Then Again...

In my last post I discussed some of the things I am happy with SCOTUS for doing. This post is decidedly the opposite.

Two cases today had less than pleasing outcomes for me. The first was a case brought by the state of Michigan against the Environmental Protection Agency claiming that the EPA's demand that power companies cut mercury emissions was imposed without any thought to what it would cost power companies to comply. The court ruled against the EPA, agreeing that the EPA essentially could only protect the environment and thus the safety of the US public if it first made sure it wasn't going to cost big business too much. (It should also be noted that the EPA did eventually do a cost study for the mercury provisions in the Clean Air Act and found that the cost to public health and safety was 9 times higher than the cost of industry compliance. Big surprise there.) 

The ruling is fairly narrow and only affects the Clean Air Act, but it creates a greater possibility for future trouble between industry and the EPA. The ruling opens the door for companies to drag their heels over regulation implementation. In this case most companies have already implemented the mercury reduction standards required by the EPA, but in the future they may be able to use this case to argue that they shouldn't have to comply with EPA regulation until their case has been heard and decided (which we all know can take years). On a separate and more common sense than legal sense tangent I find this ruling deeply troubling. The idea that big business profits are more important to us as a society than the safety of our environment and our population is deeply disturbing and frankly disheartening in the extreme. I have feelings about this ruling that boil down to this: time is money and ruin. The extra time the EPA will have to spend confirming what should be common sense and the extra time companies will spend dragging their heels on implementing common sense wastes a hell of a lot more money than immediate implementation of environmental and safety standards. It seems a small price to pay for me, but then I am not an oil, gas, or electric company executive...

The other ruling handed down by the court today was Glissop v. Gross and at stake was the use of midazolam, the sedative currently used in the lethal injection cocktail to execute death row prisoners. The court upheld the legality of the drug and rejected the idea that the use of a non-barbiturate that does not induce coma constitutes cruel and unusual punishment as set out by the Constitution. Sonia Sotomayor, writing for the minority dissent, likened the experience as "being burned at the stake" in terms of the pain the inmates endure. The majority opinion, written by Samuel Alito, hinged on the point that the prisoners who brought the case had not provided an adequate substitute for the midazolam and blamed them and other groups opposed to capital punishment for making pentobarbitol harder (almost impossible) to obtain. (The reason it's harder to maintain is that drug companies don't want the stigma of providing a drug to prisons to cause death. Though undoubtedly public pressure has played a huge role in creating that stigma.) 

Overall 3 percent of lethal injections in this country are botched and 2014 was one of the worst years on record with at least 4 very prominent cases. Most botched attempts stem from the inability of poorly trained prison attendants to find a vein. But all the cases from 2014 (and what the case was arguing against) happened after the drugs started flowing. The problem boils down to the midazolam, which began wide usage in 2014. The drug is a sedative and extreme amount are needed to adequately sedate. The midazolam is combined with a paralytic drug and then two other drugs are administered to kill the inmate. Between the paralytic and the midazolam it is hard to tell how much pain prisoners are in (they are effectively paralyzed for their death). Except that during botched executions when prisoners haven't been given enough paralytic or sedative observers are privy to the gasps and screams of the dying. Often for some time. After seeing or hearing about those executions there can be little doubt that death by lethal injection can be an excruciatingly painful experience - beyond cruel and unusual punishment. Moreover, the frequency with which executions are botched in this manner is creeping up since the new cocktail's introduction. 

In the wake of increased botched executions there has been a shadow of doubt cast over the whole process. How effective is midazolam at actually stopping someone from feeling pain? How much of an execution looks peaceful as opposed to actually being peaceful? How well are we training those who are executing inmates? If we can't find any alternatives to an imperfect and sometimes agonizing method of execution does that mean we can continue on in good faith with the imperfect method? Is cruel and unusual punishment a relative term or have we ruled incorrectly in the past in favor of cruel punishments because it was the best we could do at the time?

