Just under the wire the Redistricting Commission have submitted their final Congressional and legislative maps. Now it goes to the legislature to basically rubber stamp it. So, I’d like to take this moment to add a few thoughts to N in Seattle’s post from the other day.

Congress:
• Even if Adam Smith is safe electorally, a majority minority district may force him to hire a more diverse staff (I have no idea what his staff looks like now) and recommend more non-white people to military academies. Members of Congress take their duty to represent their district very seriously, and do a lot of behind the scenes constituent service things that might have more of an immediate impact.
• While you still have to give the advantage to McMorris Rodgers in any race, her district has probably got a bit more liberal. Since she won every county against Don Barbieri and against Peter Goldmark, she’s probably safe, but the right candidate, a bit of luck, and maybe the right timing, I wouldn’t put it past a Democrat in that seat (but hope springs eternal with me).

Legislature:

• The 32nd and 46th seem to look quite bit different from how they’re currently drawn with the 32nd going pretty far North and the 46th going over Lake Washington and pretty far down. The rest of the Seattle area districts look pretty much the same to me on first glance, although I’m sure having typed that, someone in the comments will point out some glaring change.
• The 15th LD becomes the first majority Hispanic district in the state. At 54.52% of the population (as opposed to the % of voters), I don’t know if that’s enough to organize a majority of voters, but I suspect the Democrats will be aggressive in organizing there.

It’s almost 12:30, so I’m going to bed.

– New Approach Washington has submitted the signatures for their initiative.

– Today in Ron Paul totally isn’t racist or homophobic.

– The Reconstruction-era South didn’t invent dishonesty, but its response to America’s defining trauma has become a foundational lie, supporting an ever-growing edifice of false history. It’s a lie so big no one will forcefully challenge it, a lie that’s too big to fail.

– Mitt Romney Is Running For America’s Embarrassing Dad

– Awesome species identification, Orkin.

The Seattle Times’ editorial board is talking vaguely about reforms without ever explaining how much money (if any) they actually save, let alone what they’ll do to the people working in government. And even after mentioning that many of the so called reforms they want have already passed, they seem to get angrier. This is bad enough, and I considered a more general critique of it. But the opening paragraphs are what really pissed me off.

DEMOCRATS who take cheer from business leaders’ support for a tax increase should make sure they are hearing the whole statement: taxes and reforms.

That is what Jim Albaugh, CEO of Boeing Commercial Airplanes, said last week. Add to his voice that of Microsoft’s general counsel, Brad Smith: “It’s important reforms are approved along with revenues.”

Phew, I was worried that an attorney for Microsoft and the CEO of Boeing might not have a space to push their preferred policy. Thank goodness The Seattle Times editorial board will act as stenographers for them!

Now, perhaps I’m being unfair here. I mean those tax policy changes affect those companies. Well the editorial goes on to mention some of the reforms they want: “formulas for pensions, pay increases, medical reimbursements, benefits, etc.”* Oddly, they don’t quote anyone who will be hurt by those things. People losing a good deal of their pensions and pay over the long haul, or who’ll have worse medical care maybe deserve as much time as a CEO of a Chicago company.

[Read more…]

Darryl and I have been doing some live blogging recently. Darryl has been on fire with the GOP Presidential debates, and I also did one of them. Mostly, I’ve been live blogging either events I’ve gone to as an activist or been invited to (or weaseled my way into) as a writer for this blog.

Recently, I’ve been influenced by this piece by Tim Wood. And while not everything about a sports blog applies to a politics blog, especially to the events where most of the readers aren’t able to follow along, there are some style things that are important.

There is an art to every format we use at Bleacher Report, but none more than the live blog. Done right, a live blog can be your ticket to a loyal following on B/R, because the live blog is the spot where you can most spotlight your personality.

You’re keeping readers up to date on the event, but more importantly, you’re giving the reader the feeling of watching it with you at a sports bar. You’re the buddy for the reader to interact with, so perspective and variety are two keys to keeping your readers interested.

I think change sports bar to watching the debate and you have a pretty good summation of Darryl covering the debates. For me, I think the most important thing is to put the updates below the older things. That way people just finding it half way through don’t have to scroll up and down a bit, then back up, and people can hit refresh from one point in, and be in the same spot. I try to remember to put times at the start of each update, but sometimes I forget. I’ve also made more of a point of going back and correcting grammar/punctuation/starting sentences that I don’t finish so it stands as something.

So, my question to you on this holiday shortened week, while most of you are perhaps still out with family: are these things you’d like to see more of? Less? Would you like advance warning? Would you like something different stylistically?

