in the primary for Secretary of State, but that doesn't mean that any of the people written in will advance to the general. If any of them did, unless they're a very surprising candidate, they're going nowhere.
State Treasurer
Republican
Curt Meier won the GOP nomination for a second term.
Democrat
Nobody ran in the Democratic primary. A little over 400 write votes were cast, but once again, it's highly unlikely that any of the write-ins will run, and even more unlikely they would win if they did.
State Auditor
Kristi Racines took this race in the Republican primary, and she seems to be the only candidate in the state that everyone likes.
Superintendent of Public Instruction
Republican
This race saw Delgenfelder beat out recently appointed Schroeder, who was not a popular choice, for this position. This race bucked the hard right trend.
Democrat
Sergio Maldonado advances to the primary as the Democratic candidate, where he was running unopposed. Maldonado is a member of the Northern Arapaho tribe as well as being a Hispanic, so he joins Gray Bull in being in the category of the rare minority running for office. He has a long career in education and has been endorsed by the Wyoming Education Association, one of the few powerful unions in Wyoming.
Other Races
I don't try to cover all the legislative and county races, as I don't know a lot about them as a rule. I'll cover a few here, just as they're of some interest. I'm going to do that, however, in summary form.
The Natrona County Assessors race has proven interesting as incumbent assessor, serving his first term, Matt Keating, lost to Linda Saulsbury. Saulsbury had been an appointed assessor who filled out her popular predecessor's term, but ran into trouble with the staff she inherited. Keating took advantage of that in his race, but Keating has proven to be an unpopular assessor in the county, and Saulsbury took advantage of that.
What probably wasn't obvious to county residents was that assessors statewide ran into a state mandate to correct their undervalued assessments, which was part of a state drive to address budget shortfalls statewide. Be that as it may, Keating's bedside manner on the topic was awful, and this was far from apparent. Late in the race he began to try to point this out, and also took the position that the elevated tax levels could be dropped by municipalities choosing not to impose their full mill levies, a position that would be untenable for the municipalities as it would disqualify them for Federal grants. Three years running of tax challenges due to sometimes bizarrely changed assessments caused people to have enough, and it's been obvious for months that Keating was going to go down in the primary.
What might not have been expected, however, is that he'd take county commissioners out with him as collateral damage. Several challengers campaigned on the commissioners not being able to address this situation, which legally they really can't. Nonetheless, one long serving commissioner fell for the two-year seat and another for the four-year seat. One previously elected commissioners survived to run in November, but he polled the lowest among the survivors and will be joined in the race by a Democratic challenger. It's very far from obvious that he will survive the challenge.
An interesting aspect of this is that, while it was not obvious at the time, the Natrona County Commission was one of the first local bodies in the county to show the rightward tilt of the GOP, having elected a couple of right leaning commissioners in prior years and having one who was able to tilt that way at least in appearance. Now two of them are gone, and a third who was previously a City of Casper Councilman who had fallen in a city election is gone as well. Chances are good that a third will fall. This will leave with the council with new members who are bucking the rightward drift (rush?) trend and should cause the remaining right wing member some concern. At the broken edge of the bottle, the same voters who voted in the county for Gray and Hageman have basically rejected a hands-off approach and voted for a sharply more activist, and indeed activist that will disregard the law, approach. This is interesting in that in the end, Wyoming elections slowly drift towards being like Canadian ones to some degree, with people voting their pocket books.
If all the "less government", "no Federal money" Republicans get their way in the legislature, Wyoming would actually be looking at sharply reduced Federal funds and such grim tasks as paying for our own highways, something we can't do and don't want to try.
August 22, 2022
According to Fremont County Senator Cale Case, a traditional Wyoming Republican conservative, there's an effort being made to find an independent to mount a write-in campaign against Republican Secretary of State nominee Chuck Gray. Nobody has yet been identified to make the attempt.
In order to run on the general ballot as an independent a little over 5,000 signatures would have to be filed with the Secretary of State's office by August 31. That seems rather unlikely.
