Twenty-Seven Questions

Pennsylvania's 2022 gubernatorial and Senate races coalesce around several critical issues. GOTV considers the following to be the most so:

1. ease of availability of higher education

2. availability of health care to all communities

3. retraining those without 21^st century skills

4. continuing to move away from environment-killing fossil fuels

5. expanding, rather than downsizing, access to the ballot

Without exception, these questions pertain to state as well as to Federal government. For instance, it's at the state level that funding for higher education. and for Medicare and Medicaid, is allotted. It's also the state that decides details like the availability of drop-off boxes for mail-in ballots. At the same time, however, it's with the Feds that the funds that support most of this originate.

GOTV had planned to submit the following to each of the Mastriano, Shapiro, Fetterman, and Oz campaigns. But upon review of the Mastriano site, our questions became moot.

For instance, doug4gov/plan says Mr.. Mastriano would:

1. eliminate all pandemic executive orders and edicts from the Wolf Administration

2. immediately ban government and school mask mandates

3. immediately ban COVID-19 vaccine mandates

4. immediately review all hospital polices related to in-patient COVID treatment

5. immediately end all contracts with compromised voting machine companies

6. appoint a Secretary of State with experience in securing elections from fraud

7. eliminate “No-Excuse” Mail-in voting and Ballot Drop boxes

8. enact Universal ID for voting

9. increase and protect poll watchers

10. immediately ban Critical Race Theory and Gender Theory studies

11. review district “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion” plans

12. strengthen Curriculum Transparency requirements

13. establish a universal “Parental Rights” statute in law
    

14. establishment a Property Tax Elimination Taskforce that would introduce legislation that eliminates Property Taxes for all homeowners

15. establish a working group to cut the gas tax while maintaining level funding for roads and bridges

16. reduce the Corporate Net Income Tax Rate

17. establish “strike force” teams at each state agency in order to cut statewide regulations by at least 55,000 in the first year

18. automatically review all regulations with a cost of more than $1 million

19. eliminate TWO regulations for any new regulation created

20. increase transparency for permit process and expedite reviews

21. protect utilities' costs by immediately withdrawing from Tom Wolf's “Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative”

22. encourage investment into the ... coal industry

23. lift Tom Wolf's regulations, taxes and fees and expand into drilling/mining

24. introduce and pass bills to establish PA as a “Second Amendment Sanctuary”

25. make PA a Constitutional (Open) Carry State

26. sign the Heartbeat Bill legislation into law

27. end any state funding to Planned Parenthood

GOTV considers it inconceivable that even Dr. Oz could surpass this level  of obduracy, or of pandering to the far right, so we won't submit any questions to his campaign.  But our original five will still go to Shapiro and Fetterman.

When we get responses, you'll be the first to know.

1. If elected, would you extend the amount that can be borrowed per year on a student loan?

2. If elected, would you extend the amount of Medicare that can be used to fund long-term care?

3. If elected, to whom, and under what conditions, would you make job re-training available?

4. If elected, under what conditions would you grant exceptions to environmental regulations?

5. If elected, what would you do to reinstate conditions regarding pre-clearance as defined in the Voting Act of 1965?

MVP

One man holds the record for the most votes garnered for any office at any time in the history of Pennsylvania. And he beat the pants off Donald Trump to boot …

Josh Shapiro supervised or even personally prosecuted at least 40 cases of alleged voter fraud, brought by Trump minions against the candidacy of Joe Biden. Shapiro has referred to some of the more inane and inaccurate positions taken by the Trump campaign in Pennsylvania as among his (Trump's) greatest hits. In a 2021 interview, Shapiro revealed that, as soon as the Trump campaign began talking about Democrats stealing the election, he put together a team of both civil and criminal lawyers, in order to be able fully to contest legal challenges to the popular vote.

Shapiro's campaign website puts it best. The former president tried to undermine our democracy and overturn our election dozens of times in court, but Josh defended Pennsylvania voters, and won. He argued all the way up to the (U. S.) Supreme Court, ensuring all legal votes were counted and the result of our ... election was certified.

No Coming Back

According to NPR, support for Doug Mastriano, the right-wing Republican nominee for Governor of Pennsylvania, is growing; Prominent doors and backers have come on board. In response, Democrats point out Mastriano's ties to the far right.

