By Jonathan Miller, on Fri Feb 3, 2012 at 8:30 AM ET In the wake of his notorious call to legalize marijuana, the RP is now taking up a much less controversial cause — that of legalizing the production and sale of pot’s non-narcotic cousin, industrial hemp. Because of public misunderstanding and stereotypes, a product that could be an enormous economic boon for America — and especially the RP’s home state of Kentucky — is the grossly unfair victim of the overreaching war on drugs.
In this week’s edition of , the RP challenges the Kentucky business community to get behind bipartisan legislation to put the Commonwealth at the forefront of hemp legalization efforts. Here’s an excerpt:
When new Agriculture Commissioner Jamie Comer—a rising star of the Kentucky Republican Party—and State Senator Joey Pendleton—a long-time and well-respected Democratic leader—joined last week to endorse a major public policy proposal, political insiders took notice of the much-too-rare instance of bipartisanship.
But when the two mostly conservative politicians revealed that their common objective was the legalization of industrial hemp, the halls of Frankfort let out a collective gasp.
That’s because the subject of hemp legalization, while discussed and debated for decades, has been mostly seen as a cause célèbre of the political margins, either the “hippie” Far Left or the libertarian Far Right. And the politician most associated with hemp’s advocacy was the perennial candidate and courthouse jester of Kentucky politics, the recently deceased Gatewood Galbraith.
But as the Comer/Pendleton alliance reveals, public support for industrial hemp legalization—particularly within the agri-cultural community (both men are active farmers)—is reaching a tipping point.
And it’s time for Kentucky’s business community to shoulder-pad-up and push legalized industrial hemp across the goal line.
Click here to read the RP’s full piece in Business Lexington.
By Jonathan Miller, on Mon Jan 30, 2012 at 5:00 PM ET The RP: Closing Argument
[The RP’s Provocation, Artur Davis’s Rebuttal #1; Ron Granieri’s Rebuttal #2; Natasha Dow Schüll’s Analysis; Spectrum Gaming Group’s Analysis; Jason Grill’s Rebuttal #3; The RP’s First Defense; Jason Grill’s First Response; Artur Davis’ First Response; David Host’s Rebuttal #4]
I’m going to resist the urge to rebut David Host’s full-throated defense of trickle-down economics — we will leave that for another day.
I’ll close instead on a harmonizing note. Too often the two sides of the gambling debate are boiled down to self-righteous moralists versus selfish libertarians. (Indeed, more often the media focuses on the politics rather than the underlying policy debate.) In fact, whether we are discussing casinos, sports betting, or even a state lottery, there are valuable and valued moral arguments on each side of the issue.
Read the rest of…
The RPs Debate Gambling: The RP’s Closing Argument
By Jonathan Miller, on Mon Jan 30, 2012 at 1:00 PM ET The RP‘s First Defense
[The RP’s Provocation, Artur Davis’s Rebuttal #1; Ron Granieri’s Rebuttal #2; Natasha Dow Schüll’s Analysis; Spectrum Gaming Group’s Analysis; Jason Grill’s Rebuttal #3]
I guess it’s fitting that the guy who opened up this can of worms will be the first to try to shut it a bit.
I’m agnostic about Jason’s idea when it is applied to professional sports. I think players are paid too much these days for the threat of Black Sox-era thrown ballgames return. Pete Rose’s stupidity is the modern exception; when most professional players cheat today, it is in reference to the substances they ingest or inject, not the influence of gamblers and loan sharks.
My problem with Jason’s argument is how it applies to college athletics. I’ve written at this site — and more recently both Taylor Branch and Joe Nocera have written brilliant searing, substantive essays — about corruption in college sports, particularly of the extraordinary unfairness towards the unpaid athletes who are earning universities and their coaches millions of dollars.
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The RPs Debate Gambling: The RP Defends
By Jonathan Miller, on Mon Jan 30, 2012 at 8:30 AM ET Over the past three weeks, we’ve launched a new tradition at The Recovering Politician: a great virtual debate on the issues of the day among our recovering politicians; with provocations, rebuttals, responses, and defenses. Our first discussion focused on presidential leadership; our second on legalizing marijuana; and our third, Tim Tebow.
