HorsesAss.Org

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.”

Old White Guys Against Rail. These guys are the real winners when Prop 1 went down. I bet their old bellies are full of whiskey and Ensure right about now:

Photo credit: Tom Reese of the Seattle Times.

Ughhhhh.

I think Eli Sanders really captures the sad irony of Pat Robertson’s endorsment of Rudy Giuliani:

See how that works? Let your followers know that you agree that legalized abortion and gay rights were responsible for 9/11, and then, a few years later, endorse a man who is for legalized abortion and gay rights, saying he’s the only person who can defend the country against the “bloodlust of Islamic terrorists.”

Josh Marshall has some fun with it too:

As I noted earlier, Robertson’s reasoning is that God has withdrawn his protection from us because of America’s collective embrace of a godless, secular, gay-loving culture. When you put that together with his claim today that Rudy, a paragon of the secular culture, is the one to protect us from the terrorist hordes, the upshot seems to be that Robertson has more confidence in Rudy’s leadership and national security skills than he does in God’s. And that’s one hell of an endorsement.

Yeah sure, I’m depressed over yesterday’s election, but when I sat down to write a thorough race-by-race analysis and looked for a clear message in last night’s results, two things immediately jumped out at me: A) a thorough race-by-race analysis would take me days to write; and B) there is no clear message in last night’s results. So I think I’ll discard with A), opting instead for a series of individual posts analyzing individual races and issues. As for B), I suppose that’s the silver lining to the dark clouds filling my head today, for while yesterday’s election certainly sucked — and sucked hard — I see nothing to suggest any long term good news for the folks on the other side.

In purely partisan terms, yesterday’s election says very little. Republicans won the only truly contested partisan race in King County, but they did so on a bullshit theme of non-partisanship, so while they certainly keep the tactical advantage of holding the PAO, it’s kinda hard to argue that this is in anyway an embrace of Republican values. (As for my friend Jim Nobles… how does it feel to draw a substantially smaller percentage of the vote than Richard Pope?) Meanwhile, across the county line to the north, Democrats romped in high profile Snohomish County council races, while Democrat John Lovick appears to be squeaking by in the nominally non-partisan sheriff’s contest.

Across the region Republicans continue to hold their own in so-called “non-partisan” races, though that’s always difficult to analyze when candidates refuse to cop to their party allegiance and our local media plays a complicit role in perpetrating the charade. Still, progressive candidates appear to be making gains in both Whatcom County and Tacoma, while Gael Tarleton’s win means control of the Seattle Port Commission now hinges on the outcome of the nail-biter between incumbent reformer Alec Fisken and pro-business lackey Bill Bryant. We’ll see.

Looking to the ballot measures for trends is equally fruitless. Prop 1 infamously split the progressive community, so there’s no clear message from voters there, other than the usual “we want more, but we don’t want to pay for it” crap, while I-960’s public policy disaster is emblematic of the same muddled thinking. R-67 was simply a battle between good and evil, and the failure of Simple Majority… well… um… I’m just stumped.

Of course, all this took place within a national context, and there Democrats have reason to be optimistic. Dems lost the governor’s mansion in the southern state of Louisiana, but picked up one in a bloodbath in the border state of Kentucky. Dems also picked up Senate majorities in Virginia and Mississippi, while expanding legislative majorities in Maine, New Jersey and New York. As for Ohio, that continues to be a disaster in the making for Republicans, where Dems now hold the mayor’s office in the once red state’s ten largest cities. Ouch.

So what does this all say about our local prospects for 2008? Not all that much. But if you’re a “no news is good news” kinda person, then I suppose that might take a bit of the sting out yesterday’s very disappointing election.

UPDATE:
Of course, I didn’t even mention turnout. Turnout sucked. Yet another reason not to read too much into these results. Apparently, Republicans turned out a bit better than Dems, but I’m told the real fall off was with independents… who tend to vote with the Dems on many issues.

I’m traveling and unable to divine the full gestalt of Tuesday’s vote, but from where I sit it sure appears that the electorate spoke with a much better vocabulary than the eighth-grade level usually assigned it. (I recognize I’m in the minority here but that’s the great thing about this blog, people can disagree. At least, that’s what I’m told. If the Cow of Political Correctness falls off a cliff onto my van, HA readers will know the reason why.)

