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Lots to talk about. Let’s see…the Washington legislature has a stalemate with a huge deadline tonight, Newt is bouncing checks, Santorum has suspended.

Let’s talk about it. Please join us tonight for an evening of politics under the influence at the Seattle Chapter of Drinking liberally.

Seattle DL meets every Tuesday at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. We begin at 8:00pm, but some folks show up even earlier to enjoy a peaceful dinner.

SPECIAL EVENT: This Thursday (April 12th) the Northwest Progressive Institute (NPI) will hold their 2012 Spring Fundraising Gala Mercer Island Community Center, 8236 SE 24th Street.

The event will benefit NPI and will feature food by Frankie’s Pizza (my favorite pizzeria in the PNW), music, memorable speakers, and great company. The speakers include Senator Maria Cantwell, Congressman Adam Smith, the Honorable Ron Sims, and NPI’s Andrew Villeneuve.

The reception begins at 6:30 PM, main program to begin at 7:15 PM. Tickets are available here or at the door. (The individual rate is $60, household rate is $90. Those living lightly can get in the door for $20, and students who want to volunteer with event setup and takedown are welcome to come for free.)

Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? You’re in luck…there are DLs meeting all over Washington state. Tonight there are also meetings of the Tri-Cities, Bellingham, and Vancouver, WA chapters. And on Thursday, Drinking Liberally Bremerton meets. Next Monday there are meetings of the Woodinville, Olympia, Yakima, and Shelton chapters.

With 233 chapters of Living Liberally, including twelve in Washington state and six more in Oregon, chances are excellent there’s one near you.

– Just put a school downtown.

– It’s not a future many in the Northwest had considered in the past. A region that prides itself on green energy, new economy jobs, and a clean environment is about to crown a new king—coal.

– Republicans on Twitter have found the real racists.

– The best encapsulation of every problem with Slate.

– Because we were in Iraq promoting freedom (h/t).

– Whatever you think of Obama’s policies, this GIF of him reading Where The Wild Things Are is pretty great (h/t).

– Middle aged is different for sports stadiums than for people, but I think the Safe is going to be around for a while.

Late last week, media sources, both local and national, were abuzz with the figure $770,000 released by Secretary of State Sam Reed. That is, supposedly, the “cost” for a special election to replace Rep. Jay Inslee (D-WA-1). Inslee recently resigned his seat to run for Governor.

Last Friday I listened to KUOW’s Weekday Friday news round-up as they spent quite a bit of time on the topic of this special election. (Aside: I was a little surprised that the four esteemed journalists in the studio didn’t understand that the Governor cannot appoint a replacement for a Representative…it’s in the Constitution.)

I was puzzled by the figure. I mean, the special election will take place on the same days as the primary and general election. Does it really cost $770,000 to add one race to the ballet for about 11% of the state’s voters? Is that the cost of adding a couple of pages to the voter’s guide for residents of the old 1st CD?

Now…if Inslee had resigned just days earlier (before March 6th), it would have required a stand-alone special election. I could imagine a new election costing taxpayers $770,000. But that isn’t what happened. Inslee, intentionally or not, delayed his resignation and a stand-alone special election was avoided.

For the answer to the puzzling cost figure we turn to TNT.

Katie Blinn, the co-director of elections with the Secretary of state, said there isn’t really an increase in election costs only a change in how those costs are distributed. County elections offices divide the cost of elections among the government entities with matters on the ballot. But state law dictates that the state doesn’t pay anything for state and federal elections held in even-numbered years like this. It only chips in for special elections that are normally held in odd-numbered years and for any election to fill an unexpired U.S. Senate or U.S. House position.
[…]

So there are not additional costs other than the postcard mailing. What Blinn’s response seems to indicate is that the costs will be shared by an additional governmental entity. As state costs go up, the costs borne by local governments will go down.

In short…the election itself costs taxpayers almost nothing extra. What we are talking about with the $770,000 is the transfer of funds between different government entities; budgetary shuffling. Somehow, the mainstream media missed that subtly. And maybe it’s because Sam Reed wasn’t particularly clear about what the $770,000 is.

The Democrats, of course, point out that Sam Reed is the McKenna campaign’s Thurston County co-chair, and that “[t]he conflict of interest is clear.”

The SOS office is also requesting $225,000 to do voter education—essentially to mail out postcards to educate voters about the confusing special election in the old 1st and the regular election in the new first. I’m not sure why the voter’s pamphlet—you know, that document sent to all voters that educates them about the elections and candidates—cannot be used to educate voters about the special election. Perhaps it violates the RCW or something. I don’t know.

