Just Lower The Flags

Look, I'm just going to say it, because someone who lives in this county should: just lower the flags. I don't know what it is about Progressives, but something just unhinges their brains in moments like these and they choose to pick fights over the stupidest fucking shit. This, this is the hill you're going to die on? You're going to defy an unpopular Governor who is not running for re-election? I'm stunned at the bravery on display. I marvel at the profiles in political courage it must have taken to decide to chase some Progressive internet clout in a moment that demands, if nothing else, basic human decency.

Do I have a very high opinion of our county board of supervisors? Not really. But I am disappointed in Jon Green. Progressive though he was, he struck me as a dude who had his head screwed on straighter than most of the rest of the local Progressives, and it turns out, I was wrong. He's exactly as myopic and clout-chasing and small-minded as all the rest of them. The Reddit Constituency is thrilled by this, obviously, and that's the problem: so much of Progressive politics in this country is driven by The Reddit Constituency, and as a result, Progressive politicians spend far more time chasing upvotes than doing something actually worthwhile for their local communities.

I want every elected official in this county to please, please, for the love of tap-dancing Jesus Christ, take a goddamn minute and think about the things they do over the course of the next year. Is it possible to play 'error-free ball'? Probably not. But we are the county they are going to point to. We are going to be grist for their Ruby Red MAGA-loving flour Mill, and we shouldn't make it so easy for them. 

There are times when you need to stand by your principles. When the school district received guidance over the summer that they could, in fact, reinstate gender identity protections to their anti-bullying and harassment policies, they didn't hesitate; they slapped them right back in there. If this were that, I would have no problem with taking a stand. Clear and obvious principles and rights are at stake? Sure, thumb your noses at the current hot mess we've been saddled with in Des Moines. You won't hear a peep out of me.

This isn't that. This is cheap clout-chasing with no appreciable gain. I don't mind picking fights. I don't mind a little clout-chasing and pandering, because politicians are going to be politicians after all. I mind when it's picking a stupid fight, which is going to make the other ninety-eight counties in this state go 'what the fuck, dude' at a time when maybe, just maybe, there might be the faintest of breezes stirring behind the sails of statewide Democrats. I know people love hearing, 'now is not the time,' and I won't say that. I'll say this instead: If you're going to pick a fight, pick a fight worth having and a fight worth winning. This isn't one of those.

You wouldn't know it, because here I am writing a blog post, but I'm stepping back (or at least trying to) from social media a bit. Facebook came off my phone screen this week. A few others followed suit, and if I can Twitter-detox for a while, I think it will be better for my mental health. Twitter is an open sewer, even more so than usual, and also: when did we, as a country, decide that mainstreaming 9/11 Trutherism was okay? When the fuck did that happen, because other than Trump's face at the Memorial this week, every other piece of 9/11 content I've seen has been from accounts with names like ILLUMINATIBOT or some shit like that. It's gross.

The grossness of this week just multiplies the further you dig: we all saw a snuff film, a man getting assassinated live and in living color, and it got dumped into our feeds whether we liked it or not. Did I agree with anything Charlie Kirk believed in? No, I didn't. But what I do know is that nobody should get shot in the neck for engaging in public debate in the United States of America. 

I'm not going to celebrate the death of a human being who was splashed all over the internet. I'm not going to join the gleeful cancel mobs that got legions of people fired from their jobs over the past few days. I'm not going to join in the chorus of whataboutism, because that's not how you change things. That's not how you progress. Getting your rumpled suit all in a wad because the Governor didn't lower the flags for the last god-awful act of violence we had to live through is not progress. It's not cute. It's not progressive. It's just a shitty thing to do.

Regular people, who aren't online all the time and keep score about these things, barely notice the flags being at half-staff on a good day.

Maybe- and crazy notion that this is, but stay with me here, maybe the Board of Supervisors could turn to the pressing matter of the crumbling facility that is the Johnson County Jail. Maybe they should explain to taxpayers in this county why we spend upwards of $16 million every single fucking year shipping our inmates to other counties (thus contributing to the carceral state local Progressives rail about) instead of building a new goddamn jail. 

Do I want to build a new jail? No. It's like a mammogram, a prostate exam, or a visit to your local proctologist. It's not particularly pleasant. You probably won't have fun doing it, but every few decades, when your jail is literally falling down, you have to build a new one. That's just how this works. I'm not saying we need to build a fucking Supermax. But we need to build something. 

And I know it's hard for local townies to grasp, but the jail roster is freely available on the internet. Don't listen to the politicians. Fuck, don't listen to me. Go look up the jail roster, see what everybody is in jail for currently, and then ask yourself: Should these people be in jail? Because I assure you, whatever bullshit flies around Reddit about how local popo only go after shoplifters and pot smokers and 'victimless crimes' is just that: bullshit. Go read the list and then ask yourself, should we just let these people out? Should we be paying a premium to house them in other counties? Should we be punishing their families and loved ones and impacting the legal defence that they are allowed by right by forcing lawyers and loved ones to travel to those counties?  

I would love it if the Board of Supervisors would pull its head out of its ass and address all of these things. I would love that, if for no other reason than once we build a new jail, we take that not-at-all insignificant amount of money we're spending on sending folks elsewhere and reinvest it into our county. Wouldn't that be great? Wouldn't that be lovely? Even if you have to take a slice of that to maintain a new facility, it wouldn't take all of it, surely.

Right now, in Iowa, state revenue is dropping like a rock. If we don't break the Republican Trifecta or at least eat into in a major way, I have no idea how we're going to function as a state. We're entering a profound economic crisis in the farm sector. Rural hospitals are under threat from Republicans and their Big Beautiful Bill. Statewide, we've seen a voucher program that is hoovering unaccountable, obscene amounts of money away from our schools. We've seen trans folks lose civil rights protections. But sure, this is the fight we should be having right now.

Just lower the damn flags, already.