Noemie does what Noemie does best… an incredibly thorough examination of, and interview with Richard Pope. And she’s not really suggesting that HA’s comment threads sometimes change minds, is she?
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As always, Noemie is through, well researched, and just plain outright ROCKs.
Yeh kinda reminds me of your choice Venus Velazquez! Hic. Maybe you can invite them both to the next Drinking Liberally. I’d send a few now affordable Cigars for you all, but you can’t smoke em in celebration in a public place.
Just saw my absentee ballot this morning, and you know what, no Prop one on it anywhere. I find that interesting since I am still registered in King County. So I guess not all of King County gets to vote (NO) on this even though they will all get to pay the additional sales taxes and every other tax in this massive boondoggle, except the RTA (which we are apparently far enough away from to forget for the next 50 years)
I’ll have to go check to make sure there are no new Wabbitt holes in my yard, if so I’ll throw a bunch of carrots on down, cause he’s even smart enough to vote against this boondoggle!
Roger Rabbit’s Endorsements
King County Prosecutor – This one is a no-brainer; Dan Satterberg is a Republican Party tool. There is no evidence Bill Sherman is a Democratic Party tool; but even if he is, I prefer our tools to their tools.
King County Council Pos. 6 – Another no-brainer. Richard Pope graduated 2nd in his law school class and has more experience at running for public office than anyone except Mike The Mover; the incumbent is a drunken liar who uses her position to bully cops. It doesn’t hurt that Pope is a Democrat; it doesn’t help his opponent that she’s a Republican. Besides, he needs a paying job so he can support his disabled kid. The fact he has custody of the kid is some evidence of good character. The fact he menaced an opposing witness in a deposition is not necessarily evidence of bad character, even though it pissed off the Bar Association; that depends on what the character of the witness was. I don’t get to vote in this race, so I can only offer Poor Richard moral support.
Port of Seattle Pos. 2 – While Bob Edwards is by no means the worst of the incumbents, Gael Tarleton is too good a candidate to pass up.
Port of Seattle Pos. 5 – Alec Fisken is a reformer who has earned re-election by consistently voting against the excesses of the dysfunctional majority.
(Note: Tarleton and Fisken are both endorsed by all the right people: King County Democrats, various legislative district Democratic groups, and the King County Labor Council; they also have earned major newspaper endorsements.)
Initiative 960 – No! This complicated Eyman initiative would create another layer of government procedures, requiring more staff at more expense to taxpayers, while accomplishing nothing of discernible value. But the main objection to it is that it puts a straitjacket on efficient governance and opens to the door to tyranny of the minority.
Referendum 67 – Yes! Washington is one of only 5 states that hasn’t imposed penalties on insurance companies for deliberately delaying or denying valid claims, and they’ve taken full advantage of this omission. The industry argues Ref. 67 will drive up insurance rates, but the only way that can be true is if they’re planning to violate their customers’ contractual rights and incur the penalties. It should be noted that the treble damages authorized by Ref. 67 are not automatic, but must be approved by a judge, who is given discretion to award damages UP TO three times; this is not a mere technicality, as s/he is not REQUIRED to do so, and can choose to award nothing in appropriate cases. We’ve had a treble damages provision in our timber trespass statute for over a century, and in our consumer protection law since the 1970s, and these laws have worked well to deter unlawful conduct and reimburse victims for the high costs of seeking redress from those who wronged them.
Senate Resolution 8206 – No. While the concept of a rainy-day fund is superficially appealing, the devil is in the details, and this measure is opposed by a number of Democratic legislators, Democratic organizations, and labor groups. For one thing, it will divert 1% annually of the existing revenue stream for 10 years, whether surpluses are available or not, and it is likely some of this money will be taken from immediate needs in education and children’s health care.
Senate Resolution 8212 – No. This is a constitutional amendment to allow the state to provide inmate labor to private companies. While presented to voters as a housekeeping measure to restore the status quo ante prior to a “technical court ruling,” its potential to make free market workers compete against prison labor can’t be overlooked. That’s why it’s opposed by an eclectic assortment of business and labor interests.
House Resolution 4204 – No (reluctantly). This was a difficult vote for me. This constitutional amendment does two things: (a) It requires only a simple majority to pass school levies, and (b) it eliminates minimum-turnout requirements in school levy elections. First of all, let’s keep in mind what a levy election is: It asks voters to waive property tax lids enacted for their protection. Viewed in the context of a vote to override an existing law, the supermajority and turnout requirements look considerably more palatable (and justifiable). Further, if this measure passes, schools will get special treatment in this respect, because all other taxing jurisdictions will still need supermajorities and minimum turnouts to get these waivers. But I could live with this amendment if it only modified the supermajority requirement; however, doing away with any minimum turnout requirement, it seems to me, invites manipulation: School districts having difficulty passing their levies inevitably will be tempted to schedule elections at inconvenient times in hopes of winning by default. Without a minimum turnout requirement, a handful of voters could waive property tax protections for thousands of households. That’s undemocratic. I will vote for this measure if it returns to a future ballot without (b).
House Resolution 4215 – Yes. I parted company with the Democratic Party and organized labor on this one. I don’t understand why they oppose it; it’s a housekeeping measure to remove investment restrictions on certain dedicated higher education funds emanating from land grants; the same restrictions that were taken off investment of other state funds long ago. Passing this measure will make more money available for higher education.
King County Initiative 25 – No! Electing the elections director is more likely to make election administration more partisan than to make it better. A professional elections director is the way to go.
King County Proposition 1 – Renewal of Medic 1 property tax … Yes. This should e another no-brainer; we’re already paying this tax, and it’s one of the very best bargains in government services around. At 30 cents per $1,000 assessed valuation, it’s cheaper than a funeral.
Proposition 1 – No! Our region needs to address a number of critical transportation problems, but this ballot measure doesn’t do that, despite imposing an onerous tax burden on those least able to pay. Instead of providing funding for the 520 bridge and the region’s worst traffic bottlenecks, Prop. 1 buys a super-expensive light rail expansion that will do very little to move people or commerce. By Sound Transit’s own estimate, if Prop. 1 passes, light rail will carry only 1% of the region’s commuter traffic. Prop. 1 is more about anti-car ideology than practical traffic solutions. The market clearly has chosen cars, and even if Prop. 1 passes, we’ll be confronted with another expensive package of tolls, fees, and taxes to fund the high-priority road and bridge projects that Prop. 1 ignores. We shouldn’t make irreversible transportation investment decisions for the next 50 years based on a subjective judgment that cars are bad without taking into account the probability that automotive technology will address the bad things about today’s cars, such as emissions and oil dependence. For example, future cars may have electric propulsion systems, using electricity from “green” sources. Thus, mass transit’s touted advantages in reduced emissions and fuel efficiency may be only temporary. I’m not opposed to mass transit per se; but of the available modes of mass transit, light rail seems a poor choice in terms of cost and inflexibility.
By way of clarification, Prop. 1 does provide funding for SOME priority road-traffic projects; but that doesn’t change the fact it’s essentially funding for Phase 2. The “for” statement in the official Voter’s Pamphlet is misleading when it says “Vote Yes for funding to replace vulnerable bridges — SR 520 bridge …” in that it provides only about 20% of the money needed for the bridge. Voters contemplating voting “yes” should consider that Prop. 1 is not the end of transportation funding needs; we will be asked for MORE MONEY LATER to complete the 520 bridge and other urgent road and bridge projects, not to mention the fact light rail boosters are already scheming to hit us up for Phase 3.
Well, its the first time I have voted for a Democrat, but if Satterberg doesn’t have the decency to support Richard Pope, Sherman gets my vote. So there.
FYI – Jane and Venus both deserve to be put out of public life.
Drunks, both. Driving drunks, even worse, the public will not stand for it … no way.
Went to a big fag community fund raiser last night, 1150 people at the Westin, raised about $800,000. I take cabs, but others at my table had rooms at the Westin so they could party with no need to drive. THAT is the lesson for poor, dumb, vapid Venus.
