(Permanent Musical Accompaniment To This Post)

Being our semi-regular weekly survey of what's goin' down in the several states where, as you know, the real work of governmentin' gets done, and where the whole kitchen explodes from boiling fat.

We begin this week in, of all places, the Commonwealth (God save it!), where things are even wilder than usual on Beacon Hill. A state representative named Daniel Hunt proposed the following amendment to the General Laws of the Commonwealth (God save it!).

A person who uses the word “bitch” directed at another person to accost, annoy, degrade or demean the other person shall be considered to be a disorderly person in violation of this section, and shall be subject to the penalties provided in subsections (a) and (b). A violation of this subsection may be reported by the person to whom the offensive language was directed at or by any witness to such incident.

Of course, this has set off the usual aneurysms among our First Amendment warriors on the right. Truth be told, the whole thing is a bit silly, and the controversy has become even sillier than the idea. From the Boston Globe:

“She e-mailed me, and it was right around filing deadline,” he said, adding that he normally receives many requests from advocates of various issues. “We’ll file it to get it in the process.” Hunt declined to identify the constituent and would not say whether he supported the bill. The state’s Republican Party mocked the bill in several tweets.

Constituent service is hell.

The statehouse looms in the Commonwealth (God save it!). Paul Marotta Getty Images

We move along now to Texas to check in on disgraced Speaker of the Texas House Dennis Bonnen who, along his other peccadillos—which is a smaller version of the armadillo, I believe—seems to hate local government more than would seem to be proper for a conservative Republican, because, as we know, conservative Republicans believe in empowering the government that is closest to the people. From the Corpus Christi Caller Times:

Bonnen rose to the third most powerful elected position in Texas government, behind the governor and lieutenant governor. He evidently was on a serious drunk-with-power binge when a weaselly political operative secretly recorded him spouting off about how the operative could help him knock off some state representatives he wanted out of office...

Bonnen's disdain for home rule, while tangential to his supposedly bigger story, has more impact on you. Here's a key quote from the secret recording: “Any mayor, county judge that was dumb-ass enough to come meet with me, I told them with great clarity, my goal is for this to be the worst session in the history of the Legislature for cities and counties.” ...

Since 2015, when Gov. Greg Abbott took office and became the standard-bearer for putting local governments in a lowly subordinate place, they have lost the right to protect trees, require fingerprint checks of Uber drivers and limit or prohibit single-use plastic bags. If your senator or representative was against any of that, he or she failed to stop all of it.

As should be obvious by now, every tenet with which the conservative movement based itself, and every bit of its philosophical identity, was a sham and a hoax and a lie. And all of it is running completely out of gas at every level of government, and all the wires are showing.

Lee Chatfield is busy. David Eggert/AP/Shutterstock

We move along to Michigan, where something interesting is happening in regards to one of the most noire of this shebeen's betes. The Balanced Budget Amendment, as we know, is the Worst Idea In American Politics. An elected judiciary is second. Third is that perennial hobby-horse, term limits. Basically, they suck. They are undemocratic. Almost every politician who supports them is a howling hypocrite. And they guarantee that we have a permanent government-by-lobbyist.

Now, as if to confirm every bad thing I ever thought about term limits, the Republicans in the Michigan legislature, with the political tides running against them, suddenly have discovered a desire to "ease" the state's term limits law. From the AP via WMMT:

"Not much is finalized just yet, but I am proud to be working together in a bipartisan way with everyone who is willing to come to the table with real ideas for how to improve state government and make our elected officials more responsive and accountable to the people they represent," House Speaker Lee Chatfield, a Levering Republican, said Tuesday after the discussions were first reported by Lansing-based Michigan Information & Research Service.

Michigan voters enacted term limits in 1992 that allow legislators to serve 14 years, including three two-year House terms and two four-term Senate terms. They are viewed as the most restrictive among the 15 states with consecutive or lifetime legislative term limits.

The sweetener is some new "good government" measures regarding transparency in state government. Michigan apparently needs them.

Michigan is one of two states to wholly exempt both legislators and governor's office from disclosing communications and other information to the public. Unlike most states, Michigan also has no mandatory "cooling off" period before a government official may register as a lobbyist, except when a legislator resigns from office.

Wow. Sweet deal. I'm surprised there isn't a fleet of U-Hauls pulling up outside the Massachusetts State House, headed for Michigan.

And we conclude, as is our custom, in the great state of Oklahoma, where Blog Official Skink Wrangler Friedman of the Plains brings us the saga of a man deprived of his constitutional right to scare the hell out of drunken people. From the Tulsa World:

The leader of an Oklahoma Second Amendment advocacy group said Tuesday he plans to take legal action after Tulsa police officers refused to allow him to enter Oktoberfest while in possession of a concealed handgun.

Oklahoma Second Amendment Association President Don Spencer posted a video on YouTube of an encounter Friday between him, at least two retired officers working event security and at least three Tulsa police officers. In the video, which is almost nine minutes in length, Spencer presents his Self-Defense Act license and tells the officers state law allows him to be on the premises at River West Festival Park with a concealed firearm.

But about six minutes and 45 seconds into the clip, Sgt. Chris Witt says to Spencer, “You can step outside here or you can go to jail for trespassing. Your choice. Right now.”

A bunch of drunk people singing German songs in a beer hall and a loud guy with a gun. What does history tell us can go wrong with that?

This is your democracy, America. Cherish it.

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Charles P. Pierce Charles P Pierce is the author of four books, most recently Idiot America, and has been a working journalist since 1976.

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