Goldy

A reader reports from the campaign trail:

Last night, I was listening to a bartender out in Quilcene who was completely in love with Rossi after his recent visit.  In a moment of unintentional irony, she noted that he made a joke about Gregoire’s budget-cluelessness:

“If you’re going to hand a woman the checkbook, you’d better make sure she knows how to balance it.”

Ouch.

Yeah, sure, it’s only a third-hand account, and I would prefer to verify a macaca moment like this against an audio or video transcript of the August 9 event at the Olympic Timber House, but since Dino Rossi doesn’t allow video cameras into his events—apparently out of fear he’ll be caught saying something stupid, mean spirited or sexist (or all three)—I guess I’ll just have to run with it as a rumor.

And a very believable rumor at that, as it seems entirely in character from a man who opposes the right of a woman to control her own body, who opposes medically accurate sex education, and who quite frankly has come off as angry and bitter throughout this campaign, his patented shit-eating-grin notwithstanding.

Of course, if Dino would like to confirm or deny this third-hand account, and clarify his position on whether women are or are not inherently deficient at balancing checkbooks, I’d be happy to print his response in its entirety.  Or… if somebody else in attendance at the event in Quilcene can confirm or deny the accuracy of the statement, I’d be happy to print that too.

Everybody seems to be tamping down expectations for this week’s first ever “top two” primary in Washington state, but the biggest loser Tuesday night may be the top two primary itself.  While Secretary of State Sam Reed and his cheerleaders on editorial boards throughout the state have hailed the advent of the top two as a huge victory for Washington’s voters, it’s proving much less popular in practice, with the 27% ballot return rate thus far significantly trailing Reed’s rosey turnout predictions.

Hmm.  I wonder why?

In most cases, the outcome from Tuesday’s vote is in little doubt.

Yeah, it’s hard to get voters excited about a meaningless election, but that’s exactly what we have in almost every race on the ballot, where even the handful of hotly contested races will inevitably result in rematches come November.  Indeed, with the exception of the State Treasurer’s race, where a field of three legitimate contenders will be winnowed down to two, I can’t think of a single meaningful result to watch for Tuesday night.

(Yeah, sure, some judicial races will be decided Tuesday night, but that was true of previous primary systems too.)

Oh, if one candidate substantially trounces another, it might tell us something about their prospects for the general, but absolutely nothing will be decided; the same folks facing off against each other Tuesday will face off against each other again eleven weeks from now.  So why bother voting?

Well, the majority of WA’s registered voters won’t bother, which is a shame.  And, inevitable.

The lesson to be learned from all this is that the top two is about as close a substitute for our old blanket primary as Cremora is a substitute for half and half.  Sure, primary voters can split their ticket, choosing candidates from both parties without ascribing to any party identification themselves, but with the absence of party labels and the absence of any race with nomination battles in both parties, what’s the point?  I suppose it could be argued that top two does have the advantage of eliminating the possibility of third party candidates serving as spoilers, but doesn’t that put control of our elections even more firmly in the hands of the two major parties?  That’s not exactly what voters were promised.

And what happens in an off-year election, when Seattle’s 20-percent strong Republican minority finds itself in November with no Republicans on the ballot?  Top-two has the potential to reduce turnout in a general election as well.

I suppose the solution favored by the wise old folks on our ed boards would be to simply make all our offices non-partisan, thus covering up top-two’s reduction in choice by reducing the relevant information available to voters.  Sure, if they really wanted to give voters more choice they could push for innovative electoral reforms like Ranked Choice Voting, but honestly, all our ed boards really seemed interested in doing was delivering a big, spiteful “fuck you” to the parties for challenging the beloved blanket primary in the first place.

Job well done.  Now let’s deal with the consequences instead of pretending there aren’t any.

And yet, partisan political bloggers like me, we’re the ones who aren’t credible. Sheesh.

Bradley Marshall is an attorney, sports agent and adjunct law professor. He is also a pussy. A vain, effete, caterwauling pussy.

Of course, that’s just my opinion. My entirely non-libelous, constitutionally protected, personal opinion. But I think you’ll agree with me that it is pretty damn well supported by the facts.

So what makes Marshall such an incredible pussy? This cease and desist letter to fellow blogger Michael Hood:

Over the course of the last several years you have published the “Blatherwatch,” a conservative political blog site.

