Triad Today

According to President Trump, Iran’s terrorist General Qasem Soleimani was planning an “imminent” attack on the American embassy in Baghdad, so our commander-in-chief ordered a pre-emptive, missile strike assassination of the bad man. No doubt Soleimani had orchestrated numerous atrocities and deserved to be held accountable, perhaps even executed, but his murder didn’t happen in a vacuum, and innocent lives were lost as a result. Following the attack on Soleimani, Iran responded by firing missiles at a joint US/Iraqi military base. In the confusion, Iran also fired a Russian-made SA15 surface-to-air missile into the night skies which decimated Ukrainian International Airlines flight 752, killing all 176 people aboard, including two newlyweds returning from their honeymoon. Friends and loved ones of the victims are now left to mourn and wonder why the tragedy occurred. So are the rest of us.

Naturally Trump blames Obama for the conflict. He told a press gathering that the former president paid Iran billions of dollars to play nice, only to have that country turn around and buy missiles with our money. Not surprisingly, nothing Trump said is true. Obama merely unfroze Iranian assets as soon as we had assurances that Iran would curb its production of uranium. And since Trump lies all the time, we don’t know if an attack by Soleimani was truly “imminent”, or just in the works, or nonexistent. Even Trump supporters in the Senate like Mike Lee and Rand Paul are upset and confused by the President’s lack of transparency over matters that could still lead us into war. For example, if an attack on us was truly imminent, then assassinating Soleimani would not have stopped it, and if the attack was not imminent, then Trump had a constitutional obligation to brief Speaker Pelosi before taking military action. Trump also implied that Iran fired on our military base with no intention of killing anyone (they were “standing down,” he said), but he followed that statement by saying our early warning systems gave our troops time to get to cover. Those two statements seem a bit incongruous. Showing their disdain for the President’s executive overreach, mixed messages and lack of transparency, Democrats in Congress tweaked the War Powers Act last week as a reminder to Trump that he is not a dictator.

This is not the first time that a president has lied and abused his powers in order to “sell” his military strategy to the American public. It also isn’t the first time that such actions have led to collateral damage. Following the 9-11 attacks, George W. Bush told us that Saddam Hussein supported the attacks and was in possession of weapons of mass destruction. Nearly every member of Congress took Bush at his word, and authorized an invasion of Iraq. Later it was discovered that Bush had relied on faulty intel. In fact, Saddam had no WMDs, and Iraq had NOTHING to do with 9-11. Yet even after he learned the truth, Bush continued his attack, invasion, and subsequent occupation of Iraq. And what was the result of Bush’s unjustified war? Over one million innocent Iraqi men, women, and children were killed, the region was de-stabilized and primed for terrorists to gain a foothold, and America wasted over $2 trillion dollars which could have been used here at home to alleviate childhood hunger and provide medical care for the uninsured.

It’s bad enough that men like Bush and Trump obfuscate during a crisis, but when their knee-jerk reactions lead to the deaths of innocent civilians, that’s criminal, and they should be held accountable. Yes I know that Saddam was a tyrant who killed his own people, and yes I know that Iran had a hand in the recent death of an American contractor, but we expect our leaders to be informed and exercise some modicum of judgement before they pull the trigger, and that means having an understanding of, and appreciation for, the concepts of cause (unnecessary war) and effect (unnecessary casualties). Our current crisis may have abated for now, but it’s far from over. Just ask those who are in mourning.

In an effort to lessen the effects of the 2008 recession, the federal government infused $700 billion into the big banks, essentially buying up or insuring bad loans, and enabling those financial institutions to start lending to us little people, whose homes were either underwater or lost, thanks to sky-high balloon payments. It was a sweetheart deal for wealthy banking executives, first because of the federal bailout itself, and second, because no one policed their good faith agreement to lend money to those who needed it the most. If you were outraged by that blatant example of taxpayer-funded corporate welfare, get ready for 2020, and President Trump’s new spin on the Community Reinvestment Act.

The CRA was enacted in 1977 to make sure that banks lent money for homes and businesses in impoverished communities. In return, the banks would receive big tax breaks. Fair enough, however, several weeks ago, two agencies under the Trump administration (the FDIC and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency) announced proposed changes to CRA which don’t pass the smell test. According to a report by Bloomberg’s Noah Buhayar and Jesse Hamilton, one of those changes allows banks to meet their CRA obligations to the poor if they simply finance improvements to athletic stadiums in a government designated “Opportunity Zone”.

