Goldy

State Senator and noted right-wing nutjob Pam Roach is seriously considering a run from the newly created elected position of King County Elections Director… or at least, that’s what the TNT’s Joe Turner is reporting.  But don’t you worry, because the Elections Director is officially a non-partisan position, so we can expect whoever wins it to operate it in a completely non-partisan manner, regardless of their established record as a right-wing nutjob.  Um… right?

The new elections director will be chosen in a February 4th special election.  Here’s hoping only one qualified Democrat files for the office lest Roach win on name recognition alone.

Nearly two weeks after the election, Commissioner of Public Lands Doug Sutherland still has not conceded the race to Democrat Peter Goldmark.

Sure, Goldmark only leads by about 18,000 votes, and with aproximately 63,000 ballots left to count statewide, I suppose a Sutherland victory isn’t quite a mathematical impossibility.  But more than half the remaining ballots come from King County, where Goldmark has won nearly 62% of the vote, so Sutherland is more likely to see monkeys fly out of his ass than pull off a come from behind win.

Oh, and with the race this close, I think it is fair to claim that HA’s coverage of Sutherland’s sexual harrassment scandal was a definite difference maker.  Without a vibrant, progressive blogosphere this story never would have appeared on the front pages and the evening news.  So score one for the good guys.

Very, very sad…

A 6-year-old girl who was shot in the head while her father was cleaning a gun has died, the Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office reported.

Whenever I post a link to one of these tragic stories, I usually get a bunch of angry comments in the thread accusing liberals of wanting to take away everybody’s guns.  But I’m just trying to make the point that under most circumstances, guns don’t make you and your family safer, especially if you have young children in the house.

You want to protect your kids?  Get a dog.  They tend not to blow your head off while cleaning them, and they’re a helluva lot more fun to play with.

The Seattle Times editorial board thinks a buck an hour increase in downtown parking meter rates is too much, to which I say:  damn commies!

I mean, whatever happened to supply and demand?  If the city leased out these spots to a private company, what do you think they’d be charging an hour?  Buck fifty?  Two bucks?  Two-fifty?  I don’t think so.

Even at $2.50 and hour, downtown parkers will drive around in circles looking for a street spot rather than paying two to four times that rate for a short term spot in a private lot.  So quit your grousing and stop trying to force your decadent, free-parking, Plateau values on the rest of us.

Protesters are rallying nationwide today to protest California’s recently passed anti-gay Proposition 8, and of course Seattle is no exception.  Festivities start at 10:30 AM at Volunteer Park, with the rally starting at noon.  Protesters will then march down to Westlake Center, where speeches are scheduled to commence at 2PM.

It is one thing to fail to pass legislation granting marriage equality to gays and lesbians, but yet another to amend a state constitution to take away rights already recognized by the courts. The unexpected passage of Prop 8 has served as a wakeup call as to the level of discrimination that still exists, and the amount of work that remains to be down to achieve true equality.

Democrat Mark Begich now leads Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens by 1061 votes.  That may not sound like an awful lot, but as the remaining ballots continue to trend in Begich’s favor, it sure does look like Stevens will be hanging up his Incredible Hulk tie.  And that’s a good thing, as we wouldn’t want to give him the opportunity to hang himself with it in prison.

It’s Friday.  It’s dreary.  I’m unenthused.

The NY Times Timothy Egan takes his “fellow beleaguered journalists” to task for failing to ask hard questions about Sarah Palin’s Alaska:

Between big servings of moose chili and self-servings of blather, Governor Sarah Palin has yet to explain the disturbing message that our 49th state sent to the Outside with last week’s election.

Nearly half the voters want to send a felon back to the United States Senate – you go, crook! And a clear majority is backing one of the most ethically tainted congressmen in the land – power to the porkster!

Oh, and all that stuff about wealth-redistribution: Only one state relies on a truly socialistic model for its welfare, and with falling oil prices, Palin’s People’s Republic of Alaska is facing an enormous fiscal crisis.

This tax-free state, where every man, woman and baby gets an annual check as part of their share of redistributed oil wealth, may have to actually start paying for itself.

But none of this has crossed the glossy lips of the governor. As Palin was spreading a cartoon narrative of herself as a caribou-huntin’ gal on the lookout for creeping Marxism while slaying the bad boys of the Far North, the state that she governs was stepping all over her message.

Is it at all ironic that Seattle’s best journalist doesn’t write for a Seattle publication?

… by implementing universal, single-payer health care.

By recent estimates, health care benefits add about $1,500 to the cost of every U.S. built car, putting the auto and every other US industry at a competitive disadvantage in the global marketplace.  So why not take advantage of this economic crisis to put all the moral, political and ideological arguments aside, and finally implement universal health care simply because the modern economy demands it?

For those of you annoyed at Mayor Greg Nickels’ proposed buck an hour increase at Seattle parking meters, I say enjoy even that bargain while you can, for if the Viaduct is ultimately replaced by the “surface and transit” option, parking will be removed entirely from many of the downtown’s north/south streets.

While I’m told that having cars speeding along the curb poses an increased hazard to pedestrians, eliminating street parking is really a pretty simple and inexpensive means of adding more lanes, and thus more capacity to city streets.  Perhaps one safety solution might be to buffer pedestrians with a narrow bike lane, since urban bikers are already committed to putting their lives at risk in the service of less auto-centric transportation policies?

More information than Sarah Palin or you probably want, but I prefer to sleep in the raw.

With late ballots strongly trending Republican statewide, flipping several apparent election night Democratic legislative and local wins into the Republican column, there had been some nervous chatter about the narrowing margin in the race for Commissioner of Public Lands.  Well, with Republican incumbent Doug Sutherland trailing by 17,000 votes with less than 100,000 ballots left to count—40,000 of them in heavily Democratic King County—I think it once again safe to proclaim Peter Goldmark the winner.

Still no concession yet from Sutherland though.

After eight months on the market, it looks like the Blethen family has finally found a buyer for its struggling Maine newspaper properties, and while the terms of the deal have not been announced, it is likely the Blethens will ultimately realize a nine-figure loss on their ten-year foray into the media market of their ancestral homeland.  Looks like Frank’s own business decisions will end up costing his heirs a helluva lot more than Washington’s estate tax.

That said, any sale is good news for the Blethens, who need the cash to help shore up the sagging fortunes of their flagship Seattle Times.  And anything that helps stabilize their publisher’s finances is surely good news for Times staffers, who are already bracing themselves for another round of layoffs, expected to be finalized this week.

I’ll be on KOMO 1000’s The Commentators this morning near the top of the 11AM hour, talking about yesterday’s PDC meeting on “internet lobbying,” and whether reporting regulations should be extended to bloggers like me.