Each year I get two advertising calendars: one for the garage, and one for my writing desk. This year the garage calendar is from the car dealership where we bought and service our Chevy Spark. The other is from the grocery store in town. They each serve a useful purpose while I work. Putting them in place represents the beginning of another new year.
The political climate in Iowa had me delaying plans until after the election. It is time to begin filling those calendars with hope.
Among activities planned is writing, reading, exercise and generally supporting our personal and financial well-being. There is a budget to be managed, work to maintain the physical structure of our home, and another year of yard work and gardening. The garage calendar will prove to be handy in this.
My recent posts here indicate my intellectual interests. I feel lucky to have avoided any illness which might impair intellectual capacity. I hope to keep it that way.
Now commences a review of 2022 and a course correction for the time ahead. In coming weeks, I’ll review my reading, my autobiographical and other writing, social activity, and my health. Indoors time is best for this. I’m not quite ready to begin, yet soon will be.
Repair, maintenance and improvement of the house will be a function of available resources and prioritized needs. Over the coming years we need to make sure our home is suitable for aging and the physical plant is maintained at the ready.
Today meteorologists expect snow to stick. Ambient temperatures are forecast around freezing with continuous snowfall until 6 p.m. We’ll get an inch or two. I would like a couple dry, warm days to run the mower again and make more garden mulch. With the crazy weather we have been having, that’s not out of the question in mid-November. I’ll be okay if I have to wait until spring. Blank calendars are in place.
This morning I got out a clean pair of blue jeans and put them on. I’d been wearing the last pair since election day and it was time to get them laundered.
I keep a few pair of “nice” jeans, which means they have no known defects, fit well, and are suitable for outings into society. Currently, these are Levi’s brand, although it varied through the years. To avoid constantly laundering them, I wear nice jeans a few days around the house after an excursion. There are three pair of nice jeans in the closet.
Jeans that fit loosely and have been damaged or have holes worn in them are used when I’m working outdoors or in the garage. These are “garden” jeans. They get pretty dirty from kneeling on the ground and are usually good to wear for several days before laundering. Mostly these came from my time before the pandemic when I wore them to work at the home, farm and auto supply store. I don’t mind if these jeans wear out or get damaged on a tool or fence post. When they get unwearable, I launder them and recycle the denim.
Jeans between nice and garden are those deteriorated enough from being nice and are suitable to wear around the house. This everyday use doesn’t have a special name, yet most of my jeans fall in this category. They take the workload off the nice jeans and eventually will be converted to garden use. I purchased a pair or two of these when we lived in Indiana in the early 1990s. Good jeans last a long time.
One conversation I had with Father was about “work” clothes compared to clothes worn around the house. He felt his best clothing should be worn to drive forklift in the meat packing plant, with inferior or damaged garments used at home. He was trying to get out of the packing plant to become a chiropractor and believed his appearance in public mattered. He died wearing his work clothes while driving a forklift into an elevator. Having driven a forklift in the same packing plant after he died, the work didn’t seem too public, warranting the best clothing. His discussions about it likely led me to my present organization of blue jeans.
Now that the midterms are over it is time to get to work. I spent the days after the election hanging around the house, reading, writing and cooking. I want to say I was thinking about the election yet that’s not accurate. It was more like recovering from the losses. On Sunday I didn’t leave the house at all.
It’s time to turn the page and get to work. For that, a clean pair of jeans is just what we need to get started.
Books acquired at Ron’s Memorial Book Sale at the Solon Public Library.
What does a person do with 1,800 books after the owner dies? If one supports our local library, they have a book sale and donate the proceeds to Friends of the Solon Public Library. That’s what my friend Pat did after her husband Ron died just before the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 a pandemic in 2020.
While visiting Pat after COVID-19 had been normalized in Iowa, she offered me what books I wanted. I took one, and said I would just wait until the sale to buy more. Sometimes a person has to show up.
Besides sating my immediate reading wants and perceived needs, the sale was a chance to catch up with people in the community. The people I knew had retired or were scaling back to part time work. Our community has a small yet devoted group of readers and will show up for a book sale.
A younger me would have brought home a lot of books. Instead, I made a free will donation for these seven. I hope to read them all, likely beginning with Pat Conroy’s memoir. It will not be the same as having a conversation with Ron, who was not only well-read but could talk intelligently about almost any topic. Reading Ron’s books is no substitute for those conversations, yet that is where we are.
