I keep hearing nervous talk from several segments of the progressive community that Gov. Gregoire is “wavering” on several key pieces of legislation passed during the recent session: the climate change, toxic toys, and working families credit bills.
Gee… I sure hope not, and I gotta say, I’d be surprised if the chatter proved true. The climate change bill was the environmental community’s top priority this session, and actually came at the governor’s request, while the toxic toy legislation — which merely requires that children’s toys be… um… nontoxic — has broad appeal across ideological lines. I’d imagine the working families credit to be the most vulnerable of the three because in the long run, it actually costs money, but in a state with the most regressive tax structure in the nation (by far) it may be the most important legislation of the session, and a veto would surely piss off a large chunk of the Dems’ progressive base.
Gov. Gregoire needs to win big in King County this November, and vetoing any of these three bills would be an inauspicious campaign kickoff. So for the moment, I’ll choose to believe these rumors are nothing more than that.
I know this is off topic, but I must rant
From the NYT this morning:
“The reaction of some of Mr. Clinton’s allies suggests that might have been a wise decision. “An act of betrayal,” said James Carville, an adviser to Mrs. Clinton and a friend of Mr. Clinton.
“Mr. Richardson’s endorsement came right around the anniversary of the day when Judas sold out for 30 pieces of silver, so I think the timing is appropriate, if ironic,” Mr. Carville said, referring to Holy Week.”
This is why I have never backed Hillary Clinton. The “Clinton machine” has always believed that the nomination is due her because of her husband, and anyone who served with Bill, and now backs Obama, is a traitor.
That is not democracy, that is dictatorship.
The sense of entitlement that Hillary and her ilk have displayed throughout this campaign would make Paris Hilton blush.
This quote, from a guy who literally sleeps with Mary Matalin, personal advisor to Dick Cheney. How many “pieces of silver” has come into his household, courtesy of the Republican Party?
GBS said:
Mr. Cynical
RHAT: Boo-yaughhhhhhhhhh
$29.99 as of 12:38 pm PST. Another 3.17% gain TODAY. My 5,500 shares are looking pretty sweet right now consiering I bought at $25.10. That’s almost $27,000 to the good for me.
In your face! In your face!! In your FACE!!!
GBS–
RedHat is now at $17.06. New symbol is RHT.
You sure know how to pick ’em LEFTIST PINHEADED KLOWN!
I got out of the Market the 1st time it hit 14,000.
I did some short-term trading in Oil Companies and NOV.
I just bought Wells Fargo last week at $27.25.
In less than 3 trading days it is now at $32.55.
GBS is not an investor.
He will always be poor……and whining about it as if it has nothing to do with his horrible work ethic and pathetic investment acumen.
How much $$ do you have to invest GBS??
I’ll help you.
PS–
I have owned McDonalds and Intuitive Surgical previously.
Both great companies.
I agree they are both currently a bit overpriced.
I am watching them for a buying opportunity.
GBS–are you sucked in by the “Green Energy” charade??
You probably road Starbucks (a LEFTIST Favorite) down the tubes too.
You can talk all the LEFTIST PINHEAD smack you want….but invest like a Conservative dude!
Ok, as obsessed as I am about the presidential race, let’s get this back on topic.
I agree, Goldy. I can’t imagine that Gov. Gregoire would veto any of these bills. But the Association of Washington Business is putting on the full court press. They even flew out the CEOs of Mattel and Hasbro to meet with the Gov. to try to pressure her veto the toy safety bill.
The climate bill in question is actually a different one than what the Gov. requested. That was the Climate Action/Green Jobs bill (HB 2815), which she already signed into law. This bill is SB 6580, the Local Solutions to Global Warming bill. All this bill does is allow the state to work with cities and counties (like Tacoma, Seattle, Shoreline, Spokane,King, Pierce) that want to take climate into consideration in their next comp plan updates. But, of course, AWB and its developer members are saying this is the beginning of the end of their right to plop down a big box store or subdivision wherever they want.
Again, I think the Gov. wants to sign these bills, but a little encouragement would help her resist all the calls she’s getting from big business both in-state and across the country (with the toy bill). Please call the Governor at (360) 902-4111 to encourage her to sign the toy safety bill, the Local Solutions to Global Warming bill and the Working Families tax credit bill (an economic stimulus bill that helps working class families overcome, just a bit, the regressivity of our tax system).
