No matter what you think of the issue, the comment by Tom Wharton, apparently a Salt Lake based writer, is just flat out funny.
Replying to @butterbob
Thursday, August 18, 2022
Wednesday, August 17, 2022
Monday, August 17, 1942. The Makin Raid.
Today in World War II History—August 17, 1942: “Carlson’s Raiders”: 221 Marines conduct two-day raid on Makin Island in Gilberts to destroy a radio station; the first US amphibious landing from submarines.
From Sarah Sundin's blog.
Mankin Island through the periscope of the USS Nautilus, the submarine used in the raid.
The raid had goals beyond that, including taking prisoners, gathering intelligence and diverting the Japanese from reinforcing Guadalcanal. In these goals, the mission was a failure. Indeed, it was mixed overall for while half of the Japanese garrison was destroyed, twenty-one Marines were killed and a number left behind due to the confusion of the raid, nine of whom were executed by the Japanese.
The Japanese bombed Port Morseby.
The 8th Air Forces's first raid over Europe took place.
17 August 1942
The Second Moscow Conference came to an end.
Thursday, August 17, 1922. Flying boats, watermelons, and medals.
On this day, the Sampaio Correia, a H-16 Curtiss Flying boat, prepared to make the long journey to Brazil from New York for an expedition in Rio De Janero.
Secretary of War Weeks presided over the awarding of medals to a collection of Army officers.
Watermelon boats were photographed delivering their loads to transportation at dockside.
Forest fires raged in Minnesota, leaving six dead and hundreds homeless.
Byzantine Catholic Priest Vladimir Abrikosov was arrested by Soviet authorities for persuading Russians to become Catholic. He was at first sentenced to death, but was ultimately expelled.
The Bureau of Prohibition warned establishment owners that they could be held criminally liable for breaking the prohibition laws if they allowed their patrons to bring alcohol in themselves is flasks.
The 2022 Election Part XI. Primary Election Day.
April 16, 2020. 12:00 a.m.
It's finally here.
When this post goes live, the polls will be opening seven hours later. Twelve hours from that, they'll close, and the results will start to come in. Depending on how things go in various races, we may not know who won some races until tomorrow, or the day after, or, if they're really close. . .
No primary race in Wyoming's history has been followed anywhere near as close as this one. And while some elections could claim to be equally or more important, particularly the one that followed the 1892 Johnson County War which resulted in the Republicans briefly losing power in the state, none have been as existential since at least that time. Indeed, in some ways this race and that race are loosely, but only loosely, comparable, as that race was over whether big monied interest would dominate the state's life in every sense. That isn't as true, but it's partially true, of this race as well, although that's been very little noted.
Hanging over everything is whether a radical populist right wing of the GOP, which has been up and coming in the state's politics, and which has had monied backing, shall complete the process of taking over the party or not. In some races, such as the Governor's, it clearly will not succeed. In others, however, down at the legislature and county level, it stands a much better chance, and that may stand to make more of a long term difference in real terms.
This contest, however, certainly has filtered up to other races. The contest for Congress is certainly one, with the issue being whether the radical populist right will prevail over the traditional party, with Harriet Hageman ironically acting as the stalking horse for the radical right in spite of a lack of history of an association with it. The Secretary of State's office features the same contest, with radical right populist Chuck Gray, who lacks any qualification for the job, squaring off against attorney-legislator Tara Nethercott. Even the race for the Superintendent of Public Instruction features it.
It should be an interesting day.
April 16, cont.
With 45 minutes left to go, the national news has been reporting on the stakes in the Wyoming, and Alaska, primaries. Wyoming is reporting record turn outs.
April 16, cont.
So, as of 9:46 p.m., it appears fairly certain that:
Harriet Hageman won the GOP nomination for Congress, taking about 63% of the vote to 32% of Cheney's, actually a little lower than polls had predicted. So, Wyomingites voted for loyalty to Trump and bought off on his lies rather than principal.
While she's a long shot, as she's a Democrat, Lynette Grey Bull was nominated in the Democratic contest.
Chuck Gray, another big lie candidate, beat out Tara Nethercott for Secretary of State 48% to 42%, with the balance going to Armstrong.
Mark Gordon was nominated for a second term for the GOP with a big lead over his contenders.
Theresa Livingston, who might as well not even be running, was nominated for the Democrats.
Curt Meier was nominated in the GOP contest for a second term as Treasurer.
April 17, 2022
An extraordinary, and frankly an extraordinarily frightening, election.
Let's start with the statewide elections.
- Congressman
GOP Nominee: Harriet Hageman.
Democratic Nominee: Lynette Gray Bull.
Hageman won in spite of large numbers of Democrats, to the extent that Wyoming has large numbers of Democrats, and independents registering to vote in the GOP primary. The only real issue was loyalty to Donald Trump.
