– Mostly good answers from Inslee’s AMA, but weak sauce on Shell.
– Fiscal impact disclosures seem like a no brainer. No wonder Tim Eyman is opposed.
– James O’Keefe continues to James O’Keefe things up.
– Glad to see Cascade will still do advocacy.
– Well, Governor Inslee’s bracket didn’t last long.
Recently, the Obama Administration announced that it was applying sanctions against high-ranking Venezuelan officials. Few people deny that Venezuela’s government has committed human rights violations, as I’ve documented some of them in these roundups, but the main outrage over this move comes because of the hyperbole and the hypocrisy that went along with this move:
But the main object of South American ire may be the language leading off Obama’s order. It describes the situation in Venezuela as constituting an “unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.”
…
The U.S. government hasn’t typically described Venezuela as a major security threat. The 2015 Worldwide Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community, released last month by the director of national intelligence, devotes two paragraphs to Venezuela, neither of which describe the country as a threat to the United States.
But a senior U.S. administration official told reporters last week that the use of “national security” language is standard when issuing an executive order to impose sanctions. “Most of the sanctions programs that we have, from Iran to Syria, Burma, across the board, rely on these same types of national emergency declarations,” the official said.
Adam Isacson, senior associate for regional security policy at the human rights nonprofit Washington Office on Latin America, explained that under U.S. law, the executive has to declare a national emergency that threatens national security in order to freeze a foreigner’s assets by executive order.
“It has to look like a big, special thing, if you’re going to do it,” Isacson told The Huffington Post. “That’s why it has that stupid language at the beginning. I think the sanctions themselves are pretty legitimate. The United States has the right to decide who gets to do business and own property here in our country, and we should be limiting the number of human rights abusers who get to do that.”
Isacson also suggested that more people were worthy of sanctions. “Just look at New York and all the condos that are owned by Russian oligarchs,” he said. He noted as well the prevalence of human rights abuses in Mexico and Colombia, countries with which the United States enjoys good diplomatic relations.
So why is Venezuela being singled out here? Why are we so willing to damage relations with the region over a country whose record on human rights isn’t any worse than many other countries we remain strongly allied with?
I think part of the answer comes from a phenomenon that’s really well explained in Lawrence Lessig’s recent book “Republic, Lost”. One of the central insights of that book is about understanding the true nature of corruption in this country. It’s not simply a matter of the wealthy writing big checks in order to get what they want out of our lawmakers and other leaders. It’s about a system that relies on campaign funding and essentially forces lawmakers and others running for office to focus their attention and their efforts on the interests of those who can reciprocate.
The end result is that politicians end up in a bubble where they only hear and understand the issues and concerns of those wealthy enough to gain access to the bubble. This is not a phenomenon limited to either party. Democrats can become as captive to their wealthy interests as Republicans.
But the unique thing about Venezuela is that, unlike many other rights-abusing nations in the world, the victims of Maduro’s left-wing regime are often businessmen. Within the bubble of wealthy interests that politicians reside, this becomes seen as a more serious threat than when a regime targets activists or minorities or the press. In this context, the wealthy view themselves and their interests as the interests of the nation – and politicians follow suit. In reality, Venezuela is no more of a threat to U.S. interests than Saudi Arabia, Israel, or Egypt, but gets treated as if it’s far more threatening.
More stories from the past two weeks…
[Read more…]
Senator Sharon Brown has a brand-new idea for power generation. Nuclear something something!
In an era when carbon emissions are becoming a major concern and clean energy is a popular cause, Washington is poised to become a center for the development of one of the greenest technologies around. Clean, safe, abundant, all it needs is a bit of encouragement from the state and a willingness to understand that today’s nuclear power is like nothing before.
First off, I’m glad to see some Republican is acknowledging that carbon emissions are a problem. We may disagree on many things, but at least we can agree that humans are causing global warming. Oh? What? She voted with all but one of her GOP colleagues that we aren’t sure if humans cause global warming.
Also, unless you have some uranium lying around, you’re going to have to mine it. And that isn’t exactly a zero emissions proposition.
