As expected, the Legislature just certified Christine Gregoire’s election as our new governor.
GOP maneuver fails in Senate; Gregoire’s election to be certified
Anybody looking for excitement in Olympia today better hope for some kind of street fight between Gregoire and Rossi supporters… because you’re not going to get any drama from the Legislature. Sure, Republicans might follow through on their childish threat to walk out of the joint session, but any chance they had of blocking certification of Christine Gregoire’s election vanished when the slim Democratic majority in the Senate held firm during a procedural vote yesterday.
With that out of the way, the final certification of the election results will fall to a joint session of the Legislature, where a more solid advantage in the House gives Democrats a comfortable majority. Gregoire will be certified on Tuesday, and sworn in on Wednesday… regardless of how much money the BIAW spends on paid media.
Good thing too, because we choose our governor based on who wins the election the first Tuesday in November, not on who wins the PR battle afterwards. This is not a parliamentary system where governments are toppled on losing a vote of confidence — if Rossi wants a new election, he’s welcome to it… in 2008.
So it’s onto the courts — the proper forum for contesting an election — where I expect Rossi’s BIAW attorneys will be less persuasive then his BIAW financed media campaign. For while the court of public opinion might be moved by unsupported rumor and innuendo, a court of law is inconveniently rigid about obscure technicalities like “facts” and “evidence.”
Rossi has spent weeks shamelessly accusing Gregoire, the Democrats and King County Elections officials, of “fraud,” “corruption” and “conspiracy,” but his attorneys — constrained by reality — have now translated these charges into “neglect,” “errors” and “omissions.” This sudden shift in word choice cannot simply be dismissed as a legal expediency… it is an admission that they never had the evidence to back up these baseless charges in the first place.
For this, Dino Rossi owes the public an explanation. And he owes Christine Gregoire an apology.
Support Governor-elect Gregoire
Show your support for following the rule of law! Rally at the Capitol, Tuesday, Jan 11th, 10:30 AM, State Capitol, Olympia WA, Story Pole on North Side of Capitol Campus.
Or, show your support for Christine Gregoire, by telling the Legislature to stand up to the BIAW media campaign, certify the election, and get on with the business of government! Call the Legislative Hotline, 1-800-562-6000, or email your legislators!
Eyman proposes half billion dollars in new spending
First day of the new legislative session… first day to file initiatives to the people… it’s back to the real work of governing. While Dino Rossi, the BIAW, and the folks at (un)Sound Politics continue to pursue their real agenda — undermining the public’s faith in all government — I hope you’ll excuse me if I take a break from refuting their lies to address some real issues.
For example, as I write this, initiative profiteer Tim Eyman is holding what I expect to be a sparsely attended news conference, to introduce his newest ill-conceived initiative: mandatory performance audits of every state and local government agency, account and program.
Personally, I think performance audits can be a useful tool, along with Gov. Locke’s Priorities of Government program, for evaluating the efficiency of existing state programs, and reprioritizing government spending. But as usual, Timmy’s proposal is more about punishing government than making it efficient, and this initiative is really, stupidly over-the-top.
It’s one thing to empower the State Auditor to conduct performance audits. It’s another thing to require him to audit every single agency, account and program in the state. I mean, let’s be serious… the cost of conducting a performance audit on the average local cemetery district would likely far exceed the district’s entire budget.
How expense is this initiative. Well, Eyman dedicates a portion of the state sales tax equal to about $10 million a year. I believe in accounting terms, this is technically referred to as “a lie.” According to the State Auditor’s Office, the real cost would likely be in excess of $90 million per biennium. Not only that, it would require increasing staff levels by at least four-fold, and take 10 to 12 years to implement. That’s right… Eyman is proposing over a half billion dollars of new spending!
Way to cut government, Tim!
Don’t believe me? Check out the document provided by the State Auditor’s Office in response to questions by public watchdog group Permanent Defense. The Auditor is particularly critical of including local government agencies in the initiative, calling it “ill-advised.”
