BY MILITARY STANDARDS, TOM COTTON IS DESPICABLE

      Many members of Congress have military backgrounds, tout that experience in their election campaigns, and often refer to it in political comments on the floor and in the media.  They hope that we voters think that the honor and courage with which they might have served followed them into office.  Time was—of course, I was younger and probably naïve—when I trusted that thought.  In my time in the Army, both in the Washington area and in Vietnam, almost without exception, my fellow officers, ranking both higher and lower than me, were honorable, decent people and would likely have remained so in their civilian lives.  But I no longer trust that thought about former military officers if they go into politics.  It corrupts many of them. 

Consider, Joni Ernst, Republican junior senator from Iowa and former Army officer.  After indicating her concerns about Pete Hegseth, she was threatened with a richly endowed primary challenger.  She reversed her position and supported his nomination for Secretary of Defense.  In doing so, she abandoned her obligation to advise and consent presumably on the merits of the nominee.  In doing so, she also abandoned the integrity and bravery associated with her military service and required to serve her country.  She put service to herself above service to America.

 

Focus on Tom Cotton, Republican junior senator from Arkansas, also a former Army officer.  Some have questioned whether he made entirely true claims about his service.  Qualified as a Ranger, he did not serve as one though he claimed that he did.  So his word might be suspect.  But no one would question his aggressive politics, which include mean and mendacious remarks.

 

Cotton, a Harvard Law School graduate, has not addressed the proprieties of what is likely a quid-pro-quo deal between the Department of Justice and Eric Adams, Mayor of New York.  At least half a dozen federal prosecutors in New York and Washington resigned rather than approve DOJ’s dropping corruption charges against Adams.  Cotton, in his combative partisan mode, “wondered on social media where ‘the sanctimonious DOJ resignations’ were when Biden pardoned a number of his family members just before leaving the White House.”

 

There is much to say about Cotton’s response because it not only is typical of many Republicans’ rhetoric, but also shows the abandonment of anything like decent and respectful behavior which might be expected of someone touting his experience as an Army officer.

 

First, Cotton’s response says nothing about the alleged quid pro quo—a sign that this Harvard-trained lawyer avoids the difficult, if not impossible, task of defending DOJ’s action.  Second, instead, by characterizing these resignations as “sanctimonious,” he smears the motives of those acting out of professional integrity in adhering to standard prosecutorial practices.  His claim that the controversy is “’pure politics’” is of a piece with this smear.

 

Third, and most interesting, is Cotton’s wondering “where ‘the sanctimonious DOJ resignations’ were when Biden pardoned a number of his family members just before leaving the White House.”  There is no basis for Cotton’s comparison.  One, Adams’s arrangement was reversible and possibly temporary.  His charges were not dropped with prejudice, only suspended without prejudice.  In other words, as lawyers have pointed out, DOJ can refile the charges at its discretion and, as critics have alleged, for non-compliance with his promise to support Trump on immigration in the city.  Biden’s pardons are irreversible, permanent.  Two, the prosecutors were assigned to units dealing with corruption and integrity; presidential pardons do not fall within the scope of their responsibilities; they had no reason, professional or personal, to address them.  Third, Biden’s pardons gave no advantage to the President, raised no suspicions about a “deal,” and secured only the protection of family members (and others) from persecution by baseless prosecution insinuated or threatened by Trump and by Republicans hoping for political benefit.

 

Cotton was not having a bad day when he was quoted on this issue; the substance and style of the quotation were not a one-off, as I know from having attended to his political comments over many years.  I have never read or heard a kind or generous word from him about a politician of the opposite party.  He routinely deals in political smut of the kind which I have just analyzed.  Because of what I expect of a (former) military officer, I believe him to be the most despicable senator in that chamber.  Other senators are despicable—in particular, I think of Marsha Blackburn—, but most cannot be judged by military standards because they never served.

ELON MUSK IS ONE OF TWO THREATS TO NATIONAL SECURITY

      Dorothy Parker famously said, “If you want to know what God thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to.”  She foresaw Elon Musk.  His great wealth and the word of others testify that the world’s richest man is a brilliant businessman in high-technology enterprises.  His conduct as the First Buddy of President Trump and head of the spurious “Department of Government Efficiency” demonstrates that he is as great a fool as he is a mogul.  For Musk has mindlessly created a threat to national security. The story is an example of his incompetence.

Musk dispatched his youthful techies to the Department of Energy to eliminate waste, fraud, and abuse, so he claimed.  At some point, they encountered the name “National Nuclear Security Administration” on an organization chart or in a department budget.  The word “Administration” must have suggested a bloated bureaucracy to these presumptuous youngsters.  So, in the name of efficiency, they fired 300 NNSA employees of the nation’s steward of its nuclear arsenal.

 

I do not know about you, but if I were young again and came across the words “National,” “Nuclear,” and “Safety” in a government office building, I would have come to a screeching halt, asked myself how the hell I got here, and headed for the nearest exit.

 

At the present moment, the Department of Energy is having trouble rescinding its termination notice because those fired no longer have access to their workstations, and DOE does not have their personal phone numbers.  Officials are asking—“Please”: can you believe how humbled they are to have to use this word now?—anyone who knows their numbers to let them know that they are not longer terminated.  Preliminary results indicate that some will not return to work and some, though they will return to work, will seek employment elsewhere.

