Don Young in His Own Words – Part 1 of 2
I’ve tried and tried, but there’s really no way to actually describe Alaska Rep. Don Young. OK “idiot” works to a degree - but it’s so much more nuanced and complex than just simple idiocy. Usually when confronted with the prospect of writing about Don Young, the best thing to do is just let him speak for himself. Watching an interview with him is fascinating. It’s like watching a chameleon, or one of those cuttlefish that change colors so fast you can hardly wrap your mind around what they were just doing before they’re on to something else. The problem with listening to him is that every once in a while he sounds like he’s making sense, just like a broken clock that is right twice a day. And we grab on to that time because it makes sense, but then we find ourselves clinging to the hands of the clock while we hurtle into the netherworld of delusion, never quite sure how we got there.
So, buckle up.
Matt Felling got an opportunity he likely will never forget. This week, Lisa Murkowski was unavailable for her usual interview on the weekly segment ”A View from the Hill,” and Felling got to sit down for a 20 minute in-studio interview with the man that we like to call Yon Dung – Congressman for All Alaska – the man who, in the face of mighty and compelling evidence to the contrary believes that a bolo tie with the Alaska State Flag, and his own signature monogrammed on his shirt make a positive and powerful statement of competence.
I have partially transcribed the interview below. I pulled out the best bits. If you want the entire crazy cuttlefish experience you can play the whole thing.
On Alaska Statehood -
“I arrived here the year they voted for statehood, and I wasn’t over excited about that by the way, I have to say that. Had no idea I was going to be a congressman, but I came up here for the “last frontier” and I figured if we became a state we might lose that, and in a way we have – through legislation, and designation of lands and the restriction of use of state lands because of proximity to federal lands… but it’s been a great ride.”
Attention Alaska Natives. Please note the bold section. Don Young, your only elected official in the United States House of Representatives actually thinks that maybe it would have been better if we had not become a state, because it meant the “designation of lands.” Alaska Native Land Claims Settlement Act anyone? He’d rather not have had to deal with all that pesky “giving you rights to your land back” and stuff. What an inconvenience. And statehood? Meh. But gee, since we had to go and bee a state (eye roll) he may as well suck it up and be a congressman for 37 YEARS! (Deep breath…)
On His Ties to Corruption and the Ongoing FBI Investigation -
“Well and you know, that’s old news. It’s been three years. I’m confident when I started I tried to explain that there’s nothing wrong. This is led by innuendos and uh, and by rumors. Um, if I didn’t believe I was totally innocent, I wouldn’t be running. Uh, but this is the way this system works. And so my job is to make sure the explanation when it is appropriate will be made, and we’ll see, you know, it’s what occurs and I just have to continue to stick my guns and make sure that I present my point of view in the sense that I’m not allowed to make any more comment that I just did.”
Why has he spent millions of dollars on attorneys in the last two years? Why is he being investigated by the FBI? pfft… That’s old news.
Is Congress Broken?
“… there are groups of people now that don’t want to be legislators. They just want the idea of power within their party. And I argue that isn’t necessarily good, because we’re not doing what we should be doing and we transfer more power to the executive branch. The executive branch gets stronger stronger through the ages it passed regulatory laws. Here in Alaska you’ve got the beluga listing of endangered species. That’s from a regulatory law, not from the act itself. And I go the the polar bear – that’s regulatory law. The Clean Air Act itself is from being use as a regulatory law because we don’t have the capability of putting it together to say “no more.” You know I’m surprised congress has and I’m going to actually been promoting this with I call “we can do it” party – stop funding these agencies when they’re doing things against the intent of the congress. That’s the way to solve this problem. We don’t fund them, they can’t do it.”
Sooo… if the EPA wants to regulate the Clean Air Act, or if we want to use the Endangered Species Act to protect belugas and polar bears, Don Young says we should just cut funding to the EPA? Yeah, that’ll show ‘em.
On His Re-election -
“I know some people, even in Alaska, “Oh you gotta get rid of Don Young,” Ok, get rid of him. What have you got? Nothing. Because hostility will still be there only more so because I’m one of those people that do work together with people and will continue to do that.”
