HorsesAss.Org

– Generally my questions with any bridge are first if it’s walkable/bikable, and second if it makes sense. My question with this bridge is why isn’t it up and running right now now now? PS, I am 12 years old.

– Our initiative system is sooooo broken in Washington.

– Nice little civil rights you have there. Be a shame if anything happened to them.

– Hillary Clinton is running for president. I supported her last time and almost certainly will again this time, but I wish we had more of a primary. Also, I assume her website will get more fleshed out, but I would kind of like an issues page.

– Congrats to the Seattle Reign FC on a hell of a victory to start the season.

1 Timothy 5:23
Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach’s sake and thine often infirmities.

Discuss.

Jon: Kansas is America’s welfare queen.

Slate: The tide of every 18 years.

Thom: The Good, the Bad, and the Very Very Foveately Ugly.

White and Black and Red All Over:

• Larry Wilmore on the Walter Scott shooting
• Maddow: Police officer has been charged with murder
• Young Turks: Police dog savagely attacks unarmed black man
• David Pakman: SC cop plants taser next to dead body of unarmed black man
• Thom: Walter Scott’s killing is every black nightmare
• Young Turks: Walter Scott murdered and then smeared by press
• David Pakman: Killer S.C. cop has history of violence against blacks
• Thom: Is the SC shooting murder or terrorism?
• Young Turks: Cops’ history of violence against black people

Roy Zimmerman: What I Mean:

Slate: A year in space.

Mental Floss: What is the origin of the high-five.

Sam Seder: Louie Gohmert unhinged, “You’re playing God with the internet!!!”

Mark Fiore: Three-eyed Billy embraces the apocalypse.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren: How she learned to ‘stand up’ and ‘speak out’.

Matt Binder: Draft dodger Ted Nuget claims to know why vets are committing suicide (hint: Obama).

The 2016 Clown Parade:

• Maddow: GOP candidates dogged by political baggage
• Thom and Pap: Why the GOP is the party of the stupid.
• David Pakman: Rand Paul’s campaign is already a hilariously train wreck
• Maddow: Paul inherits bribery scandal from dad’s past
• Jon: Rand Paul’s weird announcement
• Young Turks: Rand Paul has a hissy-fit on the air.
• PsychoSuperMom: Sharp Tounged Man
• David Pakman: Is Ted Cruz a Republican plant for 2016?
• Richard Fowler: Ted Cruz is trying to repeal all climate regulation
• Young Turks: Nutcase Ted Cruz and the fabulous gay jihad against religious freedom
• David Pakman: Is disgraced Chris Christie really going to run for President?
• Thom: Should Jeb Bush go to jail for voter fraud?
• WaPo: Late night laughs…2016 contenders edition

Mental Floss: 21 Fandom Facts.

Jonathan Mann: Hey, hey, NSA, stop looking at my penis.

Maddow: TN tweaks gun laws ahead of NRA convention

Ask a homo: Gays and political groups.

Congressional hits and misses: Best of Dan Coats.

Pap: How Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert held the corporate media accountable.

Bill-O the Sociopath:

• Thom: Killing Truth—O’Reilly’s Lies Exposed.
• David Pakman: Bill-O is getting away with his lies.

Garfunkel and Oats: Rainbow Connections:

Liberal Viewer: FAUX News lies about “ban the box” law.

White House: West Wing Week.

Jon on the Rolling Stone scandal.

Mental Floss: Misconceptions about dinosaurs.

Maddow: NC Lawmakers push sweeping anti-abortion bill.

The Bloody Neocons Are At It Again:

• Young Turks: Congress to Obama, “War, have at it! Peace, we DEMAND oversight!”
• Thom: The Chicken Hawks need to STFU.
• Pap and Abby Martin: Neocon War Hawks prep for Iran conflict
• Lawrence O’Donnell: Iran war or diplomacy?
• Michael Brooks: These insane people want us to have a horrible war with Iran
• Young Turks: Sen. Tom Cotton’s dumbass Iran warmongering comments

David Pakman: Republican to Gays, at least we aren’t hanging you.

