Friday Homestead Dispatch

1.
Elections are coming up sooner than you think. Here is Arizona’s 2026 General Election Timeline.

Propositions are tricky. Below is a video describing the eleven ballot measures coming up.

10 of these measures are sneaky laws that have hidden intentions and very intentional consequences. Vote NO on them. And vote yes for the Protect Education measure to restrain fraud and waste with school vouchers.

Summmary: VOTE NO to 10 Lies, Vote Yes to 1 Truth

Vote YES: Proposition 212: Protect Education
Curbs school voucher fraud and limits vouchers for wealthy families. Exceptions for families with disabled kids. Stops Bankrolling of state $$.

Proposition 141: Bans Taxes on Car Mileage (EV)
NO TAXES ON TESLAS - No auto taxes based on auto mileage (which isn’t even a thing in Arizona now). (SCR1004)

Proposition 316: Caps Grocery Taxes
DEFUND the POLICE - Curb on grocery sales taxes in small rural towns; will force massive cuts in first responders, local services. HCR2021

Proposition 317: Terrorism
Church Groups are Terrorists Now. Designates Drug Cartels as terrorist organizations and assigns the Arizona Department of Homeland Security (a grant making department with no law enforcement powers) to help fight human trafficking and any bad thing - targeting religious, humanitarian groups who help immigrants. (HCR2055 )

Proposition 318: Bathroom Police
THE PEEWEE SOCCER PENIS POLICE BILL - Regulates bathrooms and locker use at athletic events. (HCR 2003). No exceptions for disabilities, medical emergencies, parents with small kids. Creates a co-ed team structure for transgender athletes (last count: 10??? in Arizona.)

Proposition 142: Censorship
THE CENSORSHIP BILL - Bans DEI as a concept in public schools. And a sneaky clause that allows legislature to censor any other concepts it deems in the future. (HCR2044)

Proposition 319: No Photo Cameras (and kills the Clean Elections Commission)
NO TRAFFIC CAMERAS AND CLEAN ELECTIONS - Curbs Traffic cameras and defunds the Clean Elections Commission. (SCR1004)

Proposition 143: Union Busting for Government Employees
Summary: UNION BUSTER BILL - Targets school unions but also has a sneaky clause that also can block police, firefighter and other public employee unions. (HCR2040)

Proposition 320: School Closer Bill
THE SCHOOL CLOSER Bill - Sets strict controls on how public school budgets in Maricopa County and Pima County are spent, forcing more school closures and district bankruptcies. (SCR1032/HCR2007)

Proposition 144: No Early Voting, No Mail-in Voting
No Early Voting, No Mail-In Ballots. Crazy voting requirements that are not possible.

Proposition 145: Kills all Voucher Reform - Including the Protect Education Proposition
Summary: NO VOUCHER REFORM. EVER. - Destroys the Protect Education citizens’ initiative, which calls for accountability with school voucher moneys - and blocks all future laws that curb fraud and waste with vouchers. (HCR2048)

Make your voting notes NOW! Also, make sure your registration is accurate and up to date. We always voted by mail but considering dropping off our ballets this mid-term to ensure they arrive and are counted. It’s also easy to check online when you ballot is received and counted.

2.
Don’t think your vote counts? There were a few big wins in Michigan this week against centrist Democrats and MAGA opponents.

*rump-endorsed Republican congressional candidate Amir Hassan was whipped by Thomas J. Smith, who won 50 percent of the vote in the state’s 8th Congressional District. And the kicker is, Smith suspended his campaign in mid-July—too late to get his name off the ballot. AND HE STILL WON! Har, har, har.

Progressives also picked up a win in Michigan’s one true toss-up district. Progressive William Lawrence beat two other Democrats for the nomination. Lawrence is set to challenge first-term incumbent Rep. Tom Barrett in November.

And the big upset was progressive candidate Dr. Abdul El-Sayed beating out Rep. Haley Stevens, who was backed by the establishment wing of the party and has taken a more moderate approach to the race.