 

No matter how many of the 300 return, great damage has been done to this unit.  There is a loss of highly specialized expertise not easily replaced under any circumstances and less likely to be replaced in a callous work environment and with an insecure employment situation.  There are the delays and difficulties in getting security clearances, training new employees, and integrating them into operations—a process taking up to a year and a half.  There is the loss of morale.  There is the loss of trust in administrators.  Meanwhile, NNSA work is impeded and national security, impaired—none of these results lending themselves to efficient operations.

 

I take this incredible blunder personally.  As an independent consultant, I worked on two, high-level, classified, DOD/DOD studies of the management of nuclear weapons programs.  One was the “Starbird Study”; the other was a study by a “President’s Blue Ribbon Task Group.”  Both required TS and Q clearances, and a special access clearance, CNWDI (Critical Nuclear Weapon Design Information).  My task was editorial, not checking for serial commas and split infinitives, but ensuring the coordination and cogency of policy, program, and technical content.

 

After forty years, I have forgotten everything which I knew then.  Even if I remembered any of it, I know that all of it would now be outdated.  But what I learned about the people who work in this area gives the lie to those who disparage government workers, at least at administrative, managerial, and technical levels.  Their knowledge and skills are unmatched.  They are good at their work.  They are in demand outside government.  If they worked in the private sector, their compensation would be much, even multiples, greater than their government compensation.  The reasons for their government service are the professional challenge of their work and their belief that what they do makes a significant contribution to national security.

 

Musk and Trump know nothing about such expertise and commitment to the service of the country.  They conceive of government offices as job shops staffed by expendable or replaceable personnel and operating like call centers or automated production lines.  So Elon Musk, using the uninformed and the immature to make critical decisions about government services and budgets, is one threat to national security; Donald Trump, using Musk to direct them, is another.  Their ignorance and their arrogance in this and other areas of government make both of them threats to the welfare of the country.  They are the worst, and the worst are firing the best.

POLITICAL PONDERINGS LOCAL AND NATIONAL

 The Las Cruces Police Department Scorns City Councilor

The arrogance of the Las Cruces Police Department is exemplified by its failure to respond to repeated requests for information about the five SWAT vehicles for which the LCPD asked Council to seek state funding.

 

I made a mid-January request to Police Chief Jeremy Story for that information because I was concerned that those vehicles might be not only armored, but also armed for use in military-style attacks on homes or stores, with risks posed to people and property.  A reasonable question: will they go to the right address?  He did not provide that information; instead, he assured me that the requested vehicles were only for safe transportation of officers, not for assaults.

 

As I noted in a recent blog, I regard Story’s word as untrustworthy; withholding information which presumably would validate his word certainly seems suspicious.  So I asked Councilor Cassie McClure to request that information on my behalf.  She got the run-around.  One officer suggested that she contact another officer.  She did so and got no response.  At the same time, she asked both addressees to contact me about this information; neither did.  I wrote directly to both officers and have had no response.

 

Given my criticism of the LCPD, I imagine that it refuses to respond to these requests because they are mine or hers in my behalf.  Some readers might respond with the simple question, well, what did you expect?  To which, I have two answers.  One, I expect them to act as professionally as they hypocritically proclaim themselves to act.  After all, does not the “P” in the “P.R.I.D.E.” on LCPD patrol cars stand for professionalism?  Two, I expect pettiness and prejudice by LCPD officers, up to and including, the Police Chief.

 

I also imagine that the LCPD thinks no better of any Councilor who would make a request on my behalf.  Its discourtesy and unresponsiveness to McClure’s repeated requests register its scorn.  But I can also imagine that her requests were pro forma, and the LCPD knew it, as she has since gone silent.  Following in Kasandra Gandara’s footsteps might not be just a metaphor, for Kasandra operated the same way about LCPD’s false allegations of code violations.

 

 

Candidates’ Campaign Appeals Continue Unabated and Unimproved

 

Last year, I blew through my budgeted amount for campaign contributions to candidates for the presidency, and Senate and House seats.  I think that I got my first request for a congressional seat in early January, and other requests in text messages have continued to pour in.  My response to them all: “STOP.  I am tapped out from the last election.”

 

These solicitations do as many as three things which really irk me.  One, some do not give me the candidate’s full name, his or her (or their) party affiliation, or the jurisdiction in which he or she (or they?) are running.  Two, some give me a long biography, almost invariably a story of a log-cabin birth, of up-from-poverty, boot-strapping growth, and a life-long understanding of the down-trodden.  Some appeal to their military service (as if it proves something, but Joni Ernst’s self-touted military background failed her when pressured to support Pete Hegseth, whom she knew unfit to be Secretary of Defense).  Others appeal to their elite college or law school degrees (as if Congress works best with Ivy graduates, but no one claims Yalie J.D. Vance as a classmate).  And three, none states a commitment to a particular political philosophy or specific cause.  Yes, I am for world peace and harmony, civil and human rights, clean air and water, lowered thermometers, and a chicken in every pot.  But I have resolved to contribute to no candidates who rely on safe but skimpy slogans, only to those willing to stick his or her (or their) neck out for something.  If they stand for office, they should stand for something and say so.

