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I’m going to be generous to Mitt Romney today. But first some context.

As his primary opponents predicted earlier this year, Mitt’s Bain Capitol record is coming back to bite him in the assets. The latest (which probably isn’t really the latest in the few minutes it takes me to write this post) comes from The Boston Globe:

Romney has said he left Bain in 1999 to lead the winter Olympics in Salt Lake City, ending his role in the company. But public Securities and Exchange Commission documents filed later by Bain Capital state he remained the firm’s “sole stockholder, chairman of the board, chief executive officer, and president.”

Also, a Massachusetts financial disclosure form Romney filed in 2003 states that he still owned 100 percent of Bain Capital in 2002. And Romney’s state financial disclosure forms indicate he earned at least $100,000 as a Bain “executive” in 2001 and 2002, separate from investment earnings.

The timing of Romney’s departure from Bain is a key point of contention because he has said his resignation in February 1999 meant he was not responsible for Bain Capital companies that went bankrupt or laid off workers after that date.

Here’s the generous part: Mitt’s account may be correct! It very well may be that he left Bain for Salt Lake City, and psychologically detached from Bain, leaving all of the management in the hands of his trusted partners.

I can imagine a departing speech, perhaps held on a yacht in Boston Harbor:

I’ve got an Olympic-sized corruption scandal and fiscal problems to deal with in SLC. So, I’m taking a leave. I’ll have nothing more to do with running Bain through the end of the Olympics. I leave it to you, my trusted friends, to maximize shareholder profits. (And as the only shareholder, I demand it! [forced laugh.]) If you make the shareholder fabulously wealthy, you will be generously rewarded when I move on to my post-Olympic project…. So for now, you have the helm.

(Exit stage right.)

And maybe Mitt lived up to this ideal. There is even some evidence consistent with this account. In some sense, then he shouldn’t be held accountable for decisions made during his leave. Right?

The political problem for Mitt is that, as Kevin Drum points out, the whole thing just looks icky. Denying responsibility for big decisions while at the same time being listed as “sole stockholder, chairman of the board, chief executive officer, and president” on multiple SEC filings, makes Mitt look like he is dodging responsibility.

It feels weaselly. Apparently…the buck doesn’t stop with Mitt. (It’s spirited away to a Swiss Bank Account.)

Furthermore, pulling down a salary (even a paltry $100,000) while on leave makes it seem like he was either actively doing something for the company, or skimming without justification.

Either one may be true without tying Mitt to actual decisions (or knowledge of) embarrassing investments and politically damaging layoffs. But, either way, it still looks bad, and people will have to be excused for feeling misled by Mitt.

But here is the deal. I think this Bain thing has left Mitt in a precarious position…and with a much bigger problem.

The problem is that any evidence of decision making at Bain during his leave will make a liar out of Mitt. The evidence so far is good for Mitt. And thousands and thousands of pages of additional documentation may well be released. But proof doesn’t come from negative evidence, so uncertainty will linger.

The flip side is that it will take but one memo, one recording of an invited speech, one email, a telephone recording, or maybe even a handful of disgruntled ex-employees with some personal notes (remember the Veterans who “served with” John Kerry?) to provide a solitary example of Mitt making a major decision for Bain during his leave…and Mitt’s credibility will be decimated.

And worst of all for Mitt, there is a huge incentive to be the first news organization to find it.

The race is on!

– The distinction between the nuns on a bus and the bishops making demands is quite telling.

– The wingnuts sure know their history.

– “There is a clear business case for supporting equal access to civil marriage rights,” said George Allen, the Chamber’s vice president for government relations.

– Men aren’t going extinct.

– The City of Seattle is supporting a court challenge to the federal Defense of Marriage Act.

– If, however, you insist on talking and writing things down, here’s a pro-tip: the terms “distraction” and “chronically ill and abused” don’t mix. Pretty much ever.

– Accused Burglar Incorporates Self

As you may know, our state’s Attorney General, Rob McKenna takes credit for co-founding the state attorneys general lawsuit against the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

Apparently, McKenna lost control of the lawsuit, because he repeatedly claimed that he only wanted the “mandate” and the Medicaid provisions thrown out. Indeed, his own official web site claimed that, “This suit will not ‘overturn’ or ‘repeal’ the new health care reform legislation.”

His co-conspirators colleagues saw it differently. The lawsuit ended up asking the courts to strike down the entire law.

So…remember a couple of Thursdays ago when the Supreme Court found the PPACA “mandate” constitutional? That very day, McKenna gave a press conference in has capacity as Attorney General and as one of the instigators of the ill-fated lawsuit against PPACA. Here is a excerpt from the Q&A (video here):

Jim Brunner: Do you support Congress repealing this law […]?

