Goldy

If it’s Friday, it must be time for another open thread. Please scoop your poop.

During a floor debate Tuesday night on a state House bill endorsing stem cell research, several Republican opponents compared such research to the Holocaust, including Rep. Glenn Anderson (R-Fall City):

Life sciences, biotech research – it sounds warm, sounds progressive. The potential is there, we hope, we’re betting on it…. But the cold look of history really does require sobriety. Sixty years ago in Nazi Germany, it was state policy in order to perfect humanity it would be required to destroy humanity. And the medical experiments at Auschwitz were carried out for that explicit purpose. We all say no, that’s not us, that would never happen, that’s not why we’re doing this.

Um… yeah, Glenn. Guess there aren’t too many Jews in Fall City.

Anderson refused to apologize, so today state House Minority Leader Bruce Chandler (R-Granger) apologized for him:

“The references made to the Holocaust were regarded by some, understandably, as insensitive and inappropriate,” Chandler, R-Granger, said on the House floor.
…
Chandler said he’d spoken with Jewish community leaders about the stem-cell debate. “I offer my apologies to them and to people who have committed their lives to using science to improve humanity.”

FYI, the bill passed 59-36.

Michael Hood of blatherWatch has an interesting piece today about King County Councilwoman Julia Patterson (D-SeaTac) diving headlong into the lion’s den of right-wing talk radio. She defended KC Elections for an hour yesterday on the John Carlson Show, correctly admonishing John and his fellow travelers for demanding KC prove a negative. She was then mugged in absentia on Kirby Wilbur this morning, who played clips from the Carlson interview, teasing listeners with claims that Patterson had accused President Bush of eating children. (Choked on a pretzel, my ass.)

Michael goes on to “salute Julia Patterson for leaping into the [right-wing] talk radio breach,” where few liberal Seattle politicians dare to tread. He argues that politicians shouldn’t avoid the KVI/KTTH crowd, even if it means occasionally getting the rhetorical snot beaten out of them.

Ignoring talk radio is a political mistake. It has, with the help of blogs, led the debate in the unrest around the gubernatorial election and stoking the rural/exurban rage machine roaring out of control in the 3-county area.

Liberal denial of conservative talk-radio dates back to when it was considered insignificant and peripheral by local media and politicians. It was wishful thinking–I hope by now that myth is exploded–it’s a powerful political tool of the Republican party.

I can’t agree more, and I’d like to add that any politician who can’t hold his own against the likes of John and Kirby and Dori, really has no business running for office.

Personally, while I can’t stand listening to it, I love doing right-wing talk radio, especially when they let me take questions from callers. It’s challenging and fun, kind of like the passionate and informative threads we sometimes get on HA. Contrast that to one of my appearances on Dave Ross during the peak of the Horse’s Ass Initiative hoo-hah, when we couldn’t get a single caller to disagree with me. Booooring!

Besides, it’s kind of a can’t-lose situation. It’s not like a liberal politician or pundit has much of a chance of changing the minds of many KVI listeners… but as long as we’re there refuting the lies, we make it harder for the talking heads to whip the fomentation any foamier. Perhaps my last appearance on John Carlson — where I wonkishly stepped John through the polling place reconciliation process — wasn’t particularly exciting radio. But at least for half an hour, I was controlling the terms of the debate, not him.

In addition to taking on right-wing talk radio, we also need to do a better job of establishing alternative, liberal programming. Us bloggers on both sides of the political spectrum have an over-inflated sense of self-importance — talk radio is still dominating public opinion, not us. As much as I welcome the success of Air America and Ed Schultz on KPTK-1090, they need to start doing some local programming, developing liberal talent a little less sober, and far edgier than Dave Ross.

I volunteer for the 6am to 9am slot.

