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If there’s any lingering doubt that the U.S. Department of Justice is in a serious state of disrepair, this video from TPM of the Attorney General’s testimony from yesterday should put that to rest.

UPDATE: This is also an open thread.

There can be little disagreement that the Bush administration is badly tarnishing the Republican brand. But does this damage actually affect whether or not people identify themselves as a Republican?

That is the question I examined at Hominid Views using current and historical poll data that reports party affiliation of respondents. At the national level the fraction who claim to be Democrats has been relatively stable over the last 3.5 years. But the fraction claiming to be Republican has been declining with a corresponding increase in the number of independents.

In Washington state, however, a subtly different pattern emerges over the last two years. Democratic party identity has increased substantially while both Republican and independent identity have declined. The most recent SurveyUSA poll recorded a Democratic affiliation for 40% of the respondents and Republican affiliation for 21% of the respondents. If real, that is a remarkable 2:1 advantage for Democrats!

Is this just an outlier? Perhaps this is the consequence of damage brought on by BushCo? Or maybe the Washington State Republican’s antics are causing real damage to the party?

I report, you decide. The graphical tour begins here.

I had the chance to hear Rodney Tom speak before the 48th District Democrats last week, and while he touched on education and the Iraq war, he led off his nascent stump speech by arguing that the primary race was mostly about beating Dave Reichert. One of his main critiques of Darcy Burner’s 2006 campaign was her relatively poor showing in Pierce County, where she garnered only 42.6 percent of the vote. Tom argues that he is a better fit to this more conservative, blue collar part of the 8th Congressional District. (Apparently because these voters strongly identify with wealthy, Lexus-driving, Medina realtors, I guess.)

The Tacoma News Tribune picked up on this theme yesterday with an article titled “Pierce vote important to Reichert challengers.”

Last year, as she prepared to challenge Republican Dave Reichert for the U.S. House, Darcy Burner said it would take significant Pierce County support for her to win.

She was right. Burner received only 304 fewer votes than Reichert out of over 200,000 cast in King County. But the Pierce County part of the congressional district remained loyal to the Republican, giving Reichert some 7,000 more votes than his Democratic challenger.

Hmm. I know this may sound counterintuitive, but the fact is, Burner lost the race in King County, not Pierce, where despite losing by more than 7,000 votes, she came pretty damn close to meeting or beating expectations. It was the King County results that proved disappointing, and a look back at previous elections explains why.

In 2006 Burner captured 42.6 percent of the vote in Pierce County, more than any other 8th CD Democrat since 1990. In 2004 by comparison, Dave Ross received only 39.1 of the Pierce vote, less than a half-percent better than the best effort by the much maligned Heidi Behrens-Benedict. Burner knew that to beat Reichert she had to do substantially better than previous Democrats in Pierce County. And she did.

In fact according to campaign insiders, Burner’s 3.5 point improvement over Ross (and nearly 7 point improvement over the ten-year average,) was right on target. All it would have taken to win the race was a very attainable 51.8 percent of the vote in the more Democratic King County portion of the district. But it didn’t happen. Late absentees broke decidedly towards Reichert, and Burner ended up losing King County by a few hundred votes out of over 200,000 cast.

Clearly, Tom is more conservative than Darcy, but then so was Ross, and to argue that this somehow makes Tom more electable simply isn’t supported by the facts. Burner did relatively well in Pierce County, a Republican stronghold, and with high name ID, increased turnout and presidential coattails, she’ll likely do even better. Unless, of course, I’m totally underestimating Pierce County’s Lexus-driving Medina realtor vote.

And one more balloon to burst before I go:

Tom supporters note the anti-Republican wave that swept the nation last year and say Burner had her chance to ride it to victory.

What a load of crap. Republicans held 232 House seats going into the 2006 election, and only 22 incumbents lost. Only 22. The GOP poured everything it had into defending Reichert; Karl Rove made WA-08 his number one target. And yet a total unknown with no prior campaign experience came within a silver hair of defeating “the Sheriff.”

Underestimate Burner at your own risk.

The Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally meets tonight (and every Tuesday), 8PM at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels will be stopping by tonight, so please join us for some hot conversation, washed down with some icy cold brew.

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

Yesterday I announced a break from my longstanding (near) zero-moderation policy, warning that blatantly off-topic comments, copyright violations and sock puppetry would no longer be tolerated. Today Slog announced a “new” comment moderation policy of its own:

The Stranger’s Blog Comments Policy

We remove comments that are off topic, threatening, or commercial in nature, and we do not allow sock-puppetry (impersonating someone else)—or any kind of puppetry, for that matter. We never censor comments based on ideology.

Define “threatening.” But other than that, that’s pretty much the same standard we intend to follow here on HA. Repeat violators will be banned, joining the infamous JCH in comment thread purgatory.

I’d say the HA community has been very cooperative, and overwhelmingly supportive. I’ve personally only deleted a single comment thus far… and that was a mistake. Thanks.

(Taken at Broadway and John on Capitol Hill by Dominic Holden of The Stranger)

Everytime I hear somebody say “instead of rail, let’s add more buses,” this is the image that pops into my mind: a line of buses snarled after a bus breaks down in an intersection.

