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Darcy Burner issued the following statement on the fire that destroyed her Ames Lake home:

“As many of you may be aware, early this morning my home was destroyed by a fire. It appears to have been caused by a faulty lamp in my son’s room. Unfortunately, our home and all of the possessions in it are a total loss, but I am so grateful that my family and I escaped safely. We may have lost our home and our possessions, but for the most part they can be replaced, and I feel like a true tragedy was narrowly avoided today. Please rest assured that while we have been a bit shaken by what happened, Mike, Henry and I are all okay.

“Particularly, I am grateful to the wonderful men and women of the Redmond and Kirkland Fire Departments, and the investigators from the King County Fire Investigation Unit. Their rapid response and incredible professionalism brought the fire under control and kept it from spreading to our neighbors’ homes. And these brave first responders even miraculously rescued my son’s puppy, who we initially thought had perished in the flames. Sadly, our cat, Charlotte, did not survive the fire.

“I am also deeply grateful for the expressions of support from friends, supporters and others who have called to express their condolences and offer their generous and heartfelt assistance. I am so moved by all of the offers of a place to stay, or clothes to wear, or all of the other offers of help that have poured in throughout the day. While we are fine for now, your kind expressions of support and concern have helped to sustain me through what has been a long and difficult day.

“For those who would like to do something to express their support, let me suggest making a contribution to your local humane society or animal shelter in memory of Charlotte, or to the Washington State Council of Firefighters Benevolent Fund.

“Thank you all for being there for us in my family’s time of need.  It means so much to us.”

I’ve added in the links, but feel free to choose your own charities that fit the spirit of the request.

Join us at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally for an evening of politics under the influence. Officially, we start at 8:00 pm at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Some folks show up early for Dinner.

If you find yourself in the Tri-Cities area this evening, check out McCranium for the local Drinking Liberally. Otherwise, check out the Drinking Liberally web site for dates and times of a chapter near you.

The preliminary 60-day supply limits for medical marijuana patients in Washington have been released:

Patients authorized to possess or grow marijuana for medical reasons under Washington law would be limited to 24 ounces of harvested marijuana, plus six mature plants and 18 immature plants, according to an official draft rule filed by the state Department of Health today.

The filing of the draft rule starts a rule-making process and a public-comment period. A hearing has been scheduled for Aug. 25 in Tumwater, Thurston County.

As I mentioned below, this is lower than earlier numbers proposed by the DOH, but it’s also higher than the 3 ounces that law enforcement considered “reasonable.” Why these numbers? Probably because they’re exactly the same as what Oregon allows.

Senator Jeanne Kohl-Welles, the prime sponsor of the bill tasking the State Department of Health to set the limits, has released a statement:

We have a responsibility to stay true to the values of compassion and empathy that are at the basis of this law, which was passed by voters in 1998. While I appreciate the Department of Health’s efforts to address this complex issue, I am concerned that today’s proposed rule is more restrictive than what had been previously discussed and may be unclear regarding a physician’s role in making a recommendation for a patient’s use of medical marijuana. Since the rule is not yet final, I encourage all stakeholders to continue providing written input and participate in the upcoming public hearing on August 25 to ensure a full consideration of their concerns.

In a recent interview with the Seattle Times, Dave Reichert made a point of emphasizing his bipartisanship:

“It’s about solving problems,” he said. “This bickering back and forth is a waste of time. It’s tiresome. I just think sometimes it gets childish.”

Childish bickering, huh? Well take a look at Reichert’s approach to bipartisanship, as he describes it before a roomful of Republicans back in 2006:

“Hardest thing in the world to do to be nice to a crook, let alone someone who took your best friend’s life. But it’s my job. And in America, how hard is it for me to put my arm around a Democrat, if I can put my arm around Gary Ridgway?”

Reichert takes a touching story about a colleague and friend, tragically shot and killed in the line of duty (just get a load of those dramatic pauses)… and uses it as a setup for a punchline about Democrats. A cop killer and a serial killer, equated with Democrats. Right back at you, Dave.

But I guess that’s bipartisanship, Dave Reichert style.

