Mo Rage: The Kansas City Star

Showing posts with label The Kansas City Star. Show all posts

Monday, August 17, 2020

On Trump Trying to Dismantle the USPS--and Likely Our Democracy. And Nation

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So here is what's going on with this many-layered situation. First this.

USPS Removes Mailboxes

Followed, also, amazingly, by this.

Postal Service plans to remove 671 high-volume mail processing machines

An internal US Postal Service document obtained by NBC News reveals plans to remove 671 high-volume mail processing machines from postal facilities across the country. The document, circulated in June, is broken out by region and city/state.

Heck, our own Kansas City Star reported it did, in fact, happen here locally.

Postal Services removes mail machines in Kansas, Missouri

Can you imagine working for the Postal Service, walking in and seeing the mail sorting machine gone? Where does that happen? In what industry do they REMOVE automating equipment? Anywhere?

Then this came from the Orange Man's mouth himself.

Trump Admits He’s Trying To Stop Mail-In Voting With USPS Sabotage

Trump admitted that he is trying to stop mail-in votes from being counted with USPS sabotage during a Thursday Fox Business interview.

Once again, this President shows he wasn't/isn't smart enough, bright enough to even keep his mouth closed, keep quiet about his plans, nefarious and blatant as they are.

With all that, this is where we are now.

House Oversight Committee calls for 'urgent' hearing with Postmaster General

The House Oversight Committee is calling for Postmaster General Louis DeJoy to testify at an "urgent" congressional hearing later this month amid growing concerns about whether cost-cutting measures will leave the U.S. Postal Service (USPS) ill-equipped to handle a rise in mail-in voting.

It seems the Trump's Postmaster General may have some significant conflicts of interest.

Amid political controversy, postmaster general's stock holdings come under renewed scrutiny

USPS head Louis DeJoy reportedly owns millions of stock in mail processor

With this President trying to under-fund or de-fund the Postal Service and the House Democrats planning to have the Postmaster General this coming week, here are some things I'd like to ask the head of the Postal Service, that Postmaster General, just now:

Do you deny that 671 mail sorter machines--or some number--have been ordered out of our postal service facilities across the nation?
Why are they being taken out?
How does taking mail sorting machines out make any sense at any time but especially now when we need the postal service and all you do for this most killing pandemic in over 100 years?
Why are post office mailboxes being carted away?
How can anyone think this isn't to keep people from voting this Fall?
Can you testify now, under oath, that you own no other investments that have to do with mailing or shipping of any sort in our nation?
Can you testify here under oath that you would in no way benefit from having our United States Postal Service ceasing to exist?
Can you testify here, now, under oath that it is not now nor will be in the future your goal or the goal of your boss, this current President, to end the existence of the United States Postal Service?

I hope someone asks them.

This, however, is how and where it gets difficult.

What Really Scares Voting Experts About the Postal Service

No matter what Trump says, the USPS has the money and the capacity to handle a huge surge in mail-in ballots. But new restrictions could disrupt the election.

President Donald Trump and his allies might well succeed in undermining the United States Postal Service’s ability to handle an expected surge in mail-in ballots this fall. But the biggest immediate threat to voting by mail isn’t blocked funding.

Trump acknowledged yesterday that he opposes a major stimulus deal with Democrats in part because he wants to stop an infusion of $25 billion to the Postal Service ahead of the election. “They need that money in order for the Post Office to work, to take in these millions and millions of ballots,” Trump said in an interview with Fox Business’s Maria Bartiromo. But the president doesn’t want more voting by mail, and he doesn’t want the Postal Service to have any more money to help with it. “If we don’t make a deal, that means they don’t get the money. That means they can’t have universal mail-in voting. That means they can’t have it.”

Democrats see the president’s comments as slam-dunk evidence of what they have been charging for weeks: that Trump is sabotaging the November election by purposely degrading the ostensibly independent Postal Service. They have assailed the appointment as postmaster general of a Trump donor, Louis DeJoy, who has moved rapidly to reorganize the Postal Service’s leadership and institute cost-cutting measures that have already resulted in slower mail delivery. Those service changes, rather than the congressional fight over funding, are what alarm advocates for mail-in voting the most. At stake is nothing less than the integrity of the election itself, which to a large degree rests on whether tens of millions of ballots can get into mailboxes and then back to their precincts in time to count.

