Goldy

It was only a matter of time…

Gabrielle Giffords, a Democratic congresswoman from Arizona, was shot today at a public event outside a grocery store.

A spokesman for the Pima County sheriff says that at least 12 people were shot. The Tucson Citizen reports that Rep. Giffords was “shot point blank in the head.”

New reports now say that Gifford is dead, and her district director and two other staffers were also shot, all three in critical condition.

UPDATE:
There are a lot of lessons to learn from this tragedy, but one, unfortunately, is that assassination can be a very effective political tool.

UPDATE, UPDATE:
NPR is now reporting six seven dead.

UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE:
SarahPAC hits a target:

UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE:
There are now conflicting reports, with at least one news outlet reporting that Giffords is not dead, but still in surgery. So I’m going to stop updating for now, and save it for a subsequent post.

OKAY, JUST ONE MORE:
Some folks in the comment threads caution me that I shouldn’t be jumping to conclusions, but as I’ve frequently written on the subject, words have consequences, and when it comes toviolent, right-wing, eliminationist rhetoric, one must accept that those consequences might ultimately include violence.

So when Giffords own Republican opponent uses rhetoric like this and holds a symbolic campaign event like that, well, what did he expect?

I’m just sayin’.

Hey Ryan… it’s not like I’ve signed a contract or anything. You top the Stranger’s offer, and give me a spot on your editorial board, and I’m all yours. I even promise not to use the word “fuck.” (You know, in print.)

Come on… you know it would be fun, at least, for your readers. Think about it.

It’s been a difficult few months attempting to keep enough quality content up here on HA while also contributing almost daily to Slog, especially once the election season ended. So I’m both pleased and wistful to announce that this experiment will soon be coming to a merciful end. Starting February 2, I will give up my part-time gig on Slog… and join the Stranger staff full time.

Part of what this means for HA—a blog into which I’ve invested over six years of my life—should be kinda obvious: come Feb. 2, I simply won’t be writing here much anymore, if at all. I’m working on some plans to try to keep HA going as a relevant, independent voice in the post-Goldy era, but I can’t share any details until I know them.

As for me, I know it’s the right move. The Stranger will give me a larger audience and a steady (if relatively modest) paycheck, plus, after years of toiling under the mixed blessings of my “Horse’s Ass” brand, I’m probably the only political writer in Washington state for whom the Stranger’s masthead would provide a boost in credibility. There’s a part of me that regrets giving up one of the best-read, independent state blogs in the nation to take an MSM job, but in spirit, you can’t get any less mainstream than the Stranger, and I mean, fuck… a newspaper job in this crappy, imploding newspaper market? How could I possibly turn down the opportunity? I’d have to be crazy.

Anyway, I had hoped to put a little more time and care into this announcement, but goddamn Dominic scooped me, so here it is. It’s been an absolute honor serving up dish and rants and whatnot to all of you these past six years. Well… most of you. Okay, some of you. The point is, a blog isn’t worth anything without its readers, and as bloggers go, I know that I’ve been incredibly fortunate to find such a loyal and passionate audience.

So, well, thanks.

Yeah, I sure do enjoy poking a little fun at Crosscut—kinda a friendly rivalry—but really, Roger Valdez’s piece on waste in government is a must read.

As I’ve long said, a bureaucracy is a bureaucracy is a bureaucracy, public or private, and anybody who has ever worked for or with a large, established corporation knows what I’m talking about. Think there’s no waste, fraud or abuse at Microsoft or Boeing? Talk to a few longtime employees, and then tell me how it’s any worse in the public sector.

I’m not saying there aren’t any efficiencies to be gained in government. Of course there are. But all this perennial talk about waste, fraud and abuse is just a way of avoiding the more difficult conversation about policy priorities.

The GOP wins control of the US House in November, while making big gains in the Senate, and just a month later the unemployment rate falls to 9.4 percent, the lowest rate in 19 months. Wow, those Republicans sure did move fast to turn this economy around… even before they actually took office.

Of course I’m joking, but if unemployment continues to fall, dollars to donuts the GOP will attempt to take the credit during the 2012 election. See, that’s how it works. Booming economy and budget surpluses by the end of the Clinton administration, and that’s thanks to the policies put in place by Ronald Reagan. Near historic economic collapse and record deficits after eight years of Bush administration mismanagement, and that’s all Barack Obama and the Democratic Congress’ fault. Any recovery we see between November 2, 2010 and November 6, 2012… well clearly, it’ll be all the House Republicans’ doing.

