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From the Times:

The trail would be designed as a “dual-use facility” that could accommodate a high-capacity passenger rail line sometime in the future, said one of the architects of the deal, County Executive Ron Sims.

If a final deal is reached in the coming months, the Port would pay $103 million for the rail line, then swap it with King County in exchange for county-owed Boeing Field.

The Port would also give the county $66 million to build a biking and hiking trail south of the Snohomish County line. Freight trains would continue to run between Woodinville and Snohomish.

The really important thing to remember here is this: before everyone starts arguing about what to do with the right-of-way, we had to acquire the right-of-way. Idon’t know if rail will be feasible, I don’t want the rail line eliminated in favor of a trail-only use. At least not right away.

Here’s what Goldy had to say about it back in January:

The pro-rail group wants the corridor to be converted to commuter rail now, using the existing tracks, but transit experts who have studied the route insist that it just isn’t economical. The tracks themselves have been neglected over the years and would require expensive upgrades, while current commuter patterns simply won’t support much of the route. Or at least, that’s what I’ve been privately told.

I wonder when the Joel “Global Warming Is A Problem” Connelly is going to meet the Joel “Let’s Build A New Freeway On The Waterfront” Connelly.

Just askin’.

I ALMOST FORGOT…

Joel’s a friend of the blog, so consider this post just friendly needling.

JOEL RESPONDS:

“When you unleash an additional 50,000 cars a day onto Seattle city streets, and onto I-5, they’re going to spend hours and hours a day belching pollutants into the atmosphere.
How do you square your position with its potential impact on Seattle’s airshed . . . and on Pioneer Square, the first Seattle neighborhood liberated from automobile culture.
‘Suggest you might devote some critical examination to the governor’s talk-it-over position on global warming rather than taking shots at those who have consistently urged action.”

Just kidding about the headline. I like David Postman. I think he’s a great reporter. And I don’t even know if he drinks. In fact, hypothetically, if I were developing my own online news venture to compete with our city’s two dailies, and I raised enough venture capital to do it right, Postman would be one of the first reporters I’d attempt to hire away from the Seattle Times.

But man can he be sensitive.

Yesterday I critiqued our two dailies’ coverage of the Sonics hearing in Olympia, posting the two ledes side-by-side. I thought it instructive that two papers covering the same hearing should come away with such different story lines. And to some extent, I think that Postman agrees:

I think it’s a good day for journalism when the Times and the PI take different angles or dig up different facts. That’s what makes having two papers important.

Absolutely.

So I’m not really sure why Postman understood my post to be a “baseless attack” on his colleagues, or why he felt the need to characterize me as “wrong-headed”, “fatuous” and, well… drunk?

David Goldstein crows about how he has no pretense toward objectivity. That’s the only way to explain his fatuous bit of journalism criticism today. Goldstein read stories about the Sonics in the Times and the PI, and as he often does, decides that the Times is showing bias.

Actually, I decided that both stories were biased. No doubt I prefer the P-I’s bias, but I never singled out the Times. Indeed, I thought I was rather specific:

I’m not implying any intentional bias on the part of the various reporters, just that bias inevitably exists, and inevitably seeps through every journalist’s work, no matter how hard they try to suppress it.

Um… how is this a “baseless attack” on the Times?

Postman is clearly offended, and goes to some length deconstructing my rather brief post in an effort to show how little I understand the facts reported, or the business of journalism in general. His main point?

But Goldstein just isn’t paying attention if he thinks the financing plan was the news of the day.

As for the Renton vs. Bellevue angle, that was, in fact, news. It wasn’t known before yesterday. It was new.

Actually, the “Renton vs. Bellevue angle” wasn’t exactly news either. The choice of the Renton site was leaked way back in December, and widely reported at the time. (I spent an hour on it while filling in for Dave Ross.) If you’re going to say that it is only news when Clay Bennett confirms it, then you might as well just reprint Sonics press releases.

Given the fact that the details were already widely known, I’d say that the news of the day was the hearing itself, and how legislators reacted to Bennetts demands. But then, that’s just one man’s opinion.

Which once again is my point. I don’t know how many times I need to explain it on my blog, or say it to Postman’s face: I love newspapers and admire his profession. But I simply don’t believe that objectivity is humanly possible. I repeat:

The “journalism generally practiced in America” today is an historical anomaly that grew out of the media consolidation that shuttered the vast majority of dailies early in the twentieth century. “Objectivity” was a necessary sales pitch required to reassure readers that one or two dailies could adequately replace the many different voices to which they had grown accustomed. It is also a wonderful ideal, though unfortunately impossible to achieve in reality, for as Woody Allen astutely observed, even “objectivity is subjective.”