Allegheny County Dem Dan Frankel put it succinctly - There is no coming back from this. You cannot do business with these people (i.e., entities like gab.com) and claim to represent all Pennsylvanians … if you embrace antisemites and racists and homophobes and xenophobes, then you are one of them.

Frankel says Mastriano's positions feel particularly personal for him. In 2018, his House district was the site of the country’s deadliest-ever antisemitic attack. Robert Bowers, the man who killed 11 Jewish worshippers in the Tree of Life Synagogue, used Gab frequently to post and engage with antisemitic conspiracy theories.

State Rep. Malcolm Kenyatta (D-Philadelphia), a former candidate for U.S. Senate who attended the press conference, added that in some cases, GOP colleagues — he declined to say who — have denounced Mastriano privately, but won’t do so publicly.

Mastriano as Anti-Intellectual

The Republican candidate for Governor of Pennsyvania can't seem to get his facts straight.

WESA, Pittsburgh's NPR news station, reported recently that four Pennsylvania universities intend to resist pressure from Republicans in the PA House. Each of the four will introduce tuition increases, despite calls from Republicans led by GOP gubernatorial nominee Doug Mastriano. These misguided folks argue Penn State, University of Pittsburgh, Lincoln and Temple are federally funded, and therefore do not need to increase tuition.

That's a lot of bat-bleep, and, GOTV feels, an expression of the anti-intellectualism that's been present in conservative American political thought for decades.

These universities did not receive a bump in funding in either of this year’s state or federal budgets. Instead, the four will split about $30 million from a one-time federal grant.

GOTV hasn't heard from any of Penn State, Temple or Lincoln on this question. But a Pitt spokesperson told WESA the Pitt share will be earmarked for student financial aid and outreach.

Part of the Union

 GOTV is, among other things, a product of two generations of working-class progressives. all of them union members.

That's why a recent news story from the US Department of Labor was like music to our ears.

The Department has recovered $353,945 in back wages and liquidated damages for 79 sales associates at 12 New Jersey T-Mobile locations, whose owners willfully denied employees overtime wages for hours over 40.

Investigators with the department’s Wage and Hour Division found that individuals who operate Metro by T-Mobile locations in Bayonne, Colonia, Elizabeth, Somerset, and Union City failed to pay overtime at time-and-one-half the required rates, and paid in cash, off the books, at a straight time rate. Their actions violated the Fair Labor Standards Act.

In addition to the recovery of back wages and damages, the division assessed a civil money penalty of $38,670 due to the employers’ willful violation of the law.

This decision is an analog to the right to vote - an affirmation of the dignity of the individual.  Besides, as one of the state’s largest unions recently told its members, in a direct reference to voting rights, Doug Mastriano would like to restrict access to the ballot, and to unions.

Mastriano wants access to voting machines, in order to conduct what he called a forensic audit.  Trouble is, once someone tinkers with them, those machines are useless.  Ergo possibly unavailable for future electtions.  Ergo also, almost certainly unavailable for future elections in poor or urban percincts ...

Mastriano Is Dangerous

GOTV considers Republican gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano dangerous in several ways.

First, his innate misogyny. Mastriano has said on more than one occasion I am pro-life. It's the number one issue, I don't give way to exceptions either.

Second, his pandering to the far right.  A report in the New York Times identified Mastriano as a go-to person in efforts to divert Pennsylvania's Electoral College votes to Donald Trump, by creating an alternate (AKA made-up) slate of electors.

Third, his participation in the 01/06/21 attack on the U S Capitol.

Fourth, his belief that a state legislature can choose its own Electoral College delegates if that body believes the popular vote to have been fraudulent.

The chair of the Republican Committee of Allegheny County claimed that Mastriano was never copied in during discussions about efforts to override the popular vote. Which is both a feeble attempt at plausible deniability, and a tacit admission that such efforts did exist … 

Punishing Research

As a graduate of Pitt and a former faculty memer at Lincoln University, I'm more than usually annoyed by  close-minded Republicans - in particular, 14 Republican members of the PA House of Representatives.  Led by State Rep. Jerry Knowles (R., Schuylkill), these folks were frustrated that the University of Pittsburgh, one of four state- related institutions of higher learning, received its usual appropriation. Why frustrated? 