So where do I stand on this issue. As usual, I tend to defer to well-regarded professionals when it comes to issues on which I have only limited expertise… so I support giving State Auditor Brian Sonntag the kind of legislation he wants:
We believe the intent behind the initiative is good, however, we also firmly believe that there is a better way. We were nearly successful in getting a measure passed during the 2004 session of the Legislature… In our view, the optimum means of accomplishing an independent, comprehensive performance audit function is to have the Governor and Legislature embrace it and enact authorizing legislation and funding to support it.
Sonntag nearly got the legislation he asked for last year… it had the votes to pass the Democrat-controlled House, but was blocked in the Republican Senate. Now that the Democrats control both houses of the Legislature, and the Governor’s Mansion, it seems likely that responsible performance audits legislation will be signed into law, preempting Eyman’s initiative, regardless of his rhetorical gamesmanship.
But even if the Legislature grinds to halt in the partisan meltdown currently being promised by Republicans, and nothing is passed, this initiative still doesn’t have a snowball’s chance. Over the past few years Eyman has demonstrated that he lacks the grassroots support to finance both an initiative campaign and his standard of living. If he couldn’t rile up money-in-my-pocket fervor with last year’s “25% tax cut” initiative, performance audits is guaranteed to be a fundraising dud. And without directly benefiting a greedy special-interest like the gambling industry, he has no sugar-daddy to bankroll his efforts.
Makes you wonder, what with all the money he’s wasted proposing and running failed initiatives… isn’t it time his contributors conduct a performance audit on Tim Eyman?
Fan contests Seahawks loss… demands new game
An Ellensburg, WA man has filed a lawsuit contesting the results of the Seattle Seahawks’ 27-20 loss to the St. Louis Rams in the first round of the NFC playoffs. The suit alleges malfeasance, misconduct or errors by referees resulted in nine penalties on the Seahawks, “several of which kept Ram drives alive when they would have faced fourth down situations.”
Apparently inspired by the unsportsmanlike manner in which failed GOP gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi has blamed his own loss on the officials, longtime Seahawks fan and political blog connoisseur John Slyfield claims that failure to replay the game “could harm the integrity of the game, by not allowing mistakes to be corrected.” Impartial observers — like Seahawk Cornerback Ken Lucas — apparently agree:
“The refs made some very questionable calls today,” Lucas said. “There was one call I thought I did, and that was the hands to the face. The other two I thought were questionable. But they made the calls, and that’s been the story for us this year, calls made against us.”
The lawsuit comes in the wake of a rising tide of public opinion in favor of a new game, fueled by inflammatory rhetoric coming from local sports radio. Radio hosts and callers are particularly irate about a “phantom” fourth-quarter illegal contact call on cornerback Marcus Trufant, that set up the Rams with a first down at the Seattle 30, on a drive that eventually led to a tying touchdown.
Seahawk boosters have reportedly reserved the domain “replaywa.com”, but rumors of a planned “victory parade” through downtown Seattle could not be confirmed.
Will propagandize for food
According to an article by Howard Kurtz in the Washington Post (“U.S. paid journalist to tout law“), the Education Department secretly paid conservative commentator Armstrong Williams $241,000 to help promote President Bush’s No Child Left Behind law.
In taking the money, funneled through a public-relations firm, Williams produced and aired a commercial on his syndicated television and radio shows featuring Education Secretary Rod Paige, touted Bush’s education policy and urged other programs to interview Paige. He didn’t disclose the contract when talking about the law during cable-television appearances or writing about it in his newspaper column.
Democrats immediately accused the administration of trying to bribe journalists. Well duh-uh! It’s standard practice for the US to bribe journalists around the world… what makes anybody think they’re not doing it at home?
This is blatant propaganda that would make Goebbels proud — and at taxpayer expense, no less. When critics like me reluctantly use the word “fascism” to describe the tactics of the Republican leadership and their corporate patrons, this is exactly the kind of undemocratic crap we’re talking about.