Back to those astute voters. On Prop 1, they seemed to get that building more highways simply adds more traffic. They knew a Trojan Horse when they saw one — a blank check to the road lobby in the guise of a jolly green transit giant. My feeling is the region is ready for transit, yearns for transit, will vote for transit — but wants to proceed project by project, spur by spur, to keep the process on task and costs accountable. On R-67, who would’ve thunk? With all those ad dollars being spent on how the insurance industry is our friend! I wonder how many voters thought, each time they got hit with one of those commercials, “Gee, if only that money could go toward lowering my health insurance rates!” Or even — d’ya think? — providing coverage their policies say they’re providing.

David Della tried to smear Tim Burgess, but voters ultimately recognized Della as the feckless incumbent without a cause he really was. I’ve sat through entire Council committee meetings supposedly chaired by Della where he barely asked a question, and Jan Drago had to step in and run the thing. Our own little George Bush, an accidental officeholder with no political acumen or even an identifiable constituency, has been blessedly sent back to the private sector. Won’t we all be intrigued to see what it can do with him now.

As for poor Venus, can we please clarify why she lost so miserably? It was not because she was charged with drunk driving. It was how she handled the process and aftermath of being charged with drunk driving. When she said she was not impaired, what stuck in people’s minds was the word “impaired.” As further evidence of her ability to comport herself under pressure, she told reporters after results rolled in, “I am not talking to you tonight.”

Admittedly, my theory of an Enlightened Elector kind of falls apart with the school levy and Eyman measures. Maybe this crowd can see through hype and hypocrisy, but isn’t too good at percentages. Sherman should have won, and Jane Hague should not have been able to beat a garden gnome (maybe her secret was not saying the word “impaired”). Still, what I’m taking from this election is that not all campaigns are about big bucks. It used to be that dollars could deliver at the polls no matter what was right. This time around, people were talking, turning a lot of those paid political announcements into expensive white noise.

Go ahead, all you trolls, get it out of your system. It was an utterly crappy night for folks like me, and while I wouldn’t say any individual race was a surprise in itself, the fact that they nearly all went the wrong way (from my perspective) was a huge disappointment. Off the top of my head I think I only voted for three winners yesterday: the two Port Commission races and R-67. (And Alec Fisken’s victory isn’t entirely in the bag yet.)

A more thorough analysis later.

So much for the euphoria of last year, when everything went well.

First, the numbers, as of 4:30 AM, skipping uncontested races. Then, some observations. (And I’m sure Goldy will also chime in later this morning.)

I-960: Yes, 476511 (52.4%); No, 432811 (47.6%)
Referendum 67: Approved, 520667 (56.9%); Rejected, 393924 (43.1%)
Substitute Senate Joint Resolution 8206: Approved, 603168 (68.0%); Rejected, 283238 (32.0%)
Senate Joint Resolution 8212: Approved, 532253 (60.1%); Rejected, 352683 (39.9%)
Engrossed House Joint Resolution 4204: Rejected, 472938 (51.9%); Approved, 438815 (48.1%)
Substitute House Joint Resolution 4215: Approved, 464518 (53.0%); Rejected, 411785 (47.0%)
RTID, Proposition One: No, 66549 (55.1%); Yes, 54086 (44.9%)
RTA (Sound Transit), Proposition One: No, 66450 (55.1%); Yes, 54058 (44.9%)
King County Initiative 25: Yes, 81012 (60.4%); No, 53031 (39.6%)
King County Proposition One (Medic One): Approved, 113201 (80.6%); Rejected, 27270 (19.4%)
Prosecuting Attorney: Dan Satterburg (R), 72857 (54.2%); Bill Sherman (D), 61234 (45.6%)
Assessor: Scott Noble (D), 91673 (69.4%); Jim Nobles (R), 40263 (30.5%)
County Council, District 6: Jane Hague (R), 9071 (57.2%); Richard Pope (D), 6395 (40.3%)
County Council, District 8: Dow Constantine (D), 10668 (74.8%); John Potter (R), 3562 (25.0%)
Port of Seattle, Position 2: Gael Tarleton, 61419 (51.3%); Bob Edwards, 57312 (48.1%)
Port of Seattle, Position 5: Alec Fisken, 59502 (50.8%); Bill Bryant, 57194 (48.8%)
Seattle City Council #1: Jean Godden, 29420 (71.8%); Joe Szwaja, 11396 (27.8%)
Seattle City Council #:3 Bruce Harrell, 24845 (60.8%); Venus Velazquez, 15883 (38.9%)
Seattle City Council #7: Tim Burgess, 24311 (61.3%); David Della, 15164 (38.3%)
Seattle City Council #9: Sally Clark, 28814 (74.4%); Judy Fenton, 9758 (25.2%)
Seattle School Board, District #1: Sally Soriano, 25966 (38.3%); Peter Maier, 41593 (61.4%)
Seattle School Board, District #2: Sherry Carr, 37402 (58.2%); Darlene Flynn, 26661 (41.5%)
Seattle School Board, District #3: Harium Martin-Morris, 45366 (72.2%); David Blomstrom, 17082 (27.2%)
Seattle School Board, District #6: Steve Sundquist, 39519 (60.5%); Mari Ramirez, 25612 (39.2%)
City of Seattle Charter Amendment 17: Yes, 31853 (73.9%); No, 11262 (26.1%)
City of Seattle Charter Amendment 18: Yes, 31679 (74.1%); No, 11076 (25.9%)