Voted for Harrell, not in the county so I can’t vote for Pope, but would if offered the chance.
I like underdogs and the sharp debate they often bring to public affairs.
Godly is till sticking with the lying drunk. Too bad, Goldy. Your credibility sinks with her campaign. Politics gets hard sometimes, she has shamed the city, dump her. Move on. She is an albatross.
Rabbit @3: Your opposition to HR4204 is troubling, and I ask that you reconsider if it is not too late.
(a.)It provided guidelines allowing local jurisdictions to get around, albeit rather clumsily, the strangling Eyeman 1% taxing guidelines that is laying waste to effective government in the rural areas of our state.
(b.)It eliminates the tyranny of the minority with respect to school levies–especially capital improvement levies which have been defeated many times repeatedly (cf. Seattle, Burien) and at great cost to the effectiveness of public schools, the PARAMOUNT POLICY GOAL AS STATED IN THE CONSTITUTION OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON, by lunatic anti-taxers falsely representing themselves as the ‘will of the people’, all 41% of them.
and (c.)Majority rule is the foundation of democracy. We need more democracy, not less. That few people vote on oddly timed school levies is not a fault to lay at the foot of local school districts, and your comments in this regard are nothing but a red herring. If the turnout is low, an effective campaign to disuade a few voters would, conceivably, be equally successful to defeat the proposed levy.
You are cutting off your nose to spite your face on this issue.
With all due respect,
PTBA
For all those that want us to think Satteburg is more qualified, remember this. Some Nazis may have been more qualified. Should they have got your vote?
The Republiconvicts are trying to do to America exactly what the Nazis did to Germany, using the exact same methods. The similarities are horrifying. Instead of Jews they have Gays, and Illegals for their minions to hate. Reichstag Fire = 9-11. Fatherland = Homeland. Needless wars. Claiming false threats. Terrifying the people non stop. Ignoring the nation’s laws, and amassing dictatorial power, with the help of their “friends” in office. The list goes on. Same exact playbook. We have seen it before.
It is up to us to stop it.
By being a Republiconvict, Satterburg makes himself unqualified. He is such a slimeball, that he doesn’t even mention the fact that he is a Republiconvict in his TV ads. He is trying to pull a fast one. Their standard procedure.
Pretty simple choice isn’t it. A Scammer -vs- a Democrat.
The only thing for sure is that Sherman won’t be using the law to give Republiconvicts free passes in King County, and prosecuting Dems for being Dems when the Rove types call.
Ignore my posts at our nation’s peril……
If Richard Pope is so hot to go, where’s the HA fundraising effort for him? You pimped Bill Sherman, candidate for prosecuting attorney unsupported to the point of being downright opposed by liberal Democratic attorneys in the PAO, and received, per your taken-at-face-value pronouncement, something over $5K in campaign contributions from more than 100 donors.
Where’s a similar effort for Pope? Or is your support limited to rhetoric and links to the self-impressed Noemie Maxwell? Some interview! Felt like she spent as much time on her own agenda, positions on issues, etc. But that’s to be expected.
I found it odd in the extreme that she was selectively critical of some comments about Richard Pope she read here at HA. She ought to spend time reading the even worse stuff – stuff bordering on incitements to violence at times – that are routinely defecated here whenever any of us wingnuts deign to have the temerity to challange the conventional HA “wisdom.”
Selective outrage is synonomous with hypocrisy.
That HA raised for Bill Sherman, who probably didn’t need the dough, well over what Richard Pope has in his entire campaign war chest is a telling indictment of how thin your support for him truly is. BS walks, money talks.
Would that you started such a dialing for dollars on Pope’s behalf; in the 6th Councilmanic District, an HA effort like that would indeed be the kiss of death for Pope, who, it’s interesting to note, never seems to spend his evenings out campaigning. Instead, his misplaced priorities have him cruising the blogs and occassionally tossing an electronic hand grenade. Given that HA plenipotentiary, Darryl, defines blogging as merely recreational, Pope, by definition, prefers to play instead of taking his latest and soon-to-be failed race for office seriously.
Curious…to what extent has he door-belled the 6th? With what results?
Make no mistake…the incumbent has serious baggage, and I’ve never questioned that. But pinning your hopes on Pope? “D”elusional. Then again, the qualifications of candidates for office begin and end at HA with the letter “D.”
It’s said that the depraved Roman emperor, Caligula, sought to have his horse appointed Counsul of Rome and a member of the Roman senate. No doubt had HA been around at the time and had the horse, one Incitatus, been identified by Caligula as a Democrat, Goldy and the gang would have been positively agog at the prospect of an equine in office.
Just think: a real horse with a real ass. All the more fitting and proper.
If Jane Balogh’s dog expressed Democratic tendencies, all complaints against the pooch registering to vote would have immediately been silenced.
Dead or alive, a Democratic vote is a Democratic vote.
Has anyone thought about pitching the HA concept to the folks at Comedy Central? Really…Southpark has nothing on you! Just think…”Somebody shot Will” (or Lee or Geov or Darryl…take your pick).
Pretty soon, I expect to read in the tabloids that Goldy and Brittany are now an item. The entertainment value in all this?…Priceless!
The Piper
“Proposition 1 – No! Our region needs to address a number of critical transportation problems, but this ballot measure doesn’t do that, despite imposing an onerous tax burden on those least able to pay. Instead of providing funding for the 520 bridge and the region’s worst traffic bottlenecks, Prop. 1 buys a super-expensive light rail expansion that will do very little to move people or commerce.”
RR provides a nice assessment of Prop 1.
What I would only add is Prop 1 does *nothing* to address the congestion problems of today in five years (worse) or a decade (worse yet). Proponents make exceptionally vague and misleading (some say dishonest . . ) claims for congestion improvements that are in fact not improvements over today, but improvements over having not done anything, twenty years from now (hardly a realistic scenario). And this is if you believe the published data, which is extraordinarily inadequate for making informed judgments, and not accompanied by an underlying study that can be scrutinized (shame on the Times and PI for not focusing more on this aspect of the data they published *courtesy of RTID*, and shame on the RTID for not making this analysis readily available).
Far and away people in this region are looking for solutions to today’s congestion – and that happens to be the one thing Prop 1 is not providing, despite the immense sums being paid out for years to come.
Piper has an attack of the vapours, and asks for smelling salts:
“She ought to spend time reading the even worse stuff…”
At National Review On Line? Little Green Footballs? Michelle Malkin? Confederate Yankee? The Wall Street Journal editorial page?
“It’s said that the depraved Roman emperor, Caligula, sought to have his horse appointed Counsul of Rome and a member of the Roman senate.”
What better way to mock the do-nothing social parasites in the Roman Senate, eh? Your hero George Bush pulled a similar stunt by nominating Harriet Meyers to the Supreme Court. But let’s see here…a horse or Jane Hague? Well, let’s see here….(visit Hague web site)….
Good God Almighty, Jane has a “plan” (unspecified, natch) to ensure that county capital projects come in on time and within budget! Now this is really news!
….I’ll have to get back to you. It’s a tough choice.
@10 James,
Fair enough. But what solution do you envision that will end today’s congestion? I’m a fair guy. I’ll even consider insane proposals–like summary executions of anybody daring to move into King County. Give it your best shot.
Because otherwise, your slimy innuendo regarding the ‘honesty’ of the RTID backers is just that….slimy.
It is a weak argument that relies on accusations of the motives of the other party in the absence of any evidence. Try bringing some next time.
At least Rabbit has solid reasons for his opposition. You bring nothing.
What is this with people attacking me for supporting Venus? When have I ever endorsed Venus? When have I ever taken a position on this race?
I mean, geez… I fly cross country on a red eye, hop on a computer, read of Venus’ DUI, immediately take time away from my family to write a post skewering her for her poor judgment and her dumb response… and somehow that makes me a hypocrite?