I will admit to an immense bias on this issue. I am a staunch opponent of the death penalty. For a number of reasons. The first is that I believe it to be largely ineffective as a deterrent to criminal behavior. Overwhelmingly criminologists and law enforcement do not see the death penalty as an effective deterrent of violent crime. Though I'm sure there are many who believe it to be effective, I am more inclined to agree with those who study and see the effects of it on a daily basis. Second, cases involving the death penalty in all stages from prosecution to incarceration and execution are more expensive than cases that do not involve the death penalty. Third, the methods we use at present in my mind are clearly flawed and I think we will look back at this method of execution with the same measure of repulsion that we now view hanging, electrocution, or asphyxiation. Another big reason I don't support the death penalty is that I believe there is some clear bias surrounding who is sentenced to death. There is a tendency to give harsher sentences in this country to people of color and almost 45% of executed inmates have been non-white (a disproportionately high percentage based on population). There is also a strong correlation between the quality of representation and the possibility of receiving a death sentence. Or plainly stated - if you're poor and can't afford a good layer, you're more likely to be sentenced to death. The last reason is this - we make mistakes. We have killed innocent men, women, and even children. Death is irreversible and once a mistake is made the best we can do after execution is apologize and try to make amends with the living family, which is woefully inadequate in the face of what we have done. Our country has an imperfect past, which we see more clearly in the present. It is obvious to us now that some black men were executed because of the color of their skin during horribly racist period of our history. I wonder if we will look back on some of our current executions with similar shame in the future (like perhaps the execution of the mentally ill - though I already feel a great deal of shame about that particular issue). 

Wanting vengeance and retribution is as human as it gets. But so is prejudice, so are mistakes. I hope this ruling brings about a larger discussion of exactly what the majority pointed to in its decision: what are the alternatives? Is it time to join the more than 50% of countries that have banned the practice. There are now only 36 countries left in the world that retain and practice the death penalty. We are on that list. In fact, we are on an even more select list. We are 1 of 22 countries that carried out at least one execution in 2014. And an even smaller list. We are one of 9 countries that has executed someone who was under the age of 18 at the time of their crime in that last 10 years. There are very few other developed countries that still allow the death penalty as broadly as we do and almost none that actually practice it. Certainly just because everyone else is banning something doesn't mean we have to, but the fact certainly warrants a broader debate on the issue.

Rejoice in the Constitution!

Wow! Last week and today sure have been an exciting time to follow the Supreme Court. Right, guys? Did you know they upheld Obamacare, or at least the part of it that demands subsidies in both state and federal healthcare exchanges? Boy, that was big. Especially since the decision was far from a close one. A 6-3 ruling is pretty decisive, guys. I am hopeful the ruling will cement the law in the bedrock of our country and maybe open the way for more expansive and more effective policing and subsidizing of the health insurance industry.

And how about the decision today that upheld the right of independent, bipartisan commissions to draw districts, rather than the state legislature in a case brought by Arizona State Legislature Republicans? I hope that case ends up being a landmark shift in thinking on the issue. After all as Ginsberg wrote in her majority brief, "voters should choose their representation, not the other way around." This is a huge blow against gerrymandering in a state that badly needs an independent commission drawing the district lines.

So those are some amazing decisions right there. Pretty historical. But did you know the Supreme Court made another badass decision last week? You did? Oh, well. That makes sense since the news was all over the place that... GAY MARRIAGE IS LEGAL IN ALL 50 STATES!!!!!!!!!!!! 

I cannot contain my joy over this, you guys. I just can't. I think everyone reading this is well aware that I am bisexual and in a long-term committed relationship with another woman. Committed like, this is the person I want to spend my life with kind of committed. It gives me joy beyond words to know that my country will support the two of us in our devotion to each other. I really didn't think the decision was going to hit me so hard because I live in a state that already allowed gay marriage before the ruling and I am from Massachusetts, the first state to legalize gay marriage back in 2004. I have been fortunate to live with a minimum of discrimination and homophobia my whole life (though I still get looks, remarks, and conversations that I think are well beyond polite or appropriate.) I am also not looking to get married anytime soon - I'm happy living in a committed, but not legally binding, state of partnerhood for the foreseeable future. So, this decision didn't have a lot of practical use for me right this second. But it had a symbolic resonance that was unexpectedly deep and poignant for me.