Thom: The Good, the Bad, and the Very Very Foudroyantly Ugly!

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

Ted Cruz, an actual senator who is actually running for president, says gay people are launching a “jihad” by “going after people of faith who respect the Biblical teaching that marriage is between one man and one woman.”

I try to keep an eye on what the conservative fringe is doing, and I’ve been noticing a certain troubling escalation in the Republican vocabulary lately. They are now openly and repeatedly using terms of war, of terrorism, to describe gay marriage. Right Wing Watch, who posted the above video, also posted audio from a radio show hosted by Family Research Council’s Craig James. In the recording, a caller asks James if it’s possible that the Pentagon fired a “gay bomb” on America to make us more gay. “Just a thought,” the caller said. I guess you can’t argue with that!

You  might want to dismiss this as laughing at a few stupid Teabaggers, but it’s not that simple. Language matters. Words leave impressions. And if a bunch of people who the media tells us to take seriously start saying that Adam and Steve are terrorists who want to blow up innocent Americans, it’s well within the realm of possibility that some heavily armed loner somewhere might decide to bring the fight to the “terrorists.” The drums of war are not a toy.

Cruz’s platform as senator legitimizes him, endowing upon him a certain responsibility. The fact that he’s shirking his responsibility in such a flagrant way ought to be an actionable offense. You can have your petty little arguments about what your God does and does not believe. That’s your right as an American. But when you’re a public figure and you start accusing innocent Americans of terrorist actions, I believe you’re shouting “Fire!” in a crowded theater. This video very could well come back to haunt Ted Cruz one day.

UPDATE 12:40 PM: And just a few minutes ago, Bobby Jindal called the backlash against Indiana and Arkansas an “attack on our Constitution.” Tell me this kind of language isn’t spinning out of control.

– It looks like the Law Enforcement Assisted Diversion program in Seattle has been pretty successful and could use some expansion.

– Just because you can still check Facebook while driving, doesn’t mean you should. In fact, please don’t.

– Maybe when Feidin Santana says of Dominicans (like the citizens of so many nations), that “we look for the alternative of the United States, we follow you,” it might motivate better American behavior, if we were afraid other nations had somewhere else to look for moral leadership. As it is, it’s a sad indictment that makes a terrible story even worse.

– More and more abortion restrictions are coming from the states. This time Kansas.

– I don’t have a TV, so my TV news comes via the Internet, so grain of salt. Still, I haven’t noticed KING 5 being worse than other local media outlets on being super car-centric, but Erica C. Barnett makes the case that they’re pretty bad while noting their latest problematic piece.

In yesterday’s Open Thread, I noted that it looked like Jeanne Kohl-Welles was going to run for the King County Council seat that Larry Phillips has decided not to run for. Later in the day, she made it official.

State Senator Jeanne Kohl-Welles, D-Seattle, announced today that she is entering the race to succeed King County Councilmember Larry Phillips who informed the public that he is not running for re-election for King County Council District 4.

She seems to have most of the important endorsements lined up, and as such is probably the frontrunner. (or maybe the causation runs the other way).

Kohl-Welles has been endorsed by King County Councilmember Larry Phillips, who currently represents the 4th Council District, as well as Councilmembers Rod Dembowski, Joe McDermott, and Dave Upthegrove. She also has been endorsed by her 36th Leg. District seatmates, Reps. Reuven Carlyle and Gael Tarleton, as well as all of the Democratic state Senators from King County.

I can’t imagine voting for anyone else, but I still would like a primary. Maybe a neighborhood activist or something like that. I suppose the people most likely to run in one of those races are being sucked up into city council races what with all of them up this year. Or maybe not, since district 7, that has quite a bit of overlap with that County Council seat the only one that isn’t an open seat without a challenger to the incumbent. But maybe someone will move over from one of the other districts or at large now that the County seat is up for grabs.