Approximately two years ago, you published a defamatory and slanderous blog of the undersigned in connection with a story of the famed talk show host, Mike Webb. […] The story you published concerning me was inaccurate, denigrating, and placed me in a false light. The purpose of this writing is to formally request that you remove the article from the BlatherWatch website and cease any further negative reporting concerning the undersigned.

[…] It is not my desire to seek redress through the courts, but I will do so if you and I are unable to reach an amicable resolution.

As Darryl has previously pointed out over at Hominid Views, A) a defamatory post would be libel not slander; and B) there is absolutely nothing defamatory about a post that reports facts, no matter how unflattering or how secondhand. Hell, Michael would have a better chance of suing Marshall for libel for his clearly false and defamatory claim that blatherWatch is “conservative”… though I guess Marshall could always fall back on the defense that he was merely expressing an opinion… you know… like my characterization of him as a dainty, dickless pussy. (It would be worth the lawsuit just to see Marshall definitively prove in a court of law that he does indeed have a dick.)

The December 27, 2005 blatherWatch post that Marshall is attempting to bully Michael into removing (and which I have appended in toto at the end of this post) is titled “mike webb’s attorney no stranger to ‘dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation’,” a factual claim I haven’t bothered to independently verify, because under US law, I don’t have to. I am merely reporting that Michael reported it, an inherently non-libelous act within the context of covering a threatened libel suit, regardless of the accuracy of the original statement. (Think about it… one could never report on libel suits if repeating the charges is an act of libel itself.)

Likewise, Michael’s headline was merely quoting the conclusions of the Washington State Bar Association from a Disciplinary Notice he blockquotes in its entirety. In correspondence with Michael, Marshall disputes the WSBA’s findings, but as a legal argument that’s neither here nor there, for Michael has every right to report on the WSBA’s Disciplinary Notice, again, regardless of its accuracy. The WSBA found Marshall to be in violation of its Rules for Personal Conduct (RPC), including the subsection that prohibits “dishonesty, fraud, deceit or misrepresentation”… an undisputed fact (the finding itself) that Michael duly reported. It is also a fact that Michael reported it, and I could not possibly report on the dispute between Michael and Marshall without reporting this particularly fact as such.

See, this isn’t Canada where litigious pussies like Marshall can attempt to bully the press and citizen journalists alike with harassing libel suits that place the burden of proof on the shoulders of the defendant. This is the United States of America, where the First Amendment protects freedom of the press and freedom of speech, and where the courts have firmly placed the burden on the back of the plaintiff… a burden of proof, by the way, that Marshall already failed to meet when the WA State Supreme Court handed down an 18 month suspension of his license as punishment for the exact same RPC violations he is now threatening to sue Michael for reporting.

What a pussy.

And what an idiot, for if his goal was to rid the Internet of an unflattering blog post that ranks near the top of Google searches on his name, Bradley Marshall has achieved the exact opposite, not only attracting subsequent posts by Michael and a highly ranked post by Darryl that only further elaborate on their subject’s reported ethical failings, but now a post by me, one that will surely settle near the top of Google’s rankings, where it will forever inform potential clients that Marshall is a frivolous, conscienceless, unscrupulous pussy. (At least, in my opinion.)

As it so happens, today is the day the pussy has set as a deadline for Michael to pull his post:

I am prepared to execute a settlement agreement, wherein I will release you personally, Blatherwatch and its writers from all liability. This proposal may be accepted on or before August 15, 2008. Thereafter, I will file the lawsuit against you personally, any writer who contributed to any slanderous story about me, Blatherwatch, the Seattle Magazine and any other publications you may have been affiliated with during the time the subject storie(s) were written.

See Brad, I mention this because I wanted to make it clear that I got my post in under the deadline, and that I have no intention of pulling this post or any other, short of a court order… and possibly not even then. So if you really intend to file a lawsuit that you have no possibility of winning, under the bizarre belief that this will somehow clear your reputation as a lawyer, you better sue me too.

Some may find my bravado stupid or irrational, but Marshall’s whole attempt to intimidate Michael was based on the expectation that he would do the rational thing, and quietly pull a two-year-old post rather than risk the expense and hassle of even a clearly frivolous lawsuit. The problem is, once bloggers start caving in to litigious pussies like Marshall, we’ll find ourselves inundated with cease-and-desist letters from every litigious pussy who has ever been the subject of an unflattering post, and who happens to have access to a lawyer or a law license (suspended or not).