That wouldn't keep anyone from running a write in campaign, but that's an even more difficult proposition.
Independents do not have a history of electoral success in Wyoming and while Gray is controversial, such a person would face long odds.
August 23, 2022
A press report indicates that a lot of Republicans in the recent race did not vote down ballot.
For instance, 14,000 Republicans did not cast a Secretary of State vote.
This likely explains the hard right turn to some degree. Voters turning out to vote against Cheney out of Trump loyalty likely amounted to a disproportionate percentage of primary voters.
August 23, cont.
In a really unusual turn of events, Cale Case was mounting an effort to draft former legislator Nathan Winters for a run at the Secretary of State's office even though Winter didn't consent. Today the current Secretary of State determined that a potential candidate had to sign off on the effort, which ended this draft campaign.
At the same time, according to the Trib, Republicans are urging Tim or Susan Stubson to run as an independant.
August 28, 2022
The director of communications and policy at the Secretary of State's office has resigned as she does not wish to work for Chuck Gray, who has called into question the work of the office through his assertions that something was wrong with the Wyoming election.
It's beyond question that the Wyoming election was well run and there was no fraud, none of which has kept Gray from running around pretending like something needs to be done to shore up Wyoming's elections. In the words of the resigning individual:
He’s called into question the integrity of this office and now he’s going to run it, and yuck.
He has called into question the integrity of the office through his suggestions.
According to a post on Reddit, which therefore may be wild innuendo and dubious, rumors were circulating prior to the election that there'd be widespread resignations in the office if Gray was elected. That is, we'd note, purely a rumor. But now at least one person has resigned. Even if the rumor was true, however, people generally need their jobs and large scale registrations would be phenomenal.
Having said this, Gray himself may have had an inkling of this, as he said in an earlier PBS debate:
The insiders down there at the Capital, a lot of them don’t want things to improve, I’ve seen the Secretary of State staff work, and I do believe I can work with them towards getting this election integrity vision.
While not greatly familiar with the workings of the office itself, it is more likely than not is nearly self operating with professionals no matter who is in office which means that more likely than not, the only thing the Secretary of State really needs to do is set wider policy. If Gray doesn't lose most of the staff, he can likely spend four years on his "election integrity vision" and not really mess up the work of the office. That would leave him, as he likely knows, a springboard to attempt to become Governor if Gordon does not run for a third term, which he may well do knowing that if he doesn't, the office may fall to the hard right, assuming, which is not a safe assumption, that politics hasn't moved on in the meantime.
If, and it's only an if, and not very likely, Gray faced a large-scale office revolt, however, he may find himself in the same position as Cindy Hill was, who at some point really wasn't able to deal with an office that was in open revolt against her.
August 30, 2022
The write-in deadline fell yesterday, with nobody filing with signatures to run against Chuck Gray, as some had hoped. There were write in candidates certified, however, for several of the legislative races.
August 31, 2022
Secretary of State Ed Buchanan will assume the judgeship he was appointed to in mid-September, and step
down from his current position at that time. This means an interim Secretary of State will be appointed to oversee this year's election.
September 1, 2022
In Alaska, Democrat Mary Peltola defeated a slate of candidates in a special election for Congressman from that state. Sarah Palin was one of the contestants.
The race was to fill the seat of the deceased Don Young, so the position is, obviously, pretty temporary, but presumably gives Peltola an edge as the incumbent in November.
The race was notable for several reasons, including that Peltola, who is Yup’ik, will become the first Native Alaskan Congressman. But more than that, it's the first ranked choice election in Alaska's history, the system, which disregards party, having just been adopted by Alaska's voters.
A bill in a Wyoming legislative committee proposes to adopt the same system, which is more democratic than the party primary system the state now has. This result would suggest that when unrestrained by party, voters will in fact cast a a wider net.
Defeated Sarah Palin complained about the new system in the election itself, and railed against it after being defeated.
September 6, 2022
The Wyoming GOP, noting that if he leaves on September 15 as he has indicated that he will it will mean that his appointed successor shall have mere weeks to prepare for administering the General Election, has asked Ed Buchanan to remain in office to the end of his term.
