Monthly Archives: April 2025

Some more State level elections took place today yesterday, for those who try to predict the future. Over in Wisconsin, a seat on the Wisconsin Supreme Court was up for grabs, and WaPo projects a victory for the liberal candidate:

In a state as evenly split as Wisconsin, it’ll be tempting to read the tea leaves into confirmation bias.

Republicans may discuss, if only in private conversation, how this election was not in the context of a larger election. Only those with a special interest in it might attend. Wisconsin has a population of six million, though, so attendance of, guessing here, maybe two million 2.3 million is not a bad turnout; this point may be invalid.

Democrats may be excited if margins hold, but, truth be told, given the disaster in Washington and in State capital Madison, where the Wisconsin Republican Party has made an absolute joke out of itself, I think Democrats should have expected better results.

They may have to commit to self-examination, to listening tours, to understand why they didn’t absolutely cream the conservative candidate, Mr. Schimel. No offense to Mr. Schimel, but those who have associated themselves with him cast a pall over him.

Meanwhile, in Florida two special elections for US House seats took place in Republican-controlled districts, and were won by the Republicans, but a writer on Daily Kos points out that victory margins are going to have shrunk, considerably.

But it still looks like a definitive loss to me.

All that said, Rep Elise Stefanik (R-NY), who had been nominated for UN Ambassador, is no longer the nominee. Speculation has it that the Trump Administration worried that the race to replace her in the House would result in a Democratic win and decided not to risk it, and the cited link more or less officially confirms it. This suggests that the Republican epistemic bubble of old is leaking, that telling themselves they’re popular isn’t entirely working.

And I figure Rep Stefanik inadvertently dodged a bullet. It’s not hard for the President to fire a diplomat, but it’s well-nigh impossible to fire a member of Congress. Given the President’s misogyny and Stefanik’s former moderate positions, it’s not hard seeing it as a maneuver to put a man in her current seat.

Erick Erickson tries for that profound observation, but I think it’s hollow:

But the larger issue is that we as a people have abdicated our responsibility of taking care of the poor to the federal government. Instead of sending kids on “mission trips” to picture-perfect beaches in third-world countries, perhaps we’d be better off if they took a shift at the local soup kitchen or volunteered at the local homeless shelter. When Jesus references the poor, he undeniably puts the burden of support on me and you, not the federal government.

The problem? He’s bought into a long-time propaganda point of those who’d prefer to have more influence over there community and will obscure important points to get there. What is that? Let me state it as a negation of the propaganda point.

The federal government is us.

That’s the delight and glory of the United States of America. In monarchies and autocracies, government is thrust upon the populace by force, whether that force be exogenous or endogenous. I’ll leave the question of theocracies to the reader.

But not only do we pick our leaders, we can be those leaders. If we’re a citizen, we can put ourselves forth as candidates for positions from little town council member to President. For those who bang away with hammers and wedges to alienate the people from the very government we select, I say Cease! To demand the government change its goals, despite your opinion being a minority, is to not understand how our way of life works.

Are we subject to limitations when it comes to that participation? Of course; logistics demands it. But that doesn’t mean we, individually, cannot be part of the government.

So when Mr Erickson says feeding the desperately hungry is not the federal government’s responsibility, he’s ignoring one of the most important and fundamental truths of our Constitution, as well as a practical matter of feeding folks so we don’t have food riots.

We, not them, but emphatically we are the federal government. If you win an election with the purpose of stopping food bank support, you’re against Jesus. Says the agnostic.