South Dakota democracy gets a bad review from a visitor from Venezuela. Bo Sistak, Democratic candidate for District 35 House, notices this letter to the editor from a District 25 resident on the other side of the state whose foreign exchange student finds our legislators hungry but inattentive:
I can live with the burger and fries—a guy’s gotta eat! I can even live with lawmakers hitting social media on the job, assuming they are using social media to get feedback from the public and update them on Legislative business.
But our Venezuelan visitor’s overall impression of the lack of care shown by our legislators for their sworn duties does suggest it’s time to elect a new crop of legislators.
Well, this foreign exchange student got a chance to see what any South Dakotan would see if they made the journey to Pierre. It is a pretty sad picture, and it only takes one day to see how corrupt and ineffectual most of those folks who have a legislative badge are. What you see on display every day in Pierre is the behavior of a corrupt system that depends on ciphers to do the bidding of special interests. These legislators aren’t there to represent their constituents and to actually mediate and decide on critical issues. There is no need to take notes. Why should they bother to pretend to listen to citizen testimony? Effective and uncorrupt legislative bodies listen to testimony on both sides and come up with some reasonable compromises, suggest amendments, ask questions to bring out more information. That rarely happens under the dome. They already have been told how they are going to vote, so there is no reason to listen and to legislate.
And this:
South Dakota legislative panel never met to review sex harassment rules
https://www.argusleader.com/story/news/politics/2018/03/06/sexual-harassment-south-dakota-legislature-metoo/397581002/
Who is the majority whip? Welcome to SD, where old fat republicans rule and where student genitals and shooing Muslims out of the state are more important. Welcome to SD where low wages and one party oligarchy rule is the only way of life. Oh and you better get a gun and be a Christian whitey or you’ll get kicked out.
Pretty dang funny when innocents from abroad can clearly see the problems the entrenched bureaucracy fails to see or completely ignores.
Maybe the student should check out what’s going on in her own congress. Fist fights are rather normal on the floor of the Venezuela congress. Well, it is between those the government haven’t imprisoned.
You would almost think she isn’t much of a polite guest.
The thing is, it can be different. This is the way the Legislature worked in the 1980s. It was very autocratic and corrupt. Part of it was the top-down nature of the Janklow administration, and another part of it was the dominance of one party. There was a cultural shift in the late 1980s to mid-1990s, where, for about 6-8 years the Legislature was much more congenial and consensus-oriented. They paid attention to citizens, didn’t bash citizens too much for using the initiative and referendum, and paid attention when citizens testified. Part of the reason for the change was a Governor with a different style and different priorities. Part of it was a more even split in the party make-up of the Legislature. Part of it was an erosion of the numbers of the old guard, and younger, newer folks taking those positions in the Legislature. Part of it was an influx of women legislators. Sure, I bitched about the Legislature all through that time, but there’s bitching and then there’s BITCHING.
I seriously doubt South Dakota’s one legged, one trick pony is any better than you’d find anywhere else. It sure as hell ain’t nothing to brag about or elicit pride in unless you were one of the ruling class.
Ask any non-brainwashed female in South Dakota if they feel like they have control over their lives and bodies.
Typical diversion from OS, who can’t refute the plain facts laid out here and thus has to start some other fight.
It is possible to recognize one’s own failings and still clearly critique others’ failings. If we could defuse every critique by pointing out the critic’s failures, then I would have to require all commenters to use their real names, so we could all fairly skip real argumentation and dismiss everything each other says by saying, “But [insert real name here] picks his nose.”
Our smart Venezuelan visitor may well recognize her own government’s poor adherence to democratic ideals. She may have come to America hoping to see democracy at its finest so she could go back to her country and say, “Hey, dummies! Here’s how government should work!” She apparently found South Dakota not living up to America’s democratic ideals. We should work to change that.
When someone catches you sinning, it’s rather childish to insult the person who caught you (see also, Donald Trump). Responsible adults recognize and rectify their sins.
The last sentence of the editorial appears to be a thinly veiled reference to draining the “swamp” that is the SD Legislature. Tiling is a reprehensible agricultural practice that conveys polluted water (shoddy, corrupt legislators) to nearby surface waters (non-lawmaking general public). I despise tiling because it degrades our most important natural resource, but in this case it’s certainly an apt characterization.
Good close reading, HydroGuy! It is interesting to stop and think about the actual metaphor, “drain the swamp”—it comes from obsolete ecological thinking that failed to recognize the value of swamps (now more genteelly called “wetlands”, but dang it, Aberdeen is built on a swamp!) and promoted development über alles.
But as you note, that doesn’t mean Pierre isn’t a swamp filled with putrescence and a few alligators. It just means we could use a new metaphor… like take out the trash!
(But wait—we have to separate the recyclables… :-D )