So boos and hisses to the majority of the MSM that hyperventilated over the $770,000 “cost” of a special election.

And boos and hisses to the SOS office for failing to clearly communicate to the media the meaning of the $770,000 figure. It’s an integrity issue, given how a high-ball estimate would look like conflict of interest. Reed should have gone out of his way to explain exactly what the figure means, and provide an actual estimate of taxpayer’s costs.

Finally, Reed should have been out front with corrections last week when the media was hyping the figure incorrectly.

Because the governor might die, or otherwise have to leave. And also because Owen often does annoying things. Mostly deciding the unconstitutional 2/3 requirement was rad. Also, on the plus side of the ledger, he doesn’t fuck around when Gregoire is out of the state, and he could. But while I want the Democrats’ budget to pass, I don’t know that this is the best thing (if he’d actually do it).

It’s a 24-24 tie in the senate because Republican minority leader Sen. Mike Hewitt (R-16, Walla Walla) one of the 25 votes that gave the GOP (and a couple of conservative Democrats) the majority for the GOP version of things, is out recovering from surgery.

Conservative Democrat Owen, who’s made momentous decisions before (ruling against the Democrats by deciding that repealing tax loopholes is tantamount to raising taxes and requires a two-thirds vote), could step in a give the Democrats the budget vote they need.

I mean I’d prefer we win the day because someone realizes that the GOP position is horse shit not because someone needs surgery. I mean the people of Walla Walla deserve representation in this budget mess. That said, I wouldn’t shed a tear if it happened. The Democrats have a better budget than the Republicans and the people voted for Democrats in the majority of both houses.

The right-wing media has a huge breaking scandal….

The Democratic Party’s newly appointed Jewish outreach liaison is pictured on Facebook in a series of provocative photos with her friends holding dollar bills and referring to themselves as “Jewbags” and the “Jew cash money team.”

Dani Gilbert, who has been a staffer in the office of Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D., Fla.), was recently appointed as the Democratic National Committee’s Jewish outreach liaison, according to her Twitter feed.

Ooohh….that sounds weally, weally, wascally really, really bad.

The whole thing supposedly exposes a huge riff between Pres. Obama and DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz.

Here is the offending picture….

There she is kissing the money!

Except, wait. That Facebook page is from January 2006. I presume Ms. Gilbert was in college (or maybe high school) and was goofing around with some friends.

Inexcusable still. It’s scandalous!

Clearly, Ms. Gilbert should be fired and forbidden from participation in politics.

And kept away from young children.

– Good for Bruce Harrell for his proposal to allow women to file a complaint with the city’s Office of Civil Rights if they are asked to leave a public place or cover up while breastfeeding.

– I’m not sure weirdness is really something you can measure legislative session to legislative session.

– Eliminating Disability Lifeline, on top of being horrible policy on its own, doesn’t even save money. (h/t)

– War Crimes

– Finally, we need to stop shrugging off the concerns and cries of people in states that feel like lost causes or bastions of GOP influence because those people matter too. We need to stop telling people to move (most can’t), to secede (we don’t want to), or to start fighting (we already are, you just aren’t looking).

– Possibly the dumbest use of I was just asking for people’s opinion ever.

– Where’s my Higgs?

– Seattle’s Road Map to a Climate-Friendly Future

– It’s worth noting that the quickest way to enact restrictions on walking around while carrying a gun is probably for the “wrong” kinds of people to start carrying firearms, causing a freakout among the people who wrote the laws in the first place.

– Call me a skeptic, but I think corporate compassion is mostly PR.

– Pictures of the U-Link breakthrough.

– You, gentle Times reader, should your accept your trite generalizations about female sexuality from noone less than a Latin-spouting Harvardian.

– Our awesome banking system.

– Health care glossary.

– Trayvon-like Dudes

What the hell is up with white hipster Jesus, Newsweek?

– I don’t buy the idea that a large group of black bodies = crime, but I know a lot of people who trumpet on & on about the joys of gentrification do.

– I think no one really was identifying him with white conservatives until white conservatives adopted Zimmerman as their Mumia Abu-Jamal.

– Urban agriculture discussion in Olympia.

– Waspzilla

– Too far

In 2005, Rep. Dave Reichert (R-WA-8) was one of only 21 Republicans to vote against House Resolution 639 that, essentially, authorized drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). HR-639 passed the house only to be killed in the Senate (thanks to a big show of leadership by Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA)).

