Thoughts on the Midterm Election
Among the biggest midterm election news is that deep red Missouri overwhelmingly approved the most liberal (Proposition 2) of three medical marijuana propositions, the other two failed (Prop 3 & Prop C). All 3 were described in a Sunday Poll in late September. In 2019 we’ll see rules for growers & dispensaries. A year from now we should see storefronts fill up as dispensaries occupy them.
Missouri voters also approved a new redistricting plan with campaign limits (Proposition 1). The state’s minimum wage will now increase gradually to $12/hour by 2023. A gradual fuel tax increase failed (Prop D).
St. Louis County voters approved all propositions:
- 1 (donation limits to candidates for county executive or council)
- 2 (County council can hire their own attorney separate from the county counselor, who is appointed by the county executive)
- B (County council more budgetary power)
- C (Require specific County financial information be placed online)
- D (Establishing a commission to examine revising county charter)
- F (A casino-backed smoking change)
- Z (one-eighth of 1 percent sales tax for the Zoo)
St. Charles County passed their first smoke-free law, with exemptions.
Claire McCaskill lost her bid for a 3rd term in the US Senate. Though I voted blue, I know she wouldn’t have won a 2nd term in 2012 had Todd Aikn not mentioned “legitimate rape.” This was a gift she didn’t receive this year. As I watched her ads about being right in the middle I hated that I had to fill in bubble next to her name.
The middle is a point equidistant from two poles. That’s it. There is nothing inherently virtuous about being neither here nor there. Buried in this is a false equivalency of ideas, what you might call the “good people on both sides” phenomenon. When we revisit our shameful past, ask yourself, Where was the middle? Rather than chattel slavery, perhaps we could agree on a nice program of indentured servitude? Instead of subjecting Japanese-American citizens to indefinite detention during WW II, what if we had agreed to give them actual sentences and perhaps provided a receipt for them to reclaim their things when they were released? What is halfway between moral and immoral?
When we revisit our shameful past, ask yourself, Where was the middle?
The search for the middle is rooted in conflict avoidance and denial. For many Americans it is painful to understand that there are citizens of our community who are deeply racist, sexist, homophobic and xenophobic. Certainly, they reason, this current moment is somehow a complicated misunderstanding. Perhaps there is some way to look at this–a view from the middle–that would allow us to communicate and realize that our national identity is the tie that will bind us comfortably, and with a bow. The headlines that lament a “divided” America suggest that the fact that we can’t all get along is more significant than the issues over which we are sparring. (Time)
If Democrats want to win in Missouri they need to stop trying to be GOP Lite.
— Steve Patterson