Oregon Senator Ron Wyden isn’t buying the stadium scam, saying, “There are no safeguards to ensure taxpayers are not simply subsidizing handouts for billionaires, with no benefit to the low income communities this program was supposed to help.” Wyden’s warning is, pardon the expression, right on the money. That’s because most of America’s most impoverished cities have one or more taxpayer-funded sports stadiums. M&T Bank Stadium in Baltimore recently completed $120 million dollars worth of improvements. Meanwhile, taxpayers in Cincinnati, Indianapolis, and Minneapolis paid for stadium renovations to the tune of $424 million, $600 million, and $678 million dollars respectively. It’s a great deal for billionaire team owners who get to hold onto their wealth and, at the same time, profit from improvements to their stadium. It gives a whole new meaning to the term “home field advantage”.

To be fair, the proposed CRA regulations also give tax breaks to banks who finance new factories, something which could, in fact, benefit poverty-stricken areas. But it’s a stretch to believe that renovating NFL stadiums will do anything to alleviate hunger or sub-standard housing. As Buhayar and Hamilton noted, the proposed credit for refinancing improvements calls into question, “whether banks can satisfy CRA obligations by funding, say, a 200-foot video screen.” One thing’s for sure, though. Poor people can’t even afford the price of admission to be able to sit in a renovated stadium and see that video screen. What they can see, however, is financial assistance bypassing them, and being offered freely to billionaires who don’t need it.

It’s the age-old irony that banks only lend money to people who already have money, i.e., the rich keep getting richer. But if Trump’s proposed changes to CRA are enacted, the real irony is that the banks themselves will get richer, in this case, from a tax program designed to help the poor. Instead of a credit, there should be a penalty for such behavior. In football, we call it “illegal procedure”.

New Year’s resolutions are usually about self improvement. Some folks resolve to lose weight, others vow to stop smoking. I hope for everyone’s sake that college and professional athletes resolve to stop behaving badly in 2020. Here are just a few recent examples of bad jock behavior:

Ole Miss lost a big game because of a penalty given to their wide receiver, Elijah Moore, who celebrated in the end zone by pretending to be a urinating dog. Washington Redskins quarterback Dwayne Haskins missed the last play of the game because he was taking a selfie with fans. The Cleveland Browns’ Myles Garrett got mad at the Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback, Mason Rudolph, and instead of yelling at him, he took off the QB’s helmet and hit him in the head with it. Meanwhile Indianapolis quarterback Chad Kelly got drunk at a bar, and assaulted a patron. Three Georgetown basketball players were arrested for alleged burglary, and for threatening physical violence against the women they were robbing. And two weeks ago, Carolina Panthers defensive end Vernon Butler was ejected for punching another player, then flipping his middle finger to fans as he left the field. I could keep listing other examples of bad behavior, but there’s not enough space in this entire newspaper to fit them in.

Like so many problems in this country, I wondered if bad behavior by athletes has just become an accepted norm that cannot be remedied. Then I heard about a winning football team that has NEVER had any discipline problems, so I reached out to their head coach, Bryan Davis, to find out about his success with players, both on and off the field.

Jim: How many of your players have ever been in trouble with the law?

Coach: None.

Jim: How many of your players regularly attend late night parties, or frequent night clubs?

Coach: None.

Jim: Have any of your players ever assaulted a woman?

Coach: No.

Jim: How many of your players have tattoos all over their body?

Coach: None.

Jim: How many of your players have made obscene or pornographic gestures in the end zone?

Coach: None.

Jim: Have any of your players ever hit an opposing player in the head with a helmet?

Coach: No.

Jim: How many of your players have ever taken cash bribes from boosters?

Coach: None.

Jim: Do your players ever use foul language?

Coach: Never.

Jim: Do your players make gay slurs or racists comments?

Coach: No.

Jim: How many of your players have been goofing around taking selfies while they were supposed to be on the field?

Coach: None.

Jim: Have you ever had to suspend a player?

Coach: No, never.

Jim: Coach, what is your philosophy and technique for keeping your players focused and out of trouble?

Coach: My coaching philosophy is just to keep them focused on the task at hand, and nothing else matters. They buy into that philosophy because they all want to learn and be better players.

Jim: What is the name of your team?

Coach: The Lewisville Titans.

Jim: And what league do you compete in?

Coach: The Piedmont Youth Football & Cheer League.

Jim: How old are your players?

Coach: We have forty kids who are age 10 and under.

Jim: Do you think that college and pro athletes could learn something from your players? And if so, what?

Coach: Adult athletes could learn a lot from our players. Our kids are humble and are eager to learn. They don’t focus on “Me, me, me”. Instead, they focus on being the ultimate teammate, and that helps them now as well as later in life.

Well, there you have it, folks. Proof positive that athletes CAN be well behaved. So next time you hear someone say that college and pro jocks are role models to kids, you might remind them that it should actually be the other way around.

This weekend’s edition of Triad Today focuses on the economic impact that Piedmont Triad International Airport has on our region. Special guests will include: Kevin Baker, Executive Director of PTI; Stan Kelly, President and CEO of Piedmont Triad Partnership; Thomas Maxwell, Southeast Managing Director of FedEx; and Nick Yale, Director of Aviation Programs at Guilford Technical Community College. What follows are highlights from our discussion.