Keeping in mind this, overall, from our own Constitution.

8 U.S. Code § 1701.Obstruction of mails generally

Whoever knowingly and willfully obstructs or retards the passage of the mail, or any carrier or conveyance carrying the mail, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than six months, or both.

(June 25, 1948, ch. 645, 62 Stat. 778; Pub. L. 103–322, title XXXIII, § 330016(1)(B), Sept. 13, 1994, 108 Stat. 2146.)

I would never have thought a President, even this one, would attack and try to dismantle, destroy our Postal Service.

Unreal where we are.

Then this President said this.

Trump says it could take 'months' or 'years' to know election results

Have we become, are we already some Third World banana republic backwater?

Are we going to tolerate this?

I'm sure as Hell not if I can do anything about it.

First, we can't respond to a pandemic---but all other nations can---and now this?

Oh, Hell no.

Once again, one more time, thanks, Republicans.

Friday, June 19, 2020

Wyandotte County, Keeping That Task Force on Police and Community Relations White--and Ineffective?--As Can Be

I can really hardly believe what I've seen and read. Check out this article from the Star last week.

Wyandotte County DA is left out of law enforcement task force seeking ‘objective’ view

A bit of the article:

A task force on police and community relations in Wyandotte County will include the sheriff, the Kansas City, Kansas, police chief, and the mayor of the Unified Government.

But it will not include the Wyandotte County district attorney.

Mark Dupree, who has clashed with police and pushed for reforms since he was elected in 2017 as the state’s first black district attorney, was left off the list of members announced Monday.

In a statement to The Star, the office of David Alvey, the Mayor and CEO of the Unified Government of Wyandotte County and Kansas City, Kansas, said the task force will be charged with gathering community input and passing that input on to local officials. The members will not be making recommendations for change based on that input.

The group, the statement said, is intended to be an “objective panel” — a consideration that contributed to Alvey’s decision not to include Dupree.

“The intent was to allow the district attorney to remain independent, providing inputs and recommendation as part of the task force’s future public forum process, actually ‘presenting’ before and to the task force and offering his perspective and insight as it moves forward.”

But wait. It gets better...

The mayor’s office did not immediately respond to questions regarding what criteria was used to determine whether a task force member was objective and whether any of the chosen members have a history of advocacy.

So the "White Guy In Charge" decides that the local DA, the local District Attorney, shouldn't be included in a task force on police and community relations in light of the street murder of a black American citizen, George Floyd, and consequent calls for police reform in and across the nation.

Even though this very District Attorney has been loudly and publicly calling for that very reform in his job for the last 3 years.

Right. Got it.

Seriously Mayor Alvey, Wyandotte County, Kansas City, Kansas---can you hear yourselves?

And check this out. this is how this was all announced, days before the above article.

KCK mayor announces task force to help improve relations between community and police

Let me say again, this Mayor announces a "task force" to "improve relations between community and police" but his first task on this force he created is to throw out the very qualified black guy who has been calling for this for years?

You can't make this stuff up.

Another thing to see from the article:

A woman in the crowd asked why no young black men were on the task force. The mayor said they aren’t trying to exclude anyone.

To which they should have added, "Well, except the one black District Attorney in town who's been calling for change for years. We ARE trying to exclude him, for sure."

How much more blatantly racist and exclusionary can we all get and be, folks? Incredible.

At least, thank goodness, the kindly Mayor did allow, in fact, for Unified Government Commissioner Harold Johnson, who is black, to be on the committee. Thank goodness for that, anyway. How good of him.

Interim Kansas City, Kansas, Police Chief Michael York is on the committee. A white guy.

Fortunately, too The Rev. Tony Carter Jr. of Salem Missionary Baptist Church, a black man, they let him in on the committee, too, thankfully.

