Goldy

It occurs to me that the whole raison d’etre behind the Dick Cheney Torture Tour and the FOX/GOP cacophony surrounding it is little more than an elaborate set up for an “I told you so” of monumental proportions.

The Republican message is that America is less safe under Barack Obama than it was under George Bush, a thesis whose ultimate proof seems to rely on there being another terrorist attack on American soil sometime during Obama’s long, eight years in office. Should Obama survive his term attack free, nobody will remember Cheney’s ravings, but should he not, Cheney and his cohorts will be all over the media screaming “I told you so!” And from a purely cynical political perspective, especially considering the current state of the world, that’s not a bad bet.

But it’s a bet none the less… and worse, it’s betting on the terrorists to succeed.

Think about it. Had Bush been warned publicly, before 9/11, about the imminent risk of a terrorist attack (instead of just being warned privately by his intelligence experts, as he was), he would have been raked over the coals for leaving Americans more vulnerable.  And that’s exactly what Republicans hope to do to Obama and the Democrats in the event of another attack.

I guess that makes the GOP the party of hope.

As newspapers and other large media corporations struggle to develop new business models for the twenty-first century, I wonder if we aren’t already seeing the future of journalism gradually evolving before our eyes… a future that, from the consumer’s perspective doesn’t really look all that remarkably different from the past?

I was reading the New York Times this morning (online of course), and clicked through on a headline in the Technology section, “Why It’s the Megabits, Not the MIPs, That Matter.” It’s an interesting bit of analysis, at least to a techno-geek like me, but what I found truly fascinating was the fact that the Times had picked up the piece from the GigaOM technology news network.

Of course, this kind of arrangement is nothing new. Newswires like Reuters and the Associated Press have played an integral role in our media since shortly after the invention of the telegraph, and syndicated columnists have long been a mainstay of opinion pages nationwide. Hell, there are often days when less than half the stories on the Seattle Times front page are written by Seattle Times reporters.

What’s different today is the explosion in number and quality of web sites and networks like GigaOM, and their ability to expertly specialize in subject matter far beyond that of traditional news wires like the AP. As the Internet and other related technologies continue to tear down the barriers of entry to the media market, there will be many more, not fewer, opportunities to enter the field of journalism. These opportunities may not always pay well (or, at all), but they are there none the less.

The result may be that journalism is gradually transformed from a profession dominated by generalists to one of specialists, each focused on their own particular field of expertise. And as traditional media outlets grow increasingly comfortable with the notion of outsourcing their content to a growing number of third party sources, we may see an end to the kind of duplicate efforts that have long characterized certain types of coverage.  (For example, do we really need four TV cameras at the same press conference, when the same sound bite inevitably ends up on all four evening newscasts?)

Under such a model one could imagine an entrepreneurial journalist setting out to provide in-depth coverage of Seattle city government, a notebook computer and compact high-def camera in hand, serving as a one-person, city hall news pool for any and all media outlets wishing to subscribe. The fact that the same footage might appear simultaneously on KING-5 and KOMO-4 has little downside considering that few viewers watch both broadcasts at once, and if properly done, the only thing keeping the Seattle Times from supplementing their city hall coverage with this wire-like reporting might be a misplaced sense of pride.

Neighborhood sites like West Seattle Blog could fill a similar role, distributing hyperlocal coverage to regional, state and national outlets. On the flip side, a political site like Publicola could serve as a sorta Capitol news bureau for West Seattle Blog and other neighborhood sites.

Yes, such a model would surely lead traditional news outlets to hire fewer full time reporters, and produce less and less original content, but that’s already happening as it is. And as the Internet continues to tear down barriers to market, those newspapers and broadcasters who transition to a more portal-like product while failing to provide a richer and more varied experience to their audience will inevitably face serious competition from upstarts who will.

All that’s lacking now is a standardized distribution and payment network… a kinda AP representing bloggers and other journalists that allows media outlets of all sizes to reproduce content in print, on air and online, without having to negotiate a hundred different contracts. Ideally, this would take the form of a cooperative owned by the content creators themselves, but I suppose the market will have a say in the final details.