And speaking of those bastards at the BIAW, I just thought I’d repeat a few tidbits about their newly purchased Supreme Court Justice, Jim Johnson:

• While in private practice, served as a lawyer representing the BIAW.
• Received by far the most campaign contributions of any justice from the BIAW and its affiliates, including at least $146,500 in cash donations to 2004 campaign.
• Received in-kind donations of at least $25,555 from the BIAW and its affiliates in 2004.
• At least one-third of all donations he received in 2004 came from the BIAW and affiliates.
• During unsuccessful 2002 campaign, Johnson received at least $124,500 in cash, and $51,327 in in-kind services, from BIAW and affiliates — about 44 percent of all money he raised.
• Received more than $22,000 in in-kind donations from the Washington State Republican Party in 2002.
• Received at least $450 each to 2002 campaign from Tom McCabe, a BIAW vice president, and his wife.

In fact, I’d guess a close examination of Johnson’s financial disclosure reports would probably show that in addition to direct contributions, Johnson received substantial indirect contributions from the BIAW and their associates.

Hmm… can anybody say recusal?

Building Industry Association of Washington (BIAW) founder and Executive Vice President Tom McCabe, the prime mover behind the GOP’s controversial “felons list,” has himself been linked to a multi-state crime spree, including burglary, criminal mischief, and driving while intoxicated. The incidents date back to November and December of 2002, but probably represent only the tip of his felonious iceberg.

I have not completed my research, and it could very well be that some of these crimes may be attributable to other “Tom McCabes,” but an exhaustive several minutes of Googling has turned up additional suspicious evidence that simply cannot be ignored. Prior to founding the BIAW, McCabe apparently passed himself off in a number of unrelated professions, including stints as a priest, a story teller, Scotland’s Deputy Health Minister, and a down-on-his-luck Santa Claus accused of murdering his landlord on an episode of Matlock.

Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.

Seattle’s own Rep. Jim McDermott has blogged on dailyKos today, commemorating the Iraq War’s second birthday on Saturday.

It is almost impossible to be coherent about the situation in Iraq. 1500 Americans dead. Over 10,000 maimed in mind and body. Too high a price for no increase in national security.

Rep. McDermott invites Seattle’s “peace community” to join him at rally this Saturday at noon, at the Seattle Center, before marching to the Westlake Center at 1:30. You are also welcome to join him at his 11th Annual Potato Festival fundraiser, 4:30 at Town Hall.

David Postman of the Seattle Times reports this morning that the GOP’s felon list may be way off, because it includes hundreds of people tried as juveniles, who never lost their right to vote.

A partial check by The Seattle Times showed that 165 alleged felon voters in King County had only juvenile cases. The Times was able to check 462 names using a Washington State Patrol database.

An attorney for the Democratic Party said more than 200 juvenile cases were found among the King County names.

That’s 165 out of 462… a 36 percent error rate! (I hope my bank isn’t run by Republicans.) Rossi spokeswoman Mary Lane acknowledged the mistake, but failed to apologize for dragging the names of juvenile offenders into the public record.

“It could very well be that people we have on our list didn’t have their voting rights taken away,” Lane said of the juvenile cases.

Well duh-uh, Mary. Nearly every other “scandal” you’ve touted to the press turned out to be nearly as bogus or exaggerated, so why should the felons list be any different?

Sloppily including juvenile convictions on a public list of suspected felons is just another example of the Rossi camp’s complete and utter indifference towards how many innocent lives they sully or destroy in their PR campaign to brand this a stolen election. Whether it be the baseless charges and innuendo regularly launched from Rossi HQ, or EFF President Bob Williams squawking on talk-radio that Dean Logan is a “crook” who should be jailed, or right-wing shill Stefan Sharkansky misdirecting his anger and disappointment into personal vendettas against individual voters… the entire GOP propaganda war has been reckless and mean-spirited from the start.

Here’s the truth: Rossi’s attorneys have absolutely no evidence of organized fraud or official corruption. And they continue to insist that the felons who voted — the real ones — can’t be trusted to tell us for whom. So they simply don’t have a case.

But while the 2004 election is clearly over, Rossi continues to maintain a a full-time campaign staff, including a campaign manager and spokesperson. And who’s paying for all this? The “Rossi for Governor 2008” PAC.