Yes, nuclear power. We’ve come a long way since the days of tie-dyed T-shirts and no-nukes concerts and the reactor technology of the 1960s and ‘70s. The new generation of reactor design is safer, simpler and potentially cheaper than anything we have seen to date. Export potential is enormous, to a Third World now electrifying with coal. Washington is uniquely suited to become a center for the development, design and export of this small modular nuclear-reactor technology, and we have a small window of opportunity to establish leadership and make this industry our own.
Export potential? I feel like that’s something to explore a bit. But no. Instead we have more discussion of the fashion sense of the 1960’s than of how that would happen.
Anyway, you could get me on board with one minor amendment. I propose we store the waste in her district. Since it’s so clean or whatever, I’m sure she wouldn’t mind. Or maybe just ask the Feds to deal with it and everything will be fine.
I have sponsored a series of bills in the Legislature this year that demonstrate our interest in this most promising industry. Senate Bill 5113 would require the state Department of Commerce to coordinate and advance the siting and manufacturing of small modular reactors. SB 5093 would establish a nuclear-education program in our high schools. SB 5091 would declare nuclear power a form of alternative energy that qualifies under the state‘s voluntary Green Power program. For those concerned about storage of spent nuclear fuel, we have passed a memorial asking the federal government to develop a nuclear-waste repository, once and for all. These measures all cleared the Senate — some with broad bipartisan support.
Oh cool. The Federal Government through Democratic and Republican governments, for decades and decades hasn’t been able to come up with a good solution. But now we’re asking them to develop a repository and so that’s that solved. PS, can the repository be in Richland?
Small modular nuclear reactors are quite a bit different from the big-reactor designs of the ‘70s. Instead of using a single built-in-place reactor core, they utilize a series of interchangeable and replaceable small reactors. A dozen together might be half the size of one of the big reactors of old. These small reactors use a more modern design with fewer moving parts, reducing risk of failure. And when one reactor goes offline for regular maintenance or repair, other modular reactors at the same facility can take its place and keep up the flow of power.
OK, great. We haven’t exactly solved the waste issue yet.
There are many exciting technologies being proposed. Planning is under way for a first-of-its-kind modular reactor in Idaho that will begin serving the Utah power market within a decade — most likely at the Idaho National Laboratory, with support from Washington’s Energy Northwest. Technology isn’t the holdup — federal and state permitting procedures must be developed, and there is ramp-up time involved in developing facilities capable of producing the required components.
Look, we’ve literally asked the Federal government to do something about nuclear waste, so now we have to hurry.
Now imagine if those manufacturing facilities were located here. Imagine if the next reactor were located at Hanford – Washington’s own nuclear industrial site, adjacent to the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and the talent base in the Tri-Cities. It could power Hanford’s new glassification plant, where legacy high-level defense waste will be converted to solid-glass form – and that by itself could spare us the need to consume 45,000 gallons of diesel fuel every day.
Hanford: Where nuclear waste was never a problem.
On a national level the states of Oregon, Idaho and Utah are becoming players. Nowhere in that conversation is our state, yet we have the intellectual capital and the resources. It is easy to see the possibilities. Successful companies plan for how to get from point A to point B — Washington should do the same for energy. Nuclear power is poised for a resurgence for economic and environmental reasons, and the question is whether we will seize the opportunity or let it slip away for lack of vision. It is better to lead, instead of looking back 10 years from now saying “woulda, coulda, shoulda.”
Couldawouldashoulda had all that nuclear waste of our very own.
– I say let bikes and motorcycles run reds all the time.
– The first step of Seattle’s minimum wage hike is going into effect.
– Six things to know about Shell’s plan to base its Arctic fleet at the Port of Seattle
– You guys, stop what you’re doing. They found Cervantes’ tomb! This is not a drill.
– Am I the only person here excited about Overthinking It’s Eurovision coverage? I am? Cool.
Gotta hand it to my former KIRO radio colleague Dori Monson—he’s never so sure of himself as when he’s absolutely wrong:
Seattle restaurants are closing because of the coming of $15 an hour. … Seattle Magazine had a story about this. Queen Anne’s Grub restaurant closed Feb. 14. Pioneer Square’s Little Uncle shut down Feb. 25. The Boat Street Cafe will close May 30.
The restaurant owners said certainly there are a lot of reasons, but they said that $15 an hour is a major factor in all of this.