Jim: Why is PTI different from other airports?

Kevin: Most airports you think of as a place of transportation and we certainly have that component. We’re the third largest airport in the state in terms of passengers. But we have a second mission, which is to be a center of employment as well as a center of transportation. There are 6,000 people employed at the airport, and that’s not including service providers and others. Estimates are that there are 12,000 people who are indirectly employed as a result of the airport. The beauty of these jobs is that the average household income within 40 miles of the airport is $45,000, and that could be two earners. The average income for an employee on the airport is between $60,000 and $65,000, so then you have one earner making almost 150% of the average household income in the area. The message is that these are very good jobs.

Jim: Stan I’ve been hearing about the “Carolina Core” initiative. What is it? And, how does PTI figure into it?

Stan: Carolina Core is a vision, it’s a brand, and it’s a strategy. Over the next twenty years our aspiration is to grow at least 50,000 net new jobs across this region. Relative to the brand, the name “Carolina Core” more readily identifies us as to our geographic location. As to strategy, there’s a million additional residents who will move to North Carolina in the next 20 years, and we want to take advantage of that.

Jim: How much land is available around PTI for development?

Stan: There’s a thousand acres, so we can entertain opportunities of 20 acres, 200 acres, 800 acres, or someone can take it all.

Jim: Tom, you employ about a thousand people in this community. Why did FedEx select PTI for its Mid Atlantic hub to begin with?

Tom: There were a number of factors that influenced our decision. For one thing, the infrastructure makes it very friendly for surface transportation. We have good access to the highways and the road system. It’s also close to a major aircraft maintenance facility, and we have ideal runways. There’s also additional land available as an option for expansion, and there’s a ready workforce here along with a variety of educational opportunities.

Jim: Nick, speaking of a trained labor pool, how do you work with PTI to help grow the workforce?

Nick: When Kevin is out trying to recruit companies to come here, he can bring them over to GTCC, and we can show them how we generate custom programs to fit their needs. And if we don’t have what they need, we’ll go to their work environment and figure out what their key learning outcomes are for employees coming in the door, then we develop a program around that, and have it ready before they get here.

Kevin: I describe GTCC as the crown jewel whenever we’re out meeting with tenants. The folks being trained at GTCC are feeding right into these businesses who need those employees so badly. Without that workforce development, the companies can’t survive.

This special episode of Triad Today will air Saturday December 21st at 7:30am on abc45, and Sunday at 11am on MY48.

Most people know Popeye as the cartoon sailor who ate spinach when he needed super strength to fight a bad guy. But I’ll always remember Popeye for the phrase he uttered just prior to consuming those leafy greens. Frustrated with the situation at hand, Popeye would say, “That’s all I can stands, I can’t stands no more.” It meant that he had reached his breaking point, something we all do from time to time, and when that happens, we say, “This is the last straw”. It’s a phrase which, in its complete form references, an Old World observation for what happens when you break a camel’s back by loading too much straw on it. According to the American Heritage dictionary, however, the modern connotation means, “The last of a series of annoyances that leads one to a final loss of patience, temper, trust, or hope.” Regardless, no matter how you say it, the last straw is what I’ve reached with Donald Trump.

Truth is, there have been a lot of last straws with Trump, beginning with his childish behavior during the 2016 Republican debates, in which he assigned nicknames to other candidates, like “Little Marco”, “Lyin’ Ted”, and “Low Energy Jeb”, and while doing so, made outlandish and false claims about his opponents, such as accusing Cruz’s father of having been involved in the Kennedy assassination.

Then there was the Access Hollywood tape on which he could be heard bragging to Billy Bush that he could do anything he wanted to with women. “I can kiss them and grab them by the p***y.” Trump’s defense was that his words were just locker room talk, but I’ve been in a lot of locker rooms, and I’ve never heard any one brag about sexual assault. Speaking of which, during the campaign and throughout his first term in office, nearly two dozen women have come forward with credible claims of sexual harassment and assault against the Donald.  For most Americans, Trump’s misogyny and various offenses against women should have been the last straw.

In the run up to the 2016 election, Trump and his fixer, Michael Cohen, arranged for the National Enquirer to kill a story about his sexual encounter with Stormy Daniels, a hotel romp that occurred while Melania was pregnant with their son Barron. He also authorized hush money be paid to Daniels. Taken in tandem,  the “catch and kill” and payment smacked of an illegal campaign donation.  That should have been the last straw.