So sue me, Brad. Sue Michael. Sue Darryl. And sue the dozens of other bloggers, local and national, who will surely follow up on our posts should you choose to follow through on your pussy threats. Turn us into netroots heroes and I can all but guarantee that “Bradley Marshall” will become the equivalent of a Google bomb for the words “dishonesty,” “fraud,” “deceit,” “misrepresentation” and “pussy.” Or, you can do the rational thing, accept the fact that we called your bluff, and walk away from this dispute before you sully your own reputation to the point where you become legally libel-proof.

It’s not about me, Brad. It’s not about you. It’s not about Michael. It’s about the integrity of our medium. And damn if I’m going to allow a pussy like you to turn bloggers like me into pussies too.

APPENDIX:
Following is the original blatherWatch post that prompted Marshall’s bullying tactics, reproduced in its entirety. (Nice job expunging any record of your ethical lapses from the Internet, Brad. Let this be a lesson to anyone else who thinks they can use bullshit cease and desist letters to chill online discourse.)

[Read more…]

It’s not something the campaign likes to talk about, but when Darcy Burner first started pushing her Responsible Plan to end the war in Iraq, the folks at the DCCC weren’t exactly supportive. Sticking your neck out on a controversial issue like that is just not the sort of thing that challengers are supposed to do, so you can be damn sure that the DCCC didn’t encourage any of Darcy’s colleagues to sign on. And yet, over 50 fellow challengers did anyway.

And now we House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (Stefan’s girlfriend) not only recording a video in support of Darcy, but mentioning the plan by name.

You want a guy with great hair and big biceps representing you in Congress, faithfully supporting the Bush policies on Iraq and the economy? Vote for Dave Reichert. But if you want a smart, energetic representative, willing and able to challenge the establishment in both parties, and still come out on top, your only choice is to vote for Darcy Burner.

It was Michelle Malkin who shot and killed Arkansas Democratic Party chairman Bill Gwatney yesterday. At least, according to Michelle Malkin.

Yes, just hours after the shooting, before Gwatney even died from his wounds, Malkin responds to the tragedy with a defensive post attempting to immunize herself from potential accusations that her right-wing hate-mongering might have played any role in provoking this senseless act of violence. Jesus… talk about a guilty conscience.

And talk about a narcissistic personalty that borders on solipsism. A man had just been mortally wounded, shot three times in the chest, clearly the target of an assassin’s bullets… and Malkin can only think about herself and her own victimhood as the potential target of a character assassination. Could she be any more insensitive to Gwatney, his family and his friends?

Oh, but she’d already received an email, Malkin cries, telling her that she should be “held accountable” for hate-talk that “turns people to murder.” A lone email, for chrissakes? That’s her justification for this mind-numbingly inappropriate post? A single fucking email?

Shorter Michelle Malkin:

Somebody sent me an email blaming my so-called ‘hate’ for this horrible act of violence against a Democrat Party liberal. Here is that person’s full name and unredacted email address.

And while I’m sure as hell not one to judge a blogger by their comment threads, Malkin is, and in her own heavily vetted thread it is apparently calm, rational, non-hateful discourse to accuse Bill and Hillary Clinton of assassinating Gwatney as a message to Barack Obama that he’ll be next if he doesn’t fall in line.

But you know, we foul-mouthed liberals, we’re the crazies… we’re the dangerous lunatic fringe.

While Gwatney was clearly the victim of a targeted attack, we don’t yet know the motive. We don’t yet know if his assassination was an ideological hate crime like last month’s Knoxville shootings, or just the kind of everyday tragedy in which sick, personal grudges sometimes (and inevitably) manifest themselves in our heavily armed society.

But if she’s come to the point where she feels the need to preemptively issue a denial of culpability each time news breaks of another Democrat or other such perceived liberal being assaulted or murdered, perhaps Malkin should listen to her guilty conscience the next time she’s tempted to resort to the sort of violent, eliminationist rhetoric that has made her famous. That is, assuming, Malkin still has a conscience.

The Democrats gained some ground in the standings this week, as the Seattle Times endorsed incumbent Rick Larsen over Republican challenger Rick Bart in Washington’s 2nd Congressional District. Using our NHL-style scoreboard (two points for a victory, one point for a tie), that brings our current standings to Republicans 11, Democrats 9.