Or maybe not. This model of distributed journalism is clearly playing a larger and larger role in the news industry. The only question remaining is whether the journalists themselves will reap a fair share of the profits.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcNQuHsrxXY[/youtube]

Huh. I suppose the boys in the backroom at the RNC who concocted this “Pelosi Galore” ad patted themselves on the back for dreaming up such a clever a pun, but if Republicans are serious about closing the ever widening gender gap, I don’t think calling the highest ranking female in US history a “bitch,” a “hag,” and a “pussy” is the most effective way to do it.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qUkj9pjx3H0[/youtube]

Anybody who has followed the dramatic collapse of the newspaper industry knows that publishers have blamed much of their woes on Craigslist for stealing away the lucrative classified advertising revenues on which the dailies had grown fat for decades. And so it strikes me as more than a bit ironic to learn that when the Seattle Times has a job for hire, they wisely choose to spend their advertising dollars where else, but Craigslist:

Executive Assistant for Top Media Co! (Seattle, WA)

Reply to: hr.resumes@seattletimes.com
Date: 2009-05-11, 2:55PM PDT

Do you enjoy the challenge of working in a fast-paced, ever-changing, results-driven environment? Can you juggle ten projects effortlessly while exhibiting professional savvy and poise? Are you the go-to person who is in charge of making it all happen?

Then The Seattle Times Company, the region’s largest and most trusted print and online destination for news, information and advertising, seeks you as our new Executive Assistant.

Yup, we’re the region’s most trusted destination for “news, information and advertising”… except, you know, classified advertising.  For that, even we go to Craigslist because, we may be fifth-generation inbreds, but hey, we’re not stupid.

It sounds like a demanding job. Amongst the many prerequisites you must have well-honed “email etiquette” skills, the “ability to exercise discretion,” and be a “technical guru who is proficient on PC systems such as Outlook, Excel and PowerPoint.”

Huh. If proficiency in Outlook, Excel and PowerPoint is all that’s needed to qualify one as a “technical guru” at the Times, I think that explains a lot as to why they’re now advertising on Craigslist rather than the other way around.

Oh… and one word of caution:

We offer a dynamic, drug-free work environment…

Really? I guess Nicole Brodeur must work from home.

In education news:

Contrary to popular lore, John never drove a pink Harley. John vehemently insists it was a salmon colored Harley. Not that knowing the difference between pink and salmon comes off as any less emasculating.

Light blogging for me today as I fill in for Ken Schram on The Commentators, 10AM to 2PM, KOMO 1000. Tune in as John Carlson and I butt heads on… well… I don’t yet know what topics we’ll be taking up, but no doubt there will be some head butting.

Ho hum. Another election cycle, another gaping money pit in WA-08 for the NRCC:

The National Republican Congressional Committee is launching a revamped incumbent retention program designed to help vulnerable House Republicans raise cash for their reelection campaigns — and warning members that the committee will not bail out those who are insufficiently prepared for competitive races.

The NRCC plans to unveil the first 10 incumbents who qualify for their Patriot Program at a Tuesday briefing to political action committees. … Among those on the list are Reps. Dan Lungren, Ken Calvert and Brian Bilbray of California, Judy Biggert of Illinois, Anh “Joseph” Cao of Louisiana, Thad McCotter of Michigan, Erik Paulsen of Minnesota, Leonard Lance of New Jersey, Christopher Lee of New York and Dave Reichert of Washington.

No doubt I’ve been disappointed and indeed depressed by Darcy Burner’s failure to close the deal these past two elections against the profoundly mediocre Rep. Reichert, but that doesn’t mean she didn’t make a huge contribution toward the Democrats achieving their House majority. Every dime Darcy forced the NRCC to spend propping up the financially floppy Reichert is a dime they couldn’t spend in another district. That’s how the 50 state strategy works.

In Jennifer Dunn’s hands WA-08 was a cash cow for the Republican Party, exporting dollars into competitive races nationwide, but even after three terms, the ever vulnerable Reichert is still sucking at the party teat. And while that may not sound like much of a victory, it still provides some genuine consolation for those of us who understand the bigger picture.

There’s a reason why babies cry… it works:

State Auditor Brian Sonntag won a scarce commodity today – more money for his budget.