This is an Open Thread.

Those were Sen. Joe Biden’s words at the end of the debate after the the candidates were subjected to another weird question from YouTube land.

Some thoughts on the candidates:

Gravel: Why is he still allowed into these debates?

Dodd: He’s growing on me. There isn’t a question he doesn’t want to answer. Years in the US Senate haven’t dulled his edge.

Edwards: He doesn’t attack well, and it shows in these “debates.” But, when given a chance, can find the thread and run with it in a passionate way.

Clinton: She’s the smartest, best equipped candidate in the race. She has a great grasp of issues. She’s in the lead because she hasn’t had to attack yet.

Obama: I don’t get how the nat’l media folks see him as naive. He’s not, but he does have a sort of “over-thinking” quality, reminiscent of Gore circa 2000. He needs to get out of his own way once in a while.

Richardson: I’m surprised how by how little I liked his performance. With the background he has, you’d think he’d be taking it to Obama and Edwards. He hasn’t. I get the “he’s running for VP” vibe from him. Still, I’m ready to see what he does later in the race.

Biden: He’s not afraid to say unpopular things. But what a mistake to openly mock the gun owner from MI! Still, Biden is relatively bullshit-free. Even though I know he’s a longtime pol, I don’t want to write him off. He could be a factor (but probably not) later on.

Kucinich: If ever there was a worse spokesman for his ideas, Dennis is it.

I thought Anderson Cooper did a pretty good job. They could have given some candidates more time. Some of the YouTube questions were overly schlocky and schmaltzy, but the format is here to stay.

But next time, Jon Stewart hosts! I wish.

I think you know how this works by now, so let’s get to it starting nationally:

* The bullshit artists sure like to make up things about presidential candidates and potential presidential candidates. Speaking of make up, the fact that Mitt Romney spent almost $700 on one makeup session proves that John Edwards’ haircut is horrible. Hillary Clinton wore clothing appropriate for DC in the summer, so clearly that’s bad. Obama supports teaching children age appropriate sex ed, the horror. And Al Gore’s daughter’s husband’s family had a food that has been available at Whole Foods since 1999, and was, you know, “from one of the world’s few well-managed, sustainable populations of toothfish, and caught and documented in compliance with Marine Stewardship Council regulations” so clearly he’s the devil.

* Hew Hughitt thinks that trying to end the war will hurt Democrats, you know, because he cares about helping us out politically. But maybe the horrible war is, you know, just branded wrong.

* And of course the democrats constantly need to have a Sister Souljah moment. No matter how wingnutty the rightwing base is, no matter how in lock step the top tier is on the most compellingly shitty foreign policy decision in this country in decades and possibly ever, only Democrats ever seem to need to distance themselves from their base. You know, anti-war folks who were either right all along, or who have since come to the right side long ago on again, the most important thing on the election by miles.

Locally,

* Dave Reichert still doesn’t have a record of bi-partisanship or independence. As if there was ever any doubt.

* Darryl and The Olympian are calling bullshit on one of Dino Rossi’s main campaign totally not a campaign themes.

* Will has already mentioned Gary Randall, but tee hee hee.

Seattle Times:

The state’s new domestic partnership law, which went into effect Sunday, gives gay and lesbian couples some of the rights granted to married couples, including the right to visit a partner in the hospital, inherit a partner’s property without a will and make funeral arrangements.

To qualify, the couples must file an affidavit of domestic partnership with the Secretary of State’s Office. The state then gives them a certificate with a state seal, and plastic cards that say “State registered domestic partnership” and lists their names. On the back it cites the chapter where the law can be viewed.

But not everybody is happy:

Gary Randall, president of the Faith and Freedom Network, a Christian political organization, said last week that his group has no plans to demonstrate today, but that doesn’t mean it approves of the new law.

“I’m disappointed, and I don’t think it should be happening,” said Randall, who considers the law a steppingstone to gay marriage. “I think it deteriorates society. Over time it takes away from what is the most important cornerstone of society, and that’s marriage between a man and woman.”

Notice how Gary doesn’t approve of the law, but he isn’t sending in the anti-gay shock troops just yet. You see, normal people (even many conservatives!) think that there is nothing overtly weird about a person visiting a loved one in the hospital, even if they are both of the same sex. Gary knows he’s on the wrong side of public opinion, so he’s doing his best to tie domestic partnerships to something not as popular: gay marriage. He knows fighting this law is a loser for his side, so he’s keeping his powder dry.

So Gary is reduced to getting the second quote in newspaper articles like this one. In the future, I hope for his sake that he can manage a less limp-dicked response than “I don’t think it should be happening.”

On a similar note, comedian Louis CK has a bit in his act where he explains how the gay marriage was argued in court in Massachusetts:

I can imagine when they get to the Supreme Court and the lawyers for the gay side say:

“Well your honor, we pay taxes, there’s nothing illegal about what we do, we’re the same as anyone else, why shouldn’t we get the same protection under the law as the heterosexuals get?”

And then they ask the lawyers [for the other side] and they say:

[Thick Boston accent] “THEY’RE FUCKING QUEER!!! THEY’RE FUCKING QUEER!!!”