The committee’s name is about the only thing honest coming out of the campaign these days.

UPDATE:
I just want to add that I hope the BIAW does a better job building houses than they do legal cases. As Richard points out in the thread, the case numbering system makes it “pretty obvious” as to which are juvenile court records.

This whole incident also illustrates the ugly truth behind GOP proposals to aggressively purge the voter rolls: it would inevitably lead to many legal voters being wrongly denied the franchise… as it did in Florida. I suppose this consequence is acceptable to the GOP leadership, as long as it occurs mostly in heavily Democratic counties like King.

I’m not really sure who the Washington Management Service is, but man… everybody sure does hate them. Governor Christine Gregoire announced today that she would eliminate 1,000 middle-managers from the 5,400-member service, saving $50 million per biennium, a move that elicited applause from both organized labor and the virulently anti-labor Evergreen Freedom Foundation.

Tim Welch, spokesman for the Washington Federation of State Employees, said his members likewise are thrilled.

“This is long overdue,” he said. “Next to our collective bargaining contract, this is the most emotional issue for our members. Our members hate WMS with a passion.”

What… both WFSE and EFF are enthusiastically supporting the same thing? As a knee-jerk liberal with no mind of my own, I’m so confused!

According to a press release, Governor Gregoire also expects another $50 million in savings by creating a bulk-purchasing program, and has proposed cutting or eliminating low priority programs, like the state Film Office.

“We must change the culture of state government,” Gov. Gregoire said. “We must reduce bloated management, cut reckless spending and eliminate programs that don’t work.”

With rhetoric like that, I’m sure there are some Republicans who are now even less sure that their party didn’t win the governor’s race, but the silly notion that the Democratic agenda primarily consists of wastefully spending tax dollars is, well… silly. Democrats believe in government, and it doesn’t do us any good to have it bloated with inefficiencies. I’ve always expected Gregoire to be more fiscally conservative than her predecessor, but either way she brings a new perspective to the job that facilitates cuts like these.

“These cuts are just the beginning,” she said. “Our Government Management Accountability and Performance Program

Share:

• Facebook
• Reddit
• LinkedIn
• Email
• Print

SENS. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell would benefit their state and their party by supporting repeal of the federal death tax.

In perhaps their most cynical editorial on the topic yet, the Seattle Times attempts to persuade Democrats that it would be good political strategy to support repeal of the estate tax, if only to stop their Republican opponents from continuing to use it as a fundraising cash cow.

Okay, we get it already, Frank… you’re mortal, and your family doesn’t want to pay the estate tax when inevitably, the type is set on your tombstone. So how about if Murray and Cantwell trump your cynicism, and instead of repealing the estate tax entirely, they just support an exemption for all people with the last name Blethen? Will that shut you up?

Or as long as we’re considering creative incentives, how about we add a provision that raises the estate tax on newspapers by a whole percentage point, for each time they print the propagandistic misnomer “death tax” …?

Or better yet Frank, if you really have your heart set on repealing something, why not help the state close its yawning budget gap, and selflessly editorialize in support of repealing the sales tax exemption for newspapers?

I’m all for a well-informed, public debate on the estate tax… but you’re just not going to find one in the Seattle Times.

There is a critical vote today in the US Senate on drilling for oil in the Alaska National Wildlife Reserve. NPI Blog has some information on how you can (quickly) voice your opposition.

Our good friend Stefan’s noble crusade to purge our voter rolls of medical researchers was dealt a crushing blow today, when King County Elections rejected his challenge of the voter registration of Dr. Daniel Sosin — a commissioned member of the Public Health Service — currently serving at the CDC in Atlanta. Carla at Preemptive Karma has summarized the decision, and you can download the official ruling here.

Unable to exact revenge on an epidemiologist, Stefan is now turning his sights towards future biochemists, urging prosecution of Chun C. Chen, a sophomore at the University of Washington, who voted in the November election despite the fact that he was not a citizen. Of course, one of the reasons we know about this incident, is that Mr. Chen went down to King County Elections three days after the election, told them he was not a citizen, and asked to have his registration cancelled.

