Friday Homestead Dispatch

Bituminous Bearded Béchamel

Jake turned the globe again and pressed his blunt, grimy thumb on a carefully selected spot. "Here. These thirteen states. I know what I'm talking about. I read books and I go around. I been in every damn one of these thirteen states. I've worked in every one. And the reason I think like I do is this: We live in the richest country in the world. There's plenty and to spare for no man, woman, or child to be in want. And in addition to this our country was founded on what should have been a great, true principle – the freedom, equality, and the rights of each individual. Huh! And what has come of that start? There are corporations worth billions of dollars – and hundreds of thousands of people who don't get to eat. And her in these thirteen states the exploitation of human beings is so that _ that it's a thing you got to take in with your own eyes. In my life I've seen things that would make a man go crazy. At least one third of all Southerners live and die no better off than the lowest peasant in any European Fascist state. The average wage of a worker on a tenant farm is only seventy-three dollars per year. And mind you, that's the average! The wages of sharecroppers run from thirty-five to ninety dollars ore person. And thirty-five dollars a year means just about ten cents for a full days work. Everywhere there's pellagra and hookworm and anaemia. And just plain, pure starvation. But!" Jake rubbed his lips with the knuckles of his dirty fist. Sweat stood out on his forehead. "But!" he repeated. "Those are only the evils you can see and touch. The other things are worse. I'm talking about the way that the truth has been hidden from the people. The things they have been told so they can't see the truth. The poisonous lies. So they aren't allowed to know." —"The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter" Carson McCullers (1940)

1.
Not reported in The NY Times, WA Post, nor the Guardian this week, unless buried down deep, was Biden’s designation of the Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni–Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument as protected land. His administration is honoring his commitment “to prioritize respect for the Tribal sovereignty and self-determination, to honor the solemn promises the United States made to Tribal nations to fulfill federal trust and treaty obligations.” The protected land is home to 3,000 cliff houses, cave paintings, and other Indigenous cultural sites. Biden also said “The natural and cultural objects of the lands have historic and scientific value that is unique, rich, and well-documented.  By creating the monument, we’re setting aside new spaces for families to hike, bike, hunt, fish, and camp—growing the tourism economy that already accounts for 11 percent of all Arizona jobs.”

Politico reported that Flanked by Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.), Rep. Raúl Grijalva (D-Ariz.), Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs (D) and various Native American tribal leaders, Biden signed the proclamation establishing the Baaj Nwaavjo I’tah Kukveni – Ancestral Footprints of the Grand Canyon National Monument at a ceremony in Red Butte, Ariz.

Even though the national monument designation upholds private property rights, and also does not affect existing uranium mining claims, Republicans are up in arms as this puts the kibosh on further digs. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland, the first Native American Cabinet secretary, said "It will help protect lands that many tribes referred to as their eternal home, a place of healing and a source of spiritual sustenance. It will help ensure that indigenous peoples can continue to use these areas for religious ceremonies, hunting and gathering of plants, medicines and other materials, including some found nowhere else on earth. It will protect objects of historic and scientific importance for the benefit of tribes, the public and for future generations,” prompting Committee on Natural Resources member MAGA Paul Gosar of Arizona to bray about the new designation as “another strident abuse of the Antiquities Act” and demanded documents justifying the decision to put the area’s uranium out of developers’ reach, although he had to look up the word ‘strident’ before he used it in a sentence.

2.
Getting some ink, however, was the sinking of the not-so-good ship MAGA concerning abortion rights in Ohio. Those fuckers have opened a can of kick-ass women voters, along with other citizens who think that women should have their own say concerning their health and well-being. As our own David Fitzsimmons writes, Ohio’s fanatical Anti-Choice MAGA-nauts forgot their sole noble purpose was to represent the will of the People of their state. Instead, the mad mullahs of middle America chose to enforce the will of the most repressive minority of zealots to march out of the middle ages since the Inquisition. When these divinely inspired anti-democratic despots tried to limit the right of Ohio voters to amend their Constitution they stepped right in front of a speeding train called the 21st Century and found themselves flatter than a Lincoln penny on the wrong side of history.

The Washington Post reported that Ohio voters overwhelmingly rejected a ballot measure that would have made it harder to pass future ballot measures, including one Ohio voters will consider in November that would codify reproductive rights. Seeking low turnout, state lawmakers scheduled for mid-August a special election on their proposal to limit the initiative process. But the poll drew more than 3 million votes. More than twice as many people voted early in Ohio on Issue 1, the only measure on the ballot, as voted early in the highly contested May 2022 primary for U.S. Senate.

Fitz goes on to say for this Progressive there’s a bonus to putting this to the voters in 2024. As we saw in Kansas, and now in Ohio, abortion on the ballot gets voters to the polls. As it should. I have news for Arizona’s cave dwellers who gerrymandered their way out of the Pleistocene and into power. A majority of Arizonans are done with you and your tiny tribe of tyrants. We’re done with your gaggle of Elmer Gantrys and Tammy Fayes in Ten-Gallon hats aching, longing and lusting after the power to control our lives and our bodies.

Arizonans, we have an opportunity NOW to put “Arizona for Abortion Access” on the 2024 ballot. The ACLU of Arizona, Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona, NARAL Arizona, Affirm Sexual and Reproductive Health, Arizona List and Healthcare Rising Arizona are all backing the effort to get enough signatures by next July (383,923 valid signatures). Go here to help the cause!

