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If FCC chair Kevin Martin thought he could depress turnout at tonight’s public hearing on media consolidation by scheduling it with only five days notice, he shouldn’t have located it in Seattle. By 7PM, Town Hall’s 800-seat auditorium was comfortably full, with more people still streaming in. Even now, over three hours into the proceedings a large crowd remains, with many more people milling about downstairs. I think it a safe bet to estimate that over 1200 people will have come through the doors by the end of the night.

The audience is not only large, but extremely enthusiastic, and almost entirely opposed to the FCC’s proposed rules loosening limits on cross ownership and consolidation. It is also (gasp) bipartisan. The meeting opened with live statements from Gov. Chris Gregoire, AG Rob McKenna, state auditor Brian Sonntag, and KC councilmember Reagan Dunn, plus prerecorded statements from Sen. Maria Cantwell, Rep. Jay Inslee and Rep. Dave Reichert. Needless to say, all opposed the rule changes. A panel of speakers including Seattle Times publisher Frank Blethen and KVI radio personality John Carlson also spoke to the commission, and again, overwhelmingly against the rules. Indeed, the only speakers the FCC could find to support further media consolidation were a handful of representatives from media companies that would benefit from the rule changes.

Meanwhile, over 251 audience members have already signed up for a two minute speaking slot — if everybody gets their turn we’ll be here for another eight hours! And of the dozens of concerned citizens who have already spoken, only one has argued in support of loosening ownership rules… my colleague and KTTH morning host, David Boze. (Talk about a brown nose. I sure hope that’s not what it takes to get ahead in today’s corporate-owned media, because if it is, I’m screwed.) Each speaker (except for Boze) has been thanked with loud and boisterous applause, a level of enthusiasm all the more amazing considering we all realize that the Republican majority on the FCC has already written the rules and made their decision, and that this whole hearing is little more than show.

I’m not sure how long I’ll stick around, but I’ll certainly post more later….

UPDATE (11:30PM):
I gotta admit, I couldn’t sit through the whole thing, so I went out for a drink, but I just got back, and it’s still going strong… maybe 200 people still sitting in the audience, more than seven hours later. Amazing. Over 280 concerned citizens signed up for their two minutes to speak, but they’re planning to shut things down at midnight. According to Andrew, who’s been live blogging the whole time, only a couple people have spoken in favor of loosening the ownership rules.

You can argue the merits of the proposed rule changes all you want, but one thing is absolutely clear from this FCC hearing… the public is overwhelmingly opposed. Nearly unanimously. This whole hearing may be a farce, but if so, the people here tonight are playing their roles with passion and verve.

San Francisco’s sixth annual Green Festival opened today, cosmically juxtaposed with a nasty oil spill in San Francisco Bay. The best and worst, simultaneously in real time, that’s Cali for you. I wanted to be on hand not just because this is the grandaddy and you can talk to Kevin Danaher himself while strolling down the aisles, but also because Greenfest is coming to Seattle for the first time next April. “We think it’ll be huge,” Danaher told me, recounting how Chicago’s first event last May drew more than 31,000. “They were lined up two hours before the doors opened,” Danaher said. Keynoter Mayor Daley was going around saying “his festival this, his show that,” Danaher laughed. “I don’t care if he takes the credit, in fact, it works better if he does.” That’s good, Kevin, because we’ve got this Daley groupie mayor in Seattle…

I’ve been coming to the Greenfest since the beginning, when it was funky, crowded, sweaty and a bit contradictory as too many plastics and toxins were still in evidence. This year’s event, though, has to be the cleanest yet (last year only 4 percent of all the waste generated during the three-day event drawing 35,000 people found its way to the local landfill; we’ve come so far since Woodstock). On exhibit are flushable green diapers, highway-certified electric scooters (62 mph, 66 miles on a charge), artworks made of recycled chopsticks (so if you happen to get hungry…) and hemp oils, underwear, energy drinks, garden furniture, smokes. Er, I made that last one up. Unlike Hempfest, Greenfest is only about the planet.

Anyway, this year’s show is the graying of green, as it reminds me of the countless tech fests I used to go to back in the day. Free goodies everywhere, Clif bars, Organic Valley cheeses, Real Foods apples and bananas, Fruitabo fruit leather, Seeds of Change chocolate, lots of mags and lit, all portable in bio plastic or canvas bags. More suits (albeit natural fibre) than tie-dyes, and lots of big-ticket items like cars, adventure travel, homes. Green is going corporate all right, and no harm in that. Like I kept hearing, the price of oil isn’t going down any time soon.