Rob McKenna: This law is not going to be repealed…

Jim Bruner: Do you support it being repealed?

Rob McKenna: No. There are a number of provisions in this law that ought to be maintained.

Okay…he had to be asked a second time when he tried giving a non-answer the first time, but…pretty clear answer, no?

Yesterday, McKenna further “clarified” his position when speaking before Chamber of Commerce in Yakima :

…McKenna said the reports were a misinterpretation by “Seattle media” and that his position on the Affordable Care Act hasn’t changed.

“I wish I had been better prepared with a better articulated response than the one I gave at the press conference,” McKenna told the luncheon audience after an attendee accused him of changing his stance. “Frankly I didn’t think we were going to lose so I wasn’t ready for that question.”

McKenna insisted he was only asked whether Congress would go forward with repealing the act, not whether he thinks it should be repealed.

Huh. The media clearly reported that McKenna didn’t want Congress to repeal the PPACA. So…um, now, under criticism on the other side of the Mountains, McKenna claims the “Seattle Media” misinterpreted him? So…he is suggesting to a more conservative audience that he believes it should be repealed?

So…to further “clarify” exactly how McKenna feels, his campaign manager, Randy Peeple points out:

…McKenna’s position has not changed and that his [forthcoming] op-ed will not be calling for repeal of the health-care law. Instead, he said McKenna will more fully lay out the parts of the law he still has concerns with and how he’d responsibly approach them as governor.

McKenna has continued to warn about the expense of the law’s Medicaid expansion and has said its individual mandate is problematic despite the court’s ruling. (At his June 28 news conference, however, McKenna said the mandate should remain in place “for now” because it is so closely tied to key positive parts of the health-care law.)

So…the “mandate” is problematic (East) but he wants it to remain in place (West).

Come on. He’s just fucking with everyone now!

This is very interesting indeed [h/t].

[Alexander Hamilton] duly makes an appearance as the judges are warming up to denounce the individual mandate as constitutional overreach because it dragoons healthy young individuals into buying health insurance they do not want.

If Congress can do that, the dissenting justices write, “then the Commerce Clause becomes a font of unlimited power, or in Hamilton’s words, “the hideous monster whose devouring jaws … spare neither sex nor age, nor high nor low, nor sacred nor profane.”

Those are indeed the words of Alexander Hamilton, but, as they’re quoted here, it seems that he must have been warning against the ever-present tyranny of the federal government. But that was not what he was saying.

…

The relevant clauses of the Constitution, Hamilton wrote, had been “the source of much virulent invective and petulant declamation…” He castigated his political opponents who had criticized the powers the Constitution gave to the federal government “… in all the exaggerated colors of misrepresentation as the pernicious engines by which their local governments were to be destroyed and their liberties exterminated; as the hideous monster whose devouring jaws would spare neither sex nor age, nor high nor low, nor sacred nor profane.”

Hamilton did not decry the federal government as a constitutional Godzilla. He denounced the Anti-Federalists for their distortions and lies.

I don’t really know what to make of that. I’m not a lawyer, so maybe someone who is can help me out. It seems like the argument Ian is making is that the justices wanted to overturn the act so they turned to some dubious history. Still, shouldn’t some clerk have verified what the quote meant before it got to the opinion?

– Higgs

– Democracy itself is under attack. I don’t think Thomas Jefferson had this sort of thing in mind when he wrote the great document.

– Romney wasn’t so much a captain of industry as a captain of deindustrialization, making big profits for his firm (and himself) by helping to dismantle the implicit social contract that used to make America a middle-class society.

– What to do with disused parking lots is one of those questions.

– Words will never break your bones. But also, they shouldn’t make you numb. You can’t feel everything all the time — nor should you — but don’t forget how to feel altogether.

– I did a fair amount of cleaning yesterday, but I think this may be my strategy going forward.

It’s bizarre. Really, really bizarre.

Rob McKenna has largely been a cautious politician. He has mastered the technique of being as inoffensive as possible—an absolute necessity for a Republican running for statewide office in Washington state. So, when asked to comment on an inflammatory partisan issue, McKenna skillfully responds with the most vacuous, inoffensive answer imaginable.

But the façade has been showing cracks. They became apparent during McKenna’s gubernatorial kick-off event, when Goldy was barred from entry to the press conference. The campaign was specifically targeting Goldy or The Stranger for exclusion.

What the fuck?!? That’s the kind of petty shit I expect from Tim Eyman, not a serious person asking to be the next Governor of Washington. My impression at the time:

There are warning signs here. The McKenna campaign, right out of the starting gate, is engaging in thuggery. “Open government champion,” my ass.