Gregoire needs to appeal to centrist and right-of-center voters, so that’s where she’s going to head. So she irritates some lefties by vetoing some bills? Where are they going to go? Dino Rossi? Sit out the election, which is the same as supporting Rossi?
Give it a rest, Goldy. Gregoire doesn’t need you, you need her. So much of the hard-left agenda makes good newspaper copy but lousy social and economic policy as many Democratic members of the legislature will privately concede. You get tossed the occassional bone to keep you on the reservation, but on so many of the big issues you lose.
The so-called “progressive agenda” may have appeal inside certain Seattle neighborhoods, but out in the hinterlands it falls flatter than a pancake. Washington is an entire state, not just a few isolated podcasters, techies, and aging unreconstructed hippies on Pill Hill, lower Queen Anne, Fremont, and the U District.
Stack the track record of the “progressive agenda” up against, say, the overall success of Tim Eyman to see the point.
Certainly, leftists are entitled to their opinion. At the same time, marginally left-of-center Democrats, moderates, centrists, Republicans, and conservatives far outnumber what Puddy calls the 16%’ers, the leftists. Self-realization is a key to freedom.
You have a choice: increasingly shrill demands upon others to acquiesce to your agenda, which will only serve to further marginalize the increasingly marginalized, or improve your social and political skills enabling you to reach out across ideological lines to objectively address issues and problems, something Washington voters repeatedly express the desire to see happen.
In other words, try finding common ground with Tim Eyman, who routinely whips your butt at the ballot box, instead of making yourself look silly. Up to you.
Politics is the art of the possible and the art of compromise, not a march under a massive red banner toward a worker’s paradise where all are equally miserable.
The Piper
Piper @ 4:
So according to you it’s “leftist” not to want toys with lead and phthalates in them sold to children in this state?
I’ll tell you what, asshole. When the governor signs this bill how about you get your hero, Tim Eyman, to run an initiative bringing back the lead?
I’m not falling for any faux-“centrist” line of shit from you dwindling little cult that lets kids be poisoned by their toys.
Piper. It is not Gregoire’s fault that the people that live in the “hinterlands” are zombies. You can’t talk politics with them because they know so little about what is actually going on, you have to communicate on a 1st grade level. Sorry.
Eastern Washington folks have opinions based on zero facts. I know, because I grew up there. They haven’t even figured out today’s welfare is for corporations, not single moms when they complain about it. They just don’t want anyone getting in their way when it comes to their lifestyles, no matter how much damage their lifestyles do to our environment. Slash and burn mentality. Some sick bastards if you ask me. All they do is complain about the people that want the world that their grand children will inherit to be habitable, and not as toxic as their toys.
Make the fine $5,000 per toxic toy. Let’s see what Hasbro does then. Make Hasbro’s CEO’s grandkids chew on a lead paint choo choo!!! Bastard.
4 – Yep, that slot machine initiative was a real winner. Goldy can learn a lot from that one.
And the anti-gay deal just cashed in at the ballot box. A lot Goldy can learn from that loser as well – maybe he can learn not to pander to the whims of sugar daddy Duncemire.
No income tax for Washington state. Never, never, ever!
In fact, let’s start getting rid of federal income taxes, too!
IMPEACH MCCAIN! and/or IMPEACH CLINTON! and/or IMPEACH OBAMA!
Hey, I’m just gettin’ a head start on things. In less than 10 months, we’ll have a brand-new cast of clowns to attack.
@5,6, & 7…
Thank you for proving my point about marginalization.
First you massively overstate problems, next you demand thermo-nuclear solutions to jay-walking issues, then finally you demean and insult all who hold contrary or even slightly differing opinions.
Let’s not mention the delusional fantasy land within which so many of you live that makes you think yours is the American way of anything.
And you wonder why you’re not invited to the better homes and the nicer social events???
Insulting people does nothing to either persuade them to your POV or respect it or you. All it does is convince them – and all objective observers – that you’re nothing but hyper-dogmatic and meanly intolerant.
And it’s so easy to get you to offer proof of same!