A lot of the stuff here will be familiar to Seattle greenies, but a couple of booths caught my eye. One had paper products made from elephant dung all the way from Sri Lanka, which seemed fine till I caught myself unconsciously putting its promo sheet in my mouth to free my hands. Apparently elephants are being killed in Sri Lanka not for tusks (few have tusks) or for hides but because they get in the way of agro-business. If they can find a way to make money off elephants, the reasoning goes, the farmers will stop killing them. Not sure how many trees it saves, but one elephant churns out 500 pounds of poop a day.

My show fave is Reware, which makes solar-powered backpacks you can plug your cell phone or iPod or whatever into for recharging while you cycle along in the sunshine, or even, um, bright cloudy days like we have in Seattle (they’re waterproof too). There’s even a fold-out cordura panel for recharging laptops. The bags are pretty sturdy and you can even puncture a panel and have them keep working. You mainly want to avoid surface abrasions (like a sandstorm, for instance) on the clear plastic. A Kenya user sticks his on top of the roof of his jeep. Other folks use them to trickle-charge their car batteries parked at airports during long road trips. And so on. Really clever. I’d write more except my PowerBook is running out of juice…

It is not often that I find myself passionately on the same side of an issue as the likes of Frank Blethen and John Carlson, but that’s the Bizarro World alternate universe I’ll find myself in later today as I join them at Town Hall voicing opposition to the proposed loosening of the FCC’s media ownership rules. This is the FCC’s sixth and final public hearing on media ownership rules, and to show you how much the Republican majority on the commission fears a public backlash, they scheduled it with only five days notice.

All the more reason to fill Seattle’s Town Hall to the rafters. 4PM to 11PM, 8th & Seneca, Seattle.

If you want less localism, less original reporting, less diversity and less independence, then by all means stay home tonight and watch Deal or No Deal, or Friday Night Smackdown. But if you care about maintaining the vibrant and independent media that is final guarantor of our democracy, then I urge you to join me tonight in expressing righteous outrage.

Since when are we taking our cues from these guys?

This isn’t about the personal religious beliefs of a pharmacist. This is about enforcing a religious code that governs the behavior of individuals. Women who want to avoid pregnancy use Plan B to avoid having to make the choice of abortion later. But that’s not good enough, apparently.

I have heard stories from women who go to the drug store to get Plan B. They tell me that the pharmacist has told them that they’re a “whore,” or that they need to find Jesus. This isn’t about a pharmacist’s personal beliefs governing their own actions. It’s about their personal beliefs governing yours.

A lot of court rulings in the news today, and it’s fascinating to hear local talk radio (ie, conservative talk) responding. When the court throws out Tim Eyman’s I-747, because, you know, it violated the Constitution, we get outrage, absolute outrage. And not just at the court, but at the legislature and the governor, who had nothing to do with ruling. (Because that’s the cynical purpose of the outrage, spinning some political advantage for 2008.)

Yet when a federal court throws out the state Pharmacy Board rule requiring pharmacists to fill prescriptions…? [audio:http://horsesass.org/wp-content/uploads/crickets.mp3]

What this tells me is that the folks on the right believe in the rule of law, except when the court rulings don’t go their way, prompting folks like my friend Dori to start talking about an armed tax revolt. Of course, he was only joking. The type of joke that would get a liberal like me labeled a hate talker, or possibly even jailed. But then, we’re the ones with all the guns, so I can understand the distinction.

Speaking of the rule of law, it looks like Lt. Ehrin Watada dodged a bullet — metaphorically this time — when a federal court ruled that military attorneys so totally fucked up his court martial, it would subject Watada to double jeopardy to be tried again. Of course, they could have just discharged Watada for refusing to go to Iraq, say, the way they would a qualified gay soldier who actually believes in this war and wants to fight it, but no, they had to try to make an example of an officer who boldly took a principled stand, whatever the consequences. I’d say the military’s execution of their case against Watada is an apt metaphor for the Bush administration’s execution of it’s war in Iraq: immoral and incompetent.

And nearly as incompetent as the army’s efforts against Watada in the court of law is NBA commissioner David Stern’s efforts on behalf of the Sonics in the court of public opinion:

“If the team moves, there’s not going to be another team there, not in any conceivable future plan that I could envision, and that would be too bad.”