– When I finally stopped talking, I exhaled. I’d finally told someone I was falling for my whole story. And I was afraid that my biggest fear would come true: Aaron would look at me differently. (h/t)

– We might be all redistricted out by the end of the day, but this vignette from the 1960’s was fascinating.

– Is anyone else but Erika surprised that she finds it more remarkable that she would defend Kim Kardashian than that she would defend child sweatshops? You shouldn’t be because one of the questions on the wingnut welfare eligibility exam is to write an essay explaining the benefits of child sweatshops, poll taxes and climate change.

– Those Ron Paul newsletters are really, really, really awful.

– I think the question about Edgar Martinez and what would his Hall of Fame case would look like if he’d been a terrible third baseman is interesting.

HA seems to have eaten the last couple posts of mine. I’ve an out email to Goldy, but haven’t heard back. Here’s a replacement Open Thread

I mostly agree with The Seattle Times here on their piece about Mike Baumgartner, Cantwell’s maybe opponent next year. As I said in an earlier open thread, he’s a real piece of work for bringing up the fact that Cantwell isn’t married so she can’t have an opinion on Plan B. But for part of the editorial, they start with calling it a “rookie mistake.”

REASONABLE people can agree or disagree on the wisdom of making “morning-after” pills readily available to young teens. But Republican state Sen. Mike Baumgartner made a rookie mistake attacking U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell, the Democratic incumbent he is challenging in 2012.

I mean yeah, it was an asshole thing to do, but it would be an asshole thing to do no matter what the timing. They pivot to why it’s wrong, and as I say mostly it’s fine. But that phrase just rankled me: He’s a grown up, he’s run for office before. He should know better.

– My abortion didn’t make me crazy.

– Your lie of the year, ladies and gents.

– I was as much in the bag for Hillary Clinton in 2008 as anyone you’re likely to find. But the people trying to draft her to run against Obama are awful.

– I’ve generally had good experiences with Seattle Police, but really, when I read a story like this, I can’t help think maybe we need to sack the lot of them and start from scratch.

– Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor, Your Internal Organs

– The public hype around Tim Tebow was enough to get me to root for the Patriots last week.

Erica C. Barnett has a post on Metro cutting the hours of the 99.

However, the low ridership is a bit of a Catch-22. Before Metro eliminated the streetcar, ridership on the corridor was dramatically higher than it is today—about 404,000 trips a year in 2003, compared to about 252,000 in 2010 (and 204,000 in 2009). The reason, probably, is twofold: First, Metro cut service on the route from every 15 minutes to every 30, making the faux-”streetcar” less reliable and convenient. Second, and perhaps more importantly: People like riding streetcars—and buses painted like streetcars don’t fool anyone.

Fair enough, and as good an argument for rail as anything. The bus gets stuck in traffic and traffic grinds to a halt on rainy days down there, probably more now with construction. But there’s another reason that Erica doesn’t mention, and that’s that the 99 only runs one way. So it makes a circle, going South along the waterfront, then across Pioneer Square through the ID, and then back North up First Ave.

If this were a commuter route going from the suburbs downtown, a few blocks wouldn’t be a big deal. But if you’re a tourist and you get off the bus anywhere other than the ID, you’re not going to catch it close to where you got off. Also, the route to the sculpture park doesn’t go by the waterfront, so you can’t get off for a bit, look at the aquarium or whatever and then hop back on.

Still, I’ve always pictured it as potentially a great route, even a bus route. If it ran every 15 (or dare to dream 10) minutes each way a lot of people, not just tourists, would use it. As it is, poorly thought out and underfunded, it doesn’t do much.

10 Conversations On Racism I’m Sick Of Having With White People (h/t Howie on Facebook)

– It seems like Ryan Blethen had already mostly stopped writing anyway.

– Two of the most insightful, best writers among lefty blogs are having fundraisers.

– I’m surprised more Neocons aren’t claiming Kim Jong Il’s death as a glorious victory against the Axis of Evil.

– a very dangerous president.

– Merry Christmas from Batman.

The Department of justice released a report on the SPD. So far it seems like the elected officials are saying the right things, but there’s a lot of hard work to make sure that things improve. So, while it might be tough for the police, from the rank and file up, to accept this it’s also a great opportunity to improve the department.