Some of the HA Happy Hooligans are legitimately driven by a belief system that includes respect for differing opinions. To joust with them is instructive and entertaining because with their POV comes the acknowledgement that another may be just as legitimate.
Occassionally, Judge Learned Hand is quoted around here, and it’s his maxim, given in a speech to new citizens in 1944, that, “The Spirit of Liberty is the spirit which is not too sure that it is right.” You all would do well to take Judge Hand’s truth to heart.
Many – too many – of the HA Happy Hooligans acknowledge no POV other than their own – they concede nothing, respect no one, demean and debase themselves by doing it to others, and generally paint themselves into such an ideological corner that even those who you claim to support end up disowning you.
A lot of the Jeremiah Wright hate speech now vehemently denounced by Barack Obama is parroted here, and then some, daily.
I defy any of you to take the perjorative smears against John McCain’s military service and experience as POW and try to get that rhetorical puss endorsed by Sen. Obama…or even Sen. Clinton or Dennis Kucinich! It would be denounced as the lying hate speech that it is in an instant, and those who utter or promulgate it would be cast into a political nether region from which there is no return.
Indeed, yours does stink.
And no, Chicken Little, the sky is not falling, nor will it if Christine Gregoire vetoes some legislation on toys that could mean she would be painted as the Grinch who stole next year’s Christmas from the children of Washington state since the measure could be so Draconian as to result in the withdrawal of Mattel or Hasbro products from local storeshelves altogether.
Want to make progress on issues? Try less spitting and more respectful reaching out. Sure, you may lose on some or settle for half-loaves on others, but that’s the essential nature of the political process.
Just because you’re experiencing a temporary – momentary, ephemoral, transitory, impermanent, evanescent, sky-hook, smoke-repellant, gossamer – ascendancy doesn’t mean you can willy-nilly impose your agenda on everyone.
Prop. 1 apparently didn’t teach you a severe enough lesson that humility rarely is rebuked while hubris gets slapped down in most painful ways.
Two-fisted, hard-charging debate is perfectly acceptable and well within the American political tradition. But vituperation, libel, and vacuous smears are not. Especially when they’re delivered by an anonymous pen.
The Piper
I have a suggestion for Governor Gregoire. Instead of pandering to pea brains, just do what is right. Tell them why it is right and why they should help you, and what they should hope to expect. Don’t let the right wing frauds steal the language. Ever.
If the “world is only 6,000 years old” fruit cakes can’t handle the fact that the world is billions of years old, it is their problem, not our.
Remember, Reality has a liberal bias…..
To be fair, many of the precincts around Spokane have swung Dem recently. Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown is from Spokane, as is Chris Marr; the 3rd has been reliably Dem for a while, the 6th will be all Dem once we get Ahern out this November, and I think the 4th could be in play if things go well.
Sure, Northeast Washington is impossible, but there are pockets where good things can happen.
PS abv….”that could mean she would be painted as the Grinch who stole next year’s Christmas from the children of Washington state since the measure could be so Draconian as to result in the withdrawal of Mattel or Hasbro products from local storeshelves altogether.”
To quote Dick Cheney, “So?” I, for one, look forward to the GOP trying this line that the ‘poor little children’ are denied toys by those who insist on the right to poison them. That will go over real well with parents.
So you dare to lecture we ‘16%’ers’ about the ‘other Washington’? Face it, yours is a POV that is becoming increasingly exposed for the toxic intellectual bankruptcy that it is.
Enjoy your mini-minority status, whilst basking in your purety.
Piper – alot of truth told in that. We need a society of respect and willingness to work together, not this “it’s my way or no way” attitude. Glad someone said it.
Piper?
Other than the snarky bits about making the Hasbro CEO’s kids chew on the toxic toys, I’m not sure how you can complain about this law. Since we really aren’t going to do that, (hey, just because dad or grandad may work as Hasbro, it isn’t the kid’s fault) what is your problem with requiring testing and big fines for folks caught cheating?
And the law allowing cities, counties and the state to coordinate their climate change efforts seems like a pretty good idea, too, unless the real objective is to tie matters up to the point where nothing gets done. Certainly, some of the opponents of this law have that in mind, but what is your problem with it?
We could have differences on the Working Families law, but it is a very Republican concept that tax cuts are good for the economy. Of course, these cuts go to folks that will probably actually spend them, hence putting money back into the economy.