Two days after McKenna’s kick-off, The Stranger’s Eli Sanders ran into McKenna outside the KUOW studios and asked him about excluding Goldy. McKenna responded:

“I don’t think David Goldstein qualifies as a journalist,” a miffed McKenna told Eli. “He’s a hack. He’s a partisan hack. He’s just there to parrot points from the other side.”

Legally, McKenna is simply wrong. Goldy is a journalist under the laws of our state.

You would think the Attorney General would know that!

(*Crack*)

Then there was the cupcake incident, where McKenna was to give a speech before the King County Young Republicans:

McKenna was about 40 seconds into his talk—he was outlining the state’s dismal job numbers—when a young man in a blue Cougars baseball cap, blue sweat jacket, jeans, and Tevas walked in, sat in the front row, took out a camera and started filming.

McKenna stopped and asked the man who he was with. The man gave his name, Zach Wurtz, and said he was with the Washington State Democrats. The Young Republicans club president, Jennifer Fetters, asked him to leave. Nope. McKenna told Wurtz to turn off the camera. Wurtz refused. McKenna’s voice got sharper, “You need to put the camera away. Now!”

Through the cracks is revealed a peevish—and possibly paranoid—man.

That same mix of peevish and paranoia was seen when he barked, “Get a job!” to Kendra Obom, a woman asking him questions about his position on the Reproductive Parity Act:

McKenna first tried to blow off her question, stating that as a lawyer for the state — he is currently Washington’s attorney general — he wasn’t allowed to comment. Then, apparently flustered, he went after Obom personally, asking her if she thought she was being honest and accusing her of trying to gain a political advantage.

Despite Obom identifying herself as a youth worker, McKenna ends his interaction by telling her “Why don’t you go get a job?”

A candidate has the right to be dickish, of course. Perhaps McKenna was picked on too much in school. Or maybe being a partisan Republican in a moderate’s clothing has rendered him a little skittish and paranoid. But these events strongly suggest that McKenna has serious character flaws that are, at the very least, unseemly in a Governor.

It becomes totally unacceptable when a candidate’s character flaws infect his judgement as a public official. This is precisely what happened last Thursday, when McKenna’s staff specifically targeted Goldy for exclusion from an AG press conference. Goldy’s news editor, Dominic Holden, the person who had assigned Goldy to cover the conference reported:

“They are physically blocking me from entering,” Goldy told me by phone, seven minutes before the 11:30 a.m. press conference was scheduled to begin. A spokesman for McKenna, Dan Sytman, had told Goldy a few minutes before that Goldy wasn’t a journalist and then blocked him from entering. A McKenna staffer had also grabbed Goldy by the shoulders and turned him away from the door.

(*Snap*)

Goldy offers two competing hypotheses:

1. McKenna wasn’t aware of the legal issues of barring a member of the press (or even the public) from public meetings.
2. Our State Attorney General, out of some mix of personal vendetta and sense of invulnerability, used his office to illegally intimidate a citizen into giving up his rights.

This latest episode goes beyond “warning sign.” It’s a danger sign. Rob McKenna has some serious flaws in his temperament that make him paranoid and vengeful—to the point of abusing his office.

It is something voters really ought to know about.

– I love the Donald Verrilli meme.

– And I love the over the top reactions to health care being upheld from conservatives.

– #Noshame

– It must be tough to switch what you believe when you were thrust into the spotlight at a young age.

– Why can’t Democrats just get behind Obama, admit ACA is a big win, admit Obama’s election was a big win? I’m a mopey, pessimistic, anxious, depressive person, but I still can’t understand it.

– How people see conservatives.

– Health care reform glossary

– There are going to be a lot of sappy Olympic profiles. So far, this is my favorite.

Proverbs 30:15
The leech has two daughters.
‘Give! Give!’ they cry.

Discuss.

When you’re an elected official in Washington State acting in the capacity of your office, you can’t decide who gets to attend your press conferences. They’re open to the public. But Rob McKenna doesn’t seem to realize that.

Yesterday morning, Attorney General Rob McKenna notified media across the state that he would be speaking about the US Supreme Court’s decision to uphold most of the Affordable Care Act. McKenna was one of 26 state attorneys general who sued to block the Affordable Care Act. But when Stranger reporter David “Goldy” Goldstein arrived for the press conference at McKenna’s downtown Seattle offices, a guard was waiting for him. Cameramen, radio people, and reporters were granted free entry. Goldy was prevented from entering.

“They are physically blocking me from entering,” Goldy told me by phone, seven minutes before the 11:30 a.m. press conference was scheduled to begin. A spokesman for McKenna, Dan Sytman, had told Goldy a few minutes before that Goldy wasn’t a journalist and then blocked him from entering. A McKenna staffer had also grabbed Goldy by the shoulders and turned him away from the door.