Mankind has witnessed a number of horrors in recent decades—the Rwandan genocide… the ongoing tragedy in Darfur… DOE’s stormwater regulations—but none, according to Seattle Times editorialist Kate Riley a few weeks back, matched that of a state Democratic Party press release criticizing Dino Rossi for deliberately attempting to hide his Republican affiliation:

Oh, horrors! Stop the presses. Republican gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi is trying to “rebrand” himself as a member of the Grand Old Party. How sinister.

The real horror here is the state Democratic party’s attempt, in a press release today, to invent a scandal out of nothing — and, worse, the premise for their argument is founded on an apparent belief that voters are too ignorant to know that “GOP” and “Republican” are the same thing….

Really, Kate? Well, I hate to say “I told you so”… so I’ll just let Postman say it for me:

Dino Rossi’s rebranding effort may pay off with voters who say they don’t know what it means when a candidate declares himself a member of the “GOP Party.” […] A recent poll by Stuart Elway says that about 25 percent of respondents didn’t know what GOP meant.

Elway asked respondents which party they thought a candidate who “prefers GOP Party” is associated with. 15% didn’t know, 7% said Democratic and 3% other. And of that 25% who didn’t know or got it wrong, 27% identified themselves as Independents and 26% as Democrats. Only 18% of Republicans were confused.

This came as no surprise to Postman, who adds:

That’s where the greatest benefit of rebranding could come for a Republican trying to buck a 24-year gubernatorial losing streak for the party.

And you can trust Postman on this, because he’s one of those credible corporate media bloggers.

Anybody who knows anything about initiatives knows that a good ballot title can mean a couple extra points at the polls, and no doubt Rossi took advantage of the new top-two primary to jigger the ballot to his advantage. You can’t really blame Rossi, I guess, for this calculated deception—he is a politician after all—but neither can you blame the Democrats for their efforts to educate voters by pointing it out.

It is at the very least ironic then, that Riley, a member of an editorial board that has argued persuasively for government openness, should so vehemently defend Rossi’s deliberate obfuscation, while hyperbolically attacking a Democratic press release on the subject. But as I wrote at the time…

[T]hat’s the sort of “I’m rubber, you’re glue” partisanship we’ve come to expect from an amen editorialist who applauded Dave Reichert’s sexist dismissal of Harvard grad Darcy Burner as a ditzy blond, while condemning Burner as the reincarnation of Karl Rove.

No doubt I can be just as much a partisan propagandist as Riley and her colleagues on the Times ed board. The difference is, I admit it.

Darcy Burner, her husband, son and dog escaped unharmed this morning from a serious fire at their Carnation home. There is no word yet on what the cause might be, but the campaign tells me that the house might be “a total loss.”

I’ll post more information as I get it, but needless to say, Darcy and her family need all of our personal support at this obviously trying moment. (And if you believe in them, your prayers.)

UPDATE:
I hate to be so coldly pragmatic at a painful time like this, but no doubt the fire and its aftermath will severely cut into Darcy’s campaigning and fundraising over the coming weeks, so her campaign could use your help now more than ever. Go to Darcy’s website and sign up to volunteer your time. Or if you can’t give of your time, your contributions are always welcome.

UPDATE, UPDATE:
NWCN has raw footage of the home burning. My daughter and I had been to the house, and it’s pretty devastating for us to see it in flames like that, so I can’t imagine what it might be for the family.

UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE:
KIRO TV has clearer footage that shows the full extent of the damage.

UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE:
The Seattle Times reports:

Her 5-year-old son, Henry, came into her and her husband’s bedroom around 7 a.m. screaming there was a fire in his room, Burner said.

“I scooped him up and got him out of the house,” she said. Everyone, including the family’s golden retriever Bruce Wayne, made it out uninjured, but their cat did not survive.

I briefly got a hold of campaign spokesman Sandeep Kaushik, who is at the scene, and he roughly confirms the report, though he has not yet seen it. I asked if smoke detectors went off, and he said his understanding was yes, but that everything happened very fast, the house going up in flames within three or four minutes.

UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE, UPDATE:
The TNT’s Niki Sullivan has even more details…

Earlier this morning, Postman wrote:

I was talking to a smart friend over the weekend who bemoaned the oh-so-careful approach Gov. Chris Gregoire is taking to governing. He’s a supporter. But he worries that out of fear of alienating someone, somewhere, Gregoire has traded activism for near-paralysis.

