I wasn’t trying to be mean to Jan Drago in writing yesterday about her less than exciting public speaking performance. Not every politician is great a public speaker, just like not every talk radio host wields Dave Ross’s mellifluous baritone. Given her inability to differentiate herself from Mayor Greg Nickels on values and issues, I just don’t think she has what it takes defeat the incumbent, and, well, I calls ’em as I sees ’em.
But rather than hearing from angry Drago supporters, the most defensive comment in the thread came from Mike McGinn booster Craig, who objected to my focus on Drago and mention of Joe Mallahan while ignoring the McGinn campaign entirely:
On the other hand, Michael McGinn has stood up and challenged the political status quo (NO tunnel!), has dedicated his life to our City and his beliefs (fighting RTID, leading the Green Legacy Coalition to develop and pass last years Parks levy, serving as the local Sierra Club leader, founding Great City and serving on numerous City boards, commissions and oversight groups), has a vision for our city and understands what it takes to get it done (better schools, improved transit service and technology infrastructure), and, most importantly, has a fast-growing base of dedicated volunteers (what really wins elections). He’s also got the whole “smart, articulate and positive thing going” as well.
Let’s start talking about the real buzz in this year’s campaign, Michael McGinn.
Okay Craig, if you insist, let’s talk about the “real buzz” surrounding McGinn, which unfortunately for him has so far centered around his anemic campaigning.
Yeah, sure, whatever buzz Mallahan has (if any) is entirely self-financed, but if McGinn has all this organizing experience and grassroots support working for him, why hasn’t he translated it into a little do-re-mi of his own? By my estimates McGinn has raised a little more than $30,000 from less than 150 contributors, a pretty pathetic total after three months of campaigning.
No, politics isn’t all about the money, nor should it be, but fundraising can be a useful measure of both a candidate’s political competency and support. And what does it say about a challenger who made his mark as a leader in the environmental community when most of the major environmental endorsements are going to his opponent?
Successfully running for office, especially against an entrenched incumbent, is a near full time job, yet the last couple times I saw McGinn, he was just out riding his bike. Not doorbelling, not fundraising, not working the crowd, just out enjoying the sunshine and riding his bike. Good for him, I suppose. It’s a healthy passtime. But with that kinda political work ethic, I don’t think that’s a buzz you hear coming from his campaign, Craig, but rather the hiss of the air slowly escaping from McGinn’s political tires.
Again, I’ve got nothing against the guy. I just calls ’em as I sees ’em.
You saw Mike on his bike because that’s how he gets around – from campaign event to campaign event. Wildly revolutionary, I know.
asdf @1,
No, I saw Mike on his bike because he was peddling around some local play fields while my daughter was playing soccer. Stopped to talk to some folks he knew; doesn’t know me by sight, so he didn’t chat with me.
Like I said, that’s a fine way to spend a Sunday. But if I were him, I’d be doing some call time.
As for environmental endorsements – I’m reminded of the Roads and Transit ballot measure where McGinn was out front saying that we could get rail without being forced to have it attached to sprawl highways. Some environmental groups thought that was an impossibly bad idea, and yet one year later we passed rail without the sprawl highways.
Those same groups are settling again.
*cough* RTID *cough*
http://horsesass.org/?p=3749#comments
McGinn and the Sierra Club had the prescience (and a shit ton of polling from what I’ve heard) to determine LR would succeed the following year. McGinn fought RTID and did so with volunteers, not cash. Most environmental groups are pussies and don’t want to be on McCheese’s shit list should he win and their guy lose, so they stick with the status quo.
There’s a difference between “calling em as you sees em” and calling them as they are.
Goldy,
Really?
McGinn has the most robust volunteer operation in place and has already organized five nights of phone banking every week. The McGinn campaign has turned out dozens of volunters to events on a single day, has the most extensive social media operation, and has the strongest vision. McGinn’s profile fits Seattle values. And he is the one serious candidate aligned with the voters on the boondoggle tunnel.
You’re welcome to go to WeLikeMike.com to learn more. McGinn isn’t going to have more money than Nickels (or Mallahan for that matter), but he is doing to have enough. That’s what matters. He is going to have enough money to get his message out to voters.