Iowa is among the least educated states in the country. Those of us outside academia who pursue intellectual interests get to know each other and support our public library. In our community of several thousand people there are not many of us. When someone dies, or experiences a stroke, dementia, or Alzheimer’s Disease it is a substantial loss. We are of an age when that possibility is tangible.
The first snow fell in small flakes as I left for the sale. It continued while I was browsing books, and until I arrived home. Winter has not arrived, just a reminder of it. For me that means hunkering down in the warmth of our home to read and write until spring. Those of us who remain must go on living. That’s what I plan to do.
Big Grove Precinct polling place at the Catholic Church.
Computers for the poll workers were set up below a large crucifix on the wall of Saint Mary’s Church. It was as if Jesus and I (the certified Democratic poll watcher) were keeping an eye on the proceedings. There was no controversy during election day activities. From news accounts, that appears to have been true across the state. When issues arose, the election system addressed them. It was a statewide Republican sweep, with a few exceptions, and that was that.
756 voters cast a ballot under Jesus’ watchful eye. As was expected, more Republicans cast a ballot at the polls on election day with Chuck Grassley receiving 478 votes and challenger Michael Franken 274 in our room. (In my previous post I tallied the main results). Voters have spoken, and that, too, is that.
Father worked as an organizer on the 1960 election of John F. Kennedy. I watched him complete mimeographed sheets with a generic grid for our block printed on it. He recorded the names and voting preferences for each property. When he finished our block, he got a clean sheet from the union hall to start another. Richard Nixon won Iowa that cycle.
I remember us discussing living in a Republican state with a Democratic president. It was a non-issue because we were part of a country that had 50 states after Alaska and Hawaii had been admitted to the union the previous year. JFK was our president, too, he said.
I didn’t understand in 1960, and don’t understand now, how voters could pick candidates that don’t hold similar values and would vote against their best interests. Maybe people have been dumbed down. Iowa is not known for having a lot of deep thinkers. According to a recent article by Samuel Stebbins, Iowa ranks among the least educated states. That has to be part of it yet is not the whole story.
Iowans are conditioned to accept a wide range of outrageous things and such socialization or indoctrination is a key reason for Iowa Republican successes this election cycle. How they got there goes back to the rise of right wing talk radio and FOX. The socialized modern Republican is a primary cause of the infection of social discourse. It feeds upon itself. More liberal people either don’t want to engage in this discourse or don’t have to. Living in a progressive or liberal bubble isn’t good either.
Toward the end of election day, some Republicans hung around the entrance to the polling place. I listened to them chatting after they voted. Most were not aware of any framework, just that their peers can carry on a certain conversation with which they agree. Politics was hardly mentioned even though there we were at the polling place. The subject of conversation did not matter as much as the fact of it. This behavior, of setting existential reality aside to focus on something else, is essential to Republican dominance in modern society.
As film maker Jen Senko pointed out in her book and movie, The Brainwashing of My Dad, this conditioning is reversible if we know how to do it. For my part, I don’t enjoy getting into conversations where participants recount what happened last night while they were getting ready for sleep with the television tuned to FOX News. If we are serious about changing society for the better, people like me don’t need to consume right wing talk radio and television. However, we have to enter into more of these types of conversations. In doing so we become part of the community. I believe our differences will be tolerated in civil conversations and that is better than not being heard at all.
There is a lot to say about the 2022 midterms. There is nothing else to say. I’m moving on to more productive ground as this plot needs to lie fallow for a while. We’ll see what tomorrow brings.
Seeds went on sale at Johnny’s Selected Seeds and I placed a typical fall vegetable seed order. The cost savings were important, although I’m more anxious to get started with next year’s garden. I labeled packets with the gardening year of their intended use and filed them away. Apparently I decided to grow a lot of Romaine lettuce and got 1,000 pelleted Monte Carlo seeds.
Wednesday was a punk day with negative feedback from the election coming in via all media.
The preliminary results for Big Grove Township are that Republicans swept all the top races. Voter turnout in both parties was much less than in 2020. Chuck Grassley beat Michael Franken 563-473; Mariannette Miller-Meeks beat Christina Bohannan 565-473; Kim Reynolds beat Deidre DeJear 570-434; Dawn Driscoll beat Kevin Kinney 529-503; and Brad Sherman beat Elle Wyant 574-442.
In the county supervisor race, votes were split among five candidates as follows: Phil Hemingway – 580, Jammie Bradshaw – 537; Jon Green – 422; V. Fixmer-Oraiz – 351; and Erick Heick – 34.
Public Measure 1, adding language about Second Amendment rights to the Iowa Constitution, was approved here 562-436.