Oh yeah, now that’s going to win you public support. Some rich white guy buys the team and attempts to blackmail local taxpayers out of half a billion dollars… and then you threaten the loyal fans who faithfully supported the team and the league for 40 years? And after one of the team’s Oklahoma City based owners publicly admitted that they never planned to keep the team in Seattle in the first place? Oh, well in that case, here’s your new arena.

Jesus… has Stern bothered to even read our local papers? This is a region where taxpayers refuse to pay for the things they need let alone the things they want, and he’s blaming Frank Chopp? This has nothing to do with Seattle — Clay Bennett and his buddies wanted an NBA team in Oklahoma City, so they went out an bought ours — and if Stern is happy swapping a big market for a little one, that’s up to him. But don’t come back and threaten us that we’ll never get another team because we refused to play ball with a blackmailer.

What an asshole.

The Wallingford Neighbors for Peace and Justice hold discussions on political topics every Friday night at the Keystone Church at 5019 Keystone Place N in Wallingford. This week, they’re looking at the drug war with the film “American Drug War: The Last White Hope”. Here’s who will be there:

Larry Gossett – King County Councilmember
Nora Callahan – Founder and Executive Director of The November Coalition
Chuck Armsbury – Senior Editor of The Razor Wire
Matt McCally – Former Probation Officer
Douglas Hiatt – Criminal Defense Attorney
Sunil Aggarwal – Immediate Past President of Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility

Matt McCally is a member of LEAP (Law Enforcement Against Prohibition). Having thousands of current and former law enforcement officials advocating for ending the drug war is one of the major reasons why public perceptions on this issue have been changing so rapidly.

Oh goodness:

A doctor can’t be held liable for resuscitating a baby who was born without a heartbeat and survived with severe disabilities, the state Supreme Court says.

The baby’s parents filed a malpractice lawsuit after the baby’s 2004 birth. They claimed doctors in Vancouver, Wash., were negligent when they continued to resuscitate the baby for almost half an hour, after he was born without a heartbeat.

The parents also said the medical team should have gotten their consent before continuing to revive the baby.

I don’t know how many XBox’s/toys/TVs/trips to Disney Land you have to buy for your kid to make it up to them, but I’m guessing it’s a lot.

daimajin:

* They counted 1,250 Seattlites of their 5,004 voters. That counts Seattle as 25% of the region instead of 20% as it is. And, in turnouts, Seattle performed worse than other areas.

* Their “rest of King County” did not show where they came up with those 1,998 voters. Were they all in Federal Way or Bothel? It’s a big county.

* They only counted 646 Snohomish County voters, half as many as Seattle voters, when far more Snohomish County folks voted than Seattle folks.

Even if this poll is shoddy, people do care about global warming. Do they care enough to trade in their comfortable, convenient, privately-owned automobile for a city bus?

Maybe you want to talk about something that isn’t Roads and Transit? Anyway, I miss Do-Nothing-Doc. Sure, he wasn’t investigating Tom DeLay or any other Republican corruption. But at least he wasn’t riding herd on the opposition to basic gay rights:

Representative Doc Hastings of Washington, who led the Republican effort to get a vote on the amendment, said he opposed the overall bill in part because many states already had similar laws and because he viewed it as intrusive. “I do not think it is the place of the federal government to legislate how each and every place of business operates,” Mr. Hastings said.

No: the states, counties, and cities where gay rights aren’t protected are the very places where basic gay civil rights are needed the most.

Goldy talked about how he’s going to vote no on everything:

We gave you your gas tax. We gave Ron his buses. But you refused to give us our light rail. And you did so believing that despite being dicked over on the one thing we really wanted, we would remain good progressives, pragmatically voting to tax ourselves for good infrastructure projects, whenever they came our way. Well fuck that.

What’s more, if Ron Sims “green transit package” looks like some BRT, variable tolling piece of shit, then I’m out. Fuck ’em. People who talked absolute shit for months about Prop 1 and then demand that I be reasonable and negotiate? Fuck them. Ron Sims and the Sierra Club savaged the proposed line to Tacoma for months, and I’m supposed to shrug that off and roll with it? Erica C. Barnett’s title says “Pro-Light Rail Enviros May Have Swung Prop. 1 Election.”

Well, but…

The Sierra Club didn’t campaign on a pro-transit theme. They campaigned on an anti-global warming theme (I remember, I was there).