In any event, and while I don’t want to get too far ahead of things, presuming that she gets elected in November, it would mean an appointment to her seat. The most obvious choice is Reuven Carlyle: He clearly (although inexplicably to me) wants the job, and having won a primary and several general elections in the district, he would probably have the best case. He seems pretty conservative compared to the district, but that hasn’t hurt him yet.

Is there anyone you’d like to see either run against her or to fill her seat if she moves on?

– I can’t even imagine what you’d do for an oil train explosion in the Downtown train tunnel.

– I don’t know Oregon enough to know about if running a primary against Schrader would be worth while, but in general I’m pro-primary elections.

– Liberals Aren’t Hypocrites for Opposing Indiana’s Religious Freedom Law

– It’ll be tough to lose Jeanne Kohl-Welles from the legislature if she runs for Phillips’ seat, but I can’t blame her for not wanting to deal with that garbage when King County can actually get shit done.

– He’s well enough to rot in our prisons.

In the wake of the news that Expedia will be moving its offices to Seattle’s waterfront, there’s been a lot of chatter lately that Chinese online retail giant Alibaba may be looking for up to 80,000 square feet of Seattle office space in which to set up its US headquarters. But why would Alibaba pick pricey Seattle? At least partially, because we’re cheaper than San Francisco!

In addition to much lower rents than the San Francisco Bay area and cheaper housing for workers, the region is filled with e-commerce and cloud computing talent thanks to Amazon and other growing Seattle tech companies, and Sea-Tac has recently increased the number of flights between Seattle and China. Alibaba could benefit from the four daily nonstop flights to China from Seattle-Tacoma International Airport.

Hear that? “Much lower rents!” I guess it’s all relative.

I’ve had this running argument with some in the urbanist crowd over Seattle’s growing affordable housing crisis. Free up developers to build more housing faster, I’ve been lectured, and the market will do its magic—you know, supply and demand, and all that. But I just don’t believe that the market can address this problem on its own.

Freed from neighborhood NIMBYism and municipal interference, no doubt developers would build more housing faster, substantially bringing down the price of luxury housing. But since developers will almost always target the top of the market first (in order to squeeze as much profit as possible out of any piece of buildable land), we won’t get many new units aimed at median income or below households. In fact, we may see a loss of affordable units as older buildings are torn down or converted to meet demand from more affluent renters and buyers.

But as Alibaba’s decision-making process demonstrates, our residential and commercial real estate markets don’t exist in a vacuum. Global financial capital is pouring into Seattle’s real estate market seeking a higher rate of return, pushing up real estate prices and rents with them. And when it comes to attracting high tech companies like Alibaba, Facebook, and HBO, Seattle is competing with cities like San Francisco and New York where office and housing costs are much higher. Ironically, the more supply we build, the more competitive we become, increasing demand, and pushing prices back up. And as more high tech companies locate here, attracting more talented high tech workers, Seattle becomes even more attractive, especially to companies doing business with Asia. Even our growing traffic congestion bumps up in-city demand by incentivizing the choice to live closer to work.

In this scenario, it’s not clear that the market alone can ever build itself out of our affordability crisis as long as there is such a huge cost disparity between Seattle and San Francisco. It’s kinda like attempting to build our way out of traffic congestion by just adding more freeway lanes: build it, and people will come.

So, yeah, I’m all for lifting height limits and other NIMBYist restrictions, particularly around transit centers. And of course we should be smart about streamlining the permitting and approval process. But I’m convinced that if we want to substantially add and retain middle and low income housing in Seattle than we’re going to have to build and retain tens of thousands of units outside of the market.

Tuesday has arrived, so please join us tonight for an evening of politics and conversation over a pint at the Seattle Chapter of Drinking liberally.