Gov. Chris Gregoire and Sonntag reached a deal that’s expected to give Sonntag an additional $14 million for performance audits, giving him around $26 million to spend on the program over the next two years.

Tim Eyman and the editorial boards went ape-shit when Sonntag’s office was asked to absorb the same sort of cuts everybody else was enduring, and so of course the Governor caved. But even worse was the related veto…

The budget contained a provision that would have allowed Sonntag to recoup some of the money if he could prove his audits actually save the state money. Performance audits are aimed at finding efficiencies in state and local governments. Sonntag blasted the Legislature, saying the move would make him a bounty hunter.

“What a dumb idea and a stupid way to manage,” he said recently.

Get that?  The guy who argues that performance audits are so important that he’d rather deny kids health care and education than scale back his office for a couple years, thinks it is “dumb” to audit his own audits.  Let’s hear it for accountability.

Seattle Times heir apparent Ryan Blethen will replace Jim Vesely as editorial page editor, the paper announced today, and while I guess I should feel disappointed to have been passed over for the job without so much as the courtesy of an interview, I’m not at all surprised, and in fact, I’m actually a little bit pleased.

Ryan’s not the most compelling writer you’ll find in a major newspaper, but I agree with Sandeep that he comes off as quite a bit less ideologically reflexive than his father or the board as a whole, and so I’d say there’s a helluva lot more potential upside from his appointment than there would be from say, Kate Riley. And while some might criticize as nepotism a publisher naming his own son to run the ed board, I think there’s something inherently more honest about this arrangement than we had with Vesely serving as a beard for the Blethen family interests. Gone are the days when the board could proclaim its editorial independence with a straight face.  And that’s a good thing.

So congratulations Ryan on your new position. Now get out there and give me something good to blog about.

“He’s definitely destroyed his working relationship with the council,” Seattle City Council member Jan Drago insisted to Publicola’s Josh Feit when asked about her apparently imminent plans to challenge Mayor Greg Nickels.

“One of my motivations,” she said, “is that he [Mayor Nickels] has destroyed every relationship—with citizens and neighborhoods, with regional leaders, with state leaders … I’m the one who was sent down to lobby in Olympia [for the tunnel]. They’re [Team Nickels] toxic down there.”

It’s a theme I’ve heard repeatedly from politicos, politicians and pundits over the past year or so.  Nickels is arrogant and autocratic, a political tyrant who forces his will on the Council, fires popular agency heads, and who seems intent on creating a political vacuum that sucks the air out of all voices outside the gravitational pull of his immediate orbit. Deserved or not, he has earned a reputation, at least in the eyes of many fellow elected officials and their aides, for not working and playing well with others. And whatever Machiavellian instincts the Mayor lacks are more than made up for by the amoral political machinations of Deputy Mayor Tim Ceis and the rest of his ruthless henchmen.

Or so I’m told.

Quite frankly, there are a lot of political insiders who just can’t stand the Mayor’s style, and more than a few who don’t like the man himself.  Okay, I get it.  But the question remains: is process and personality really an effective platform for mounting a challenge to a scandal-free, two-term incumbent?

Perhaps Mayor Nickels’ style truly is as destructive and divisive as his critics allege, I dunno, but the rub for Drago and the other challengers is that the biggest insider issue in the mayoral race isn’t really an issue at all, at least not from a practical, electoral prospective.  The typical voter neither knows nor cares whether Nickels is buddy-buddy with Nick Licata as long as he’s getting the job done; and as for being “toxic” in Olympia, well, after the recent legislative session I’d be tempted to wear that scorn as a badge of honor.

Does he share our values? Where does he stand on the issues? Has he delivered bread and butter services? What is his political agenda, and can we trust him to successfully implement it? Those are the kind of questions voters ask of incumbent executives.

And the answer?

“You can’t win a race against this mayor based on delivery,” Drago said. “It’s hard for me to conceive of running a campaign based on process and personality if you have a good record. I think that’s the dilemma.”

That was the dead-on political analysis of Drago herself, back on March 2. Huh. Before deciding to challenge the mayor, perhaps she should hire herself as a consultant?