 

Let me offer one suggestion: a radically reformed tax system which would reduce financial inequality and simplify tax preparation.  Suppose the tax system:

·      Taxed both income and wealth

·      Treated all income from whatever source the same

·      Assessed all non-income assets at end-of-year prevailing market valuations

·      Eliminated all personal and corporate credits and deductions except for state and local taxes, accredited charities, and accredited educational institutions

·      Allowed corporate credits and deductions for research and development

·      Graduated personal and corporate taxes on income and assets in ten or so brackets.

·      Simplified tax returns of three sections: income, wealth, and allowed deductions.

Benefits of this proposal, among others: no more government-sponsored tax favoritism, with attendant forms of corruption; no more tax lobbyists, with attendant forms of corruption; no more tax lawyers of the rich circumventing the tax code; lower house costs; shorter, simplified, and intelligible tax returns.

 

Let me offer another: terms limits on senators and representatives.  Establishing term limits for Congressional seats would require a Constitutional amendment, something akin to Mission Impossible.  But advocating term limits might be an advantageous campaign talking point and preparation for eventual adoption of the amendment.  The argument for is simple.  Without term limits, senators and representatives become careerists, with an overriding career imperative of re-election, with an overriding need to raise money for re-election, with an overriding interest in serving their biggest donors.  Senators facing a maximum of two terms and representatives facing a maximum of five terms are more likely to serve the public interest and accept political risks in supporting legislation for innovation or reform.

 

 

Trump and Republicans Are Defeating Themselves

 

Republicans always know the price of everything and the value of nothing.  This proclivity is nowhere more evident than in Musk’s and his muskrats' cleaver-wielding approach to the federal government in the name of efficiency.  Presumably, these techno-vandals are addressing waste, fraud, and abuse—oddly, without benefit of forensic accountants, among others—to reduce the size and expense of government and thereby save taxpayers billions, if not trillions, of dollars by eliminating entire agencies or depopulating those which they cannot eliminate.  Their reckless actions are more likely to promote incompetence and corruption than efficiency.  Some endanger national security (note the firing of personnel at the National Nuclear Security Administration, which maintains the safety and security of the U.S. nuclear stockpile.)  Even so, the metrics of government performance are not those of corporate performance—a distinction unknown to them.  For this reason, despite the rabid Republican rhetoric of aggressive, fact-free assertion, Musk and his muskrats have demonstrated no waste, no fraud, and no abuse.

 

By curtailing agencies and federal employees, they are also curtailing services which sectors of the economy and segments of the population want and expect.  (When I consulted to the Grace Commission forty years ago, its attacks on waste, fraud, and abuse were nothing but attacks on government programs which the Reagan administration opposed.  Same, same, today, with DOGE.)  When the economy and the electorate do not get what they want and expect from government because of unasked-for reductions or cuts, a powerful reaction will set in, and reality will reassert itself to the Republican ideologues who had dismissed it.  Widespread discontent will lead to the widespread electoral defeat and discrediting of the Republican Party.  Trump will have led lemming-like Republicans over the electoral precipice.  A restored law enforcement regime, recovering previously established norms and procedures, will pursue prosecution, yes, with a vengeance entirely warranted.  Prosecutors, juries, and judges are unlikely to be sparing of those who abused the government of, by, and for the people.

 

Meanwhile, instead of Plan B to fall back on, save the Republican Party as Plan A fails, and do the country some good, Trump will blame others for the damage of interrupted, deteriorated, or cancelled services which he has directed.  He will sideline Musk and fire Cabinet Secretaries and other senior officers.  He will defame them and others, including Republican senators and representatives who had humbled themselves in his service when he was riding high.  He will have no way to unring the bell, mend the broken china, reconstitute agencies and departments, and recruit the expert staff necessary to revive them.  Or to restore his bond with his supporters.  For his voters—not once, but twice, burnt—will blame Republicans up and down their tickets.  Trump, unable to run again, will leave office and suffer nothing more than a bruised ego and a ruined reputation.  He may even enjoy their humiliating, cringe-worthy efforts to explain away their lack of courage and conviction, their abandonment of Republican principles and values, and their traitorous retreat from democracy, the Constitution, and decency.

MY LAST NEW DOG: JEWEL IS A GEM

 [NOTE: Even I need a change of pace from my recent blogs.  I think that you do too.]

 

In the past two years, three of my dogs have “retired”: Cassio, my third “boss” dog; Brandon, my senior citizen; and Miranda, my “girlfriend.”  As I anticipated her retirement, I dreaded leaving Darcy, my “Holy Terrier,” without a canine companion.  So I went to the pound for a suitable friend.  The usual search elicits two kinds of reactions by the inmates: those who rush to the gate and bark to be chosen and those who rush to the gate and bark to protect their turf.  This day, one dog behaved rather strangely; she sat still and silent at the back of the cage.  The card for her said “shy”; that is pound talk for “abused.”  Since all of my nearly three dozen dogs (and cats) have been rescues, most of them have experienced abuse.  Nevertheless, this dog’s behavior was unusual by the standard of my other abused rescues.  I moved on.

