Ricketts Can Stick It

(Editor's Note: Katie, this one's for you.)

With the midterm elections coming up the blitzkrieg of campaign commercials is in full swing. Working at a TV station means once I step out of my office, it's nearly impossible to avoid seeing what we're currently broadcasting. Throughout the day I catch snippets of game shows, soap operas, and talk shows. I also see more than my fair share of commercials, which by the way seem to be of a much lower quality than those shown during prime time, but, that's beside the point. Recently it seems I simply can't escape Pete Ricketts' cue ball-like visage calling out from the TV screen and telling me why I should vote for him. It's about all I can do to keep myself from screaming at him to shut it. This would, after all, prove to be rather counterproductive. First of all, he can't hear me since he's on the TV and not in the same room with me, and second, I think my coworkers might think that I've lost it (if they don't already).

You see, Pete Ricketts is running for senate here in Nebraska. And while I have nothing against him personally, since I've never met the guy, his commercials really make my blood boil. Is it because he's a Conservative Republican? Honestly, the answer is no. Having lived it either Nebraska or Kansas my entire life, I've grown accustomed to seeing conservatives espouse their points of view in campaign commercials. I may disagree with their views (although I do have some conservative views of my own), but disagreeing with someone's political views is not something that sets me off. So what does infuriate me about the Ricketts ads? It's that Ricketts' messages are often times hidden in political code, misleading, or outright lies.

In almost all of his ads Ricketts says he's for "conservative change." Since he's running for senate here in Nebraska, I really can't see the logic in that statement. Yes, Nebraska currently has a Democratic senator in Ben Nelson, but he too is considered conservative. Nelson votes with the Republican Party almost as much as he votes with his own party. So, I guess Ricketts' idea of conservative change would mean a senator that votes Republican more often, or more likely, all of time. Still, that's all pretty straightforward stuff, nothing really misleading there and nothing I really take umbrage with. It's when Ricketts focuses in from the broader "conservative change" platform to more specific changes he has in mind that I start to get hot under the collar.

In ads like "Believe" Ricketts posits that the government has gotten out of touch with mainstream American values. Again, I'm in almost total agreement with Mr. Ricketts there. Where we differ however, is apparently on what those values are. But I can't really attack someone's belief system, even if they seem to calling for the abolition of the Separation of Church and State. What I can attack is Ricketts' platform. So I think the Ricketts' spot "Intro," is a good place to start. In this spot, Ricketts say this:

"I'll cut spending and pork to balance the budget, enforce our laws to stop illegal immigration, eliminate the death tax and promote ethanol, and I'll work to protect life and support conservative judges."

In principal, I would be with Ricketts on what he is planning to do. Balance the budget? I'm all for it. Enforce our laws to stop illegal immigration? It's a pretty complex issue, but I'll say I'm for that as well. Hell, I even went to his website and agreed with almost all of his immigration proposals. One thing though, how exactly is Pete Ricketts going to "enforce our laws to stop illegal immigration?" Is he going to patrol the border himself? I'm sure that it was probably just a bad choice of words, but as a senator I don't think he'll have too much time to be out protecting our borders personally. Promote ethanol? Sounds good to me. So, that's three out of six. What about the other three? Well, that's where Pete tends to get a little misleading and where we start to disagree.

So, Ricketts wants to "eliminate the death tax." Let's be clear, there is no such thing as a death tax. This is republican code for the estate tax. In one spot, "Tax Squeeze," Ricketts claims "farm families struggle with... the unfair death tax." Ricketts is either misinformed or lying. Either way the ads are misleading. How? Well, eliminating the estate tax would not really help our farmers. I can tell you who it would help though, and that's rich families. Really rich families, like say, the family of the former C.O.O. and current board of directors member for Ameritrade. You know, families like the Ricketts.

You see, guys like Ricketts are selling this idea that the estate tax is making families lose their farms or small businesses when the head of the family dies. This could not be more false. In fact, Iowa State University Economist Neil Harl has searched extensively for, but never found, a farm lost to the estate tax. Even so, the estate tax could still harm the families financially, right? Doubtfully, since according to New York Times Writer and Pulitzer Prize Winner David Cay Johnston only 2% of Americans will owe estate taxes. What's more, Johnston goes on to say this:

"Yet tax return data show that very few farmers pay estate taxes. Only 6,216 taxable estates in 1999 included any agricultural land and equipment, the I.R.S. report shows. The average value of these farm assets was $440,000, only about a third of the amount that any married couple could leave untaxed to heirs. What is more, a farm couple can pass $4.1 million untaxed, so long as the heirs continue farming for 10 years."

So, it doesn't really sound like farmers need to be protected now does it? It sounds to be like Ricketts is really being rather self serving in the guise of helping farmers since, according to Johnston, nearly half of the estate tax is paid by the 3,000 or so people who each year leave taxable estates of more than $5 million. How many farmers do you know who are worth more than $5 million? I'm guessing not many. Now, maybe I'm just being cynical, but since according to a December 17 AP Article, TD Waterhouse paid Pete Ricketts' father, Joe Ricketts, $535.9 million in dividends for his share in Ameritrade, that maybe, just maybe, that has something to do with him wanting to abolish the "death tax?" Just a thought.