And the funny sad thing is, a lot of Americans will buy it.

Nightlife promoter and bar owner Dave Meinert provides no hard numbers to back up his claim that the state could raise an easy $1.5 billion a year by massively expanding both legalized gambling and alcohol sales in Washington state, yet in attempting to refute my opposition to his proposal, he routinely dismisses me as an “old school thinker” who “doesn’t get it,” and who throws “shit at the wall,” while basically “guessing” about the economics of gaming. So in case he tries to similarly dis me today on KUOW, I thought it best to post a few links to some of my source material:

Lancet: Alcohol “most dangerous drug”

National Gambling Impact Study

WA Lottery: GAMBLING AND PROBLEM GAMBLING IN WASHINGTON STATE: A REPLICATION STUDY, 1992 TO 1998

Evergreen Council on Problem Gambling

Bill Virgin, Seattle P-I: Gambling craze not a good bet for states

These are all sources, by the way, that I’ve cited throughout my six years extensively covering this subject here on HA, as well as my behind the scenes activism on behalf of the welfare of problem and pathological gamblers. So if Meinert wants to dismiss me as not knowing what I’m talking about, he does so at his risk.

UPDATE:
For those who listened to the show, I a couple of points I didn’t have time to make.

Meinert talked about allowing a limited number of card rooms in Seattle, but that’s not how state law works. State law gives cities the power to either allow or disallow card rooms, but not the power to limit the number, or limit where they may locate beyond normal zoning powers. Once we allow card rooms, we lose all control. It’s an all or nothing, and Seattle has chosen nothing.

I also find it amazing that Meinert would brush off the difference between a problem gambling incidence rate of one percent and five percent as mere statistics. Five percent is five times one percent. Furthermore, while problem gamblers may make up a relatively small part of the general public, they make up a huge proportion of the casinos profits, with some studies showing up to 50 percent of the revenue from slot machines coming from problem gamblers (the 1998 WA study cited above found 40 percent).

Finally, Meinert likes to talk about “starting the conversation,” but we’ve had this conversation again and again, and he’s consistently come out on the losing side, most recently with the liquor privatization initiatives, and a few years back with Tim Eyman’s odious slot machine initiative. Washington voters simply don’t want this, and it is disingenuous to attempt to exploit our current budget crisis as an opportunity for a windfall for bar owners like Meinert.

UPDATE, UPDATE:
One further point for the moment. Meinert talks about card rooms and casinos as economic engines, but this simply isn’t true. They don’t manufacture money. Rather, they pull discretionary spending from other discretionary activities, or in the case of pathological gamblers, non-discretionary spending.

His proposals won’t turn Seattle into Las Vegas. Tourists won’t flock here to come to our casinos, nor will Washingtonians cancel their trips to Vegas. Rather, casinos and card rooms and slot machines in bars will mostly compete for local business between themselves, and with other local entertainment venues. It’s a zero sum game, particularly slot machines in bars, which studies show to be the worst form of gambling if your goal is economic development.

I don’t necessarily disagree with the general sentiment of the Seattle Times’ recent editorials on higher education and fixing potholes; these both constitute important government services that demand public investment, as the Times appears to recognize. But if the Times’ editors are going to continue editorializing in favor of spending taxpayer dollars, they might want to start rethinking their seemingly knee-jerk opposition to raising them.

For example, in making the case for dedicating more city resources towards pothole repair, the Times correctly points out that in 2006, Seattle voters approved a roads and bridges levy that, amongst other things, promised to “pave and repair Seattle streets.” What the Times fails to recall is that its editorial board advised readers to vote “No” on the $365 million proposition.

Likewise, while the editors rightly insist that “among the many things Washington must do about higher education, none will be as important as returning its investment in the system to a stronger, more robust stage,” they were also among the loudest voices arguing against a high earners income tax that would have restored budget dollars for education, while reducing taxes for 98 percent of Washington households.

The Times editors like to smugly harrumph about “Tax and Spend Liberals” like me, and I don’t deny the label—I think our state currently invests too little in our public and human infrastructure to sustain and grow our economy and improve our quality of life. Disagree with that perspective if you want, but at least give me credit for enunciating how we might pay for my spending priorities, unlike those “Don’t-Tax but Spend Conservatives” at the Seattle Times.