The topic of that post had nothing to do with drug policy, but with the deadline for having the State Department of Health establish the 60-day supply limits for medical marijuana patients coming up tomorrow, I find myself in the same boat as Postman’s unnamed friend – if not even more critical of the Governor.

As of my typing this, I still have no idea what the released limits will be. Earlier this year, it was revealed that preliminary numbers of 35 ounces and a 100 sq ft growing area caused the Governor to get more involved in the process and demand more feedback from law enforcement and medical professionals. Many patients and advocates within the medical marijuana community saw this as an attempt by the Governor to derail the process in support of the state’s law enforcement union, while the Governor’s dishonesty about why the process was derailed didn’t exactly convince people that she was acting in good faith.

At the follow-up meeting (which the DOH attempted to keep closed to the public, but failed), the two parties who the Governor claimed were underrepresented in the initial round of workshops were in attendance. The law enforcement officials again iterated that the decision should be left up the medical professionals, and the one medical professional who showed up said that 35 ounces might be too low of a limit for some patients who ingest it within food. Law enforcement officials also asserted that the limit shouldn’t be so high that criminals could hide behind it, but believing that someone with a small growing area in their basement could launch a massive criminal enterprise is more than a little absurd, considering that marijuana is already the most lucrative cash crop in the state of Washington.

The released limits tomorrow (if they’re even released) will go a long way towards showing whether or not Governor Gregoire is someone who can put politics and special interests aside and do what’s right for the citizens of this state.

Earlier this month, I visited a partially disabled medical marijuana patient in Tacoma who spent over a week in jail this winter. She was kept from receiving the special liquid meals she requires for nearly the entire time. In her mid-40s, she was a former nurse who told me she was staunchly anti-drug before discovering that marijuana worked best for her illnesses. She and her husband then became active in helping other registered patients learn how to grow for themselves.

Stories like that one are common. The list of other patients being hauled into court across the state has been growing. At Drinking Liberally and other events, I occasionally talk to people close to the Governor, and they rarely seem to understand that this is more than just a number. It could be the difference that causes someone to lose their house, their livelihood, or what’s left of their health, should they be sent to jail without adequate medical needs being met. Hopefully, the Governor herself doesn’t suffer from her own paralysis on this one.

This is what we’re stuck with:

Despite heavy criticism, Gen. Wesley Clark is standing by his statement this weekend that Sen. John MCain’s military experience doesn’t qualify him to be commander-in-chief.

“I certainly honor his service as a prisoner of war,” Clark said of McCain on Sunday. “But he hasn’t held executive responsibility. That large squadron in the Navy that he commanded — that wasn’t a wartime squadron. He hasn’t been there and ordered the bombs to fall.”

That statement from Clark has come under withering criticism from McCain’s campaign and was rejected by Sen. Barack Obama, both of whom (along with the media) distorted Clark’s words by painting them as an attack on McCain’s military service.

Clark is a retired four star general, the former Supreme Allied Commander of NATO. If he can’t call bullshit on the lionization of Saint McCain, no one can.

Surrogates say the things candidates can’t say. That’s Clark’s job. For Obama to go out of his way to reinforce the “McCain has foreign policy experience” is political malpractice.

Obama should pick a vice president who will tell him not to do this again. That seems to be the most important criteria for VP selection at the moment.

Only four more hours to donate to Darcy Burner before the all important end of quarter deadline.  And while you’re at it, why not throw a little change to George Fearing running against the execrable Doc Hastings out in WA-04?

The immigration issue can be complicated, but one part of it that should be simple is that it benefits us to have hard working immigrants come here and raise families.

A friend of mine just sent me a petition for Anuj Garg, a friend and co-worker of hers who’s close to facing deportation due to delays and understaffing in the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service (USCIS) office. He owns a home here and has a three-month old son. You can sign a petition supporting him and his family here. Their story is probably just one of many right now, especially considering he works for a large company and even that hasn’t been enough to get his visa extended.

It’s really disheartening to see how we’ve gone from being a country that welcomed my great-grandparents off of boats in New York a century ago (some of whom were teenagers who spoke no English) to one that sends back hard-working people who’ve been here for years, hold good jobs, and own their own homes.

Kudos to Seattle Times reporter Emily Heffter for giving a little space to the well documented thesis that Rep. Dave Reichert has been manipulating his voting record to appear more moderate than he is:

Often, he votes with Republicans on procedural motions, then switches sides and votes with Democrats in the final roll call.