This week, the RP stirs up the mix with another controversial subject: the morality of gambling The RP starts off with his provocative article from The Huffington Post. Tune in every half hour to read what other RPs have to say.
SPOILER ALERT: There will be fireworks.
The RP‘s Provocation:
It was one of those awkward, seemingly-endless moments that elicited pained winces from both secular liberals and those of us who believe that prayer is a sacred communication with God.
Rev. Hershael York stepped up to the Speaker’s lectern, before a televised joint session of the Kentucky General Assembly, purportedly to deliver the opening prayer. Instead, he launched into a blistering political diatribe, attacking Gov. Steve Beshear’s signature proposal to generate tax revenue by expanding gaming in the Commonwealth:
May [the Legislature] never resort to leveraging vice and avarice to pay our bills… May they not lead this state to share profits from an industry that preys on greed or desperation. Help us to foster salaries, not slot machines, to build cars and enable jobs, not license casinos and seduce the simple into losing what they have.
While York’s oration was as inappropriate as it was unsubtle, it certainly reflected a widely-shared worldview within the conservative Christian community: Gambling is immoral, and its creeping sprawl through Middle America should be contained.
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The RPs Debate Gambling: The RP Provokes
By RP Staff, on Wed Jan 25, 2012 at 11:00 AM ET  As the nation celebrates the miraculous recovery of Congresswoman Gabrielle “Gabby” Giffords, who was grievously wounded just over a year ago — and who has decided to retire from Congress today — The RP spoke to the Washington Times about Gabby’s legacy:
For Ms. Giffords, civility had been an issue well before the shooting.
Even before she won her seat in Congress, she was part of the inaugural class of the Aspen Institute’s leadership program, designed to foster better sharing and cooperation on ideas among elected officials.
One of her fellow classmates was Jonathan Miller, then the treasurer of Kentucky, who would go on to co-found No Labels, a group that pushes elected officials to move past partisanship and who said Ms. Giffords has become a symbol of “a return to civility and a return to developing relationships.”
“That’s what Gabby’s career is all about,” he said.
His group and Third Way, a progressive-leaning think tank, want to institutionalize the bipartisan State of the Union seating, which Third Way and some lawmakers came up with in the wake of the Tucson shooting.
“There was that very temporary surge [in civility], and it was quickly forgotten it seems,” Mr. Miller said. “But I think in that temporary surge there were a number of efforts that got their germination, including No Labels, that really have picked up a lot of steam and a lot of energy.”
Click here to read the full Washington Times article.
The RP additionally was quoted yesterday in the National Journal on last night’s bi-partisan seating at the State of the Union address, also a legacy of Giffords’ service:
Part of the push for bipartisan seating comes from independent groups like Third Way and No Labels, which took out a full-page ad in the New York Times earlier this month. But are they really expecting Republicans and Democrats sitting next to each other to solve partisan gridlock?
Last year’s State of the Union included bipartisan seating in response to the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.). But that didn’t exactly lay the groundwork for a productive and cooperative 2011.
“It won’t have any dramatic short-term effect,” admitted Jonathan Miller, a co-founder of No Labels and the former treasurer of Kentucky.
But, Miller said, if bipartisan seating gets institutionalized, it could make a difference. And he said that “it’s a signal to the public that [lawmakers] are taking their demand for less hyper-partisanship seriously.”
No Labels has also been tracking the announced bipartisan seating pairs.
Click here to read the full National Journal piece.
By Jonathan Miller, on Tue Jan 24, 2012 at 12:30 PM ET
By Jonathan Miller, on Tue Jan 24, 2012 at 11:45 AM ET Kudos to LEO Weekly News (Louisville) political reporter Joe Sonka for the headline on his story of U.S. Senator Rand Paul’s encounter yesterday with the TSA: “The Glitch Set Me Up!”
For those of you too young to get the pun, click here.