We meet every Tuesday evening at the Roanoke Park Place Tavern, 2409 10th Ave E, Seattle. Our starting time is 8:00 pm, but some folks stop by earlier for dinner.

Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings this week. The Long Beach, Tri-Cities and West Seattle chapters also meet tonight. On Wednesday, the Bellingham and Spokane chapters meet. And the Bremerton and Kent chapters meet on Thursday.

There are 191 chapters of Living Liberally, including eighteen in Washington state, four in Oregon and two in Idaho. Chances are excellent there’s a chapter meeting somewhere near you.

Tomorrow, as the Washington Post‘s Colby Itkowitz reports, Rand Paul fans will celebrate their dear leader’s presidential announcement by hosting karaoke fundraiser parties in almost every state in the union. You can find a list of every Stand with Rand #LibertyKaraoke event on this Eventbrite page. The Seattle Stand with Rand #LibertyKaraoke will take place at Capitol Hill’s wondrous Rock Box karaoke bar tomorrow night at 6 pm. As someone on the event’s Facebook page writes, “JUST OVER 24 HOURS UNTIL LIBERTY BOOMS!!!”

What should you sing at #LibertyKaraoke parties? Organizer Matt Hurtt explained to Itkowitz:

There’s no official liberty song list, though Hurtt’s personal favorite is Bob Dylan’s “Subterranean Homesick Blues.” He often changes the lyrics in one stanza to: “The phone’s wiretapped anyway, Maggie says that many say/ They must bust in early May, orders from the NSA.”

The parties are intended to dispel the stereotype that political fundraisers are for “stuffy old people” at hundreds of dollars a pop, he said.

Uh. Okay. But what songs should organizers sing to identify Rand Paul’s anti-choice beliefs? Maybe “The Lady Is a Tramp?” Which song would best exemplify Paul’s anti-gay-marriage stance? Probably “Going to the Chapel,” only with the whole room joyfully shouting “NOT” before every line of the chorus. Obviously, someone should sing that old John McCain classic “Bomb Bomb Bomb, Bomb Bomb Iran” to symbolize Paul’s belief that we need to increase military spending and go to war all over the Middle East. What a fun time #LibertyKaraoke will be for the handful of delusional white men who show up! I bet a stirring conversation about 9/11 Truth will break out at the Rock Box tomorrow night, too. They’ll for sure get to the bottom of the mysteries of Building 7 with all that brain power in one room!

See, the problem is that Rand Paul is trying to run his campaign as though he’s got a shot with the cool libertarian-leaning tech-minded youth vote, but that train left the station a long time ago. Paul has cozied up to the neocon right over the last few months, and in so doing, he’s distanced himself from the libertarian civil liberty platform that won him youthful attention in the first place. These karaoke parties are about as fanciful (and effectual) as the Ron Paul blimp.

– For the press, reporting on policy and actual legislating is homework. Reporting on the horse race and invented campaign narratives are a session of Nintendo or a pint of ice cream.

– I know you can’t judge a group solely on its worst members, but holy shit, some of the worst members of the Minute Men.

– Forgot to mention this in a previous open thread so it’s a bit old, but the NPI fundraising gala is looking pretty impressive.

– I will have to play around with Seattle In Progress a bit.

The Seattle Times editorial board has long supported spending more money on K-12, higher education, and other essentially services, it just never wanted to raise the taxes necessary to pay for it. Until now:

If some new revenue is needed — and that appears to be the case — the Legislature should vet a capital-gains tax proposal offered by the House Democrats. It is more conservative than Gov. Jay Inslee’s proposal, hitting relatively few wealthy households, while accounting for the volatility of capital gains with a dedicated fund that would fill in go-go years and could be drawn down in slowdowns.

Whether the Legislature is capable of such fiscal restraint — and not spending every dime, every year — is an open question. A serious proposal would lock revenues in a rainy-day fund, accessible only with supermajority. The Legislature also needs to weigh the potential to chase away startups seeking to launch in a state without an income tax. But the capital-gains tax is a provocative idea, and could ease a regressive tax code that favors Seattle’s accumulating tech wealth.