I’m not one of those bloggers who long for the extinction of the legacy media, nor do I think this modern American model of an objective, fair and balanced press will ever perish at the hands of us advocacy journalists. But there’s certainly more than enough room for both models to coexist, and to some extent, converge. Both models can be equally honest and informative, as long as the practitioners remain true to themselves, and to their slightly divergent ethical principles…

But in the end, how is my openly biased blog really any different from the op-ed section of any major daily? Facts are facts, and when I get them wrong my readers abrasively taunt me in my comment threads. The rest of what I write is nothing but personal spin and opinion…

Postman writes that “alleging bias in a newspaper reporter is a serious matter,” and he spiritedly defends his colleagues from what he assumes to be a personal insult. But I didn’t allege bias in a reporter or a newspaper or even his profession. I alleged bias in our entire species. That is the human condition. We are all biased. Each and every one of us will experience the same event somewhat differently, shaped by our own unique personal histories and perspectives. Two different ledes were written off the same hearing, and yes I do think it instructive to highlight the difference.

Postman refers to my Tuesday night Drinking Liberally festivities and jokingly implies that I should have slept off my hangover before writing. In truth, the post was admittedly rushed as I was late for a meeting. Perhaps Postman would have been less offended had I taken the time to pen my intended closing: an attack on Times publisher Frank Blethen for his efforts to make Seattle a one-newspaper town.

I apologize, David, for not being more thorough.

As consumers struggled to cope with rising prices at the pump, the oil industry pulled in a record $101 billion in profits last year — about $11.6 million an hour — and according to Barb Flye of the Washington Tax Fairness Coalition, taxpayers are picking up the tab… twice.

“Individuals have to dig deeper to fill the gas tank and heat their homes, and collectively, all taxpayers will be covering the higher gas and heating costs for a host of publicly-funded services and institutions,” Flye said. “We’re paying more for heat at public schools and colleges, hospitals and nursing homes, courts and other government buildings, not to mention the higher cost of running school buses and public transit.”

This has prompted state Rep. Steve Conway to introduce HB 2128 a tax hike on excess oil industry profits. The bill would put a 3% B&O tax surcharge on gross receipts of companies with a refining capacity in excess of 10,000 barrels a year, whenever retail gas prices exceed $1.75 a gallon. The Washington Tax Fairness Coalition will be holding a press event at noon today in Olympia, in support of HB 2128.

HA co-blogger Will speculates about former state rep Toby Nixon and his political aspirations:

Maybe Nixon’s stoking the fires for a run at his old seat (won by Roger Goodman when Nixon ran for Senate). I’ve got a better idea…

Lieutenant Governor! Think about it, Toby… I don’t know anyone who’s “high” on Lt. Gov. Brad Owen. He’s got that ridiculous rock band which he takes across the state, trying to keep kids off drugs (If he had come to my high school, I would have STARTED smoking pot, just to spite him). He endorses right wing judicial candidates and wants to spend tax dollars on a NASCAR track. What a waste!

To which I say… do your homework Will. I’m guessing our friend Toby might be planning to run for King County Auditor, an obvious stepping stone to the Secretary of State’s office.

What’s that you say? I’ve got my head up my ass? Toby can’t possibly run for Auditor because it is an appointed position? Well, not if Toby has his way. Just last week Toby filed a C1 with the Public Disclosure Commission creating “Citizens for Accountable Elections,” a new PAC supporting a King County initiative to make the Auditor an elected position. Given Toby’s deep interest in election reform, and his admitted eye on the SOS office, this would seem to be an elected office tailor made for (and by) Toby Nixon.

Toby and I disagree on a lot of stuff, but he’s a standup guy and a great sport. I’m off this weekend, but Toby has agreed to come on my show on 710-KIRO the following weekend, when I’ll have the opportunity to ask him the tough questions, and he’ll have every opportunity to respond.