If there are any U.S. Representatives out there who want to talk to me about how Don Young is such a great uniter and even the Democrats want to keep him around, and how if he leaves everything is REALLY going to go to Hell, feel free to email me. The way I see it, is if we get rid of Don Young, we’ve got Harry Crawford. I can live with that.
On the Biggest Problem in Congress -
“Now, back East, we’ve gotten into this trap now – most people, frankly from the urban areas, now if you really want to know the truth, that’s the biggest problem of our congress. Most of the congressmen are elected from San Francisco, Miami, New York, Kansas City, Dallas, Houston, L.A. and Seattle. They have no concept what Alaska’s about or their own states as far as that goes. Now I feel sorry in California, I came from California originally, but they have elected a bunch of dodos in the congress because they don’t have any understanding of the state. They’re ruining that state. They’re about 22 billion dollars in the hole, and they’re driving business out right and left, not through taxation but they can’t do anything. And Arnold Schwarzenegger, the Terminator… he’s terminated the state of Alaska as far as I’m concerned. I just think it’s a terrible thing. and they lost contact with the people and that’s where the angst comes from with the Tea Party.”
Yes, you heard it here, the “biggest problem in congress” is…. representative democracy!
Matt Felling points out the concept of representative democracy-
“But that doesn’t keep democracy healthy. Most democracies have collapsed. Most social countries, countries that were empires collapsed because of the concentration of power in the urban areas because they have little knowledge of what’s going on on the outside. Check the Roman Empire. Why did the Roman Empire collapse?
#1 because they were the most intellectual group of people in the world at that time, as we were.
#2 – they got so intellectual they thought they didn’t have to grow their own food so they bought it, which we do.
#3 they didn’t have any workers cause they’re all intellectuals so they can imported workers.
#4 they didn’t have their army. They had mercenary armies so they ended up losing their empire collapsed because they stopped producing and that’s what this country is beginning to do – started about 35 years ago and if we don’t change that around there’s no way we’re going to get out of this morass.”
Nope, the Constitution as it lays out representative democracy doesn’t keep democracy healthy. We’re all doomed because of all that book learnin’. We’re just too damn smart. If this is true, Rep. Young can rest assured he’ll be the last man on Earth. It’s back to the fields for the rest of us. Come on San Franciscans – put down your textbooks and start growing your own food.
And let’s get rid of Black Water, our mercenary army…. Hey, wait a minute. SEE? I told you! That’s one of those moments when the broken clock is showing the right time. So, let’s leave it there. Part II of Adventures with Don Young will be coming soon.
And should any of this have inspired you to part with a few bills in your wallet, here is a link to Harry Crawford’s website. He’s a decent guy, a hard-worker, a great Alaskan with good ideas, a hand-shaker and a deal maker, and someone who gets along with people. Anything you can throw his way brings us one step closer to ending the embarrassment. CLICK HERE to help Harry give ‘em Hell!
Anti-Intellectualism is the first step in the construction of totalitarian and authoritarian regimes. Always. And they always go after the “other” intellectuals, professors, liberals, gays, immigrant group or people unlike their majority group.
I do not for the life of me understand why this moran keeps getting elected.
He is the elite of ignoramuses. Looking down his nose at the educated because they’re not as “good” as he is.
You almost (ALmost!) make me feel better about Lieberman.
ALmost!
whadda putz.
Yon Dung..is..something special…one might say he’s out- standing in his field. Yes Yon we dont need no stinkin regulations. Re-election! Yon in this day and age if you even look guilty your rendered and tortured and held forever with not a word of why. Good luck with that election. Perhaps Yon you should push a bill that would mandation De-education. That way we could all smile and stare off into space and blissfuly vote for you.
What moose’s ass that guy is. (AKM, you might need to spell check.)
Umm… would you believe me if I said I was deliberately trying to save the world by not sounding like an intellectual? Didn’t think so….
AKM
Wow, just wow.
So Mr. Young wants an uneducated agricultural society that usurps native
rights and only wants representative democracy as long as it doesn’t represent urbanites.
I don’t live in Alaska, but would love to support ANYONE running against this
loser.