And he is the only candidate who has already beaten Nickels—and he has done it twice (Roads and Transit in 2007, and the Parks and Green Spaces Levy in 2008).
McGinn is going to be at the 37th District Dems meeting tonight at 7PM in your neck of the woods (at Rainier Valley Cultural Ctr 3515 S Alaska St). Anyone in South Seattle should go.
You’re concluding that McGinn isn’t campaigning hard because you saw him riding his bike while your daughter was playing soccer. Don’t you usually lambaste people who draw broad conclusions from one narrow data point, and an unreliable data point at that?
Goldy,
I never involve myself in your comment threads, but this post really irked me.
The point Craig was making is this: in this campaign we have four choices: the incumbent, a long-time City Councilwoman who is indistinguishable from the incumbent in any substantive way, a wealthy businessman with a poor grasp of the issues who claims to care about the city but has been completely absent from public debate for the last two decades, and Mike McGinn who, apart from being a successful attorney, has been devoting his time and money to his neighborhood and his city for as long as he’s lived here and has twice taken on the Mayor and won.
Mike speaks his mind and believes that compromising one’s core values is no compromise at all, it’s defeat. For this, he’s earned the ire of many in the local political establishment, and has been treated as a lost cause by the media. This I can understand. But what I don’t understand is how you, who constantly encourages our politicians to say and fight for what they believe, political reality be damned, can rag on Mike for saying and acting on what he believes, political realities be damned.
I don’t care which environmental names the Mayor has on his endorsement list, the Mayor’s record speaks for itself. He’s trotted around the country getting other cities to sign up for Kyoto and then he endorses and fights for a tunnel on the waterfront that will increase Seattle’s vehicle miles traveled and make it impossible to reach the goals laid out in Kyoto. We should be embarrassed to live in a city that talks such a big green game, while simultaneously lobbying the legislature to take steps to increase automobile pollution, the single largest source of greenhouse emissions in Seattle. And every other candidate in the race has lined up behind the Mayor as though this tunnel were a done deal, as though we can do nothing to stop it.
Seattle should be to the green movement what San Francisco is to the gay rights movement, and yet our current “environmental Mayor” has spent the last eight years putting out press releases touting his accomplishments while doing absolutely nothing of substance. So yeah, Goldy, you can call em as they are with respect to Seattle’s political reality. I just expected you’d be in favor of a guy who calls em as they are with respect to Seattle’s actual reality.
@6 “a tunnel on the waterfront that will increase Seattle’s vehicle miles traveled”
Curious, how does a tunnel do that?
It does it by increased throughput and capacity, via induced traffic. Make it easier to drive, and more people will drive. Oh, and no downtown exits to slow people down, you know…
Bottom line, for anyone truly concerned about man’s effect on the environment, burying a freeway is the wrong decision. We should be working to allow people to get out of their cars or get on to efficient transit, not encouraging them to drive as much as possible and live on the opposite side of the city from where they work.
And actually, speak of the devil…
http://seattletimes.nwsource.c....._with.html
Goldy,
Thank you for highlighting my comment and for allowing the other commenters to supplement my points. Interesting that no Drago supporters stepped forward in her defense; whereas this thread is filled with pro-McGinn comments.
Craig
sir hoary @4,
My support for the Roads and Transit measure was never based on the supposition that a transit measure alone couldn’t pass voters, but that the powers that be would never allow a transit-only measure on the ballot in 2008. And when I was proven wrong, I publicly ate crow. You can ask Erica and Josh about that.
Gary @5,
Well, the bike anecdote was mostly a springboard for the “buzz” vs. “hiss” metaphor. That said, McGinn is still going to have step up the fundraising if he has a hope of surviving through the primary. Rightly or wrongly Malahan’s money is going to buy him a lot name ID.
@4
If I’m remembering correctly it was the state’s own polling and data that said transit would pass without RTID and that RTID needed to piggy back on transit to pass.
@4
Goldy’s seen the light on that one and has done more for progressive causes in the Puget Sound region than most of our allegedly progressive electeds.
Derek @6,
You seem to conflate my criticism of Mike’s campaign with criticism of Mike. To the best of my recollection, I haven’t written anything critical about Mike, his qualifications or his policies. Indeed, I have nothing particularly for or against any of the candidates in this race, including the mayor.