And opportunities like this don’t come along very often, so I hope the police will embrace it. It can be tough to hear you need to change. And for many, the first inclination may be to recoil, to make excuses, to figure out why it isn’t so bad. But I hope we can move beyond that, because it is so bad. Because,

• When SPD officers use force, they do so in an unconstitutional manner nearly 20 percent of the time;
• SPD officers too quickly resort to the use of impact weapons, such as batons and flashlights. When SPD officers use batons, 57 percent of the time it is either unnecessary or excessive;
• SPD officers escalate situations, and use unnecessary or excessive force, when arresting individuals for minor offenses. This trend is pronounced in encounters with persons with mental illnesses or those under the influence of alcohol or drugs. This is problematic because SPD estimates that 70 percent of use of force encounters involve these populations.

And we have a chance to fix it. We have the chance to take a serious look and make policing better in the city. The cops on the street can either fight it or they can embrace it, but these opportunities don’t come up very much.

– Scary stuff happening in Europe.

– Oh look a book that will kill children.

– The guy running against Cantwell? Quite. A. Charmer.

– I used to think a union started like this: You round up all the hotheads, get them in one room, and storm the castle. Which would be great if it were true because then it would only take a couple of weeks out of people’s lives instead of years.

– Christopher Hitchens has passed. While he could certainly be infuriating, he sure could string words together.

– Rick Perry’s next ad.

Well, the Legislature passed something crappy.

The Legislature adjourned shortly after the Senate approved the new budget plan by a 42-6 vote. Gregoire had called for $2 billion in changes and a fully revamped budget by Christmas, but lawmakers settled on a plan that provides a $480 million fix through a combination of cuts, transfers and delayed payments.

Our Democratic legislature is still too chickenshit to even consider putting revenue in front of the people, let alone just passing a package outright.

Budget negotiators said it was impossible to get full consensus on a plan during a session that would last a maximum of 30 days.

I have to say, the we only had a limited time nonsense is stupid, stupid, stupid. I’m not suggesting it should have been easy, especially given the Republicans and Roadkills. I understand saying we didn’t get as far as we need because a significant portion of the legislature hates math. But to pretend nobody had any time to prepare? Please. They should have known as soon as they passed the budget that this was possible. And they definitely should have known several months ago when the revenue forecast that precipitated this session came about.

Anyway, kudos to Marko Liias for drawing a line in the sand.

“Not one bill came to the floor nor where there any committee hearings on revenue,” Liias says, explaining that he wants to “tax the one percent” and close corporate loopholes. “I know the high-earners’ income tax (Initiative 1098) failed before, but that was before Occupy. That was before people were occupying the Capitol asking us for revenue.”

And while I appreciate Josh Feit covering this aspect of the session that far too many reporters ignored, seriously, what the fuck is “Was Liias’ lone vote (among the Democrats) simply a bratty grandstand?” I mean really, “bratty grandstand” in an otherwise straight piece? I guess I can understand parsing out how serious he was and how much this is electoral stuff, bratty seems a totally unnecessary word.

– I can’t fathom how a middle class white guy thinks it’s OK to write this piece.

– While we cannot officially speak for every worker who shares our occupation, we can use this opportunity to reveal what it’s like to walk a day in our shoes for the 110,000 of us in America whose job it is to be a port truck driver. It may be tempting for media to ask questions about whether we support a shutdown, but there are no easy answers. Instead, we ask you, are you willing to listen and learn why a one-word response is impossible? (h/t)

– Film The Police

– I’m no fan of Michell Bachmann, but the Washington Post is a disgrace.

– That Made in America label

– Newt Gingrich is no Reagan, and he’s also no Howard Dean.

– That’s probably the best Rick Perry 3 things joke.

– Newt is a scary, scary guy.

The Republican presidential candidates had another debate. For some reason (exhaustion perhaps, maybe common sense kicked in?) Darryl decided not to live blog that one. I listened to a bit and, you’ll never believe this but, Newt Gingrich is still really annoying. The bit that people who watched the whole thing thought was most newsworthy was how Mittens thought to casually bet $10,000.

Now, despite what that link says, the odd thing about the number is that it’s neither a reasonable amount like $1, $5, or $10 that people actually make on these sort of things, but nor is it so exorbitant that it necessarily calls out as a joke bet. If I said to you, “I’ll bet you a billion dollars” then you know no matter who wins the bet that we’re not actually paying up because neither of us has a billion dollars. But $10,000 is both way too much, and just enough that you aren’t quite sure what would happen if you lost.

And any way why make a personal bet? Why not say for charity? Presumably the whole bet thing was because someone in his campaign suggested it knowing this had come up before, and hoping to defuse it in the future. He could easily say something like, “I’ll bet $500 that that isn’t true. If I win, give it to children’s hospital in Boston, if you win, I’ll give it to any charity of your choosing in Texas.” Then the worst thing that happens is he has to give $500 to a charity in Texas, and that doesn’t seem awful.