Uh-huh. Except, if Dori had actually read the Seattle Magazine piece, he’d know that not a single one of these owners mentioned the minimum wage as a contributing factor toward their restaurant’s closure. Grub’s owner sold out to pursue “future opportunities in this wonderful industry;” a new restaurant will open in its place. Boat Street Cafe’s owner is closing to focus on her three other restaurants and the two new ones she’s opening, while the neighboring Boat Street Kitchen expands into the cafe’s space. And Little Uncle’s owners say they closed because their “Pioneer Square location ultimately does not fit into the goals of our professional life and personal life,”—and are planning to reopen in a new location.
“We did not close our Pioneer Square location due to the new minimum wage,” Little Uncle’s Poncharee Kounpungchart told PubliCola.
“That’s weird, ha. No, that’s not why I’m closing Boat Street,” owner Renee Erickson told the Seattle Times when asked if her closure had anything to do with the minimum wage. (Yay, Bethany!)
So why isn’t Seattle’s $15 minimum wage a factor? It could be because it hasn’t happened yet! Also, the first step of the phase-in will have very little impact on these restaurants’ bottom line.
Starting April 1, small businesses (and these are all small businesses) will be required to pay tipped workers a minimum wage of $10 an hour. But Washington State’s minimum wage is already $9.47 an hour, so that’s not much of a raise. The ordinance requires a “minimum compensation” of $11 an hour—wage plus tips plus benefits—but most back of house staff at full service restaurants in Seattle already earn more than that. Maybe a few dishwashers will get a small raise. This isn’t restaurant armageddon.
In fact, restaurants close all the time—about 17 percent a year in Washington State, according to the article Dori cited, but obviously didn’t bother to read. And there is no evidence that Seattle restaurants are closing any faster than they normally do.
In any case, correlation doesn’t equal causation. So why Dori, who denies climate science, would find a handful of restaurant closures to be irrefutable proof of the “real world consequences” of a higher minimum wage, seems strange. Unless, of course, Dori couldn’t actually give a shit about the truth.
Mental Floss: 23 bad business moves.
David Pakman: When did right-wing anti-intellectualism begin?
Pap: GOP is scamming its donors.
Young Turks: Megyn Kelly drops some reality sauce on Mike Huckabee’s head.
#47Traitors
If Susan B. Anthony had a Vlog.
David Pakman: A President Lindsey Graham would deploy military against congress to reverse military cuts.
Sam Seder: The mainstream press fails Wisconsin Workers
SNL Weekend Update girl at a party on ISIS and Boko Haram.
Kerry spars with Rubio over ISIS
Anti-Vax Fever (with chills and light sneezing):
Jon mocks CNN’s Selma coverage of… a drone.
Thom: Why unions are the seeds of democracy.
Mental Floss: Misconceptions about your lawn.
John Oliver: U.S. Territories.
Wrong-email-address-ghazi!!!!!11!1!11!!!!
Amazon Prime for Women (because you deserve 78% satisfaction).
Jon questions Christie’s loyalty to NJ.
Thom: The Good, The Bad, and The Very Very Ecdemicly Ugly.
Mental Floss: Why do we get dark circles under our eyes.
Rep. Donna Edwards launches Senate bid.
Congressional hits and misses of the week.
Sam Seder and Cliff Schecter: Scott Walker butchers Wisconsin workers.
Racism in America:
Kimmel: Obama reads mean tweets:
Sam Seder: The legacy of Paul Wellstone.
White House: West Wing Week.
Thom: The Good, The Bad, and The Very Very Jubately Ugly.
David Pakman: The Obama economy.
Sen. Patty Murray and other Democratic leaders cry foul over abortion language shamefully put into anti-human trafficking bill:
Vsauce: Human extinction.
ONN: Should unpaid interns be paid for fighting for their boss’ amusement?
Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.
– Remembering Trailblazing Abortion Provider Mildred ‘Millie’ Hanson
– Since the state Senate isn’t sure that humans caused global warming, I’m just going to go ahead and blame it on the bears who want to end their hibernation early.
– It’s interesting to think of downtown sub-components and hopefully how to better serve them with transit.
– As a former fetus myself, that guy is a jerk.
If the Seattle Times editorial board is so “depressed” about Republican science denial, perhaps they might want to stop endorsing Republicans?