So, can you see why I say his ads are often misleading? Now, on to Ricketts' pledge to "protect life." Again, I'm all for the idea of protecting life. And if Pete Ricketts wants to dress up in some kind of costume to stop crime and protect innocent people from harm, well, I'm all for that, too. Not because I'm pro-vigilante or anything, but because it would be pretty funny. However, I think we all know that when he says he's for "protecting life" that's really political code for "I'm against abortion rights and stem cell research." If you didn't come to that conclusion on your own, well, he comes closer to spelling it out for in his ad "Priorities." And if you're still not convinced, on his website Ricketts says, "To encourage a culture of life we must... support an end to federal funding for embryonic stem cell research and cloning."

I'm not really going to get too far into this one, except to say a couple of things. First, I think it's easy for rich, white guys to say we should get rid of abortions. I think that it's ludicrous to make that decision for women, when you can't even carry a child yourself. Second, when he was in office, President Clinton said that he wanted to make abortions "safe, legal, and rare." And he did. In fact, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a nonprofit research organization focused on sexual and reproductive health, abortion rates fell about 17.4% during his presidency, or an average decrease of 1.7% per year. Under President Bush, the abortion rate is still going down, but at a much slower rate of about 0.9%. Maybe Ricketts should look into what's causing that instead, and try to fix it. That way, maybe we can get the abortions down to a number that we all want, which is 0. Because even if you ban abortions outright, they're not going to stop until we stop what's causing them to happen in the first place.

Finally, with regards to Ricketts' stance on stem cell research, no matter what Ricketts and others try and tell you, embryonic stem cells do not come from babies, they come from blastocysts. According to the National Institute of Health a blastocyst is "a preimplantation embryo of about 150 cells." That's 150 cells, not a living being. What makes me say that? Well, according to an article from the Stanford Medicine Magazine "until the blastocyst actually implants in the uterus (seven to eight days after conception), it cannot possibly develop into a person." Another interesting fact the article points out is that "in the normal course of human reproduction, about 60 percent of embryos spontaneously abort and are simply flushed in the course of the menstrual cycle." But don't tell Pete Ricketts that last one, because next thing know, he'll be trying to stop women from having their periods, too.

Okay, so that one wasn't really misleading. If he really, truly, honestly believes that his stance on abortions and stem cell research will save lives, I can't really get mad at him about that. But I can disagree. Just like I disagree with Ricketts' pledge to "support conservative judges." Now, that sounds pretty straight forward, right? It may sound straight forward, and actually if he would have left it at that, I probably would have left that comment alone. However, when I went to Pete Ricketts' website, I read this Ricketts quote, referring obviously to conservative judges in general, but the nomination of Samuel Alito in particular:

“I support conservative judicial nominees who understand it is their job to interpret the law, not create it.”

That is what I call a lie. It's a lie because he really wants conservative judges so can push his conservative agenda, plain and simple. So, why can't he say just say that? Instead he has to lie about his motives while simultaneously inferring that all judges who aren't conservative are what the Right likes to call "activist judges." But before I get into why, once again, Ricketts is just espousing inaccurate platitudes rather than facts, I better explain what an activist judge is.

An activist judge is someone who, to paraphrase Mr. Ricketts, creates law, rather than interprets it. According to our Constitution, laws are not to be made by the Judicial Branch, but rather the Legislative Branch (i.e. Congress). Since Congress is made up of elected officials, this was to give us, the people, a voice in creating our laws. This is where terms like "the law of the land" come from. Therefore, according to Yale Law's Paul Gewirtz and Chad Golder:

"Declaring an act of Congress unconstitutional is the boldest thing a judge can do."

"Of course, calling Congressional legislation into question is not necessarily a bad thing. If a law is unconstitutional, the court has a responsibility to strike it down. But a marked pattern of invalidating Congressional laws certainly seems like one reasonable definition of judicial activism."

So using that metric, Gewirtz and Golder set out to rate how "activist" the Supreme Court Justices are by the percentage of times a justice voted to invalidate Congressional Laws. Here are each of the Justices and what their percentages were according to that study:

Thomas 65.63%
Kennedy 64.06%
Scalia 56.25%
Rehnquist 46.88%
O’Connor 46.77%
Souter 42.19%
Stevens 39.34%
Ginsburg 39.06%
Breyer 28.13%

Huh. That's funny. It looks like the more conservative you are, the more activist you are. It' almost THE EXACT OPPOSITE of what Ricketts and his ilk would have you believe. I mean, George H.W. Bush's appointee Clarence Thomas leads the pack with voting to overturn Congressional laws 65.63% of the time. Guess who nominated Justice Stephen Breyer, who has the lowest rating? Why none other that President William Jefferson Clinton. Boy, I sure hope Pete Ricketts reads this study, so he can really start pushing for liberal judges since he really just wants judges who "interpret the law."

What a joke.

Anyhow, that's why I can't stand Pete Ricketts. I hope the last time I see him is after he concedes in the Republican Primary. Unfortunately, I don't see this happening, as according to a recent poll Ricketts is leading his closest challenger, Don Stenberg, by 10 points. Actually, I hope he does win the Republican nomination so that in the general election Ben Nelson (who is enjoying an approval rating of 73%) destroys him. I just don't think I could take a mega-millionaire conservative senator representing our state. We already have one as President, and look at how well that's turned out.