Of course this isn’t too surprising coming as it does from a man who doesn’t recognize the difference between campaign mode and serving the public. Still, we should expect better from our elected officials.

My questions in bold, Gael Tarleton’s answers are below.

1) The state’s paramount duty is education. Do you feel the state is living up to that duty? If not, what needs to happen to live up to it?

We are not fully funding public education. It is the moral and constitutional obligation we must meet. To fully fund public education, we must think about providing early childhood education through lifelong learning. We need to change the discussion so that we prioritize funding to achieve shared education goals:

– We want 80 percent of high school students earning their high school diplomas 10 years from now. Therefore, we should fund public school systems to help them reach that goal – and that means working with teachers, administrators, parents and kids to help communities with the resources needed to succeed.

– We want early childhood learning centers in every school district in the state to be accessible and affordable. Therefore, we must fund programs in parts of the state with limited numbers of early childhood learning centers.

– We want our higher education system focused on serving our residents who are ready for college-level courses and technical school programs. Therefore, we must fund programs that help high school teachers and college deans and departmental chairs co-develop high school curricula, especially in English, Life Sciences, Foreign Languages, Applied Mathematics, and Sociology/History.

– Our higher educational institutions must have the No. 1 priority of making higher education affordable and accessible to all our citizens for lifelong learning. Any newly available revenues must immediately support hiring new teachers so that more courses are taught, which in turn will allow higher ed to admit more students each year. At a minimum, we should aspire to have 70 percent of incoming undergraduate students at our four-year institutions each year be Washington residents. We should expect and plan for having 90 percent of first- time students in our community colleges and technical schools be Washington residents. We must place special priority in the next decade on having our higher education system serve high school graduates from low-income and immigrant communities, returning veterans, and adults who have lost jobs and are preparing for a new career.

The most important task we face is to set shared goals now, develop a 10-year funding plan, and examine how existing revenues must be more effectively allocated to get to work on these four goals. As new revenues are available from various sources, we will have a strategic plan for how best to allocate those dollars.

We have the following options for public revenues: school bond levies in local jurisdictions; state tax revenues to support low-interest student loans, salaries, operations, capital infrastructure, and programmatic initiatives; federal grants to match state programs for student loans, free- and reduced-lunch programs; and potentially new taxes if the state’s Supreme Court upholds the King County ruling that I-1053 is unconstitutional.

From a budgeting and planning perspective, we must have two scenarios in mind: what we do if I-1053 is overturned, and what we do if it is not. The obligation to fully fund public education is the constant in a sea of uncertainty. How we meet this obligation is up to us. After working for eight years at the University of Washington to help secure millions of dollars in grants and gifts for faculty and students, I know the impact that these investments have on the economy, environment, and quality of life for all Washingtonians. We must meet this funding challenge.

2) Washington State voters recently rejected an income tax. Most of the revenue that the legislature might be able to pass is quite regressive. Will you push for revenue, and if so, how will you make sure the burdens don’t fall on the poorest Washingtonians?

Yes, I will be an advocate for the following kinds of revenue options and reforms:

– Examine the current constraints on how local jurisdictions, especially special-purpose districts, are able to use their existing taxing authority with property taxes.

– Develop strategies for enabling local jurisdictions to enter into time-limited partnerships where they create funding mechanisms for building a 21st Century infrastructure for a clean economy: multi-jurisdictional transit systems; construction and technology solutions to stop toxic runoff from local communities to protect Puget Sound, rivers and streams; shared investment in renewable energy infrastructure such as electric charging networks; and other capital-intensive investments that local jurisdictions cannot handle on their own.

– Develop a rate-paying “environmental infrastructure district” system to have all users pay into the equivalent of a public utilities district. This is the kind of progressive reform that makes all of us responsible for clean air and clean water infrastructure investments.

– Adopt “system tolling” on critical transportation corridors to fund regional transit solutions and safe pedestrian/bicycling corridors that separate freight and autos from bikes and pedestrian users.

– Identify a more fair and equitable way to use B&O revenues to reinvest in what small-business owners need most and do best: to help them hire and retain more employees, reduce the cost of start-up loans, incentivize innovative strategies for clean energy and clean trade; and make them the centerpiece of how we build a modern economy beyond fossil fuels.

– When we pass legislation regarding tax exemptions, we must understand what programs will be most affected by exempting private entities from paying their taxes. State legislators should identify what sources of revenue will be used to protect against the constant erosion of critical funding obligations resulting from tax exemptions.

3) There is a good chance that the State Senate and/or the Governor’s Mansion will be controlled by Republicans after the next election, and certainly most legislators will be more conservative than people who would be elected in a Seattle district. Given that how will you get your agenda passed?

