The 2026 Wyoming Legislature, Part 1. The way too early edition.

April 10, 2025

Freedom Caucus leader John Bear went on record at a meeting of legislators on how to handle the upcoming populist initiative to reduce property taxes by 50%, after they've just been reduced by 25%, as favoring completely eliminating property taxes in favor of sales taxes.

On the imported geezer reduce my property taxes on the house I bought after I moved here from California initiative, he feels that the effect wouldn't be cumulative (50% of the just reduced 25%), while other legislators do.

May 2, 2025

A press interview of Freedeom Caucus member Bear reveals the WFC wants to treat the Wyoming budget to some DOGEy style actions, particularly in regard to grants and loans.

May 4, 2025

Wyoming Republicans Elect Sheridan's Bryan Miller As New Party Chairman

I don't know anything about the woman from Teton County who was his competition, but Miller was another individual who spent a career in the military, and therefore was a lifelong recipient of public funds, and who has now returned as an opponent of the Federal government.

May 7, 2025

Wyoming Legislature finalizes list of ‘off-season’ topics for study

May 9, 2025

Chuck Gray Supports 22 New Election-Reform Bills, Committee To Study 10

Some of these bills are frankly nuts.

May 19, 2025

Wyoming lawmakers go after funding for state associations that sometimes oppose their bills: Green River Rep. Marlene Brady is leading the charge on prohibiting cities, towns and counties from paying dues to elected officials’ associations.

May 21, 2025

Legislative panel pursues bills to regulate Wyoming library books with sexual material: Lawmakers are taking up library books as conservative activists around the state pore over material in young adult and teen library sections for sexual content.

For reasons I won't go into, I've seen some of the book that is featured in this article, and there's no way it should be in the children's section of a library.

May 22, 2025

Committee Adopts Bill To Make Wyoming Senate Confirm Supreme Court Justices

This is inaccurate. Rather they voted to have the LSO draft such a bill.

May 23, 2025

As scrutiny of judges grows, lawmakers weigh changes to Wyoming’s selection process: In her final official appearance before lawmakers, Wyoming Supreme Court Chief Justice Kate Fox defended the process for choosing the state’s judges. But some lawmakers still want changes.

May 25, 2025

A draft bill would allow for nuclear facilities to have armed guards as a type of private police force.

Private police forces are rare, but not completely unknown. The Wyoming Stock Growers Association at one time was authorized to have them, although that's long ago in the past.  While I haven't kept up on it, so I don't know the current status, railroads at one time had them as well.

June 4, 2025

Oh great . . . 

Wyoming Freedom Caucus plans on ‘DOGE-ing’ state budget: House Appropriations Chairman John Bear takes inspiration from the Trump administration’s efforts to cut federal jobs and spending.

DOGE has been such a disaster that even Trump is questioning it.  This is the last thing Wyoming needs

Deep down, to a large extent, the Freedom Caucus just hates the government.

Meanwhile:

Wyoming Democrats Are Going Broke And Don’t Want The Press To Report It

The State's Democratic Party is abasically as dead as a doornail.  Those looking for a middle path aren't being offered it by the Democrats, who recently replaced their leadership.  The thin, bow tie, wearing newly elected leader provides an apt symbol for a party grossly out of step with the state.

June 5, 2025

Wyoming Legislature to consider abolishing property taxes through constitutional amendment: After creating a complicated web of residential property tax exemptions, lawmakers are now weighing whether to eliminate property taxes entirely.

June 11, 2025

Wyoming lawmaker uses slur for Japanese people before visiting Heart Mountain internment site: Rep. John Winter made the remark while discussing logistics for a tour of the former internment camp, where more than 14,000 Japanese Americans were held against their will during World War II.

 Wyoming lawmakers step toward bill clarifying corner crossing’s legality: Some agricultural industry lobbyists urged a legislative committee to wait and see whether the U.S. Supreme Court takes the case, but others — including law enforcement — testified that they could use precise legal directions.

July 28, 2025

Wyoming lawmakers consider nuclear waste storage as tensions rise over microreactor plant proposal: A draft bill that would make an exception to Wyoming's nuclear waste ban is intended to accommodate a California firm's plans to "mass-produce" microreactors near Casper.

July 31, 2025

Legislators Clash Over Proposed Bill That Would Allow Spent Nuclear Fuel In Wyoming

August 1, 2025

Lawmakers table bill to allow nuclear waste storage in Wyoming

August 9, 2025

Tom Lubnau:  Calling Innocent People Pornographers And Pedophiles At Taxpayer Expense

Related threads:

The Wyoming Freedom Caucus and the 2025 and 2026 Legislatures. Some things to keep in mind.

Liz Cheney sends out a message to Democrats.

Via Robert Reich:

From Liz Cheney

Dear Democratic Party,

I need more from you.

You keep sending emails begging for $15,

while we’re watching fascism consolidate power in real time.

This administration is not simply “a different ideology.”

It is a coordinated, authoritarian machine — with the Supreme Court, the House, the Senate, and the executive pen all under its control.