This is, quite frankly, a frightening anti-democratic result in the GOP, evidence of the extent to which democratic principles are being abandoned in the rank and file of the party, or of the degree to which Trump's fables about the election being stolen have been bought by the GOP rank and file. Wyoming will now exchange a conservative GOP Congressman with outsized power for a freshman stalking horse with no power at all.
This assuming, of course, Hageman wins in the Fall, which she almost surely will. Still, this does put Gray Bull in a unique position as the first Democrat to actually have a chance at winning, albeit a small one.
- Governor
Governor Gordon took the GOP nomination and therefore the office.
One might hope that gadfly Rex Rammell, who did not even poll 10,000 votes and therefore polled about a fifth of that of his Bien, who trailed Gordon massively, would finally knock it off, but that's unlikley.
Theresa Livingstone took the Democratic nomination.
- State Auditor
GOP Nominee: Kristie Racines was running unopposed for reelection.
Democratic Nominee: None.
- State Treasurer
GOP Nominee: Curt Meier running for reelection came out the victor, although his opponent took about half the number of votes he did, an interesting result ni that Meier was running to be reelected and had been endorsed by Trump.
Democratic Nominee: None.
- Secretary of State
GOP Nominee: Chuck Grey
Democratic Nominee: None.
Grey, with little in the way of qualifications, goes on to become Secretary of State after taking a minority of the vote. Nethercott and Armstrong combined took slightly more, with Armstrong taking ly about 8%.
Here too, the issue turned out to be the 2020 election and the elevation of Grey to this office is more than a little worrisome.
- Superintendent of Public Instruction
GOP Nominee: Megan Degefelder. In a very tight race against appointed incumbent Brian Schroeder, Degenfelder pulled out in front to take the most votes, but not over 50%. The strength of the appointed Schroeder shows the strength of far right candidates this year.
Democratic Nominee: Sergio A. Maldonaldo, Sr.
From here will turn to some interesting legislative races.
- Senate District 25.
Long time conservative Republican from Fremont County Cale Case won the GOP nomination, and will run uncontested, but he only barely survived a challenger. Case, whose conservative credentials are unimpeachable, had come under fire from the far right earlier this year.
- Senate District 29
Long time Natrona County Senator Drew Perkins was defeated by far right challenger Bob Ide. Perkins had barely survived a challenge from Ide the last time he ran, in this atmosphere, he did not, although the margin may have been closer than the last election.
- House District 2
GOP incumbent J.D. Williams, serving out his first term, lost by about fifteen votes to challenger Alan Slagle in a vote in which county residence seemed to be the deciding factor.
- House District 9
Moderate Republican Landon Brown survived a challenge from the right easily in the GOP contest.
- House District 35.
Incumbent Republican Joe MacGuire was defeated by challenger from the right, Tony Locke.
- House District 43
Incumbent Dan Zwonitzer, who has been heavily attacked from the right for some time, easily won renomination to his GOP House seat.
- House District 57
This district saw the rise of Chuck Grey and now has nominated Jeanette Ward, his endorsed successor who is every bit as far to the right as he is, and who moved here only recently from Chicago.
- House District 58
Long serving Patrick Sweeney went down in defeat to challenger Bill Allemand in this district, whose boundaries were heavily redrawn this year. Allemand challenged from the right. Sweeney had always been a moderate in the GOP.
- Natrona County Commission
In the GOP race for the four-year seat, voters mad over local assessments tossed out the incumbent, Paul Bertoglio, but preserved that of incumbent Jim Milne, who trailed third in a race which will only advance three candidates to the general. In that race, they'll be joined by Dr. Tom Radosevich, who was running as the only Democrat. Milne barely did better than recent Democratic cross over Terry Wingerter. Recent appointee Peter Nicolaysen gained renomination.
In the two-year contest, Steve Freel defeated long time commissioner Rob Hendry.
As a result of this, the Natrona County Commission is going to be seeing mostly new commissioners.
- Natrona County Assessor.
This position has been hotly contested seemingly forever, and this time former assessor Tammy Saulsbury took the nomination over current assessor Matt Keating.
Elsewhere
Alaska's Lisa Murkowski, a target of Trump ire like Liz Cheney, survived a challenge from the right.
Commentary
In this election, Wyoming blindly embraced the far right in what might be regarded as a Trump fueled sense of rage over a stolen election that wasn't stolen. Beyond that, however, this reflects a steady drift to the far right fringe to the degree the state has largely crossed over into the extreme right.
We can look for the next legislature to back measures that Wyomingites will ultimately find horrific, including measures to grab the state lands. The state's rank and file population will grow upset with what they've voted in, but only in rare years will they remove incumbents, this being one of them, so this development likely defines the next ten to fifteen years.