Of course, this capital gains tax proposal neither raises enough money to fill our K-12 funding shortfall, nor makes anything but a small correction in this, our nation’s most regressive tax structure. But it’s a modest step in the right direction, and a hopeful sign that our state’s paper of record may be willing to have a grown up conversation about taxes.

Malachi 2:2-3
If you do not listen, and if you do not resolve to honor my name,” says the LORD Almighty, “I will send a curse on you, and I will curse your blessings. Yes, I have already cursed them, because you have not resolved to honor me.

“Because of you I will rebuke your descendants; I will smear on your faces the dung from your festival sacrifices, and you will be carried off with it.

Discuss.

Thom: How the 1% are rewiring brains & future generations.

SlateTV: America’s Worst President.

The 2016 Clown Parade:

• David Pakman: Rand Paul fails miserably at explaining the 1st amendment
• Sam Seder and Cliff Schecter: Fighting in the Clown Car
• Nutburger Ted Cruz repeatedly say he wants to repeal something that’s not a federal law
• Pap: Scott Walker’s blueprint to destroy Wisconsin.
• “Gay friendly” Jeb Bush supports law allowing refusal of gays by businesses
• Richard Fowler: The right-wing Birfers (e.g. Donald Trump) goes after Ted Cruz.
• Maddow: Remembering Jeb Bush’s unconstitutional support of right-wing WACKOS in Florida

Russell Brand explains why FAUX News pundits “have to attack Bowe Bergdahl”.

Thom: The Good, the Bad, and the Very Very Cheimaphillicly Ugly.

Mental Floss: Thirty facts about chocoloate.

Thom: How much dark money is being funneled into our “democracy”?

SlateTV: The strange chemistry of the Crab Nebula.

A PSA from The Committee for Universal Accessibility and Lycantropic Concerns.

The Anti-Gay Agenda:

• If you’re anti-gay…Indiana wants you!
• PsychoSuperMom: Scary, Indiana
• Mike Pence inhaled
• Seth Meyers: Yes, No, or George
• Maddow: Indiana governor Pence flounders defending discrimination law
• David Letterman: Not the Indiana I remember as a kid
• NCAA floats idea of pulling out of Indiana.
• Young Turks: States and groups ban interactions with Indiana
• Lawrence O’Donnell: George Takei, “Indiana law effects all Americans”.
• SNL lays out some hard truths on Indiana’s bigotry law
• Sen. Al Franken tells David Letterman to run for Indiana Senate
• Conan speaks with Indiana’s “religious freedom czar”
• Gov. Daniel Malloy (D-CT) Nobody who defends Indiana Law is qualified to be President
• David Pakman: Pathetic anti-gay liar Mike Pence makes a fool of himself
• Matt Binder: No Pizza for your gay wedding in Walkerton, Indiana
• Maddow: Religious right puts GOP at odds with public opinion:

• Young Turks: Mike Pence clowns himself on national TV
• Michael Brooks: Indiana Gov.’s Big Fat Gay Wedding Problem
• Mark Fiore: Religious freedom and gay commerce
• Thom: Why Indiana’s Indiana’s “Stand Your Ground” Anti-Gay law is different from the federal and other state RFRA laws.
• Young Turks: Mike Pence signs changes to Indiana’s religious freedom law
• Maddow: Indiana an object lesson for wary Arkansas governor
• Arkansas Gov’s son asked him to veto “religious freedom” bill
• Alex Wagner: Dan Savage hits Tom Cotton for comments on gays with “bigot blender brain”.
• Young Turks: What changes were made to Indiana’s anti-gay law?
• Matt Binder: Ted Cruz’s father incites right wingers to ponder killing judges over same-sex marriage
• David Pakman: Virginia set to pass a “No Gays Allowed” law.
• Young Turks: Religious bigot against gays but adultery is a “different kind of sin”
• David Pakman: Arkansas Gov. won’t sign anti-gay bill…for now.
• Ann Telnaes: Mixing religion and politics will come back to haunt the G.O.P.