UPDATE:
Via email, Toby elaborates on his initiative and his plans:

The proposal is not for an elected “auditor”, but an elected “elections director” – it wouldn’t include the full range of auditor responsibilities, but just the election functions. There have been folks trying to encourage me to seek the office if it were to become elected, and I haven’t told them flatly No. I haven’t told them Yes, either, but I haven’t ruled it out. I do believe an important part – maybe the most important part – of the responsibility of the office would be to exercise leadership to create a culture of excellence, accountability, integrity, accuracy, and transparency in elections, and anyone who knows my legislative record knows that I am strongly committed to those things. But you also know that my interests cover a wide range of topics, and I’d have to think hard about whether I’d want to forgo other opportunities to serve where I could have an influence in those broader areas in order to focus specifically on the elections office.

Toby will join me on 710-KIRO in the 8PM hour, on Sunday Feb. 25.

Here’s a couple of columns well worth reading, in case you missed them.

In today’s Tacoma News Tribune, Peter Callaghan rips Tim Eyman a new one: “Tim Eyman, professional victim for hire.”

How do we know he’s telling the truth now? We don’t, of course. Given his history, I find it best to assume everything he says is a lie until proved otherwise.

As Callaghan reminds us, Timmy is an admitted liar, with a well documented and steady string of deceptions. And yet our state’s editorial pages continue to give him free reign (and hundreds of thousands of dollars of free press) to run his lying, self-serving guest columns. Amazing.

Meanwhile, over at the Seattle P-I, Joel Connelly had a great column Friday comparing the shrinking reputation of the self-absorbed Ralph Nadar with the growing global stature of Al Gore: “Nader has withered; Gore has grown.”

Connelly contrasts how Nadar has self-destructed under the weight of his own ego, while “the man ridiculed by Nader in 2000 has attained new and global stature.”

Al Gore has watched his early global warming warnings be vindicated by a landslide of scientific evidence.

With the documentary “An Inconvenient Truth,” he has found a way to outflank the political press and make complicated material accessible to the public. The film is up for an Oscar, and Gore has been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.

What a transition: While Nader worships at the altar of his own unappreciated brilliance, Gore speaks to the world.

Man, do I hope Gore runs for president.

The same people who want you to turn the music down! Josh Feit explains.

Check out the No Tunnel Alliance blog. Look at who is pushing for the rebuild, and whose support they tout: Helen Sommers, Joni Balter (and the Seattle Times editorial page), Joel Connelly, the Washington State Alliance for Retired Americans, Nick Licata …

It is a veritable who’s who of Seattle oldsters.

The rebuild is endorsed by the WSARA? (Their slogan: “We’d like some deli and a comfortable chair.”) I think retired people are great, don’t get me wrong. They still use checks, drive the speed limit, and their houses smell like medicine. But…

Of course, if we take their advice and rebuild this monstrosity, most of these folks won’t be around in 25 years to explain why the city made such a dumb mistake.

A friend who works in politics once told me a story about a room full of folks listening to a transportation planner talk about the region’s future. The speaker says, “Now, most of this won’t come to fruition until the year 2015…”

An old man rose to his feet, and slowly walked out of the meeting. I guess he figured he’d be dead by then.

The question of how to replace the viaduct is too important to be left only to those who’ll never see it’s consequences.

In what can only be called a stunning decision, a conservative Republican Governor is taking a stand against cervical cancer, even when his political “base” is against his position:

Mr. Perry’s action, praised by health advocates, caught many by surprise in a largely conservative state where sexual politics is often a battleground.

[…]

Under the order, girls and women from 9 to 21 eligible for public assistance could get free shots immediately. The governor’s office said parents could opt out of the school program “for reasons of conscience, including religious beliefs.”

“Requiring young girls to get vaccinated before they come into contact with HPV is responsible health and fiscal policy that has the potential to significantly reduce cases of cervical cancer and mitigate future medical costs,” said Mr. Perry, who was re-elected to his second full term last November.

HPV, affecting 20 million people nationally, including one in four 15-to-24-year-olds, is the nation’s most common sexually transmitted disease. Texas has the second-highest number of women with cervical cancer, with nearly 400 deaths last year, the governor’s statement noted.

The vaccine, approved for ages 9 to 26, is given in three shots over eight months. The shots are effective for at least five years, and together cost $360, said Curtis Allen, a spokesman for the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

This is amazing news. But there’s more:

Merck is bankrolling efforts to pass state laws across the country mandating Gardasil for girls as young as 11 or 12. It doubled its lobbying budget in Texas and has funneled money through Women in Government, an advocacy group made up of female state legislators around the country.

Perry has ties to Merck and Women in Government. One of the drug company’s three lobbyists in Texas is Mike Toomey, Perry’s former chief of staff. His current chief of staff’s mother-in-law, Texas Republican state Rep. Dianne White Delisi, is a state director for Women in Government.

The governor also received $6,000 from Merck’s political action committee during his re-election campaign.

Some of my “left-of-center” buddies were quick to accuse Perry of doing the bidding of a big donor. It may very well be the case.

But does that change things? Even if Gov. Rick Perry has “sold out” to the drug lobby, isn’t that OK if it saves hundreds of lives? I’m all for voting out the crooks, but lets get some perspective. If Merck’s influence over the Governor of Texas will save even one young woman’s life, then I say God bless him. Most Christian conservatives are against the vaccine; they say it’ll make girls more likely to have sex. They’d rather seen women die, I guess.

Republicans are like Labradors; I’m inclined to reward them for good behavior. In Gov. Rick Perry’s case, he gets a Milkbone from me for showing some “enlightenment.”

From the Give ‘Em Enough Rope and They’ll Hang Themselves Department, Darren McKinney of the American Tort Reform Association eloquently makes the conservative argument against public financing of elections:

The Jan. 24 letter to the editor from Nick Nyhart and Chellie Pingree (“Full public funding of elections proven to work in states, cities,”), respective presidents of Public Campaign and Common Cause, lament the lack of public financing for all American political campaigns: “A democracy should be about all of us and not just about those who can write huge checks.”

But if Nyhart and Pingree had their way, black helicopter conspiracy theorists off their meds, the dysfunctionally unemployed, irresponsible young men and women who have multiple babies out-of-wedlock, repeat felons and various other burdens to society without means might have as much to say about our nation’s political leadership and direction as folks who soberly get up every morning, lovingly raise their children, productively hold jobs, responsibly pay taxes, and occasionally write checks, huge or otherwise, to the political campaigns of their choosing.

[…] There’s a lot to be said […] for having most of our big political decisions influenced in greater measure by those who have succeeded in life and thus have a better sense of what it’ll take for our nation to succeed in the future.

Well… um… you gotta respect his honesty.

Conservatives like to accuse liberals of being elitist, but as we continue to debate Governor Gregoire’s proposal to publicly finance state Supreme Court races, remember that at least some of the opposition stems from the concern that us average folk simply aren’t as qualified to participate in the democratic process as the wealthy. Uh-huh.

In what can only be called the upset political victory of the year, Diane Tebelius was defeated in a vote of 71-43 for the position of party chair. The winner? A pulled-pork sandwich from Seattle area restaurant Longhorn Barbeque.

While the biggest challenge to Tebelius was thought to come from former state Senator Luke Esser, the sandwich from Seattle was able to convince wavering delegates that was time for a different form of leadership.

“I don’t care if he’s from Seattle, that sandwich has what it takes,” said Earl Murtt from Tonasket.

“The GOP got whomped last year. I figure a hamburger bun stuffed with delicious meat could get out the vote better than (Tebelius and Esser),” said Fay Wingenhauser from Liberty Lake.

Some aren’t excited that the Washington State Republican Party will be lead by an entrée. Former chair Chris Vance said, “I know a sandwich sounds good, but will it be able to appeal to swing voters in the suburbs?” State Senator Pam Roach had questions too. “I’ll do what I can to work with the sandwich, but as we all know, savory meats have a well-known liberal bias. Who’s hungry for that? Certainly not me”

Not every Republican insider was as skeptical. Radio host (and 2000 candidate for governor) John Carlson noted, “When I ran for governor, I was told- repeatedly, by great numbers of people- than a potted plant had a better chance to unseat Gov. Gary Locke. While a pulled-pork sandwich doesn’t have the media skills of a ficus, I’m excited to see what the little guy can do.”

Visit Horse’s Ass in the next several days for an exclusive interview with the pulled-pork sandwich.

For other updates on the pulled-pork sandwich, visit Longhorn Barbeque.

In the 24 hours since I launched my first annual HA Pledge Week, 38 readers have contributed nearly $1,400, bringing me more than a third of the way towards my one-week goal of $3,500. That’s an amazing start, and I thank all 38 of you for your generous support. (As for the other 2100 readers who visited HA today, well… you know who you are.)

Still, not everyone reacted so positively to my pledge drive. I expected the usual personal attacks belittling me as stupid or lazy or a societal leech, and my trolls didn’t disappoint. But by far the nastiest comments came via email, where one pseudonymous righty lectured that my “shameless panhandling” made me an “unfit parent,” and claimed to have copied the email to DSHS along with my street address and phone number.

Whatever.

Of course, if I were a righty blogger with a comparable impact on local politics and media coverage (and yes, I know that requires a leap of imagination on both counts) I probably wouldn’t be reduced to begging — at least not publicly. The right has developed institutions to nurture and support up-and-coming talking heads, and help build and promote their profiles. Faced with the prospect of losing a right-wing voice like mine, a faux-think-tank like the EFF might find me some cushy job, or a friendly publisher might offer me a generous book deal. Nobody on the right would expect me to continue doing what I do for as long as I’ve done it without some sort of steady income.

And yet that’s exactly the status quo on the left. This despite the fact that us netroots bloggers have not only become an integral part of the Democratic Party’s messaging machine, but have raised hundreds of millions of dollars for Democratic candidates.

Chris Bowers writes about the “one-way flow of progressive movement money,” and he comes off sounding rather pissed. And rightly so.

In a painful and disturbing irony, the same Democratic political consultant structure that the netroots seek to reform–and which Markos and Jerome called “The Consultant Con” in Crashing the Gate–is actually being funded, reinforced, and strengthened by the netroots. Roughly one-third of the money that went to Democratic campaign consultants in the 2003-2004 election cycle came from netroots activists….

[…] While I don’t think the netroots should regret any of the money it raised for Democratic candidates during 2003-2006 […] we needed to do more to help support the underfunded people, institutions and ideas that make the progressive movement possible. Just lining the pockets of already well compensated consultants is no way to build a movement over the long term.

My partner at BlogPac, Matt Stoller, has previously written about examples of full-time progressive movement activists who receive little or no compensation for their work. Maria Leavey, who did not have health insurance, passed away last month as the result of a heart attack a doctor could have identified. […] Local progressive bloggers typically lose money on blogging every year, even as they help transform local media and activist scenes. Even a prominent blogger such as myself, who helped raise around $2 million for Democratic candidates and committees in the 2005-2006 cycle (and transfer another $3 million into competitive races through Use It Or Lose It), spent the entire 2005-2006 cycle without health insurance. Quite frankly, it is pretty brainless for someone such as myself to help so much money flow into the hands of a small number of highly paid consultants without simultaneously raising money to meet my own basic needs, such as health insurance. What the hell was I doing?

But I am not just angry at myself, or the general lack of funding currently available to the people, institutions, and ideas that make the progressive movement so vital. I am also pissed off at the Democratic and progressive establishment that is funded with our dollars, but which refuses to fund us in return.

I’m not ashamed to be asking for your contributions, but I don’t particularly relish doing it, and I realize that long term this is an unsustainable way to support my work. My personal goal is to integrate my blogging and activism into a fulltime radio gig or some other kind of paid media venture. But my personal finances aside, the larger deficit is institutional, and if we want the progressive blogosphere to continue to grow in size and influence, the progressive community is going to have to step up and find a way to support bloggers of merit. This means labor, environment, pro-choice and all the traditional private and institutional backers of progressive candidates and causes are going to have to dedicate resources to funding bloggers like me. You can’t expect us to do this work, unpaid, indefinitely… and in the long run, you get what you pay for.

But in the meanwhile, I need your help. If you value what I do, if you would miss this blog if it were to suddenly go away, if you look forward to the impact I might have on future elections, I ask you to please reach into your pocket and throw a few bucks my way. I don’t do what I do for the money, but the bank that holds my mortgage does.

Six days and $2,100 to go. Thank you in advance for your generous support.

I visited the new Sculpture Park yesterday. I have to say, it’s awesome. The view of the Puget Sound is wicked, as is the view of the new gleaming condo towers of my native Belltown. I’m not art guy (velvet Elvis, anyone?), but our new outdoor art museum is heads and shoulders above its ugly-ass companion at 1st and University Street downtown.

Some of the sculptures are better than others. Weird-looking wheel thing? Check. Big, orange swoopy deal? Check. Artwork designed for the sole purpose of giving Dori Monson something to talk about? Check. Perhaps the best of it is the part that isn’t finished. The grass hasn’t grown in yet (its winter) and it’s too muddy to finish some of the shoreline stuff, but it looks like a winner. When it’s all done folks will be able to walk on the beach where Elliot Bay meets Seattle. A natural waterfront where you can dip your toes in? What a deal!

To think this whole place used to be owned by Unocal. The site was polluted as hell, so they had their work cut out for them. Thanks to private donors and some federal monies sent home by my home-girl Patty, the whole idea became reality. If that’s pork, well, gimme some mo’!

There are some downsides. The hot dog cart I saw probably won’t be there in a month, which is too bad. We need more hot dog carts in Seattle, and not just the ones that are open at night in Belltown and Pioneer Square. Thankfully the park has a little cafe where you can get a salad and, uh, a panini. I’m not dissin’ them, I’m just saying… Would it kill you do put some meat on a grill? Some of that kick-ass deli mustard with onions and kraut would be awesome. I’ll have to settle for “line caught tuna, roasted peppers, arugula, hard boiled egg, butter lettuce & lemon remoulade on herb-sea salt baguette.” Sigh.

I didn’t see any basketball courts at the new park. You might be saying to yourself, “you’re an idiot, Will. It’s a friggin’ sculpture park. Of course there’s no hardtop.” That’s not the point! As Seattle is graying population wise, our city leaders don’t see the need to build soccer fields, baseball diamonds, or basketball courts like they used to. Park space is much more likely to be used as so-called “green space”, for “non-specific, non-programmed” uses.

The basketball court at the Regrade Park was decommissioned in favor of a dog park. While the change was welcomed in the neighborhood (the dogs chased the crack heads away), I’m lamenting the fact that there is just a single basketball court in the general downtown area meant for public use. Sure, sculptures are nice, but I need someplace to shoot hoops. Lots of other big cities make a point of building parks designed for “active use”, but after Seattle was hounded by a bunch of old folks for trying to build lots of sports fields at Magnuson Park, I don’t see anything happening soon.

Shortcomings aside, the new park is pretty damn cool, and it’s worth visiting. I’m sure Knute Berger will write a column about how we should have built a tank farm there (oops, looks like he already did!). Joel Connelly mostly likes the park, but got a bit irritated with all the “fawning over” and attention it’s getting. Personally, I don’t care if some architecture writer in New York likes it. Those folks like anything that’s weird and new (just read the reviews of our Downtown Seattle Public Library. Those NYC folks loved it. Meanwhile, I STILL can’t find the fucking fiction section. Yeesh.) Joel can take heart that if the Seattle P-I folds, they can just roll that big shiny globe south a block and he’ll be able to visit it anytime he wants.

Take heart, people of the Emerald City: when private fundraising with no help from Seattle City Hall can do something as amazing as the Olympic Sculpture Park, just think of the possibilities…

Seattle Art Museum Sculpture Monorail anyone?

Twice now I’ve mentioned “war crimes” and the Bush administration in the same sentence, acts of deliberate provocation that sure tied the righties’ panties in a knot. But contrary to the screaming headlines of the all-knowing Orb, I have never explicitly called Donald Rumsfeld a war criminal — and out-of-work radio host Brian Maloney doesn’t do his job prospects any good with his incoherent and (and fictional) assertion that I have twice called for administration officials to be executed.

Gimme a break.

But given the recent show trial of Saddam Hussein and his top aides, and their subsequent “fumbled” executions (I suppose Bush was referring to the moment Barzan Ibrahim’s severed head hit the ground,) I think it quite an appropriate time to stop and consider the very notion of “war crimes,” especially considering the inherently violent and unforgiving nature of war itself. As Americans, we are quick to examine Saddam’s murderous life and discard him as a monstrous dictator undeserving of mercy… and that very well may be true. But at the same time, President Bush — our Commander in Chief — has himself been directly responsible for the death and dismemberment of tens of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians, not to mention the destabilization of Iraq into a bloody civil war that claims hundreds more lives every day.

Perhaps such “collateral damage” is an unavoidable and thus acceptable consequence of war, and perhaps our unprovoked “preemptive” invasion of Iraq is both morally and legally justified.

But… even if one disagrees with the notion that our own government is guilty of war crimes itself, it should at the very least be possible to empathize with the hundreds of millions of Muslims who may view the administration’s actions less charitably. We invaded Iraq, allegedly in pursuit of weapons of mass destruction that were not there, and possibly with high government officials fully cognizant that the publicly touted intelligence was false and/or deliberately misleading. We tortured, humiliated and perhaps murdered defenseless Iraqi prisoners. President Bush’s decisions have undoubtedly resulted in death, destruction and untold human misery.