Other members of the task force:

Donnelly College student Yareli Castor-- a young woman of color. Apparently they think she'll be "safe"
Randy Lopez of the Wyandotte Health Foundation-- not a white guy, thankfully, and not ancient, either
Donnelly College President Monsignor Stuart Swetland-- White guy. Very white. (On the side, someone please tell me what an elderly white Monsignor knows about young black guys being pulled over by police. Please. I'm all ears}.
Wyandotte County Sheriff Don Ash-- And closing, of course, with a white guy. Another very, very white guy. And a member of a police force, in effect. Because he's not going to be subjective or defensive of his force, right, Mayor Alvey?? Right?? I'm just glad we wont' have anyone on this task force that is nothing but "objective." (Are you freaking kidding me??)

But let the local District Attorney in on this committee to examine relations between the police and the community? The guy who's been clamoring for change for years?

And as the young woman in the audience that day asked, not one younger black man on the task force? Not one? What? They didn't want his input? His "subjectivity"? Excuse me but I thought that's what a community task force was for. That is, to get people's input. You know, THEIR OPINIONS? THEIR EXPERIENCES??

Added to this, I haven't seen or read anything critical about this task force at all. Not in the Star, not in the younger people's media like The Pitch--which doesn't really get widespread readership anyway, rather sadly. Certainly not on the vacuous, local evening news.

Nah....

Don't ask the DA in town. He's a black guy.

He won't be "objective" about it. His, the Mayor's words, reportedly.

He may have an opinion.

Isn't having an opinion on a task force a good thing? Isn't that what this is all about? Or supposed to be?

This doesn't look like an attempt to fix or change anything as much as it does to maintain the status quo.

Systemic, institutional racism, anyone? Everyone?

Are you freaking kidding me, Mayor Alvey?

Are you kidding us? All of us?

This is going to stand?

Thursday, June 4, 2020

On Institutionalized Racism: Now, Two Things Kansas City Can and Should Do

Given the killing of George Floyd and the consequent race protests across the nation and world, now would be an excellent time for Kansas City to make a couple more changes. Sure, it's been announced the local police are finally going to have and wear cameras on them all the time and that's a great change but here are two more we should make.

First, as Steve Kraske so well and rightly said some time ago, we need to rename the JC Nichols Fountain.

Steve Kraske: Kansas City should confront racist past and rename J.C. Nichols fountain

JC Nichols was a publicly known racist. He's one of the biggest reasons the city was and still is, to this day, so racially segregated and separated. Mr. Kraske did a great job of calling it out at the time, thankfully. Unfortunately, that was 3 years ago and nothing has yet been done. It's incredibly ironic that these racial protests are taking place around the fountain named after him and at the shopping center he created.

Then, next, the second thing we should do, as a city, is to finally, at long last, take down the Andrew Jackson statue downtown. There is no bigger or worst, known racist than Andrew Jackson, former President or no.

Andrew Jackson, President, Patriot, War Hero, Racist

Andrew Jackson was a slaver,

ethnic cleanser, and tyrant

The 11 Most Racist U.S. Presidents

Andrew Jackson Racist Quotes

The state and Governor of Virginia are doing it, so should we.

Virginia governor announces removal of

Robert E. Lee statue

Philadelphia, too, removed a statue of racist former Mayor Frank Rizzo.

Philadelphia removes statue

of controversial former mayor

Birmingham, too, did the right thing and removed a statue. This was 2 days ago.

Birmingham Mayor Orders Removal

of Confederate Monument

This was announced late today.

Kentucky governor: Jefferson Davis statue should be moved

To be clear and complete, too, we should take down this Andrew Jackson statue downtown and melt it down, not put it anywhere else.

It's time, Kansas City. It's time. In fact, it's long, long past time.

Let's do this.

Let's change both.

Additinal links:

Steve Kraske: I’m still talking about J.C. Nichols, racism and renaming the fountain

Kraske: Rename Plaza Fountain Because Racism

Quote of the Day -- Prescient, Local Version

Great statement from the protest locally I heard on the evening news. It was said by a speaker at the protest this past Sunday, I believe, by one of the organizers, on the Plaza:

"This isn't black against white.