So, how exactly are any of these “thermo-nuclear solutions to jay-walking issues“? I don’t see any of these being minor issues, nor are any of the solutions drastic. Heck, they hardly going as far as being “moderate”. Far from “thermo-nuclear”, these solutions look more like “band-aids”.
And even with the proposals being so moderate, so restrained that anything less would be completely ineffective in solving the problems, you still complain that they are too drastic.
I presume that we both find lead in toys to be unacceptable. I also presume that both of us think that helping working families with some tax relief is a good idea, and I presume that you are not one of those far out wingnuts that refuse to believe the vast majority of climate and earth science specialists that have stated that climate change is a problem, and that we need to work effectively to minimize the effects. (We can just agree to disagree on the causes and severity of the problem for now.)
There are Republican Governors that have proposed bolder solutions to climate change, and prohibiting lead in toys is not a partisan issue, unless you own a toy company that imports toxic toys. Republicans are always touting tax cuts.
So, what is your problem with these three laws?
@1 “This quote, from a guy who literally sleeps with Mary Matalin, personal advisor to Dick Cheney.”
Well yeah, but she’s his wife, so he’s entitled to sleep with her.
@1 C’mon Mike … really. Love is blind, and liberals are broad-minded to begin with; Carville, apparently, was broad-minded and inclusive enough to marry a Republican. The only thing that’s amazing about this is there’s even one Republican in the whole country who was broad-minded enough to marry a Democrat.
@1 You go too far in criticizing the Clintons for bristling at perceived disloyalties among their perceived natural allies. Alliances and loyalties are the stuff of which all politics is made. For example, I consider myself on the same side as Will, even though he’s as obtuse as a wingnut when it comes to seeing reason on light rail and even tried to have me banned from HA because of our differences over light rail. But that’s inconsequential compared to the big issues of war and peace, cheap labor, health care, and the class warfare being waged by Republicans against the working and middle classes. We don’t expect our friends (or, for that matter, our spouses) to agree with us on everything. For example, Mrs. Rabbit and I disagree on lots of things. She thinks the Alpha Male in a Rabbit Reproductive Unit should do housework, which is the stupidest thing I ever heard of! I’m too busy fucking to do housework. My responsibility is to ensure the continuity of my species, and I don’t have time to worry about washing dishes or taking out garbage — that’s supposed to be her job.
[scuffling and crashing noises]
Ouch!! Ow!! Yiiiiy!!
[biting and clawing noises]
[more crashing noises]
[sounds of fleeing rabbit]
The CrackPiper is as much guilty, or perhaps more so, of the “sins” he tars the rest of us with.
He has nothing but dumbass right-wing generalizations and Dori Monson sound bite descriptions of problems that have been festering since Reagan and his “I got mine so fuck everybody else” pseudo-libertarianism overtook the political landscape.
THAT is how we got to the mess we’re in now and THAT is why we have NO truck with that kind of thinking.
PIPER!!!!
You HAD your shot!
It DID NOT WORK!
Step aside or get run over.
Dennis Miller while making fun of James Carville said
“He has more nervous tics than the valet parker at the
Baghdad Hilton”. That is funny.
I would expect that, unless they have some really extraordinary kinks, Mr. and Mrs. Carville don’t spend their time together trading politically-based epithets. It’s even possible they don’t talk politics much at all (there are probably plenty of things that “security concerns” prohibit her from telling him), but if and when they do, it’s probably pretty low-key.
When Steve Largent went to Congress, he shared lodgings with a couple of other freshmen members, and as I recall, at least one was a Democrat. Now, Steve had a lot of ideas which most of us here would consider pretty extreme, but not only his housemates but his House-mates pretty universally liked him as a person. He was able to deal with those he disagreed with with the greatest of respect, and always tried to make his own points in his own words, without resorting to name-calling or sloganeering.
I appreciate that Piper seems to at least make up his own rhetoric, as opposed to several of the other righty trolls who frequent this forum, mostly regurgitating the catch phrases they heard from Sean Hannity or Michelle Malkin the day before. But mostly, what all of them do is disrupt what otherwise might be intelligent discussions by filling miles of space with repetitive screeds that are more intended to irritate the rest of us than to win anyone over to their side.