Alex Jones, director of Harvard’s Shorenstein media center, said he is “disgusted” by what he called “the worst kind of fakery and flackery” on Williams’ part. “It’s propaganda masquerading as news, paid by government, truly a recipe from hell,” he said. “It would make any thinking person hearing any pundit speak want to say, ‘OK, how much did they pay you to say that?’ ” The contract also shows that “the Bush administration neither understands nor respects the idea of an independent media,” Jones said.
Hmm… makes you wonder how much Dori Monson got paid for his right-wing conversion, huh?
Convicted felons for Rossi!
Much has been made by the Rossi campaign over the alleged “felon vote”, with the slanderous implication that it would heavily favor Christine Gregoire. Well, I can think of at least one convicted felon who most likely voted for Dino Rossi: his longtime mentor, Melvin Heide.
As was widely reported in The Seattle Times, The Stranger and other publications, Rossi’s rags to riches story is a little ragged around the edges. Rossi got his start at a real estate company owned and operated by Heide, that engaged in fraudulent business practices, bilking millions out of clients. As scandals and bankruptcies unfolded, Rossi’s colleagues fled to more reputable firms, but he stuck with Heide, following him to two other companies.
On August 18, 1989, a federal grand jury indicted Heide on 18 counts of bank fraud, mail fraud, and making false statements. In exchange for other charges being dropped, Heide eventually pleaded guilty to bilking a Tacoma couple out of $400,000 — and on July 20, 1990, he was sentenced to three years in prison and ordered to pay $1.7 million in restitution.
However, Rossi’s eight-year business relationship with Heide only ended in 1992… in the middle of his first political campaign. Even then, Rossi remained close to the Heide family, indeed, Rossi’s first campaign treasurer was none other than Heide’s son, Ralph. (A tip of the hat to Pleasing to Remember for that tidbit.)
Perhaps this explains why several Republican readers took such offense by the technically accurate description of Rossi in my previous post? In light of the shady companies he worked for, the only thing worse than describing Rossi as an “unemployed real estate agent” would be to describe him as an “employed” one.
Gregoire spent most of her professional career putting felons behind bars, while Rossi spent much of his working for one. So who do you think is more deserving of the “felon vote”?
“Glass houses,” and all that.
Carolina in my mind
One of the more curious rhetorical choices coming out of today’s press conference from Dino Rossi’s Charlotte Bellevue headquarters, was former-Senator Slade Gorton’s odd attempt to point to North Carolina as a role model for setting aside an election whenever the margin of error exceeds the margin of victory.
In a hotly contested Agricultural Commissioner race that saw the Democratic incumbent defeated by only 2,287 votes out of 3.3 million cast, the North Carolina courts ordered a new election after it was revealed that Carteret County had accidentally erased 4,438 votes from electronic voting machines. (Oops.) The decision came despite that fact that Carteret split 60-40 for the Republican, suggesting that these missing votes would have only added to the margin of the winner. Gorton uses the North Carolina example to support his argument that if the GOP can prove there are more illegal or improperly canvassed ballots than Christine Gregoire’s 129 vote margin, her election should be tossed out too.
Problem with that argument is… we don’t live in North Carolina.
At the risk of boring you with more wonkish legal stuff, take a look at the pertinent section of the North Carolina election statute:
Ho-hum… Rossi files election lawsuit
Unemployed real estate salesman Dino Rossi announced today that he has filed a lawsuit contesting the gubernatorial election.
Yawn.
In other breaking news, it didn’t snow yesterday… yet in some places it did… prompting angry bloggers to attack King County’s failure to reconcile its weather with its forecasts, as a “total mess.”
