Posted inPhoenix

Superiority complex

Judging from the comments on the previous post, readers were interested in hearing more about my appearance with former Arizona Republic Editorial Page Editor Keven Ann Willey toward the tail end of KJZZ's Here and Now on Wednesday. It's a measure of the true grit and journalistic integrity of host Steve Goldstein that he has me on his show every year or so. I can only imagine the pushback he gets from the Kooks (so tell his bosses if you like hearing me). But, yes, there's more to be said.

Of course, good people are working hard for Arizona, from the activists behind Save Arizona and the campaign to recall the odious Russell Pearce, to grassroots leaders such as Becky Daggett in Flagstaff and Kimber Lanning in Phoenix, to hard-fighting state Sen. Kyrsten Sinema at the capitol. They are part of the Resistance. But they are losing. Arizona has become dominated by the worst kind of public and private craziness. Things have degenerated badly since Willey decamped for the Dallas Morning News in 2002 and even since I was kicked out of the state in 2007. Yes, she's in Texas, a very red state, but it's also a place with the kind of robust economy, opposition, vigorous media (e.g. Texas Monthly) and truly diverse cities (e.g. blue Austin) that are all lacking in Arizona. Dallas just opened a new 28-mile segment of its 72-mile light-rail system, just one thing that's unimaginable in Arizona. Its red-state Texas-sized braggadocio about conservative governance has run up against one of the worst state fiscal crises in America.

So with all due respect to my friend and former Palmcroft resident Keven, she doesn't know Arizona now. When Evan Mecham was governor, he was eased out of office by the business leadership because he was a national embarrassment. Now the business leadership is gone or hiding or compromised, and worse-and-dumber people than Mecham keep rising in power. Internally, at least, Arizona is rewarded for extremism. Also, as an editorial-page editor, she's paid to temporize. As a columnist, I'm paid, or not, to break china and throw down idols in the name of the truth. As for Arizona, the rocks come with the farm, so quit complaining about being badly treated by the rest of America.

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Phoenix 101: Conservatives
Posted inPhoenix Phoenix 101: History Politics: Arizona/Phoenix

Phoenix 101: Conservatives

Infromal_press_conference_following_a_meeting_between_Congressmen_and_the_President_to_discuss_Watergate_matters
Sen. Barry Goldwater, center, and Rep. John J. Rhodes, right, after the fateful showdown with President Nixon in 1974 when they told him he must resign.

Conservatism wasn't always synonymous with the Kookocracy. The political label has carried different meanings at different times through the state's history.

The Kooks down at the Capitol today would be anathema to the lions of the dawn of modern Arizona conservatism: John J. Rhodes, Paul Fannin and, especially, Barry Goldwater.

What later passed for Arizona conservatives could say, "Barry changed," when the senator criticized the religious right or the ban on gays in the military with his characteristic circumspection. No, he didn't. I had conversations with Rhodes late in his life — the House leader who, along with Goldwater and Republican Sen. Hugh Scott, told Richard Nixon he must resign the presidency. Rhodes was aghast at what the state Republicans had become.

Arizona conservative lions telling a disgraced president of their party it was time to go. Can you imagine John McCain or Jeff Flake showing such independence or integrity?

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Posted inPolitics: National

Dangerous party animals

Dear God, I wish America had a real two-party system. As it is, the Republicans have been reduced to a regional gaggle of angry white guys. They're opposed to everything but tax cuts and — now that their profligate former president is gone — government spending. One of their most prominent governors hinted that Texas ought to secede. I wish we could let them go, confiscating North Dakota's nukes on the way out. And given the Great Disruption that is only beginning, national breakup is not out of the question. But the reality is that what's left of the Republican Party are welfare queen states such as Arizona and Mississippi that need the federal Treasury even as they curse it.

The damage from the Republican crackup goes beyond the latest laff riot on Fox "News" or even the bottleneck in the Senate. I think about Seattle, where Democrats have been in charge for years, often with bumbling results. It would be nice to have a real opposition party that would provide meaningful competition. One-party polities are never healthy. But the Republicans can't be trusted because in power, even those who claim independent thought almost invariably become janizaries of the extreme right and its bankrupt policies.

Think about Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Big Finance). Wouldn't it be nice to have a Prescott Bush-style Republican to take him on (Bush defeated Dodd's father for the senate seat Connecticut in the 1950s)? Such a Republican wouldn't be focused on defunding Amtrak, denying global warming and voting in lockstep with the extreme right. We would have an alternative — perhaps as much a creature of big money, perhaps not. But competition that would keep everyone more honest.

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