While overall predications are difficult to make, generally the nation is likely not to head in this direction, meaning that politically, and likely economically, the state will be marginalizing itself but unable to appreciate that, and in turn will retrench even further. Comparative eras for Wyoming would be difficult to find, but politically in the US the best analogy would likely be the post Reconstruction American South of the late 19th Century and early 20th, an era which saw the same at work in the American South and which operated very much against the interset of the common people.
Tuesday, August 16, 2022
Yes, thanks to Blogger, this now has a pretty screwed up appearance.
We'll fix it when we get a chance.
And worse yet, the easy editor pencil is gone, and I use that constantly.
Ugh. Blogger.
Update.
Well, save or the edit pencil being mysteriously missing, which is something I use a lot and really like, we're not quite as screwed up as we were.
Why did the edit pencil disappear?
Also, we've had to put up a new photo on the header. In the whole process, the old one evaporated, although I don't know that I don't like this one better actually.
Press Watch
There will be piles of national, and even international, press in Wyoming today.
If you spot some you recognize, let us know here.
Sunday, August 16, 1942. The mystery of the L-8.
The Navy blimp L-8, put out earlier that day in search of Japanese submarines, coasted into Daly California without its crew.
The blimp and its crew of two had taken off at 06:03 from Treasure Island off of San Francisco. At 07:38 its crew radioed that they had seen an oil slick off of Farallon Islands, Point Reyes. A Liberty ship and a fishing boat both later reported that the blimp descended to about 30 feet above the slick and then headed east, rather than its planned route, which would have taken it northwest. It was next spotted at 11:15 off of Ocean Beach, by which time it lacked a crew. The blimp contained its parachutes and life raft, so the crew had not bailed out.
They've never been found.
Official speculation is that they were trying to deploy a smoke signal when one slipped out and the other went to rescue him, with both going into the ocean, or some variant of that. This seems fairly likely, although other theories abound.
The 101st Airborne Division, provided with cadre from the 82nd Airborne Division, was activated. The 82nd had been converted organizationally from a conventional infantry division to an airborne division the day prior.
Shoulder insignia of the 101st Airborne Division.
The 101st had come into the table of organizations during World War One, but just existed for nine days on the charts, having been created immediately before the end of the war. In contrast, the 82nd "All American" Division had seen action in World War One and included in its ranks the famous Alvin York.
Shoulder patch of the 82nd Airborne Division.
The USS Alabama was commissioned.
_in_Casco_Bay_c1942.jpg)
The Alabama in 1942.
The ship avoided being scrapped in 1964, which the Navy intended to do, and was acquired by the State of Alabama where she became a museum ship. In spite of the original scrapping intent, a provision of the Navy's transfer of her ownership was that she could be recalled if needed, and in fact when the Iowa Class battleships were reactivated in the 1980s, some of her engine parts were cannibalized by the Navy as they were needed for those ships and were no longer manufactured.
The German Navy began Operation Wunderland with the goal of entering the Kara Sea, an extension of the Arctic Ocean, in order to attack Soviet ships that took refuge in the region which was iced up ten months out of the year. The German Navy also sank three ships off of Aracaju, Brazil, operating under the belief that Allied ships were operating in neutral territorial waters off of eastern South America.
The Japanese, operating off of faulty areal reconnaissance, dispatch the 28th Naval Infantry Regiment from Truk to retake what they believe is a mostly abandoned Guadalcanal.
The U.S. Army Air Force bombed Axis targets in Egypt for the first time.
What started as a Mass to commemorate members of the Begona Regiment who had died in the Spanish Civil War degenerated into a riot between Falangist and Carlist factions in which a Falangist member, who had hand grenades with him, through two resulting in the wounding of thirty people.
Monday, August 15, 2022
Duty to vote?
Veritas
By No machine-readable author provided. Javier Carro assumed (based on copyright claims). - No machine-readable source provided. Own work assumed (based on copyright claims)., CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=674551
We often hear this time of year that everyone has a duty to vote. This is regarded as a patriotic duty, but beyond that some hold it to be a moral obligation.
Indeed, the Catechism of the Catholic Church states:
It is the duty of citizens to contribute along with the civil authorities to the good of society in a spirit of truth, justice, solidarity, and freedom. The love and service of one’s country follow from the duty of gratitude and belong to the order of charity. Submission to legitimate authorities and service of the common good require citizens to fulfill their roles in the life of the political community. . . [s]ubmission to authority and co-responsibility for the common good make it morally obligatory to pay taxes, to exercise the right to vote, and to defend one’s country
No. 2239 and 2240
I have an old friend that once told me that he never bothered to inform himself on the lesser candidates in an election, and barely did on the major ones. He just went in and guess on most of them.
