Isaac Laquedem

Donald Miller is dead in Ohio, but might be living in Indiana

In 1986, an Ohio man named Donald Miller, married with two children, disappeared without a trace.  In 1994 his wife petitioned to declare him legally dead.  An Ohio court declared him legally dead.

Despite being legally dead, Mr. Miller wasn't factually dead; he was quite alive.  He reappeared in 2005, not knowing that he was legally dead, and tried to establish that he was in fact alive.

An Ohio court, sympathetic to Mr. Miller's plight, ruled last week that Mr. Miller was still dead, despite his personal appearance in the courtroom to argue that he was still among the living.  The judge, Allan Davis, ruled that the statute of limitations to challenge a declaration of legal death in Ohio is three years, meaning that because Mr. Miller didn't show up by 2008 to argue that he was still living, he was incontrovertibly and unappealably dead, at least in Ohio.

Why "at least in Ohio," you may ask?  It's because the federal government hasn't passed a Defense of Death Act.  Until Congress passes a Defense of Death Act, the definition of death is left up to the states, and if Ohio chooses to define Mr. Miller as being dead, he can't insist that Ohio renumber him among the living.

Just because Mr. Miller is dead in Ohio doesn't mean he is dead everywhere.  He might move to Indiana or Kentucky, or some state that believes in the Right to Life, and if his new state determines him to be living, he will be among the living, at least while he is within that state.  If he has enemies remaining in Ohio he'd best stay out of the Buckeye State, for they might be able to kill him and have a perfect defense to the case:  how can they kill a man in 2013 who died in 1994?

[Thanks to WTAE.com for reporting in the possible existence of Mr. Miller.]

Business may hate government, but Wall Street wants it back

It's odd that even though big business regularly complains about the national government, when the national government shuts down, Wall Street tumbles.  The stock market is down about 5% since mid-September, when it became apparent that the House wouldn't agree to fund the government past September 30.

Oregon's Monsanto Protection Act, Part I

Although the Monsanto Protection Act, SB 863, which the legislature passed in its special session last week, appeared to come from nowhere, it was a remnant of the regular session earlier this year, when it made it through the Senate under the name of SB 633, only to die in the House.  Its original sponsors were a bipartisan mix:  Democratic Senators Betsy Johnson (Scappoose) and Arnie Roblan (North Bend) and Republican Senators Herman Baertschiger (Central Point), Bill Hansell (Pendleton), and Jeff Kruse (Roseburg).  In the regular session, the Senate passed it on not quite party lines:  14 R's and 3 D's voted yes, and 12 D's voted no.

In the special session the bill passed the Senate on the same 17-12 vote, with one interesting switch: Senator Johnson, one of the sponsors of the original bill, voted against it.  The final tally was unchanged because Senator Prozanski, who had voted against the first incarnation, did not vote the second time around.

Though designed to prevent local governments from regulating genetically modified organisms (GMOs), the bill is written so broadly as to have some unintended effects, including on blackberries and bongs.  I'll have some more to say about the bill's side effects presently.

The CRC construction may be dead, but the consultants can march on until 2023

When the Oregon legislature passed House Bill 2800 this spring, authorizing the state to issue $450 million in bonds to fund a portion of the Columbia River Crossing, it included a list of conditions that had to be met by September 30 for the state to be able to issue the bonds. Two of the conditions weren't met (approval by State Treasurer Ted Wheeler, and the State of Washington chipping in $450 million), and so the state's authority to issue the bonds expired Monday night.

That doesn't mean the entire bill has expired, though.  Section 21 of the bill (it's on page 10 of the engrossed version) requires the Oregon Department of Transportation to submit a report to the legislature every quarter on the progress of the bridge project, continuing through the end of 2023 -- ten years from now -- whether or not the replacement bridge is ever built.  It's a wonderful legislature that can command a state agency to report every three months on the progress it's making on a bridge it isn't building.  I'm curious if ODOT will outsource the progress reports to one of the legions of consultants who have dined well already.

The Laquedem Congressional Spending Reduction Plan, revived for the shutdown

As long as the House of Representatives doesn't want the government to work because a majority of the House members believe the government is too large, I'd like to revive my suggestion of two years ago that Congress reduce the size of the House by a meaningful percentage, let's say by a quarter, so that the House would have 325 members instead of the present 435.  Each of the remaining members would represent about 1 million constituents and could boast about becoming 33% more productive.  The savings in cost would be modest -- Congress isn't a big part of the federal budget -- but it would be a good symbolic move.  The savings would allow the government to reopen the Panda Cam and several of our national parks, good places for the newly retired Congresspeople to go and chill out.