There is an equally good chance that the Governor’s Mansion, State’s Attorney General, and both State legislative bodies will be controlled by Democrats. Recent Elway polls show that the state’s political climate and voter party affiliation are not growing more conservative: voters are instead becoming more independent. Some observers believe independents tend to vote Democratic more frequently than they vote Republican. The 36th District is frequently described as the anchor of liberal, progressive Seattle politics. It is also home to more than 20,000 working-class jobs in the Ballard-Interbay Manufacturing Industrial Center, including 15,000 jobs related to the fishing and seafood processing markets. There are thriving small business communities in every corner of the District. The District is where the working class and middle class co-exist. This strengthens our communities because we believe in teachers, metal workers, fishers, start-up companies, family-owned small businesses, parks for kids, and the dignity of work with living wages, regardless of the type of job a person might hold.

We have an aggressive agenda for job creation, expanding higher education affordability, providing healthcare, and protecting our environment. We are also home to a recreational boating industry that generates $3.5 billion in revenues across the state, as well as home to the grain terminal at Pier 86 that makes Washington’s agricultural firms competitive in a global economy where 90 percent of their business comes from exports through the Port of Seattle. When we focus on creating jobs, expanding markets for Washington companies, and strengthening opportunities for Washingtonians to pursue higher education, we will help legislators from all over the state share common cause.

That said, I’ve learned from experience that solutions to problems don’t happen with group think. I don’t just reach across the aisle; I’ve reached across continents and communities to do the hard work of creating jobs, building bridges, and protecting communities. To help create an international earthquake monitoring network, I worked with Russians and Ukrainians and the International Atomic Energy Agency. To fight human trafficking, I’ve worked with State Sen. Jeanne Kohl-Welles, D-36, and King County Councilmember Kathy Lambert. To help rebuild the South Park Bridge, I worked with the South Park Neighborhood Association, the Machinists, and colleagues at the Port, City, County and State to find the funding. And to build the Rental Car Facility that created more than 3,700 jobs in South King County, I worked with elected officials in the State Legislature as well as Sea-Tac, Des Moines, and Burien.

4) You’re running in a race with many Democrats who share similar positions. What separates you from the rest of the field?

We’re all asking the voters to hire us to do a job. We may share the same values, but we all have different experience and qualifications to do the job of a lawmaker. I’m asking the voters to hire me because I have the experience and skills of working in the public and private sectors creating jobs, solving difficult problems, and managing millions of dollars in budgets. When it comes to solving tough problems with responsible funding strategies, my experiences working in federal, state, and local governments as well as in a technology company and international markets give me a deep reservoir of ideas, lessons learned, and experts to help find solutions. These are the resources that will help me do the work that voters are hiring me to do.

As a Port Commissioner, I have helped create 7,000 living wage jobs through critical public works projects. At UW, I’ve worked with scientists, engineers, historians, political scientists, archeologists, musicians, and cybersecurity experts to help secure millions of dollars in grants and endowments for faculty and students. I’ve worked with legislators from all over the state to help criminalize human trafficking, create more open contracting laws, and build transit and transportation corridors that help our companies compete globally. To accelerate a clean, green trade agenda in Washington, I’ve supported partnerships with the Port of Seattle, WSU, Climate Solutions and Pacific Northwest National Laboratory to develop an aviation biofuels market based in Washington, while also supporting investments in electrification and renewable energy infrastructure. And as a federal government employee, I’ve written policies and run programs regarding critical national security interests and concerns.

5) Seattle and King County give more to the state than they get back. Part of this is reasonable things like the cost of providing education and social services in rural and suburban areas, but part of it is a lack of respect for Seattle and King County with the legislature that treats us as an ATM. How will you make sure your district gets its fair share of revenue without harming education or social services throughout the state?

We all have a stake in the success of our schools and our students, regardless of their home base. We will all benefit if we have affordable access to public health centers and community clinics. We all share a stake in tackling climate change and building the foundation for a clean economy in the 21st century. If we reflect on how the concept of the public commons emerged in Washington, it will help us understand how to think about sharing resources with communities and regions that don’t live in our own backyard.

All property owners pay property taxes to build infrastructure and invest in healthy, safe communities. However, not all people who benefit from investments in the public commons are paying property taxes. Does that mean we stop paying our fair share of taxes? No. It would be short-sighted when we want to collectively improve the quality of life for everyone, not just the District we represent. The state pays only 7 percent of the annual operating costs of the University of Washington, its flagship public university. Just 20 years ago, the state paid closer to 40 percent of the total annual operating costs. Yet UW benefits the public commons of the whole state, Pacific Northwest, the nation and the world. UW’s nursing and public health graduates are the people who staff community health clinics and protect public health systems throughout the state and the Pacific Northwest. The UW School of Medicine receives $700 million a year from the federal government to educate the doctors who will be serving rural, low-income, and underserved communities with safe healthcare. Researchers at UW spawned the life sciences research community that has become home to the Gates Foundation, PATH, and Nobel Laureates – all in our district.