No doubt some at the Times may find my scoring system arbitrary and unfair, but the scorecard would be tilted even further toward the Republican side if not for my decision to exclude local judicial and legislative races. For example, my standings don’t include the Times endorsement of Republican State Sen. Cheryl Pflug, who they glowingly describe in the lede as an “independent workhorse.” (Isn’t it at least ironic that the highest praise the Times can muster for a Republican these days is to describe them as not really being all that much of one?)

And then there are the Times’ superior court endorsements, where in Position 22 they dismiss the two candidates endorsed by the King County Democrats in favor of the one endorsed by the Republicans. Huh. I guess that’s probably just a coincidence.

In the end, I always expected the standings to be close, but there’s a point to be made in all this, and if you haven’t figured it out already, you’ll just have to wait for my end of endorsement season wrap up. In the meanwhile, here are the current standings:

Breaking news…

The chairman of the Arkansas Democratic Party was hospitalized in critical condition Wednesday, a party executive said. A television station reported that three shots were fired at party headquarters.

[…] Lee said the secretary told her the man had come into the party’s office and asked to speak with Gwatney. When the secretary said she wouldn’t allow him to meet with Gwatney, the man went into his office and shot him, Lee said.

She said the secretary described the man as in his 40s and white and drove off in a blue truck.

I’ve got no other details, but I dunno, whenever I hear about Democrats being shot by middle aged white guys in pickup trucks, I tend to get a little paranoid.

So what explains Dave Reichert’s pro-oil industry energy agenda in the face of skyrocketing fuel costs and the dire consequences of carbon-induced climate change?  Well, maybe we should just ask some of Dave’s pals who set up that lucrative K Street funder for him… you know, energy industry lobbyists like Dan Maloney (American Petroleum Institute), Brett Shogren (Exelon Corp.), Mike Chappell (Edison International) and Matt Lapinski (Frontier Oil)?

I’m just sayin’.

So… Dave Reichert, struggling to keep pace with Darcy Burner’s overwhelming support from individual contributors, turns to a group of high-powered lobbyists for a quick infusion of cash—including lobbyists representing Airbus parent EADS against Boeing in the controversial tanker deal—and what’s the headline in the Seattle Times? “Words fly over lobbyist for Boeing rival at Reichert fundraiser.”

That’s right, EADS lobbyist Mike Chappell writes Reichert a $500 check and the main story here is the accusation itself, with the Times emphasizing that “Burner spokesman Sandeep Kaushik leaked the EADS lobbyist tie to the online political newspaper Politico.”

“Leaked…?” Really?

leak -verb
9. to disclose secret, esp. official, information anonymously, as to the news media

A) Kaushik is Burner’s communication director; it’s his job to pass information on to the press, even damaging information about her opponent; and B) How exactly do you “leak” information that had already appeared in an article in Roll Call?

All Kaushik did was call Politico’s attention to the fact that an article in Roll Call contradicted editorializing that had appeared in their own publication, causing Politico to write a follow-up story when they determined that the info in Roll Call checked out. And that added tidbit about Chappell writing Reichert a check? That came from good, old fashioned “sleuthing” on the part of the Times reporter Emily Heffter. That’s some “leak.”

Reichert goes begging to lobbyists paid to oppose the interests of his district, and it’s “words flying” that makes the headline, and the Burner campaign’s role in publicizing Reichert’s Airbus connections that makes the lede. And Reichert gets a check from Airbus, but that’s okay, because he says he plans to return it, you know… after he was caught. Jesus… could the Times pedal any softer?

But then, Reichert is the Times’ favorite “conscience driven independent,” so I guess we’re unlikely to see a piece criticizing Reichert for publicly posturing in defense of Boeing against the Alabama/French Connection, and then going back to the other Washington to quietly solicit support from the very people he’s supposedly opposing… folks like EADS lobbyist Chappell, Alabama Aircraft Industries lobbyist Chris Cox, former Tom DeLay henchman (and co-conspirator) Drew Maloney, and the rest of the K Street crowd.