For example, on an energy bill last year, Reichert voted with his fellow Republicans several times — against Democratic motions to close the bill to amendments and bring it to a vote. But in the final vote, he sided with Democrats to pass the bill.

“How can you end up on both sides of the vote?” asked Sandeep Kaushik, Burner’s spokesman.

Kaushik says Reichert in fact is trying to manipulate his image to ensure his re-election. Reichert rarely casts the deciding vote when going against his party on an important issue, Kaushik says, and he joins the Democrats when they are going to win anyway.

Sure the refutation doesn’t come until more than halfway through Heffter’s 1200 word piece, and well away from the prime front page real estate on which the article starts, but no reporter has given more thought or space to exploring beneath the surface of Reichert’s actual voting record, despite the fact that his tactics are both common and, well, obvious. How common?

Reichert wouldn’t be the first to use that strategy, said Matt Barreto, a UW political-science professor.

“It is a common thing that you see a lot that allows a politician to portray themselves a moderate,” he said.

And how obvious? Well, listen to Reichert explain his voting record before a gathering of Republicans back in 2006 (courtesy of TVW’s new player widget):

“So when the leadership comes to me and says , Dave you have to vote over here because we want to protect you and keep this majority, I do it.”

That’s Dave Reichert, “conscience driven independent,” in his own damn words… words backed up by Dan Kirkdorffer’s meticulous fisking of Reichert’s voting record, but words which the media have for the most part ignored when addressing the issue of Reichert’s alleged political moderation.  Reichert explains “how things work” back in the other Washington, political science professors validate it and his own voting record demonstrates it.  And yet our local news media, desperately longing for that mythical creature known as the modern moderate Republican, have been complicit in presenting this pro-war, pro-Bush, anti-choice congressman as somehow a perfect fit for his suburban swing district.

Darcy Burner, on the other hand, has somehow been given the label of being too progressive for her district, though on what specific issues the gatekeepers of conventional wisdom never bother to tell us.  On the war?  You can read her Responsible Plan on ending the war for yourself, and see if it’s out of step with the voters in WA-08.  Too progressive on reproductive rights?  On FISA?  On the economy?

Heffter’s piece is a great first step toward setting the record straight on Reichert’s record, but we can’t rely on our local media to tell the whole story.  Darcy is going to have to do that herself, and it’s going to cost a lot of money.  That’s why she needs your help.

Today is the last day of the fundraising quarter, and heading into the homestretch, pundits and big donors are going to size up the competitiveness of the various races based on its outcome.  So please give today and help Darcy hit her end of quarter target.  That’s the only way we’re going to dispel the Reichert myth.

This post is dedicated to the folks at Crosscut.

Stephen McDonald is serving life in prison without the possibility of parole, for allegedly burning a doormat at a Mount Vernon, WA motel. As the trial appeals judge snidely remarks in the transcript: “Prisoners now have two rights, the right to go to jail and the right to stay there until their term is up.”

Regardless of whether McDonald actually committed the crime (and McDonald effectively argues that he was railroaded), a sentence of life in prison without parole is ridiculous, immoral, and an unjustifiable expense of taxpayer dollars for a minor property crime, regardless of his prior record. But then “Three Strikes and You’re Out” is a popular string of rhetorical bullshit with both the political and media establishments, so good luck Mr. McDonald in finding a politician or journalist to champion your cause.

Noemie has much more at WashBlog.

Chuck Taylor of Crosscut:

When we launched Crosscut, my fantasy was to require full, real names of commenters. Our goal is to run a site where ideas were fair game but individuals are not, where civility would be imposed by the power of shame. We didn’t want this to turn into the island in Lord of the Flies or, worse, Slog.

Yeah, because who wants to be like SLOG, what with their huge traffic and what not?

I was once in the audience for one of those “New Media: What Does It All Mean?” things at the downtown library. Michael Hood asked the panel, “what are you doing to reach out to young readers?”

The guy from the Times was very funny: he admitted that anything the Times does to woo young folks comes off as “uncool.” Josh Feit mentioned that The Stranger does really well in this area. Chuck Taylor’s answer was, basically, “we don’t think we have to.”

I think that’s why Ted Van Dyk is Crosscut’s sex advice columnist…