El-Sayed was outspent 9-to-1 by AIPAC and corporate Super PACs in the most expensive Senate Democratic primary of all time.

He will face former Representative Mike Rogers, a Republican, in a general election clash that could determine control of the Senate.

The Guardian noted by casting the Michigan Senate primary as yet another battle between progressive insurgents and establishment centrists, media coverage of El-Sayed’s campaign has tended to overlook what is innovative about it. Like Zohran Mamdani and the democratic socialists who have won House races in New York, Pennsylvania and Colorado, El-Sayed wants to end unconditional US military support for Israel. But while Mamdani sometimes discusses Israel purely through the language of human rights and international law – as he did in his recent video arguing that Benjamin Netanyahu should be arrested as a war criminal – El-Sayed’s message is more nationalistic. He rarely discusses the Jewish state without linking it to Washington’s failure to address problems at home.

In a recent interview, the New Yorker editor, David Remnick, asked El-Sayed whether he supports one or two states in Israel-Palestine. El-Sayed did not take the bait. He replied that his focus was less on “what’s happening there rather than what’s happening here”. His primary concern, he explained, was that the US was allocating money for Israeli weapons that it could be spending on schools in Michigan. While acknowledging: “I believe in equal rights to peace, dignity, and self-determination, for Palestinians and Jewish Israelis alike,” he said: “It is not my job as an American policymaker to decide what the ultimate peace should be. But it is my job to make sure that our resources are stewarded correctly for the people I’m responsible for: those kids going to those broken schools.”

Also worth mentioning is MAGA Rep. Andy Ogles lost his primary in Tennessee DESPITE backing by *rump. So long, gun nut…

3.
Still more news regarding the Cottonwood trees on the Mexican border near Lochiel, Arizona. Even the Guardian published an article Tuesday saying protesters are staging a “tree sit” in a tiny Arizona town to prevent the destruction of a grove of ancient cottonwood trees as federal contractors race to build a row of two 30ft walls along the border with Sonora, Mexico.

The gathering ramped up last week in the town of Lochiel, in the remote San Rafael valley of south-east Arizona. On 27 July, contractors working for Fisher Sand and Gravel crushed three of the largest cottonwoods with excavators.

Now the group is defending a towering cottonwood. Estimated to be more than 200 years old, it is the last of the huge old trees right on the border that some locals call the “grandmothers”.

The group has now grown to include several dozen people, with many camping on private land with permission of the owner. The protesters help to support and feed a single rotating person who stays in a platform high in the tree at all times.

4.
Some people have their panties in a twist over Democratic Governor Katie Hobbs choice of running mate for her second term…former Mesa mayor and FORMER Republican John Giles.

Giles, who actually endorsed Kamala Harris, accomplished good things for the city of Mesa in education, social programs, free pre-kindergarten programs, a nondiscrimination ordinance, and advanced citywide sustainability goals and infrastructure updates to address regional environmental and extreme heat challenges.

Hobbs will be going head-to-head with MAGA Andy Biggs…who cannot become governor. If that happens, you’ll need to begin your bending over exercises and have the lube handy.

5.
A lesson in hero/celebrity worshipping is Neko Case’s takedown of Glen Hansard. He wasn’t the good guy everyone, even women, made him out to be. Case writes, “Men like that have class systems for the women they “know.” They spoil and flatter the women they NEED things from, business associates, press people etc. The “mother” part of the mother-whore complex… They consume the sex princesses like it’s some big favor they are handing out, as well as their basic right. Then there’s women like me, the underlings. We don’t need to be treated well or with basic respect. Men like that often confuse using their charm on us as “respect” at times, but we all know it’s just a big fat manipulation when it works and when it doesn’t. Just another fucking day at the fucking office.”

6.
As many of you know, we’re in the PNW for a week or so. After three nights on Whidbey Island we hopped on the ferry for Port Townsend. We stumbled upon Sea J’s Cafe for amazing fish and chips before heading to parts west. This morning we’re departing Westport, Washington for Con’s family reunion over the weekend…so more pics later!

And now…