County-wide, Democrats won all of these races except House District 91, and Public Measure 1 failed.
The best result of the last few days was receiving my first order of garden seeds. Politics has been a disappointment the last few years. I plan to stick to gardening in 2023.
Lunar Eclipse on Nov. 8, 2022 taken with my mobile device.
Election day began with a total lunar eclipse at 4:16 a.m. I’ll refrain from obvious puns and wise-cracks. This election should be serious business.
Before the polls open, I’m not hopeful of turnout. Democratic early voting in our county is running behind the results in 2018 and 2020. According to former county party chair Brian Flaherty, Democrats need to turn out voters on election day at 128 percent of what we did in the 2018 gubernatorial race. Based my Sunday door knocks, too many people are blowing off this year’s election, making achievement of that election-day turnout goal more difficult. Mine was a small sample of voters, so maybe the broader trend is different. It is young, married people on my list — millennials and Gen-Z — who are not planning to vote.
This cycle my engagement with the campaigns changed. I found a home with the Kevin Kinney campaign because unlike the two decades of previous contests, the race to represent our precinct in the Iowa Senate was highly competitive. It is one of the most expensive political campaigns for a statehouse seat in the state. It seems clear the Democrat is the better candidate and the campaign is knocking doors until there are no more to knock. They also have a paid campaign manager, which makes a big difference in accessibility, professionalism, and flexibility. In the past, I aligned with the House candidate for campaign activities. This cycle our candidate, Elle Wyant, is running a less conventional campaign, which made it a bit difficult to plug in. The usual political activists in Big Grove did what they could to support her. We remain optimistic that Kinney can win his race. We should know tonight, although it will likely be close.
I began writing political letters to the editor about our congresswoman Mariannette Miller-Meeks in March 2021 after Rita Hart withdrew her election contest. My letters have been regular until my final one appeared last Thursday. I have written on topics other than the congressional race, yet the focus after the nominating period has been on electing Christina Bohannan to the Congress. In every political poll, Republican Mariannette Miller-Meeks held the lead. This race will be determined by turnout. Bohannan’s name recognition has not been good on the doors, even among people who said they plan to vote for Democrats. The only poll that matters is the one today after the polls close.
Other things I did during the campaign include attending the Iowa County central committee meetings, donating what I could afford to candidates, placing campaign signs at home and in our area, discussing the ballot with friends and family, attending a couple of events, and holding one event at the library. I was more active than I thought I would be.
The eclipse is ongoing as I hit the publish button and head upstairs to shower. I signed up as a poll watcher after no one else in our precinct did. It is going to be a long day. I’m hoping for a quiet day in which I can get a lot of reading done. To conserve battery life, I’ll keep my mobile device mostly turned off.
If you are reading this and haven’t voted, the polls are open Nov. 8 until 8 p.m. in Iowa: go vote.
Setting aside Thursday’s dozens of requests to help canvass, donate and generally do my part to help Democrats before Tuesday’s midterm election, I tuned into CSPAN to listen to part of the 45th president’s speech in Sioux City. Oh My God!
He doesn’t drink alcohol, yet his speech was slurred and difficult to understand. Perhaps he is on medication. He claimed to have teleprompters yet the stream of consciousness patter was more than a person could take for long. I listened for fifteen minutes then turned it off.
Promoters had trouble getting rid of all the tickets, according to news sources. There were no crowd shots on CSPAN yet the bleachers behind the speaker were not filled to capacity. The participants seemed restless, which distracted from the speech. Preparing for the camera view is basic event organizing, so event execution was not the best.
Republican Party of Iowa chair Jeff Kaufmann opened the event. His voice was hoarse from public speaking and difficult to understand. He welcomed the ex-president with enthusiasm and denounced news media outlets with opinion sections. He has changed since I met him in 2011. We used to be able to have reasonable conversations, but I don’t know in the post-Trump era. On hand for the event were Iowa governor Kim Reynolds, U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley, businessman Mike Lindell and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, along with other Republicans. Like all CSPAN videos, this one is archived online.
One had to be deep into Republican culture to understand some of the speech. I picked up the Hunter Biden laptop reference which is totemic in their culture. Much of what I heard was an airing of grievances by someone whose post-presidency period has turned him into the complainer in chief of the Republican Party.
Many of us believe the 2022 midterm election will determine the fate of our democracy now and for years to come. Based on yesterday’s rally, things could turn fascist if Republicans win majorities in the U.S. Congress. Radio commentator Thom Hartmann had some thoughts about this.