Knowles objected to Governor Tom Wolf's plan to give Pennsylvania's four state-related universities, including Penn State and Pitt, a one-time, $40 million funding boost.  Wolf's action was catalyzed by opponents to abortion and their attempts to block funding for all four state-related schools.  The 14 objected to Pitt's use of fetal tissue in scientific research when, in 2019, some Republican lawmakers used talking points from anti-abortion advocates to try to block Pitt's appropriation.  Only if the administrations at all of Pitt, Penn State, Temple, and Lincoln swore under oath that they did not and would not engage in any research that used fetal tissue would the four institutiones be funded.

Threatening scholars and educators strikes me as oafish.  How would these Republicans have reacted to Jonas Salk?

Mail-in Voting

According to the Associated Press, GOP lawmakers in the Commonwealth House of Representatives are again trying to have Pennsylvania's expanded mail-voting law thrown out.

The 2019 mail-in voting law has become a preferred target for Republicans. Republican gubernatorial nominee Doug Mastriano has promised to repeal it if he's elected.  Irony alert! Most states offer mail-in voting for all voters. In our Commonwealth, every Republican lawmaker but one voted for it in 2019.

A Loyal Trumpie

Mehmet Oz, Republican candidate and Trump endorsee for the Pennsylvania Senate seat that will open upon Pat Toomey's retirement, has as little grace as The Donald. Oz appears to have adopted Trump's practice of using open-ended and factually unfounded insults as substitutes for real debating points.

Even a long-lapsed Catholic like myself is offended by Oz's hypocrisy. He had the temerity to use a gathering of Christians to do a categorically un-Christian thing – ridicule an opponent. As bad if not worse, Oz seemed to assume that his audience were deaf to his distortions of the teachings of the New Testament. Certainly, he seemed unaware of passages like Matthew 20:19, Mark 10:34, and Luke 18:32.

Oz's TV ads have him proclaiming himself as 100% pro-life. One must assume that's another part of his effort to attract the votes of Christian conservatives. No problem there. But belittling John Fetterman as part of thar effort makes Oz appear decidedly debased. Like his mentor Trump, it seems Oz will do or say anything to gain or retain power.

Down to 17

After the 2000 census, Pennsylvania was divided into 19 congressional districts, down from 21. After the 2010 census, the number of districts decreased again, this time to 18.

In 2018, the PA Supreme Court ruled that existing Congressional districts were illegal by virtue of being partisan-driven gerrymandering.   Buit despite this ruling, the Republican-controlled General Assembly failed to reach a compromise with Democratic Governor Tom Wolfe on a more appropriate redistricting plan.  In the 2022 midterms, because of the 2020 United States census, Pennsylvania will lose another  congressional seat, and have only 17 districts, as shown below.

Whichever of these 17 you're in, vote.  Vote like your future depends on it, because it does.

Getting Past Legal-ese

A bipartisan bill aimed at protecting the right of same-sex and interracial couples to marry passed the U.S. House of Representatives Tuesday (07/19/22). The bill is a response to concerns that the Supreme Court could roll back more decisions, similar to its overturn of Roe v. Wade last month.

The bill, the Respect for Marriage Act, passed 267 to 157, with 47 Republicans joining their Democratic colleagues.  It's too soon to welcome the millennium, though. All opposition came from Republicans, including Pennsylvanian Mike Kelly of Butler (R-PA 16) and five other Pennsylvania House members.

It’s very important for the American people to understand that same-sex marriage is already the law of the land. The 2015 Supreme Court case, Obergefell v. Hodges, made that very clear, Kelly said in a statement. With just 16 days left in session before Election Day, Speaker Pelosi and the Democrats are forcing the House of Representatives to vote on bills that are already law so they can create a false narrative and deflect from their failed economic and energy policies, which are costing Americans more and more money.

Sorry, Mr. Kelly; that doesn't hold water. Here, including a healthy dollop of legal-ese, is why.

The majority of 81 briefs in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health, which briefs supported Mississippi's 15-week abortion ban, were mum about Obergefell v. Hodges. GOTV suspects the reason for the lack of argument was the principle upon which the decision was based - that same-sex couples have a fundamental right to marry because of the 14th Amendment's Due Process Clause.