Reichert has gotten a lot of mileage out of these types of “courageous” votes against his own party…but he shouldn’t. After all, Reichert stupidly admitted that his voting record was built on a strategy of keeping himself and Republicans in power—even on this very ANWR vote:

Sometimes the leadership comes to me and says, “Dave, we want you to vote a certain way.’ Now, they know I can do that over here, that I have to do that over here. In other districts, that’s not a problem, but here I have to be able to be very flexible in where I place my votes. Because the big picture here is, keep this seat, keep the majority, keep the country moving forward with Republican ideals…. Not the vote I place on ANWAR that you may not agree with, or the vote that I place on protecting salmon.”

With redistricting, Reichert finds himself moving from a very competitive district to a safe district. So today, when the House Republicans took a vote on the Ryan budget—you know, the one that would dismantle Medicare and replace it with a coupon system–how did Reichert vote?

He voted in favor of it (via Publicola):

Perhaps it’s because he’s in a safer Republican district now thanks to redistricting (and the only person running against him has raised just $12,000), but US Rep. Dave Reichert (R-WA, 8 ), who has broken with his party on some high-profile and highly politicized votes in the past, stuck with his party today. (In the past, Reichert voted against his party to override President Bush’s veto of a children’s health care bill, voted for the employee non-discrimination act, i.e., for gay rights, voted with President Obama and the Democrats to extend emergency unemployment benefits, and, most dramatically, voted for the cap and trade bill.

Today, the liberated Congressman from the redrawn 8th (no more rich Microsoft liberals coming after him), voted for the controversial budget pushed by Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) in a party-line 228-191 vote.

Last year, Reichert skipped this vote…not out of political strategy, but because his mother had just died after an 18-month bout with pancreatic cancer (and, no doubt, Medicare prevented another bankruptcy). His office suggests he would have voted for it with the caveat that:

I’ve heard from my constituents and share their concerns about reductions in Pell Grants for low-income students, oil drilling expansion in our wilderness, and how entitlement reform could affect seniors and those approaching retirement.

Today he really did vote for a extremist right-wing bill. Sure…this version is a bit less extreme than the previous version, but it is still extreme. Yes, this one lets Senior’s use their coupons to purchase their way into a Medicare-like system. (This particular modification came about with the assistance of Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR).) It’s still extreme.

The bottom line is that the bill gives tax breaks to the wealthy at the same time raising health care costs for Seniors by thousands of dollars a year. And it does lots of other bad things, like repealing key parts of “Obamacare” and cutting Pell Grants.

If this bill were to become law millions of Americans would be affected by loss of insurance, increased health care costs, uncertainty and bankruptcy.

As Publicola suggests, Riechert is free now—free from having to take strategic votes that appease his constituents against his conscience.

Reichert still represents the OLD 8th Congressional District. What his vote today did was tell many of his constituents (the soon-to-be ex-constituents from the liberal parts of the old 8th) to fuck-off. And why shouldn’t he? Yeah…as he said last year, he’s heard from them, he knows their concerns. But they no longer hold anything over him, so screw ’em.

Via Human Rights Campaign:

You’re not gonna use the pink ball. We’re not gonna let you do that. Not on camera. Friends don’t let friends use pink balls.

I’m pretty sure Rick prefers blue balls….

An all local open thread, but feel free to talk about whatever you want in the comments.

– Puget Sound Energy owns the biggest chunk of the power (and the pollution) coming from the Colstrip coal plant in eastern Montana, which is the second-largest coal-fired power plant west of the Mississippi.

– This is about the greatest picture I’ve ever seen.

– City Council member Tim Burgess failed to pass a proposed amendment to the city’s comprehensive plan this morning saying that the city supports homeless encampments only at religious institutions.

– Solid endorsements for DelBene.

– Financial fitness day.

– Trail updates

– Strangest opening day ever.

No surprise, really:

While he is yet to campaign in Wisconsin, Mitt Romney worked the state’s Republican voters from Dallas on Wednesday, holding a “telephone town hall” in which he embraced Gov. Scott Walker’s labor policies, endorsed U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan’s House budget….

Got that?

1. Romney endorses Walker’s anti-labor policies
2. Romney endorses Ryan’s budget which will end the current Medicare program and replace it with “coupon care”

The problem for Romney is that these two positions taken together pretty much make him unelectable in a general election.

Romney is counting on being able to “hit the reset button”—start over in his political positioning—after winning the nomination.

