HorsesAss.Org

I’d imagine we’re going to be seeing more stories like this all around the state:

Faced with a dire state budget forecast, Clark College has announced a hiring freeze and asked executive department heads to cut budgets about 3 percent.

That might not be all, for the 12,500-student Vancouver college.

Deeper budget cuts may follow as the state economy continues to slide, Clark President Bob Knight wrote in an e-mail to the college community on Wednesday night.

Our state’s revenue system makes this sort of thing pretty much inevitable. I remember writing stories about such stuff during the George H.W. Bush recession back in the early 1990’s for a community college newspaper.

Sure, it’s easier to play politics than to actually prioritize, but for once I would like to hear Republicans state how much education (and thus our state’s future potential economic growth) they wish to cut. Vague “waste fraud and abuse” accusations don’t count. Where efficiency can really be improved, that’s great, but it takes hard work in boring hearings, not campaign talking points.

I’ll explain later, but you know what I mean.

The United States Supreme Court has overturned an appellate court that ruled in favor of the Republican Party regarding voter registrations in Ohio.

In a brief unsigned opinion, the justices said they were not commenting on whether Ohio is complying with a provision of the Help America Vote Act of 2002 that lays out requirements for verifying voter eligibility.

Instead, they said they were granting Brunner’s request because it appears that the law does not allow private entities, like the Ohio GOP, to file suit to enforce the provision of the law at issue.

About 200,000 of 666,000 voters who have registered in Ohio since Jan. 1 have records that don’t match. Brunner has said the discrepancies most likely stem from innocent clerical errors rather than fraud but has set up a verification plan.

While this is heartening, it’s not the end of Republican monkey business. Josh Marshall, as usual, leads the way covering highly suspect Department of Justice actions, this time with the ridiculous FBI folderol regarding ACORN. If that’s not an attempt to screw with the outcome of the election, I don’t know what is. That lady from Alaska even mentioned it this morning on my tee-vee. Here’s a bit from TPM’s story this morning:

“I’m astounded that this issue is being trotted out again. Based on what I saw in 2004 and 2006, it’s a scare tactic.”

Who’s that speaking? And what’s he talking about?

That’s fired US Attorney David Iglesias talking about the news leaked today that the DOJ and FBI are opening a nationwide investigation into allegations that the community organization ACORN is somehow working to undermine the November election through fraud. For more from Iglesias and his fellow fired US Attorney Bud Cummins, don’t miss TPMMuckraker’s Zack Roth’s interview post from earlier this evening.

There really needs to be intense scrutiny of the FBI investigation of ACORN in the traditional media. If there’s anything there other than everyday mistakes and the occasional people ripping off ACORN, then we all want to know about it. Because if there’s not anything worth investigating then the FBI itself is now being used as an arm of the Republican Party. (I know, who would think the Bush Justice Department would do such a thing?)

As Iglesias notes in his interview with TPM, the leaking of the investigation itself is highly suspicious. It’s hard enough to win elections without having to win by margins larger than Republican suppression efforts.

So it turns out, “Joe the Plumber” isn’t actually a licensed plumber.  And… um… his name’s not “Joe.”  Huh.  Go figure.

Obama	McCain
100.0% probability of winning	0.0% probability of winning
Mean of 368 electoral votes	Mean of 170 electoral votes

Yesterday’s analysis showed Sen. Barack Obama leading Sen. John McCain by 369 to 169 electoral votes. If the election had been held yesterday, Obama would have won with near certainty.

Today there were seven new polls in six states released. As a result, Obama holds his massive lead, but McCain gains back one electoral vote. After 100,000 simulated elections, Obama wins all 100,000 times. Obama receives (on average) 368 to McCain’s 170 electoral votes. Obama, in an election held now, would have a near-100.0% probability of winning.

More details from this analysis are available at Hominid Views.

Methods are described in the FAQ.The most recent version of this analysis can be found on this page.

After a brief hiatus, the Podcast is back—and with a special guest.

Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels starts the conicnversation on Seattle “inside baseball ” politics Sound Transit’s Prop. 1 ballot measure and mass transportation. The conversation then turns to the piles and piles of money dumped (sometimes illegally) into in the Washington state gubernatorial race. Will Rossi and surrogates succeeded in unifying the haters? And why hasn’t the BIAW been enjoined from spending more money on the race? Goldy laments the lack of editorial outrage from the traditional media over flagrant violations of election financing laws. The panel chit-chats about other races, like the presidential race and the Burner–Reichert race. Goldy, in response to the PI’s endorsement of Reichert, offers the proposition that the Seattle media establishment suffers from mediocrity. With two journalists on the panel, the comment triggers something of a group therapy session….