“These things happen in every election”
“These things happen in every election.” That’s what Republican Secretary of State Sam Reed said this morning on KUOW. And that’s why Dino Rossi, in his wisdom, voted for a major revision of our election code, including a contest statute with such a high burden of proof:
RCW 29A.68.110
Illegal votes — Number of votes affected — Enough to change result.No election may be set aside on account of illegal votes, unless it appears that an amount of illegal votes has been given to the person whose right is being contested, that, if taken from that person, would reduce the number of the person’s legal votes below the number of votes given to some other person for the same office, after deducting therefrom the illegal votes that may be shown to have been given to the other person.
The Republicans are going to have to prove, at the very least, the appearance that the margin of illegal votes given to Gregoire exceeds her margin of victory. In Foulkes v. Hayes, the court accepted evidentiary findings of substantial ballot tampering on behalf of the contested candidate. But there has been no such evidence uncovered thus far in the governor’s race.
Given the lack of evidence that illegal ballots favored a particular candidate, it is not certain that the courts would even attempt to assign these votes to one candidate or the other. But if they did, the only reasonable method would be to take the known margins in the counties or precincts in which they were cast, and extrapolate this to the disputed ballots. Ironically, by that method, the 52 votes cast by felons allegedly found by the BIAW in Pierce County would result in a net gain for Rossi.
As to the unknown number of provisional ballots that are alleged to have been improperly scanned at the polling places, it is not clear that these even fit the definition of “illegal.” These ballots were not properly canvassed, due to error by poll workers. But if they had been handled properly, it seems likely that 90% of them would have been valid votes, based on the county wide percentages. So perhaps, maybe 30 to 40 ballots were counted that would not have otherwise.
There are errors and mistakes in every election, but there has been no evidence of misconduct, and no evidence of illegal votes being cast in favor of Gregoire. Furthermore, there has been no evidence that this election has been more flawed than the typical election.
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, if this election is tossed out on the evidence publicly presented thus far, then every close election should be tossed out, because the precedent will be that you simply need to prove that the margin of victory was within the margin of error… and that is true of every close election.
I don’t believe the courts would want to set that kind of precedent. And as Sam Reed reiterated this morning on KUOW: “I don’t think Republicans have a smoking gun.”
Another “smoking gun” disarmed
An article in today’s Seattle Times debunks yet another GOP lie, that Christine Gregoire’s victory was somehow aided by hordes of Democrats illegally voting from the afterlife. [Voting by dead people isn’t always a scam]
Times investigators found that in six of the state’s largest counties, only 24 dead people were credited with voting this November.
However, most of those votes were mistakes made either when someone at the polls signed on the wrong line or when a relative with the same name inadvertently voted using the wrong absentee ballot.
Elections officials say only three of the cases warrant referrals for felony prosecution, while several more require further investigation. Secretary of State Sam Reed said he would “prosecute to the hilt” any valid case, but personally, I’m kind of hoping they go lightly on Robert Holmgren, who followed his wife’s dying wish that he vote her ballot for Dino Rossi.
“I know by the law it wasn’t right, but it felt right in my heart,” he said. “I wasn’t trying to defraud anybody. I was just going with my wife’s last wishes.”
So let’s see, how many smoking guns have we debunked thus far? Inaccurate hand recount, late military ballots, voting list discrepancies, and now Democratic voters from Hell. (That’s where Republican’s apparently assume all Democrats go when we die.)
What’s left? Well, there’s the question about an unconfirmed number of provisional ballots that may have been improperly fed into the scanning machines at some polling places. And that, reports the Times is apparently the basis of an election contest the state GOP plans to file today.
I’ll have more on this later, but I should quickly note that with the number of such ballots reported to be as high as 350, and with 90 percent of provisional ballots countywide found to be valid, your looking at no more than about 35 ballots that are likely illegitimate votes. Not enough to throw out an election based on a clerical error.
Tell the Legislature to follow the law
Dino Rossi, the GOP, BIAW, and right-wing blogs and talk radio have been urging Rossi supporters to contact their legislators and urge them to vote against certifying Christine Gregoire’s gubernatorial election. Even Tim Eyman has gotten into the act, emailing the 3,600 names on his list.