In addition, most of these briefs have little to say about any of the other substantive due process precedents mentioned by Clarence Thomas. But, one exception is particularly relevant in this context: the brief filed on behalf of Texas Right to Life, written by Jonathan Mitchell and Adam Mortara. Mitchell is the author of SB8, the Texas Heartbeat Bill, which effectively bans abortions after six weeks of pregnancy and authorizes any person (can you say vigilantes, boys and girls?) to seek an injunction against anyone who assists women in obtaining abortions.  Said vigilante may also win an award of at least $10,000 ...

GOTV isn't paranoid; history matters. Mitchell was a clerk for the late Justice Scalia and is a former Solicitor General of Texas. Mortara clerked for Clarence Thomas and led a team challenging Harvard's affirmative action program. Both have stellar reputations within the conservative legal community. In a nutshell, their brief maintains that the constitutional right to abortion declared in Roe and reaffirmed in Casey has no basis in constitutional text or history and that stare decisis should not prevent them from being overruled. No surprise there. Problem is, according to this brief, there are many other decisions that similarly lack any constitutional grounding. Among these is Loving v. Virginia, which struck down a state anti-miscegenation law on due process grounds. The brief contends that the Civil Rights Act of 1866 provides all the authority needed to set aside such laws. That's because the 1866 Act prohibits racial discrimination under state law in making and enforcing contracts and, the brief's authors assert, marriage is a contract subject to this statute.

This analysis is curious for more than one reason. Essentially, it says that marriage rights for interracial couples cannot be established by fundamental interpretations of the Constitution. Also, the argument suggests that, in 1967 and because of the 1866 law, bans on laws that forbade interracial marriage had been in place for more than a century. That certainly would have been news to the 16 states that still had such laws in '67.  In fact, all but nine of the United States had, at some point in their history, passed anti-miscegenation laws, with the last of these (in Alabama) removed only in 2000.

Like the right to same-sex marriage, no specific reference to a right to interracial marriage ca be found anywhere in the Constitution. In what must warm Clarence Thomas' originalist heart, there is no reference at all to marriage in our foundational document. Further, the Mitchell – Mortara brief proposes that states be allowed to criminalize sexual intimacy in the privacy of gay couples' homes.

What's scary about all this? Just that, with SCOTUS now chock-full of conservatives, Mitchell and Mortara might easily be able to persuade Thomas et al that substantive due process means little or nothing. AKA as Thomas implied, any question, such as interracial marriage, that might rely on due process, and on precedent regarding that, can be tossed aside.

GOTV wonders where Pennsylvania candidates for the House of Representatives stand on questions such as due process and stare decisis, especially as they affect issues like interracial  or intra-gender marriage.

Watch this space …

The Travesty of Trumpism

The things I most admire about John Fetterman are his support for working class Pennsylvanians, and his sense of humor.

Today's Republicans are dismally lacking in that latter quality, Perhaps because Trump endorsed  him, Mehmet Oz continues to ignore the Constitution.  Our founding document requires that a Senator reside in the state he or she represents, More grist for John Fetterman's mill: Fetterman is working to tie his GOP general election opponent Oz to neighboring New Jersey, encouraging supporters to sign Oz up to be added to the New Jersey Hall of Fame.

We all know Dr. Oz is soooooo proud to be Jersey Strong, Fetterman’s campaign wrote this week. He’s a huge New Jersey celebrity who’s lived there for three decades. The dude is even registered to vote in NJ and voted there as recently as 2020 … Fetterman also posted a video to his Twitter account, urging his supporters to sign the petition. Take a look; it's to smile.

And remember, you heard it here first. His humor is one reason why Fetterman will succeed in November.

Take That, Clarence

Clarence Thomas suffers from a complete lack of humility. He seems to believe in his own draconian ethics. How else can we get our heads around his opposition to such – shudder! - radical ideas as adults in a consensual relationship being able to use contraceptives?

GOTV tends to think of Satchel Paige in such contexts.  But all of Mark Twain, Henry David Thoreau, and George Washington recognized the danger mere ego could pose to effective thought. Ergo, don't look back, Clarence; something may be gaining on you. The U S House of Representatives recently passed two bills that tell Mr. Thomas his is not the last word on such questions.