I’m not saying that Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld committed war crimes, or that they should be brought before an international tribunal. But I certainly believe it to be a proper subject of debate, for moral introspection — even self-recrimination — is a worthy and absolutely necessary exercise within a functioning democracy. So for those of you who would attempt to silence this debate, who would denounce any mention of the subject as an act of treason or terrorism, well… I strongly suggest you stay away from the Citizens’ Hearing on the Legality of U.S. Actions in Iraq being held this weekend in Tacoma:

The Citizens’ Hearing on the Legality of U.S. Actions in Iraq will be held on January 20-21, 2007, in Tacoma, Washington, two weeks before the Feb. 5 court martial of Lieutenant Ehren Watada at Fort Lewis.. The Citizens’ Hearing will function as a tribunal to put the Iraq War on trial, in response to the Army putting Lt. Watada on trial as the first U.S. military officer to refuse deployment to Iraq.

[…] The hearing will present the case that Lt. Watada would, if allowed, make at his court martial. His defense attorneys maintain that the war on Iraq is illegal under international treaties and under Article Six of the U.S. Constitution. Further, Lt. Watada’s defense argues that the Nuremberg Principles and U.S. military regulations require soldiers to follow only “lawful orders.” In Lt. Watada’s view, deployment to Iraq would have made him party to the crimes that permeate the structure and conduct of military operations there.

The format of the Citizens’ Hearing will resemble that of a congressional committee, employing a dignified approach to gathering information. Testimony will be offered by Iraq War veterans, experts in international law and war crimes, and human rights advocates. Your gift of funds (or frequent flyer miles) will enable more of these clear voices to be heard by people around the country and the world. Among the figures that have committed to testify are:

• Daniel Ellsberg, military analyst who released the Pentagon Papers in the Vietnam War;
• Denis Halliday, Former UN Assistant Secretary General, coordinated Iraq humanitarian aid;
• Richard Falk, Professor Emeritus of International Law at Princeton University;
• Stacy Bannerman Military Families Speak Out; author of “When the War Came Home”
• Harvey Tharp, former U.S. Navy Lieutenant and JAG stationed in Iraq;
• Antonia Juhasz, policy-analyst and author on U.S. economic policies in Iraq;
• John Burroughs, Lawyers’ Committee on Nuclear Policy executive director;
• Benjamin G. Davis, Assoc. Law Prof., Univ. of Toledo; expert on law of war;
• Eman Khammas, Iraqi human rights advocate (via video).
• Geoffrey Millard, 8 years in NY Army National Guard; stationed in Ground Zero, Kuwait, Iraq.
• Ann Wright, Retired Army Colonel and State Department official
• Darrell Anderson, Army 1st Armored Division in Baghdad & Najaf; awarded Purple Heart
• Dennis Kyne, 15 years as Army medic & drill sergeant; trained in NBC warfare; Gulf War I.
• Francis Boyle, Professor of International Law at University of Illinois (video testimony)
• Chanan Suarez-Diaz, Former Navy hospital corpsman; awarded Purple Heart & Commendation with Valor.

A panel of citizens will hear the testimony, examine witnesses, and issue a fact-finding report. The panel will be comprised of veterans, members of military families, high school students, union members, and representatives of local governments, academia, and religious organizations. David Krieger, Director of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, Former Army 2nd Lieutenant stationed in Hawaii during the Vietnam War, and a member of the Jury of Conscience at the 2005 World Tribunal on Iraq (in Istanbul) will serve as panel chair.

Panelists’ questioning will focus on the legality of the war and whether or not the invasion of Iraq in 2003 constituted a “crime against the peace,” whether the military occupation and economic constriction of Iraq constitutes a “crime against humanity,” and whether individual soldiers have an obligation or duty to refuse unlawful orders. We expect that this hearing will focus attention on the role of the U.S. government–rather than that of individual soldiers–in perpetrating the crimes of the Iraq War.

If you find the very notion of such a mock war tribunal offensive, then absolutely don’t attend Friday Jan 20 and Saturday Jan 21 at Evergreen State College’s Tacoma Campus, 1210 6th AVE. And absolutely don’t tune in to my show on 710-KIRO Saturday night at 8PM, when I’ll have Daniel Ellsberg on to discuss the Watada case and the conduct of our war in Iraq.