After taking office, Trump surrounded himself with a bunch of misfits, a half-dozen of whom have since been convicted of federal crimes. Meanwhile he has fired or run off the handful of competent advisors who tried to keep his erratic behavior in check, while retaining folks like Steven Miller, whose radical views on immigration and acceptance of white supremacist groups has shaped Trump’s racist rhetoric, which has included referring to the Charlottesville Nazis as “very fine people.” That should have been another last straw.

Trump has used his bully pulpit to demean, defame, or embarrass American citizens. At one rally he pointed to the lone African American in the crowd and said, “Where’s my black? Where is he? There he is.” At another rally Trump mocked a disabled reporter by flailing his arms around as if to simulate spasms. And then there’s his recent bizarre dramatization of how he imagined a romantic encounter transpired between two FBI investigators, complete with orgasmic inflections. He insulted a gold star family, made fun of John McCain’s military service, and berated one of our nation’s most capable and distinguished ambassadors. Any of those things should have been the last straw.

Donald Trump is functionally illiterate, and hands-down the most uninformed president in history. He can’t string two coherent sentences together, refuses to read briefing books, thinks Colorado borders Mexico, and has shown time and again that he has no working knowledge of our constitution, a document which he swore to uphold. In addition, according to several fact checking organizations, Trump has told over 12,000 lies since taking office, and those lies sometimes affect or are the basis for setting public policy. Serial lying is not presidential, and it should be the last straw.

According to 27 noted mental health experts who studied Trump’s actual words and behavior (see “The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump”), our president suffers from clinically documented narcissism. They cite his “displays of instability”, and his disregard for the consequences of his actions. They observed his willingness to “say or do anything at any time for purposes of self-aggrandizement”, as well as his propensity to “dehumanize others”. They wrote of his lack of “foresight and compassion”, his bullying and paranoia, his misogyny, and his inability “to recognize other people’s emotions and feelings”. And they referred to his behavior as immature and incompetent. Any of those findings should have been the last straw.

Finally, there’s Trump’s demand for the Ukrainian president to announce an investigation of the Bidens in return for our releasing to him some congressionally approved military aid that he needs to defend against Russian aggression. That, combined with multiple counts of obstruction should be the last straw.

Not to diminish the other straws, but I came to my Popeye moment last week when I witnessed the president of France scolding Trump for making an uninformed remark about ISIS, then watched as four European leaders were overheard making fun of Trump. That was MY president those men were scolding and scoffing at, and it was as if they were laughing at me and our entire nation. In a way, their lack of respect and contempt for Trump was derivative of all the other straws and flaws. And so, too, was it for me. Trump needs to go, whether by impeachment or election, but he’s got to go. He has broken the camel’s back.

 
 

Back in May I wrote about Senator Kamala Harris’ proposed “Equal Pay Certification” program, which, if adopted, would make it illegal for companies to pay their female employees less than males doing the same job. Said Harris, “Under our plan, for the first time in American history, companies will be held responsible for demonstrating they are not engaging in pay discrimination.”

Harris’ plan follows other attempts to legislate away pay disparities, such as the Equal Pay Act of 1963, a year when women were paid 59 cents for every dollar earned by a man. But JFK’s act fell short for a couple of reasons. For one thing, it initially only applied to women in blue collar jobs. For another, any woman with a claim had to file a sex discrimination complaint, and then argue her case before a supervisor who was almost always a male. In 1972, the EPA was finally amended to include women in white collar jobs, but the pay disparity levels only improved slightly, as was the case in 2009 when President Obama signed the Fair Pay Act into law.

So just how bad is the pay gap today? The American Association of University Women conducted a study in 2018, which concluded that white women are paid about 80 cents for every dollar paid to a man doing the same job. That number falls to 61 cents for black women, and 53 cents for Latina women. Here in North Carolina, women earn about 84 cents for every dollar paid to a man, but that’s only an improvement of one penny from four years ago. Even worse, the pay gap isn’t expected to close until the year 2060.

I believe that one reason the gender pay gap hasn’t improved is because most corporations are still run by men. In fact, according to a 2015 report by Thinkprogress.org, there are only 48 female CEOs heading up the top 1,000 companies. I can’t prove that closing the pay gap isn’t a priority for most male executives, but the lack of progress made over the past decade in that regard is a good indicator. That means the problem is coming from the top. The California legislature must agree with me because they recently passed the first-ever law that would require publicly held corporations to put women on their boards of directors.

The new law would require those companies to place at least one woman on their boards by the end of this year. Companies with at least five board members must have two women on the board by 2021, and boards of six or more members, must include at least three women by that same deadline. The penalties for non compliance will be severe. According to the Associated Press, companies who fail to “report their board compositions” to the state face a $100,000 fine, and if they fail to meet the deadlines for inclusion, they will pay $100,000 for the first violation and “$300,000 for subsequent violations.”