Yelling tomfoolery and lies doesn’t make them any more credible. I suspect that’s why Tim Eyman doesn’t run for office–he hasn’t the guts to stand up in front of the general populace and explain himself. It’s far more fun to throw rocks and holler at the folks who are actually working hard to keep America from completely falling apart.
@21-so true, the ” repetitive screeds that are more intended to irritate the rest of us than to win anyone over to their side” get quite annoying on both sides here. Seems PU and YLB are two of the top contributors of repetive screed, both on different sides of the fence.
@18: RR Just made me laugh out loud!
@10: Piper
Ummm – marginilization. I want to know who is NOT in favor of banning toxic toys and putting fines on corporations that sell them. Are republicans against this? Do they want to commit political suicide by endangering kids lives?
working families: who is against tax breaks for working families – not republicans, I think.
Somehow these are, in your opinion, thermonuclear solutions to jaywalking problems? What are the republican alternatives? Where are the republicans who are demanding safe toys for little kids? Are these the same republicans that endorse corporate welfare for Bear Stearns and tax breaks for Exxon – when it has twice made more than any company in history?
@ 24 – I don’t think anyone is against working families tax breaks, but the legislature has put that bill on the back burner til next year. Toxic toys, same goes there. Endorsement of the Bear bailout, has been approved by even Obama and Clinton in this last weeks news, it seems a straight across the board approval. I think its sucks and it goes to show both sides see the consequences of Bear falling down and going boom.
Has anyone seen my husband? I followed the blood trail to a bluff, but didn’t hear a splash, so he may still be alive and hiding in the brush somewhere down there.
Here’s why Gregoire needs Seattle progressives more than Eastern Washington conservatives.
We’ve had a few elections in the recent past (and this trend is likely to become a permanent pattern) where the D has outpolled the R by 70% to 30% in the 7th CD and been outpolled by the R by 40% to 60% in the 4th and the 5th CDs.
Set these numbers up as fractions, add them up and you’ll see that Seattle cancels out Eastern WA, assuming that turnout is equal. It’s actually higher in Seattle most times but the point stands.
So a Dem’s strategy should be to turn out every progressive vote in all three of these CD’s while not alienating any of them in a futile attempt to pick up conservative votes.
The election is then decided in the remaining six CDs, five of which usually break Democratic (the 3rd CD can be squirrelly). Three of these six are largely in King County.
You’ll win votes in all six of these, not to mention the 7th, by passing bills that keep poisons out of toys, address climate change, etc.
Note to Frank Chopp and Lynn Kessler: putting gravel mines in the middle of Puget Sound will lose you votes in these areas. Killing bills to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill will lose you votes in these areas, not gain you votes.
See Crosscut’s excellent interview with Pat Lantz on this subject:http://www.crosscut.com/2008-e.....ew+swings/
Roger you are cracking me up today!!!! Thank you so much for the laughs, as today has been one of those days I need some laughs!!!! :)
@25: Hannah – do you have a citation – I can’t find anywhere Obama approving of the Bear Stearns bailout. I have heard him criticizing it in a speech as coproate welfare. The bailout was by Bernanke at the Fed – appointed by Bush.
corporate
@25: Hannah
Goldy says these are passed legislation and the question is wqhether Gregoire will sign them.
@31 – http://www.komotv.com/news/16924671.html
Most of these issues are on the back burner til next session
@29 I can’t find the story, but one thing is for sure, I also cannot find any info on either (all 3 of them) disapproving of the bailout.
http://www.realclearpolitics.c.....w_day.html
Quote from National Ledger in regards to Hilary:
“It is interesting to note that Senator and presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has not denounced the bailout. It turns out that Bear Stearns is on the list of top contributors to her presidential campaign. J.P. Morgan, the firm that has now bought Bear Stearns, is also on the list.”
And finally an article claiming praise by all 3 candidates on this weeks fed chairmans moves:
http://news.moneycentral.msn.c.....id=8373861
I see the family leave bill on the list – but not the toxic toys or the environmental bill – did those pass already?
@34 – the climate bill is listed last and I can’t find ANYTHING on the toxic toys bills…still looking at the state web site…do you know the bill number by any chance?