Here’s a kid who made a mistake, realized it, admitted it, and tried to fix it as best he could, and now Stefan is going out of his way to publicize it, knowing full well it could result in revocation of his student visa, and ultimately, deportation… all to make a tiny political point. It’s just another example of how some people on the other side couldn’t give a shit about how many lives they disrupt or careers they destroy in the service of their larger political agenda.

Oh… and don’t you just love Stefan’s typically paranoid musing?

Of course it’s possible somebody impersonated Mr. Chen when he registered to vote, voted and/or cancelled his registration.

Yeah Stefan, and it’s also possible that you are not delusional… but equally unlikely.

Hmmm… perhaps I’ll file a challenge to Stefan’s voter registration on the grounds that he is “incompetent for the purpose of rationally exercising the right to vote” under RCW Chapter 11.88…?

UPDATE:
TJ at Also Also has posted a more thorough discussion of the Sosin case, pointing out what a complete waste of time (and taxpayer dollars) it was.

The argument over Social Security privatization isn’t about rival views on how to secure the program’s future – even the administration admits that private accounts would do nothing to help the system’s finances. It’s a debate about what kind of society America should be.

And it’s a debate Republicans appear to be losing, because the public doesn’t share their view that it’s a good idea to expose middle-class families, whose lives have become steadily riskier over the past few decades, to even more risk. As soon as voters started to realize that private accounts would replace traditional Social Security benefits, not add to them, support for privatization collapsed.

But the Republicans’ loss may not be the Democrats’ gain, for two reasons. One is that some Democrats, in the name of centrism, echo Republican talking points. The other is that claims to be defending average families ring hollow when you defer to corporate interests on votes that matter.

Paul Krugman of the New York Times then goes on to lambast Senator Joseph Lieberman, who he calls The $600 Billion Man, for mindlessly repeating the Bush administration’s empty rhetoric, and for his own empty gesture of voting against the bankruptcy bill.

It isn’t always bad politics to say things that aren’t true and claim to support things you actually oppose: just look at who’s running the country. But Democrats who engage in these tactics right now create big problems for a party that has been given a special chance – maybe its last chance – to remind the country of what Democrats stand for, and why.

Read the whole thing.

Destroying Social Security may not be the only “reform” the faltering Bush administration has trouble passing this year. Apparently, a permanent repeal of the estate tax is facing strong opposition, only this time from traditional GOP allies: the insurance industry.

Leading the charge for the life insurers, who stand to lose a combined $12 billion in premiums if the estate tax is ended, is Frank Keating, the Republican former governor of Oklahoma who now is president of the American Council of Life Insurers. “I am institutionally and intestinally against huge blocs of inherited wealth,” he says. “I don’t think we need the Viscount of Enron or the Duke of Microsoft.”

Speaking of Microsoft, the senior member of the royal family will testify before Congress this week, also in opposition to repealing the estate tax. Bill Gates Sr., the father of the world’s richest man, has suggested that the tax be retained on estates in excess of $3.5 million, a level that would exempt all but one-half of 1 percent of estates from the tax.

“We wouldn’t have an Internet or microprocessors or human genome projects without the funding from the federal government,” Gates, co-chairman of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, said in an interview.

“Those are the things that make our economy so wonderful and make it possible for people to get very, very wealthy.”

Gates says his son, whose net worth is estimated by Forbes magazine to be $46.5 billion, “doesn’t have any confusion about the fact that his success has a lot to do with this country.”

The Republican response? The estate tax isn’t fair to rich people.

“The death of a family member should not be a taxable event,” says Rep. Kenny Hulshof, R-Mo., who sponsored the repeal in the House of Representatives.