THE state Senate this week had a brief but telling debate about climate change. It ended, depressingly, with a mostly party-line vote that very well could have taken place years earlier, with Republicans resisting the science on humankind’s clear role in reshaping our global climate.
Seriously… how many of these idiots has the Seattle Times endorsed?
Republicans are excited about this Time cover because they think it makes Clinton look like she has devil horns. Seriously. Go check out National Review‘s blog if you don’t believe me.
If you are at all superstitious, this New York Times story by Nicholas Confessore, Jonathan Martin, and Maggie Haberman about the inevitability of Hillary Clinton ought to be triggering serious alarm bells for you. Get a load of this paragraph:
“Anytime you have all your eggs in one basket, it is a concern,” said Gov. Jack Markell of Delaware, acknowledging the risk Democrats were running by deferring to Mrs. Clinton. “Although if you’re going to have them all in one, this basket is a good place to be.”
Talk about tempting fate! I’m an atheist, but just reading this quote makes me want to throw salt over my left shoulder while making the sign of the cross and bellowing the word “JINX” 137 times, because everyone knows that if you say “jinx” an even number of times it doesn’t work due to the law of double negatives. My mind is reeling with other things Governor Markell could have said:
“Anytime you try to kill the golden goose in hopes of figuring out how it makes the golden eggs, it is a concern,” said Gov. Jack Markell of Delaware, acknowledging the risk Democrats were running by relying on Democratic voting demographics to turn out in 2016 for a candidate who will go through essentially no serious primary challenge. “Although if you’re going to murder your golden goose, this one certainly seems to be asking for it!”
“Anytime you try to count your chickens before they hatch, it is a concern,” said Gov. Jack Markell of Delaware, acknowledging the risk Democrats were running by deferring to Mrs. Clinton. “Although if you’re going to count them before they hatch, these eggs sure do look awfully healthy, don’t they?”
“Anytime you ask what could possibly go wrong, it is a concern,” said Gov. Jack Markell of Delaware, acknowledging the risk Democrats were running by deferring to Mrs. Clinton. “Although, to be frank, what could possibly go wrong with a Hillary Clinton presidential campaign?”
Look. I think Hillary Clinton could be a very strong candidate. I don’t believe this e-mail imbroglio is really going to amount to much in the eyes of the general public, the same way Benghazi and Whitewater only matter to the conservative fringe. And as much as Republicans love to hate her, I believe Clinton would enjoy a tremendous groundswell of support among independents and even centrist Republicans in comparison to the unfettered (racist) vitriol that Obama has had to deal with.
But if we’re seriously looking at a race between Martin O’Malley, Bernie Sanders, and Hillary Clinton, I think this is a sign that the Democratic Party could be in for some lean years ahead. Where are our options? Why aren’t any young up-and-comers willing to give this a shot? Are they afraid of retribution from the Clintons? Is everybody just willing to sit this cycle out and politely wait their turn? This isn’t elementary school. It’s real life, and in real life, the unexpected happens. This is the reason why we have cliches about eggs in baskets and counting eggs and golden geese. For the sake of the party, will no young Democrat heed these very important pieces of bird-related advice?
If there’s anything the Seattle Times editorial board hates more than the $15 minimum wage, it’s unions!
It is easy to substitute McDonald’s corporate face for the word “franchise” and feel no pang of sympathy. But in reality, franchise owners are often small, family-owned businesses, which get the use of a copyright, advertising, training and group buying discounts. In exchange, franchises typically pay between 4 and 7 percent of gross profits.
Unions dislike this business model and the low wages usually paid by quick-serve retailers, and have worked with some success to unionize fast-food workers. In the political pressure cooker of the $15 Now movement last year, Seattle Mayor Ed Murray and the City Council sided with the unions, and against the small-business owners who are franchisees.
… In siding with the union pressure, Seattle sided against not only fast food chains, but also against pet groomers, barbers, businesses providing in-home care to elders and people with disabilities, and others.
Yup, that’s the Seattle Times’ narrative, and they’re sticking to it: this is a struggle for survival by small, locally-owned businesses (like McDonalds, Burger King, and Subway) against the dastardly political machinations of the IBFFWS (the International Brotherhood of Fast Food Workers or Something), the all-powerful—yet curiously nonexistent—fast food workers union!