Whatever else our duty may be, that breaches it.
I don't disagree that we have a duty to vote. But that's an informed duty. That duty includes weighing what a person declares themselves to be for on every level, including an existential level. It also includes weighting the candidate's honesty.
It requires the voter to embrace reality and the truth as well, no matter how uncomfortable that may be. If it seems that everyone in your pack thinks just like you, and some candidate rabidly supports that, you might want to rethink things.
Courthouses of the West: Laramie, Albany County, Wyoming. First "Woman Jury" Memorial.
Courthouses of the West: Laramie, Albany County, Wyoming. First "Woman Jury" Memorial.
Accurate information on this event is actually fairly difficult to find. The trial was the First Degree Murder trial of Andrew W. Howie. The prosecutor, Albany County Attorney Stephen Downey, had only been in that role for a few months and objected to the women being seated as jurors, but was overruled by the Court, which held that as women had been granted the franchise in Wyoming, they also had the right to sit in juries. Downey's objection was based on social convention, rather than the law.
Laramie, Albany County, Wyoming. First "Woman Jury" Memorial.
Memorial, MKTH photograph.
Contrary to the way it is sometimes recounted, the jury was not all female, but half male and half female, with six women jurors. It returned a verdict finding Mr. Howie guilty of manslaughter, which must have been included as a lessor offense in the charges. The trial convinced Downey who in turn became a champion of women's suffrage.
This memorial is not at the Albany County Courthouse, but at the downtown railroad park. Judicial proceedings in Laramie were originally held in a store at that location.
(Photo and reasearch by MKTH).
Saturday, August 15, 1942. Ohio gets to Malta.
Today in World War II History—August 15, 1942: Allied “Pedestal” convoy arrives in Malta—only 5 of 14 cargo ships have survived (including tanker Ohio lashed to destroyers HMS Penn and HMS Ledbury).
From Sarah Sundin's blog.
The Pedestal convoy was a major saga in 1942. Even now, historians debate whether the huge convoy losses made the matter an Axis victory or the fact that some ships did get through, including the Ohio, made it an Allied one. At the end of the day, the arrival of the Ohio was in fact materially important, and the supplies allowed Malta to carry on.
The Ohio after arriving in port.
Malta was in truth very near to being starved out of the war at this point and therefore, from my prospective, this was in fact a British naval victory, albeit one at a high cost. The British could not afford to lose the island, however, and Pedestal prevented that and allowed it to go on to be used as an air and naval base to disrupt supplies going to the Afrika Korps.
Also on this day, the British submarine HMS Porpoise sank the Italian MV Lerici. The U-705 sank the SS Balladier off of Ireland. The Finnish patrol boat VMV 5 sank the Soviet submarine M-97 in the Gulf of Finland.
The Germans attacked Grozny.
The Marines, now suffering from short supplies, opened the captured Japanese airfield at Lunga Point, naming it Henderson Field. On the same day, four ships arrived with much-needed supplies.
Tuesday, August 15, 1922. Germany defaults.
Germany defaulted on its reparations payments.
Released this day with an absurd plot involving vying for the hand of a wealthy Mexican señorita, a virtuous lass back home threatened by the KKK, and a major issue to be determined by a jumping bean contest.
The Casper Daily Tribune ran a cartoon attacking Governor Carey on the front page.
Frankly, even now, I’m shocked.
As can be seen, Casper was expanding in 1922 and the stresses that involved were apparently getting to people.
Sunday, August 14, 2022
Can Democracy Survive Social Media?
"A republic, if you can keep it", said Franklin about the new form of American government. Franklin was an intellectual. I doubt he could be heard now.
Truly, whenever something is posted on social media, piles of self convinced reply to it.
Political discourse has always had a rough edge, but the least educated, most opinionated, and least intellectually endowed did not always reply to every single political story or advertisement made. Now, they do, and indeed downright dominate it.
As an example, anything posted in favor of Cheney will receive piles of self convinced assertions that Trump is nearly a saint and everything said against him is an anti-American plot. This is, frankly, absurd.
Or, as an example, one post pointing out the fabrications of another, recently received replies that amounted to the schoolyard "nanna nanna doo doo". That is not an argument, but that's the general nature of the replies on social media.
It's not that some political discourse is like this. Most is. Twitter, Facebook, or what have you, pander to the lowest common denominator, not the intellect.
Early on, the political forces of the republic actually catered to the intellect. Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and the like, were intellectuals. People with knee-jerk, ill-informed, opinions didn't get it much past their neighbor's fence. People with informed opinions were better able to distribute them.
They wouldn't get a voice now.
This direction is, to say the least, not encouraging.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)