At the end of the post I wrote:
Considering it was written minutes after learning of the incident, and surely without me knowing all the details, I think that was a fair and appropriate caveat to add. And it was hardly an endorsement.
@13, Goldy: “What is this with people attacking me….”
You’re a liberal. QED
I am lifelong Democrat. I arrived in WA state in the year 2003. The first I ever heard of Richard Pope was right here on the HA comment threads. Although I disageed with many of his opinions, I could readily see that Richard Pope was intelligent, informed, and principled.
For these reasons, I vote for him when he runs for office, whether it be as a Republican or Democrat.
As Piper Scott (our most pompous commenter) and our most famous homosexual poet, Walt Whitman, remind us: Absolute consistency is a false idol to diminutive minds.
Or, sometin’ like that.
Is Piper Scott an unwitting tool of the GAY agenda that is trying to destroy the American family? His constant references to Walt Whitman, 19th century GAY American poet and confirmed bachelor, would suggest that this is true.
No on R-67. They could accomplish the same thing without something that enriches trail lawyers.
Suggest they go back to the drawing board on R-67.
Lloyd Thaxton?????????
Haven’t heard that name sice the 60’s! Didn’t he do one of those teenage dance shows, like “American Bandstand?”
@16
As I noted in another thread, Piper likes to dress up in a plaid skirt (PLAID!!!) and strut around squeezing the remains of a deceased sheep ( a fetish for dead relatives, perhaps?) to produce cacophanous whining sounds which anyone who visits here (and God-knows-how-many blogs) will instantly recognize.
I look forward to him breaking a heel and falling on his fatuous face in the next several elections.
I’m an Anglican, but his wailings alone would suffice to make me a papist.
@15…LT…
“Do I contradict myself? Well, then I contradict myself. I am large, I contain multitudes.” Walt Whitman, “Leaves of Grass.”
I neither know nor care nor care to know of Whitman’s sexual orientation. That was his business, not mine. You seem to have a fixation about such matters, however, which leads me to ask when you last visited the Twin Cities?
The quote you boffed was more properly Ralph Waldo Emerson’s, “Foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of small minds.” At HA, the minds are small, indeed.
The original Lloyd Thaxton was the king of lip-syncing, and had an early 60’s Los Angeles-based TV show patterned loosely after American Bandstand. He also had a gig as a Top-40 DJ.
I’m sure you’ll do better next time…Still won’t be good enough, but anything would be an improvement.
The Piper
Piper Scott is a newbie here, like me, so we really can’t say he’s the most pompous poster. My money would be on another of the usual suspects for the most pompous asshole on this blog. I think everyone knows who I’m talking about.
You know, Piper, I think a lot of the apostles were gay. Given that statement and the propensity of a few Catholic priests to have trouble keeping their hands off the altar boys, the foundations of Christianity might be a little stained. Could it be that Christianity, like all religions, is a tale that grew with the telling and was initially influenced by what modern Christians would call “vile” lifestyles?
@19…Hanging Chadt…
Anglicans were the great persecutors of Highlanders and thieves of the their lands and property, so it’s no wonder. And your threat to become a Catholic tells me you have no knowledge of British history since it was James II’s Catholicism that was largely responsible for the Glorious revolution that brought William of Orange and his wife who was also James’ daughter, Mary, to the British throne.
The aftermath of this was a series of Catholic-led, French-supported efforts to reclaim the throne for James and any number of his progeny ending in the Battle of Culloden in 1746.
Your spew about piping only serves to alienate Canadians who are perhaps and pound for pound more piping oriented than today’s Scots.
Way to go, bupkis…Starting an international incident by pissing off our neighbors to the north.
The Piper
SJ
King County Prosecutor – Sherman. My reasons for this are more than a bit disingenuous. While, all other things being equal, I woulkd choose Satterberg, the emergence of DL backed candidates as a good alternative to what I see as a failed party system.
King County Council Pos. 6 – Richard Pope Basically because I agree with Roger Rabbit.
Initiative 960 – No! Eyman could get me to vote for Intelligent Design.
Referendum 67 – Yes! Frankly, I resent being asked to vote on an issue like this where I lack expertise. For all his pixel abuse, Roger’s legal opinions are always well thought out. While I realize the rabbit is a shyster, he know more than I do on this sort of thing. So I will follow the rabbit sown the hole on this.
Senate Resolution 8206 – No. This is a stuoid issue t put on the ballot, worthy of Eyman. I do not know enough about the budgte to make this descision. That is why we pay accountants to to tell us where the money is and elect politicians to decide on priorities.
Senate Resolution 8212 –No . I disagree with the shyster bunny on this constitutional amendment to allow the state to provide inmate labor to private companies. While I agree that this could be abused, I fail t see the logic that incarcerated people should not be able to work. Indeed incarceration may serve a better pur5pose if we allow prisoners to work in jobs that provide real world training. Is there a potential for misuse of prisoners to compete against the free market? Yes, but the same can be said of almost anything we d as a government. Of course there needs to be oversight.
House Resolution 4204 – Yes I agree with the Rabbit that this constitutional amendment facilitates school levies but I think that is a good thing. In effect this would make the default to pass the levy. As long as we have elective school boards and the state does not do what the Constitution requires, the board should be elected to make exactly this decision.
House Resolution 4215 – Yes. Roger has it right. ” It’s a housekeeping measure to remove investment restrictions on certain dedicated higher education funds emanating from land grants; the same restrictions that were taken off investment of other state funds long ago. Passing this measure will make more money available for higher education.”
King County Initiative 25 – No! Again, damnit .. this obsession with electing folks for every job is nits. The elections director does a technical job. Hire her or him.
King County Proposition 1 – Yes Medic one is envied around the world.
Proposition 1 – YES, reluctantly I HATE this measure but see no choice. It is a dishonest abuse of the electorate, worthy of the criticism of Eyman. But, I think we have been thoroughly fucked by the bad le4adershio of our regiuona and have no other choice. These facilities ar needed, for the most part. Doing this the right way, telling voters what the real costs will be and doing it as aprt of a comprehensive transportation plan would be a lot better, but not doing it will just cost us more money. I also see this as meat for acompatent Pubican running vs. Gregoir.
I will not vote on the following because I think it is absurd these are elective offices. Port of Seattle Pos. 2 – Port of Seattle Pos. 5 – The port needs to be managed professionally and report to a more logical regional political entity .. presumably the County, I am also highly suspicious of any high level job that is not recompensed. With the BEST of intentions, the result is always corruption or incompetence.
re 20: So, you are saying that a person’s sexual orientation is their own business and no one else’s? Yet, you belong to a political party that cynically uses fear of homosexuality to garner votes for itself.
As long as we are referring to great Americans of the 19th century, let’s talk about what Sitting Bull had to say to the American public about the defeat and destruction of his people: “I do not know why you are so pleased that they (the powers that be) can do this to us. If they can do it to us, they can, and will, do it to you.”
Give me an example, Piper, of one thing that this administration has done to help the American people. You can’t, because they haven’t.
This is really an extraordinary interview. Though it’s a very sympathetic one, it finally raises all the important questions, with some solid research behind it. Shame on the MSM.
This puts to rest all the questions about the past, but it’s still hard for me to buy Pope as a Democrat. He is starting to break for me as at least the slightly lesser of two evils though. So, Mr. Pope, if this continues as we near the election, you may just gain my heavily qualified, conditional, and unenthusiastic support! :-)
Go Richard!!!
@23
I AM a Canadian, you dolt, and if you weren’t so impaired, you’d have detected the humour in papist = supporter of the Pope. It was a pun, Your Ineffable Brilliance. If you were half as bright as you keep telling us you are, I wouldn’t have had to EXPLAIN IT to you.
As for British history, Idiot, it was your fellow puritan protestant (you ARE SBC, you say) Oliver Cromwell who started the whole mess by offing King Charles the Martyr.
It was he who did untold damage to the Scots.