All of my analysis of this race thus far has merely been of the electoral horse race variety. You may not like what my analysis says of your candidate’s chances, but that’s the way I see it. It takes a lot more than money to win a race, but if you think your guy can win spending one-tenth that of his opponent, you’ve got another think coming.
Look, I know from buzz. I put a huge amount of effort into helping to create buzz for Darcy Burner. But buzz doesn’t win campaigns unless it filters down to the average voter, and right now the average voter doesn’t know Mike McGinn from a hole in the ground.
Some campaigns that should take off, great candidate w/ a great back story, great on the issues and so on go nowhere. Some races that really should go no where (W in 2000?) take off. It would be interesting to delve into why this is.
Goldy @10,
Just trying to prevent more crow consumption this August/November!
To me, McGinn seems like the only candidate with his hand on the pulse of us schmoes. The link Derek posted above is testament to this. The tunnel is just a prime example of the political establishment trying to force feed us a piece of crap idea and McGinn is the only guy with the sense to say “WTF? No deal.”
What if McGinn brings that kind of ballsack to the schools? Or to economic development? This is the kind of leader I’m on board with and if he loses to Frau Drago or MacCheese, fuck at least someone who isn’t a closet republican tried.
I’m not usually a big poster, but the whole “he needs money to win” argument is what the Man wants you to believe.
Goldy, why not hop on the McGinn bus and see how much cash you can help raise? Considering the other choices, you might as well weigh in on the rabble-rousing end of things.
Goldy,
I understand your comments have thus far been on the horserace, and that’s what frustrates me. You’ve never been shy about endorsing a dark horse before when you felt that he/she had the sort of vision needed for the job (see: Darcy Burner-2006, Darcy Burner-2008). Yet your recent rant about which candidate could be mayor made no mention of who ought to be mayor.
I realize your focus tends to be on state-level politics, but for a guy who clearly cares so much about Seattle Public Schools (37% of Seattle students don’t graduate high school, by the way), why can’t you get behind a guy who wants to make them a priority for city government? If the Mayor and council can spend untold amounts of time and effort to lobby the state for their preferred alternative to a State highway project, to say nothing of finding nearly $1 Billion of Seattle tax money to fund it (pretty much maxing our our taxing authority for the next ten years by the way), then certainly a mayor could use the power of City Hall to influence the school system whether or not he has de jure control. Even raising the public profile of the problem would be a start. And McGinn clearly states in his platform that if headway isn’t made quickly, he’ll be heading to the Legislature to ask for direct control. Pie in the sky? Obama’s Secretary of Education has made mayoral control of urban schools one of his top priorities, because he, like McGinn, knows that this is the only way school districts can be made accountable.
I guess my point is this: you live here, we have a decision to make, and you’re an important voice in the city. It’s time for you to pick your candidate, and why wouldn’t you pick the one who believes that we shouldn’t be reacting to what ‘political reality’ tells us is possible, but that we should be determining what we want our city to be and then fighting for our shared vision. How could you look at this lot and not come to the conclusion that McGinn is the only guy worth backing? If you think his only barrier is cash on hand, then boot up your 386 and start drumming up support instead of playing into the standard “he’ll never win” media meme. You do run a well-read advocacy blog, right?
Most of us are true believers here in Seattle, and we’re ready for some real leadership. It’s time for us to become the city that the rest of the country thinks we already are.
@8 “It does it by increased throughput and capacity, via induced traffic.”
You’ve gotta be kidding. The tunnel would replace an existing 6-lane highway that carries a third of Seattle’s north-south through traffic with 4 lanes and less access — how does this increase capacity or “induce” traffic? It’ll create a goddam traffic jam, that’s what it’ll do. Do you think the people driving on Highway 99 are doing so for fun? Or because they like to burn expensive gas for the hell of it? That traffic is commerce. Choke it off, and you kill the city’s commerce.
@8 “It does it by increased throughput and capacity, via induced traffic.” How would throughput be increased if there are no more lanes added to the highway? Is there some study you can point to?
“Make it easier to drive, and more people will drive.” Do you propose to make it more difficult to drive? Why would you want less people to drive? Is this because you believe driving to be bad in and of itself?