The House voted today (Thursday 07/21/22) to pass a bill that would guarantee access to birth control, by protecting the right to buy and use contraceptives without government restriction. These eight Republicans voted with their Democratic colleagues:

• Liz Cheney of Wyoming

• Nancy Mace of South Carolina

• Fred Upton of Michigan

• Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio

• John Katko of New York

• Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania

• Maria Salazar of Florida

• Adam Kinzinger of Illinois

The final vote was 228-195.

Earlier this week, the House passed a bill that would protect, in Federal law, the right to same-sex marriage. On this question, 47 Republicans joined Democrats to vote for the bill.

But don't celebrate just yet. It's not clear whether either bill can pass the Senate.  For that, at least 10 Republicans must side with Democrats, in order to overcome the filibuster-driven 60-vote threshold.

If ever there was an argument for voting, this is one. Pat Toomey's Senate seat is rated, by most sources, as the one most likely to flip in November. Let's each of us do what we can to ensure that.

Mandating Morality

In a post on July 11, GOTV made the point that the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v Wade was ominous.  So was Justice Clarence Thomas's statement that he wants to re-examine similar SCOTUS decisions, like those on contraception, gay sex, and same-sex marriage.

Even more-than-usually-horrific reports have surfaced since the 11th that make Thomas's thinly veiled misanthropy seem almost quaint.  But it's hard to imagine anything that will top what follows.

New Texas anti-abortion laws have made doctors unwilling or unable to perform procedures for miscarriages.  Such procedures are effectively identical to those used to terminate pregnancies.  As a result, because of the fear of some doctors of violating Texas' draconian anti-abortion laws, one woman was forced to carry her dead fetus in her womb for two weeks. 

James Carville described Pennsylvania as Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Alabama in between.  No one in either my adopted home of Delaware County or my born-to home of North Braddock, however conservative they might otherwise consider themselves (and for some it's pretty darned conservative), would accept any outcome like that just described.

Vote, people.  The state legislature in Harrisburg influences any number of mores.  We as progressives need to pick up 14 seats in the Commonwealth House of Representatives to ensure that no one is forced to endure a Texas-like fate.

An Innovative Political Strategy

Pennsylvania's Democratic Senate candidate John Fetterman has always been innovative.  But he's outdone himself this time, and it's to smile.

Recently. the former mayor of Braddock, PA (just down the hill from my home town of - wait for it - North Braddock 😎) paid Snooki of Jersey Shore fame to appear in a Fetterman campaign video.  That video trolled Dr. Mehmet Oz, Fetterman's Republican opponent in the PA Senate race, by pointing out that Oz resides in New Jersey.

Perhaps Oz intends to use Article 1 Section 3 Clause 3 of our Constitution to justify a quick move to Pennsylvania should he be elected ...

A Unitarian, a Buddhist, and a Jew

Two religious leaders — a Unitarian and a Buddhist — plan to join a South Florida rabbi in challenging a new Florida law banning abortions after 15 weeks, arguing it violates more than one Section of the Florida Constitution, particularly those which define the rights to privacy and freedom of religion. (While the lawsuits in question don't reference it, Amendment 14 of the United States Constitution also applies in this context.)

The retired Unitarian minister Rev. Harris Riordan, and the Buddhist minister Maya Malay confirmed they will file a lawsuit in state court next week, echoing Rabbi Barry Silver's position. Silver, along with Rabbi Arthur Wascow, the founder and director of the progressive Jewish organization the Shalom Center, intends to file an amended complaint in the same timeframe.

We are excited to expand this lawsuit to include outstanding representatives of the Buddhist and Unitarian traditions, Silver said. Maya Malay and Harris Riordan are wonderful teachers of their own traditions and have dedicated their lives to improving the world for people of all faiths and religions. Then Silver added We look forward to building coalitions with people of all faiths and backgrounds, including atheists and freethinkers, to repair the wall of separation between church and state and to unite the people of the world to protect human rights and save our precious planet.

Silver's synagogue, Congregation L'Dor Va-Dor in Palm Beach County, originally filed a lawsuit over the Florida law before it took effect July 1. In his updated complaint, the rabbi will add his name as an individual plaintiff. In addition, Silver has retained the legal counsel of David Ferleger, a Philadelphia attorney who has argued five times before the U.S. Supreme Court; Ferleger will also represent Riordan and Malay, Ferleger said in a statement. This … abortion law forces Jews to surrender their religious beliefs.