And you?

You’re still asking for decorum and donations. WTF.

That won’t save us.

I don’t want to hear another polite floor speech.

I want strategy.

I want fire.

I want action so bold it shifts the damn news cycle — not fits inside one.

Every time I see something from the DNC, it’s asking me for funds.

Surprise.

Those of us who donate don’t want to keep sending money just to watch you stand frozen as the Constitution goes up in flames — shaking your heads and saying,

“Well, there’s not much we can do. He has the majority.”

I call bullshit.

If you don’t know how to think outside the box…

If you don’t know how to strategize…

If you don’t know how to fight fire with fire…

what the hell are we giving you money for?

Some of us have two or three advanced degrees.

Some of us have military training.

Some of us know what coordinated resistance looks like — and this ain’t it.

Yes, the tours around the country? Nice.

The speeches? Nice.

The clever congressional clapbacks? Nice.

That was great for giving hope.

Now we need action.

You have to stop acting like this is a normal presidency that will just time out in four years.

We’re not even at Day 90, and look at the chaos.

Look at the disappearances.

Look at the erosion of the judiciary, the press, and our rights.

If you do not stop this, we will not make it 1,460 days.

So here’s what I need from you — right now:

⸻

1. Form an independent, civilian-powered investigative coalition.

I’m talking experts. Veterans. Whistleblowers. Journalists. Watchdog orgs.

Deputize the resistance. Build a real-time archive of corruption, overreach, and executive abuse.

Make it public. Make it unshakable.

Let the people drag the rot into the light.

If you can’t hold formal hearings, hold public ones.

If Congress won’t act, let the country act.

This isn’t about optics — it’s about receipts.

Because at some point, these people will be held accountable.

And when that day comes, we’ll need every name, every signature, every illegal order, every act of silence—documented.

You’re not just preserving truth — you’re preparing evidence for prosecution.

The more they vanish people and weaponize data, the more we need truth in the sunlight.

⸻

2. Join the International Criminal Court.

Yes, I said it. Call their bluff.

You cannot control what the other side does.

But you can control your own integrity.

So prove it. Prove that your party is still grounded in law, human rights, and ethical leadership.

Join.

If you’ve got nothing to hide — join.

Show the world who’s hiding bodies, bribes, and buried bank accounts.

Force the GOP to explain why they’d rather protect a war criminal than sign a treaty.

And while you’re at it, publicly invite ICC observers into U.S. borders.

Make this administration explain — on camera — why they’re terrified of international oversight.

⸻

3. Fund state-level resistance infrastructure.

Don’t just send postcards. Send resources.

Channel DNC funds into rapid-response teams, legal defense coalitions, sanctuary networks, and digital security training.

If the federal government is hijacked, build power underneath it.

If the laws become tools of oppression, help people resist them legally, locally, and boldly.

This is not campaign season — this is an authoritarian purge.

Stop campaigning.

Act like this is the end of democracy, because it is.

We WILL REMEMBER the warriors come primaries.

Fighting this regime should be your marketing strategy.

And let’s be clear:

The reason the other side always seems three steps ahead is because they ARE.

They prepared for this.

They infiltrated school boards, courts, local legislatures, and police unions.

They built a machine while you wrote press releases.

We’re reacting — they’ve been executing a plan for years.

It’s time to shift from panic to blueprint.

You should already be working with strategists and military minds on PROJECT 2029,

a coordinated, long-term plan to rebuild this country when the smoke clears.

You should be publicly laying out:

• The laws and amendments you’ll pass to ensure this never happens again

• The systems you’ll tear down and the safeguards you’ll enshrine

• The plan to hold perpetrators of human atrocities accountable

• The urgent commitment to immediately bring home those sold into slavery in El Salvador

You say you’re the party of the people?

Then show the people the plan.

⸻

4. Use your platform to educate the public on rights and resistance tactics.

If they’re going to strip us of rights and lie about it — arm the people with truth.

Text campaigns. Mass trainings. Downloadable “Know Your Rights” kits. Multilingual legal guides. Encrypted phone trees.

Give people tools, not soundbites.

We don’t need more slogans.

We need survival manuals.

⸻

5. Leverage international media and watchdogs.

Stop hoping U.S. cable news will wake up.

They’re too busy playing both sides of fascism.

Feed the real stories to BBC, Al Jazeera, The Guardian, Reuters, Der Spiegel — hell, leak them to anonymous dropboxes if you have to.

Make what’s happening in America a global scandal.

And stop relying on platforms that are actively suppressing truth.

Start leveraging Substack. Use Bluesky.

That’s where the resistance is migrating. That’s where censorship hasn’t caught up.

If the mainstream won’t carry the truth — outflank them.

Get creative. Go underground. Go global.

If our democracy is being dismantled in broad daylight, make sure the whole world sees it — and make sure we’re still able to say it.

⸻

6. Create a digital safe haven for whistleblowers and defectors.

Not everyone inside this regime is loyal.

Some are scared. Some want out.

Build the channels.