The truth is, Seattle city government has long been at least a tad dysfunctional, and never the idyllic setting for a Norman Rockwell painting. Nor should it be. Democracy is by its very nature a messy endeavor in which conflict is a necessary if painful part of the political dialectic. Does Nickels’ aggressive style piss off council members and other stakeholders? No doubt. But if anything, the problem is not that the Mayor is too mean, but rather that the Council is too nice!

How may times have we heard council members whine about the Mayor’s unilateral style… then vote to approve his proposals by 7 to 2 or better margin? Seattle government isn’t a “strong mayor” system by charter, it’s just appeared that way during the Nickels regime, partially due to his forceful style, and partially due to the endemic weakness of the council members themselves. You want a more effective and politically inclusive city government, and a more responsive mayor, Jan? Then why haven’t you stood up to Nickels while you’ve had a chance?

In the absence of forceful leadership on the Council it has been the Mayor who has largely set the agenda over the past seven years, and for the most part, achieved it. Nickels embraced light rail; we got light rail. He turned his back on the monorail; the monorail died. He fought hard for a Viaduct tunnel, while a new, taxpayer-funded Sonics arena, not so much… and we all know how those two battles turned out. On issue after issue, and levy after levy, the Mayor tends to get his own way. Disagree with him if you want—and I often do—but if you deny him credit for his political acumen you have to acknowledge the incredible weakness of the opposition.

In truth, it’s a combination of the two. Mayor Nickels’ style can seem relatively autocratic and abrasive, but only by the passive-aggressive standards of our frustratingly sclerotic “Seattle Way.” Plunk Nickels down in the midst of a real political machine, like that in Chicago or Philadelphia, and I wonder if he’d survive past sundown before being eaten alive by the Morlocks?

Now some might counter, if Nickels is so strong, why are his polling numbers so weak? But that’s a question for another post… and another opportunity to lambast the mayoral challengers for failing to enunciate a winning message.

But for the moment, anybody expecting a 35% approval rating in April to automatically translate into defeat at the polls in November should heed Drago’s circa March 2nd warning. With few notable exceptions, Mayor Nickels does have a track record of delivering services, and of clearly enunciating and enacting a policy agenda. And like him or not, voters will choose competence over process, if that’s their only choice.

I’ll be back arguing with John Carlson again on The Commentators, filling in for Ken Schram, Thursday, 10AM to 2PM on KOMO 1000.  Just thought some of you might want to know.

I can’t find any editorials on the Seattle Times web site with a publication date more current than May 15, so naturally, I have absolutely nothing to blog about. Who knew shutting me down could be that easy?

UPDATE:
Lacking fodder from my favorite smorg-ed-board, I’ve been reduced to dumpster diving in the op-ed pages of some our region’s smaller papers, finding this tasty tidbit in last week’s TNT, which warns South Sounders to “keep a hand on their pocketbooks” in the face of King County’s rapacious appetite for digging tunnels:

Seattle’s transit taxes, plus federal grants, are covering its Beacon and Capitol Hill tunnels. No problem there. The Legislature has committed to pay $2.8 billion for the underground Alaskan Way replacement. That’s OK, too, as long as the Legislature continues to insist that Seattle – which demanded the tunnel – cover any cost overruns.

Yeah, except, just to be clear, Seattle did not demand that tunnel; in fact voters rejected a tunnel option when it was put to the ballot for an advisory vote.  Had the governor and the rest of the Olympia leadership embraced the much less expensive surface/transit option at the time it was fast building consensus on the ground in Seattle, that is the alternative that would have been chosen, and happily so.

And one other quibble:

[T]here must be an understanding going in that Bellevue itself will have to find either the money or economies needed to pay for a tunnel without delaying or jeopardizing rail expansion into Snohomish County and Federal Way.

The impression given, that extravagances in King County have come at the expense of Snohomish and Pierce County residents is simply false.  For better or worse, thanks to “sub-area equity,” what’s been raised in the South Sound has stayed in the South Sound… which of course is why Sound Transit told Bellevue on Friday that if it wants a tunnel, it’s gonna have to come up with the extra money itself.

The Seattle Times congratulates former Seattle police chief and new Obama “drug czar” Gil Kerlikowske for ending the use of the phrase, “war on drugs.” The Times is right, “words do matter,” (though you wouldn’t think so from some of their other editorials), but rather than just rebranding our failed experiment with prohibition, isn’t it time to have a serious conversation about ending it entirely?