Heads up: I’ll be on KUOW’s The Conversation at around 12:40 this afternoon, giving nightlife promoter (and bar owner) Dave Meinert the business over his misguided proposal to help fill our state budget hole through doubling consumption of alcohol and a tenfold increase in gambling. I’ll post a few relevant stats and links closer to air time.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RpOUctySD68&feature=player_embedded[/youtube]

As much as it might pain me to type this… what Danny Westneat said.

I got nothing. At least, nothing I feel like writing about at the moment. So talk amongst yourselves.

As I explained yesterday on Slog, the High Tuition/High Financial Aid model proposed by Gov. Gregoire’s higher education task force, doesn’t exactly work if the plan doesn’t guarantee high financial aid, and from what I’ve seen of it, I’m just not confident that this proposal does. What might satisfy me? Well, for one, a philosophical shift in the task force’s objectives:

Along with more money from tuition, the task force’s proposal would lessen the impact to lower- and middle-income families by creating a private financial-aid endowment, with a goal of raising $1 billion in the next decade.

Change “lessen the impact” to “eliminate the impact,” and then back it up with reasonable safeguards, and you might just get my support, along with a enough Democrats in Olympia to make this a reality. Otherwise… piss off.

As the chart at the top of the post illustrates, it is possible to charge sky-high tuition, while keeping a college degree affordable to lower- and middle-income families. This chart compares the net costs at my admittedly pricey alma mater, the University of Pennsylvania, to those at a typical public university, and as you can see, once financial aid packages are factored in, Penn can turn out to be just as affordable. In fact, more so, as Penn’s aid comes entirely in the form of grants, meaning its students no longer graduate with tens of thousands of dollars in loans.

That’s the way the High Tuition/High Financial Aid model is supposed to work. Those families that can afford to pay full price do; those who can’t, pay what they can afford. At Penn, students from typical families earning less than $90,000 a year receive grants equal to full tuition and fees; students from families earning less than $40,000 have their room and board covered too.

And it could work that way in Washington state too, if both the money and the commitment is there to move to this model without making a four-year degree less affordable to lower- and middle-income families.

So in the interest of moving this conversation forward, I’d like to suggest that my friends in the legislature consider this very simple but significant amendment to the task force’s proposals: give our four-year universities the freedom to set tuition prices as they see fit, but impose a needs tested cap on the net cost to in-state, lower- and middle-income families.

In the end, I couldn’t care less where the sticker price of a UW degree falls in relation to that at comparable public universities, and neither should should students or lawmakers. All that matters is the net cost of that degree in relation to what the student can afford. And if we as a state can embrace and defend this principle, then the move to tuition flexibility can be a net plus for our higher education system as a whole.

Anybody expecting bold gestures or a call for shared sacrifice from our state’s civic “leaders” should think again, at least when it comes to funding higher education:

A task force charged with finding stable money to pay for higher education in Washington state has some ideas it wants the Legislature to consider.

At the top of its list announced Monday: Find someone other than state government to pay the bill.

That’s right, the last thing the panel, chaired by Microsoft executive Brad Smith, seems to want to propose is that we should adequately fund our state college and university system by raising adequate tax revenues. Instead, they suggest the state hike tuition, and then raise a new scholarship fund via donations from individuals and corporations.

Uh-huh. I myself have long advocated that the state consider moving to a high-tuition/high-financial-aid model in order to more efficiently target state subsidies at a time of tight budgets, but I’ve become increasingly concerned that we’re on the verge of embracing the former without implementing the latter. And the apparent reluctance of this panel to consider taxes as a legitimate revenue source, well, it only adds to my unease.

Other bold proposals include saving money, by doing more with less:

— Eliminate underused majors and courses.

— Offer more online classes, particularly for large introductory courses.

— Create three-year bachelor degree programs.

— Limit state support for students taking credits beyond what they need to earn a degree.

— Test students on prior learning experiences and give them credit.

— Recognize college work done during high school.

Do any of these six proposals actually make the educational experience at our state colleges and universities any better? No. Of course not. They make it cheaper… and in every sense of the word.

