HorsesAss.Org

Don’t forget, the “will of the people” only counts when that will is expressed as anti-tax, anti-consumer and anti-worker sentiment intended to destroy things.

No worries about a special session to fix this!

The House passed the bill, HB 2363, on an 84-12 vote. It now goes to the Senate.

The raises were spelled out in Initiative 732. But they would be suspended through mid-2011 for school district employees, community and technical college academic employees and classified employees at technical colleges.

Obviously paying teachers enough money to afford extras like food and housing was a bad idea, because that would be constructive, not destructive.

So when citizens decide they want to support things like education, it doesn’t matter, the Legislature will just discard the program rather than work on the tax system. You don’t really hear crap about the “will of the people” now, because the only people who count are politicians, lobbyists and well-heeled contributors who can buy their way onto the ballot.

The suckers are the ordinary citizens who play by the rules, buying houses and goods they can actually afford, paying bills and taxes on time, expecting only some basic opportunities from the state like quality, affordable education.

But teachers and parents should vote for a regressive sales tax increase to fund health care this fall! Because it makes so much sense to lay people off, crowd classrooms, raise tuition and then ask for a regressive tax increase.

Good luck with that, Democrats, you’re going to need it.

“Why does Frank Chopp hate Seattle?” That’s the question Josh asks at Publicola after State Rep. Reuven Carlyle (D-36) showed him an amendment to the Viaduct Bill that pins potential cost overruns on the backs of Seattle taxpayers.

The amendment, sponsored by House transportation committee chair Rep. Judy Clibborn (D-41, Bellevue, Factoria, Newcastle), says any cost overruns on the Viaduct tunnel project have to be paid by Seattle-area businesses—a standard for a state-funded project that Carlyle argued had never been applied to locals before. (Without any local accountability measures, for example, Rep. Carlyle pointed out, the state has spent $1.56 billion on 405.)

[…] Carlyle wasn’t simply standing up for his turf, though. He believed the amendment, if passed, would set a “dangerous precedent” that locals across the state could now be held accountable for cost overruns “on any bridge, ferry, roads, or building project.”

The “Big Bore” is the brain child of the oh so credible Discovery Institute, which, based on its profound respect for the sciences, promises that new and barely tested deep bore technology can dig the tunnel cheaper and faster than ever before possible.

Um… maybe.  But maybe not.  The deep bore tunnel is without a doubt the least studied Viaduct alternative from an engineering and a geological perspective, and yet it was quickly embraced by the powers that be after local voters and politicians appeared to be reaching a consensus on the much less sexy surface/transit option.

Surface/transit was also the least expensive option, for both the state and the city, and no doubt the easiest to accurately estimate costs, as we have a helluva lot more experience laying down asphalt than we do sending giant boring machines through downtown Seattle’s relatively unexplored substrata.  Discovery’s assurance’s aside, the Big Bore is by far the riskiest option in terms of potential cost overruns.  I’m loathe to bring up Boston’s infamous Big Dig, as I don’t subscribe to the notion that Americans have somehow lost the ability to engineer tunnels, but… well… shit happens.

And if shit happens, it should be the responsibility of the state to clean it up.  After all, it’s the Governor and the Legislature who put up the most resistance to the surface/transit option, and who eagerly sought out the Big Bore as a magically delicious alternative.  So why the hell should local taxpayers, who were already prepared to settle on a less expensive, less risky (and yes, less elegant) solution, pick up the tab should Discovery’s faith-based transportation plans turn out to be not all that intelligently designed?

We shouldn’t, and now is the time for Mayor Nickels and other local political leaders to send a clear message to Olympia that, if they change the terms of the deal on us, forcing us to pick up the costs of their potential blunders, then the deal is off.  Seattle has already agreed to pony up $1 billion toward the cost of replacing this state highway, but if this amendment sticks, placing all the risk on our backs, I say we put away our checkbook and tell our legislators to just go screw themselves.

Please join us at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally for an evening of politics under the influence. The festivities take place at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. beginning at 8:00 pm. Or stop by earlier for dinner.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIGHqeKG8Io[/youtube]

Not in Seattle? The Drinking Liberally web site has dates and times for 328 chapters of Drinking Liberally spread across the earth.