Too bad that some of those who voted for Ron Desantis weren't able to see past his inane Trump-loving campaign videos ...

Far Right White Christian Nationalism

That's something of a non-sequitur. No organization like Gab can truly be called Christian.

While I was still teaching, I made a point of exposing my students to two types of web sites – the compassionate and peace-loving (such as this one) , and the ugly and hateful. Were I still in the classroom, Gab would be an excellent example of the latter. Founded in 2016, Gab has spent most of its existence on poisonous alternative social media platforms. That dubious distinction was exacerbated (or, in the minds of some, enhanced) by Gab's links to the 2018 shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh. The shooter, 46-year-old Robert Gregory Bowers,had earlier posted antisemitic online alt-tech social network Gab. That proved to be to Gab's advantage; the suspending of high-profile right wing accounts on Twitter and Facebook created a tsunami of new users and income for Gab.

Analysis of Gab has raised disturbing questions.

• Previous research had indicated that Gab was not a significant force for organizing real-world activities. But in 2021 and 2022 it had significant growth in anti-vaccine protest organizing.

• Extreme anti-Semitic, racist and homophobic content is rife, with open praise of Nazism, encouragement of violence against minorities, and Great Replacement narratives. Many of the memes cited by the Buffalo shooter's manifesto are indistinguishable from content on Gab.

• Gab contains much of the same toxic content as openly neo-Nazi sites such as Stormfront, but companies who refused service to Stormfront continue to provide Gab with services.

What does any of this have to do with voting? The GOP nominee for PA gov, @dougmastriano , paid Gab $5k for “campaign consulting.” Now, every new account on Gab automatically follows Mastriano.

Don't be misled.

Thanks, NRA

At this date (07/16/22), there are over 400 million guns in the US.  As of Tuesday, July 5, 2022, the population of our country was 334,887,583.  That works out to over 1.2 guns for each of us.  In theory, it also works out to the same number / ratio of gun deaths.

6 out of every 10 such deaths are suicides.  Thanks, NRA; you've made it so much easier for the troubled among us to kill ourselves.

Today, 07/16/22, a new national suicide prevention hotline will go live.  All that's needed is to dial 988.

Dumping Trump

A group of conservatives, including prominent lawyers and retired federal judges, issued a 72-page report on Thursday categorically rebutting each of the claims made in court by former President Donald Trump and his supporters over the 2020 election results.

The report, "LOST, NOT STOLEN: The Conservative Case that Trump Lost and Biden Won the 2020 Presidential Election," looked at more than 60 court cases Trump and his supporters filed and lost in six key battleground states. It reached the "unequivocal" conclusion that the former Republican president's claims were unsupportable -- which Trump's own Department of Homeland Security as well as election officials nationwide debunked days after the 2020 election.

The report was released as the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, insurrection at the US Capitol has been holding public hearings that have connected Trump's involvement in efforts to overturn the 2020 election to the attack that disrupted Congress from certifying Joe Biden's victory. Trump is considering an early 2024 presidential run announcement, CNN has previously reported.

"There is absolutely no evidence of fraud in the 2020 Presidential Election on the magnitude necessary to shift the result in any state, let alone the nation as a whole. In fact, there was no fraud that changed the outcome in even a single precinct," the report says.

The report is signed by retired federal appeals court judges Thomas B. Griffith, J. Michael Luttig and Michael W. McConnell, former Solicitor General Theodore B. Olson, former US Sens. John Danforth and Gordon H. Smith, longtime Republican election lawyer Benjamin L. Ginsberg and veteran Republican congressional chief of staff David Hoppe. Several of them are longtime Trump critics.

"Even now, twenty months after the election, a period in which Trump's supporters have been energetically scouring every nook and cranny for proof that the election was stolen, they come up empty. Claims are made, trumpeted in sympathetic media, and accepted as truthful by many patriotic Americans. But on objective examination they have fallen short, every time," the report says.

The report warns that it's "wrong, and bad for our country, for people to propagate baseless claims that President Biden's election was not legitimate."

It delved into a detailed examination of each case brought by Trump and his supporters in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin. Trump and his backers alleged fraud, irregularities and procedural deficiencies in their challenges in court.