Well, two can play at that game… indeed, two must. Too often the voice of the many is drowned out by the voice of the loud.
So please call the Legislative Hotline (1.800.562.6000 ) and contact your legislators, and urge them to follow the rule of law and certify this election.
Be polite, but firm. Make it clear that Gregoire won this election according to the rules in place, and that the proper forum to address any claims of fraud or irregularities is a court of law… not the legislature, and not the court of public opinion.
And make it absolutely clear to Democrats in swing districts that this is a battle between two political parties, and if there was ever a time for party unity, it is now. If they do the right thing and certify this election as the law prescribes, they will have your support. But if they give in to threats coming from the GOP’s well-orchestrated PR campaign and break ranks with their party, let them know that angry Republicans will be the least of their worries.
Reed proposes election reforms
Once again, Republican Secretary of State Sam Reed has proven himself a man above the partisan rancor. While his party is busy tearing down the public’s faith in our electoral system, Reed is working to build it up.
While insisting that he has seen no evidence of wrongdoing, Reed unveiled today an election reform package aimed at addressing some of the problems uncovered in the Nov. 2 election. Proposed reforms include:
The “discrepancy” discrepancy explained
In my previous post I debunked Dino Rossi’s shameful lies about disenfranchised military voters. In King County — the focus of an intense Rossi/BIAW/GOP propaganda campaign to undermine public faith in the electoral process — military ballots not only went out on time, but over 83% were returned by the deadline… a rate equal to the turnout of all registered voters.
In this post I will expose the mock outrage over the “discrepancy” between the number of voters credited with voting, and the number of ballots cast. Ready? They’re not intended to reconcile.
For those actually interested in the truth, King County Director of Elections Dean Logan has posted a document explaining what this voter list really is:
Historically, the number of votes cast and the number of voters credited with voting does not typically balance.
State election laws address ballot security and accountability on the front end of the elections process
King County: 83% turnout for military ballots
King County Elections has issued a couple of FAQs answering questions that have been raised about its handling of the Nov. 2 election and the subsequent recounts. The first regards Military and Overseas Ballots:
King County Elections began mailing oversea and military ballots for the General Election on Oct.1, 2004. These were from an absentee category referred to as “submarine” or “special absentee ballots” for voters who may not be able to receive a regular absentee ballot within the timeframe necessary to participate in the election. The bulk of the military and overseas ballots were mailed on Oct.6 with some mailings in between these two dates and subsequent mailings as further requests were received.
246 ballots went out on Oct. 1, the bulk were mailed by Oct. 6, and an additional 3055 went out on Oct. 10. KC issued 15,289 military and overseas ballots in all, and of these, 12,694 were received back… exactly matching King County’s overall 83% turnout rate.
In addition to regular absentee ballots available to military personnel, King County also provided ballots via fax or email to those who contacted the office that they had not received their regular ballot by election day. Several hundred of these were issued. In addition…
The Federal Voting Assistance Program, a program of the United States Department of Defense monitors services for military and overseas voters. Under federal law, a federal write-in ballot is also available from armed services voting assistance officers to allow service members the opportunity to cast a ballot for federal office. These ballots are accepted and counted even if the service member is not listed as a registered voter in the jurisdiction where they indicate their residence.
1,342 Federal Write-in ballots received, and 1,081 validated and counted.
As to the oft raised question of military and overseas ballots that were received too late to be counted, King County reports a grand total of… sixteen.
The Washington State GOP is now running a deceptive and dishonest radio ad, featuring a wounded marine who did not receive his ballot on time. While this is regrettable, and both parties should work together to assure that military ballots are mailed out even sooner, it is despicable to attempt to turn this into a partisan issue, when all the facts indicate that King County conscientiously issued military ballots in a timely manner, and in full accordance with federal law.
Dino Rossi’s PR henchmen continue to cynically impugn Christine Gregoire’s patriotism, but as part of a legal contest of this election, military ballots are clearly a non-issue.
Coming soon, much ado over voter lists…