The Times knows damn well how damaging this story really is—hell, it’s exactly crap like this that has destroyed the Republican brand. The “K Street Project,” the “Culture of Corruption,” the cozy relationship between the Republican leadership and their corporate patrons… this is why Democrats took control of both houses in 2006, and this is why they are poised to expand their majority in 2008. And whatever his intentions when he first headed off to Congress, Dave Reichert now finds himself smack dab in the middle of everything that is wrong with the Beltway establishment, totally reliant on (and indebted to) lobbyists and PACs in his desperate efforts to fend off Burner’s challenge.

Darcy Burner on the other hand, with her people-powered politics and her thousands upon thousands of small contributions from individual donors, is indebted to nothing but her own conscience. So if 8th CD voters really want to send somebody to Congress who can truly challenge the corrupting influence of the K Street crowd in both parties, they need to elect a representative who doesn’t have to rely on these very same lobbyists to fund their campaigns. They need to elect Darcy Burner.

Apparently fearful that their bitter and genuinely mean-spirited candidate might embarrass himself with his own devastating macaca moment, Dino Rossi’s campaign staffers and supporters have resorted to increasingly aggressive tactics to keep opposition cameras out of public events, and thus the real Dino Rossi out of the public eye. And as the Seattle Times reports this morning, this resulted last week in a Democratic Party cameraman being forcibly dragged out of a press conference at the Seattle Police Officers Guild, and physically restrained by off-duty cops.

“We don’t allow them in to collect attack video,” Rossi spokeswoman Jill Strait said.

But we do allow event organizers to attack the videographer, apparently.

Guild members threatened the cameraman with arrest, but no charges were filed and no fine or penalty issued… because, of course, no laws were broken (except, perhaps, by the off-duty officers). This wasn’t a private fundraiser or other such event, it was a press conference, which by its very nature is an inherently public event, and thus the cameraman had every expectation that he would have the same right to record the proceedings as the several other cameramen in attendance.

“We’re sorry that it had to end that way,” Strait said of Thursday’s incident. “But he wouldn’t have to be escorted off the premises if he had just left when he was asked to. I really think he was trying to provoke an incident by refusing to leave.”

Yeah… it “had to end that way;” he was, after all, “provoking an incident” by quietly standing in the back with all the other cameramen, so I suppose he was lucky to walk away with only a bruised sternum. As one die-hard Rossi supporter enthusiastically suggested in the threads over on Postman’s blog, his response would have been “a bullit [sic] between his eyes, no questions asked.” I guess that’s why Republicans pride themselves as the “law and order” party.

As for the Democrats? Well, I guess we’re just all a bunch of pussies…

A Republican Party worker videotapes appearances by Gregoire, so Steele said it’s hypocritical for Rossi to kick out Akers. Strait said it makes no difference to the Rossi campaign if Gregoire allows herself to be taped by the opposition.

FYI, here’s the video of the rough reception the Republican cameraman gets at Gov. Gregoire’s events:

Jesus Christ… they did everything but offer him milk and cookies. Pussies.

It is great to see this story picked up in the news section of the Times, but I can’t help but wonder if their editorial board—champions of sunshine and open government—will see fit to comment on Rossi’s stunning lack of openness when it comes to endorsement time. This is a candidate who has cameramen forcibly ejected from public events, sometimes even from public property, and who routinely brushes off questions about issues on which he is out of step with Washington voters by curtly responding that “I’m not running on that issue.”

Well, he may not be running on issues like reproductive rights, comprehensive sex education or school vouchers, and he may have carefully avoided taking a public position on gas tax repeal and other controversial initiatives, but voters have a right to know where Rossi stands on all these issues, not just those his pollsters and focus groups tell him best work to his political advantage. And our local press have an obligation to inform the public by relentlessly following up on these questions, rather than just allowing Rossi to shrug them off with a quip like they did in 2004.

In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve been doing a little light posting recently, and that’s because my daughter and I have been out of town this past week visiting my family in Philadelphia. Well, the phone rang tonight during dinner at my sister’s house, and when she checked the caller ID a little while later it read the following:

PLANE CRASH INF
18004483543

Curious, and a bit bewildered, my sister called the number back, only to get the automated phone system of “American Red Cross Blood Services,” with no option to reach a live person after hours.

I sure hope this is some kind of a mistake rather than a calculated effort to get people to pick up the phone or return the call, but spooky as it was at the time, imagine my family’s reaction had this call been received 48 hours later, when my daughter and I would indeed have been on an airplane heading back to Seattle.

Holy crap.

First there was email spam, and then comment spam. Is caller ID spam the next big thing?