When I think of honesty and integrity, yon dung is about the last person on the list… indeed, his name doesn’t come up unless I am already thinking of dung!
since Irish girl is sleeping i shall do the honors; Yon Dung is a fecking tosser.
really to be honest, Alaskans as well as every voter in the lower 48 had best do some soul searching and root out these idiots with their noses perpetually stuck in the taxpayer’s money trough.
and to be perfectly honest states who continuously send these useless, idiotic, men and women to serve in the congress and who willfully send bigots and racists to represent their states and whose presence is an affront to all the other states who since the civil war have been carrying and propping up states who never have and never will stop being a drag and a burden on the rest of us.
truly, i would love to see what would happen if Alabama and Alaska were to receive $1.05 for every dollar they throw in the kitty for the next ten years.
Wow Bubs! Kudos to your rant. I love it – and love you
Good on you.
And great teaching there AKM! You do such an excellent job of bringing stories to us and I truly appreciate it. I personally am unable to listen to the audio, but am totally happy to read about it. Thanks!
One might think he was looked up in a cabin for 50 years. Roman Empire failed because of intellectuals. What a clown!
So many elected officials are going to hell in a hand basket.
We have a congress that doesn’t want to work together. Anything our President does or wants is getting a no no.
I see where our Republican Senator here in Iowa—-for 35 years I think, is slipping in the polls. Wonder why! He is the one that put out the lie about pulling the plug on grandma. Has been getting money from the health insur companies. Come election time, we Democrats also know how to clean house.
A male Michelle Bachmann. He sounds like an uneducated geezer sitting in a coffee shop, with a bunch of his conservative buddies. I thought palin was a fluke, but between Young, Stevens and Palin it sounds like dumb, dumber and most dumb!!!!
You know these idiots also affect all of us, even if you do not live in that particular state.
Diane — You’ve got it exactly right – you can walk into any cafe or bar and listen as long as you can stand to people who sound just like – not only Young – but most of the Repubs. And the further off the beaten path, the more true that is. Here in AZ we had Repubs in our state legislature arguing against environmental controls on a Uranium mine becuase “the earth has been here for 6K years and has been doing just fine w/out environmental regs.” I kid you not. (40% of our state legs have no educ beyond High School – the vast majority of those have an “R”. I’ve seen no figures on Home Scholers.)
Yon Dung, for all his scientific ignorance, does seem to rely heavily on the Dopeler Effect – that unexplained phenomena that makes stupid ideas sound smarter when they’re coming at you really fast.
Good grief.
“Now, back East, we’ve gotten into this trap now – most people, frankly from the urban areas, now if you really want to know the truth, that’s the biggest problem of our congress. Most of the congressmen are elected from San Francisco, Miami, New York, Kansas City, Dallas, Houston, L.A. and Seattle.”
There is exactly one city on that list that most people would consider “back East” (yes, Miami is on the eastern seaboard, but really. Also, it’s smaller than Fresno; #43 in population).
And, while NYC, LA, Houston, and Dallas/Fort Worth are #1, 2, 4, and 5 in population, he oddly omits Chicago (#3), and throws in SF (#12), Seattle (#25), Miami (#43) and KC(?) (#169).
Of course, as AKM points out, the truly magic part is that he considers the “biggest problem of our congress” to be the fact that representatives are selected based on population (what we learned in school was “representative democracy”). Damn, that Constitution is just so inconvenient.
@14 Desert Mudpup: Big hurrah for the Dopeler Effect. Spelling is important.
Don spews his own special brand of word salad, doesn’t he? His recipe includes a large helping of moose turds mixed with a whole lotta gall.
Yon Dung had better watch himself…he’s identifying (or at least, I think he is,) with the T-partiers (and their ‘angst’), but according to the below “PATRIOT ALERT” from a fringe group of them, they want *no* help from legislators who’ve *held office * ~ either past or present.
When it comes to Yon Dung and his like-minded cohorts, I *do* agree with the sentiments of the T-p-fringe, though: Dung needs to be set out to pasture. Soon! [The T-p-fringe's main, over-riding, all-consuming, barely-containable complaint, although unwritten and unspoken, roils and boils just under the surface ~ it is that POTUS isn't w h i t e. That said, ... ] beth.
[Part of the] PATRIOT ALERT
[snip] “Now we are under attack again, they are infiltrating our movements in an effort to destroy us from the inside all over again. We cannot allow this to continue. All Tea Parties and all organized Conservative groups must not allow any person who has held office in the past, regardless of party affiliation, to assume any active leadership role. Think about it, we have experienced their leadership, do we want to go through all we have been through just to end up where we started?