3.
Larry Bodine, a journalist and attorney, and the Chair of LD18 Democrats in Tucson wrote in the MAGAs-Never-Sleep category that conspiracy theorist Bernadette Gruber of Tucson claims that Planned Parenthood will put abortion clinics in schools and that public schools teach children to consent to sex and how to masturbate. Hmmm, It’s been a while but it seemed like the masturbation thing didn’t need teaching as your parts are right there on ya. And when I was growing up, we only had access to old copies of men’s ‘sweat mags’ as they were called (the term to refer to the men’s adventure magazines that primarily featured cover paintings of scantily-clad women and men being menaced or tortured by evil Nazis, Japanese or Communists, bloodthirsty natives, psychopaths, Satanists or some other fiends) that were usually piled high in the back room of Flynn’s Drug Store downtown, handily by the bathroom, with a partial cover torn off. We had to use the bathroom a lot when we went in for after-school ice cream sandwich. Now kids can watch such activities easily on the web any ol’ time starting at age 4 or so.

But, I digress. Bodine wrote that Gruber spoke on August 5th at the “Southern AZ Values in Education Summer Conference” held at the Catalina Foothills Church, 2150 E. Orange Grove Rd. She claims that sex education in public schools “Is designed to change the sexual and gender norms of society by raising the rising generation in radical gender ideologies.” She asserts that sex education sexualizes children. “Comprehensive sex education also teaches them how pleasurable it is to use these types of things, condoms and lubrication.

Gruber is one of many involved in the Protect Arizona Children Coalition which has a website combined with the STOP CSE (Comprehensive Sexuality Education) site. Their mission is to petition the Arizona State Board of Education, state legislators, the governor, and all local school boards and charter schools to ensure no instruction or materials, including highly controversial comprehensive sexuality education (CSE), be given to children in our schools. Read more in the link if you’d like…me, I’m going to scrounge around for that worn copy of Nude Justice in the Frozen Hell…

Tiny Tidbits of Goddamn!

1. And the hits just keep coming in Arizona. Borrowing from the orangeman’s playbook MAGA Mark Finchem’s failed bid for Secretary of State gives him a reason to continue duping the rubes for cash. Arizona Republic’s Laurie Roberts reported that even though Finchem’s attorney filed the motion to dismiss his appeal on July 30, on July 31 he wrote a plea for funds. “We are INCREDIBLY close to being able to pay our lawyer’s fees for this month, which means we will be able to continue the good fight for Election Integrity. We can fortify our challenge of the fraudulent 2022 election, and we can fight the punitive and unconstitutional sanctions that have been levied on me and Kari Lake. We expect big developments in the case this month, we just need to be able to pay our lawyers so we can capitalize!” Uhhhh, he accidentally forgot to mention that he dropped the lawsuit the day before this missive. Goddamn!

2. Iowa’s Gov. Kim Reynolds deployed 109 Iowa National Guard soldiers to Texas last week, and on Aug. 31 will send a contingent of state troopers to show the Texas Rangers how it’s done. As fabulous writer and editor of the Storm Lake Times Pilot Art Cullen reports, Reynolds will pay for the show by raiding federal pandemic relief funds. The last time she sent 28 troopers to the border a couple years ago it cost over $300,000 for 14 days. This will cost millions that otherwise could have been used for K-12 public schools or to buy ice cream for everyone. Iowa used to be known for being No. 1 in education. Under Reynolds we’ve fallen to about No. 18, according to the latest college test scores. Goddamn!

And dang it, RIP Robbie Robertson. I’ve professed my love for The Band before but I had not read a description so apt as by writer and musician Will Stenberg on Wednesday:

Listening to The Band's debut and it is as astonishing as ever. What's so distinctive about it is the way that the five players actually DON'T blend. It's most evident in their vocal harmonies, which are the opposite of the smooth, anodyne sound of, say, The Beach Boys or The Eagles: the phrasing isn't perfectly matched and the tones and timbres of each voice remain distinct and individual, never braiding into a single sonic shape, textural, rubbing up against each other, creating a burnished, coppery sheen.

Similarly their instrumental parts shine, shimmer, stagger, clatter and march along, colliding off each other, caressing each other, careening across the songs like pool balls: Garth's ornate stabs of celestial organ illuminating the dark spaces where Rick's bass lines slither across Robbie's understated, thoughtful guitar and Richard's gospel-tinged piano, all held up by Levon Helm playing like he doesn't have bones in his arms. They're really all playing lead, including the drummer. They're a unit, but startlingly individualistic, like a community of hermits.

But the true miracle is how loose they are. You have to be so tight to be that loose, to court disaster with that kind of swaggering grace. The songs have a lurch to them, a feeling that they are always about to fall apart; everyone swings with such a laconic and relaxed feel that the effect is like watching a tight-rope walker whose progress is made all the more compelling by his constant swaying - but he never falls. So much open space, an almost superstitious fear of hitting the beat too squarely, the groove flexible as spider-silk, but strong as spider-silk too - the players push up against it and it bends and bends and bends but never breaks, always retains its immaculate geometry.

No one sounded like this before them. No one has since. No one will again.

Also, RIP Sixto Rodriguez, William Friedkin, David LaFlamme, and Mark Margolis (Hector Salamanca). And, my heart goes out to the the people on Hawaii's Maui island. Donate a bit now if you’re able.

And now…