It’s been a bannering year for the Federal Way School Board, which is now considering banning cell phones and other electronic devices:

Federal Way School Board is exploring a ban on iPods, MP3 players, CD players and electronic games from campuses. Cell phones still could be brought to school, but they’d have to be turned off and stored in backpacks or otherwise out of sight.

Why ban cell phones, an object as integral to the lives of modern teens as weird piercings and moodiness? School board members have been coy, but one district insider tells me that the real concern is that too many Federal Way High School students have been using their cell phones to call Al Gore.

After years of fawning coverage in local media, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation was backpedaling last week. It had help.

The reason was a two-part investigative story by the Los Angeles Times, begun on Sunday, 1-7-07, and reprinted on the front page of the Seattle Times, which reported that

“…the Gates Foundation has holdings in many companies that have failed tests of social responsibility because of environmental lapses, employment discrimination, disregard for worker rights, or unethical practices…. hundreds of Gates Foundation investments – totaling at least 41% of its assets – have been in companies that countered the foundation’s charitable goals or socially concerned philosophy.”

The practices of many of those companies, we learned, “are hurting many of the people its grants aim to help….”

The high-powered local executives running the world’s largest charitable organization, with some $70 billion or more in existing or pledged assets, might not have paid much attention to bad ethical investing. But they act quickly when bad publicity strikes. Wednesday, in an exclusive interview, we learned in the Seattle Times that:

“The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is planning a systematic review of its investments to determine whether it should pull its money out of companies that are doing harm to society…”

So far, so good. Only one problem: the Seattle Times pulled a major punch. It made no mention of one of the major threads of the L.A. Times stories:

“…investing in destructive or unethical companies is not what is most harmful….Worse is investing purely for profit, without attempting to improve a company’s way of operating.”

Gates, in responding to the bad publicity, made no mention of whether it would join the movement in American philanthropy to push companies to change their business practices. By their silence, we could presume the foundation would continue to keep its highly influential hands off the companies it invested in. And the Seattle Times let Gates get away with it.

And, it turns out, there was another problem: talk is cheap, and, it quietly emerged, fully retractable. Two days after that, on Friday, the web site NewsCloud.com broke a story bluntly headlined “Gates Foundation Revokes Pledge to Review Portfolio.” Our beneficent local philanthropists got their message out, and then changed it. Or, as NewsCloud put it:

“Shortly after that [Seattle Times] interview, the Gates Foundation took down their public statement on this [from their web site] and replaced it with a significantly altered version which seems to say that investing responsibly would just be too complex for them and that they need to focus on their core mission: ‘There are dozens of factors that could be considered, almost all of which are outside the foundation’s areas of expertise.’…”

The Seattle Times, however, was not done making up for the error of its ways. Yesterday, our local apologist for all things Bill Gates featured what seemed to be something like an official’s makeup call in sports: a makeup feature for having reprinted the L.A. Times expose the previous Sunday. Sympathetically titled “Gates Foundation faces multibillion-dollar dilemma,” the article literally let our heroes have it both ways:

“As the Gates Foundation embarks upon a review of how its $32 billion endowment is invested, officials insist they won’t change their basic investment philosophy.”

Aside from greatly understating the Gates’ endowment, this sentence raises a rather basic dilemma of its own: what’s the point of “a systematic review of investments” if foundation officials “won’t change their basic investment philosophy”?

Let’s review, then: caught in a well-researched investigative piece, published by one of the nation’s most prominent newspapers, that looked (and was) really bad, a beloved local institution scrambles to put a good face on things. It announces this good face through the ever-pliant hometown paper, which already has probably fired an editor or two for reprinting the expose in the first place. It then promptly issues a meek, Gilda Radneresque “Never mind!,” which our local paper utterly ignores in a makeup feature devoted to those hard, hard, hard choices wealthy philanthropists must sometimes make.

What we have, then, is a massive investment firm (embedded in a multi-billion dollar philanthropy) smoothly reassuring the public while changing its odious practices not a whit; and the hometown paper first publicizing the odious practices and then, obediently, helping make it all right and sunshiney again.

The only losers are the millions of people around the globe victimized by the practices of firms invested in by the Gates Foundation; and local news consumers who think that the Seattle Times, for once, cast an unfettered, critical eye on a feelgood local institution. In both cases, it’s bad news.