November 2006 the United States government ceased to represent American citizens and began representing the 111th congress. With total and complete disregard and abandonment of the Peoples Constitution this congress set new agenda. An agenda which has done more to damage our great nation than all the wars we have ever fought. An agenda aimed at taking over every citizens rights and ability to make their own choices for themselves and their families.
November 2008 our nation witnessed the most corrupt election in our two hundred thirty four year history. An election in which voters were forcibly removed from voting stations against their will and without being able to cast their vote. An election so corrupt that citizens from other countries were shipped in only to cast their vote for the democrat party, get paid and be sent back home. An election so corrupt that votes cast by people who had been dead for years were counted for the democrat candidate. An election so corrupt that many votes cast by deployed American service men and women were not counted. An election so corrupt that it destroyed what, at one time, was a semi respectful mass media industry. Most reporters for American news broadcasters prostituted themselves to a candidate who to this date is still not legitimately qualified to hold the office of President of the United States.
If you are a conservative Patriot who wants to preserve and protect the Constitution of the United States of America and defend Freedom and Liberty, then your help is urgently needed. You all know our Constitution, our Freedom, and our Liberty are under attack from within our great nation. For the first time in our history we are faced with government occupied by individuals bent on the destruction of our Constitution as well as abolishing Liberty and Freedom. [/snip]”
Full text of the ALERT, here: http://patriotsforamerica.ning.com/profiles/blogs/patriot-alert?xg_source=activity [I'm pretty sure it'll curl (or straighten, as desired) your hair when you read it. It's chock full of WTF?-statements...just as we've all come to expect from such wondrous diatribes. As is all of the T-p and T-p-fringe 'information,' this is a real corker! Enjoy the paranoia. b.]
My son was in DC for the inauguration last January and had occasion to meet some US Representatives. One asked him who represented Alaska. My son was incredulous! This guy who has been around since the dinosaurs and tells us how indispensable he is isn’t even known to his colleagues. Time for a change …
“….their (the Romans) empire collapsed because they stopped producing and that’s what this country is beginning to do – started about 35 years ago and if we don’t change that around there’s no way we’re going to get out of this morass.”
So, Yon Dung has been a Congressman for 37 years? And the Decline of the American Empire began about the time he was first elected? And if you do the Mathistory, you get the resignation of fellow Californian transplant Richard Millhouse Nixon as the event that brought on the decline….or was it the election of Yon Dung that tipped the scales and sent us all crashing to the ground? Blame it on California…..yeah, that’s the ticket….
When you’re paid $174,000 or more a year to BE a congressman, it’s sometimes easier to SUCK IT UP I guess.
2010 numbers – Rank and file House and Senate members get paid $174,000 per year.
Senate Leadership
Majority Party Leader – $193,400
Minority Party Leader – $193,400
House Leadership
Speaker of the House – $223,500
Majority Leader – $193,400
Minority Leader – $193,400
http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/uscongress/a/congresspay.htm
And if you want to find out what Congress and other Federal Employees are offered for benefits…you can do so here…it’ll make you sick (if you’re unemployed, uninsured and maybe even if your not).
http://www.opm.gov/insure/health/planinfo/guides/index.asp”
OK, so now I know where those 4 talking points about the Roman Empire come from that have been recited on the internet for quite a while now. It’s basically from the Libertarian mindset. One thing they forgot to add, though, is that CORRUPTION was the rule of the day in Rome, first and foremost, which led to the other 4 points.
People like Young speak with forked tongues…
14 Desert Mudpup Says:
February 21st, 2010 at 10:24 PM
If you think 40% is high for AK state legislators, you should see who’s running the various depts in AK state govt and getting paid 6 figures with only a HS education. Palin appt’d quite a few, on her own, like her gal pal, Deborah [Richter] Bitney (a former owner of the infamous Safari Lake properties where no tax was paid on the luxurious “cabin” they built there w/the Palins) who was making $75K+ in 2008 and ran payouts for the APF with only a HS education (screwing it up in the process).