The bad news is that the California law is being challenged in court by two different organizations who claim that it violates provisions in both the state and federal constitutions. The good news is that California lawmakers are on the right side of the pay disparity issue, and judges will be hard pressed to rule against a substantive effort to reform a corporate culture that discriminates against the majority of its workforce. Beyond that, we here in North Carolina should push our own General Assembly to embrace and adopt California’s new law, because putting more women in the board room can lead to a change in corporate priorities, among them to close the pay gap now instead of waiting until 2060. I said it before, and I’ll say it again: Women shouldn’t have to wait forty more years for something they should have had in the first place.

 
 

When I was in high school a hundred years ago, it was not unusual for two guys to get into a fist fight over one thing or another. I had one of those encounters myself, and afterward, ended up in the principal’s office. The principal, a former coach, read me the riot act, told me it better not happen again, then sent me back to class. It was the last time I engaged in fisticuffs during my high school career. I realize that, today, too many school fights involve weapons, and when that happens, suspensions and expulsions may be warranted. But my point is that sometimes, student misbehavior should not warrant anything more than a warning, and that brings me to the Guilford School Board, and their recent decision to allow parents to appeal their child’s short-term suspension.

In the past, it has been up to the school principal to sign off on short-term suspensions, and his or her word was pretty much final. However, earlier this month, the Board voted 6-to-3 to implement a new, two-step policy for appealing suspensions of 10 days or less. First, parents can take their case to the principal’s direct supervisor, and if not satisfied, they can then appeal directly to the superintendent. Reaction to the new policy has been mixed. Most educators I have spoken with, including former superintendents, are opposed to adding another layer of red tape to the process. Said one former administrator, “I am totally against allowing appeals of short-term suspensions because it creates way too much due process and is cumbersome.” Current Guilford School Board members Darlene Garrett and Pat Tillman also have a problem with the new policy. Speaking with the Greensboro News & Record, Tillman said, “This is a solution without a problem,” while Garrett remarked that it would, “undermine principals as well as safety in schools.” Parent Steve Mitchell told the GNR that the new appeals process would, “embolden student misbehavior and bog down schools in paperwork.”

On the flip side, Board chair Deena Hayes-Greene and many other parents welcome any policy that would help further clarify the rationale for a short-term suspension, which, if let stand, would be reflected on the student’s permanent record. I’ve never been a parent, but I’ve been a student, and from that perspective I support any process that could lessen or avoid a suspension for a minor violation. My problem with this matter, however, lies not so much with the new policy, as it does with how short-term suspensions are identified in the first place.

According to the Guilford County Schools’ Code of Conduct, there are over a dozen categories of violations which could warrant a short-term suspension, among them: using insulting or harassing language; inappropriate or lewd behavior; fighting with another student; cheating; non-compliance with direction of teachers; gambling; use of tobacco products; and, misbehaving on a school bus.

But here’s the fly in the ointment. After reading through Guilford’s entire Code of Conduct section, I couldn’t find a table or chart that specified the exact number of days suspension that are issued for a specific violation. As one former superintendent told me, “Some level of discretion is provided to principals for certain acts.” That means if Johnny punches Sam in the stomach, the number of days he will be suspended can vary from school to school, and that’s no way to run a railroad. Public schools need to codify the exact number of days your child will be suspended if he or she commits a particular offense. Doing so would give parents and students an advance warning about consequences, and perhaps eliminate the need for modified policies regarding an appeals process.

I learned early on that warnings can be an effective method for improving student behavior, and preventing suspensions altogether. I just hope our area school boards can learn that same lesson.

Presidents are only human, so they make mistakes. No, I’m not talking about Donald Trump’s claim that Colorado borders Mexico, or George Bush’s decision to invade the wrong country after 9/11. I’m talking about John Kennedy, and how he misread history, unintentionally insulted the Commonwealth of Virginia, and was compelled to make amends.

The story begins on Wednesday December 4, 1619. That’s the day 38 English settlers from the London Company, navigated their ship down the James River and onto Berkeley Hundred (Harrison’s Landing), in what is now Charles City, Virginia, just 20 miles upstream from Jamestown, which had been settled twelve years prior. The landing party was led by Captain John Woodlief, who, as prescribed in the company charter, ordered a day of Thanksgiving to be observed upon their arrival, and every December 4th thereafter.

Over time, Berkeley became known for its historic firsts. The first bourbon whiskey was made there in 1621 (by a preacher no less). “Taps” was played for the first time while the Union army was encamped at Berkeley in 1862. And, of course, it was the site of America’s first Thanksgiving. But more on that in a moment.

In 1907 Berkeley was purchased by John Jamieson who had served as a Union drummer boy during the army’s encampment at the plantation. Ownership later fell to his son (and my friend) Malcolm, who passed away in 1997. Mac loved Berkeley and was aggressive in marketing the historic site, including through the use of promotional videos and commercials which I helped to produce. He invited the public to tour the house and grounds, sold Berkeley boxwoods and bourbon, and held an annual Thanksgiving pageant which attracted tourists from across the country. But the celebration wasn’t always widely recognized.