Encrypted. Anonymous. Protected.

Make it easy for the cracks in the system to become gaping holes.

And while you’re at it?

Stop ostracizing MAGA defectors.

Everyone makes mistakes — even glaring, critical ones.

We are not the bullies.

We are not the ones filled with hate.

And it is not your job to shame people who finally saw the fire and chose to step out of it.

They will have to deal with that internal struggle — the guilt of putting a very dangerous and callous regime in power.

But they’re already outnumbered. Don’t push them back into the crowd.

We don’t need purity.

We need numbers.

We need people willing to burn their red hats and testify against the machine they helped build.

⸻

7. Study the collapse—and the comeback.

You should be learning from South Korea and how they managed their brief rule under dictatorship.

They didn’t waste time chasing the one man with absolute immunity.

They went after the structure.

The aides. The enforcers. The loyalists. The architects.

They knocked out the foundation one pillar at a time —

until the “strongman” had no one left to stand on.

And his power crumbled beneath him.

You should be independently investigating every author of Project 2025,

every aide who defies court orders,

every communications director repeating lies,

every policy writer enabling cruelty,

every water boy who keeps this engine running.

You can’t stop a regime by asking the king to sit down.

You dismantle the throne he’s standing on — one coward at a time.

⸻

Stop being scared to fight dirty when the other side is fighting to erase the damn Constitution.

They are threatening to disappear AMERICANS.

A M E R I C A N S.

And your biggest move can’t be another strongly worded email.

We don’t want your urgently fundraising subject lines.

We want backbone.

We want action.

We want to know you’ll stand up before we’re all ordered to sit down — permanently.

We are watching.

And I don’t just mean your base.

I mean millions of us who see exactly what’s happening.

I’ve only got 6,000 followers — but the groups I’m in? The networks I touch? Over a quarter million.

Often when I speak, it echoes.

But when we ALL

speak, it ROARS with pressure that will cause change.

We need to be deafening.

You still have a chance to do something historic.

To be remembered for courage, not caution.

To go down as the party that didn’t just watch the fall — but fought the hell back with everything they had.

But the clock is ticking.

And the deportation buses are idling.

2025 Off Year US Elections

They can be, sometimes, an indicator of things to come.

June 25, 2025

New York City Mayoral Race

Progressive Zohran Mamdani beat Andrew Cuomo in the Democratic Primary.  

Mamdani, who immigrated with his parents as a child from Uganda to the US, is a self declared democratic socialist.  He's a Shi'a Muslim. All of these things are setting off the populist far right.

Curtis Sliwa, founder of Guardian Angels, won the Republican primary for New York City mayor, but was unopposed.  He stands no chancing of winning the general election.

Blog Mirror: Public land selloff proposal threatened Medicine Bow, continues to threaten other local parcels Laramie Rep. Karlee Provenza and Wyoming columnist Rod Miller are among the cross-partisan coalition planning to rally in Cheyenne on Thursday

 

Public land selloff proposal threatened Medicine Bow, continues to threaten other local parcels

Laramie Rep. Karlee Provenza and Wyoming columnist Rod Miller are among the cross-partisan coalition planning to rally in Cheyenne on Thursday

Blog Mirror: Guest Column: Wyoming Is Full Of Politicians Who Want To Sell Your Public Lands

Provenza is a Democratic legislator, one of Wyoming's few, who used blaze orange t-shirts recalling big game hunting for her campaign last year.  She names names in this article, which is very much worth reading.

Guest Column: Wyoming Is Full Of Politicians Who Want To Sell Your Public Lands

Best Posts of the week of June 15, 2025.

The best posts of the week of June 15, 2025, a week dominated by the news on the reprehensible inclusion of public land sales in the budget reconciliation bill.

June 15, 1215. King John seals the Magna Carta

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 90th Edition. Parade and Protests.

Subsidiarity Economics 2025. The Times more or less locally, Part 7 and Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 91st Edition. Reality is hard.

Lex Anteinternet: Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 91st Edition Postscript. Remigration

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist, 92nd Edition. Immigration. How did we get into this mess?

June 17, 1775. The Battle of Bunker Hill.

Map shows iconic Wyoming landscapes could be developed under GOP budget, land sale plan

The Madness of King Donald. The 25th Amendment Watch List, Second Edition.

Wars and Rumors of War, 2025. Part 3. The peace didn't break out on day one edition.

Wyoming's broken politics.

Former Wyoming Governor Francis E. Warren, and sitting Senator at the time of the Johnson County War, F. E. Warren was a Republican Senator who knew how to cover his ass, whic his why he was able to survive the scandal of Republican support for the invasion of Johnson and Natrona Counties.  That scandal took down the GOP in the state for a period of time.

Back at least a decade ago I had a conversation with a high ranking member of the Wyoming Republican Party about some really odd going ons down at Cheyenne.  He stated, broken hearted, that Wyoming politicians had been "bought".