I’m still waiting for the Seattle Times editorial board to take me up on my 5,001 protester challenge.  I promise to bring 5,001 protesters to Olympia to rally on behalf of an income tax, if they promise to credulously editorialize in favor of our populist movement should we hit the turnout target.

Yeah, sure, I know that a mere 5,001 citizens out of a state population of over 6.5 million may not seem like much of a “movement,” but that’s still one more than the low bar set by the Times in regards to last week’s teabagger rally:

… when organizers get 5,000 people to come to Olympia on a workday, it is evidence of a strong feeling.

Funny thing is, the Times hasn’t always sold populism so cheap.  When 40,000 people peacefully marched in Seattle to protest WTO, only to be met with tear gas and billy clubs (and yes, the overwhelming majority of marchers were peaceful), the Times didn’t embrace the populism of the moment.  No, they demonized and ridiculed labor leaders and environmentalists for their “narrow point of view,” calling their message “shameless,” “dishonest,” “distorted, “canned,” and “99-percent fact free.”

When in years past, tens of thousands of people have turned out to protest education cuts or immigration policy or the Iraq war, where was the Times editorial arguing that this should be enough to stop lawmakers in their tracks?  Likewise, where is the populist embrace from the Times when labor manages to turn out teabagger-plus-sized crowds at the state Capitol?

Agreeing with the teabaggers is one thing.  The Times’ editors are entitled to their opinion.  But in light of the much larger rallies the ed board has either willfully ignored or contemptuously mocked, spinning this unimpressive made for TV event into some sort of populist rebellion is disingenuous at best, and delusional at worst.

I don’t generally follow Tacoma City Council races, but I’ll make an exception for Keven Rojecki, who recently announced his candidacy for an open seat.

I’ve had the opportunity to meet and talk with Keven on a number of occasions during my adventures in Olympia, where in his capacity as a legislative liaison for the Washington State Council of Fire Fighters (WSCFF) we have often found ourselves working the same side of important public policy issues.  Keven is also an active fire fighter, an 18-year veteran with the SeaTac Fire Department, and has served the past two years as Vice-Chair of the Washington State Gambling Commission.

I know nothing about Keven’s opponent—perhaps she’s just as qualified, I dunno—but I do know that Keven is exactly the kind of public servant we could use more of in electoral politics, so I wish him the best of luck.  And if you’re down in Olympia Thursday, you can wish him luck in person at a luncheon reception and fundraiser being held at the WSCFF headquarters:

Date:	Thursday, April 23, 2009
Time:	11:00am – 1:30pm
Location:	Washington State Council of Fire Fighters
Street:	1069 Adams Street SE
City/Town:	Olympia, WA

Ah well, it looks like the timid status quoists are in full spin mode.

Covering the on-again/off-again prospects of a tax increase measure, Austin Jenkins reports for both KUOW and Crosscut that as weak as public support is for a sales tax increase, an income tax fares even worse:

The sales tax garnered better than 50 percent support if it included a tax rebate for working families and if the money raised was used to support hospitals, nursing homes, and other health care programs. […]  The income tax proposal polled under 50 percent even if the money was dedicated to education and health care.

Huh?  That’s not what I heard.  And while I’m not sure I’ve seen the polling detail to which Jenkins refers, clearly, neither has he.

Or maybe I have. Here’s how Jenkins describes the poll in question:

I got my hands on a summary of the poll that was given to the Senate Democratic Caucus. It’s not the complete poll, and I don’t have a sample size or margin of error; however I believe 800 likely voters were polled. The poll was taken last week — right when people were filing their taxes and there were anti-tax demonstrations all over the country, including at the State Capitol in Olympia. The health care groups who paid for the poll say it was the “worst possible” week to be asking voters their mood on taxes.

Huh.  I too have seen a poll of 800 likely voters, conducted last week, the worst week possible for asking voters their mood on an income tax… although unlike Jenkins, who reports on a summary passed on to the Senate Dem Caucus, I got to see some of the actual details:

Three tenths of one percent sales tax for working families tax rebate and Health Care Trust Fund For Basic Health Plan
(Total Approve) =  40%
Definitely Approve: 16%
Probably Approve 17%
Lean Approve 8%
Lean Reject 4%
Probably Reject 12%
Definitely Reject 22%
Undecided 21%

3% state income tax on individuals making over $250K
(Total Approve) =  47%
Definitely Approve: 27%
Probably Approve 15%
Lean Approve 5%
Lean Reject 2%
Probably Reject 8%
Definitely Reject 35%
Undecided 8%

Hmm. Perhaps there were two polls of the exact same survey size conducted at exactly the same time on the exact same subject?  And no doubt the pollsters asked these questions in multiple ways, pushing different strengths and weaknesses, so perhaps Jenkins’ data is just as valid as mine?  And yes, it is very difficult to make an apple to apple comparison when it comes to polling data.