Also, Clark “Click” Bishop, who heads the Dept of Labor and Development, with only a HS education and the major part of whose experience was 17 yrs on the Slope as an operating engineer, a pal of Toad’s who was appt’d by $P and made $104K in 2008, and with whom Toad worked while Toad was, as part of his shadow govt, working on the same and enjoyed touring mines and oil fields w/Bishop on a state plane.
Then, there is Joe Schmidt, with a 2 yr degree in law enforcement, whose major experience was as a prison guard, appointed as Commissioner of prisons, and we know all about his record.
Someone commented on another site that $P appointed 100 of her friends to key positions and patronage jobs in state govt. And most are still there.
What a lune! Don is talking has though Dennis Hastert is still leader of the House. Hastert left government, over three years ago.
#9 @bubbles
Well said!!!
I was so sad to see the Fly By Night club close. The first time I went, they did a song about opening the mailbox and “getting a letter from Don Young!”
“… that’s what this country is beginning to do – started about 35 years ago and if we don’t change that around there’s no way we’re going to get out of this morass.”
According to Yon Dung, two years after he joined Congress the country started going downhill and over the course of the next 35 years he was powerless to stop the terrible things that have been done to Alaska. I’d say right there he has given every Alaskan ample reason to replace him.
Grandma68 — Someone commented on another site that $P appointed 100 of her friends to key positions and patronage jobs in state govt. And most are still there.
With some research, I would expect to find that all 100 ties to her Dominionist church – it is Palin’s duty to facilitate the Infiltration of Government. Bush gave us the same thing at the Federal level – remember Monica Goodliing? The ditsy blonde who was overseeing ALL US attorneys, and was liaison to the WH – a Liberty U grad in her late twenties. After she was uncovered, Olbermann reported another 150 Liberty U grads had been insinuated into the Justice Dept. No telling how many others into other agencies to intentionally Dumb Down gov’t and sabotage its effectiveness.
Dumb Young has an office with a zoo’s worth of stuffed animal heads. That’s pretty much enough for most of the gun-owning voters of Alaska, it seems.
I’d love to see gun owners prove me wrong on that come this next election…
Science gives us so many answers, and more questions also, too.
Desert Mudpup said, “Yon Dung, for all his scientific ignorance, does seem to rely heavily on the Dopeler Effect – that unexplained phenomena that makes stupid ideas sound smarter when they’re coming at you really fast.”
DOPEler Effect! Of course! That expalins OOPS, exPLAINS So Many Things.
The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which “people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it”. The unskilled therefore suffer from illusory superiority, rating their own ability as above average, much higher than in actuality; by contrast the highly skilled underrate their abilities, suffering from illusory inferiority. This leads to a perverse result where less competent people will rate their own ability higher than more competent people.
Thanks, sunny lumpen, for the “Dunning–Kruger effect,” giving us a name for something most of us have observed. Is there a scientific term for what Desert Mudpup called the “Dopeler Effect,” i.e., the distorted perception of heightened importance and/or meaningfulness of a communication induced by rapidity of delivery? And what should we call the mental analogue to the craving for junk food, where the impulsive consumption of sound-bites, buzz words and cliches induces a false but comforting perception of having understood a problem, or even having done something about it?
Nice to know a Republican agrees with Mao. Send the intellectuals to the country for retraining, and the aggies to the city to run the big businesses, like government.
Of course China started its revolution with a country that was functoning on about the level of a 2nd world early 17th C country and came out of the revolution in about the same condition but with a vastly reduced capacity to make it into the late 17C.
And I bet Yon calls Obama a socalist commie.
Well he has proven it takes one to know one.
15 strangelet Says:
Also Dallas and Ft Worth are different cities with very different personalities and different city governments with their own political interests.
Granting the DFW metroplex has all globbed together but in it are dozens of towns and cities, some high tech, yankee transplants, some are still native born Texans, some are stinking rich enclaves and some are still blue collar conetree types.
1 Nin Says:
February 21st, 2010 at 5:54 PM
Anti-Intellectualism is the first step in the construction of totalitarian and authoritarian regimes. Always. And they always go after the “other” intellectuals, professors, liberals, gays, immigrant group or people unlike their majority group.
Yup. That is one of the many reasons I started calling the Bushies Nazi. Not only was grandaddy Bush a Nazi sympathizer, but they are using so many of the same tactics. And frankly it can happen here it is happening here.