For example, take marijuana.  Seriously, go ahead and take it.  I don’t care, and neither should the government.

All the D.A.R.E program scare rhetoric aside, marijuana is a relatively innocuous substance that’s proven no more dangerous and no more a “gateway drug” than alcohol. A majority of Americans have used marijuana at some time in their lives, and an overwhelming majority of them have used it responsibly. It is easily grown in backyard gardens and on indoor window sills, yet our prisons are bursting at the seams, at great taxpayer expense, with petty users and small time dealers. Meanwhile, the U.S./Mexican border has been turned into a bloody war zone as violent drug gangs fight to the death over control of this lucrative, multi-billion dollar black market.

Where’s the sense in that?

With the Obama administration signaling its intent to back off enforcement conflicts with state medical marijuana laws, California’s dispensaries are set to evolve into an informal, quasi-legal marketplace, but if we’re going to repeal prohibition, the best course would be to do it honestly and do it right.  And fortunately, we already have here in Washington state not only a model for the legalization of a potentially dangerous intoxicant, but an established system in place for regulating, selling, and perhaps most importantly, taxing the hell out of it.

Of course, I’m talking about Washington’s oft-reviled State Store system.

Other states may be further along the political path toward de facto legalization, but no other state, with the exception of my native Pennsylvania, has a more robust system already in place for effectively executing it. Washington already heavily regulates the in-state manufacture of wine, beer and distilled spirits, and maintains an extensive statewide network of retail stores and distribution centers for the sole purpose of operating its exclusive monopoly on the retail sale of liquor. A similar monopoly on the legal sale of marijuana would not only be easily implemented, but highly profitable for taxpayers and state farmers alike.

At an estimated street value of over $1 billion a year, marijuana is already Washington’s number two cash crop, second only to apples, and consistently ranking us among the top five pot-producing states.  By legalizing and regulating a crop that is already being grown, the state could impose standards of consistency and quality on the product, and by setting prices as the only legal buyer for the crop, farmers could be assured a stable, legal income for their efforts.

And considering the existing federal ban on marijuana, and the federal government’s constitutional authority over interstate commerce, Washington’s State Stores, by necessity, would initially only be able to buy and sell state-grown product, thus nurturing a nascent hemp industry that would eventually produce a valuable export commodity once the ban is lifted nationally, perhaps even dominating the market.

As for retail and consumption, the same restrictions that apply to the sale and use of liquor would apply to the sale and use of marijuana, with the state likely maintaining prices at or near current street levels. The result would be hundreds of millions of dollars a year in additional state revenues, plus hundreds of millions of dollars in savings from law enforcement and incarceration (not to mention the elimination of the incalculable human suffering caused by our current prohibition.) Distribution to minors, for profit or otherwise, would be strictly prohibited and harshly punished, as would driving under the influence of marijuana. And just as consumers may already legally make their own beer and wine for their own consumption, the current guidelines on medical marijuana could be easily adapted to apply to all home growers.

And the societal impact? Most studies I’ve seen suggest that marijuana use would indeed rise slightly if legalized, and thus we should likely expect an increase in marijuana abuse, and the personal and social costs associated. (Marijuana is not an addictive substance like, say, nicotine or heroin or even alcohol, but it can constitute an addictive behavior like problem gambling.) Thus a sizable portion of state profits from the production and sale of marijuana should be dedicated toward prevention and treatment programs for marijuana, alcohol, drugs and other addictive substances and behaviors.  In the end, the revenue earned from legalizing marijuana could be used to curtail the abuse of other more dangerous substances.

I know this might sound to some like a radical proposal, but our current prohibition on marijuana simply isn’t working, and its widespread illicit use only serves to undermine respect for the law by normalizing its violation. Meanwhile, the State Store system we created after the repeal of alcohol prohibition leaves us uniquely positioned to take the lead in responsibly moving toward marijuana repeal as well. And even if the feds attempt to block such a dramatic shift in marijuana policy, either through the courts or through direct conflict with state agencies, our effort to create a viable model for full legalization would at the very least spark a real national conversation on the pros and cons of our current failed, national policy.

And that’s a conversation that’s long past due.