At least you get credit for consistency. One more post reminding us all of the reasons for the contempt in which you’re held here. You’re just lucky you have military kids to hide behind and a long-suffering wife who probably works very hard to support you in the aristocratic style in which you’d like us to believe you’re accustomed. If you actually did have a real job, you’d not have any time for the endless Republican propaganda you inflict on the victims here and elsewhere.
At least YOU don’t have to worry if your kilt is too short.
Thanks, Goldy, for linking to my piece. In looking at all the coverage of Richard Pope over a couple of years, you were the only source I could find that provided serious information to help people make up their minds on the basis of facts. That was your piece that recommended against Pope for district judge. Your recent KIRO interview where you actually ask the guy about issues is appreciated too. People are trying to make up their minds about who to vote for — and it helps when the media provides some real information rather than the tired old conventionalized tropes. Yeah, I do think that the discussions on HA change people’s minds. I’m not speaking for RP here (though I suspect that was a factor) — but I’ve seen it in a number of ways over the past 2 years and I think it’s cool, I like it.
So much of the coverage on Pope has been tongue-in-cheek, insider-joke, patronizing — toward the candidate and, by extension, toward voters who are trying to make decisions. It’s that attitude — politics is a game that neglects the reality that who we elect has impact on the lives of the most vulnerable people in our communities — people who can’t speak up for themselves. I don’t take issue with satire — I take issue with lazy-minded & cute jokes that forget that politics has impact on real people.
#15: “Absolute consistency is a false idol to diminutive minds.” Hey, I like that, that’s beautiful!
Howard Dean did yell in New Hampshire but he wasn’t out of control. He sounded like he was out of control in the version played over and over in the media because the sound file had been manipulated — all the background sound had been stripped out.
Pope’s made professional mistakes. So, what’s the context for that? How does anyone decide what those mean, how they compare to the mistakes everyone else makes, what they mean about the potential for this job, this race. The media and (some) bloggers and the Republican hit page have stripped out the background sound on Pope’s record to make him look crazy and incompetent. That’s easy to do — but it’s, functionally speaking, a lie. It leaves us in the dark. It doesn’t serve the public interest.
I think everyone knows who I’m talking about.
Yeah, it’s you. Thanks for your honesty.
“Because otherwise, your slimy innuendo regarding the ‘honesty’ of the RTID backers is just that….slimy.”
It is a weak argument that relies on accusations of the motives of the other party in the absence of any evidence. Try bringing some next time.”
This is straightforward and right up front. If you make claims about congestion reduction be sure the presentation is clear, backed up by the data, and not misleading (RTID brochure: “Finally, a balanced and comprehensive plan to **unclog our roads** . . .”). Especially if this is the primary issue for voters and they’re being asked to pay billions for it for decades (in addition to other billions that will be requested). Make the data behinds these claims readily available – it’s not posted by RTID (why?) – so it can be evaluated. The only data published on this subject has been through the PI and Times, and it has been very, very selective (and in the case of the PI’s presentation, very much in need of clarification).
If you choose to accept the data and claims at face value and never ask questions, that’s up to you. We were also asked, as I recall, to trust the monorail claims (and, for what it’s worth, a number of the vocal backers of that project are backers of this one).
My guess is most voters have far more questions than answers right now, just weeks before the vote.
Noemie @29: I mention it above, but excellent interview. You’ve gained a new reader. Did RP say more about going after the construction lobby in Washington, or did he just deflect your question, as it appears in the interview?
BTW, @2, @9: Sounds to me like the critics/trolls on HA have to decide whether they want to accuse Goldy of being a hypocrite for being a true believer or a hypocrite for not being true enough.
#20 — You sre , of course, correct. It was Ralph Waldo Emerson who spoke of minds and hobgoblins. But, in Mr. Thaxton’s defence the ‘Wal’ in Walt and Waldo could become transposed in Mr. Thaxton’s aging mind.
‘WAL’ Tghat should count for something!
James,
You were the one who brought up the “some say…dishonest”, a tactic that is, frankly, reprehensible.
I’m no big fan of RTID (trains to Tacoma, regressive taxation, etc.) I have listened to Julia Patterson speak on the subject in person, and more than once. Even she says this is not the final ‘solution’ to (forecasted) congestion. She freely admits that congestion 20 years from now is projected to be rather grim, even with this package. She knows this is not a perfect deal. So insofar as the ‘future’ is concerned, I believe the pols who put this together are being pretty honest.
But it is a patchwork of deals and smacks of political desperation and an exasperation to do something now at the expense of kicking this can down the road again. Maybe you don’t think the sky in falling wrt to congestion, or perhaps you believe in miracles. Frankly, you do not reveal yourself in this regard.
Of course one can cast stones…that’s pretty easy. I’ve done it myself plenty in partisan settings. I still see no suggestion from you…just anything to get an idea of where you’re coming from.
All I want is an honest conversation, not an evaluation of RTID’s honesty. Is this a policy issue or a morality play?
@7 I expected to get some criticism from my liberal friends for my position on 4204.
On a preliminary matter, local governments are indeed being financially strangled becaus of an Eyman initiative — sort of — but not the one you imply is responsible. The local revenue shortfalls resulted from the legislature’s repeal of the unpopular car tab tax, not I-601, which voters passed several years earlier. I say “legislature” because Eyman’s car tab initiative failed in the courts; but, instigated by the heavy “yes” vote it received at the polls, legislators got rid of it. It was a bad tax, and is not missed, and its ill effects on local revenues could reasonably be laid at the doorstep of the legislature for doing nothing to replace those revenues.
The fact education funding is, according to the state constitution, the state’s paramount duty is not relevent to this debate, because that provision speaks to priorities and says nothing about funding mechanisms. That we need excess levies at all is proof the funding mechanism is dysfunctional, and that our energies should be focused on broader tax reform instead of tinkering with the mechanisms of levy elections. We need to amend the constitution, but this is the wrong amendment; this state needs an income tax, and will never have the money to fully fund education until the affluent households who get to skate under the current tax system are forced to cough up their fair share of taxes. The less affluent classes have already been bled for as much as the market will bear, as the defeat of the penny-sales-tax education initiative demonstrates; and you’ll never get the money you want for education by making it easier to raise regressive taxes.
Based on my 40 years of experience in living in the Seattle area, I’m not inclined to agree with you that weirdly-timed levy elections are a random accident of nature, and that calculating school officials have nothing to do with the low turnouts in these elections.
@9 “If Richard Pope is so hot to go, where’s the HA fundraising effort for him?”
Has he asked for one? Richard’s style is to run moneyless campaigns. He probably gets votes cheaper than any other politician in America; I read recently that Romney forked out $130 for every vote he got in Iowa’s straw poll, and those votes don’t even count. Richard likely will spend about $100 on his county council campaign, and the votes he gets will end up costing him less than 1/10th cent each. Maybe Romney should call Richard for investment advice! And, to tell you the truth, I don’t mind having a tightwad like Richard supervising the expenditure of my King County tax dollars! But, I can see where Republicans, who have turned into looters and big spenders, wouldn’t be impressed by that …
@3
I’m still chewing on the rainy day fund. We should have one, but like you say the devil is in the details.
Piper:
Arrogance is certainly your strong suit. Humility has obviously never been part of your character (not that you have of that either). You write with a sardonic glibness that is neither cute or rational.
Yes, this is personal. Yes, I am attacking you. You are an idiot wrapped in a fools clothing. Your loquacious ramblings only serve to reinforce just exactly how far up your ass you have managed to jam your head.
Thankfully…… mercifully…you will soon leave. Your kind always does.
@10 There best solution to today’s congestion is high gas prices that discourage frivolous driving and encourage commuters to use mass transit. The most sensible way to raise money for mass transit is to raise the price of gas by taxing it more, before oil companies and oil-producing nations raise the price of gas by charging more for it and putting the profits in their own pockets. Gas is going to cost more anyway you slice it; and the question here is simply one of whether we get to spend the money on public transportation, or whether third world dictators get to spend it on military hardware.