“American democracy is under attack because the defeated former president of the United States refuses to accept the results of the 2020 election,” President Biden told the nation (on Wednesday). “He refuses to accept the will of the people, he refuses to accept the fact that he lost.”
I wrote about this six months ago, and it’s time to talk again about what an American fascist government would look like. Because over the next two weeks we may — depending on how these elections turn out and how Trump’s followers react to the outcomes — very rapidly slide into a state-by-state form of fascism much like the old Confederacy.
Like the old Confederacy, it will feature political violence and threats of violence, rigged elections, and single-party rule combined with a corrupt oligarchy that finances the politicians.
And, just like the old Confederacy, it will reach out and try to destroy the historic democracy of the United States of America, only this time in 2024 and the two years leading up to it.
The word “fascism” gets thrown around a lot, but most Americans have no idea what it would look like or how it would actually play out.
[…]
First, and essential to American fascism, Republicans envision a strong-man Leader who will hold power for as long as he (it’s almost always a “he”) chooses, with the transition to the next Leader determined by The Leader himself.
Email Newsletter from Thom Hartmann, Nov. 3, 2022.
Despite the unsettling nature of the speech and the common refrains about fascism in the United States, I slept through last night. If we are turning into a fascist country, self-care will be important to our survival. I’m going to do something on the last weekend to help Democrats win races on Tuesday. I don’t relish the inclement weather forecast, yet I expect to spend some time in it. A lot depends on our participation this weekend.
Painting on the front of Lebowski’s Rock n’ Bowl, Washington, Iowa
Lebowski’s Rock n’ Bowl in Washington, Iowa seemed an unlikely location for a political forum, yet that’s where the local chamber of commerce held the only match up this cycle between State Senator Kevin Kinney and State Senator Dawn Driscoll. Candidates from House District 92, Eileen Beran and Heather Hora, also participated.
I live in the northern part of State Senate District 46 and it was an hour drive to the forum. I picked up a long-time political cohort who lives across the lake, so we had a good conversation on the way down. I had been to Washington a couple of previous times to attend district conventions.
Democrats held a rally on the sidewalk outside Lebowski’s. When Kinney arrived, we all entered the building together and took seats. Governor Kim Reynolds was to bring her state-wide bus tour for a pre-forum rally, yet there were permitting issues that prevented it. When the forum was finished, her bus was parked across the street from the bowling alley waiting to drive north to the next stop in Williamsburg.
The venue was expansive including a large room with a stage for bands, a dance floor, and framed posters of bands that had played there. I didn’t drink anything, yet having a bar at a political event had to have been a nice bonus for the proprietor and a boon to participants. The moderator from the chamber of commerce mentioned we were welcome to stay and participate in dance lessons after the forum. Line dancing and two-step were offered.
It is a late in the cycle for a forum. Democrats have a propensity to vote early and many of those I knew who were present had already done so. Republicans tend to vote on election day at the polls. Seven days from the election is not a lot of time to disseminate information from the forum to voters not present or viewing online.
Both the Democratic and Republican parties are spending more on this senate race than on any other election in the state. George Shillcock posted an article about this in today’s Iowa City Press Citizen. I had a couple of takeaways from the forum.
Kinney and Beran provided real answers to audience questions. Driscoll and Hora parroted talking points that even I know because they and other Republicans repeat them so much. Hora literally read her answers from a piece of paper held up in front of her. Driscoll also appeared to read from prepared remarks in her answers to questions.
Each candidate was asked to which political party they belonged and what it meant to them. Hora’s answer demonstrated how today’s Republican party is devoid of original thought. Hora mentioned her memory of Reagan’s election (when she was age 10) and her positive feelings about his policy. She mentioned part of her political education was listening to Rush Limbaugh. I have written previously about the influence of right-wing talk radio in our society, yet to have a candidate cite Limbaugh as an influence at a public forum was a new one. What Hora didn’t mention was the 45th president. On the road leading to town, her large barn sign displayed next to a larger pro-Trump sign tells that story. Driscoll’s barn sign was also adjacent to the ex-president’s sign. These candidates, and the Republican Party of Iowa, are close to and seemingly subservient to him.
At Lebowski’s I heard Kevin Kinney mentioning to a man wearing a Hora t-shirt that all his grain was in the bin. As we drove back to Big Grove Township there was corn standing in the fields along with tractors, combines and grain wagons. This political cycle is almost over. Forums like this inform us of how much work remains to regain Democratic majorities in the Iowa legislature. It will be an uphill climb for Democrats to gain relevance in Iowa again unless we win a few races. Senate District 46 is an essential one to win.
