If Idaho’s Republican legislators aren’t listening to experts, who are they listening to?
In one of the dumbest yet most telling statements ever made by an Idaho politician, state Sen. Steven Thayn, R-Emmett, let the voice inside his head come spilling out of his mouth on Monday.
Thayn was speaking during a meeting at which GOP legislators voted to strip school closure authority from Idaho’s health districts.
“What’s happening is we’re having a standardized approach by people saying we need to listen to the experts,” Thayn said. “Listening to the experts to set policy is an elitist approach. I’m fearful of an elitist approach. I am also fearful it leads to totalitarianism, especially when you say, ‘We are doing it for the public good.’”
It’s a statement that’s shocking yet not surprising at the same time.
After all, we’ve seen that attitude play out so many times during the pandemic.
White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany last month said, “The science should not stand in the way of” reopening schools.
It’s an attitude that allows people to move about freely without social distancing and without wearing a mask.
It’s what allows thousands of people to gather for the annual motorcycle rally in Sturgis, South Dakota. It’s what allows people to disparage and attack Dr. Anthony Fauci, who has advised six U.S. presidents on infectious diseases and is a Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient.
It’s an attitude that allowed Southwest District Health board members last month to merely recommend face coverings, despite the so-called experts at our hospital systems and our local doctors asking — practically begging — for a statewide mask mandate.
It’s an attitude that allows schools and school districts to ignore the experts and reopen schools.
The New Plymouth school district is putting itself in Category 1, the lowest category, and reopening schools even though the medical experts at Southwest District Health put Payette County at Category 3, the highest category for substantial community spread. The West Ada school district this month approved a plan to reopen schools as if Ada County were in Category 2, even though Ada County is in Category 3, according to the “experts.”
It’s more than just anti-intellectualism. It’s anti-intelligence.
I say Thayn’s statement is shocking but not surprising, and anyone who has attended a committee hearing during a legislative session knows exactly what I’m talking about.
You see it all the time. Expert after expert will come before a committee and offer their testimony, whether it’s about Medicaid expansion, establishing a state health insurance exchange or setting common standards for public education. Time and again, Republican committee members like Thayn will either outright roll their eyes at the testimony or ask questions that aren’t really questions seeking the truth, rather than opportunities to make a point, debate or attempt to refute an expert’s testimony.
During the most recent session, legislators “debated” a bill to allow a drug and alcohol rehabilitation facility to treat teenagers without a license. For two solid hours, expert after expert testified against the bill. Doctors, psychologists, lawyers, child health experts, parents, one after the other testified against the bill. After listening to those two hours of testimony, Republican legislators passed the bill. What was even the point of taking testimony?
By the way, kids, if you happen to graduate from high school, go on to college and get a bachelor’s degree or even, God forbid, a master’s degree or Ph.D. and become one of those “experts,” don’t come back to Idaho. You won’t be welcome in these parts.
Here’s the rub: If legislators like Steve Thayn aren’t listening to the so-called experts, who are they listening to? Hint: It’s not the people you’d hope for and expect. During testimony to limit school bond elections in February, state Rep. Wendy Horman, R-Idaho Falls, admitted she hadn’t consulted school district officials or board members about her bill, rather, she relied on a coffee klatch of her friends back in her district.
Too often, legislators like Thayn clearly already have their minds made up, not open to persuasion or different schools of thought. They’re listening only to themselves and no one else.
To me, that is the real elitism here — the worst kind of elitism. It’s ignorant elitism.
This story was originally published August 11, 2020 at 10:13 AM.