I haven’t yet read the task force’s report, so I don’t mean to entirely dismiss it out of hand, but I’m disappointed by what appears to be a relentlessly free market approach to the problems at hand. Soviet-style controlled economies ultimately failed; I understand that. But there must be something in between that, and pinning the educational aspirations of the children of the working and middle class on the voluntary generosity of wealthy individuals and corporations, right?

Of course there is, and I’m guessing it looks something like the taxpayer funded state college and university system upon which much of the economic gains of the past half century were built.

Over the past couple weeks I’ve been posting a bit about budget priorities, pointing out that the decisions we make in Olympia in regard to both taxing and spending, reflect our priorities as a state.

For example, if lawmakers choose to cut yet another couple billion dollars from K-12 education while refusing to even consider the repeal of nonproductive, special interest tax exemptions, well, that reflects our priorities. If the state continues to slash funding and raise tuition at our community colleges and four-year universities at the same time businesses claim they can’t find enough qualified workers in the midst of near record-high unemployment, well, that reflects our priorities too.

And of course, the fact that our state and local governments have steadily shrunk themselves over the past couple decades both as a percentage of the total economy and in the number of FTEs compared to population, that sure as hell reflects our priorities, as does the fact that nationwide, Washington now ranks 45th in spending on K-12 education, but 14th in spending on corrections.

But unfortunately, when I write about stuff like this, I’m mostly ignored. Oh, call out the Seattle Times editorial board for licking Rob McKenna’s balls, and that might earn me a link from some self-anointed arbiter of journalistic integrity, but spend a little time and effort exploring the conventional “government must learn to live within its means” narrative, and refuting it with actual, you know, numbers, well that just elicits a collective yawn from our political press corps. I guess, because, I’m just some foul-mouthed local blogger (as opposed to a real journalist like Joni Balter), so you can just ignore my math, even when it’s lifted directly from the OFM. And… I sometimes use the word “fuck.”

Well, okay then… if you won’t pay attention to little ol’ me, perhaps you’ll listen to State Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown, a trained economist, who on the Senate Dems blog writes about how we pride ourselves on being one of the top states in the nation in terms of quality of life, but how we’re increasingly at the bottom of the pack in terms of our willingness to pay for it:

In Washington, we want to be among the top quarter of states in public services, but we’re in the lower-half in amount paid in state and local taxes. In fact, we’re lagging far behind the same mid-West states like North Dakota and Minnesota that Lake Wobegon is meant to poke fun at.

We may laugh at the gap between what people from Lake Wobegon think of themselves and reality, but if Washington levied the same amount of state and local taxes per $1000 of personal income that North Dakota levies – North Dakota –  we’d have 29 percent more revenue than we have today. That’s more than $9 billion, which would more than cover our current revenue shortfall, and then some…

In Washington, we have a bigger Lake Wobegon gap than Lake Wobegon does. We’re in the third year of significant recessionary impacts on our state budget. And for the third year in a row, we hear loud talk about making Washington live within its means by cutting state spending to match diminished revenues.

The truth is, state spending compared to personal income has been declining for a decade. And all this talk about “living within our means” masks another important truth: We can’t keep cutting spending without downgrading the public services mentioned above. And if we keep downgrading these same services, we can’t expect to maintain our quality of life, much less improve it.

Both Sen. Brown and I are making the same basic assertion, and we’re making it based not on ideology, but on math. We cannot continue to shrink government, the services it provides and the human and infrastructure investments it makes, while continuing to maintain the quality of life Washingtonians have come to expect.

Republicans and their ball-lickers on the editorial boards would have you believe that we have no choice but to make do with tax revenues that continue to fall even as the economy recovers, but the reality is, thanks in part to the public investment of prior generations, we are a wealthy state that can afford to do more… particularly the wealthiest amongst us. Whether we choose to, well, that reflects our priorities.

I’m watching the Seahawk’s game, and I’m wondering… why the hell would anybody patronize one of those bars in the Miller Lite commercials with those bitchy, emasculating, female bartenders?

As for the game itself, I’d much prefer my Eagles play either one of these teams than the Green Bay Packers.

UPDATE:
Seahawks win! And get to host the Saints next week. It would be fun to see the the Seahawks face the Eagles, but that would require the former getting past the Saints and the Falcons, and the latter getting past the Packers and the Bears. Not a likely scenario.