Thoughts: Ugh. The RTID/Sound Transit Prop. One goes down, putting our region back to square one for transportation planning, with no inkling as to whether voters said “no” because they don’t like roads, don’t like light rail, didn’t like these particular road projects or the routing for light rail, didn’t like the price tag, didn’t like the regressive tax, or didn’t like the legislature tying the fate of two separate measures together. Or any combination of the above.

Eyman wins; repealing our antiquated supermajority for school levies goes down; we’ll get an elected Elections Director on King County’s ballot next year. At least voters (a majority, anyway) weren’t fooled by the insurance industry’s millions, and R.-67 passed.

However, the WSRP’s (probably illegally earmarked) last-minute infusion of cash stole the Prosecuting Attorney’s election for Ken Satterburg over Bill Sherman. And the last-minute infusion of self-inflicted stupidity doomed the Steinbrueck-anointed Venus Velazquez and incumbent David Della, giving us two more regressive new voices on city council instead. (And note that over two percent – a very high number – opted for write-ins in the Hague/Pope race.) We’re stuck with Jean Godden for four more years, too. Oh, and the downtown establishment/Seattle Times campaign to vilify the school board paid off handsomely: “they” have “their” board back, with two incumbents being bounced handily and the progressive (Maria Ramirez) losing out in the only other truly contested race.

Eccch.

In other news:

Pakistan is going to hell in a handbasket as Bush watches helplessly, having backed yet another unpopular dictator;

Republicans joined a House vote to override President Bush’s veto of a water spending bill, handing Bush his first veto-proof majority. On the flip side, two Democrats joined all Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee to approve Michael Mukasey’s nomination as Attorney General; he’s expected to sail through the full Senate shortly.

And finally at the national level, the House spent a good deal of time yesterday debating Rep. Dennis Kucinich’s bill to impeach Vice President Dick Cheney. Improbably, a move to table the measure, backed by the Democratic leadership, failed when Republicans started voting to debate the measure — calculating, as did the Dem leadership, that such debate would serve to embarrass the Democrats. (Or maybe not. After all, several polls have suggested that a majority of Americans favor impeaching Cheney.) In any event, Steny Hoyer did the next best thing by referring the measure back to the House Judiciary Committee, where John Conyers Jr. has already sat on it for seven months.

And over at the Seattle Times, once you work your way past the election coverage, there’s this classic lede from an AP story:

A Chelan County fire chief says a couple were lucky they weren’t killed by a cow that fell off a cliff and smashed their minivan.

I guess someone should mention them as of 10:45. A better round-up to come tomorrow, I think:

* Well Roads and Transit failed, so maybe we can address public transit in 2009 if we’re very lucky. In the mean time, busses. Yippie.