Trump and his allies lost nearly all the more than 60 cases they brought challenging the 2020 election results, the report noted. Twenty were dismissed before a hearing on the merits, 14 were dropped by Trump and his supporters, and 30 included a hearing on the merits, it found.

The group of conservatives argued that Trump and his supporters had "an obligation to recognize that the election debate was over".

Child Care Tax Credits

Pennsylvania's budget for 2022 - 2023 includes a permanent child care tax credit that will allow families to claim thousands of dollars in benefits.

The $45.2 billion spending plan, which Gov. Tom Wolf signed into law last week, also allocates over $140 million to a temporary expansion of a property tax credit for low-income and older Pennsylvanians.

Either of which and many more are arguments to support Josh Shapiro and oppose Doug Mastriano ...

Elections Mean Something - for Budgets

Pennsylvania's delayed 2022-23 state budget is now law. The $45.2 billion spending plan earned Gov. Tom Wolf's signature one week after the official due date.

The plan includes a $1 billion boost in education funding, a new child care tax credit, a corporate tax cut, and a $2.1 billion deposit into the state's rainy day fund —all made possible by higher-than-expected revenues that led to a multibillion dollar surplus.  (Wolf announced those better-than-expected revenues in May.)

Further, the General Assembly agreed to spend $2.2 billion in remaining federal stimulus dollars on a number of conservation, water infrastructure, housing, child care, and public safety projects. But they've not yet had their come-to-enlightenment moment; none of the $2.2 billion will be used for direct payments to Pennsylvanians, as Wolf had requested.

Finally, the budget also includes $45 million in new election funding for counties statewide. That's potentially very consequential for those of us who want progressives to regain 14 seats in the PA House.

Overturning Roe

The Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v Wade troubles me deeply. As ominous is Justice Clarence Thomas's statement that he wants to re-examine similar previous SCOTUS decisions, such as those on contraception, gay sex, and same-sex marriage. As Thomas put it:

In future cases, we should reconsider all of this Court's substantive due process precedents, including Griswold (contraception), Lawrence (gay sex), and Obergefell (same-sex marriage).

In more detail:

• Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479, was a decision of our Supreme Court in which it ruled that the Constitution of the United States protects the right of married couples to buy and use contraceptives without government restriction.

• Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558, was a decision in which the Court ruled that sanctions of criminal punishment for those who commit sodomy are unconstitutional. AKA gay males who make love with each other can't be jailed for doing so.

• Obergefell v. Hodges, 576 U.S. 644, is a landmark civil rights case in which the Supreme Court ruled that the fundamental right to marry is guaranteed to same-sex couples by both the Due Process Clause and the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

• The 14th amendment states that no State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection ...

By his statement, Thomas urges that the government violate the most widely-held interpretation of the 14^th Amendment, when he suggests that it dictate:

• how or even if contraception can be used

• how or even if gay sex can be carried out

• how or even if members of the same gender can marry

How absolute will this appeasement of the far right become? Based on something I experienced decades ago, we should all be very concerned.

Angela was a member of my high school class. She was a knockout, and bright. She was kind, even to those like me who were about as far as one could get from the in-crowd. Angela died at the age of 17, after a back-alley abortion. Born into a traditional Irish Catholic family, she feared telling her parents about her pregnancy. Instead, she turned to the rumor-mill in southwest Allegheny County, and found a woman, in one of the boroughs near her, who performed abortions. Angela went to her, but never returned home.  Angela's mom, and Angela's boyfriend and father of her child, visited Angela's grave-site daily, for months after her death.

I can only imagine the suffering Clarence Thomas's sanctimonious callousness might create.

The Second Amendment - A Biography

Widely acclaimed at the time of its publication in 2014, this book explores the most misunderstood provision of the Bill of Rights. In today's era of ever-increasing, and ever-more-horrific, gun violence, Waldman’s book helps demystify the Amendment.

The Second Amendment (thank you, James Madison, for insisting on a Bill of Rights) was written to calm public fear that the new national government would crush militias, at that time the only mechanism for self-defense of the nascent United States. Such groups were made up only of white adult men, who were required to own a gun in order to become part of a militia; ownership of firearms had been forbidden under the British crown.