By Jonathan Miller, on Mon Jan 23, 2012 at 4:30 PM ET  The RP‘s Closing Argument
[The RP’s Provocation; Artur Davis’ Rebuttal #1; Rod Jetton’s Rebuttal #2; John Y. Brown, III’s Rebuttal #3; Ron Granieri’s Rebuttal #4; Robert Kahne’s Rebuttal #5; Artur Davis’ First Response; Michael Steele’s Rebuttal #6; The RP’s First Defense; David Host’s Rebuttal #7; Zack Adams’ Rebuttal #8; Artur Davis’ Second Response; Rod Jetton’s First Response; Ron Crandall’s Rebuttal #9; Jason Grill’s Rebuttal #10]
In the long, storied history of the RP Great Debates (OK, it’s only been three weeks…), we’ve never had so many participants and so many opinions. There is something about Tim Tebow that certainly strikes a chord in so many Americans.
But to conclude where I began, the civility and positivity that Tim Tebow has added to the public dialogue is remarkable, particularly considering the hostility of some of his supporters and his detractors. And what’s even more remarkable is that the kid is only 24 years old! To be the idol of of millions and the devil to others, and to still retain such a modicum of humility is truly admirable.
Read the rest of…
The RPs Debate Tim Tebow: The RP’s Closing Argument
By Jonathan Miller, on Mon Jan 23, 2012 at 1:00 PM ET The RP‘s First Defense
[The RP’s Provocation; Artur Davis’ Rebuttal #1; Rod Jetton’s Rebuttal #2; John Y. Brown, III’s Rebuttal #3; Ron Granieri’s Rebuttal #4; Robert Kahne’s Rebuttal #5; Artur Davis’ First Response; Michael Steele’s Rebuttal #6]
This debate has sparked so many wonderfully different tangents. (That, or I am just high in the moment of Tom Brady moving up my list of Pretty Boys I Begrudgingly Admire. And no, it wasn’t for leading my beloved Pats to the Super Bowl, but rather for admitting before 40 million Americans that “I sucked today, but our defense saved us.”)
I want to unfurl one of the threads here; and of course, in the spirit of my political recovery mission to grab onto any third rail issue I can, I want to address an subject alluded to by both Michael Steele and Rod Jetton:
Abortion.
Despite my own über-feminism — the product of the extraordinary influences of brilliant women from my mom to my sis to Mrs. RP to the RPettes — I’ve always been quite conflicted on the issue. Yes, ultimately, I believe that the woman should have the right to make the awful decision, but I’ve never viewed it as an expression of empowerment, or even “reproductive freedom.” I’ve simply concluded that if abortion were illegal, women would still have them, and too many girls and poor women would die or suffer serious injury at the hands of illegal abortionists.
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The RPs Debate Tim Tebow: The RP Defends
By Jonathan Miller, on Mon Jan 23, 2012 at 8:30 AM ET Over the past two weeks, we’ve launched a new tradition at The Recovering Politician: a great virtual debate on the issues of the day among our recovering politicians; with provocations, rebuttals, responses, and defenses. Our first discussion focused on presidential leadership; our second on legalizing marijuana.
This week, the RP goes where no progressive has gone before: a liberal defense of Tim Tebow. The RP starts off with his provocative article from The Huffington Post. Tune in every half hour to read what other RPs have to say.
SPOILER ALERT: There will be fireworks.
The RP‘s Provocation
Like much of the spiral-pass-challenged intelligentsia, I’ve held a high-school-rooted grudge against many of America’s handsomest sports heroes; they too often remind me of the spoiled jocks who applied wedgies, received special treatment in the classroom and always got the girl. Fortunately, Tom Brady (the supermodel-marrying quarterback of my beloved New England Patriots) helped relieve me of this affliction. (Click here to read my ode to pretty boys I begrudgingly admire.)
Tim Tebow, of course, presents a different and, indeed, unique case. (The 24-year-old virgin isn’t exactly stealing and breaking the hearts of other guys’ girls.) Tebow instead plays to a different one of my childhood insecurities — that of being one of the few Jewish kids in my Bible Belt home of Lexington, Kentucky.
Certainly, there’s no athlete in recent memory who’s worn his Christian faith more on his sleeve — and sometimes even his eyeblack — than Tim Tebow. Tebow’s constant public declarations of devotion to Jesus Christ remind many of us non-Christians and Christian liberals of the small — but much-over-publicized — collection of angry tele-evangelists and hypocritical politicians who manipulate religion to multiply support by fostering division.
Read the rest of…
The RPs Debate Tim Tebow: The RP Provokes
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