 

I came to the pen of a non-descript dog, slender body, long legs, whippy tail, and yellow coat—the kind of dog who, in stories written by or set in the South, is known as a “yaller dog.”  I liked her looks, filled out the paperwork, paid the fees, and took her home.  I named her “Yaller.”  Now I am an ultra-rationalist probably because of my STEM background, but I have learned to trust my intuition, which, with my empathy, is part of my make-up as an animal whisperer.  So the question occurred to me as we drove home, is this dog a cat-killer.  The answer came almost as soon as we got home, by which time Yaller had bonded to me.  I always bring a new dog into the house on a leash.  When I walked with her out on the porch, CleoTwo, my feisty calico, attacked her and scared her so badly that she nearly pulled me over trying to get away from her.  Message sent and received.  The next day, still on a leash in the house, Yaller twice lunged at Damsel, my other cat.  Conclusion irrefutable, so the next day I took Yaller back to the pound (and recommended her as a pet for a family without cats).

 

I then took a second look at the strange dog.  Let me say at the outset, she is a beauty, probably a Shepsky, a blend part German Shepherd, part Husky.  I later named her “Jewel” because it took me very little time to realize that she was a gem.  But, in the meet-and-greet pen, she paid absolutely no attention to me—which also surprised me since most dogs recognize me for the friend who I am.  Again, my intuition kicked in, and I knew that this dog and I would work out just fine.  So home we went and bonded on the way.  Thirty hours later, we were walking together, she on a leash.  She saw a man at some distance approaching; the hair on her back went up, she began growling, she elevated her concern to barking—all to protect me.

 

 

But it was a strange bonding.  She liked me, but, as abused as I realized she had been, she did not trust me.  So it took several months of not scolding or punishing her for her accidents—I did have to scold and punish her a few times for chewing bedding and antique Indian rugs—before she caught on that I was a good guy after all.  But, as I say, she had bonded to me and liked me.  From the start, she got along with my other dogs—Maggie, “boss” and BOAT (best of all time), and Darcy—and my cats, CleoTwo and Damsel (CleoTwo’s approval mattering most).  She also showed herself to be the smartest, most expressively affectionate, and possibly most beautiful dog whom I have owned!  So, with Jewel and Maggie, I have the Beauty and the Best.

 

CIVILIAN POLICE OVERSIGHT COMMISSION: THE ONLY MEANS OF ACCOUNTABILITY

      Despite its officials’ talk about accountability, Las Cruces city government is incapable of accountability for the conduct of the Las Cruces Police Department.  City Council’s lack the conviction and courage, the City Manager’s indifference or timidity, and the Police Chief’s weakness allow no hope for police reform.  Without it, there will be no improved police work, not only no better routine services, but also no lower risks of harm and no lower settlements costs from excessive use of force, including police murders of citizens.

 

Police Chief Story’s remarks after the end of a recent trial of an LCPD officer raise the issue of police accountability.  The city government’s response to my long-standing, unresolved complaint bears on this issue.  Together, they demonstrate the need for an independent body to receive and assess complaints from Las Cruces citizens about police conduct.  They distrust the police—so testified then-Deputy Police Chief to City Council—and are dissatisfied that the LCPD responds to their complaints by ignoring them.  Given the LCPD’s resistance to reform on the one hand and to citizens and their complaints on the other hand, citizens need some forum encouraging them to air their grievances and to have hope for remediation.

 

The LCPD strategy when challenged in public is to tell stories.  According to a KFOX14 news report (21 Jan 2025) about the officer cleared in an excessive force case from 2022, LCPD Chief Jeremy Story stated, “When an officer makes a mistake, there is accountability.”  He went on to say, “Just as important, when an officer does their job, we will stand behind them all the way to the finish line.”  No one can be entirely clear from his telling whether a mistake-making officer is held accountable by the courts or by the LCPD.  My guess is that Story wants the public to think that the LCPD holds the officer accountable, and it is possible that it does.  The public must take his word on trust because the LCPD cannot discuss “personnel matters” in public.  However, in the context of the acquittal, it was the court which held the officer accountable.  A less contrived statement would have said simply that a verdict had been rendered and presumably justice served.

 

But Story has a tale too tell.  It is the same tale which LCPD police chiefs tell on all such occasions.  In 2020, after George Floyd’s murder, when the public was criticizing police everywhere, then-Deputy Police Chief Miguel Dominguez told City Council, “We make mistakes.  We will own up to our mistakes.”  Responding to his general invitation to contact the police, I did, and—surprise—I got no response, much less an owning up to multiple LCPD mistakes in my case.  So my experience is that the LCPD not only does not admit its mistakes, but goes to great lengths not to admit them.