This is people against racism."

Sunday, April 5, 2020

Check Out This Chart From the New York Times Today on this virus

Check out this enclosed chart showing your percentage probability you'll/we'll contract the virus given the known cases already found in a county. Very eye-opening. From today's NYT.

Known cases in a county	Probability of community transmission
0	9%
1	51%
2	70%
3	79%
4	84%
5	85%
10	95%
20	99%
43 or more	100%

By The New York Times·Source: Emily Javan, Spencer Fox and Lauren Ancel Meyers, the University of Texas at Austin

To better see the chart and for the article from which it comes:

Does My County Have an Epidemic?

To put the above chart in perspective, Wyandotte County presently reports 137 cases. Johnson County, 183 cases, according to the Kansas City Star. More from the Star:

According to state data at least 135 cases have been confirmed in Jackson County and at least 172 have been confirmed in Kansas City.

Apply those totals from our local counties to this chart above and see what conclusions you come to.

So yes, let's take this stay at home idea and order seriously. It doesn't last forever. Stay positive. It's Spring.

Be careful out there, y'all. Be safe. Get a mask if you haven't got one already?

And stay home.

Sources:

Missouri reports 178 new cases of coronavirus, at least 24 total deaths statewide

Coronavirus in Kansas City: Confirmed cases of COVID-19 climb in Missouri, Kansas

Sunday, March 10, 2019

Another Plea to All Local Media--On This Mayoral Race

The topic is Kansas City Mayor.

The election for a new one, after Sly James terms, is coming up, of course, April 2. Weeks away.

All I personally know is that there are at least several people running for the position. This is most of them, I understand

Image result for kansas city mayor candidates 2019

I've seen a few names. I've gotten some mail from a few but really, I've no idea who's running, who they are, what they stand for or what they say they will stand and work for.

I know Clay Chastain threw his proverbial hat in the ring. That's all I need to know about him.

And Jolie Justus. I know she's running and from where she's coming, mostly, since she's been around the area for some time.

I did a cursory Google search today and found this, thankfully, from our local NPR station, KCUR:

Here's Who's Running For Mayor Of Kansas City, Missouri

But if you go there, you'll see they are extremely brief descriptions of the candidates, of one small paragraph. That's it. It is also, brief as it is, the most complete description of these candidates I've been able to find. That's sad.

I don't think our Star newspaper has run articles on all the candidates yet. I don't see every daily paper but I do check in regularly.

There are a couple more links on the interwebs, from national sources:

Mayoral election in Kansas City, Missouri (2019) - Ballotpedia

According to that link, above, there are officially 11 candidates in the race. Six of those candidates are currently on the City Council. Three are on the Council for their first terms--Alissia Canady, Jolie Justus and Quinton Lucas. Two are second-term candidates--Jermaine Reed and Scott Taylor while Scott Wagner is currently Mayor Pro Tem.

2019 Kansas City mayoral election - Wikipedia

The Star did run this piece:

Newcomers to 2019 KC mayoral race most active fundraisers

This is helpful, of course, but it more tells of their fundraising than anything, of course. It's important, sure, but still doesn't tell what they stand for and say they're going to work for in the office. It is also an extremely brief article. If that tells us anything, it's that the one candidate, City Council member and candidate Scott Taylor has the most money behind him and by a long shot. (This may make him the defacto winner. We'll see, of course). Another interesting thing coming from that article is that it doesn't even mention Clay Chastain.

Finally, Flatland KC ran this online article.

What You Need to Know About KC's Mayoral Election

It gives the most perfunctory information, with links to the candidates own websites so again, it's up to you, the reader and voter to chase down any and all information.

So my question. Is any news media out there--KCUR, KCPT, the Star, Mike Shanin and his program "Ruckus", Steve Kraske and his, anyone, anyone doing any in-depth interviews and research on these people and who they are and where they come from and what they stand for and what they say they'll work for as mayor?

I surely hope there is. If someone's seen or heard something, please let me know. I want and need to know, before the election, just as we all do here in the area.

It's coming down to election time. We need to know.