I still remember the day the Massachusetts Supreme Court made same-sex marriage legal in my state. I was a freshman in high school, an active member of my school's GSA, though I was not yet aware that the ruling would have personal significance to me (read: I didn't think I was bi then). I remember the two co-presidents of the GSA coming to school in drag (she was in a tux, he was in a wedding dress). I remember my high school English teacher announcing his engagement to his partner and telling us with a twinkle in his eye that he was going to miss our final exam because he wasn't going to miss out on the chance to get married and hoped they could get in before the ruling could be reversed (it never was). I remember the pervasive feeling of elation - I remember celebrating the victory as part of a larger community and being swept up in the communal ecstasy and triumph of it all.

11 years later the joy is no less great and the triumph no less exhilarating than it was then, but it was different. I didn't hear the news at school, with a mass of friends. I heard it from my Raven after she threw her phone at the ground in excitement (and I imagine a fair bit of shock, too). We didn't celebrate in a mass of people, though there were plenty of impromptu celebrations all over our city. We celebrated together - just us. Then I went to work for the evening like nothing was different, except everything was. It took longer to sink in this time and the true meaning is still coming in flashes and pieces. My relationship is equal to a heterosexual relationship in the eyes of this country's highest court. I am a legal equal to my straight friends. I can enjoy the same rights and assurances other couples enjoy. I can make a conscious choice to not marry if I want (which for now I do). I have options. I have freedoms. I have a choice. I can exercise the benefit of a truth I have known for years - my love (and the love of other queer individuals) is not lesser in caliber or depth, nor is it less worthy of protection than that of heterosexual couples. 

I'm not going to dwell too much on the negative here, though it exists in abundance. The dissents were largely foolish and bordering on homophobic in a few cases. Though I will admit I felt no surprise in any them. I also feel little surprise in the response of some states that are now forces to comply with the high court's ruling. Alabama, Texas, Louisiana, and Kansas have all made official moves at some level to go against the Supreme Court's order. Louisiana, Kansas, and Alabama are flat out refusing to issue gay marriage licenses. Louisiana and Alabama say it is just a waiting period, basically to see if the law sticks. Kansas' governor and Attorney General said they needed to study the SCOTUS decision further before "making any moves" towards a lawsuit. They will presumably sue since they are one of the few states that has outlawed gay marriage by popular vote. Texas' Attorney General said in a statement to state clerks that they did not have to issue licenses that went against their religious beliefs and though they might face legal ramifications there would be lawyers lining up to defend them.

I'm not going to dwell on these now because I am hopeful that actions will be taken to enforce the ruling and these states will eventually fall in line. Change, when thrust upon the unwilling, is slow. And 11 years is a relatively short time for those unwilling to change (though it is an interminable wait for those on the other side as I can attest). For now I am choosing to remain positive and hopeful for the future. I think everyone working for equal rights and protections for the GLBT community realizes this is still only the beginning. We have so much more to work and strive for, but a victory still deserves celebration - if only to remind us that momentum matters and that victory will breed victory. Eventually enough victories will bring acceptance, tolerance, and understanding. The road is long, and much of it is uphill, but we do not walk it alone and last Friday the United States government joined the long march towards equality in a big way. I couldn't be prouder.

Best wishes,

Owl

P.S. Though not a case ruling the Supreme Court also placed a stay on an abortion law passed in Texas until the court can decide if it is going to hear the case. The law mandates that abortion providers operate like hospital surgical centers and for abortion providers to have stronger ties to local hospitals. The law has already forced the closing of almost half of Texas' 40 providers. In a big state that means a long drive to get an abortion (and probably even to get good, reliable information about getting an abortion). If SCOTUS takes the case it will be deciding if the law places a "undue burden" on abortion providers or on women's access to the service. Let's hope they take the case, but if they don't they've at least granted a brief reprieve for Texas' remaining clinics.

The Truth Resists Simplicity*

Tonight's post is going to be a more serious one, but I hope you'll read anyways.