 

My case occurred in a 5-year period just before Story took command, but, once he did, he had his chance to address and correct the consequences of those earlier mistakes but refused to do so.  Here is that story.  A year ago December, I met with him and showed him the documents which proved that Internal Affairs had found the five code violations alleged against me to be false but had failed to address them in response to my complaint.  As he reviewed them while I discussed them, he frowned and muttered that he saw things which he did not like.  Good show.  For, in the aftermath, he did nothing to correct my record.  When we met at a McClure town hall, I said that my file should be cleaned up, he lied that there was no file, and I promised to send him proof.  When I did so, he said that he would get back to me, but he never did, even after reminders..  No truth-telling; no promise-keeping.

 

So I am doubtful that Story, since he does not hold himself bound by the LCPD policy on honesty, would hold any LCPD mistake-maker accountable.  If he did, he would lose the support of his officers and their union, the City Manager, and City Council.  For at least three IA officers, two previous Police Chiefs, two City Managers, two Interim City Managers, and one City Attorney refused to take action to dismiss the allegations.  (An assistant city attorney resisted disclosing redactions in documents by lying to an Assistant New Mexico Attorney General about their contents; resistance ended when the AAG’s opinion upheld my IPRA complaint.)  Meanwhile, no City Council member from 2019 forward did one thing to support their dismissal.  When police conduct is an issue, constituent service is an alien concept to its members.  More generally, city government is ethically challenged in addressing proven LCPD misconduct.  Such a lapse does not bode well when the federal government threatens local elected officials and police officers with prosecutions for not obeying illegal dictates.  We can expect the LCPD, with a leader having no moral compass, only a political finger in the wind instead, to knuckle under.

 

Story has been sensible and suave in dealing with such near-crisis problems as stolen shopping carts, repeatedly broken windows, panhandling, and other low-intensity but persistent and publicly unpleasant misdemeanors.  His ideas about dealing with various kinds of perpetrators and various kinds and levels of offenses are not unreasonable; they are certainly superior to the string-‘em-up approach of some of his professional brethren and some politicians.  Council is content with his mellifluous, reassuring stories about efforts to reduce misdemeanor crimes.  But tested in a minor case which required an ethical response, he failed.  He has yet to be tested in a major case on his watch which involves excessive use of force or something which might cast shade on him, the LCPD, or the city.  The outlook is not promising.

 

My case, except for my persistence in pursuing it and exposing the rot in the LCPD, is not unusual.  The LCPD gives out other false citations for code violations, minor traffic infractions, and unpleasant encounters with citizens.  Few, if any, contest them, certainly not as I have done.  So they, their families, and their friends learn to distrust the police, and such distrust is widespread.  Dominguez admitted as much, yet no councilor wanted to expose LCPD’s hostile interactions with citizens by asking why LCPD officers were distrusted.  The situation remains so bad today that Councilor Johana—I support “real police reform”—Bencomo believes that improvement lies in minimizing police/citizen interactions.  Yet she and other Council members prattle about “community policing.”

 

Las Cruces officials’ resistance to a civilian police oversight commission is understandable.  Council Members, the City Manager, and the Police Chief know that it would expose the failures of the LCPD and its leaders.  It would expose the $75,000-per-year whitewashing by OIR, the infamous police auditor, as useless and wasteful.  Two years ago, its agent testified in all seriousness that citizen/police interactions were all good—because the police said they were; OIR interviewed exactly not one citizen involved in an interaction, good or bad, with the police.  Which fact points to another: the members of Council do not care any more than the police do about citizen opinion when it comes to the performance of the LCPD.

 

Which points to another fact: without a civilian police oversight commission, Council members can continue to impede public knowledge of the LCPD culture of incompetence and misconduct.  Such a commission, free from their efforts to repress public discussion, would give citizens a venue to address issues of police reform and public safety, issues which Council members desperately want to avoid.

AFTER INSURRECTION, MERCY IS FOLLY AND FORGIVENESS A MISTAKE

      On 9 April 1865, at Appomattox Courthouse, Robert E. Lee surrendered the Army of Northern Virginia to Ulysses S. Grant and the Union Army.  In an act of mercy, Grant permitted the Confederate troops to keep their sidearms and horses, which he knew they needed for spring plowing.  Although some of the political and military leaders of the Confederacy were tried, convicted, and briefly incarcerated, most officers and soldiers were never held accountable for their participation in a rebellion against the United States.  The prevailing thinking was that the nation would heal from the wounds of war by neither penalizing the states nor punishing the troops of the Confederacy.

It never did.  Reconstruction changed no one’s heart or mind about the equality of all men.  The Ku Klux Klan emerged under the leadership of Nathan Bedford Forrest, a renowned cavalry officer and an infamous one for ordering the murder of hundreds of Black soldiers after they had surrendered.  The Jesse-Younger Gang of former Confederate soldiers robbed banks and killed civilians, mostly “Yankee.”  The KKK revived in the early twentieth century, partly in response to the influx of millions of immigrants from southern and eastern Europe, partly in response to a hugely popular silent movie The Birth of a Nation.  From the end of the Civil War through the Civil Rights Movement, the myth of the “Lost Cause” romanticized Dixie and “The War between the States,” the southern name for the Civil War.