When we talk about who is getting their “fair share” of the tax pie, it is a familiar refrain that another part of the state benefits from King County’s and Seattle’s wealth. But the people in Seattle and King County who like to go skiing in the Cascades, own homes on Lake Chelan, go hiking on Mount Adams, or take weekends sampling wines in Walla Walla are only able to enjoy these benefits because they can fly there, drive there, drink clean water, and benefit from cheap electricity. And they benefit when their kids decide they’d rather go to school at WSU or Central Washington because they like the idea of dry, sunny weather three weeks in a row.

We will create jobs, opportunities, and a cleaner economy if we invest in research at Central Washington University or in social services for returning veterans in Tacoma or Yakima. The 36th District’s small businesses want to hire people who are prepared for jobs in the trades, fishing industry, biotechnology companies, or software start-ups. One of the most important roles I will play in Olympia for my district is making sure we are showing how tax revenues are used to create jobs, prepare employees for high-demand job markets, and give all our communities a chance to live a decent life and pursue affordable education.

My proposal to create a sustainable funding base for public health revolves around this idea of a shared stake in a common network. The “Public Access To Health Services” (PATH) center calls for reforming the way we use property tax authority of special purpose districts in the state. If we allow special purpose districts to share their property taxes to create local health centers, we stand a chance of putting public health services on a sustainable financial path. My district would help lead the way, as we have thousands of public health professionals, caregivers, and small business owners who would be potential partners in making affordable health care, family planning, adult day care, and other essential services available to our communities.

Our district also believes in investing in a clean economy future. Our ideas and know-how for designing and building environmental infrastructure systems for homeowners and small business owners will create best practices for others around the state. When we share knowledge and solutions that help our own communities, we are creating the foundation for helping all Washingtonians live in healthy, safe communities where they will enjoy a better quality of life.

For all of the discussion of how the new arena in SoDo would hurt traffic, you’d think this would be a bigger deal.

Coal trains can easily be 8,000 feet long, which means that it takes more than 6 minutes to clear a street crossing when traveling at 15 mph, a pretty typical speed in an urban area. Then factor in 30 seconds of street closure time for warning signals to sound or crossing arms to stop traffic, plus 30 seconds to re-start traffic after the train has cleared the intersection. Add it all up and you get this: Bellingham’s new loaded coal trains would completely cut off street intersections by somewhere between 105 minutes and 125 minutes of every day.

I don’t want to be disingenuous here. I support more rail infrastructure at the port and oppose the coal trains for non-traffic reasons much more than this. Still, if the trains come, hopefully they come with more infrastructure to mitigate this.

8:58: I am listening to Mitt Romney right now…and he is shamelessly lying about the impact of the patient protection and affordable care act. I didn’t hear anything about “death panels” but the same old bullshit lines:

“Obamacare puts the government between you and your doctor”

“Higher deficits.”

“Causes you to lose the insurance you like”

“Or return to a time when you could chose the insurance you like,”

“Obamacare is a job killer”

…and others.

Yawn.

Most of his claims have been shown false by the fact checking web sites.

9:06: Gov. Gregoire is on KUOW now, pointing out how “going back to the status quo would bankrupt our businesses, our families, and the state.”

9:09: Goldy takes the SCOTUS decision as a sign that Rob McKenna is a crappy lawyer:

Remember, McKenna was instrumental in initiating the lawsuit that forced today’s ruling, and spoke confidently on the campaign trial that he and his fellow attorneys general would prevail. He was wrong.

“Our precedent demonstrates that Congress had the power to impose the exaction in Section 5000A under the taxing power, and that Section 5000A need not be read to do more than impose a tax. This is sufficient to sustain it.”

Even though an overwhelming majority of constitutional scholars had weighed in that the mandate appeared to be constitutional, perhaps it is unfair to use this ruling to impugn McKenna’s legal acumen. Perhaps McKenna merely made the political calculation that the conservative majority on the court would ultimately prove be just as politically unprincipled as he is, and thus toss out the ACA regardless of clearly established precedent?

Perhaps. Not that that take is any more flattering.

The point is that under McKenna’s leadership the attorney general’s office has an established track record of championing losing, politically motivated cases and opinions.

9:15: Obama is on now. He goes through a list of the major advantages.

“Young Americans can stay on their parents insurance”

“Seniors receive discounts on prescriptions”

“No insurance? Then you will be insured starting in 2014.”

“No discrimination by preexisting conditions”

“People who can afford insurance should take the responsibility of buying it”

“I didn’t do this because I believe it is good politics. I did it because it is good for America.”

Not much new there. Essentially, Obama and Romney stuck to their previous points.

9:23: The gods of politics are to be worshiped and thanked for giving us a Republican nominee who, while a Governor, passed the model of universal health care that he must now fight against. I think this angle has been downplayed to date because of the uncertainty of the SCOTUS decision. Now, it’s ripe….

9:26: The real “Death Panel” would have been SCOTUS if they had struck down Obamacare. Hopefully, today’s ruling will help us claw our way back to the top of the list for health statistics….

9:28: Rep. Jim McDermott is on KUOW. He is happy.

“John Roberts…is fantastic” (Okay…maybe I’ve changed the meaning there.)

“People have been trying to do this since 1935…huge victory”

“Rob McKenna has egg on his face.”

9:31: Republicans have been chanting “overreach, overreach, overreach” like they are in a fucking trance. What the SCOTUS decision shows us is that they were engaged in a collective reach around!

9:34: Steve Scher on KUOW is now interviewing some wingnut (part of the lawsuit) who claims that today’s decision means Americans have “lost their freedom.” Sure…they have lost the freedom to go bankrupt from medical costs. Freedom from watching the most disadvantaged Americans suffer for want of health care. Freedom from the constant worry about how to get health insurance….

9:40: Okay…finally back to Goldy’s point above. He is right that McKenna was shown by the SCOTUS decision to be a lousy lawyer. McDermott is right, “Rob McKenna has egg on his face.” But I stand by my statement that McKenna is a winner by this decision. A little egg on his face is nothing compared to dealing with the actual consequences to real voters had the lawsuit succeeded.

9:49: Paul Constant posts this hilarious CNN moment:

10:20: Josh Marshall:

I have some thoughts on the politics of this — mainly because the politics is what I have some expertise to speak about. But that will be my next post. Before I do that I wanted to state very clearly that the politics of the decision pales before its substance, a fact that I suspect will get little attention today. This decision will have a massive effect on the lives of literally millions of people. Mitt Romney may have joked yesterday that the White House was “not sleeping real well” last night. But a lot of people tonight and in the future will sleep a lot better for this result. Young people, people with pre-existing conditions and mainly people who through the chaos of the health care market simply find themselves with no coverage.

That’s the big deal.

10:33: Apparently, FAUX News joined CNN in jumping the gun. They heard or read that the court didn’t find the Commerce Clause argument convincing and assumed the whole thing would be struck down. TPM does a medley:

10:40: Obama speaks:

10:45: Gov. Christine Gregoire’s statement on today’s SCOTUS ruling. (Livestreaming for now.) Gregoire eviscerates Rob McKenna!

10:56: Rob McKenna releases a say-nothing statement on today’s ruling. As one of two people who initiated the lawsuit, you’d think he’d have a hell of a lot more to say than that. I suspect he is just relieved that the whole potential nightmare for his gubernatorial campaign is over.

11:06: Justice Ginsburg’s opinion quoted from Gov. Christine Gregoire’s brief,submitted in reaction to McKenna joining the lawsuit. “We tried healthcare without a mandate and it [became]…a death spiral.”

11:09: I, for one, look forward to the forthcoming law with its tax incentive to eat broccoli.

11:14: Seattle PI’s Joel Connelly summarizes some of the PPACA’s benefits for Washingtonians:

About 52,000 young people have been able to stay on their parents’ health insurance programs until the age of 26.

The law has provided that families seeking insurance cannot be denied coverage because of a child’s pre-existing condition. Nor can insurers place lifetime limits on spending for an individual’s health care.

More than 100,000 small businesses in Washington are now eligible for a federal small business tax credit designed to make it easier and more economical to provide employees with health care.

“I look forward to the day not long from now when more than 800,000 people in our state will be able to use our Health Benefit Exchange to get health insurance they need but currently must go without,” said Gov. Christine Gregoire.

The Supreme Court has largely upheld the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA).

My limited understanding from media coverage is that the ruling on the “mandate” is narrow. The crux of the argument: The U.S. government can tax. Period. Since the mandate is a tax incentive, it’s not outside the constitutional scope for congress to enact such a tax incentive for people to purchase insurance.

Two quick points. First, we see once again, that Democrats lost the battle of words by the fact that the tax incentive provision became known as a “mandate.”

The fact is, it isn’t a mandate. It is an incentive. You are not mandated to purchase insurance. Rather, you pay a tax if you can afford but don’t purchase insurance. Or, put another way, you avoid paying a tax if you have insurance.