Goldy was joined by Chairman of the Sound Transit Board of Directors and Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels, Seattle P-I columnist Joel Connelly, Publisher of the Group News Blog, Jesse Wendel, HorsesAss reporter Josh Feit , and Seattle blogging pioneer N in Seattle.

The show is 65:16, and is available here as an MP3:

[audio:http://www.podcastingliberally.com/podcasts/podcasting_liberally_oct_14_2008.mp3]

[Recorded live at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally. Special thanks to Confab creators Gavin and Richard for hosting the site.]

Whenever we pass a ballot measure lowering taxes or limiting government in some way, or reject a measure proposing the reverse, the wise old sages of our media and political establishment always caution that we must follow “the will of the people.”  Yet I have noticed a curious pattern to Dino Rossi, who criticizes Gov. Gregoire for raising the gas tax, advocates for reducing the minimum wage and eliminating the estate tax, and has voted to defund initiatives raising teacher pay and reducing class size… all actions contrary to the will of the people as expressed at the polls.

I-920: Rejected, 38-62
This measure would repeal Washington’s state laws imposing tax, currently dedicated for the education legacy trust fund, on transfers of estates of persons dying on or after the effective date of this measure.

I-912: Rejected, 45-55
Initiative Measure No. 912 concerns motor vehicle fuel taxes. This measure would repeal motor vehicle fuel tax increases of 3 cents in 2005 and 2006, 2 cents in 2007, and 1.5 cents per gallon in 2008, enacted in 2005 for transportation purposes. Should this measure be enacted into law?

I-728: Approved, 72-28
Shall school districts reduce class sizes, extend learning programs, expand teacher training, and construct facilities, funded by lottery proceeds, existing property taxes, and budget reserves?

I-732: Approved, 63-37
Shall public school teachers, other school district employees, and certain employees of community and technical colleges receive annual cost-of-living salary adjustments, to begin in 2001-2002?

I-688: Approved, 66-34
Shall the state minimum wage be increased from $4.90 to $5.70 in 1999 and to $6.50 in 2000, and afterwards be annually adjusted for inflation?

And Rossi’s disregard for the will of the people doesn’t end there, with the candidate promising to build an Alaska Way tunnel that Seattle voters rejected by 70-30 margin, while constantly attacking Gov. Gregoire for failing to build a new Sonics arena that 74% of voters rejected at the polls.  And that’s just off the top of my head.

Huh.  If that’s the way Rossi honors the will of the people while running for office, imagine how much respect he’ll show us once he’s in it.

The Gregoire campaign alerted me this afternoon to this news release from the National Letter Carrier’s union blasting some ads created by the Republican Governors Association to aid Dino Rossi.

The television ad, being run by the Republican Governors Association in support of GOP gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi, shows a man walking a dog, and then a letter carrier (with satchel and mail), leering at young children near an ice cream truck, while in the audio background a woman depicting a mother warns that some convicted sex offenders have not properly registered with law enforcement agencies during the Gregoire administration.

“This television ad is beneath contempt,” said NALC President William H. Young. “It is ludicrous and shameful that the Republican Governors Association would stoop so low as to portray America’s most trusted government agents in this manner just to pump up a specious political argument against the incumbent governor.”

Yeah, that sounds pretty low, although I must confess I haven’t had the pleasure of seeing this particular piece of GOP Party handiwork. Let us know in comments if it pops up on the YouTube.

Talk about “leave no sleaze behind.” I guess they haven’t caught on that regular people get disgusted with demagoguery surrounding this issue. The state House Republicans tried it and look where it got them. The Speaker’s Roundtable, one of the Republican organizing committees, can now meet at a booth at McDonald’s.

As I recall, the fake sex offender postcard was met with widespread editorial board condemnation in this state. Just sayin’.

A couple weeks ago it became clear that our state’s media-political complex had written off Darcy Burner’s chances in Washington’s Eighth Congressional District, and was already busily writing a post mortem.