 

Thus, a century later, the whites who remained in the South and their descendants who migrated to the industrial upper Midwest or traveled the Oregon Trail to Idaho and the eastern regions of the Pacific northwest remained receptive to racist politics.  Arizona Senator Barry Goldwater represented them in his opposition to the Civil Rights Act (1964).  He prepared for the emergence of the new Republican Party, not the party of Lincoln which fought to end slavery, but the party of racism and other forms of bigotry under Nixon, Reagan, and Trump.

 

America faces not a geographically defined rebellion against the federal government, but a metastasized administrative-legal insurrection against it by Republican officials in the Executive Branch.  Whatever else may be said about them, these officials, from Trump and all Republican political appointees, are perverting, weakening, or destroying government programs or agencies without having secured the support of the American people and their representatives in Congress.  No one voted for Trump to withhold disaster assistance to states run by one party but not the other, shut down medical research or stop welfare benefits, or attempt to cancel a Constitutional provision of birthright citizenship—among others on a far longer and growing list.  No one voted for Senators and Representatives to ignore Trump’s violations of the law.  Trump’s reckless or lawless actions will continue as long as Republicans reject law and order, the Constitution, and democracy.

 

And until the American electorate finally rejects Republican government, especially the Trump-led, Executive Branch insurrection against the essentials of American government.  When the electorate turns against the Trump regime, Republicans will try to obscure their dereliction of duty and redeem themselves from charges of cowardice and collusion in the insurrection by saying they always disliked and distrusted the man, as if their private feelings excused their failures to fulfill their public obligations to serve the public.

 

Out of a misplaced belief in second chances or redemption, or a misguided sense of mercy, Democrats must not forget or forgive that Republican officials are no longer rational politicians, but deceitful and dedicated opponents of democracy.  For the immediate future, Democrats must do two things.  One, they must offer unceasing, unsparing criticism of the Trump administration for its misconduct and its mishandling of public affairs; and of Congressional Republicans for their cowardice and collusion in tolerating both—all to improve Democrats’ electoral chances in 2026 and 2028.  Two, they must prepare for and publicize how they would hold all Trump political appointees and their staff members accountable for their undemocratic, illegal, or unconstitutional actions.

 

For example, Trump illegally fired nearly two dozen Inspector Generals without first giving Congress the thirty-day notice and the detailed justification in each case as required by law.  Executive Branch officials—members of Trump’s staff, and officials and staff in Executive Branch departments or agencies—carried out those firings.  Every one of them should be prosecuted, with obedience to orders denied as a defense.  Convicted, every one should be sentenced to a minimum incarceration of a year and a day and be fined an amount equal to the highest one year’s gross adjusted income while in office.  Every one should be disqualified by law from receiving a commuted sentence, amnesty, or pardon; and lose any security clearance and be permanently barred from receiving another.  Every one should be permanently barred from federal or state employment or employment by a federal or state contractor; and barred from lobbying as an agent of foreign government, company, or NGO, or of a domestic company or NGO.  Every one should permanently lose the right to run for state or federal office and to vote in state or federal elections.  State governments should seek, and the federal government should support, the disbarment of every lawyer or paralegal involved in illegal actions.  The point: Every one who supported an insurrection, who violated or supported the violation of the law and the rule of law, in order to undermine or eliminate government policies, diminish or eliminate government programs, or weaken or terminate agencies, department, or other duly constituted government bodies should be punished for their actions, expelled from the franchise, and removed from direct or indirect government employment.

 

Such accountability is possible under Sections 3 and 5of the 14^th Amendment to the Constitution.  All that is required is that Democrats control the Presidency and both chambers of Congress or have veto-proof majorities in both chambers.  They can then legislate a definition of insurrection as deliberate administrative or legal actions by the country’s domestic enemies to violate the Constitution or otherwise corrupt democratic government, can prescribe for the courts the applicable punishments and penalties for such actions, and can authorize restrictions on future government or government-related employment.  Democrats should publicize their intent so that the possibility of such legislation might have a present deterrent effect.

 

A greater challenge will be presented by the federal court system and enforcement agencies.  Democrats entertain the naïve hope that the courts will act as guardrails to Trump’s illegal or unconstitutional executive orders, legislation, and administrative guidance.  But anticipatory compliance with authoritarians extends to courts.  Corruption and cowardice of the Supreme Court will trickle down to federal appellate and district courts.  With lifetime appointments, federal judges at all levels are protected from prosecution and immune to pressures.  Public reaction to their outrageous conduct or their outrageous decisions has already shown itself insufficient to reform their conduct or reconsider their decisions.  Impeachment in any case is difficult; multiple impeachments impossible.  Legislation to enlarge the courts is possible; so, too, term limits.  Despite the Constitutional requirement for lifetime terms, the political desire for shorter terms—18 is the common suggestion—can be satisfied by enacting a minimum age for appointment.  If it were set at 65, appointees would have a long record for the Senate to consider and a life expectancy of about 19 years (18 for men, 20 for women).

 

A little-remarked danger is that the Executive Branch can simply choose to ignore any unfavorable ruling—Trump has admired President’s Jackson’s remark “John Marshall [then SCOTUS Chief Justice] has made his decision, now let him enforce it.”  Of course, if Trump were to do so, Congress could impeach him.  As for enforcement agencies or personnel, whether federal, state, or local, many are already corrupted by the grant of judicial privilege; their histories of unaccountable, if not uncontrolled, power; and the swagger of military tactics and weaponry.  How to bring them under the rule of law is an imponderable.