In this context, that is not an unreasonable request and, indeed, this should have been taken into account as soon as he indicated that he was pursuing a judgeship.
September 7, 2022
Secretary of State Buchanan declined the GOP's request.
I'm frankly surprised, and I also frankly think this entire episode has not been well thought out.
September 10, 2022
The Tribune reports that November's general election shall have the highest number of unaffiliated and third party candidates on the ballot since 1998.
House District 8, in which the notable mainstream Republican Dave Zwonitzer is running for reelection, but in a newly formed district in Laramie County, is one of them. In that district, Independent Brenda Lyttle is his only opponent. The increasing discord in the mostly Republican legislature, which has split into two branches, motivated her run as an Independent, although Zwonitzer has one of the most dignified presentations in the legislature Medicare expansion and education funding are her issues, so she's basically ironically running with what would normally be moderate Republican or Democratic stance.
Here I hope that Zwonitzer, who has been an influential intelligent voice in the legislature, wins reelection.
Bob Strobel is running in northwest Wyoming's House District 22. Stroble represents himself as a lifelong Republcan, but he's unyielding on the public lands remaining in Federal hands. I don't know anything about that district, but on that basis alone, I hope that Strobel wins.
Three Constitution Party candidates are running. The Constitution Party, at least in my view, tends to have a reading of the Constitution that uniquely interprets it by disregarding what it actually says, in support of a far right Quasi Christian Nationalist position. I'd thought they'd gone away, but they're running more candidates this year than ever.
A record number of Libertarians are also running for state solon positions.
Which takes us to the Governor's and House races. We haven't covered the third parties at all, and we now should. The Trib reports the third parties as having candidates for both, but we're only seeing that for the House of Representatives. Having said that, the Trib is probably right, but the candidates probably haven't secured sufficient signatures yet to appear on the general ballot.
United States House of Representatives
Republican Party
Harriet Hageman. Hageman is the Trump endorsed flag bearer for the those who felt that Cheney betrayed the state by not getting on the Trump train. She'll go into the race with more wild far right GOP populist enthusiasm, more moderate GOP contempt and more inflated expectations of any candidate in the state's history.
Democratic Party.
Lynette Gray Bull, who pulled in an impressive performance in the 2020 general election when she ran against Cheney, when put in context (25%) comes back for a second crack at the bat, as a darkhorse candidate, but with better odds this time than previously as she'll secure a fair number of disgruntled Republicans and horrified independents.
Constitution Party
Melissa Selvig, who ran on the Republican ticket to the far right before correctly assessing her ticket as doomed, has signed up for a doomed effort as the Constitution Party's candidate for the House.
Independent
Casey Hardison is a gadfly candidate who is also running for the President of the United States in 2024 for the Democratic Republican Party. A chemist, he has a series of drug convictions.
September 13, 2022
Senator Cale Case will be the subject of a censure vote by the Republican Central Committee, which will also ask him to drop his Republican affiliation.
This is the second time Case has faced a censure vote for being true to his values. He earlier this year was censured by the Fremont County GOP before going on to win reelection with a 10 point margin.
This time it's because of his open opposition to Chuck Gray and the election stolen lie that Gray espoused in the primary election. Case, a longtime legislator and formally one of the most conservative members of the body, has openly been backing the bill to remove election certification from the Secretary of State on the basis that Gray is an election denier. The Republican Party censure resolution refers to this as an abuse of power, which is somewhat ironic given the putative threat Gray represents in his role. Case also sought to have an independent run against Gray. Case has indicated that, having been through this process once already, he isn't really worried about what the GOP Central Committee does.
September 14, 2022
GOP Congressional candidate Harriet Hageman has refused a PBS offer to host a debate with her opponent, Lynette Grey Bull.
Boo hiss.
The refusal comes across as chicken, chickenshit, and disrepectful.
Grey Bull took about 25% of the vote in the last election against Cheney, at which point most of the people who now hate Cheney with the red hot passion of a thousand burning suns swooned at her inherited GOP presence. If she too 25% under those circumstances she likely holds to take more now. The question is whether Hageman figures that she's already been crowned and need not lower herself to debate her Democratic candidate, or whether she fears debating a candidate who isn't welded to Donald Trump might increase that candidates odds.
Anyway a person looks at it, this is already a symbol of how those Wyomingites who haven't agreed to work towards the leader are likely to be treated in some quarters.
Park County's GOP has passed a resolution supporting Chuck Gray and denouncing efforts to restrict the Secretary of State's authority over elections.
On Gray, as readers here know, there is a bill in the legislature to remove election supervision from the Secretar of State's office and vest it in a new non partisan commission. Gray released a statement condemning the bill, not surprisingly, aiming it as he tends to do at imaginary "big government" insiders. More specifically, he stated:
Republicans across Wyoming correctly see Zwonitzer’s and (Case’s) effort for what it is — a couple of big-government insiders who are shamelessly ignoring the will of voters and our right to have our elected officials represent us.
There might be some merit to that, although Zwonitzer had a good reply, but it raises the question of why on earth the Secretary of State's office is an elected office. Indeed, the same question applies to the State Auditor's office and the State Treasurer's office. Whatever the original reason is, it's long since become obsolete and most years a high percentage of voters, if asked, don't have any idea who any of these candidates actually are. More on that in a seperate post.
Gray, of course, was elected because he was Trump backed and he ran around in his campaign spreading the election lie myth, so he was in fact elected in the primary as a contestant, the only one, to prevent a myth that didn't happen from reoccuring. That, however, brings up the interesting point that if Gray is really worried about this, he ought to support the law, as it would make our already really secure election super safe.
September 23, 2022
The news reports (but not the Edition of the Trib, which was replaced today with the E-edition of Beatrice Nebraska's newspaper) that a group of Wyoming lawyers, including some very prominent ones (the outgoing and elect State Bar Presidents, at least one prominent retired judge, a former Attorney General of the State of Wyoming) wrote to Harriet Hageman complaining of her misrepresenting the election as stolen and pointing out what they state is her ethical obligations as a lawyer to tell the truth.
Hageman's reaction has been to publically publish a counter to their letter which might best be characterized as absurd, asserting the lawyers are part of a left wing national movement to attack conservative candidates. Her reaction, therefore, to be told not to lie, was to lie.
Hageman, as a politician, is now past the State Bar as a concern and into the hall of Congress where lying is a long practiced tradition. But the evolution of the candidate, from a quiet Cheney supporter, to a Cheney challenger who at first wouldn't call the election stolen, to one who now heavily leans into having "questions" and implies the election is stolen, to one who won't debate her opponent and who reacts to her fellow bar members private letter with a public assertion of wild conspiracy has been remarkable.
The writing lawyers who were in turn interviewed by the Trib were measured in their response, simply siting their obligation to uphold the truth, with only the former AG signatory showing some real ire, in which he also noted the lies more directly advanced by Chuck Gray.
September 26, 2022
All three of the names forewarded to Governor Gordon for interim Secretary of State are far right figures aligned with the views of Chuck Gray.
September 28, 2022
Lynette Gray Bull, Democratic candidate for the U.S. House in Wyoming, publicly asked for Liz Cheney's endorsement via Twitter.
The request was based on Cheney's open statement that she's help anti Trump candidates even if they are Democrats.
September 30, 2022
Karl Allred, who is a gas plant manager who unsuccessfully ran for the legislature with a Harriet Hageman endorsement, will be the interim Secretary of State.
Applicants for the office included some who had direct experience with it, but they were not appointed to be finalists. The office deals principally with business matters and has been highly respected. It has a very professional staff who can likely carry that forward, but there have been rumors that they'll largely resign rather than work under Chuck Gray.
Allred enters the office an unknown, but one who is likely less extreme than the other two finalists. He fits into the mold right now, however, of the GOP sending individuals who are fully bought into the populist Trump wing of the party. It's remarkable that individuals who were clearly more qualified were passed over. The state has reason to worry about this trend, which it has now endured a second time, although the last one, with the Superintendent of Education seems to hae worked out. Notably, the voters did not choose that person for reelection.
October 1, 2022
Following up on yesterday's entry, Allred it turns out has a string of failed legislative bids. He was one of the inidividuals who sued Governor Matt Mead over the capitol improvement contract and he was one of the conservative candidates who violated the University of Wyoming's open carry prohibition in an attempt to challenge its constitutionality. Indeed, a recent photo of him addressing the Central Committee depicts him carrying a sidearm at that event.
The Governor's announcement, which I cannot find, was "pointedly" short, according to the press.
Representative Mike Yin, D Jackson, emailed to the Tribune that none of the choices presented to the Governor were reasonable ones, which seems to be borne out by the names of applicants the Central Committee passed over who had experience relevant to the job. Allred was seeingly the least extreme of the three. On September 17, prior to his selection, Allred had called Yin a "flippin idiot" who needed to be gotten rid of.
October 2, 2022
The lawyers castigated by Harriet Hageman after they wrote her letter about truthful representations replied to her public reply to their private letter, once again pointing out that lawyers have a duty to respect the decisin of courts. More signed the second letter, than the first.
Somewhat missed in the story on the first letter is that it was a private letter, not a public one. Hageman published it, associating it with a conspiracy theory.
October 3, 2022
Both China and Russia appear set to try to interfere in the elections, Russia by trying to cast doubt on US election integrity.
It can't help but be noted that the GOP has done a fine job of doing that itself without Russian help, although some of the prinicpal figures in that, such as Donald Trump and Tucker Carson, have very odd affinities with Putin.
The FEC has notified the Hageman campaign that it has failed to meet reporting regulations.
Republican Senate Majority Leader Ogden Driscoll faces a write in campaign now from his right for a defeated candidate from the primary. The challenger, Roger Connet, hasn't endorsed or discouraged the campaign.
October 7, 2022
In a development showing just how odd this election year really is, the Uinta County GOP is endorsing a write-in candidate, and "enthusiastically" over their own primary candidate victor for House District 19.
The move by the county's GOP committee was not received with universal welcome.
October 9, 2022
Lynette Grey Bull forcefully campaigned for Liz Cheney's endorsement in a rally in Casper yesterday.
Footnotes:
1. See:
Fromer legislator Stubson's position on this is very admirable and he's been an outspoken champion of Cheney this election cycle, but he supported Ted Cruz in the Cruz campaign, which is some ways was a portent of things to come. As a legislator, he also supported the study bill that was to look at trying to get the Federal lands transferred to Wyoming, which also fits in to the far right list of ticket items. He is not in that camp, but this illustrates in a way how we slid down this slippery slope.
Former Speaker of the House in Wyoming Tom Lubnau very much saw this coming and tried to warn everyone to no avail.
2. It can certainly be debated whether or not Hageman really is a Christian Nationalist, which is not the same thing, we'd note, as being a Christian or observant Christian. Rather, it's the theme that the GOP is leaning heavily into.
We dealt with the rising phenomenon of Christian Nationalism recently, but the definition of the movement is becoming much clearer. We'll expand on that shortly.
Why do pundits, from Robert Reich, to the great cast of NPR's Politics, to the round table folks on the weekend shows keep getting politics, their bread and butter, wrong?
Maybe they don't go out and actually live the lives of real folks.
A recent week from the formerly august journal, The New Republic:
If Merrick Garland had been confirmed in 2016, we would still have the Roberts Court instead of the Trump-McConnell Court. As backlash to “Dobbs” mounts, McConnell may come to regret that fact.
What an amazing load of complete drivel. No wonder the left remains threatened by the presence of a bizarrely speaking septuagenarian millionaire serial polygamist.
They're clueless.
Here's how the logic noted above is supposed to work.
Suburban women (which in the minds of progressives defines somebody who is a cross between "soccer mom", Betty Crocker and the proverbial "Karen") suddenly becomes a Democratic voter due to the Dobbs decision because, no matter what else she thinks, the issue of abortion, the way progressives define it, is the most important issue in the world to her. And because of that, she's now boosting gay education in schools, the rights of the LBGQT, and subscribes to the Bernie Sanders newsletter.