Will it work in 2012? Can a campaign really erase history when access to video, audio, and print media has become so democratized? Or will truckloads of money succeed in buying a big case of collective amnesia?

I know it’s super provincial, but I don’t care: I love it when Seattle and Washington State get mentioned in the New York Times, especially for good things.

Nationwide, women’s groups point out the glaring gender disparity in public life, noting that there are only 6 female governors and 17 female senators. Across the country, women make up 23.6 percent of state legislatures, according to Off the Sidelines, a project started last year by Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand of New York. But in Washington State, women’s serving in public office has been as consistent as the rain.

“Every once in a while a note or a letter will mention it,” Ms. Gregoire said. “But mostly, it’s taken for granted.”

Courtney Gregoire, her daughter, would relay differences between Washington State and Washington, D.C., where she worked as the director of the National Export Initiative at the Commerce Department. She found herself biting her tongue when men mentioned her age (she is 32), and she started wearing pantsuits to appear older. Once, after being the lone woman in a meeting of 25, she called her mother.

The governor replied, “Welcome to how it was for us.”

There’s still a lot of work for equal representation here in Washington. A lot of women are retiring from the legislature this year. I mentioned a while ago that we might not have any women elected executive officers come November. I don’t think the Democratic party has done a particularly good job in recent years of recruiting women.

Also, the Norm Dicks quote (if it was in context) makes me glad he’s retiring.

“I think women tend to advocate for women, and I think to myself, ‘They ought to mention men, too,’ ” he said. “When I’m running, I’m not just talking about men, I’m talking about men, women and children. I think women in politics have to be a little careful not to act as if they’re just representing women.”

Ms. Cantwell, Ms. Gregoire and Ms. Murray have campaigned together, he said, and Ms. Murray in particular has focused on recruiting women to run for public office.

“All of that is great but I feel like, ‘Can’t they find a good man to run sometimes?’ ” Mr. Dicks said.

If only men would run for office sometimes.

If this piece was written by anyone but Lou Guzzo (his archives are funky, scroll down to March 17), I’d assume it was satire on the hype around the NFL draft. For Guzzo, I think he thinks it’s a good idea.

Why Not Draft Opera Singers, Actors Like the NFL Does It?

Because it’s a terrible idea. Because nobody thinks it’s unfair that the best opera singers go to the best operas? I’m going to feel bad making fun of this if it’s actually satire.*

I’ve been an incurable football nut almost since birth, but even I have the feeling that the annual shindig called the National Football League draft is terribly overdone as entertainment, despite the valiant efforts of the league and the various owners to make it seem like the rebirth of old-time vaudeville.

Sure. Fans only have 16 games and a relatively short playoff, and they love the game, so they get excited when things like the draft, the combine, and the when next season’s schedule comes out. That’s fine: if there’s a market for it, let people watch it. People get excited about all sorts of things.

After all, what on earth is so exciting about watching an annual supermarket for excessively high priced human beef? Why in the world don’t we get that hysterical, say, over drafting talent in many other walks of life. Let’s say, grand opera, for instance. I can just hear the announcer at a Grand Opera “draft” now:

Why don’t we get hyst… Why… don’t we get that hysterical over drafting opera singers? For starters, we can’t really get excited about an event that doesn’t happen. Second, the event doesn’t happen because the operas don’t compete against each other in a league so there wouldn’t be anyone to organize the draft. And third even if there was an opera league, singers can go wherever they want to perform.

“And now, folks, please give me your undivided attention. Here is the announcement we’ve all been waiting for. Speight Jenkins, general manager of the Seattle Opera Company, will step up to the microphone and announce his first pick from among the tenors. Speight….”

Does Lou Guzzo think the NFL drafts by position? Otherwise, why would he have a pick among the tenors? Is this satire? Isn’t satire supposed to be funny?

“Ladies and gentlemen of the opera world, it gives me the greatest pleasure to report that our first draft choice is Mario Lungbuster, lyric tenor from the Cincinnati Conservatory! Mr. Lungbuster, will you please come up here to the microphone so I can introduce you properly.”

Was there any point of this paragraph?

(Can you hear the audience cheering and shouting “Bravo! at the top of the operatic registers?)

No.

The announcer returns for a moment: “Mr. Jenkins! Mr. Jenkins! Will you please answer a few questions for our TV and radio audiences? You can? Good! OK. Here’s one from a woman in our audience. She wants to know why you selected Mario in the very first round — and can you afford to sign him to a contract?”

It sounds like this plan would make opera worse.

