Close readings: Heintzelman’s brush with potential dissent

Colin Kaepernick kneels during the national anthem.

Colin Kaepernick kneels during the national anthem.

Indy reporter and Missoula’s actual best journalist Derek Brouwer sent me this tweet from Missoulian publisher Mark Heintzelman, who narrowly avoided witnessing a protest at the annual meeting of the Chamber of Commerce. Granted, no one actually protested. But they might have, given the way things are going in this country. Quote:

Our colors were just presented at the annual meeting of the @MissoulaChamber and, thankfully, everybody stood.

What a relief! Again, no one knelt or raised one fist in the air or conveyed anything but deferential respect for the flag—sorry, “our colors,” because apparently we’re all sailors in the War of 1812—but if they had, Heintzelman would have been against it. He sounds a little disappointed no one did. Close reading after the jump.

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SEC disclosure petition makes half of America insane

The other, much more fun SEC that this post is not about

The other, more fun SEC that this post is not about

Last Thursday, House Republicans introduced a bill that would make it illegal for the SEC to require publicly-held corporations to disclose their political spending. They did so in response to a popular petition asking the SEC to require publicly-held corporations to et cetera etc. At this point, the GOP is by far the most responsive party in American politics. The people issue a petition, and before the relevant government agency can even take it up, the Republicans have drafted a law demanding that it never be satisfied. They cited free speech. Welcome to the extremely ironic world of modern campaign finance.

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