All the players in this game are figuring out what this election means, and what the next step is. I want to see Sound Transit go right back to the voters in November of 2008, a high turnout election where liberals will vote in droves, with the same 50 miles of rail and the rest. To me, anything else is unacceptable, and will get a big fat ‘no’ vote from me.

Dear Pro-Roads/Anti-Rail Guys,

Fuck you. No really… fuck you.

And I’m not just saying “fuck you” out of anger, though hell yeah, I’m pretty damn pissed right now. No, I want you to remember this post as a threat of things to come, rather than just a cussing out for deeds past, for mark my words, you’ve made an enemy, and I hereby promise to do whatever I can to stick Prop 1 so far up your ass you’ll be wiping shit out of your ears with a Q-tip.

You see, you think you were so clever with your $157 billion lie and your SOV-loving Seattle Times endorsement and the way you used the dupes at the Sierra Club to cover for your selfish, car-fetish agenda. But while you may very well have succeeded in killing light rail expansion for a decade or three by defeating Prop 1, I’m going to do my darnedest to turn lemons into more lemons — bitter, spiteful lemons — and vehemently oppose any and all road or bus proposals that subsequently come down the pike. And you know what, I’m guessing that there are an awful lot of Seattle voters who are with me on this.

See, we didn’t just vote to defeat I-912 and preserve the gas tax increase, we progressives fought like hell to defeat it, because raising the gas tax was the responsible, right thing to do. A year later, when Ron Sims came to us and asked for an increase in our regressive sales tax to fund expanded bus service countywide, we Seattle progressives voted for that too. And even when you insisted on tying a roads package to our light rail package, forcing us to vote for highway expansion we didn’t want, we continued to be our usual pragmatic selves, recognizing that some of these roads projects were structurally necessary, while others were politically necessary, and that in the end, the pros outweighed the cons. And then you fucked us.

We gave you your gas tax. We gave Ron his buses. But you refused to give us our light rail. And you did so believing that despite being dicked over on the one thing we really wanted, we would remain good progressives, pragmatically voting to tax ourselves for good infrastructure projects, whenever they came our way. Well fuck that.

Yes, our transportation needs are great, and in some cases desperate, and I’m sure you’re counting on that reality to incrementally achieve everything you want, piece by piece, outside of a mega-package, all the while denying us the one thing that can’t be built incrementally: rail. For example, 520 is just too important to this region, so push comes to shove, Seattle voters just wouldn’t reject funding a new bridge, right? Don’t be so sure.

See, I’m tired of being reasonable. I’m tired of being sensible. I’m tired of being pragmatic, only to have amoral fuckers like you use my pragmatism against me. As far as I’m concerned, the 520 bridge can sink into the fucking lake, I don’t drive it more than three or four times a year anyway. Traffic on I-405? That’s Kemper Freeman Jr.’s problem, not mine. The Viaduct? Screw the Port, screw DOT, screw the state… just tear the fucker down and be done with it. I live in South Seattle. I’ve got my light rail. Everybody else can fend for themselves.

Really.

You opposed Prop 1 because you figured you’d get most of the roads stuff anyway, if incrementally, but hell if I’m going to reward you for your cynicism. I-5’s Ship Canal Bridge could collapse in an earthquake, and I will fight against any tax or fee increase to replace it, unless… we get light rail expansion with it. So here’s the deal: first, you give us rail, and then we’ll give you some roads money, because we clearly can’t trust you the other way around. And if that’s not good enough for you then have fun watching your precious gasoline excise tax revenues eaten away by inflation and declining per capita consumption, because you can’t pass another increase without us.

Sure, it’s just little old me talking right now, but while most Seattleites are too polite to swear like me, and perhaps aren’t quite as spiteful either, I honestly believe you’ve underestimated the depth of opposition you’ve generated through your cynical maneuvering. In relying on the absolutist “no new roads” meme enunciated by your allies at the Sierra Club and The Stranger, you may very well have laid the seeds of your own destruction. That’s a meme I intend to seize upon without compassion or remorse, consequences be damned.

We had the opportunity to work together on a regional transportation solution, but instead you chose to fuck us. Prepare to be fucked back.

Love,
Goldy

One initiative is born. Another initiative dies. Just days after voters approve Tim Eyman’s blatantly unconstitutional and laughably unworkable I-960, the state Supreme Court throws out Timmy’s laughably unconstitutional and blatantly unworkable I-747. It’s the Tim Eyman version of the “circle of life.”

