(Permanent Musical Accompaniment To This Post
Being our semi-regular weekly survey of what's goin' down in the several states where, as we know, the real work of governmentin' gets done, and where your grass is turning black and there's no water in your well.
We begin in Idaho, Bedlam's little corner of the universe. The Bundy Bunch is back again, totin' them farr-aarms for freedom's holy cause. From InvestigateWest:
Parker’s decision to point a gun at government officials got him accused of “domestic terrorism” by the FBI. He spent 19 months in prison. He went through two federal trials. But it also gave him the kind of fame that he’s been turning into political influence ever since. And now, Parker, head of the Real Three Percenters of Idaho, a militia movement group, is casting himself as a key architect of Senate Bill 1220, an Idaho bill to change the state’s definition of terrorism.
The bill “essentially guts” the state’s Terrorist Control Act, said Jim Jones, a Republican who served as the state’s Idaho Attorney General from 1983 to 1991. Jones said he convinced the Legislature to pass the act nearly 40 years ago, in the wake of a bombing of a North Idaho priest’s home by violent white supremacists. It gave the state the power to charge criminal acts that are “dangerous to human life” and intended to influence government policy through intimidation as an “act of terrorism,” carrying elevated criminal penalties. This bill would change the law to apply only to those who commit violent acts who are associated with federally designated foreign terrorist organizations, like ISIS or Hamas, making it inert against actual homegrown domestic terrorists.
How nice!
Parker walked into a January 2018 meeting of the Idaho Legislature as a free man. Two trials over his role in the Bundy standoff had resulted in two hung juries. He’d copped to a misdemeanor plea of obstruction to avoid a third. Rep. Dorothy Moon, R-Stanley, announced Parker was in the room and praised him for “everything he’s done for the citizens of Idaho and Nevada.” Dozens of Republican members of the Legislature responded with a hail of applause. Moon and more than 50 of her Idaho Republican legislative colleagues had signed a 2017 letter urging the charges against Parker be dropped, arguing they represented government overreach. Today, Moon is the head of the state GOP.
Chairman Moon represents 122 people. So, naturally, we should allow Stanley, Idaho to define terrorism.
Remaining in the great western plains, we find that the good folks at the Montana Free Press have been checking out the state of self-government in a place called Glendive. The state of self-government in Glendive can be fairly describe as "prone."
All the ingredients were there: a multi-generational power structure with a long-established way of conducting business under next to no scrutiny; a collective amnesia about local civic history; a population (4,871, as counted in 2021) anxious about the economic future of their town, which, like many tiny towns across the prairie, had stagnated — even with its newly legal marijuana dispensaries and proximity to intersecting highways, the Yellowstone River, Montana’s largest state park, and the once-money-minting Bakken Formation. Then came Olson. She said she didn’t run for mayor as a revolutionary, just as an alternative to a two-decade incumbent. Powered by an earnest sense of municipal do-goodery, she wanted to revive local manufacturing, generate jobs, expand trail access and support a struggling and understaffed police department. The voters of Glendive were willing to trust her, electing Olson over her predecessor by a huge margin. The eight-member City Council, not so much.
Olson left after two years of knocking heads with the city council.
Ego, miscommunication, stubbornness and inexperience combined with the claustrophobia of small-town life generated acrimony that engulfed essentially all of Olson’s term, which began in January 2022 and ended, prematurely, with her resignation last month. She and the council fought over everything from nuisance petitions to the very form of city government. And in what proved to be the real beginning of the end, they fought over Olson’s controversial firing of Glendive’s new police chief.
Ah, small city politics.
To call the council a “good ol’ boys’ club” applies a normative judgment. But there’s an element of truth to the label. In the current council, Leon Baker, the council president, is the father of council member Doug Baker. Former Mayor Jimison is the father-in-law of council member Rhett Coon. The council has its own traditions and lore. Members regularly meet after meetings at the Beer Jug on Merrill Avenue. Part of this is the reality of small-town politics. Leon Baker, asked by MTFP whether the council ever reached a quorum at the Beer Jug — a potential violation of the state’s open meeting law, depending on what they discuss — replied that it’s just as easy to reach a quorum by happenstance in the hardware store or at a high school basketball game.
Sounds like the whole "good old boys" argument is pretty well-founded. The Beer Jug looks like a nice enough saloon, but it doesn't look like a seat of government.
Last Tuesday was election day, and the MFP was still on the case. It looks as though the supporters of former Mayor Olson managed to carry the day.
“I threw a monkey wrench into the ‘good ol’ boys club,’” Thompson said, using the term Olson’s supporters adopted to describe the city’s entrenched political establishment. He added that “there was a lot of mistrust built up over the whole Teresea deal, and I think people know I’m not scared to voice my opinion.” Thompson expressed a vision for economic development in Glendive, which hasn’t experienced the growth seen by many other Montana cities. “Glendive, we’re 200 miles from Bismarck, 200 from Billings, 200 from Rapid City, 200 from Regina,” he said. “We have a major interstate, the [Yellowstone] river, the largest state park in Montana, there’s no reason we shouldn’t be a thriving community.”
And we conclude, as is our custom, in the great state of Oklahoma, whence Blog Official Sagebrush Topiarist Friedman of the Plains brings us the saga of a judge who got bored. Or something. From NBC News:
An Oklahoma judge agreed to step down Friday after she was caught sending hundreds of texts from the bench while overseeing a murder trial in the killing of a 2-year-old boy, including messages that mocked prosecutors and were sprinkled with emojis. District Judge Traci Soderstrom also agreed to not seek judicial office again in Oklahoma under a proposed settlement agreement filed with the Oklahoma Court on the Judiciary.
Oklahoma Supreme Court Chief Justice John Kane IV recommended Soderstrom be removed following an investigation that found she mocked prosecutors, laughed at the bailiff’s comment about a prosecutor’s genitals, praised the defense attorney and called the prosecutor’s key witness a liar during the murder trial of Khristian Tyler Martzall. Security video published by The Oklahoman showed Soderstrom texting or messaging for minutes at a time during jury selection, opening statements and testimony during the trial in Chandler, about 45 miles (72 kilometers) outside of Oklahoma City.
OMFG. LOL. Ipso facto.
This is your democracy, America. Cherish it.
Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976. He lives near Boston and has three children.