@19,20:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Induced_demand
McGinn’s an ideologue plain and simple. Thats fine when it comes to say running the sierra club, but not when it comes to being mayor. He is also antidensity and antigrowth. McGinn was wrong on RTID, maybe not politically, but he was still wrong. It was a good plan and he was opposed to it.
At this point I’m going with Drago as I want density downtown and I want a tunnel. I also want a street car network and good roads to drive on.
I could also give a fuck that he rides a bike. BFD, we all have our hobbies and I am not sure why I should for him on account of his.
@21 From your link: “Research indicates that the elasticity of traffic demand with respect to roadway expansion is between 0 and 1, indicating that a 1% increase in roadway expansion will generate less than a 1% increase in traffic demand. However it is greater than 0%, so new roadway construction will result in some additional traffic that would not have occurred but for the new capacity.”
I don’t see where road capacity will be increased. We’d have no more lanes than we had before.
@8. If true, please, build it ASAP! Mobility is critical, and we don’t all ride bikes and buses.
Yes, yes McGinn sucks! He can never win! Elections are won based on money!
Be a realist, vote your fears, not your hopes!
(And most of all, get a progressive blogger to buy into this!)
The McGinn claque on this thread is no different than the right-wing trolls who fill up the comment threads on the P-I. you know, the ones who make Cynical and Stamn look reasonable by comparison.
Just because you guys repeat something over and over again doesn’t make it representative of the voters at large. People are falling all over each other trying to create a buzz that Nickels is somehow in trouble.
He isn’t, and none of this bunch of clowns is going to take him out. McGinn is a decent enough guy, he doesn’t mind having his basic assumptions challenged, and — it might shock some of you Green Taliban types — actually told me when prodded that yes, we did need *some* highway growth to keep pace with the projected population influx.
But he has no experience in public service, any more than Mallahan does, and that’s what will sink him. Mayor of Seattle is not an entry-level job. We don’t need any more Charlie Royers, thank you very much.
By November the voters will get this, Nickels will cruise, and game over.
@23
I’m betting that:
Credit is going to be harder to get from here on out and that gas prices are only going to go up. I’m not a doomdayer on either of these counts, but I do think the two of them together will mean a reduction in the amount of cars on the road.
Derek @18,
I’m not advocating for McGinn at this point because I’m not convinced he’s the right person to be mayor. I’d love to see him run a tougher campaign–win or lose, Nickels desperately needs to be seriously challenged–but it’s up to him, not me, or a bunch of volunteers to make that happen.
And by the way, the schools issue is a losing one for McGinn, regardless of how anybody feels about the way the schools are run now. The schools are run by an elected school board, and nobody’s gonna vote for less democracy. He should be focusing on things he can actually do.
Goldy,
I’m not that impressed with McGinn’s campaign so far either, but I think Derek’s got a point.
With a primary in August, June ain’t an unreasonable time to expect progressive bloggers to start having some non-horserace-based opinions and to maybe start beating the fundraising drum for those candidates that pass muster.
@28
http://online.wsj.com/article/.....03203.html
McGinn is a big picture guy which is why I’m voting for him. You’re wrong on schools too. Other mayors have taken over school systems in much larger, much tougher (read: less white kid) urban cities and the results have been stunning.
Stop being a debbie-downer and get behind the one guy that won’t be just another politician. That’s probably what has the McGinn cronies so perturbed in this discussion.
Having worked on a city-wide race before, I will never, ever underestimate the power of an incumbent – nice PAC checks and endorsements rolling in daily. In liberal heavy Seattle, will any challengers pick up endorsements/money or will the Unions, Biz, etc. just hand over checks to the Nickel’s machine again? It ain’t easy running in Seattle, even against a pretty unpopular incumbent. Oh well, maybe we’ll have public financing someday… a girl can dream, right?
McGinn does not appear to be a viable candidate. He appears to be just another politician.
But I’m sick of the re-run of the Viaduct debate he’s decided to focus on. It is completely unproductive.
I’m a surface fan. But more than that, I’m a get rid of the Viaduct fan: the sooner, the better.
The guy doesn’t seem to live in the real world. I get the idealism. But it is overdone to the point of being perceived as naively ridiculous.
Is it so hard to shave?