 

The use of the military to enforce the law except in a few, rare situations is forbidden by law.  Every soldier in any unit involved in suppressing a bona fide political demonstration should be dishonorably discharged and otherwise held accountable as appropriate.  Military personnel directly or indirectly involved in injuries to or the deaths of civilians in such a demonstration should be held accountable under civilian, not military, law for their criminal acts.  All military personnel know or should be presumed to know that disobedience to an illegal command is not insubordination or punishable under military law.

 

Even if such accountability leads to anti-insurrectionist reforms, the battle for democracy will continue and democracy will remain at risk.  The deification of Robert E. Lee, a traitor to his country, focused Confederate sentiments and established him as a symbol for the “Lost Cause.”  Likewise, Trump will be deified and serve as a unifying symbol for MAGA loyalists.  Just as Confederate renegades operated after the end of the Civil War, so the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, and other groups of their ilk will continue to promote the antidemocratic causes which their deified leader endorsed.  Sympathetic police—many strongly conservative, violence prone, and trigger-happy—will support or stand by these latter-day Brown Shirt bully boys.  Further assaults upon democracy and the Constitution are likely.

 

Bottom line: Those who wish to protect democracy and constitutional law must remain vigilant and vigorous in their defense against the virus presently represented by Trump, Republican officeholders, and MAGA supporters.  Just as viruses mutate, the Republican Party might mutate into a new political organization with a different name but with the same stench.  As the Republican challenge to democracy is never-ending, so, Democrats, in the political equivalent of playing whack-a-mole, must whack each and every Republican for each and every egregious word and deed, without forgiveness or mercy.

THE TRUE COSTS AND CONSEQUENCES OF THOSE $20,000,000 CITY BONDS

      I revisit the subject of my previous blog because City Council members and the media bandy about the settlement cost of $20M, and, as a result, the public does not know that Council’s recently passed Ordinance 3089 allows the city to issue settlement bonds which will incur additional interest costs ranging from $10M (5% interest) to $30M (10% interest).  In other numbers, the city’s borrowing will add 50% to 150% in costs to the settlement cost.  So LCPD officer Felipe Hernandez’s killing of Teresa Gomez might cost Las Cruces as much as $50M.

I cannot be precise about the interest rate for two reasons.  One, the bonds have not been put out for sale.  Two, City Manager Ikani Taumoepeau’s staff, probably at his direction, does not want me to know; it refuses to provide those estimates which Council should and might have had in deciding to sell bonds to cover the settlement.  The likely motive for refusing me this information: neither the aggregate amount nor the 20-year payment period would likely be politically popular.

 

Council had two options for paying off the $20M settlement.  The one which it adopted is the sale of bonds.  Thus, Ordinance 3089 specifies limits: no more than $21M face value ($1M for administrative costs), no more than 10% interest, and no more than 20 years.  The effect is that the current City Council imposes repayment costs on future Councils for 20 years, with their budgets for services or projects reduced or taxpayers’ bills increased to fund annual repayments.

 

Some people might liken mortgage or capital improvement payments to these settlement bond payments.  But there is a big difference between them.  Payees of mortgage or capital improvement bonds enjoy the benefits of the houses or roads, bridges, or buildings during the lifetime of the bonds.  The public enjoys no benefit during the 20-year repayment period.

 

The other option is paying off the settlement in current funds.  City Council could have directed the City Manager to make one-time deferments or cuts in services and projects to find $20M, or 3.4%, in the city budget of $596.6M.  These relatively modest adjustments would thus avoid $10M to $30M in interest payments.

 

The question is who benefits from the choice of options.  Obviously, the public does not benefit from the first option (bond debt), but City Council members do.  They avoid the political cost of approving cuts in services and projects.  They also avoid the question of responsibility for their refusal to undertake police reform of any kind over the past 4 years, which might have prevented Officer Hernandez from killing Srta. Gomez in the first place and on their watch.

 

In short, Ordinance 3089 reflects City Council members’ self-serving political decision to prevent accountability from public dissatisfaction with reduced services or projects during their term in office.  The interest costs of deferred payments are a lot to pay for their political comfort.

 

Could and would City Council members ever do the right thing in this matter, they should revoke Ordinance 3089, approve a revised budget deferring or cutting funds for some services or projects amounting to $20,000,000, and impose all costs and consequences on the current Council, not on future councils.  Otherwise, citizens might want to reconsider their support for those who voted for Ordinance 3089, shifted most settlement costs and schedules to others, and skipped out on their responsibilities.

CITY COUNCIL WANTS COSTLY BONDS AND IPRA LIMITS TO PAY FOR OR COVER UP POLICE MISCONDUCT

       On 2 December, Lucas Herndon of District 2 pointed out to the Las Cruces City Council that New Mexico is known nationally and internationally as the most dangerous state in the country for police killings of civilians.  [Albuquerque and Las Cruces have roughly similar ratios of annual police killings, about one per 100,000 civilians.]  His questions about what Council means by public safety were general ones, with some addressing overall funding for public safety and of settlements for LCPD killings. 