That's a pretty broad accusation. What he likely really meant is that right about that time the state started to be flooded by out of state political money, and it often went right into the most radical right wing politicians.  Wealthy people moving into the state brought their politics with them, and in a few cases if was radically far right.  That gave us, for example, the absurd example of Foster Friess and his goofball Dukes of Hazzard campaign for governor.

It also gave us, however, some people who moved in specifically for political reason. Chuck Gray, the family money backed son of a wealthy Republican, who was born in California and went to school at Wharton, like Trump, moved into the state and ran for office nearly immediately.  Living in a district in which the long time occupant of a legislative seat died, he managed to leverage a position at his father's radio station into a  legislative seat, and then captured the office of the Secretary of State in spite of having very little connection with the state in which he sits.  He's been a constant stream of Trump like invective.  His seat was taken over by Jeanette Ward, who was if anything even further to the far right. Ward, from Illinois, came to Wyoming as a "political refugee" and had been here so briefly that she barely qualified for her seat when she ran.  Her politics were too far to the right for even that district, which booted her after one embarrassing term in Cheyenne where she espoused far right populist, far right Evangelical, positions.

The state GOP was likewise taken over by far right populists, about whom we hear less now, but who went to war with the traditional GOP. They were largely successful, duping, although I expect only temporarily, a large number of Wyoming voters into believing the sh** sandwiches which Trump and his allies serve up as alleged filet mignon.

That they can be duped is because the state is in economic distress, and regular people don't know what to do about it.  Global Warming is real, not some sort of fib, and long term coal and oil are doomed.  A large number of workers who relocated form Texas and Oklahoma, and the like, are fairly poorly educated on top of it and are relatively easy to lead by being told that what they want to be true, is true.  The agricultural sector, which has deeply ingrained conservative tendencies, is rolling over from a generation that basically stopped its education at high school to one which is now college educated, but in the meantime the older agriculturalist who control the operations deeply want to believe that operations can be run the way they were in the 1970s, and that threats they need to deal with, which include Global Warming and the buying power of the Super Rich, really don't.

Basically, Wyoming's current politics can be explained by people voting for what they want to believe, over reality.  Coal and oil are never going way.  You'll always be able to get a job in the extractive industries, or as a truck driver, with a high school diploma, or even without one.  There are no deep existential problems with the economy here that aren't the result of a conspiracy against us.

It can't be us.

But it can be.

And right now, it is.

A further part of the problem, however, is that the Democratic Party in the state has displayed a level of intellectual denseness that would suck light out of a black hole  It's stunning.

It wasn't all that time that Wyoming had a viable Democratic Party that could serious contend for statewide and national seats.  That started to change, however, during the Clinton Administration for reasons that are now hard to discern, although the decline of unionized mining jobs in Wyoming are likely part of that problem.  Even after that, however, we had a Democratic Governor.

As the Democratic Party in the state declined it took on a lot of the same trend lines that the national Democratic Party did, which has helped explain the rise of Trump.  In a state that was both sort of conservative and sort of libertarian, they became goofball left wing as an organization, although not all of their candidates reflected that.  Over time, the Democrats never saw a fetus in the womb that they didn't' want to kill, or a brand new perversion that they didn't want to celebrate.  A party which at one time was lead by burly miners or grumpy rural lawyers is now lead by a guy who has the appearance of a bow tie wearing nerd.

Recent promo photograph of the Democratic Party.  This is a far cry from a party that once put a World War Two Marine Corps Raider in the Governor's office, a World War Two infantryman in Congress and a gruff prosecutor into office.  Marine Corps Raider gets votes, and inspires confidence.  Bow Tie Wearing Doofus does not.  And is that buffalo smiling?

Hypocritical or not, Wyomingites aren't going to vote for a party that they associate with men in tutus and that it's all okay.  Men might go into the voting booth with their third wife at home, before they go to see their mistress, but they're going to regard that as contrary to the moral law.  Interestingly, if politics returned to the "I don't care what you do, just leave me alone" ethos it once had, they'd be fine with that.  Indeed, that's how their living their private lives already.

In fairness, however, the last two chairmen of the Wyoming GOP don't win high marks either.  The current one, Bryan Miller, is another of the "I spent my life in the military and hate the government" Republicans.  After decades of drawing on the government tit, they claim to know what's wrong in a state where most people don't, or at least not openly.

We may, just might, be at a turning point, however.

We are certainly at a point where Republican office holders ignoring the real views of the state can be exploited.

Dr. John Barrasso.  He went from orthopedic surgeon to the Senate, having been appointed by the Legislature.  At age 72, he's now the Senate Whip and doesn't appear to have any desire to retire any time soon.

Wyomingites are overwhelmingly opposed to public lands being transferred out of government control.  In spite of that, Dr. John Barrasso supported Federal lands being transferred to the states in the 2016 GOP platform. That didn't happen in part because Eric Trump is a hunter.  Barrasso darned well knew that Wyomingites didn't support that, but somebody he was listening to did, as he supported it against the wishes of his constituents.