One hundred years after his father beat the Yankee drums at Berkeley, Mac was upset by something another Yankee did. In the fall of 1962, President Kennedy issued his yearly Thanksgiving Proclamation in which he recognized his home state of Massachusetts as the site of America’s first Thanksgiving. And so, on November 9th of that year, Virginia state Senator John Wicker was prompted by Mac to write to the President, and point out Kennedy’s faux pas. In his telegram, Wicker referenced historical records about Berkeley’s celebration, which took place one full year before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth in 1620.

Later that year, Kennedy confidant and noted historian Arthur Schlesinger sent a reply to Wicker with a tongue-in-cheek apology from the President. According to Berkeley records, Schlesinger “attributed the error to unconquerable New England bias on the part of the White House staff.”

The following year, on November 5, 1963, President Kennedy had to eat crow during his annual Thanksgiving proclamation, saying, “Over three centuries ago, our forefathers in Virginia and Massachusetts, far from home, in a lonely wilderness, set aside a day of thanksgiving.” Kennedy’s New England bias wouldn’t allow him to disavow Plymouth entirely, but Mac was happy that Berkeley finally gained official recognition for holding the first Thanksgiving, even if it was a shared honor. Sadly, it was to be Kennedy’s last proclamation. He was assassinated seventeen days later in Dallas.

The holiday season is now upon us, and it’s a time for celebrating with friends and family, and for remembering fondly those who are no longer with us. In this season of giving thanks, perhaps we would all do well to emulate those weary English settlers, and just be thankful for surviving another day of our long journey. So here’s a Berkeley bourbon toast to Captain Woodlief, a little drummer boy, old Mac, and to that Yankee president who finally set the record straight.
 
 

Although many of us East-Coasters like to make jokes about the “Left Coast”, and its liberal tree huggers, the fact is that California is a forward-thinking trendsetter when it comes to taking a stand on social and environmental issues. In the past 20 years alone, the Golden State was the first to oppose federal restrictions on stem cell research, the first to pass a restrictive law on greenhouse gas emissions, the first State to mandate prescription drug discounts, and the first to de-criminalize the recreational use of marijuana. Earlier this fall, Governor Gavin Newsom pushed through legislation that will allow college athletes to be compensated for the use of their name and image, a move which prompted the NCAA to follow suit. And last month, California became the first state in the nation to ban the sale of animal fur products.

According to CNN, the bill, which goes into effect on January 1, 2023, will make it illegal to sell, donate, or manufacture new fur products, and that will apply to “all new clothing, handbags, shoes, and other items made with fur.” In addition to signing the fur bill (#AB44), Newsom also signed into law several other bills designed to prevent animal cruelty. Those laws will include a ban on the use of elephants and tigers by any circus that does business in the state. It also protects horses from slaughter, and bans the trapping and killing of bobcats. However, depending upon your point of view, the recent legislation isn’t exactly comprehensive. For example, according to the Associated Press, the new laws do not apply to “products used for religious or tribal purposes…and they exclude the sale of leather, cowhides, deer, sheep and goat skin, and anything preserved by taxidermy.” Despite those perplexing loopholes, the new protections are a welcome sight to those of us who abhor mistreatment of animals.

Not surprisingly, companies that make products from animals, are furious. According to the Fur Information Council, the retail fur industry brought in $1.5 billion dollars in sales in 2014. FIC spokesperson Keith Kaplan told the Associated Press, “The ban is part of a radical vegan agenda using fur as the first step to other bans on what we wear and eat.” In contrast, a number of design houses including Versace, Gucci, and Giorgio Armani, are fine with the new laws, and according to Recordnet.com, say they have either already stopped, or plan to stop using fur. And in somewhat of a surprise move, even Queen Elizabeth got into the spirit of things, coincidentally announcing last week that she will no longer wear fur.

Obviously people disagree about what should and shouldn’t be banned, but we cannot ignore the disturbing facts. According to the Humane Society of the United States, every year, over 40 million animals are killed for fur worldwide, 30 million of which are raised on fur farms, then slaughtered. The other 10 million are trapped and killed in the wild. However, a group called Last Chance for Animals puts the numbers even higher. According to their website, more than one billion animals are killed for their pelts each year. So kudos to Governor Newsom and the California legislature for recognizing a wrong, and then righting it. I just wish our North Carolina lawmakers would follow California’s example. After all, Berger and company should at least be more concerned with protecting animals than they are with protecting gerrymandered districts.

The Dalai Lama might have said it with more eloquence, but it was Rocky Balboa, in the movie Creed, who said it best: “You can’t learn anything when you’re talking.” That bit of wisdom should be inscribed on a large plaque at the entrance to every hearing room in the United States Capitol.