@11 “It’s said that the depraved Roman emperor, Caligula, sought to have his horse appointed Counsul of Rome and a member of the Roman senate.”
A group of college students ran a jackass for Chicago alderman — and the jackass won. There are times when a horse (or a jackass) may indeed be an improvement over the incumbent, at least in the judgment of a majority of the voters. It’s probably the only sensible thing Caligula ever did; but, for all his insane atrocities, there is perhaps a tiny bit of redemption in the fact he appointed a horse as Consul and Senator of Rome.
@17 “No on R-67. They could accomplish the same thing without something that enriches trail lawyers.”
How? And what do you have against capitalist lawyers making a living by taking calculated business risks? Isn’t that exactly what Republican investors and business people do? A trial lawyer makes nothing unless the cases he takes to court are good ones that produce verdicts for his clients.
But it is a patchwork of deals and smacks of political desperation and an exasperation to do something now at the expense of kicking this can down the road again. Maybe you don’t think the sky in falling wrt to congestion, or perhaps you believe in miracles. Frankly, you do not reveal yourself in this regard.
Of course one can cast stones…that’s pretty easy. I’ve done it myself plenty in partisan settings. I still see no suggestion from you…just anything to get an idea of where you’re coming from.
All I want is an honest conversation, not an evaluation of RTID’s honesty. Is this a policy issue or a morality play?
**********************************
Point #1 Congestion is bad today. Prop 1 does not address it, despite the misleading claims to the contrary by RTID in it brochures and backers. Congestion relief is the primary issue for voters. If Prop 1 does not provide it, I can’t imagine why we’d commit ourselves to this decades long project only do discover in 2028 that we’re stuck in traffic that is worse than it is
today. I have to believe that most voters, if they could be transported to 2028 and asked to spend a week driving in traffic, would be in for a shock and asking, “But we’ve spent all this money and I thought Prop 1 was supposed to . . . ?”
Point #2 We need far more information to evaluate congestion claims 20 years from now. This is the primary issue, but we have very little data regarding it. In fact, outside of what the Times and PI have published, which has been very limited and unclear (the PI, as I noted previously, published a misleading chart, as they will admit), it is very difficult to find any data regarding the impact of Prop 1 on congestion. And it’s even more difficult getting access to the modeling studies behind the data. RTID does not make this work available, and the data – not the studies, but the results of the studies – they post is far too limited to be of much value (actually, what data they do post is misleading in the same way that the PI data is). Far more effort should have been made by RTID to clarify for voters how Roads and Transit will impact congestion. This particular issue has not received near the scrutiny it should have.
Point #3 Somewhere along the way a notion has developed that Prop 1 is the best we can do and though it make have all sorts of problems, we should just hold our nose (says the PI) and vote for it. That seems to be your thinking from what I can tell. My thinking is you don’t spend billions on something that doesn’t accomplish what voters expect it to, which is reduce our congestion. Instead, you send regional leadership back to the drawing boad and tell them to come up with something that works.
Point #4 Just to be clear, I support light rail generally and I look forward to it. However, it’s not going to address our congestion problems, far from it, and voters need to be clear on that. It will provide an alternative, but even RTID’s own numbers make clear that for the lion share of drivers, they won’t take it. In that case we have to think very carefully about how much we’re willing to spend on light rail, because there’s a limit to what people will pay. I also want people out of their cars, other than critical infrasture projects, I have deep reservations about widening roadways for more traffic. This is a losing proposition in the long run in my view, and we will be spending huge sums forever if we take this strategy.
There are no easy answers, but Prop 1 is a very bad answer in my view.
@24 “While I realize the rabbit is a shyster”
True; but I admit it, and am humble about it.
@43 I understand that, as a lawyer and a rabbit, I’m at the very bottom of the human pecking order.
However, this is partially compensated for by the fact this city’s non-inconsequential rabbit population sucks up to me, and among my own kind I enjoy the status and prerogatives of a king..
erratum
not-inconsequential not non-inconsequential
This is an example of how one letter can totally change meaning.
@24 “Senate Resolution 8212 –No .”
If you disagree with me, you probably want to vote “yes,” not “no.” A “yes” vote would pass the amendment allowing the contracting of inmate labor to private companies. A “no” vote defeats it.
@25 “Give me an example, Piper, of one thing that this administration has done to help the American people. You can’t, because they haven’t.”
More to the point, ask Piper for one thing this administration has done to help HIM. Unless he is very rich, they haven’t.
Rabbit @35:
Thanks for the correction re car tabs. However, the 1% restriction acts to further undercut local decision making and the proper assignment of resources to public goods.
“this state needs an income tax, and will never have the money to fully fund education until the affluent households who get to skate under the current tax system are forced to cough up their fair share of taxes.”
I couldn’t agree more. That more of our Dem. leadership won’t take a principled stand on this (Sims excepted) is borderline criminal.
As far as tinkering goes…you fail to address the main point: More democracy is better. That schools have to go begging to get a supermajority is simply unfair and noxious. Furthermore, if the states voters, most of whom are not rich, desire to vote high regressive taxes to the point of penury to fund public education, let us let them make that decision. It is their right.
“Based on my 40 years of experience in living in the Seattle area, I’m not inclined to agree with you that weirdly-timed levy elections are a random accident of nature, and that calculating school officials have nothing to do with the low turnouts in these elections.”
Again, red herring.
yr. obd. servant,
PTBA
RR: You know more about the law than the average bear. What happens to lawyers who habitually file frivolous suits? Aren’t they disciplined in some way?
And, if it is as I suspect, it’s not ‘frivolous’ lawsuits that the insurance companies worry about, but the valid ones.
Insurance companies don’t make their money on premium payments, anyway. It would just hurt the bottom line if they were to pay all the valid claims.
Business is all about making money by whatever means fair or foul that you can get away with. They need the tempering quality that trial lawyers bring to their frivolous waste of human lives in their pursuit of the almighty dollar.
Vote YES on R-67.
@28 “If you actually did have a real job, you’d not have any time for the endless Republican propaganda you inflict on the victims here and elsewhere.”
Inflicting it probably IS his job. And, knowing how Republicans operate, he’s probably not a Washington resident. He more likely lives and “works” in a state where the minimum wage is $5.15 an hour, because that’s what the GOP pays for the great intellectual gifts its boiler room operatives bring to the profession of trolling.
Perhaps 4204 is a case where “the perfect is the enemy of good,” and the good should be accepted rather than wait for a “perfect” that may never come. I have already voted, so my “no” vote won’t change; but I have no quarrel with those who choose to vote “yes.” This one is blurry, and I wavered a lot on it. However, my desire for comprehensive tax reform is not at all blurry; I am firmly committed to implementing the recommendations of the Gates Commission as soon as possible, including tax relief for small business.
@42 I think the main thing that is missing from the discussion of congestion 20 years from now is any questioning of the assumption that gas will still cost $3 (in real terms) and 2028’s cars will look like 2007’s cars. Let’s think back to 20 years ago, 1987 … nobody had ever heard of Microsoft then, and the Soviet threat was perceived as the planet’s biggest problem … my, how things can change in a mere 20 years. Given the pace of the technology revolution, and other changes, I think it’s folly to design transportation for 50 years from now. There’s a high risk that a monorail, or its variant, light rail, could become the Sony Beta Player of transportation — a squandered investment in a discarded technology. I don’t know all the answers to our transportation dilemma, but my gut instinct urges caution against betting the farm on a transportation technology that, even by 2007 standards, looks clunky and dated.
James,
Good points and well said.
Point #1: Yes, congestion is bad today. Everybody knows that. The question is what do we do about it? R.Rabbit advocates big gas tax increase. I agree with him. The voters do not. This is a problem.
Point #2: Twenty year projections are shakey at best (cf. Social Security debate). However, if the trend remains, we shall be in deep doo-doo in 2028. But let us concede your point that RTID did not publish hundred of pages of detailed modeling studies to back their case. This would appear to only reinforce the idea that this was a grand political bargain…logrolling at its finest, a deeply accepted part of the american political process.