72 year old Barrasso is in that class of politicians who desperately seem to want to hang on to their jobs in spite of their advancing old age.  At 72 he ought to be retired, but he hung on and is how the Senate Whip.  Once a Republican moderate, he became a Trumpite by necessity.  That means he could become a moderate again, and if the political winds shifted, he would.  

This issue is one in which he's hearing from hundreds of Wyomingites per day.  He's heard from me twice.  

He hasn't responded, but he hasn't said what his position is.

If the proposals to transfer public lands advance, he ought to be sent packing.

Cynthia Lummis.  Once the State Treasurer, she entered the U.S. House in 2009, but stepped down in 2017 to take care of her dying husband, a very admirable thing to do.

70 year old Cynthia Lummis is likewise in the age group that ought to be out of politics.  She actually returned to it, however, to take her current Senate seat.  Lummis condescendingly stated that all Federal lands didn't need to remain in Federal lands forever, which is intellectually the same as maintaining that all privately held lands don't either, something she'd be in horror about as she comes from a ranching family.  She's also shown an ability to tack into the wind, however, as she was once a Trump opponent and now is a Trump backer.

Lummis is making sort of a big deal right now about her cryptocurrency bill which just passed the Senate, and nickname Crypto Queen she's been tagged with. The truth is, however, that the overwhelming majority of  Wyomingites don't give a rusty rats ass about this topic and aren't going to remember diddly squat about this bill.  It'll soon be a "what?" sort of topic.

The public lands vote, however won't be.

Harriet Hageman. She ran an unsuccessful campaign for Governor against Mark Gordon and then, when Liz Cheney ran into trouble, ran against he rand obtained her seat.

Harriet Hageman is on her first time as Congresswoman, having been able to take advantage of her former friend Liz Cheney's downfall.  Hageman is the only one of Wyoming's Washington delegation who probably comes by her public land vote, which was in favor of the Federal sales bill, honestly.  Daughter of Jim Hageman, who spent 23 years in the Wyoming House of Representatives, Hageman is from a farming family from Southeastern Wyoming where there is very little public land.  Jim Hageman was one of the backers of a proposal to allow for the privatization of wildlife in Wyoming, which almost destroyed the GOP during its go around.

This issue could be a similar one.

Wyomingites should make it.

At the top of this page is a portrait of Francis E. Warren.  Warren had been territorial governor, and then the first governor, of the State of Wyoming.

I don't admire him.

But his ability to read the political winds is admirable.

The state Republican Party was complicit in the invasion as so many of those in it were connected with Republican politics.  Planned at the Cheyenne Club, people kne what was going on.  Republican Governor Amos Barber did and had arranged to activate the National Guard in order to keep it from being deployed to Central Wyoming to stop the invasion.

Barber lost his seat following the event.

The Republicans lost the legislature.

Warren kept his.

There's a lesson there for those currently in office. . . and those who wish to be.

Amos W. Barber.  A dentist by profession, like Barrasso is a surgeon by profession, he disgraced himself with his support of the invaders in the Johnson County War and then thereafter by attempting to retain his office after he was defeated for reelection.  He became Wyoming Secretary of State immediately after that, as that was his prior office at the time of Warren's elevation to the Senate, and then returned to his dental practice.  Oddly, like the current occupant of the Secretary of State's chair, he was a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania.

Ryan Zinke on public lands.

Tom Lubnau: Sale Of Our Public Lands Brings More Questions Than Answers

Wars and Rumors of War, 2025. Part 4. The GBU-57A/B MOP Edition.

Hageman’s stance on public land sales shows she doesn’t work for Wyoming

The GOP Land Sales Abomination.

Subsidiarity Economics 2025. The Times more or less locally, Part 8. The imaginary lost world edition (and also something about the color of pots and kettles).

Weighing in at the state level.

IVF and a Half-Cath | June 11, 2025

Going Feral: Weighing in at the state level.

Going Feral: Weighing in at the state level.: 

Weighing in at the state level.

Wyoming legislators begin to weigh in, with lukewarm Republicans, some man Republicans, and an absolute no from the Democrats.

Wyo Legislative Leaders Range From Lukewarm To Angry On Public Lands Sale 

Democrats do have an opportunity here, I might add.  One long time and very conservative Republican I know is re-registering in the Democratic Party.

One Republican who is predictably all in, is Harriet Hageman.

Hageman Says Claims Of Huge Selloff Of Federal Public Land Is 'Silly'

The "silly" reaction sparked some rage on facebook. My prediction is that this is the end of Hageman's political career in Wyoming.

Wyoming's broken politics.

Former Wyoming Governor Francis E. Warren, and sitting Senator at the time of the Johnson County War, F. E. Warren was a Republican Senator who knew how to cover his ass, whic his why he was able to survive the scandal of Republican support for the invasion of Johnson and Natrona Counties.  That scandal took down the GOP in the state for a period of time.

Back at least a decade ago I had a conversation with a high ranking member of the Wyoming Republican Party about some really odd going ons down at Cheyenne.  He stated, broken hearted, that Wyoming politicians had been "bought".

