Politics Potpourri

     State of the Union, Checked: CNN did the good kind of fact-check, long on facts, cites and links, short on emotions.  It turns out -- and I know you'll be surprised -- a lot of the President's speech was not true.  Or even close.

     What The Hell's The Matter With Kansas:  This one's not easy to write.  The thing about authoritarianism is the thing about bullies: they pick on the easy targets first.  The Federal government, in the form of ICE, CPB, etc. descends on LA or Minneapolis-St. Paul or wherever and rounds up people for the crime of being too brown and/or foreign in public, sorting them out afterward, slowly and with plenty of trouble, but if you're not brown and/or a foreigner, it's mostly just something on the news.  When Federal officers, mostly far from home and new to this kind of mass enforcement, face unexpectedly obstreperous opposition and pepper-spray protesters at close range or even shoot and kill them, if you're not minded to be out protesting, well, that's more stuff on the news, happening to someone else, and never to most people -- though in the Twin Cities, it did finally inconvenience enough people that there was some stepping back.*

     So here's some more people who are just faces on the screen, some of 'em kind of off-putting, but that doesn't rate what happened: the Kansas legislature recently decided the sex listed on Kansas driver's licenses has to match the holder's sex at birth, period, no exceptions, no do-overs, and passed a law to require it.  This is not a problem for at least 99.9 percent of Kansans, but that 0.1 percent is some 290,000 people, and if ten percent of them, 29,000, had changed their driver's license (previously allowed) so Bruce and Barbie had an M and and F on their license to match their haircut and wardrobe (if not more) despite having been born Bettie and Bill, they'd better set aside time to-- And here's the rugpull: They don't have time. As reported, the state sent out letters this week to everyone who had made such a change they could find, warning them their driver's licenses were invalid as of today.  Driving on an invalid license in Kansas is a Class B misdemeanor, carrying a $1000.00 fine and up to six months in jail.  If they're going to update their license, they'd better get a ride. And the papers are reporting they didn't all get notification.

     You don't have to like 'em.  You don't even have to disagree with the law about which letter goes in that part of their driver's licenses.†  But what's the point of making 'em criminals before they even get a chance to comply?

     Many readers are going to look at that and say, "Those people? Who cares," and I get it as only someone who lived in a cheap apartment downtown and worked late shifts can get it: street queens aren't any nicer than born-female streetwalkers and it's icky to have to dodge 'em to get to your car.  Lots of "those people" are scary; but having worked in media and met lots of interviewees, I know they're not all that way.

     And I know bullies may start with the easy targets, the weirdos, the foreign kids, the kids nobody likes; but they never stop there.  They'll work their way up, and eventually, we will all have to choose: be a victim, or an oppressor?  That's a bullshit choice.  Be a person, and let other people be people, too.  If they're not breaking the law, leave 'em alone.  And speak up when bullies go after them.  Stand up.
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* Just how much is in question, as enforcement efforts appear to have moved to suburbs, exurbs and county seats, and meanwhile the Federal government has imposed economic sanctions on Minnesota, the whole thing looking more and more like some kind of scaled-down war.
 
† Though I do have to ask, why is is there?  Photo, height, weight, hair and eye color are all on the license so Officer Friendly or the bank teller can tell if it's your license. Unless they're running genetic tests, the "sex" part of the ID makes more sense if it tracks what people look like.  If they get arrested, the police will strip-search them and if there are any lurid secrets to be found out, the police will do so then.  Me, I don't wanna know.