Point #3: I do not share your belief that voters will blindly support the measure with the impression that it will, by magic, ‘solve’ traffic congestion. I give them more credit than that (although they do test this belief to the limit quite often).
Point #4: We have to think carefully about a wide range of issues. Our past mistakes with respect to public transportation in this area has led us to a cul de sac, and not one of those pretty suburban ones.
The tipping point will come one way or the other. It may not be pretty, and decision making under such duress may not be any wiser. Our suburban development patterns are a gigantic waste…so to my way of thinking we have already sunk trillions into what is most likely a dead end enterprise.
I’m all for a radical re-evaluation of this lifestyle, because I feel it is the only rational approach. Getting to that point of even having that discussion is the problem.
The conventional wisdom on Wall Street is that oil prices will crash soon, and we will return to oil “normalcy” — with its attended big vehicles and traffic convention. I think Wall Street is wrong. Oil prices may not sustain at current levels, but a return to $30 oil is simply not in the cards. Demand has overrun the ability of Saudi Arabia and even of OPEC to manipulate crude prices; like the Texas Railroad Commission, OPEC will ordered the oilwell spigots opened all the way, and then become irrelevant. Oil won’t crash to $30 or even $40 for the simply reason that human civilization’s basic fuel needs now exceed the supply of cheap-to-extract petroleum and part of the supply now has to come from oil that costs more than $40 to retrieve from the ground. There is a vast quantity of expensive oil still to be had, and we know where it is, but the infrastructure to recover it obviously wasn’t built during the cheap-oil era, is being built now, and building it requires vast capital investments that can’t be supported by market prices under $60. And if these investments aren’t made, this “alternative oil” can’t be brought to market, and without it, demand can’t be satisfied and increasingly desperate buyers will bid oil prices far above that level. So, I think $60 is the long-term floor under oil prices, although we might now and then see a temporary weakening below this level because of recession, price wars, OPEC’s last-gasp of internal bickering, etc.
What all this means in terms of domestic and local transportation policy is that the real cost of driving, adjusted for monetary inflation, is going up permanently and this will have a discouraging effect on frivolous and recreational driving, and on inefficient modes of commuting. More people will look for alternatives to driving; and, over time, our society will be forced to become more efficient in the geographic distribution of jobs and residences. In a word, in the future, people will choose to live closer to their work, and employers will be forced to bring the work closer to where people have to live. The downtown core that draws tens of thousands of workers from 50 miles around is an albatross of the cheap-oil era that will, I believe, not survive the era of expensive fuel; I suspect that, in time, downtown office skyscrapers will suffer the same fate as family farms did in the last century, disappearing in the dust of progress and adaptation to new technologies and imperatives.
I think the individually-owned car will remain with us, but will undergo substantial adaptation and transformation. The most obvious technological changes to automotive transport would be in propulsion and guidance systems; I’m inclined to think that both ICEs (internal combustion engines running on fossil fuel) and human steering and speed control will be supplanted, the former by emerging motor technologies,* the latter by computer technologies.
(* In engineering parlance, “engine” refers to a fuel-burning propulsion plant, and “motor” refers to an electricity-driven propulsion plant; so, engineers among the HA readership should recognized the significant of my nuanced word-choice here.)
What this boils down to is that I think our ground transportion will, in the technological melting pot, hybridize and homogenize; and roads are the most likely existing infrastructure to be modified and adapted to the dominant ground transportation technology of the future.
attendant not attended
congestion not convention
Did anyone notice that before the primaries Goldy’s pals over at The Stranger endorsed Joe Szwaja in the Seattle city council race for Godden’s seat. And then last week switched their endorsement over to Godden. Not because anything about Swaja or Godden changed-they apparently (but don’t admit) think Godden will win and don’t want yet another city council member who won’t return their phone calls. They also beat up on Burgess for several weeks as a gay bashing evangelical and then, this past week, endorsed him for Della’s seat-apparently because Della doesn’t return their phone calls as Erica Barnett whined in a recent Slog post.
Regarding Venus Velaquez -it takes five citations for not having proof of car insurance with her when she was stopped foe a moving violation before she realized that there was a door that opened to the glove box and room inside for the insurance card. Obviously she is qualified for the city council.
Roger Rabbit, for the good of the country I hope you are a Republican lawyer.
@46 Roger R
“@24 “Senate Resolution 8212 –No .”
If you disagree with me, you should voye yes”
Tx. I mistyped.
Thanks Yellow Pup at #32
I don’t remember more in our conversation about going after the construction lobby. I too wanted to hear, explicitly, something like — yeah, this lobby is one of the most destructive forces in state politics…. but I realize I can’t expect others to share my views exactly. I’m pleased that he seems to clearly see much of the real-politick going on in this and other arenas — and is willing to plainly admit it. To a greater degree that some Democratic candidates I support.
The presence of former Republicans in the Democratic party can, maybe, end up having some salubrious effects in politics — as well as the problems it does potentially bring.
There was an irony that I thought was expressed in our conversation — but I wasn’t quick enough to ask him if he was actually saying it or if I was putting those pieces together myself. And that is how the practices of the building industry lobby create hardship for property owners – but then that industry exploits the political reaction to this hardship (property rights movement pushing I-933, etc.) — to get more power to create yet more hardship for those owners and yet more profits for themselves.
A classic vicious cycle that can be broken much faster if more politicians are willing to admit some plain truths as Richard Pope has.
This dynamic was clear to me the way I-933 was “sold” as something that would protect farmers. But sprawl, according the American Farmland Trust — is the main threat to high quality farmland in Washington State. Interestingly, Don Whiting — at the time the interim Legislative Director of the state Grange — basically acknowledged that at a meeting I attended earlier this year — that residential development is the greatest threat to farmland. And I’ve heard this from farmers — how difficult it is to operate next to new residential developments. Sometimes they get sued by new neighbors with starter castles for doing the farming they’ve done for generations. I spoke with a WA farmer this happened to — and he “paid off” his neighbor because he didn’t want to risk losing his farm in the lawsuit.
Anyway, rambling a bit here. I’d really like to see Jane Hague, who clearly is helping to shore up the undue influence of the developer lobby, be replaced by someone who’s willing to say, yeah, there’s unfair stuff going on, to recognize that this offers us room for improvement in, for example, addressing climate change and social equity (smarter permitting practices, for example, might result in more people being able afford housing in the communities where they work) — and that there’s a connection with the hardship that property owners face.
If you want to help Richard, get the Noemie Maxwell interview widely published. Is a link on soundpolitics.com possible?
Point #1: Yes, congestion is bad today. Everybody knows that. The question is what do we do about it? R.Rabbit advocates big gas tax increase. I agree with him. The voters do not. This is a problem.
*****************
Let users pay through tax and tab fees, and tolls. I absolutely agree. If it hurts too much, they will seek alternatives (like rail or bus).
One reason people support Prop 1 is they believe they are getting congestion relief. They are not. If they understood what they were actually getting for their money they would look at it much differently: that regional leadership will come back to them for many more billions for the viaduct and 520 on top of Prop 1 dollars; that there are a slew of underfunded road projects in the wings that will demand even more dollars; that in 2028 the roads will be just as packed as they are today if not more so YET we will have another torrent of people projected to come in the next 20 years BUT are still paying for a measure twenty years earlier that we were told would address all this. We need thinking that gets people out of their cars.
**************
Point #2: Twenty year projections are shakey at best (cf. Social Security debate). However, if the trend remains, we shall be in deep doo-doo in 2028. But let us concede your point that RTID did not publish hundred of pages of detailed modeling studies to back their case. This would appear to only reinforce the idea that this was a grand political bargain…logrolling at its finest, a deeply accepted part of the american political process.