That's a pretty broad accusation. What he likely really meant is that right about that time the state started to be flooded by out of state political money, and it often went right into the most radical right wing politicians.  Wealthy people moving into the state brought their politics with them, and in a few cases if was radically far right.  That gave us, for example, the absurd example of Foster Friess and his goofball Dukes of Hazzard campaign for governor.

It also gave us, however, some people who moved in specifically for political reason. Chuck Gray, the family money backed son of a wealthy Republican, who was born in California and went to school at Wharton, like Trump, moved into the state and ran for office nearly immediately.  Living in a district in which the long time occupant of a legislative seat died, he managed to leverage a position at his father's radio station into a  legislative seat, and then captured the office of the Secretary of State in spite of having very little connection with the state in which he sits.  He's been a constant stream of Trump like invective.  His seat was taken over by Jeanette Ward, who was if anything even further to the far right. Ward, from Illinois, came to Wyoming as a "political refugee" and had been here so briefly that she barely qualified for her seat when she ran.  Her politics were too far to the right for even that district, which booted her after one embarrassing term in Cheyenne where she espoused far right populist, far right Evangelical, positions.

The state GOP was likewise taken over by far right populists, about whom we hear less now, but who went to war with the traditional GOP. They were largely successful, duping, although I expect only temporarily, a large number of Wyoming voters into believing the sh** sandwiches which Trump and his allies serve up as alleged filet mignon.

That they can be duped is because the state is in economic distress, and regular people don't know what to do about it.  Global Warming is real, not some sort of fib, and long term coal and oil are doomed.  A large number of workers who relocated form Texas and Oklahoma, and the like, are fairly poorly educated on top of it and are relatively easy to lead by being told that what they want to be true, is true.  The agricultural sector, which has deeply ingrained conservative tendencies, is rolling over from a generation that basically stopped its education at high school to one which is now college educated, but in the meantime the older agriculturalist who control the operations deeply want to believe that operations can be run the way they were in the 1970s, and that threats they need to deal with, which include Global Warming and the buying power of the Super Rich, really don't.

Basically, Wyoming's current politics can be explained by people voting for what they want to believe, over reality.  Coal and oil are never going way.  You'll always be able to get a job in the extractive industries, or as a truck driver, with a high school diploma, or even without one.  There are no deep existential problems with the economy here that aren't the result of a conspiracy against us.

It can't be us.

But it can be.

And right now, it is.

A further part of the problem, however, is that the Democratic Party in the state has displayed a level of intellectual denseness that would suck light out of a black hole  It's stunning.

It wasn't all that time that Wyoming had a viable Democratic Party that could serious contend for statewide and national seats.  That started to change, however, during the Clinton Administration for reasons that are now hard to discern, although the decline of unionized mining jobs in Wyoming are likely part of that problem.  Even after that, however, we had a Democratic Governor.

As the Democratic Party in the state declined it took on a lot of the same trend lines that the national Democratic Party did, which has helped explain the rise of Trump.  In a state that was both sort of conservative and sort of libertarian, they became goofball left wing as an organization, although not all of their candidates reflected that.  Over time, the Democrats never saw a fetus in the womb that they didn't' want to kill, or a brand new perversion that they didn't want to celebrate.  A party which at one time was lead by burly miners or grumpy rural lawyers is now lead by a guy who has the appearance of a bow tie wearing nerd.

Recent promo photograph of the Democratic Party.  This is a far cry from a party that once put a World War Two Marine Corps Raider in the Governor's office, a World War Two infantryman in Congress and a gruff prosecutor into office.  Marine Corps Raider gets votes, and inspires confidence.  Bow Tie Wearing Doofus does not.  And is that buffalo smiling?

Hypocritical or not, Wyomingites aren't going to vote for a party that they associate with men in tutus and that it's all okay.  Men might go into the voting booth with their third wife at home, before they go to see their mistress, but they're going to regard that as contrary to the moral law.  Interestingly, if politics returned to the "I don't care what you do, just leave me alone" ethos it once had, they'd be fine with that.  Indeed, that's how their living their private lives already.

In fairness, however, the last two chairmen of the Wyoming GOP don't win high marks either.  The current one, Bryan Miller, is another of the "I spent my life in the military and hate the government" Republicans.  After decades of drawing on the government tit, they claim to know what's wrong in a state where most people don't, or at least not openly.

We may, just might, be at a turning point, however.

We are certainly at a point where Republican office holders ignoring the real views of the state can be exploited.

Dr. John Barrasso.  He went from orthopedic surgeon to the Senate, having been appointed by the Legislature.  At age 72, he's now the Senate Whip and doesn't appear to have any desire to retire any time soon.

Wyomingites are overwhelmingly opposed to public lands being transferred out of government control.  In spite of that, Dr. John Barrasso supported Federal lands being transferred to the states in the 2016 GOP platform. That didn't happen in part because Eric Trump is a hunter.  Barrasso darned well knew that Wyomingites didn't support that, but somebody he was listening to did, as he supported it against the wishes of his constituents.