Mental Floss: Thirty one facts about pigs.

Greenman: Naomi Oreskes’ climate change elevator pitch.

David Pakman: Is MSNBC dying?

Netflix for kids.

David Pakman: This years, guns will kill more Americans than cars.

Farron Cousins: Has the tort reform fight been won?

SlateTV: Obama loves America.

Meet the Part African Black, Part Jewish, and Part Swiss and (Apparently) Offensive Comedian Who Will Replace Jon:

• Young Turks: Trevor Noah to replace Jon
• Sam Seder: The Daily Show has found its replacement for Jon
• Aasif Mandvi: On the new host….
• David Pakman: Controversial tweets from Trevor Noah.
• Young Turks: People are outraged by Trevor Noah jokes?!?
• WaPo: Meet Trevor Noah
• FAUX News comedian Chris Wallace also makes “fat women” jokes!

Thom: The Good, the Bad, and the Very Very Glottogonicly Ugly.

Matt Binder: Asshole ex-Governor John Sununu (R-NH) thinks Obama is only visiting Kenya to incite the Birfers.

Rubin Report: Republicans fear Obama more than Putin

White House: West Wing Week, 5th anniversary edition .

Sam Seder and Michael Brooks: Dick Cheney’s lies keep pouring in.

Thom and Pap: Our 2016 casino elections.

David Pakman: Deranged nutburger Rep. Louie Gohmert explodes, “You’re Playing God with the internet!”

Maddow chats with Sen. Elizabeth Warren.

CNN: Reid on leaving and going after the Koch brothers and Mitt Romney.

David Pakman: Indiana’s public health disaster follows from Planned Parenthood closure.

Iran:

• Thom: Why Republicans are sabotaging their own country on the Iran nuclear agreement
• Michael Brooks: Rep. Louie Gohmert is so ignorant on Iran…it even surprises FAUX News!
• Young Turks: We have a deal (to make a deal).
• Obama announces framework on Iran nuclear program
• Maddow: Iran nuclear deal hailed as groundbreaking:

• Young Turks: Republican FAUX News “expert” lies about future of Iran nuclear deal
• Lawrence O’Donnell: Obama picks up an odd ally…Bill-O-The-Clown!

Senator denies 280,000 people health care then calls advocate ‘asshole’ for asking him to give up his own health care.

Young Turks: In which Karl Rove is a dick to an Iraqi War veteran.

Sharpton: Fixing the criminal justice system.

Thom: Getting dark money out of politics.

The Barbara Mikulski tribute edition of Congressional hits and misses.

The best of CSPAN callers.

Seth Meyers finally puts the Elizabeth Warren Presidential run idea to rest..

David Pakman: Why won’t Republicans acknowledge Obama’s strong economy?

Menendez Indictment:

• Maddow: NJ Sen. Bob Menendez is indicted.
• Sam Seder and Cliff Schecter: MenendezGhaaaaaziiiiii!!!1!11!!! Republicans invent some insane Obama/Iran/Menendez conspiracy theory.

White House: Obama signs memorandum of disapproval on anti-labor bill.

John Oliver: Red-tailed hawks:

Thom with Prof. Michael Mann: Has climate change affected the West Coast?

Mental Floss: Misconceptions about appliances.

David Pakman: Small government Republican would make church mandatory.

The Church of Scientology responds to Going Clear.

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

– Sullivan To Readers: You Are All Mindless, Soulless Subhumans

– Oh Sally Clark and Larry Phillipszzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

– No, the religious right is not dead. They were just resting.

– Oh hey, Seattle has some brand-new *historic landmarks.

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