**************
I’m interested that RTID publish data that accuracy describes congestion projections. The only data I am aware of is what the Times and PI published – they went to RTID for this – and very limited transit time projections in a RTID doc. 20 year projections are very problematic and this is part of the discussion. Any data would include key parameters – population growth, demographic patterns, gas rates (yes), transit use and so forth. Results can not possibly be expressed as a single number. Instead, results for different assumptions (eg, different rates of population growth) would be published along with some expression of confidences so we understand best/worse cases and sensitivity of the results from key parameters (so, if population growth is 5% higher than projected in certain regions, what impact does that have on conjestion over selected road segments).
There are several key objectives of Prop 1, and conjestion fixing is one of them. RTID provided selected data to the media, and and posted a little more on their Web site. We don’t know how it was generated. The studies are not available, and there is no
summary/results document. I would absolutely expect the latter because this issue is so germaine to the discussion. The summary doc would provide the types of results I outlined above, including assumptions, key parameters, risks, model vetting, and so forth. The modeling studies also need to be made available upon request. My point is, currently, for all intents and purposes, we really know next to nothing about what the conjestion projections say, including whether they’re even reasonable (For all we know, the data the Times/PI published was based on optimistic assumptions). And if it’s too hard to really say, we need to know that as part of our evaluation.
Incidentally, I asked RTID for the types of docs I describe above, and they would not provide them, for what that’s worth.
@48 The 1% restriction serves the useful function of keeping property taxes from spiraling out of control to the point where they force some people out of their homes. Those especially vulnerable include senior citizens on fixed incomes and young families with limited incomes and large mortgage payments. This cap on property taxes is something the voters of Washington enacted in self-defense; live with it. Most taxpayers have to live within their means, so why shouldn’t government have to live within the taxpayers’ means? This is the sort of fussing that gives liberals a bad name.
**************
Twenty year projections are shakey at best (cf. Social Security debate). However, if the trend remains, we shall be in deep doo-doo in 2028. But let us concede your point that RTID did not publish hundred of pages of detailed modeling studies to back their case. This would appear to only reinforce the idea that this was a grand political bargain…logrolling at its finest, a deeply accepted part of the american political process.
**************
I’m interested that RTID publish data that accuracy describes congestion projections. The only data I am aware of is what the Times and PI published – they went to RTID for this – and very limited transit time projections in a RTID doc. 20 year projections are very problematic and this is part of the discussion. Any data would include key parameters – population growth, demographic patterns, gas rates (yes), transit use and so forth. Results can not possibly be expressed as a single number. Instead, results for different assumptions (eg, different rates of population growth) would be published along with some expression of confidences so we understand best/worse cases and sensitivity of the results from key parameters (so, if population growth is 5% higher than projected in certain regions, what impact does that have on conjestion over selected road segments).
There are several key objectives of Prop 1, and conjestion fixing is one of them. RTID provided selected data to the media, and and posted a little more on their Web site. We don’t know how it was generated. The studies are not available, and there is no summary/results document. I would absolutely expect the latter because this issue is so germaine to the discussion. The summary doc would provide the types of results I outlined above, including assumptions, key parameters, risks, model vetting, and so forth. The modeling studies also need to be made available upon request. My point is, currently, for all intents and purposes, we really know next to nothing about what the conjestion projections say, including whether they’re even reasonable (For all we know, the data the Times/PI published was based on optimistic assumptions). And if it’s too hard to really say, we need to know that as part of our evaluation.
Incidentally, I asked RTID for the types of docs I describe above, and they would not provide them, for what that’s worth.
@50 “What happens to lawyers who habitually file frivolous suits? Aren’t they disciplined in some way?”
Notwithstanding the propaganda of so-called “tort reformers,” frivolous lawsuits are rare, and not just because there are sanctions for filing frivolous lawsuits. Most lawyers are people of high integrity who want to do a good job. Lawyers also are officers of the court, and as such, share responsibility with judges for the administration of justice.
Under Civil Rule 11, a judge can order a lawyer who filed a frivolous lawsuit to reimburse the defendant for his/her costs of defense, including attorney fees. A CR 11 award can be very substantial — possibly hundreds of thousands of dollars — and even though CR 11 awards are rare (because frivolous lawsuits are rare) this possibility has a significant deterrent value.
Lawyers also can be disciplined under various rules for filing meritless suits. A lawyer has a duty to conduct a proper investigation of a case to make sure it has a factual and legal basis before filing it in court. Filing a harassing suit brings several rules into play. There are ample safeguards in the regulation of lawyers against meritless lawsuits filed because of sloppiness or malice.
A genuine dispute of fact or interpretation of law is not frivolous. Lawyers and their clients are entitled to advance their versions of events and legal theories. Factual allegations must be supported with evidence, but so long as there is a genuine issue of material fact, the case will survive summary judgment and be submitted to the jury or other trier of fact.
Even where the law is well settled, a lawyer may bring a case to court for the purpose of arguing the law should be changed. This is most applicable to common law, but can apply to statutory interpretation as well. This process is a primary mechanism by which old precedents are abandoned and new ones established, and is important to the continuing evolution of the law.
#64 was posted by Roger Rabbit; temporary screen name modification by Mrs. Rabbit, who is not a Republican subversive working undercover, but merely a female rabbit annoyed by not getting enough attention. What the hell am I supposed to do? No matter how much attention you pay to them, female rabbits are never satisfied with what they get, and always demand more! They’re as bad as dogs! In addition, there are over 1,000 other rabbits down in this hole right now, so I have social obligations besides her. HTF am I supposed to entertained 1,001 rabbits at the same time? I’m fucking them as fast as I can, but I’m only the Rabbit King.
@60 “And I’ve heard this from farmers — how difficult it is to operate next to new residential developments. Sometimes they get sued by new neighbors with starter castles for doing the farming they’ve done for generations. I spoke with a WA farmer this happened to — and he “paid off” his neighbor because he didn’t want to risk losing his farm in the lawsuit.”
It’s hard to believe the developer and homeowner didn’t notice the farm next door. However, the fundamental blame for this sort of thing lies with local governments that issue permits for incompatible uses.
@61 Why would Stefan want to help Richard? They hate Richard on Sucky Politics. They consider him a turncoat. We think of him as rehabilitated.
“Most taxpayers have to live within their means, so why shouldn’t government have to live within the taxpayers’ means?”
A rhetorical question always posed by Republicans, but I shall let the absurdity of this statement pass.
For it is a lie, and it is shameless misdirection. The voting public consistently demonstrates their demand for public services, yet you want to reinforce the widespread belief that the costs can be covered out of thin air? This same public appears to believe (if the current wisdom is to be taken at face value) that a progressive income tax is some kind of unmitigated evil.
It is not “self defense” enabling this cognitive dissonance. It is the widespread belief foisted on us that we can indeed get something for nothing.
Just another example of the perfect being the enemy of the good. Policies can be implimented to assist those on fixed or low incomes to ‘stay in their homes’.
Oh, wait. We already have such policies.
I shall defend such ‘fussing’ vigorously until such time the public desires, nay demands, crappy schools, rampant crime, dilapidated streets, and open sewers.
# 3 Roger Rabbit
Can’t tell you how helpful your endorsements are. Laid out concisely and well worded, reminding me of so many of my own positions. All the months of reading, researching and forming my own opinions & how I had intended to vote. Now this last month, dealing with my ‘house of horrors’ – endless distractions – has left me eying my Absentee Ballot with fear. Fear that I will vote ‘yes’ when I really mean ‘no’ from being distracted. My sister from Phx came up to help a couple of weeks ago (plus to keep me out of a straight jacket/funny farm!), and she’s truly been a Godsend. But being from out of town she wasn’t much help discussing & making sure I’m marking my ballot correctly.
BTW, House of Horrors update, Friday the contractor finished tearing apart the kitchen&downstairs bedrm. I’ve worked enough with the crews & engineers, for 3 decades, I know what I’m seeing too and not just being taken for a ride. At this stage: former probs included mold/defective resin pipes (all need to be replaced)… now added probs of dry rot, structural damage, possible siding needed to be replaced. Washing dishes in the bathtub for the next few months most likely. Can’t replace plasterboard or cabinets until all the pipes in the house are replaced.