Senate District 46 and House District 92 chamber of commerce forum in Washington, Iowa, Nov. 1, 2022.
Locals were in their yards dealing with the fallen leaves of deciduous trees. In that peculiar American way they worked autonomously. Each had their own way of handling a natural occurrence. One family makes an annual event of piling leaves high then zip lining into them. Others piled and burned them. Some ground them up with a mower and let them remain. One family bagged them. People like me ground and used leaves as garden mulch. It was a typical autumn afternoon as I went political canvassing in the area.
For the people on my door-knocking list the election was over. A few feigned indecision yet I doubt it. More than half had already voted. The electorate has picked sides and there were few questions for a random canvasser on a Sunday afternoon. The main thing I communicated was the polling place had moved this year from the public library to the Catholic Church. For the many who voted early, that may not matter. It was good to be out with people.
Last night was Halloween beggars night and I had about 30 children and parents. The weather was mild and I left the front door open for the two hours. I bought a bag of candy for treats from the wholesale club. More than half was left at the end of the night. I’m glad to see children and their parents doing something together in our neighborhood.
Golf carts of Halloween central.
I picked more kale and chard in the garden. The color is now deep green after a few nights of frost. Under the weeds I saw a few chive plants. The plot with greens turned into a bit of a weedy mess this year yet there was an abundant harvest.
According to my device I spent 2 hours, 45 minutes chatting on the telephone. Nothing urgent. Just catching up with friends and family. Such phone use is unusual for me. While the weather was perfect, it was a punk day for working outdoors, so the phone calls filled the time. That’s where I am in life.
One of my political stops was a man I’ve known almost since we moved here. If door-knocking is supposed to be efficient, this stop wasn’t as we caught up on what is going on in the community. He lives alone because his spouse is now living at the care center. I didn’t want to rush things and the conversation took many turns. It was good to get caught up.
The plan is to work outside for a couple of hours, getting the yard and garden ready for winter. If snow fell today, I would be satisfied with where things are. We live in a climate, yet it is the people who make life worth living. I enjoy my slice of humanity these autumn days.
One day after Elon Musk acquired Twitter I protected my tweets. For the uninitiated, that means only people who follow me can see them. I cut back on posting as well.
Two days afterward, I opened this can of coffee and chicory to make a pot. The coffee reminds me of a trip to New Orleans where I had some with beignets at the French Market Cafe du Monde. After Katrina, it reminds me of the peril of living close to the mouth of the Mississippi River. Happy times a plenty, yet the brass band is always on standby for a funeral procession. Today is a Saturday tinged with sadness for more important reasons than who owns Twitter.
I began blogging in 2007 and created a writing process that includes blogging and social media. Twitter has become an important medium for my writing as 12 percent of my blog views this year came from their website. The 63,000 tweets I’ve written since joining in 2008 have taken time and thoughtful consideration. The years have been a process of learning how to write in public. I summarized it in a note to Donald Kaul’s last publisher after he had a heart attack.
How oligarchs and big money impact social media was in the background until now. After Musk’s acquisition of Twitter, the process to which I referred in this note needs re-engineering. It needs distancing from social media. My writing needs protection from the vicissitudes of oligarchs. It means breaking the comfort of patterns developed over many years. That period began specifically on Nov. 10, 2007 with my first blog post. The new period has arrived as I take up my autobiography again this fall. Let’s say it began on Oct. 27, 2022.
What about the friendships developed on Twitter? A few in my circle are unique to Twitter. I know and have had social relationships outside the platform with more than half of the 177 people I follow. I would miss those interactions, even if from time to time they make me mad. They are the strongest case for preserving my Twitter account. I may yet do that, but not before the post-acquisition period plays out.
There are complications. I’m reading Alice Wong’s memoir Year of the Tiger: An Activist’s Life. Wong has muscular dystrophy and despite being disabled by it has written an eye-opening book, which I recommend. In it she writes how Twitter enables disabled persons to participate in social activism in a way they couldn’t if it didn’t exist. We should be building people up, not tearing them down. If Musk and his investors are unsuccessful in producing the amount of revenue he wants from the platform through ownership, that could lead to something terrible regarding the disabled community. The complications are complex when we consider how many users exist and the many things it means in their lives.
I’ve been encouraged to wait the transition out. I’m in no hurry to go dark on Twitter yet accept that as a possible outcome. In the meanwhile, I’ll post less and lurk, waiting to see what happens. I have plenty of writing and reading to do offline.
Journey Home 
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