* In Seattle city council, it’s everybody you expected, and Burgess in the only really contested race. 159 write-ins. Could they all be Heidi Wills?

* Tim Eyman is a horses’ ass who just passed an unconstitutional ballot measure, presumably to tie up the Democratic legislature next year before being tossed.

* In suburbia, having married Goldy seems not to help your political career, but it’s too close to call, I think. Being my buddy is better luck for Maren Norton for Shoreline Schools.

* Being a blogger (and a write in candidate) didn’t help Jimmy at all for Richland City Council. Still 10% for a write-in ain’t bad.

* In Oregon, Measure 49 to do something to Measure 37 that I don’t really care about because I’m not from a state that passed that stupid initiative in the first damn place looks like it’s failing (.pdf) but I am having a hell of a time navigating their elections web page.

Dem landslide in Kentucky:

Beshear & Mongiardo D 619,654 58.7% percent of the vote
Fletcher & Rudolph R 435,857 41.3% percent of the vote

The ethically challenged Gov. Ernie Fletcher gets tossed by a big margin. Democrats also win/retain AG, Treasurer, Auditor.

Kos says:

Also, State Auditor Crit Luallen is cruising to reelection with around 62% of the vote. All eyes will be on her soon to see if she jumps in the KY-Sen race against Mitch McConnell.

The Kentucky GOP had fought hard to dump Fletcher in favor of a former Rep. Anne Northup (who was canned in ’06). Now, what was previously unthinkable is now plausible: Minority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell will face a top-shelf Democrat in ’08, and the Kentucky Dems will be fired up.

And in Virginia, Dems are poised to take the state senate.

Mississippi: GOP Gov. Barbour wins big. Unlike everyone else, Barbour held it together during Katrina. Benefit of low expectations to be sure, the race was never close.

That’s it for now. SF Mayor Gavin Newsom will likely win, as will Houston Mayor Bill White. I like both of them, especially Bill White. He’s going places. He’ll make a great Secretary of Commerce for the next Democratic president.

I won’t update for the rest of the night, so that’s it. Stay safe and don’t drive drunk.

The Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally meets tonight (and every Tuesday), 8PM at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E.

Of course, tonight is election night, so expect a greater flow of folks in and out of DL this evening. I’ll be arriving a little late, and leaving a little early, party hopping, depending on results, and how happy or depressed I am.

I’m really at a loss to predict how things will turn out. Money has played a huge role in a number races which would have easily been one-sided without the huge influx of cash on the other side (some of it illegal.) R-67 shouldn’t even be close, but $12 million bucks buys you an awful lot of votes, and of course Bill Sherman should have had a comfortable win in this 2-to-1 Democratic district if not for the $300,000 in unopposed TV selling Satterberg as the non-partisan he’s not. And then there’s Prop 1, where months of lying ads have convinced untold voters that the Roads and Transit package has a $157 billion price tag. We’ll see.

Either way, I don’t expect to live blog tonight unless something extraordinary happens (and I have access to a computer,) but I’ll post a full wrap-up in the morning.

Not in Seattle? Liberals will also be drinking tonight in the Tri-Cities. A full listing of Washington’s thirteen Drinking Liberally chapters is available here.

… And worse than Nixon:

Meanwhile, Bush reached an unwelcome record. By 64%-31%, Americans disapprove of the job he is doing. For the first time in the history of the Gallup Poll, 50% say they “strongly disapprove” of the president. Richard Nixon had reached the previous high, 48%, just before an impeachment inquiry was launched in 1974.

The only politician with lower approval ratings than Bush is Vice President Dick Cheney, hovering somewhere near absolute zero, which I suppose might explain why 165 House Republicans just voted in favor of impeaching Cheney. Um… no it doesn’t. They were just playing a stupid political game. Republicans apparently want 2008 to be about impeachment, because they think it will somehow help their cause, whereas Democrats are too pussified to challenge their logic. Thus, despite the fact that Cheney most certainly deserves to be impeached (and probably tried for war crimes,) it’ll never happen. That’s what really makes this administration’s crimes “worse than Watergate”… we allow them to go unpunished.

BONUS:
Enjoy this peek at one of the Republicans who wants to succeed Bush: