HorsesAss.Org

From yesterday’s Seattle Times:

Safeco plans to lay off or reassign at least 240 employees as part of a restructuring program meant to cut $75 million from the company’s annual expenses by the end of 2006.

Most of those employees will lose their jobs, spokesman Paul Hollie said. The nationwide cuts are across all departments and affect about 80 employees in the Puget Sound area, he said.

Hmm. Let’s see now. Safeco plans to lay off about 240 employees to save about $75 million annually. That’s a savings of about $312,500 per employee.

And yet, Safeco’s board renegotiated Mike?™ McGavick’s exit package — after he’d already announced his resignation — to give him a $28 million golden parachute.

How much is $28 million really worth to Safeco? Well apparently, that’s about equal to 90 jobs that otherwise wouldn’t have to be cut. Or to put it into starker perspective, the $2 million of McGavick’s “own money” that he’s already put into his campaign might have saved at least 6 Safeco employees their livelihood.

I’m just saying.

In his primary night victory speech, Mike?™ McGavick went on the attack.

With Social Security going broke already, I don’t think paying benefits to illegal workers makes sense. And yet Sen. Cantwell voted to keep that practice in place.

But as Josh Feit points out over on Slog, that’s just plain uncivil:

These are direct attacks on Cantwell’s opposition to an amendment that would have prevented former illegal immigrants (who had paid into the Social Security system) from getting those payments back when they become legal.

Social Security does not pay benefits to illegal residents; what McGavick wants to do is deny legal residents from drawing benefits based on what they paid into the system when they were illegal.

Hey… you know what’s illegal Mike? Driving with a 0.17 blood-alcohol level. Maybe we should deny Social Security benefits to you and your family?

The amendment in question failed 50-49 with 11 Republicans voting with 39 Democrats. So much for McGavick’s claims of bipartisanship.

I was going to ignore them, but it’s so hard to pass up such a golden opportunity to illustrate how my friends at (un)Sound Politics have frittered away any credibility they might have once held with local journalists. Um… it has something to do with lying.

First there was Stefan’s dig…

Goldstein’s other coup this week was to predicted [sic] that Doc Hastings would be defeated in the primary. (He won 77% to 23%). Keep up the good work, David. At this rate, soon you’ll be making Joni Balter look good!

And then Stefan’s puppy Eric picks up on the meme, talking about how my “euphoria prompted some puzzling preening” about Hastings.

Only problem is, I never predicted Doc Hastings would be defeated. Never. Never ever. In fact, here’s the post they mock:

It turns out that Hastings is facing a surprisingly tough challenge from Benton County Commissioner Claude Oliver, and some Republican insiders are even predicting an Oliver upset in tomorrow’s GOP primary.

Quite frankly, I find this hard to believe, but if Oliver even comes close to Hastings tomorrow it will speak volumes about the degree to which even the Republican base is just plain sick and tired of corruption, incompetence and intransigence from their own national leaders.

Hmm. I simply reported what I was told by two different sources in the 4th CD — that Republican insiders were really excited about Oliver’s chances. And then I wrote that I didn’t believe it. That’s some prediction, huh?

(In fact, 77% in a primary is nothing to cheer about for a six-term incumbent. Whatever the reasons, a sizable chunk of Republicans are clearly unhappy with Hastings.)

Of course, (u)SP’s posts are only petty sniping… the kind of childish snarkery that makes our adversarial relationship so much fun. (And stupid.) But it is also typical of the kind of intellectually lazy rhetorical subterfuge that Stefan routinely passes off as fact. But then, what do you expect from a man so disconnected from realty that he frightens his Everquest meetup group?

Should Peter Goldmark and Darcy Burner go on to lose in November, you can be sure that me and my fellow netroots denizens will be in for some uninspired (u)SP-style taunting, but of course, they would be missing the point entirely… for we already won. Our tireless support for Burner and Goldmark was never about predicting the outcome — it was about influencing it.

We didn’t help make Burner a credible candidate by merely saying she was one, we did it by convincing people she is credible, and by persuading them to donate time and money to her campaign. We did it by feeding and perpetuating the very real buzz that was building around Burner’s candidacy, and by helping her amplify it to the point where journalists and party officials could ignore the buzz no longer.

And now we’re doing the same for Goldmark — not attempting to do it, but doing it. No doubt Goldmark is a longer shot than Burner, and in both races the incumbent still holds the advantage. But even the experts in the other Washington — folks like Congressional Quarterly and the DCCC — have opened their eyes to the fact that Goldmark has a legitimate shot at winning… and that’s the first hurdle any challenger has to overcome.

And we’re even raising money, something I didn’t believe bloggers could do heading into this campaign season. Burner has now raised over $98,000 from various ActBlue pages, and HA readers alone have contributed an impressive $8,243 to the Burner and Goldmark campaigns combined. We’re making a difference!

As for (u)SP, well… hey Stefan… how’s that Doug Roulstone insurgency going for you?

Truth is, Stefan is just plain jealous. Jealous of the growing influence of us liberal bloggers in the face of the obvious political impotence of him and his fellow (un)Sounders. But then, to be fair to Stefan, from a grass roots perspective he was always at a disadvantage, being little more than a local mouthpiece for the neo-con’s top-down message machine, whereas us liberal “nutroots” are filling a vacuum, building a brand new media infrastructure from the ground up.

You see, (u)SP is nothing more than a stiffly written, amateur knockoff of the Wall Street Journal op/ed page, whereas HA is part of a movement.

Will Burner and Goldmark win in November? I dunno. A helluva lot of money is going to pour into WA-08 over the next few weeks and my gut feeling is that, barring an October surprise or some major campaign screwup or scandal… the best ads win. As for Goldmark, in Tuesday’s primary he out-polled McMorris in Okanogan County, proving that he can do damn well in traditionally Republican farm country. Whether Goldmark has the time to get his message out across his sprawling district, well, that’s up to him and his schedulers. Whether he has the money to get his message out, well, that’s up to you. (Hint: give now.)

All I know is that they’re both great candidates, they’ll both make tremendous representatives, and they both have legitimate shots at winning. I’m cautiously optimistic.

But win or lose I’m absolutely confident that our nascent, local netroots movement played a significant role in helping to force Republicans to divert substantial amounts of money to two districts they thought they wouldn’t have to defend. We’ve played our part in extending the “50-state Strategy” to WA. For that, we can all be damn proud. And it’s only the beginning. The very beginning.

So I hope you can all join me in forgiving Stefan for seeking solace in misinformation and name-calling. Compared to what we’re doing, it’s pretty much all he has.

There’s a new blog in town, and I think I’m gonna like it. From EFFin’ Unsound‘s FAQ:

Q: What does EFFin’ Unsound mean?

A: Well the two biggest local right wing assholes (but I repeat myself) are the Evergreen Freedom Foundation (EFF) and (Un)Sound Politics. But there are a lot of righties in Washington who are EFFin’ Unsound.

Q: Why are you such an asshole?

A: Look, usually I’m a nice guy outside of this blog. Volunteer firefighter. Give to charity. But I don’t think you treat crazy people like they’re making serious arguments.

Welcome back Carl.

Come join me tonight; tickets $13 to $15.

Seattle Follies: The Jeopardy Edition
Thursday, September 21 , 7:30 PM

Seattle Follies opens its fourth season with special guest Ken Jennings, the record holder of the longest winning streak on the TV quiz show Jeopardy. He faces off against Nicole Brodeur, columnist for the Seattle Times; Steve Scher, host of KUOW’s Weekday; and The Stranger’s associate editor and Police Beat columnist Charles Mudede. Channeling Alex Trebek is David Goldstein, KIRO radio host and the Seattle Weekly Readers’ Pick Best Political Blogger. Fifth Avenue Theatre stars Billie Wildrick and Candice Donehoo, with David Armstrong, producing artistic director, provide musical entertainment, accompanied by Seattle’s favorite cabaret performer and composer Rich Gray. Beer, wine, and copies of Brainiac, Jennings’ personal tour through the seamy underside of television trivia, will be available for purchase. Presented with University Book Store. Downstairs at Town Hall, enter on Seneca Street.

It’ll be fun. I hope.

It’ll probably be a light posting day for me as I have a busy schedule. At noon I’ll be moderating a panel discussion on initiative and judicial races before a meeting of the executive council of SEIU Local 925, and this evening I’ll be emceeing the Seattle Follies at Town Hall.

The Initiative 933 campaign has a poll in the field, the kinda-sorta pushy kind that’s probably intended to help them refine their message. How can I be so sure? I got robo-polled this evening.

The poll starts off with the usual questions: Bush approval, gender, age, income, party and ideological self-identification. How likely are you to vote? Do you plan to vote for Maria Cantwell or Mike McGavick? That kind of stuff.

And then it started focusing on I-933. The recording described the initiative pretty much the way it’s described in the ballot title, while stating that opponents argue it would hamper government’s ability to regulate property and do proper planning. Do you plan to vote yes or no? I punched in no.

Then the questions started getting a little curious. Do you think local governments are operated well, or controlled by special interests who are in it only for the money? Hmm. I had to think about that one. I guess it depends on the local government, but I didn’t want to give them the answer they wanted, so I punched in no.

Are you familiar with the Supreme Court’s Kelo decision that says governments can take away property by eminent domain for use by commercial developers? Do you agree with the decision? If you knew that I-933 was intended to address Kelo, would you be more or less likely to vote for it?

Well clearly, you can see where the I-933 campaign is going. They are testing a message that focuses on eminent domain, even though they most certainly know that I-933 has absolutely nothing to do with eminent domain. Nothing. Nothing at all.

They are preparing to lie to voters.

So when the I-933 campaign starts inundating voters with broadcast ads and mailers citing Kelo and pushing the issue of eminent domain, I expect my friends in the press to come down on them like a ton bricks, for now you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that the I-933 campaign didn’t just accidentally get it wrong. They polled on this lie. They tested and refined it. And when they run on this lie they will be running without a shred of regard for the truth.

The irony of the Kelo frame is that it’s not only based on a lie, it’s intended to entirely flip the debate on its head, for I-933 was written and financed by the same private developers and wealthy special interests who the Kelo frame is intended to demonize.

But then, that’s exactly the kind of cynical, dishonest campaign we’ve come to expect from the building industry.

It was a primary election night edition of Podcasting Liberally, and like most elections there were mixed emotions. Us DL regulars were sharing a packed Montlake Alehouse with a couple other election night parties, and while we all cheered as BIAW-backed, winger-ringer Supreme Court candidate John Groen went down to defeat, the Yes on I-88 and Bill Sherman for Legislature folks were left crying in the beers.

Joining me in live coverage as the election results poured in were Mollie, Jon, Daniel, Carl, and Seattle P-I columnist Joel Connelly. A fascinating evening of breaking news, erudite commentary, brilliant analysis, and of course, penis jokes.

The show is 49:39, and is available here as a 45.5 MB MP3. Please visit PodcastingLiberally.com for complete archives and RSS feeds.

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

If passed, Initiative 933 would cost taxpayers billions. Up to $9 billion to be exact. According to the state Office of Financial Management’s (OFM) fiscal impact statement:

Initiative 933 is estimated to cost state agencies $2 billion to $2.18 billion over the next six years for compensation to property owners and administration of the measure. In the same time period, the initiative is estimated to cost cities $3.8 billion to $5.3 billion, based upon number of land-use actions since 1996, and is estimated to cost counties $1.49 billion to $1.51 billion. Costs are derived from the requirement that, with specific exceptions, state agencies and local governments must pay compensation when taking actions that prohibit or restrict the use of real and certain personal property.

The OFM also found that I-933 is “more expansive than Measure 37,” the Oregon developer’s initiative that is wreaking havoc in the Beaver State. The result? Hundreds of millions of dollars in litigation costs.

This is a bad initiative, poorly written and ill-conceived. No wonder its biggest backer is New York real estate tycoon Howard Rich, while farmers, environmentalists, labor and even many local business interests are aligning against it.

“Burner Wins!” If Washington’s 8th Congressional District primary had the same rules as a judicial primary, that might be the headline splashed across the top of the Seattle Times and P-I this morning.

Of course the totals are extremely close, and far from complete, so when the final numbers are in Rep. Dave Reichert may turn out to have tallied more primary votes than Democratic challenger Darcy Burner, but what we’ve seen so far should have 8th CD R’s very worried. As of the last report Burner has received 19,529 primary votes compared to Reichert’s 19,133. Both candidates ran unopposed, and while primary results can be misleading, these results are a classic sign of a vulnerable incumbent.

Perhaps most encouraging (or distressing, depending on your party affiliation) is Burner’s performance in Pierce County, where Democrat Dave Ross got trounced in 2004. At the moment Reichert is only leading by a 6,699 to 6,424 margin. If Burner can keep the race close in the Southern part of the district come November, she’s virtually assured victory.

Remember, Burner went into this race with zero name recognition against one of the best known politicians in the region, and has spent very little money thus far getting her name and face in front of voters. Barring disastrous polls (and the Reichert camp’s silence on their own internal polling indicates there aren’t any) Burner can cash in her performance yesterday to assure that the DCCC follows through on the substantial financial support it has already committed.

Any way you look at it, the primary results represent a big win for Darcy Burner.

For me the biggest surprise in yesterday’s primary election was the fact that $2 million was not necessarily enough money to buy a seat on the state Supreme Court. Chief Justice Gerry Alexander — a man whose politics could probably best be described as a Dan Evans Republican — survived a bitter right-wing challenge from property rights attorney John Groen and his powerful backers in the building and insurance industries.

I suppose I should have had more faith in voters, but I just didn’t see how Alexander could overcome the flood of vicious attack ads while being outspent five to one. But the Seattle P-I’s Joel Connelly proved prescient on my show Sunday night when he suggested that Washington voters have a history of rejecting smear campaigns. It looks like they’ve done it again.

Still, Alexander’s victory is no reason for liberals and centrists to relax. The BIAW clearly overreached, with the character of the Groen campaign reflecting the meanness of his backers. But the race was still close, and there’s no reason to believe that $2 million better spent wouldn’t have given the building and insurance industries the handpicked justice they wanted. And don’t forget that it took two tries for the BIAW to get their personal attorney Jim Johnson on the bench. Expect to see Groen back on the ballot in 2008.

Now the attention (and the money) shifts to the general election, where Justice Susan Owens faces a runoff against BIAW-backed Stephen Johnson. It will be interesting to see what if any lessons the BIAW has learned from its failed Groen campaign.

The Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally meets tonight (and every Tuesday), 8PM at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. I’m hoping Patrick comes back so he can give a full report on what a “Mike McGavick Drunk” hangover feels like.

Today is Primary Election Day in Washington State, and we’ll be closely following the results all night long… as will, I’m guessing, 43rd LD candidate Bill Sherman, who has chosen the Alehouse as the location of his “Victory” party. If there’s only two victory parties you attend tonight, you’ll definitely want to visit Bill’s second.

Not in Seattle? Washington liberals will also be drinking tonight in the Tri-Cities. Here’s a full run down of WA’s ten Drinking Liberally chapters:

	Where:	When:	Next Meeting:
Burien:	Mick Kelly’s Irish Pub, 435 SW 152nd St	Fourth Wednesday of each month, 7:00 pm onward	September 27
Kirkland:	Valhalla Bar & Grill, 8544 122nd Ave NE	Every Thursday, 7:00 pm onward	September 21
Monroe:	Eddie’s Trackside Bar and Grill, 214 N Lewis St	Second Wednesday of each month, 7:00 PM onward	October 11
Olympia:	The Tumwater Valley Bar and Grill, 4611 Tumwater Valley Drive South	First and third Monday of each month, 7:00-9:00 pm	October 2
Seattle:	Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Ave E	Every Tuesday, 8:00 pm onward	September 19
Spokane:	Red Lion BBQ & Pub, 126 N Division St	Every Wednesday, 7:00 pm	September 20
Tacoma:	Meconi’s Pub, 709 Pacific Ave	Every Wednesday, 8:00 pm onward	September 20
Tri-Cities:	Atomic Ale, 1015 Lee Blvd, Richland	Every Tuesday, 7:00 pm onward	September 19
Vancouver:	Hazel Dell Brew Pub, 8513 NE Highway 99	Second and fourth Tuesday of each month, 7:00 pm onward	September 26
Walla Walla:	The Green Lantern, 1606 E Isaacs Ave	First Friday of each month, 8:00 pm onward	October 6

BBC Radio 4 is broadcasting a weekly series, Meet the Bloggers, and today “Programme 4: It’s Political“ hit the airwaves and the Internet. Featured in this week’s segments are two of America’s most influential bloggers, Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit and… um… me.

Why HorsesAss.org? Producer Mark Savage told me he was looking for two bloggers, one national and one local, who also represent the opposite ends of the political spectrum. But the average listener might assume that Savage failed in his quest, for while I proudly lay claim to my liberal Democratic bias, Reynolds once again dances around Instapundit’s true ideological slant, describing himself as a “small ‘L’ libertarian” who before the Iraq War might have been identified as a “quirky lefty.”

Yeah. Right.

One of the advantages blogging has over other forms of journalism is that we get to free ourselves from the shackles of feigned objectivity, thus enabling our readers to judge us within the context of our openly embraced bias. But if, like Reynolds, we couch our political slant in half-hearted half-denials, we’re really no better than Fox News.

As for me, I’m not sure if the segment sheds much more light on who I am or what I do than the few minutes allotted allows. Of more interest might be the extended, unedited interview clips of both me and Reynolds that the BBC has posted to the program’s web page.

And of course, if you can’t get enough of my melodious voice, I invite you to tune in or live stream “The David Goldstein Show” on Newsradio 710-KIRO (Sundays, 7-10PM), and download our weekly, beer-soaked, political blabfest from Podcasting Liberally.

Today is primary election day, so if you have not already voted, please, please do so today. But if you are an absentee voter who does not plan to mail in your ballot, or if you are a polling place voter with no intention of going to the polls, well then… fuck you. People who choose not to exercise their right to vote have absolutely no right to complain about the shitty government elected by those of us who do.

I have decided not to make any primary endorsements or predictions, mostly out of laziness. But I’ll make an exception for the one statewide election today for which the primary is the general — the race between state Supreme Court Justice Gerry Alexander and handpicked BIAW candidate John Groen.

I cannot urge you strongly enough to cast your ballot for Justice Alexander. But quite frankly, I fear it is hopeless. In fact, I fear for the independence of our entire judiciary.

Here’s what it comes down to: if you are perfectly comfortable having our courts sold to the highest bidder (ie wealthy corporate interests) then by all means vote for Groen, or don’t vote at all. Because whatever you think of his ideology (and it’s awful,) that’s what Groen’s victory will represent.

There is a reason why the BIAW and other right-wing groups have spent $2 million electing Groen — that’s the only way an extremist like him could ever get elected. If he was a well qualified centrist candidate, a couple hundred thousand dollars might have done the trick. But if you want a justice who is absolutely guaranteed to rule in your favor no matter what the issue or case, well, it costs a lot of money.

In fact it costs so much money that unless we reform campaign finance, or change the way we select judges, pretty soon our entire court system will be dominated by judges beholden to or ideologically aligned with wealthy corporate interests. What the BIAW cannot achieve via the legislature or the initiative process they will soon achieve through the courts… you know, like totally dismantling our state’s growth management laws.

And there is absolutely nothing we can do about it, because quite frankly we will never be able to come close to matching the right, dollar for dollar. There simply are no special interests who stand to make huge sums of money electing liberal or centrists judges, and so organizations like the BIAW will continue to outspend us four, five… ten to one. Whatever it takes, as long as they can be guaranteed a return on their investment, they can come up with the money. If it’s worth two million dollars it’s worth three, and if it’s worth three it’s worth four or five. That’s where we’re headed.

And once they’ve bought a comfortable majority on the state Supreme Court they’ll move on to the Appeals and Superior Courts. How can I be so sure? Because that’s what has happened in Texas and other states.

But if that’s okay with you, then don’t bother voting.