But no, the impression that some Democratic lawmakers have been spinning to reporters, that an income tax fares worse in the polls than a sales tax hike, simply isn’t true.  In fact, the data I’ve seen from last week’s poll shows exactly the opposite, with an income tax out-polling a sales tax 47% to 40%.  Meanwhile, what support there was for a sales tax increase was incredibly soft, with only 16% responding “Definitely Approve,” compared to 27% for an income tax.

And that is consistent with all the other polling data of seen.  A recent Elway Poll showed an income tax slightly out-polling a sales tax, 53% to 51%, while a March 2009 poll, again a survey of 800 respondents, surprised income tax proponents and detractors alike with the proposal’s initial level of support:

“This measure would establish a two percent state income tax only on income above $300,000 a year for individuals or above $600,000 a year for married couples filing jointly. If the election were held today, would you vote to APPROVE this referendum, or would you vote to REJECT it?”

(TOTAL APPROVE) = 56%
DEFINITELY APPROVE 37%
PROBABLY APPROVE 16
[LEAN APPROVE] 3
[LEAN REJECT] 3
PROBABLY REJECT 7
DEFINITELY REJECT 30
[UNDECIDED] 5

Considering the income tax is purported to be the third rail of Washington politics, those results aren’t bad, and arguably represent a more neutral survey of the public’s initial impression than one conducted while voters were in the midst of filing their federal returns.

I’m not a big fan of poll-driven lawmaking, but since one side in this debate is attempting to discredit the high-earners income tax by pushing cherry-picked data to lawmakers and reporters, I feel the need to set the record straight.  There has not been a single poll this session that has shown top line support for a sales tax hike to be significantly higher than that for a high-earners income tax, while all the polls show what support there is for a sales tax increase to be unnervingly soft.  That’s why the health care coalition has been backing away from the sales tax proposal… their well justified fear of the squishy middle.

Yes, neither proposal has polled above 60 percent, the magic number the initiative and referendum industry considers the bare minimum level of initial support for a ballot measure to warrant a substantial financial investment.  But as the surprising level of support for a high-earners income tax has already shown, conventional wisdom can sometimes be wrong.

Back in June of 2005, polls showed support for Initiative 912’s repeal of the 9.5 cent gas tax increase to be running as high as 70 percent, yet once voters learned the costs and consequences of the measure, it failed in November by a comfortable ten point margin.  Likewise, in 2006, opponents were initially concerned about support for Initiative 920’s proposed repeal of the estate tax, but after voters learned revenue was targeted to education, the measure was trounced by a resounding 24 point margin.

Washington voters have recently proven their willingness to tax themselves for the services and investments they want and need.  And they’ve proven even more willing to tax the wealthy.

And while that final sentiment may be derided by some as a call to “class warfare,” it is hard to make that argument with a straight face in the state with the most cruelly regressive tax structure in the nation.

Knute Berger, writing at Crosscut, in a spot-on piece about populism and the loony right’s paranoid tendencies:

(Fox Noise personality Glenn) Beck’s world view does share with some incarnations of populism a distinct paranoia — his diatribes come complete with screen-filling images of Nazi swastikas and jackboots on the march and dire warnings that Obama is selling us out to the international socialists. But his critique is mostly incoherent, as if someone dropped the tray of right-wing refrigerator magnets. Lyndon Larouche makes more sense.

Full column worth a read.

[vimeo]http://vimeo.com/4140910[/vimeo]

Such a common sense proposal… I’m sure we can find a reason why “this will never work” in Washington (or Seattle, for that matter).

“Why am I here?”  It is a profound question, and one every Democratic lawmaker in Olympia should ask themselves during the final weeks of this chaotic session, especially when it comes to the issue of whether to put a revenue proposal on the fall ballot.

Why did you run for public office in the first place? What exactly brought you to Olympia? And when you retire (voluntarily or otherwise), how will you judge the success of  your legislative career?