Waldman recounts the stormy debate that has surrounded the amendment from its birth to the present. As the country spread West, violence spread too. But through it all, gun control, rather than being timid, was abundant. In the twentieth century, with Prohibition and gangsterism, the first federal gun control laws were passed; the Supreme Court ruled against a constitutional right to own a gun – any kind of gun – four times.

The present debate, one theme of which seems to be everybody has a right to own and carry, openly or otherwise, any kind of weapon took shape in the 1970s. Because of a resurgence of libertarianism, the newly radicalized National Rifle Association (NRA) campaigned to oppose gun control. The NRA sought to emphasize an obscure constitutional provision that in 2008 reached the Supreme Court, after a push by conservative lawyers. It was only then the Court ruled that the Constitution protects an individual right to gun ownership. Ironically but not surprisingly, given his role as the avatar of conservative activism on SCOTUS, Antonin Scalia twisted one of his own principles to force the outcome he was after. The precept he used is called originalism, Set aside Scalia's reputation for intellectual excellence; his theory simply doesn't hold water. To accept originalism as a valid premise requires that we believe that neither language nor people evolve. Thomas Jefferson knew that to be specious. In the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson intentionally used the phrase in the course of human events to indicate that change must always be factored into whatever one sought to do. Too bad Scalia didn't get the memo.

Michael Waldman shows that our view of the Second Amendment is set, at each stage, not by a literal interpretation of constitutional text, but rather by political advocacy and public agitation. How then can we account for any link between voting and the accelerating rate of gun violence in our country? That's a no-brainer, and a two-word answer – Donald Trump. Mr. Trump is a number of things, none of them admirable. What he excels at is being a con artist. That is, he attempts to defraud a person or group after first gaining their trust. Con artists exploit victims by using their credulity, naïveté, vanity, or greed. Researchers define the underlying psychology as a manifestation of fraudulent conduct intended to further exchanges that benefit con men at the expense of their victims.

That's the connection with voting. Enough of our fellow Americans were duped by Mr. Trump that they voted for him. They took him at his delusional, duplicitous word. They believed him when he said things like Mexico sends us murders and rapists. After their first debate in 2016, Hillary Clinton noted Trump is a drama queen constantly describing a dystopia that exists only in his mind. But that dystopia was his tool for playing on folks' fears. As was the case with Trump University and others of his flimflams, and despite being caught several times with his hand in the cookie jar up to the wrist, Trump got what he wanted. Enough of the public voted for him that:

• he won the Presidency without earning a majority in the popular vote

• he capitalized on that victory by nominating three extraordinarily conservative judges to the Supreme Court

• he was aided and abetted by Mitch McConnell's obsession with controlling our judicial system

• he was further aided and abetted by the lies all three nominees told during their confirmation hearings in the Senate

That's why we're where we are today. We've lost:

• protection for abortion rights

• protection for environmental regulations

• protection for the right of privacy

• protection from the idea that the Second Amendment allows any kind of firearm in anyone's hands under any circumstances

• hundreds of our fellow citizens in the 309 mass shootings so far in 2022 in America

Lest you think that voting has no influence, think again. Attorney General Merrick Garland has, for the third time, challenged a state’s (Arizona's) voting law, in part in response to voting rights groups who have pressed for stronger action against limiting access to the ballot. Arizona’s law requires voters to prove their citizenship to vote in a presidential election by showing a birth certificate or passport. It also mandates that newly registered voters provide a proof of address, which could disproportionately affect people with limited access to government-issued identification cards – folks like recent immigrants, students, older people, low-income voters, and Native Americans.

Here in Pennsylvania, where the Republican party controls the legislature, there are over 200 seats in the State House. Thirty-six of those are open in 2022. Were Democrats to add even 14 of the open seats to their tally, they'd gain not only bragging rights, but the majority in the House (currently at 113 Republicans and 90 Democrats), and therefore:

• the ability to draw or re-draw the maps of electoral districts

• the ability to expand services such as SNAP and Medicaid

• the ability to affect opportunities such as those involving higher education

In a nutshell, vote. Vote like your future depended on it, because it very well might. And let's put into office in the PA State House folks who do something to earn:

Salary	Per diem
$90,335/year	$178/day

The Ballotpedia site is a treasure-trove of information about voting, and about the PA State legislature. Bookmark it. Do the same for this one as well; it's a guide to election rules and practices in Pennsylvania.