With the Star having famously/infamously and recently slashed its staff, it seems unlikely we'll now get this kind of article and coverage, however important.

Seems like the perfect program for KCPT, doesn't it? "Meet the Candidates"?

KCPT? Thoughts?

Link:

Meanwhilere's the scary part. The honestly, deeply scary part.

As Newspapers Close, Role of Government Watchdog Disappears

Monday, February 11, 2019

What Is It With Republicans Undoing Voters', Constituents' Expressed Wishes?

Time and again both in Missouri and across the nation, Republicans have been shown to be working to undo things their constituents already voted on. It's happening right now, right here in Missouri.

Defying voters, Missouri House Passes ‘Radical Undermining’ of Open Records Law

Missouri Legislators Trying to Change Open Records Law; Critics Say They Are Gutting It

We Missourians all voted to have more openness in our government and to know what's going on in it. Those pesky Republicans want nothing to do with it so they're working to undo our vote.

There is, fortunately, just one little problem with their trying to undo the voters' will, at least this time.

Lawmakers rush to undo ‘Clean Missouri’ Open Records Reform.

That’s Unconstitutional

But it's not just here in Missouri. Republicans in other states, too, have, time and again, gone against their own constituents, gone against the will of the people, the popular vote, people be damned.

This is from last month.

Missouri's GOP Governor is Trying to Block Voter-Approved Limits on lobbyists, gerrymandering

This is happening now, too.

Utah Republicans Poised to Undo Voter-Approved Medicaid Expansion

We know they want to do the will of their already-wealthy sponsors/donors--owners?--and corporations that give them big campaign money but go against our own stated will? Go against the people?

How long are we going to put up with this, folks?

How long are we going to tolerate this?

Link:

Get the Big, Ugly Money Out of Our Election System and Government

Monday, January 7, 2019

Heads Up, Kansas City!!

Don't look now, folks, but guess who was back in town---and says he's running for political office?

First this--I apologize for the blurry photos but that, ladies and gentlemen of Kansas City, is one Clay Chastain.

You remember Clay, right?

The guy who has all the answers for our fair city?

Even though he lives, most of the time in--where is it? Virginia?

Anyway, seems he was not only back in town this weekend, this is him outside the Brookside Price Chopper grocery, and he was saying he's running for political office, yessiree, Bob.

So don't think we have, you have seen or heard the last of Mr. Clay "I Know What This City Needs" Chastain.

It's my hope that, if he's actually serious about running for city political office for us again, that someone in the media like Steve Kraske on KCUR or someone down at the the Star or the Pitch or Mike Shanin at KCPT's "Ruckus" or someone, somewhere interviews the man. We need to know just what he's planning. Or working on.

If he's serious about running for office, and I'm sure he is, he needs to get the word out and we need to hear it.

However misguided and/or foolhardy.

Sunday, January 14, 2018

Republicans? Really??

Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, right, points to Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, left, during a rally in the Hoosier State. (Photo: Reuters)

Think about this.

Locally, on the state level, and on the national level, what do Republican government representatives get us?

Let me give you some very recent examples. We have to look no farther than neighbor Kansas for some real beauties, to start.

In 2012, very Right Wing, "conservative" and Republican Governor Sam Brownback and his Republican Party statehouse members slashed taxes for the state for the already-wealthy and corporations. The results are now famous and disastrous.

The GOP Tried Trump-Style Tax Cuts

in Kansas. What a Mess

Kansas' tax cuts are a spectacular failure

Kansas's ravaged economy a cautionary tale

Kansas taxpayer debt far outpaces

surrounding states

Kansas Confronts Yet Another Budget Crisis

Kansas faces $74.5 million budget shortfall

amid school funding fight

Plan to fix Kansas budget through school cuts

implodes in state

Study: Kansas cuts K-12 education funding

by fourth-most in nation

S&P drops Kansas credit rating,

citing lack of cash reserves

S&P revises Kansas rating outlook

to negative on budget pressures

I could post yet more but it would be overkill.

Then there's what the current Republican President and his Republican Party allies recently, infamously did in Congress with their very similar tax cuts for the, again, already-wealthy and corporations.