According to the website GovInfo.gov, a congressional hearing is a meeting of a special committee to obtain information. Yet, when it comes to public hearings where cameras are rolling, obtaining information takes a back seat to political grandstanding. Instead of asking concise questions designed to elicit information, most congressmen and senators use their allotted time to make speeches and badger witnesses. Last week, Ken Cuccinelli, President Trump’s acting director of Citizenship and Immigration Services, was summoned to Congress for a hearing about the administration’s policy of denying illegal immigrants with serious medical conditions the ability to remain in the United States for treatment. Cuccinelli, the former Republican attorney general of Virginia, is known for his homophobic views and blind loyalty to the GOP, but no one should be subjected to the kinds of attacks he endured at the hands of Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Schultz, you recall, is the woman who came under fire for using her position at the DNC to give Hillary an unfair advantage over Bernie Sanders during the 2016 primaries. Here’s an excerpt from her exchange with Cuccinelli.

DWS: You and Mr. Trump don’t want anyone who looks or talks differently from Caucasians, to be allowed into this country.

KC: That’s false.

DWS: Please don’t interrupt…you will pursue this heinous, white supremacist ideology at all cost.

KC: That’s defamatory.

DWS: There’s nothing defamatory about it.

Again, I’m no fan of the narrow-minded Cuccinelli, but Schultz’s calling him a xenophobe and a white supremacist was inappropriate. Unfortunately, this kind of grandstanding by Schultz is all too common, and both political parties are guilty. The website OneCitizenSpeaking.com refers to these made for TV hearings as “Kabuki Theatre, a stage-managed chance for members of Congress to play to their constituent audience and sound articulate, tough, or compassionate depending on the political climate. This is the primary reason why most hearings feature long and complicated questions that are more like miniature campaign speeches and a regurgitation of the party’s talking points.”

We’ve seen this “Kabuki Theatre” play out time and again over the past ten years, including with Republican hypocrites like Mike Pompeo grilling Hillary at the Benghazi hearings, and Lindsay Graham screaming at other members while attempting to discredit Christine Blasey Ford at the Kavanaugh hearings. And then there’s wild man Jim Jordan, who went off on Michael Cohen during the Mueller hearings. It is sad that our elected officials are allowed to lie about, defame, and accuse witnesses without fear of retribution or legal consequence. Not so for us regular folks. If we lie at a congressional hearing, it’s a federal crime, that could land us in jail alongside Felicity Huffman and Aunt Becky. Not only that, but neither a witness nor a committee member can even call out another member for lying. It’s a pretty good double standard for congressmen, kind of like when the government shuts down and elected officials still get paid while common civil servants are SOL.

But perhaps the worst part of these televised hearings, is that when congressmen spew unfounded and false information (what Kellyanne Conway calls “alternative facts”), millions of people accept their lies as the truth, and that can lead to an uninformed and misinformed electorate. Or, as playwrite George Bernard Shaw put it, “Beware of false knowledge: it is more dangerous than ignorance.”

Republican congressmen have been complaining of late that the House impeachment hearings are unfair because they have been held in private, which is yet another “alternative fact”, because Republicans have been included in every hearing. Ironically that hollow complaint and the grandstanding that goes on during televised hearings, do nothing but strengthen the case for closed-door hearings, where members of congress actually ask questions instead of making political speeches. It bears repeating: “You can’t learn anything when you’re talking.”

Over the past few months, public discourse in America has been hijacked by talk of impeachment and scandal. That’s why when 13^th district Congressman Ted Budd and 6^th district Congressman Mark Walker agreed to sit down for a half-hour discussion, we focused on a number of issues that have taken a back seat to partisan politics. On October 9, while on break from their duties in D.C., Budd and Walker stopped by the studio to tape a special edition of Triad Today, which will air this weekend. The following are excerpts from our unrehearsed conversation.

GUN VIOLENCE

Jim: Just since the two of you appeared on this program in March, there have been another 260 people killed in mass shootings. Is Congress doing anything to address this problem?

Ted: There are a couple of bills I’ve co-sponsored, one of which is the TAPS Act. It trains law enforcement personnel to make behavioral threat assessments, and to look for problems before they happen.

Mark: We’ve passed multiple pieces of legislation, including the Stop School Violence Act. We’ve also got the Fix/Nix Act that cleans up some of the background checks. And, just recently, in Guilford and Rockingham counties we saw a $500,000 grant go to protecting schools.

SECURING ELECTIONS

Jim: Are you doing anything to secure our 2020 elections?

Ted: One bill that’s already passed the Senate is the Deter Act, and it would deport anyone who is a non-US citizen who’s here trying to infiltrate or overturn our elections. There are also other measures related to “Blockchain” security, which is the future in terms of preventing cyber hacking.