Over the past five years or so I have had the opportunity to talk one on one with a number of Democratic legislators, and I think it safe to say that an overwhelming majority agree with me, at least in principle, on the necessity of revenue reform.  There is near unanimity in the Democratic caucuses that our current tax system is overwhelmingly regressive and unfair, and a strong consensus that it is also inadequate and unsustainable as is… that there exists a long term structural revenue deficit that, regardless of the economic cycle, virtually assures that the ability of state government to deliver services and invest in infrastructure will gradually erode over time.

Privately, off the record, most Democratic legislators will tell you that they support an income tax, and that they truly believe such reform to be in the best interest of the people of Washington state.  And the majority of them even have at least a basic understanding as to why.  But I am now pretty confident that a majority of Democratic legislators also believe an income tax to be a political impossibility… that it will never happen, and that it is futile to even try.

And it is these conflicted naysayers most of all who should ask themselves the question:  “Why am I here?”

Did you come to Olympia simply to balance the budget as best you can?  To do less damage to our environment, our schools and our social safety net than your Republican counterparts?  Did you really come to Olympia to fix problems in the short term that you full well know our structural deficit will inevitably unfix over time?  Are you comfortable being caretakers of our state’s slow decline?

If you understand that we need to move toward an income tax, yet cannot imagine a path toward getting there, why bother even showing up?  Shouldn’t you just step aside and make room for somebody who is at least willing to try?

And no, that’s not meant to be a rhetorical question.

Lacking any real economic arguments, our friends at the Seattle Times editorial board whine “No, no, no to increased taxes,” by attempting to frame their status quoist opposition as part of some populist rebellion.

WEDNESDAY’S tax protests should not be brushed off — particularly not by state legislators contemplating tax increases.

Five thousand people rallied in Olympia Wednesday in opposition to more taxes. Others rallied in hundreds of places around the nation, making a point about federal spending and taxes, and also about state spending and taxes.

Some will discount all this by saying it was organized, or that the rally sprung from the fringe. Of course it was organized. All protests with people carrying signs and listening to speakers are organized.

But when organizers get 5,000 people to come to Olympia on a workday, it is evidence of a strong feeling.

Really?  Fomented for weeks by FOX News and right-wing talk radio, and promoted locally by the Republican Party and the well-funded Evergreen Freedom Foundation, five thousand people show up in Olympia, and that’s reason enough for legislators to dismiss the notion of a tax increase?  5,000 protestors?  That’s the magic number?

So… if I were to get five thousand and one people to show up in Olympia rallying to support a high-earners income tax, would that be equally compelling?  Would that convince the Times that a tax increase should be considered?

No, of course not.  They’d dismiss us as the organized fringe, a small group of true believers out of step with the mainstream… you know, despite the trio of recent polls showing support for a high-earners income tax steadily above fifty percent.

But I’ll tell you what… I’m up to the challenge.  If the Times editors assure me that they would treat my pro-tax rally just as credulously as they treated the FOX teabagging party, I’ll bring at least 5,001 pro-tax protesters to Olympia.  And if I can’t, well, I guess the people will have spoken.

A photographer sneaks into North Korea and takes pictures of the 1984-like nightmare they have going on over there.

It seems the traditional media in the NW has some freaks in their midst:

Alan has never denied owning multiple Web sites catering to people interested in the sexual practices known as BDSM (for bondage, discipline, sadism and masochism). It’s long-term research, he says, adding that the true focus and scope is, for the time being, a secret.

It almost certainly has nothing to do with his work for the Cascade Policy Institute, a conservative political think tank. That’s a campaign to root out Oregonians who might cast fraudulent votes by assuming the identities, and ballots, of people who are dead.

“Fraudulent voters.” Um, yeah, okay.

I’m sure it’s just me, but every time I hear that phrase I get a little voice intoning “Republican crazy douche.” Just another MSM bad apple, nothing to worry about, or so we thought.

The BDSM media were wrong about invading Iraq and also wrong about how property values would go up forever. But you should go ahead and trust anyhow.

Please keep in mind left wing bloggers are shrill and don’t understand foreign policy or bidness. This has been proven by their opposition to foreign policy blunders and bidness bailouts.

Left wing bloggers will surely never survive in the age of virtually free internet service. Someone in the traditional BDSM media will point out the shrillness of left wing bloggers, and handcuff them to newsprint.