What a load of crap.
To be clear, there is no fast food workers union, and while there was certainly a successful effort to organize fast food workers, there was no real attempt to actually unionize them—a virtually impossible task given our weak labor laws and the franchised structure of the fast food industry. So no, the mayor and the council most certainly did not “side with the unions.” They sided with the fast food workers who risked their jobs by walking out in demand of a $15 minimum wage.
The Seattle Times’ effort to spin this into a clash between small business and BIG LABOR is simply bullshit. The story of declining wages in America is the story of the declining bargaining power of labor, and fast food franchise workers are the most disenfranchised workers of all. “We beat them on the federal level, and we beat them on the state level,” International Franchise Association lobbyist Dean Heyl recently bragged at a meeting called by the Koch-backed ALEC to strategize opposition to local minimum wage hikes like Seattle’s. And that’s what this lawsuit is really about: a Koch/ALEC/IFA plot to keep fast food workers as powerless as possible.
Shame on the Seattle Times.
Numbers 31:7-18
They attacked Midian as the Lord had commanded Moses, and they killed all the men. All five of the Midianite kings—Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba—died in the battle. They also killed Balaam son of Beor with the sword.Then the Israelite army captured the Midianite women and children and seized their cattle and flocks and all their wealth as plunder. They burned all the towns and villages where the Midianites had lived. After they had gathered the plunder and captives, both people and animals, they brought them all to Moses and Eleazar the priest, and to the whole community of Israel, which was camped on the plains of Moab beside the Jordan River, across from Jericho. Moses, Eleazar the priest, and all the leaders of the community went to meet them outside the camp. But Moses was furious with all the generals and captains[a] who had returned from the battle.
“Why have you let all the women live?” he demanded. “These are the very ones who followed Balaam’s advice and caused the people of Israel to rebel against the Lord at Mount Peor. They are the ones who caused the plague to strike the Lord’s people. So kill all the boys and all the women who have had intercourse with a man. Only the young girls who are virgins may live; you may keep them for yourselves.
Discuss.
That former gubernatorial shoo-in Rob McKenna is a crappy lawyer is no secret. But writing on his blog (yes, McKenna is now a lowly blogger like me!), McKenna seems intent on proving that he’s also a really crappy economist:
As the House debated a $12 minimum wage, Rep. Matt Manweller (R-13), who is also a political science professor at Central Washington University, had apparently heard enough of tortured economic arguments from the other side.
His speech held the House in rapt attention – no mean feat. Of course, the bill passed anyway, on a party-line 51-47 vote, but Manweller’s speech is truly worth your time.
And McKenna is right: Manweller’s speech is truly worth your time… if you want some insight into the sort of bullshit Trickle Down orthodoxy that would have guided McKenna’s economic agenda had he won the governor’s mansion. But if you’re interested in learning how the economy really works, not so much.
Insisting that when wages go up, employment necessarily goes down, Manweller is “baffled” he tells us, that there are so many people who simply do not understand “the law of demand,” angrily denouncing the $12 minimum wage as “the most anti-science bill” ever! Which would be a powerful condemnation indeed, if “the law of demand” was, you know, an actual law. But of course, it’s not. Physics is a natural science, and the law of gravity is an undeniable natural law. But Adam Smith was a moral philosopher, and supply and demand, at best, is just a broad generalization. To insist, as Manweller does, that the labor market would behave in the exact same way as the market for carbon, or health care, or private jets, is just plain stupid. (As is that oft repeated straw man that asks if $12 is so good, why not $50?)
For all his apoplectic eye-rolling, Manweller isn’t actually a bad speaker, exuding an authoritative air grounded in a profound sense of passion, commitment, and total delusion. But the last gubernatorial candidate to follow Manweller’s advice on the minimum wage, didn’t do too well. So publicly fawning over “The Nutty Professor” speaks as poorly of McKenna’s political acumen as does of his economic.
Heidi Groover writes in The Stranger about the verdict in the Kettle Falls Five case in Eastern Washington. Down from the original 5 defendants, the 3 remaining medical marijuana patients were facing long jail terms, essentially being charged as big-time drug traffickers rather than ordinary folks pushing the plant limits of our state’s collective garden law. The jury saw through the bullshit being thrown around by the U.S. Attorney’s office in Eastern Washington and acquitted them on all but one charge.