“A voter reading the text of the initiative could believe that he or she was voting to reduce the property tax limit by 1 percent instead of by 5 percent, a substantially different impact on the public coffers, as well as the perceived benefit to the individual voter’s purse,” the majority, led by Justice Bobbe Bridge, wrote.

To sum up the 5-4 decision, the majority ruled that I-747 technically violated the state Constitution, while the dissenters argued that yeah, sorta, but voters weren’t confused. Personally, I’m a big fan of the rule of law, so I side with the majority.

Eyman has passed six initiatives since achieving celebrity status in 1999, four of which have now been thrown out by the courts in whole or in part… with I-960 sure to make number five. And while it would be fun to tease Tim about his woeful inability to write laws that are, you know, legal — and I’d absolutely love to poke fun at the legal eagles who share credit for crafting I-747, state Attorney General Rob McKenna and state Supreme Court Justice Jim Johnson — I think I’d rather take this opportunity to post a more constructive commentary.

Eyman has arrogantly challenged the Legislature to respond to today’s court ruling, and I think they should do exactly that, by reimposing I-747, but at a more realistic limit factor on revenue growth of 4% or inflation, whichever is lower. This would allow local governments to continue to provide services at current levels without being forced to go to voters every couple years for special purpose lid lifts, while providing the kind of budgeting stability afforded the private sector. With energy and health care costs continuing to skyrocket, I-747’s 1% limit factor is simply unsustainable.

At the same time, Democrats in Olympia need to take the lead on providing targeted and meaningful property tax relief to those who need it most, without bankrupting the local governments that provide the bulk of our essential public services. I have long championed a revenue neutral Property Tax Homestead Exemption tied to median county home prices, that would partially reverse a decades long trend in which tax burden has gradually shifted from commercial property and the very wealthy to working and middle income homeowners. But the folks at the Washington State Budget & Policy Center have a better, if more complicated, proposal: a Property Tax Circuit Breaker.

Circuit breakers provide targeted, revenue neutral relief by providing a graduated tax credit that kicks in when property taxes exceed a certain percentage of household income, and unlike a homestead exemption, the credit can be made available to renters and homeowners alike. In a state that earns the dubious honor of having the most regressive tax structure in the nation, a well-designed circuit breaker would not only provide substantial relief to low- and middle-income households — say, a 15% reduction in property taxes — it would also restore a bit of fairness and equity. Lower income households would still pay a higher share of income in property taxes than wealthier households, but the size of the imbalance would be lower.

This is a smart and progressive proposal that lowers property taxes on the majority of voters while raising those on the wealthiest households by only about 2 percent. It is time for Democrats to seize control of this debate from demagogues like Eyman and the GOP leadership, by offering real leadership and real solutions. It is time to approve a property tax circuit breaker.

“Fox News shows more sexualized violence and humiliation than probably any other network — all in the name of condemning it — while under-showing violence in Iraq, all in the name of supporting it.”
— Gloria Steinem

Hell if the family values party would condemn the network that leads the charge in spreading their lies and propaganda. But you can. Sign the petition telling the FCC that you should not be forced to pay for FOX’s smut. Demand a la carte cable.

Is this what Bush means when he talks about supporting our troops?

Veterans make up one in four homeless people in the United States, though they are only 11 percent of the general adult population, according to a report to be released Thursday.

And homelessness is not just a problem among middle-age and elderly veterans. Younger veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are trickling into shelters and soup kitchens seeking services, treatment or help with finding a job.

[…] Some advocates say the early presence of veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan at shelters does not bode well for the future. It took roughly a decade for the lives of Vietnam veterans to unravel to the point that they started showing up among the homeless. Advocates worry that intense and repeated deployments leave newer veterans particularly vulnerable.

“We’re going to be having a tsunami of them eventually because the mental health toll from this war is enormous,” said Daniel Tooth, director of veterans affairs for Lancaster County, Pa.

Not to worry; compassionate conservatives assure me that most of these people want to be homeless.

From the New York Times on Democrats’ attempts to get a sane budget past Bush’s veto pen, our righteous senator hits the nail on the head:

“The president is appealing to a very small conservative base of people, his last few friends in the country, to say, ‘I am conservative,’ ” said Senator Patty Murray of Washington, a Democrat involved in mapping the party’s spending strategy. “But the problem is, he is playing with American lives while he sends his message to his friends.”