Darcy had run a disappointing campaign I was told.  She had done nothing since 2006 to polish her resume, or to erode the credentials of her opponent.  She focused on Iraq when voters really only cared about the economy, and was running far to the left of what is at  best a centrist, if not a slightly conservative district.  But worst of all, she was way “too close to the netroots.”  (Whatever that means.)

I heard this critique repeatedly, from journalists from politicos and from elected officials, sometimes firsthand, sometimes second, and sometimes through the whisper down the lane chorus that crowds the road to conventional wisdom.  I’ve even heard it suggested that I personally have done more to harm Darcy’s prospects than help, my relentless “cheerleading” spurring some in the media to turn against Darcy, if only out of spite.

Darcy and the netroots were going to lose a second blue wave election, and it was our own damn fault.  And, it seemed to me, there were some on the Democratic side of the partisan divide who were taking greater satisfaction in this “epic fail” than one would justifiably expect from their Republican counterparts.

Then, over the past couple days, and obviously promoted by both Democratic and Republican sources, this pre-post mortem started to appear in print, echoed in Eli Sanders’ premature articulation in The Stranger, and then oddly enough, bluntly stated in the pages of Time Magazine under the unequivocable headline: “Will the Netroots Sink a Microsoft Dem?”

Even as Burner’s campaign has become more of a long shot, she is increasingly a cause celebre in the liberal blogosphere. The website Daily Kos calls her “a netroots hero” and sees her struggle as a crusade for liberal bloggers as well. “Taking Darcy down, in their minds,” wrote one of Kos’ main posters, McJoan, about national Republicans, “means taking us down, Neutering us.” But her tight ties to the liberal blogosphere may well be her ultimate downfall.

[…] “Darcy Burner is pretty open about the fact that she wants to go to Congress to represent the netroots,” Reichert’s campaign manager Mike Shields, told the Seattle Times. “That is her constituency, and that is who she raised money from, and so that’s who she’ll do the bidding of.” But Democrats worry about the association as well. “The big question people are quietly asking about her,” says one local Democratic consultant, “is, in building her movement, did she lose touch with the people she sought to serve?”

Notice that the article is sourced almost entirely secondhand, with no effort by the author to talk to either campaign.  In fact, the only first hand sources cited in the entire piece are identified as “one local Democrat” and “one local Democratic consultant.”  (The same person?)  This thesis, that the netroots are an anchor around Darcy’s neck, is clearly being promoted by Democrats as well as Republicans, and has been eagerly embraced by a media establishment that is just as fearful as their political counterparts of the challenge we pose to the status quo.

But the problem with this thesis, that conveniently blames the netroots for the Democrats losing a district that has never before elected a Democrat, is that it is based on three assumptions, all of which happen to be unproved by the facts on the ground, that A) Darcy is indeed “too close” to the netroots; that B) a significant fraction of 8th CD voters have any idea what “the netroots” are, or where Darcy stands in relation to us; and that C) Darcy is in fact losing her race against Reichert.

[Read more…]

So both Vancouver-Portland metro dailies have now endorsed Gov. Chris Gregoire, Democrat, over Dino Rossi, GOP Party. From The Oregonian:

Attacking the gas tax, he has argued that major transportation improvements that Washington needs desperately could be financed out of the state’s general fund without new revenue. His recent TV ads making dark charges about the state’s oversight of sexual predators have been found both odious and inaccurate by many of the state’s law enforcement officers.

Rossi’s arguments, and the voice he would provide to an element of the state that too often feels unheard, don’t outweigh Gregoire’s impressive first term.

Washington voters should give her another.

Yeah, I know, they’re just newspaper endorsements. Campaigns covet them but it’s pretty hard to claim they influence that many voters.

Still, lots of folks on the north side of the Columbia subscribe to The Oregonian, so it’s worth noting. Editorial boards seem to be noticing Gregoire’s steady hand.

Won’t someone please put the McCain campaign out of its misery?

What is Dino Rossi trying to hide from voters?  Well, we likely won’t know until after the election, as a King County Superior Court judge has delayed her decision until next week on whether to quash a subpoena to depose Rossi about his involvement in the growing Buildergate scandal.

And while the Rossi camp can be audibly heard sighing in relief, our state’s editorialists, usually champions of sunlight and open government, continue to yawn, apparently unconcerned about Rossi’s role in what is without a doubt the most blatant and egregious violation of our campaign finance laws in our state’s history.  Un-fucking believable.