I have been watching a lot of West Wing and listening to an astounding amount of NPR both in my car and at home. That combination is bound to put me in a more reflective and somber mind frame. And there has been a lot to reflect about this week. There always seems to be. This week stories on everything from the White House restricting militarized gear for local police to concern over the Rohingya refugees driven to the sea to escape Myanmar/Burma grabbed the headlines. Not to mention the fall of Ramadi in Iraq to the Islamic State. All of these stories are worthy of a great deal of consideration and attention, but the story that has captured my attention for the week is the ongoing saga of Boko Haram in Nigeria.

One of the reasons I am so keen on this story is that my knowledge of the African continent is woefully lacking. I can tell you a few things about Kenya. I could tell you Mt. Kilimanjaro is in Tanzania. I even kept pace with stories out of Darfur in the Sudan and about Al-Shabaab in Somalia, but always in a rather distant - not quite disinterested, but quite disengaged way. I have come to realize that it is hard for me to engage with African political affairs. It is a sentiment I imagine many citizens of the US suffer as well. We don't engage well because we weren't taught to. Africa isn't high on the list of priorities in public school curriculum. We talk about apartheid in South Africa. We talk about the pharaohs and Cleopatra in Egypt. We may even talk about Rwanda or Darfur in high school (though I certainly don't remember spending any significant amount of time on it). I remember one very zealous high school teacher of mine had us memorize the map of Africa (a few years later I had a college professor who assigned the same thing), but I'll admit to not remembering much of it now. And that's it. We have no context for our engagement.

I think it is easier for us to engage with something we know at least the basics of or something that has an immediate impact on our own lives. It seems likely that people will educate themselves on the Middle East, because it's on the news all the time. Our country has more strategic interest in that region - therefore more coverage of the situation and history of the area. People are more likely to put their energies there (and let's be honest, most people in this country aren't even doing that much). Back in 2006 CNN released findings from a report that showed almost 2/3 (more than 65%) couldn't point to Iraq on a world map. We had been actively involved in a war in that country for 3 years at that point! Though that was perhaps an unsurprisingly revelation when viewed alongside the fact that a whopping 33% of respondents couldn't locate Louisiana on a map (this was 6 months after Katrina) and Louisiana has a pretty distinctive shape! Not to mention it's in the country the respondents actually live in. I wonder how many of them could place Ramadi on a map (not sure I could).

So maybe we even have difficulty engaging with anything that isn't directly outside of ourselves. Our family, our friends, our neighborhood, our town, maybe our state. I don't want to wag a finger and say "for shame" to people that feel that way, because it's a tempting feeling. To disengage and look out for ourselves. It's easier and (after listening to hours of NPR I can tell you) a hell of a lot less depressing. BUT (and here's where I do a bit of finger wagging) the United States is a superpower. The biggest in the world at the moment. We talk a lot in this country (or at least our politicians and commentators certainly do) about having a moral imperative to intercede abroad to uphold democracy and freedom. If we are going to do that we have to have an informed electorate capable of evaluating candidates effectively to speak for us. So that means the difficult process of engagement. For me, that also means confronting the great Vlogbrother's maxim that "the truth resists simplicity". Nowhere is that more apparent than in history, politics, and religion - three things that intersect splendidly in the case of Boko Haram.

So I'm going to take a swing at engagement myself today and see if I can take some of you along for the ride. Let's delve into Boko Haram a bit. Today I'm just going to explain what Boko Haram claims to be and what it grew out of. But I urge you to do your own searching because there are layers upon layers of nuance and minutiae involved in this (as in every) news story.

Let's start off simple -
What is Boko Haram?
Founded in 2002 Boko Haram is a Muslim terrorist organization based out of Nigeria (Maiduguri to be precise in the northeast of Nigeria). According to this BBC article "[t]he group's official name is Jama'atu Ahlis Sunna Lidda'awati wal-Jihad, which in Arabic means 'People Committed to the Propagation of the Prophet's Teachings and Jihad.'" For my sake I'm going to refer to them by their Hausa name Boko Haram, which translated means "Western education forbidden" - Boko meaning western education and haram meaning forbidden.