So basically, Gary Randall’s response is “they’re fucking queer!” And that’s all he’s got.

***THERE’S MORE***

You can watch the Louis C.K. clip here.

Also, according to HA’s Lee:

Gary Randall was also pissed that a Hindu was allowed to give a prayer in front of Congress. The man is loco.

http://effinunsound.com/?p=424

Nice.

Dino Rossi’s idea man wants us to stop being so mean to the poor pedophiles in the Catholic Church:

One of things that has always distinguished HA from most other blogs is the unmoderated, no holds barred nature of the comment threads, and the nasty, brutish and often profane political bloodsport that they produce. No stranger to vitriol and foul language, I never felt it my place to impose more solemn standards on the HA community.

But really, enough is enough. It is one thing to abuse me personally, but it is entirely another to abuse the whole HA community by hijacking threads with intentionally off-topic comments. I have no obligation, ethical or otherwise, to continue to tolerate this deliberate trolling, and the deliberate disruption of legitimate debate on important issues of the day, especially in the face of the constant and baseless accusations that I have been blocking comments. (TIP: I don’t have the time to read most of my comments, let alone censor them.)

So as of this moment I am imposing new policies regarding comment thread moderation. The following type of comments will no longer be tolerated:

• Deliberately off-topic comments (except in “open threads”), as well as pointless comments on these comments.
• Deliberately repetitive comments, particularly those intended to repeat and a reinforce slander that has already been sufficiently debunked.
• Large chunks of cut-and-paste from copyrighted works or other blogs and comment threads.
• Blatant sock puppetry.

Each of my co-bloggers are now free to delete comments on their own posts based on their own arbitrary interpretation of these standards, while Darryl and I have global moderation privileges. Repeat offenders will be banned. And don’t be surprised to see these standards imposed sporadically and selectively. This is my blog. Life isn’t fair.

My advice to the rest of you is please don’t feed the trolls. Ignore the off-topic comments and the abusers who post them. When you comment on this garbage, you only encourage them. Comments on deleted comments will likely be deleted too, so as not to disrupt the flow of the thread. And if you absolutely feel the need to discuss some off-topic issue, or announce some sort of breaking news, please save it for an “Open Thread,” which will now be graciously provided on a daily or more frequent basis.

Tonight on “The David Goldstein Show”, 7PM to 10PM on Newsradio 710-KIRO:

7PM: Is nothing sacred?
Politics is a dirty business, but are there any areas of a candidate’s life that is absolutely off limits? Writing on Slog, Josh Feit frets that it is “tacky to report on a politician’s religion,” before proceeding to report on Rep. Dave Reichert’s active membership in the ultra-fundamentalist Missouri Synod Lutheran Church. If Reichert’s religion is off limits, why not John Edwards’ haircut or Bill Clinton’s sex life… or the fact that Laura Bush killed her boyfriend?

8PM: But what about the pie crust?
King County bans Crisco! Oh no! Erika Nuerenberg, Senior Advisor to King County Council member Julia Patterson, and Trent House, Dir. Government Affairs for the Washington Restaurant Association, will join me for the hour talk about the county’s ban on trans-fat, and new nutritional labeling requirements for chain restaurants.

9PM: Prison overcrowding: supply or demand?
We’re running out of space in our region’s local jails. Is it time to start building more prisons, or maybe start treating drug addiction as a public health problem rather than a criminal one?

Tune in tonight (or listen to the live stream) and give me a call: 1-877-710-KIRO (5476).

Apparently, our region’s prisons are running out of space:

Starting in 2012, King County plans to no longer house most drunken drivers, prostitutes, small-scale drug users and other misdemeanor offenders, prompting cities south and east of Seattle to start planning to build new jails in their communities.

Officials in Snohomish, Pierce and Spokane counties may follow suit and keep misdemeanor offenders from being booked into their main county jails. Although King County’s two jails in Seattle and Kent still have room for offenders, projections show the jails reaching full capacity in about a decade.

The region’s cities currently contract with the counties to house many of their misdemeanor offenders, but will soon be faced with the expense of building more jail space of their own. Or… perhaps we might want to consider not locking up misdemeanor, nonviolent drug offenders?

Whatever you think about the dangers of illicit drug use, few would argue that the “war on drugs” is working. Drug use is primarily a public health issue, not a criminal one, and studies show that it would be much more effective and less expensive to treat it as such. And apart from the obvious ill effects of smoking, there is little science to suggest that casual marijuana use is any more dangerous to the individual or society than casual drinking.

Cities pay King County $197.23 for each misdemeanor inmate booked into the jail, plus $103.17 per inmate, per day; drug treatment, by comparison, is a relative bargain. Throughout the state, over 70-percent of each county’s general fund is spent on their criminal justice system, and politicians who have made a career of railing against high taxes and wasteful government spending, are also typically the first to demand a “tough on crime,” “lock ’em up and throw away the key” approach to all sorts of social ills, real and perceived.

But if prison overcrowding is an issue of both supply and demand, it might behoove us as a society to examine both sides of the equation.