72 year old Barrasso is in that class of politicians who desperately seem to want to hang on to their jobs in spite of their advancing old age.  At 72 he ought to be retired, but he hung on and is how the Senate Whip.  Once a Republican moderate, he became a Trumpite by necessity.  That means he could become a moderate again, and if the political winds shifted, he would.  

This issue is one in which he's hearing from hundreds of Wyomingites per day.  He's heard from me twice.  

He hasn't responded, but he hasn't said what his position is.

If the proposals to transfer public lands advance, he ought to be sent packing.

Cynthia Lummis.  Once the State Treasurer, she entered the U.S. House in 2009, but stepped down in 2017 to take care of her dying husband, a very admirable thing to do.

70 year old Cynthia Lummis is likewise in the age group that ought to be out of politics.  She actually returned to it, however, to take her current Senate seat.  Lummis condescendingly stated that all Federal lands didn't need to remain in Federal lands forever, which is intellectually the same as maintaining that all privately held lands don't either, something she'd be in horror about as she comes from a ranching family.  She's also shown an ability to tack into the wind, however, as she was once a Trump opponent and now is a Trump backer.

Lummis is making sort of a big deal right now about her cryptocurrency bill which just passed the Senate, and nickname Crypto Queen she's been tagged with. The truth is, however, that the overwhelming majority of  Wyomingites don't give a rusty rats ass about this topic and aren't going to remember diddly squat about this bill.  It'll soon be a "what?" sort of topic.

The public lands vote, however won't be.

Harriet Hageman. She ran an unsuccessful campaign for Governor against Mark Gordon and then, when Liz Cheney ran into trouble, ran against he rand obtained her seat.

Harriet Hageman is on her first time as Congresswoman, having been able to take advantage of her former friend Liz Cheney's downfall.  Hageman is the only one of Wyoming's Washington delegation who probably comes by her public land vote, which was in favor of the Federal sales bill, honestly.  Daughter of Jim Hageman, who spent 23 years in the Wyoming House of Representatives, Hageman is from a farming family from Southeastern Wyoming where there is very little public land.  Jim Hageman was one of the backers of a proposal to allow for the privatization of wildlife in Wyoming, which almost destroyed the GOP during its go around.

This issue could be a similar one.

Wyomingites should make it.

At the top of this page is a portrait of Francis E. Warren.  Warren had been territorial governor, and then the first governor, of the State of Wyoming.

I don't admire him.

But his ability to read the political winds is admirable.

The state Republican Party was complicit in the invasion as so many of those in it were connected with Republican politics.  Planned at the Cheyenne Club, people kne what was going on.  Republican Governor Amos Barber did and had arranged to activate the National Guard in order to keep it from being deployed to Central Wyoming to stop the invasion.

Barber lost his seat following the event.

The Republicans lost the legislature.

Warren kept his.

There's a lesson there for those currently in office. . . and those who wish to be.

Amos W. Barber.  A dentist by profession, like Barrasso is a surgeon by profession, he disgraced himself with his support of the invaders in the Johnson County War and then thereafter by attempting to retain his office after he was defeated for reelection.  He became Wyoming Secretary of State immediately after that, as that was his prior office at the time of Warren's elevation to the Senate, and then returned to his dental practice.  Oddly, like the current occupant of the Secretary of State's chair, he was a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania.

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist 85th Edition. DOGE dipshittery and Clinton efficiency.

The current DOGE results put Musk’s efforts well short of Democratic President Bill Clinton’s initiative to streamline the federal bureaucracy, which saved the equivalent of $240 billion by the time his second term ended. Clinton’s effort reduced the federal workforce by more than 400,000 employees. According to government estimates, the total civilian federal workforce — not counting military personnel or postal workers — reaches 2.4 million people.

Associated Press.

Last Edition:

Cliffnotes of the Zeitgeist 84th Edition. The uncomfortably agreeing with the far right edition (on some things). Hegseth orders transgenderism out and a bill to outlaw pornography.

Labels: Court, Education, law, Pete Hegseth, pornography, The relationship between men and women, The Second Trump Administration, transgenderism, University of Wyoming, Women, Zeitgeist

Mother

Today is Mothers Day, as surely everyone in the US is aware.

I'm going to comment on Mother's Day for a couple of odd reasons, even thought I didn't originally intend to.

The first is this comment by Robert Reich for the day:

Robert Reich@RBReich·14h

Your Mother’s Day weekend reminder that the so-called “party of family values” has historically blocked:

-Paid family & medical leave

-Universal childcare

-Universal pre-K

-Expanded Child Tax Credit

-Programs to support reproductive health

Doesn’t sound very pro-family to me.

First I'll note that I have sort of a love/hate relationship with Reich.  Reich is very far left, but his economic commentary, in my view, is generally pretty good.  And like him, I'm greatly distressed over what Donald Trump is doing to the country.

Secondly, I really hate the writing convention of saying "this is your reminder".  Did I ask for a reminder?  If I didn't, that's really annoying.  Reich also likes to state "I don't know who needs to know this" which suggest that nobody needs to know whatever he's going to tell us.  

He should quit using both of those writing conventions.

Anyhow, like a far lefty, he's bought into the seas of blood position of the Democratic Party. "Programs to support reproductive health" is Orwellian speech for infanticide.

Reich is Jewish, which always makes me wonder how he can support a thesis that holds that infants in the womb, earlier than a certain number of weeks, aren't people.  It's the exact same argument that resulted in the Holocaust.  It's the exact same argument that expanded into eugenics based homicide in Nazi Germany, and which has advanced murder in the guise of "assisted suicide" in various Western Nations.

I'll be frank that I've never been a huge fan of Mothers Day or Father's Day which remind me, in some ways of the Alcohol and Old Lace episode of the Andy Griffith Show in which two elderly sisters were distilling moonshine for "holidays", of which there were an insane number of manufactured ones.  But I really shouldn't be that way for Mother's Day.  There are real reasons to honor motherhood and what it entails.  But murdering infants isn't a good way to do it.

And there's no reason to pretend, no matter how much the left would like to, that the "my body, my choice" argument is a good one, or even a valid one.  A fetus in the womb has a body and its choice i not likely to be murdered.  And that body, genetically, is made up of the DNA of two people, not one.  You don't get ot be a mother through a unilateral act of self will. Motherhood in some instances wasn't planned, of course, but then much of life is not and a massive murderous do over isn't every justified.

The other reason I chose to post is that somebody I know had been at a Vigil Mass in which the attending celebrant mentioned mothers, but largely, apparently, in the context how mother's support their men, which was pretty much apparently it.  The celebrant was Indian (from India).  I'm only noting this as its so easy to forgot for Americans, and probably Europeans, how we are actually a minority of the globes' population, and the culture view of other people may be very much not the one we hold.

That oddly enough occured on the same day, yesterday, in which I listed to a Jimmy Akin's Mysterious World episode on 1 Esdras, which is in some (all?) Orthodox Bibles, but not the Catholic Bible, which is itself larger than most Protestant Biles.  In it, there's a debate between three Guards about what is the most powerful thing in the world.  One Guard presents this, which references the prior two arguments that came before his.:

Then the third, who had spoken of women and truth (and this was Zerubbabel), began to speak: “Gentlemen, is not the king great, and are not men many, and is not wine strong? Who is it, then, who rules them or has the mastery over them? Is it not women? Women gave birth to the king and to every people that rules over sea and land. From women they came, and women brought up the very men who plant the vineyards from which comes wine. Women make men’s clothes; they bring men glory; men cannot exist without women. If men gather gold and silver or any other beautiful thing and then see a woman lovely in appearance and beauty, they let all those things go and gape at her and with open mouths stare at her, and all prefer her to gold or silver or any other beautiful thing. A man leaves his own father, who brought him up, and his own region and clings to his wife. With his wife he ends his days, with no thought of his father or his mother or his region. Therefore you must realize that women rule over you!

“Do you not labor and toil and bring everything and give it to women? A man takes his sword and goes out to travel and rob and steal and to sail the sea and rivers; he faces lions, and he walks in darkness, and when he steals and robs and plunders, he brings it back to the woman he loves. A man loves his wife more than his father or his mother. Many men have lost their minds because of women and have become slaves because of them. Many have perished or stumbled or sinned because of women. And now do you not believe me?

“Is not the king great in his authority? Do not all lands fear to touch him? Yet I have seen him with Apame, the king’s concubine, the daughter of the illustrious Bartacus; she would sit at the king’s right hand and take the crown from the king’s head and put it on her own and slap the king with her left hand. At this the king would gaze at her with mouth agape. If she smiles at him, he laughs; if she loses her temper with him, he flatters her, so that she may be reconciled to him. Gentlemen, why are not women strong, since they do such things?”

It is profound, and note how it came in an ear in which women, in most of the world, would have been regarded as second class citizens.  I should note, however, that he went on to then discuss Truth, with that being the most powerful thing in the World.

While it likely shouldn't, that reminded me of Kipling's great poem, The Ballad of the King's Jest, which has this line:

Four things greater than all things are,—

Women and Horses and Power and War.

We spake of them all, but the last the most,

For I sought a word of a Russian post,

Of a shifty promise, an unsheathed sword

And a gray-coat guard on the Helmund ford.

Then Mahbub Ali lowered his eyes

In the fashion of one who is weaving lies.

Quoth he: “Of the Russians who can say?

“When the night is gathering all is gray.

“But we look that the gloom of the night shall die

“In the morning flush of a blood-red sky.

“Friend of my heart, is it meet or wise

“To warn a King of his enemies?

“We know what Heaven or Hell may bring,

“But no man knoweth the mind of the King.

“That unsought counsel is cursed of God

“Attesteth the story of Wali Dad. 

It's interesting how Kipling put it, "Four things greater than all things are--Women and Horses and Power and War".

Well, have a Happy Mother's Day.