The word “mandate” is one of those wingnut terms of art (like “death tax”) that is factually inaccurate, but is fantastic for stoking emotions. It makes for good hate-stoking.

The second point. Of the thousand and thousands of words I’ve read on the constitutionality/unconstitutionality of the PPACA after the lawsuits were announced, one of the best was written by none other than Goldy:

See, the recently passed health care reform legislation does not require that all U.S. citizens purchase insurance, it merely provides a tax incentive to those of us who do. If you are not covered by an employer, and if you have not purchased your own individual policy, and if your income is above certain levels, and if you don’t hail from a state that has opted out of this mandate by implementing its own qualified health insurance system, you will be required to pay an additional federal tax, starting at the greater of $95 or 1% of income in 2014, and rising to $695 or 2.5% of income in 2016, up to a cap of the national average premium on a bronze plan. Both the minimum tax and the cap will increase by the annual cost of living adjustment.

Now, some might argue that this is still a mandate to engage in some sort of economic activity because it targets a tax at those who refuse, but one could easily flip this perception around. What it really is, is a flat, 2.5% federal income tax — much along the lines of what is already imposed to fund Social Security and Medicare — but for which the law provides a substantial exemption to those who choose to purchase private health insurance.

And don’t attempt to bog down this discussion in jibberish over whether this is a “tax” or a “fee” or a “penalty” or a “mandate” or whatever. The courts have long been consistent that lawmakers need not jump through such semantic hoops; if a law is constitutional worded one way, it is constitutional worded another, as long as the practical application is the same. And clearly, our tax laws are filled with provisions intend to encourage some economic activities and discourage others.

Along these lines, a better analogy than Troll’s theoretical handgun mandate would be our current home mortgage interest deduction. The federal government does not actually mandate that we all take out big mortgages to buy homes and condos, but it grants huge tax advantages to those who do, essentially penalizing renters. Think about it: with the extra tax revenue from eliminating the home mortgage interest deduction, the federal government could lower the base tax rate on all of us.

So, if the health insurance mandate-cum-exemption is unconstitutional based on the contention that it compels individuals to engage in an economic activity, then so too would be the home mortgage interest deduction, and any number of other federal tax incentives. And I sincerely doubt that McKenna would choose to join a lawsuit seeking to deny Washington homeowners this very popular deduction.

If the “mandate” is unconstitutional, so is the mortgage interest deduction. After all, it “mandates” that you take out a mortgage loan, or pay a tax penalty.

Finally…winners and losers: First, this secures Obama’s legacy. Even though the PPACA was only one of many solid accomplishments of Obama’s first two years, this one is more defining and will positively, directly touch the lives of more Americans. (Ironically, candidate Obama opposed a “mandate” while he was campaigning against Clinton in 2008.) Second, this takes away Romney’s arguments that “Obama didn’t do anything” when he had a Democratic House and Senate.

Likewise, Democrats win by getting through another great social program. This is, after all, the real reason why Republicans oppose this largely Republican-designed program.

On the other hand, this is a win for conservatives, in that they will certainly be motivated by hatred, anger, fear of “socialism” largely out of the misconception that the government is now “forcing them to do something.”

The other big winner is Rob McKenna, who by losing the lawsuit he claims to have co-founded, dodges a huge bullet. Who wants the vote for the prick that kicked you off your parent’s insurance, or the asshole that quadrupled your insurance costs because of a pre-existing condition?

The final big winner is America—we have now joined most of the rest of the civilized world by making health care available to the poorest of our citizens. A reversal would have been a tragedy for untold millions of Americans. The PPACA is far from perfect, but it’s almost certainly better than what we had.

WordPress (or more likely user error) seems to have eaten my last post, so here again is the link to info about the rallies after tomorrow’s Supreme Court decisions.

Attend a rapid response event near you!

This Thursday, the US Supreme Court is expected to rule on Rob McKenna’s partisan challenge to the Affordable Care Act – President Obama’s health care reform law. It’s perhaps the most anticipated Supreme Court ruling in our nation’s history.

Regardless of the outcome, we’ll be ready. Please RSVP on Washington Community Action Network’s web site.

Thursday, June 28 outside the Attorney General’s offices around the state

– This chart of Congressional wealth is one of those charts that shocks you with things you could have guessed.

– The Seattle Great Wheel looks like it will be pretty neat.

– This idea for filibuster reform is a bit overly complex. But in general it’s solid.

– WTF, SPD?

– Clearly this is not Romney’s party – yet, anyway. Other Republicans’ willingness to buck and rebuke him signals not bracing political independence – party leaders haven’t had the guts to stand up to the birthers in their ranks – but insecurity about their November prospects. A lot of Republicans seem to have their eye on November – of 2016.

– Spoke and Food