I don’t think the family leave bill is the one everyone is talking about, I think it’s the Sales tax rebates for the poor.
Part od the Toxic toys looks like it passed!!!! YAY HB 2647…the other part got hung up SB 6530.
10 – Self parody. You take yourself waaaaaaaaaaay too seriously.
Prop 1? I voted against it. Yes, me and Roger Rabbit and even a few others, the “hard left” guys you live to stereotype. Nice to build a lot of transit and even some some roads – terrible way to finance them.
Too many people around here give you too much credit. I see little to recommend you.
You came in here dragging in discredited talking points that we’d all heard here before somehow thinking you were God’s gift to the right wing. Wrong…
You’ve chased people around here claiming things that were lies. I’d pity you for your brainwashing but it wouldn’t do an ounce of good.
What’s coming in November will gladden a few hearts around here and it will only harden yours. That’s pretty sad.
#18
I love the loser talk of reasonableness that is endemic in the old left. They think they can win elections by winning the argument.
The fact is, we are in the middle of a war in which the Republican Party has been beating the hell out of all the high-minded liberals for so many years. Since Reagan.
So anyone who thinks they can go lower than me in this election….bring it on!
I am happy to write from the bottom of the mud pit. That is where you need to go to drain this Republican swamp. Roger, you go make your arguments from the middle of the battle field. That is where the Republicans have been making hamburger out of people like you for years.
As for your statement in #18:
“You go too far in criticizing the Clintons for bristling at perceived disloyalties among their perceived natural allies. Alliances and loyalties are the stuff of which all politics is made.”
Using that as a measuring stick, why do you criticize Republicans who voted for the Iraq war, or the agenda of GW Bush? After all, they were just being “loyal” to their “alliances”. In politics, it is a short walk from “bristling at perceived loyalties”, to executing traitors of the state.
Right?
Goldy,
You are missing the other climate bill in the Priorities for a Healthy Washington. SB 6580, Local Solutions for Global Warming, helps local governments make planning and zoning decisions that create green, walkable communities. The choices made here have a tremendous impact in transportation needs and global warming emissions.
The bill would enable to state to develop a model that cities and counties can use to estimate the land-use related greenhouse gas emissions. It creates a competitive grants programs for cities that want to incorporate climate change into their planning, like the many Washington cities that have signed onto the Mayor’s Climate Partnership. It requires a report form a stakeholders group by the end of the year of policy changes that would enable local government to reduce their climate impact.
This bill is an important step supported by cities and counties, and complements the Climate Action and Green Jobs bill that the Governor did sponsor. It is a risk for a veto.
Hannah, before your time and many months ago I posted this link:
http://opensecrets.org/pres08/.....cycle=2008
JP Morgan Chase & Co $231,220
Bear Stearns $145,090
Is Heilary gonna turn back the $$$? These 16%ers don’t remember anything…
@40 – no of course not, kinda like that huge donation she got from the guy who fled the US (cannot remember the story or name) she FINALLY “donated it to charity”
Hannah, you must mean Norman “The Bundler” Hsu. I asked if the Hsu fits before the media broke the story. But Clueless Idiots and FullofFartsArt don’t remember this.
It was $850,000. Heilary was forced to reject the money.
Puddy – AH HA now I remember…did they ever catch the guy or is he still hiding somewhere in Asia?
Of course, McCain has now broken his own law and the campaign finance limits he imposed….Link:
http://blog.washingtonpost.com.....endin.html
Hannah: The Hsu Train story:
http://www.nydailynews.com/new.....s_on_.html
Sure would be nice if they actually did more than one thing that would, you know, benefit the entire state instead of taking property rights away from owners who bought years ago with plans to build, or re-orginizing dept. of education to actually make it benefit children and teachers instead of be some ultra politically correct mired in red tape money drain.
Instead we get, well, nothing really. Months of hot air with little to show for it.
BusdriverMike @18:
Now you’ve done it. You’ve questioned Rabbit with a piece of logic. Prepare to be spewed at with a bunch of inanae nonsense that will more than likely prove your point for you. It happens all too often. Rabbit contradicting himself over a series of points, especially if somebody drops a fact on him or makes an observation like yours.
Me@46:
Shoot I just rubbed his hair the wrong way too.