That would be a crime.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WI8eWEG2c4M[/youtube]

There was no winner in last week’s contest. The correct answer was Tucson, AZ. This one should be more solvable, good luck!

Earlier this week, Josh Marshall at TPM posted up some thoughts on Mexico:

Clearly, there’s a lot of violence in Mexico tied to the Mexican government’s attempted crackdown on its drug cartels. And the Mexicans are quite legitimately pressuring us to limit the number of guns being smuggled from the US into Mexico, which are fueling the fire. And if Mexico degenerates to the level of Colombia where for many years the key cartels have operated as rivals to the government — clearly beyond the legitimate government’s ability to bring them to heel — then that’s a big problem for us, given our proximity and long border, etc. But I keep hearing these stories about violence spilling over into the US, questions from whether we may need to deploy the US army to our own border, vague stories about death squads in the US. I’m not saying there’s nothing to it. But a lot of this has the feel to me of one of those stories ginned up by politicians and restless news outlets where there ends up being much much less there than meets the eye. Part of me wonders whether it’s a recrudescence of the illegal immigration hysteria of last two years.

There are three separate points being addressed here: (1) The issue of guns being smuggled into Mexico from the U.S. (2) The issue of Mexico’s inability to defeat the drug traffickers and (3) The issue of violence spilling over into the U.S.

Josh looks at these three issues and concludes that the third issue is being “ginned up by politicians and restless news outlets.” He’s right about that, and he later posts a link to a good piece in the Texas Observer about how the media is over-hyping the level of violence on the American side of the border. But the reality is that it’s both the first and third points that are being “ginned up by politicians and restless news outlets.”

Recently, a number of politicians and news outlets have been claiming that 90 percent of the guns that get used by Mexican drug traffickers come from the U.S. In actuality, that figure is wildly inaccurate. And Obama repeated the mythical percentage this week when meeting with Mexican President Calderon.

A certain amount of guns do cross the border from the U.S. into Mexico, and it’s possible that the amount of high-powered weapons bought on the illegal black market from the U.S. is higher than we can accurately measure, but to say that the flow of guns is “fueling the fire” in Mexico’s drug war is buying into a large amount of spin. What’s fueling the fire in Mexico is not the weaponry itself, but the money that the drug traffickers are making that allows them to spend so much money on weapons.

Radley Balko, in a column this week in The Daily Beast, gets to the heart of what’s going wrong in Mexico:

When Barack Obama visits Mexico today, the drug war, and the violence it has spawned south of the border, is expected to dominate the agenda. Since 2006, more than 10,000 people have been murdered in Mexico as a direct consequence of the drug trade. This bloody outbreak began when, with the blessing of and funding from the U.S. government, Mexican President Felipe Calderon ordered the Mexican military to aggressively crack down on the drug cartels. Such crackdowns often ratchet up the level of violence, as the elimination of one major drug distributor provokes those who remain to war over his territory. That’s a pattern as old and predictable as Prohibition itself, yet politicians never seem to learn.

Last month, when Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Mexico, she expressed gave concern over the escalating violence… and then heaped praise on Calderon’s crackdown, promising to support it with more funding and more military hardware. Obama appears poised to say much the same thing. According to a recent preview of his trip in The Washington Post, the president is expected to promise swifter delivery of drug-war aid and increased efforts by the U.S. to stop the flow of American weapons to Mexico. But the best solution to what’s plaguing Mexico right now is the one topic that will almost assuredly be off the table: legalizing marijuana. Marijuana makes up 60 to 70 percent of the Mexican drug trade. Lifting prohibitions on it in the United States would eradicate a major source of funds for the cartels.

I’m not saying that the first and third issues mentioned above – guns traveling across south of the border and increased violence north of the border – aren’t happening at all. What’s happening is that politicians and media outlets are using both of these issues as distractions in order to avoid dealing with the central issue that Balko is discussing right there. This is a problem of organized crime, and the fuel for that fire is the billions of dollars (I’ve seen various estimates of between $10 billion to $100 billion per year) that Americans spend on drugs. It’s not going to be solved by stricter gun control measures. And sending law enforcement to secure the border would only escalate the amount of violence in our border communities. The only way to solve this problem is to cut off the drug trafficker’s income. But that’s something that Obama and a large part of the news media still can’t bring themselves to regard as a serious issue.