What Do They Want?
What they wanted in the beginning was to oppose western education in northern Nigeria. What they want now is to overthrow the Nigerian government and create a Muslim caliphate in Nigeria. If that sounds familiar then you are clearly also listening to a lot of other extremist Muslim terrorist groups like the Islamic State and Al-Qaeda. It's hardly a new agenda.

Which brings us to... Are They Affiliated with Other Terrorist Organizations?
Yes. They have been affiliated with Al-Qaeda in the past, but since the rise of ISIS they have thrown in their cap with the ultra-violent extremist group and received recognition from that group.

But Who Exactly Are Boko Haram?
The founder of the group is Mohammed Yusuf, a Muslim cleric from Yobe State in northeastern Nigeria. He was killed in 2009 by Nigerian security forces after increased violence instigated by Boko Haram in Maiduguri. Though most thought Boko Haram finished after Yusuf's death, the group rallied under a new leader, Abubakar Shekau. Boko Haram recruits mainly from the Kanuri, an African ethnic group living in modern day Niger, Nigeria, and Cameroon. They are mainly Muslim. Many engage in the tradition of facial scarring. Their accent is also quite distinctive and they are an easily recognizable ethnic group within the country.

Where Did Boko Haram Come From?
So much for easy questions. This one is complicated and I'm not going to go into a lot of details, but for me this group can trace its beginnings to 1903 when the Sokoto caliphate fell to the British. Colonization leaves a long shadow and carving up the caliphate and imposing western education did not endear the British conquerors to their conquered. Like other extremist groups poverty also plays a large role in discontent in the region and therefore the formation of the group. It's no coincidence that some of the poorest areas of Nigeria are in the north, where Boko Haram makes its home. Young, unemployed, desperate men make for dangerous enemies. Between poverty and a historical dislike of the west you have some pretty good ingredients for anti-western extremism.

So Where Does the Complexity Come In?
The complexity is in the history in this case. There are hundreds, even thousands of years of history behind this area and the discontent is not new. And the west (and western-backed governments) clearly haven't been able to fix the problems for the region. At least at the group's core the dissatisfaction and mistrust with and of the west may very well be justified. As I said, colonization casts a long shadow. It is easy to dismiss this (and indeed all extremist groups) as "bad people" intent of causing death and chaos to upset the "good people" and the "good government", but nothing is ever that simple.
I won't argue that the people of Boko Haram aren't bad people. They're kidnapping school girls and raping them. They're forcing women to become child brides and adhere to laws they don't want (and shouldn't be forced) to follow. But they aren't mustache twirling villains out of Bond. Perhaps most importantly, they probably don't see themselves as the evil villains of the piece. They are just as convinced that we are the bad guys as we are convinced of the opposite. Their concerns aren't being honestly assessed and addressed (this is at least partly the fault of Boko Haram for pushing their agenda the way they do). But the group will never truly go away until the root of the problem is addressed. If we can't at least try to see it their way we are doomed to repeat this pattern again and again. There is a whole other side to this parallel - "the good guys". The Nigerian government is like any government, some people we would call good, some we would call corrupt and a whole lot in between.
The danger is to believe it is a simple conflict with a simple solution and a simple cause. History runs deep and memories last as long as we can hold our anger. And when you're hungry, poor, and see no promise of change for you or your children's future anger isn't hard to hold onto.



I know this a lot of information. And I know it's not easy to engage with it. There are a million "important" news stories out there. No one can really know them all. I can't tell you much about what's going with drug trafficking in Venezuela right now. Or with whatever our Congress is messing about with on the Hill. I focused on Boko Haram this week. There is a trade-off to be made. We can't do it all. But we can do something. We can make a commitment to knowing the world we live in. We can vow to look at that world with sympathy and compassion. We can try to see other countries as they see themselves, instead of imposing our culture and our norms on them.

The truth resists simplicity. But our minds love it. We have to look at the world critically, while keeping our minds open to the truth. That elusive ideal that can never quite be obtained.

Well Raven, I think that's all I've got in me for the night. I look forward to your update tomorrow (or I guess later today).



*Thanks to John Green for this gem of wisdom. You always keep me thinking.