And Kansas is evidence of this.
Not hardly.
In the real world, the suburban female voter is more likely to be a mid 30s professional who is watching her paycheck evaporate due to inflation, who can't hire competent help at work as there isn't any, anymore, whose existing help is "laying flat" and "quiet quitting", and who is wondering how she's going to help put food on the table.
She's a lot more likely to vote her pocketbook than
Most people aren't single issue voters. A few people, on the right and the left, are, but those who are single issue voters are much more likely to be on the right. And this is why:
Robert Reich
@RBReich
·
Why are Republicans trying to prevent students from discussing sexuality, gender, and systemic racism in the classroom? Because the biggest threat facing the Republican Party is a multi-racial generation of Young people unafraid to speak truth to power — and make them irrelevant.
No, that's not it either.
It's because, starting in the 1970s, the left forced social change into society through the courts, not the ballot box, and average people got tired of being told that something's that they didn't accept, they had to accept, because nine old dudes in dresses told them they had to, Oracle at Delphi fashion.
How the left views the Supreme Court, how the Supreme Court has sometimes seemingly viewed itself, and how the right views how the left views the Supreme Court. The Oracle at Delphi. The Constitution has a penumbra? Well okay then. . .
So what that means is that when Soccer Mom goes to the ballot, she's not seeing it the way Robert Reich is at all.
And you can be 20 years old Ms. Soccer, whose is looking at a world that's pretty messed up due to the "tear everything down" mentality of the 1970s isn't. She's probably looking for the guard rails, only to find that they've taken off the parapet.
Well, what about Kansas?
Yeah, what about Kansas? That proves the point.
Kansas was a vote on repealing a constitutional amendment. It was a straight up or down vote. A person doesn't have to have that strong of convictions on anything to vote on something like that, which is why really badly conceived of constitutional amendments sail past Wyoming voters and become law, and then are completely forgotten. I'm not saying that vote was insignificant, but if it was combined with pocket book issues and the like, and for that matter other social issues, there's no telling where it would go.
Indeed, real voters have opinions on gun control, abortion, health care, the environment, Donald Trump, inflation and on and on. In the mind of the punditry Soccer Mom is charging off to the polls on abortion, but that actual voter stands a pretty good chance of having highly traditional values on marriage, a middle position on gun control, is worried on environmental issues, is really worried on inflation, and has no strong opinion on the Orange Haired Menace.
This doesn't describe the punditry. The punditry has strong opinions on everything, and they line up right and left.
Real people don't.
Which gets us to this.
Some people vote single issue tickets on social issues, but they're mostly on the right. And they do go to the polls.
Most people don't vote single issue anything, save for rare occasions, and often on very local issues.
Demographic groups align with their deeply held traditions after they establish themselves in the nation, and those traditions tend to be conservative, not liberal.
Those on the left who support their social issues sooner or later take them to the extreme and alienate everyone, and then they don't go to the polls.
Young people generally don't go to the polls, and they aren't going to in 2022 or 2024.
Abortion isn't going to make much of a difference in the 2022 or 2024 elections, and to the extent it does, it'll help the right, not the left.
To the extent any progressive politician is foolish enough to make gun control an issue, that'll hurt the left.
Nobody is going to the polls one way or another on LBGQT platforms, and that's going to play no role in upcoming elections.
Inflation is a big deal and that will impact voters, but in favor of Republicans.
You can't lie to voters for decades regarding their big worries and then have them support you anymore. They'll support somebody who listens to them, even if it's a dangerous bloviator.
You can't force your issues on people through courts for decades and then come out crying about the demise of democracy. People aren't going to believe that either.
Not matter what pundits believe, and rational people may wish for, Donald Trump just isn't going away, and it's not suddenly going to be the case that lots of Republicans abandon him.
And you can't really have any idea what real people are thinking if you don't have much of a connection with their lives.
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