Our Democracy Is in Crisis—but You Can Help Fix the Problem: Coachella Valley Independent’s Indy Digest: Sept. 12, 2024

Indy Digest: Sept. 12, 2024

“Whenever the people are well informed, they can be trusted with their own government; that whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice, they may be relied on to set them to rights.” —Thomas Jefferson to Richard Price, Jan. 8, 1789

On Sept. 15, hundreds of news outlets across the nation will mark Democracy Day. (We’re doing so today, just a smidge early.) Democracy Day got its start in 2022 “as an effort to encourage news organizations across the country to report more—and better—information about the crisis facing democracy here.”

And make no mistake: Our democracy is facing a crisis—largely because a disconcertingly wide swath of our electorate is not well-informed. I am not talking about disagreements of opinion; I am talking about information—verified truths and facts—and that millions of people today believe things that are flat-out wrong.

The biggest example of this in recent years: election denialism. To repeat something I have said before: If you have evidence of widespread election fraud, please bring it to me, and we will happily report on it. Seriously. I could use a Pulitzer Prize.

But so far, despite numerous court cases, investigations and subpoenas, there’s no evidence AT ALL that there was widespread voter fraud in 2020. Nonetheless, many politicians—former President Donald Trump, first and foremost—continue pushing this lie, and a lot of people truly believe it’s true, because they’ve placed their trust in leaders and institutions that keep pushing the lie.

Take, for example, Fox News. More than a year ago, Fox agreed to settle a massive lawsuit related to false claims regarding the 2020 election. As The Associated Press put it on April 18, 2023:

What can you do? It’s simple: To paraphrase Thomas Jefferson, make sure you are well informed, so you can be trusted with your own government. Check information for accuracy before spreading it on social media. Call out leaders and institutions who are spreading mistruths—and stand up for the leaders and institutions who are being factual, even if you disagree with their opinions.

Please. Our democracy depends on it.

—Jimmy Boegle

More News

• After the debate on Tuesday, Taylor Swift threw her support behind Kamala Harris. Will it make a difference in the election? A political scientist, writing for The Conversation, says it perhaps could: “Not many people will admit that they voted for a candidate because Oprah Winfrey or another celebrity told them to – so survey research will rarely find that celebrity endorsements are meaningful. About 89% of adults also said in February 2020 that they wouldn’t switch their vote because of a celebrity endorsement. However, this leaves 11% of American adults who said that they might change their preferred candidate based on what a celebrity said. Another 19% of younger voters also said in this same poll that a celebrity could help change their vote. In a close election, these voters at the margins could change a candidate’s fortunes.“

• Our partners at Calmatters report that cities across the state are cracking down on homeless encampments following that crucial U.S. Supreme Court ruling: “It’s been a little more than two months since the U.S. Supreme Court gave cities the green light to crack down on homeless encampments. Already, Santa Monica is considering barring its homeless residents from using sleeping bags, San Joaquin County is poised to force unhoused people to move 300 feet every hour, and Fresno has made it illegal to camp anywhere at any time—even if no shelter is available. At least 14 California cities and one county have passed new ordinances that prohibit camping or updated existing ordinances to make them more punitive, another dozen are considering new bans, and at least four have dusted off old camping bans that hadn’t been fully enforced in years. The cities taking action span the state, from the Bay Area, to the Central Valley, to Southern California. Many are places where voters lean conservative, but a few are cities run by Democrats, such as San Francisco, Long Beach and Antioch. The trend toward criminalization marks a significant shift in how California manages the more than 120,000 people who sleep on its streets and sidewalks, and it could lead to more arrests, citations and fines.”

• Related, and also from Calmatters: The number of homeless people in California continues to grow: “New data shows nearly 186,000 people now live on the streets and in homeless shelters in California, proving the crisis continues to grow despite increasing state and local efforts to stem the tide. That’s according to an exclusive Calmatters analysis of the latest results of the point-in-time count, a federally mandated census that requires counties to tally their unhoused residents over the course of one night or early morning in January. The count is up slightly from last year’s tally of about 181,000, and up 8% from 2022 (the last year most California counties counted people living in encampments). But there’s some good news: The rate at which the homelessness crisis is growing appears to have slowed. It grew 13% between 2019 and 2022, 13% between 2017 and 2019, and 16% between 2015 and 2017.”

• The governors of Nevada and Arizona this week sent a joint letter asking Gov. Gavin Newsom not to force California oil refineries to store more fuel. Politico explains: “The letter from Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo, a Republican, and Arizona Gov. Katie Hobbs, a Democrat, came in response to a Newsom-backed Assembly proposal, that would give the California Energy Commission authority to require refiners to store more gas to try to prevent price spikes caused by shortages. Newsom called a special session of the Legislature on Aug. 31 to consider the proposal after the Legislature balked at passing it in the last days of the regular session. … The governors of the neighboring states, which get a significant portion of their gas from California refineries, said they were concerned that ‘mandating refinery inventory would directly raise the cost of fuel for all of our constituencies and create further economic instability in the region.’ They cited refiner concerns that the requirements could induce shortages by keeping supply off the market to maintain the reserves. They also quoted a California Energy Commission letter that said a supply requirement came with the potential for shortages.”

• Consumer Reports says a disconcerting number of cinnamon products contain enough lead to trigger a recall. According to CBS News: “A year after recalled applesauce pouches containing cinnamon left more than 500 kids with lead poisoning, new research is offering further cause for concern regarding the popular spice used in baked goods and frequently sprinkled on coffee and oatmeal. Consumer Reports found troubling levels of lead in one-third of ground cinnamon and cinnamon-containing spice blends it tested, according to the findings released Thursday. The tests involved brands carried by mainstream grocery stores as well as those that sell international foods. Purchased from 17 stores in Connecticut, New Jersey, New York and online, 12 of 36 brands measured above 1 part per million of lead—the threshold that triggers a recall in New York, the only U.S. state to regulate heavy metals in spices, according to the advocacy group.”

• And finally … forever chemicals are in the news again, but you’ll never guess WHY they are in the news in this case. We’ll turn it over to Reuters to explain: “A new lawsuit on Monday claims that Trojan condoms are not safe because they contain toxic ‘forever chemicals,’ which have been linked to cancer. In a proposed class action filed in Manhattan federal court, the plaintiff Matthew Goodman said Church & Dwight’s products, advertised as ‘America’s #1 Condom,’ are unfit for their intended purpose because they contain per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS. Goodman said independent lab testing of the Trojan Ultra Thin condoms that he bought at a Manhattan pharmacy found a presence of organic fluorine, which is ‘practically nonexistent’ outside its use in man-made PFAS chemicals. ‘Based on the label, he reasonably believed the product was safe for use on his genitalia,’ the complaint said, referring to Goodman.”

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