I’ve written before about this case and the incredibly cynical and spiteful behavior of U.S. Attorney Mike Ormsby. There’s really no excuse for the Obama Administration to continue having him serve in that role openly defying the Obama Administration’s desire to leave ordinary patients alone. Groover details the more egregious aspects of this prosecution:
The U.S. Attorney’s Office combined photos they found of 75 plants grown in 2011 with the 74 live plants they found in 2012 in order to charge the family with growing 100 or more plants. That’s the number that triggers a five-year mandatory minimum prison sentence. This actually made up three of the counts facing the defendants: 1) conspiring to grow and distribute, 2) growing, and 3) distributing. (On Tuesday, the jury found them guilty of growing fewer than 100 plants, but not guilty on charges one and three.)
Then, the feds tacked on another troubling charge: use of a weapon in furtherance of a drug trafficking crime. The Harveys keep multiple guns in their house, which they say are for hunting and protecting their dogs from bears and cougars on their property. (I know this is weird. Guns are terrifying. But they’re common enough in Eastern Washington that having them near a pot grow doesn’t mean you were using them to protect that grow.) It was troubling because it would have added another five-year mandatory minimum.
Anyone could see that the defendants in this case weren’t big-time drug dealers. No evidence was ever presented that any of the defendants sold what they were growing. Nor was any evidence presented that their legally owned firearms were used in any way other than for protection. This was nothing more than an attempt to railroad innocent people, for reasons that aren’t clear to anyone. And, as Groover points out in her article, Ormsby is unapologetic and continuing to pursue other cases. If there are other victims of Ormsby’s office out there, I hope we’re able to shine some light on their cases as well.
More news items from the past two weeks…
[Read more…]
On Tuesday, I wrote about the House Democrats passing the minimum wage bill, but it probably is going to get jammed up in the Senate. A couple different people at Drinking Liberally that night suggested that I make fun of Rep. Matt Manweller’s arguments against the bill. I couldn’t find a transcript of the whole thing, but I did find this press release where he highlights what he seems to think is his strongest argument.
I’ve also been told, Mr. Speaker, that if we raise the minimum wage, it will actually have a stimulus effect.
Yes. Because minimum wage earners are more likely to spend it than people in higher income brackets. You can make an argument against it or you can go with some bullshit analogies.
As if somehow, if I take five dollars from the member to my left and I hand it to a member of my right, there is magically more dollars on the House floor.
Well, if the person on your left was going to take the money and put it in their pocket, and the person on the right was going to buy lunch with it in the House cafeteria, then by passing the money along there’s 5 dollars worth of lunch and 5 dollars in the House. So there’s more value in the House. Also, the economy is usually more than 2 people and an intermediary.
[laughter]
I don’t know if he or some member of his staff transcribed this or if it’s from somewhere else. But I’m now thinking of some intern being like, “No, there wasn’t really much laughter… No, I don’t really think it needs it… Fine, I’ll add some laughter to the transcript. Also, please stop asking me to marry you when I turn 18.”
That’s amazing! If you believe that, please go home to someplace that has a pool – dump a bucket of water – dump a bucket in one side of the pool and then empty that bucket in the other side of the pool, and tell me how long you had to do that before you realize there was not more water in the pool.
It’s sort of amazing that an economist doesn’t think it’s possible for economies to grow based on government policy. And taken to its logical extreme, any policy (other than deficit spending or reduction, I guess) would follow the same logic. Why worry about tax increases if it’s all just the same pool? Why worry about solving waste since it’s all just water in the same pool? Is that really the best GOP argument against the minimum wage?
Just water that had moved around.
Someone is really happy with his crappy analogy. It would be kind of adorable, except for all the people whose lives will be harmed if he gets his way.
Also, not for nothing, but if your go-to metaphor is about your swimming pool, what are you even doing talking about a minimum wage?
None of these arguments make intellectual sense.
Maybe actually engage the arguments instead of spending all that time making up those rad pool metaphors.
Future ex-Rep. Pat Sullivan.
Some time over the next few weeks or months there will be another mass shooting in Washington State, because there always is. And then another shooting a few weeks or months after that. And so on.
And we will eventually learn from family members that one or more of these shooters had severe mental health problems—because they almost always do—and at that point, Democratic state Representative Pat Sullivan’s hands will be soaked in blood.
Assuming Sullivan (D-Covington) is still a state representative, that is.
Late last week, at the behest of the gun lobby, Sullivan killed in committee House Bill 1857, which would have allowed family members or law enforcement to petition the court to issue an “extreme risk protection order” temporarily enjoining a person from possessing dangerous weapons. To be clear, this was no “coming for your guns” kinda bill: Such an order could not have been granted willy-nilly, but only on the finding of “clear, cogent, and convincing evidence” that:
- the subject of the petition poses a significant danger of personal injury to himself, herself, or another by having a firearm or dangerous weapon considering specific factors; and
- the order is necessary because less restrictive alternatives have been tried and found ineffective or are inadequate or inappropriate for the subject’s circumstances.
As we tragically learned from both the Cafe Racer and Jewish Federation shootings, family members are often fearful of and for the shooter, but lack the legal tools to keep deadly weapons out of the hands of their mentally ill kin. The family of Isla Vista shooter Elliot Rodger even warned law enforcement that he was a danger, but lacking evidence sufficient for an involuntary commitment (an understandably high bar) there was no legal path to keep him from purchasing guns. Had something like HB 1857 been available, Rodger and his six victims might still be alive today.
The public testimony on HB 1857 was overwhelmingly supportive. Sarah Whitford, a cousin of one of Rodger’s victims, and a 47th LD constituent of Sullivan, pleaded with her representative to help prevent future tragedies:
“In the days that followed the shooting, we learned that the shooter’s family reported their concerns about his mental state to law enforcement, concerned that he was a danger to himself or others. In response, police visited his apartment and questioned him, but with no legal authority to search his belongings or seize his weapons, under California state law, they left. They left. It was a moment that could have prevented a mass shooting and saved not only Veronika and the other five victims, but the shooter, himself. And because of that moment – that very second when everyone who could have stopped this tragedy threw up their hands, genuinely helpless to do something – that is why I’m here.”
But Sullivan, who enjoys an “A” rating from the National Rifle Association, killed the bill, refusing to let it come up for a vote in the Appropriations Committee. And who knows how many more innocent people will die without this sensible reform?
It was a totally calculated political move on Sullivan’s part—only the problem for Sullivan is, he calculated wrong. Sullivan cravenly figures a Democrat like him needs NRA support to win reelection in his Republican-leaning swing district, and maybe that was true a decade ago when he first won his seat. But that was before Sandy Hook and a string of other mass killings (almost all at the hands of shooters who might have been stopped by the provisions embodied in HB 1857) changed the national conversation on guns. In fact, 57.4 percent of voters in Sullivan’s 47th LD approved 2014’s historic gun backgrounds check Initiative 594, almost two points better than the 55.6 percent Sullivan managed against an underfunded Republican opponent.
I-594 was so popular in Washington State that the allegedly almighty NRA put up only a token resistance. So does Sullivan really believe that the NRA is going to spend big to defend him against a pro-gun Republican? Did he really think there wouldn’t be a price to pay from a surging gun reform movement thousands strong (backed by the likes of Bill Gates, Steve Ballmer, and my boss, Nick Hanauer) in retaliation for killing their number one legislative priority this session?
That’s just plain stupid. And it’s also a display of a stunning lack of political leadership on the part of House Speaker Frank Chopp for failing to impose the party discipline necessary to get HB 1857 to the floor for a vote. As majority leader, Sullivan is the number two man in the house Democratic leadership, and Chopp just let him commit political suicide. And the 47th isn’t a seat the Democrats are likely to win back anytime soon once Sullivan is gone.
Democrats need to understand that times have changed. It’s the NRA that’s now the paper tiger, and the gun reform movement they need to fear. And I sure hope it doesn’t require taking out Sullivan in 2016 to teach Democrats that lesson.
Eager to share our brilliant political commentary and blunt media criticism, but too genteel to link to horsesass.org? Well, good news, ladies: we also answer to HASeattle.com, because, you know, whatever. You're welcome!