Mark: We’ve designated $380 million dollars back to the electoral commission system to make sure that older voting machines are not vulnerable, like maybe they have been in the past.

CONGRESSIONAL RE-DISTRICTING

Jim: Who should be responsible for drawing up Congressional maps?

Ted: The state legislature. That’s what it’s been historically, and that’s what it should be in the future.

Mark: The state legislature should be able to draw those lines because they are the representatives of the people of that state.

CAMPAIGN DONATIONS

Jim: Both of you and many other elected officials have been touched in some way by the case involving former Congressman Robin Hayes. What do you do with campaign donations which you later discover to be tainted in some way?

Ted: In cases like that, the best practice is to give the money to a charity, and let them benefit from that, and just distance yourself from it.

Mark: The maximum somebody can give to both campaigns is $5,800. With the gentleman involved in that case, we gave the money to charity.

HEALTHCARE

Jim: It doesn’t seem as though we have a cohesive healthcare plan. So where do we stand?

Ted: One of the things I’ve done is introduce the Flex Act, which codifies some of the administration’s efforts to allow associations to offer healthcare plans to small businesses.

Mark: Obamacare is still the law of the land, but evidently it isn’t good enough. The bottom line for me, is it about choice for the individual? Or, is it about more control? If it’s about more choice, then let’s go down that path as opposed to more government involvement.

During the half hour discussion, Budd and Walker also talked about how to curb illegal immigration, what kinds of legislation they are proposing to strengthen education and workforce development, and whether we’d be better off without the Electoral College. I also asked them if they were afraid to criticize Donald Trump for fear that he would campaign against their re-election. This special edition of Triad Today airs Saturday at 7:30am on abc45, and Sunday at 11am on MY48.

This past weekend, Winston-Salem Mayor Allen Joines appeared on Triad Today to share his thoughts on a wide range of topics affecting the City that he has presided over since 2001. We began by talking about job growth.

JL: What’s the current state of the City’s economy?

AJ: Well Jim, last year we created more jobs in our community than we have in decades. We’ve got a goal of creating 5,400 net new jobs per year for five years in a row, and if we do that, we’ll be one of the top 50 metro areas in the country. Last year we created 5,300 new jobs, so we’re feeling good about that. Also, unemployment is low, and we’re making progress in our entrepreneurial development programs, so I feel like we’re moving in the right direction.

JL: Let’s talk about Renfro, a sock manufacturing company with headquarters in Mt. Airy. Both the City and Forsyth County have offered Renfro hundreds of thousands of dollars in incentives to relocate over 200 jobs to Winston-Salem, but, to be clear, you didn’t recruit them.

AJ: That’s a good point, Jim. We don’t fish in other people’s pond around us here. But they indicated to me that they needed to move. They said where they are now they can’t attract the talent they need for a growing corporate headquarters, and they were going to move to one place or another. So I said, “We’d love to have you in Winston-Salem.”

JL: So, are they coming to Winston-Salem?

AJ: They haven’t made a final decision, but I think it will come fairly quickly, and I’m feeling very positive about it.

JL: Bring us up to speed on what’s going on with the Whitaker Park site.

AJ: As you know, R.J. Reynolds donated 1.7 million square feet of space to a non-profit we created. We’re making great progress there, for example, we were able to keep Cook Medical here in the community, and they’re going to invest about $55 million dollars, and probably grow their workforce from 650 to 1000 jobs. We also just announced that Chris Harrison, a developer from Baltimore, is going to do about an $80 million dollar project, with residential, hotel, and retail going in there.

JL: It was on this program last year that you announced a new program to reduce poverty in the City. How’s that going?

AJ: We’ve seen poverty rates come down from 26% to 21%, and I won’t take credit for that because we’ve only been in business for about a year, but we’re moving in the right direction. And, we’ve got a lot of other really neat programs that we’re going to make some major announcements about in the next two to three weeks, one which will help with young people graduating from high school, and being able to go to college, hopefully for free.

JL: Your friend, Mayor Nancy Vaughan is having a problem with gun violence in Greensboro, so now, her city council is allocating a half-million dollars to an anti-violence program. In the wake of similar violence in Winston-Salem, is that something you’re looking into, or have you done so already?

AJ: We’re looking at a number of things. We’ve got a task force that we’re operating within the police department, and we just received a large federal grant for something called a “shot locator”, in which we’ll be locating monitors all around various parts of the community, so that if a shot is fired, it triangulates where it was, and we can get immediate response to it. There are also some other things we’re looking at in terms of social programs as well.

JL: It sounds like Winston-Salem is doing pretty well, so what challenges still lay ahead?

AJ: As always you can’t ever let up. We need to keep pushing hard because the worst thing you can do is to sit on your laurels.