Show me a candidate with campaign funding/donations from the Building Industry and I would probably start building a bonfire to burn someone at the stake! Life on a fixed income. Think I will have to give my normal medical insurance, cut back to an HMO and give up my ear surgeon, back surgeon, foot surgeon (the folks who have kept my dual disabilities at bay and me functional) just to hang onto my house (which I couldn’t sell at this point anyway). Giving up eating wouldn’t be enough to cover a 2nd mortgage. Guess everyone can guess already how I plan to vote on any addl taxes, other than Medic 1!
# 29, Noemie Maxwell
Just wanted to say THANKS for giving us a fair and balanced article re: Richard Pope! I think you captured the type of man that I’ve seen in his posts from the time I started with HA. Can’t vote for him, but I donated to his campaign and am hoping for him to win. I think he will do a good job and it’s about time people get to see what he can do for all of us voters in King County!
The Daily Klake
I checked out the snob horse subculture last week. Hunters, jumpers, & dressage, oh my. Would have had more fun wearing a beer-bong hat and going to NASCAR.
Mad Mahmoud get a microphone at Columbia. Traitor Lynn Stewart got a microphone at Hofstra; said if she had it to do over again, she’d do it again. TNR reports that academia has finally found a leftist so bad and mad that he doesn’t deserve academic freedom. The Cal Board of Regents won’t let Larry Summers speak on a Cal campus.
Free the Minot 5: Someone from the Air Force said that their loose nukes booboo is unprecedented. Narrowly true, but its part of a precedential pattern:
(F)our hydrogen bombs from the B-52 [that collided with a midair refueling tanker at 30,000 feet over Spain in 1966] fell to earth around the village of Palomares. Although the safety devices prevented a thremonuclear explosion, the high explosives in two of the bombs went off; radioactive particles were scattered over several hundred acres of farmland. A third bomb landed intact near the village. The fourth landed in the sea. [It took an intense search of 80 days to find it.] …
On 26 July 1957, while practicing a touch-and-go landing [in England], a US B-47 bomber crashed into a storage depot housing three nuclear bombs. Blazing jet fuel threatened to ignite the TNT in the trigger mechanisms of the bombs, but fortunately firefighters extinguished the blaze. … The event was kept secret until news of the accident leaked in the early 1990s.
On 24 January 1961 a B-52 bomber came apart in midair over North Carolina, and two 24-megaton nuclear bombs were released as the bomber fell to earth. One bomb parachuted to earth and was recovered. The other landed in waterlogged farmland and was never found. … (W)hen the recovered bomb was examined, it was found that five of its six safety devices had failed. North Carolina was saved from a nuclear explosion a thousand times more powerful than that at Hiroshima by the one remaining safety system.
On the afternoon of 21 January 1968, a … B-52, carrying four hydrogen bombs, crashed into the ice seven miles away from the Thule [Greenland] base and exploded. Although the safety devices prevented a nuclear detonation, the conventional high explosives in all the bombs went off; radioactive debris was scattered over a large area. …
Even more terrifying were failures of the complex systems developed and designed to respond to a nuclear attack and to trigger retaliation. … At 4:00 AM on 26 October [1962], at the height of the [Cuban missile] crisis, unknown to Washington an Atlas ICBM was launched from Vandenberg Air Force base in southern California. The missile was not armed; its launch was a test that had been scheduled some time earlier and, due to bureaucratic imperative, had not been cancelled. But Vandenberg was on DEFCON 2 alert status, so other missiles there had been fitted with nuclear warheads. Had the Soviets detected the launch of this test missile, they could easily have imagined that the firing was for real. Their response might have been to order an immediate nuclear retaliation against the United States. Again, at Malmstrom Air Force Base in Montana, the first squadron of Minutemean missiles was about to be deployed when the Cuban crisis erupted. In the haste to get them onto alert, we now know, several routine safety procedures were overlooked. Miswirings or short circuits could have led to an inadvertent missile launch. Moreover, the crews who were rushed into taking charge of their deadly payloads had not been fully trained or certified for these launchers.
In the tensest moments of the missile crisis, ground defence forces at all US air bases were vigilant against sabotage attempts by Soviet agents. On the night of 25 October, an air force sentry on patrol at a base near Duluth, Minnesota, spotted someone climbing over the perimeter fence. He fired at the intruder and sounded the alarm for sabotage. At bases throughout the region a series of synchronized alarms went off. But at Volk Field in Wisconsin the wrong alarm was triggered. A Klaxon was sounded signalling that nuclear war had begun. Pilots ran to interceptor planes fully armed and primed with nuclear weapons. These men, who had been told there would be no practice drills during the Cuban crisis, immediately started their engines and started towards the runway. Fortunately, the base commander had checked with Duluth and ordered an officer to drive his car into the middle of the runway and flash his lights to abort the takeoff.
Back in Duluth it was discovered that the suspect intruder was a bear.
The most chilling incident of all took place on 27 October 1962, the Black Saturday of the missile crisis, the day on which both sides felt that a nuclear confrontation looked unavoidable. Just before 9:00 AM radar operators at an advance warning station at Moorestown, New Jersey, were carrying out a regular check of their computer systems. They inserted a software test tape in which a simulated missile attack from the Caribbean activated an advanced level of alert and then aborted the system automatically, after assuring that all responses had been correct. At the exact moment the Moorestown operators inserted their software test tape, a “friendly” space satellite crossed the horizon from the direction of Cuba. According to the command-post log, the computers and their operators “became confused” as to what was real and what was part of the test. They reacted as though under attack. Moorestown informed NORAD at Colorado Springs that a missile had just been launched from Cuba. They calculated that it was targeted on Tampa, Florida and would detonate at 9:02 AM. The Strategic Air Command in Omaha was alerted that a nuclear attack was under way, as was the command room at the Pentagon. But there was no nuclear detonation in Tampa. …
This scare sounds impossible. Who could have anticipated that during a test a satellite would come up on a radar screen at the precise moment and exact location where a missile launched from Cuba would have appeared? No fail-safe system could anticipate such a coincidence — and on the tensest day of the entire Cold War. But it happened.
Apocalyptic fear of nuclear disaster gripped East Europeans and the Soviet peoples far less dramatically. All they heard was reassuring government propaganda, even if few believed it. The Cuban missile crisis scared millions in the West who followed the news of it day by day. Many key events were carried live on television. But in the Soviet Union not a hint of the crisis was revealed until it was nearly over, and then only on an inside page of Pravda. It was only the party elite who had any idea of what really was going on. …
[Deep background]: Eisenhower [years before the Cuban crisis] approved a system by which, if the conventional command and control system were destroyed, local commanders would have authority to launch nuclear weapons if, in their view, the country was under nuclear attack. In the Cuban missile crisis, accordingly, one fighter squadron of the Twenty-eighth Air Division in California, armed with nuclear weapons, flew with all safety devices removed. The division’s official history noted, “Only the pilot stood between the complete weapon system and a full-scale nuclear detonation.” Fortunately, the top guns desisted from starting a nuclear war.
In addition to this, the head of Strategic Air Command had specific “authority to order retaliatory attack … if time or circumstances would not permit a decision by the president.” At the head of SAC had been the bullish Curtis LeMay. In 1957 he was replaced by the even more bullish General Thomas Power. LeMay later admitted that he was concerned about Power. “He was mean; he was cruel, unforgiving, and he didn’t have the time of day to pass with anyone.” LeMay used to “worry that General Power [who testified that we would be winners of any war if there were more of us alive than “the bastards” on the other side] was not stable.”
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[This material is borrowed from ‘Cold War: An Illustrated History, 1945 – 1991.’ It was a companion volume to the CNN Cold War series, and was written by Jeremy Isaacs and Taylor Downing. My Rabbi, Roger, Roger Rabbi, says that using this material is Fair Use Copyright Infringement. So it’s kosher. So there.]
Too cool. Borat star Alan Keyes is back in the saddle again.