My 26 November blog, “Las Cruces Cannot Afford This City Council,” stated the costs of three killings: in 2020, Antonio Valenzuela, $6,500,000; in 2022, Amelia Baca, $2,750,000; and in 2023, Teresa Gomez, $20,000,000, the largest in the city’s and probably in the state’s history.  I noted Council’s condolences for the Gomez family and wondered whether Council would feel similarly about all future victims of cop-killings and compensate similarly all victims’ families.

 

We are now learning City Council’s means to finance the Gomez settlement.  It has just passed Ordinance 3089, which authorizes municipal gross receipts tax revenue bonds not to exceed $21 million face value, 10% interest, or 20 years to settle with the Gomez estate.  Before the vote, Mayor Pro Tem and District 4 Councilor, Johana Bencomo opined that “If a $20 million settlement doesn’t shake us out of this place, I’m not sure what will.”

 

Bencomo’s opinion is morally obscene.  The Valenzuela and Baca killings did not “shake” Bencomo to pursue what she said that she wanted two years ago, namely, “real police reform” (emphasis hers).  The Gomez killing did.  The difference: the earlier killings involved only seven-figure settlements; the later one involved an eight-figure settlement.  What “shakes” Bencomo is the cost of the settlements, not the cost in lost lives; in other words, she would have been “unshaken” and tolerated more police killings if the costs of settlements were not too high.  So much for her professed concerns about human lives, public safety, and police reform.

 

Not only has City Council been compelled to pay a settlement far larger than “condolences” would suggest, but it has also adopted an unwise means to finance it.  Whatever may have been discussed in executive session in agreeing to this settlement, it is unlikely that Council members considered any of the following three important questions which have consequential answers; they certainly did not mention or discuss them in the 6 January public meeting when they passed Ordinance 3089 without comment.

 

(1)  What are the estimated full or cumulative costs—principal and interest—over the 20-year lifetime of the $21 million in revenue bonds at different interest rates?

 

(2)  Why is a direct payment from the current budget, despite necessary cuts in selected budget items, not a preferable because less expensive way to achieve the same end?

 

(3)  Why should the costs of this settlement extend beyond the terms of office of the members of the City Council on whose watch the killing or the settlement occurred?

 

The failure of Council Members to consider these questions raises a fourth: why did they not ask and answer them?  Here are some possible reasons.  To (1), Council members probably want to hide the total cost of the bonds, which ranges between $31 million (at 5%) and $50 million (at 10%)—so much more than the stated $21 million face value that the public might object.  To (2), they probably do not want to go to the trouble or to incur the political pain of selecting budget items for cuts, despite the additional cost of $10 to $29 million by using bonds.  To (3), they thus hope to avoid accountability at the ballot box by spreading the costs to many who had nothing to do with their fecklessness.  These reasons might sway the public to belatedly oppose Ordinance 3089; they should also embarrass Council members enough to induce them to reconsider it.  It is not too late for Council to do the right thing, even if it means loss of face and some real work.

 

This issue reflects the refusal of City Council to set policies which might lead to “real police reform.”  Instead, Council members want to conceal police misconduct which might (finally) arouse the citizens of Las Cruces to demand reform.  The first step in that effort is to support restrictions on access to the information about police misconduct, especially killings of citizens.

 

Thus, after City Council lost an Inspection of Public Records Act (IPRA) case costing Las Cruces about $150,000, City Clerk Christine Rivera, who committed IPRA violations and was a losing defendant, wants restrictions on IPRA requests.  Her argument at the 12 November Council working session is that her staff is overburdened by growing numbers of IPRA requests.  Many of them are resource-consuming IPRA requests for police camera footage, which require considerable effort and time to review and, if necessary, redact it.  After my IPRA request led to the release of footage showing LCPD Officer Jared Cosper killing Sra. Amelia Baca, many citizens were shocked by how some officers operate and raised questions about LCPD leadership and training—obviously, not matters which Council or the LCPD want discussed in public.

 

Any limits on IPRA requests curtail what the public can know about government operations.  There are two ways to limit requests.  One way is to limit access: create administrative hurdles or exempt certain categories of public records.  State law defines the exceptions to IPRA requests.  It exempts categories—among others, personal records, business decisions, attorney-client privilege—necessary to protect sensitive data.  Exempting other categories would run counter to the purpose of IPRA because doing so would give government the right to decide which of its operations the public can know about—a clear conflict of interest. 

 

The other way is to limit access by requiring citizens to pay fees to fulfill IPRA requests.  Rivera’s recommendation is that City Council urge the State to amend the law to permit such fees.  The problem is that they would be discriminatory, differentiating between those with discretionary funds from those without them.  They would operate like a poll tax on public records, which are the legal property of the public without regard to economic status.

 

The odd thing about the City Clerk’s argument is that, when citizens demand more services, City Council usually responds by providing them.  The obvious counter-argument is that the city should allocate additional resources to accommodate them.  But something so sensible is alien to the Las Cruces city government’s arrogant desire for secrecy, as if it knows best and does better without the involvement of the citizens who elect or support them.