I’ll tell you what isn’t fair… the record budget deficits that will be paid off by our children and grandchildren… the millions of kids who are losing their health insurance nationwide… the unfunded mandates from the ironically named “No Child Left Behind” that are bankrupting our public schools. Meanwhile, the wealthiest Americans are saving billions from the Bush tax breaks, while Dick Cheney’s Halliburton buddies don’t even get their hands slapped for overcharging the Pentagon by more than $108 million for fuel imports into Iraq.

There’s absolutely no economic rationale for repealing the tax on the top one-half of 1 percent of estates. If anything, the estate tax is pro-billionaire, as it gives the very wealthy a powerful disincentive to die.

If the Bastard Idiot Building Industry Association of Washington (BIAW) provides the muscle for the WA state GOP, then the pointy-headed criminal mastermind is the right-wing lying sack of shit faux-think-tank, Evergreen Freedom Foundation (EFF).

I haven’t spit much bile in their direction… but I intend to. In the meanwhile, here’s a quick link to EFF’dUp in WA, a somewhat amusing parody blog of their efforts to decertify state labor unions.

The front page of Sunday’s Everett Herald featured a story about the Snohomish County town of Gold Bar, and how it is struggling to stay incorporated in the aftermath of tax-cutting initiatives. [Cash-strapped town could fall off the map]

The reason Gold Bar and numerous other cities around the state are struggling financially can be traced to the passage of the car tab initiative in 1999, which lowered licensing fees to a flat $30 rate. Since then, Gold Bar has lost about $707,000 in revenue, according to the Association of Washington Cities. That loss is bigger than the city’s 2005 general fund of about $508,000. The city already has tightened its belt, cutting expenses on staff training, laying off staff and restructuring the police service contract with the county, which has saved the city about $194,000, said Hester Gilleland, the city’s clerk and treasurer.

Gold Bar Mayor Collen Hawkins realistically acknowledges that the deepening financial crisis could force the town to disincorporate, forcing Snohomish County to take over services. Residents would lose local control of local services, while facing uncertainty over who would run the local water system, which counties are simply not set up to do.

And they’ve got nobody to blame but themselves.

Hawkins said she finds it ironic that even she voted for Initiative 695 – the major cause of the city’s financial headaches.

The town’s registered voters supported the initiative by a vote of 354-138. Courts eventually struck down the measure, but state lawmakers heeded the will of the people and adopted $30 license tab fees anyway.
…
In 2002, voters approved a second car-tab initiative, which eliminated a $15 license registration fee that Snohomish County and several other counties had been charging. That money was earmarked for street repairs. As a result, the street fund in Gold Bar dropped from $17,200 in 2002 to nothing in 2004, Gilleland said.

“Even though these initiatives are appealing, they are giving a death warrant for local government,” Hawkins said.

Some might argue that these are the unintended consequences of ill-conceived initiatives like I-695, but I’d say it was intentional. While many voters — and even some mayors — didn’t realize the local impact of these statewide measures, many of their strongest and most vocal proponents knew exactly what they were doing.

We are witnessing the gradual devolution of state and local governments. Small towns across the state will be forced to disincorporate as tax revenues continue to dry up, possibly pushing some Eastern Washington counties into insolvency as they struggle to provide additional services.

Meanwhile, the structural deficit built into our antiquated state tax system has created a cycle of perpetual, multi-billion dollar budget gaps that makes it impossible for Olympia to lessen the blow, or assume more of the burden itself. When Republicans talk about cutting government waste, they’re no longer talking about making government more efficient, they’re talking about cutting programs entirely. They’re not interested in convincing the public to embrace a dramatically smaller and limited form of government… they know that if they just sit back and patiently defend the status quo, they will achieve this vision, with or without public support.

It is time for the Republican leadership to come clean about its agenda. If they don’t believe in shuttering city halls across the state, if they don’t believe in denying health care to tens of thousands of children, if they don’t believe in mediocre public schools and a university system that can’t possibly grow to meet the needs our rising population… then they need to tell us how they intend to pay for these and other basic services without raising taxes. But if what they truly believe in is minimal government and zero regulation, then they need to let voters decide on this agenda for themselves, instead of dishonestly relying on our broken tax structure to enact it by default.