Stumble of the Week

• State of Denial. To blacks, gays and immigrants, we must now add business people to the enemies list of Arizona’s dogged silent majority. For it was the Chamber of Commerce that finally persuaded Governor Jan Brewer to veto Senate Bill 1062 – a bill, said Senator Steve Yarborough, aimed at “preventing discrimination against people who are clearly living out their faith.” It proposed to strike this blow for religious freedom by protecting the right of bigots to refuse service to gay people. But gays shouldn’t feel special. Arizona has long been a full-service discriminator. It was denied the 1993 Super Bowl for refusing to recognize Martin Luther King Day, then gained notoriety and lost business revenue when Brewer signed the state’s draconian anti-immigrant bill in 2010. Now the Religious Freedom Act, which another senator defended as “pre-emptive to protect priests”, has been vetoed. Next up? Unwed mothers? • The American Dream. According to an Economic Policy Institute report, 1% of the residents of Alaska, Michigan, Nevada and Wyoming have reaped over 100% of their state’s total income gains since 1979. If my math is correct, that means the other 99% actually got poorer.

• Family Seat. John Dingell, the longest-serving Congressman in history, announced that he will not seek reelection for the seat he inherited in 1955 after the death of his father. But fear not, dynasty fans. His wife, Debbie, seeks to extend the family’s eight-decade tenure in the House. So why is the 87-year-old Dingell quitting? “I find serving in the House to be obnoxious.”