Mr. Jenkins: “Well, our regular tenor is still recovering from rib fractures suffered when he tried lifting the well-built soprano from the sofa in ‘La Traviata,’ and then a day later he really aggravated the injury when he fell off his horse in ‘Aida,’ but managed to finish the opera in great pain. We need a backup dramatic tenor.

“Mario is just the ticket. He’s short on experience, but he proved he knows how to go for the high notes without straining his, if you’ll pardon the expression, stomach muscles. Besides, he has well developed arm and back muscles so he’ll be able to hoist those overweight sopranos when they lean on him in the middle of a tearful aria. Oh, and to answer the second part of your question, we can afford to sign Mario to a long-term contract, but we may not have enough in the bank to pay for all his bills from his chiropractor.”

Wouldn’t anyone in a draft by necessity be short on experience? Also, Lou doesn’t seem to realize that this is a set of horrible jokes at the expense of made up people.

OK, enough already. In the same way, the symphony might use its No. 1 draft choice to replace its fumbling flutist with a Juilliard All-Star. Or, if you want to consider what the draft might do for theatrical companies, the Reportory Theater might gamble on a matinee idol who led the nation in free passes at the U.S.C. School of Drama.

Or they could pay a flutist or an actor on the market like they do now. There’s no advantage to this plan.

Say, you know something’ A culture draft might not be such a bad idea, at that, all jokes and hilarity aside. Just give me a minute, will you please? I have to make an important phone call. Dum-de dum-dum…. Hello, Seattle Opera? Would you please get me the boss, Mr. Speight Jenkins?

What hilarity? Is “Dum-de-dum-dum” the sound phones make in Guzzo’s world? Do the people answering the phones at the Seattle Opera need to be told the name of their artistic director? Like all Lou Guzzo pieces this left me with more questions than answers.

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Another Tuesday, another chance to raise a glass and have a laugh over the G.O.P. primary melee.

There have been four Republican primary polls taken in Illinois this year, and they were all taken in March. Here’s what they show:

• Chicago Tribune: 7-mar to 9-mar: Romney 35%, Santorum 31% (+4 Romeny)
• FOX Chicago News 14-mar: Romney 37%, Santorum 31% (+6 Romeny)
• Rasmussen 15-mar: Romney 41%, Santorum 32% (+9 Romeny)
• PPP 14-mar to 18-mar: Romney 41%, Santorum 31% (+15 Romney)

It is possible that the trend of Romney pulling ahead of Santorum is simple polling variability. Or, Santorum might be tanking, big time, from (1) alienating women through his War on Contraception™ and (2) alienating men through his War on Porn™, or both.

War is hell.

Anyway, this is an open thread, so have fun…but, you know, keep it Santorum-approved.

5:40: The polls in Illinois are closed and 15% of the vote is already counted (according to Google after typing “Illinois Primary” into its general search). So far, no signs of Romeny is not getting his ass, um, kicked by Santorum:

• Romney: 54.7%
• Santorum: 27.4%
• Paul: 10.4%
• Gingrich: 6.7%

6:06: As Michael points out in the comment thread…that was quick! The election is called for Romney. Since Illinois does proportional allocation, the interesting question is how badly will Santorum lose. (I was in transit when the election was called, so sorry about the late update.)

6:12: It isn’t impossible for Romney to win the 1,144 delegates before the August G.O.P. convention. It would require a change in momentum for Mitt:

Even after polls close on the last contest, held on June 26 in Romney-friendly Utah, according to an analysis by ABC News the former Massachusetts governor may still be short of 1,144 delegates — the magic number a candidate will need to secure the nomination.

Based on 2008 presidential-primary results, conventional-wisdom expectations, statewide 2010 primary results by county, and polls, a conservative estimate suggests Romney will end this primary season just shy of the 1,144 delegates he’ll need to win.

…or some help from G.O.P. superdelegates:

The Republican Party, however, has its own version of Democratic superdelegates: members of the GOP who will attend the Republican National Convention in Tampa this August as voting delegates, not having been elected or appointed, but included by virtue of their party roles. In nearly every state and territory, the GOP chairman, RNC committeeman, and RNC committeewoman hold this status.

In all, 123 of these superdelegates will attend the Tampa convention — enough to push Romney over the edge if a majority of them support him. Romney already enjoys the backing of 33 of these automatic RNC delegates, included in the 521 delegates ABC News estimates he has won.

Remember during the 2008 Democratic convention how the Republicans criticized the hell out of the Democratic nominating process because of the superdelegates?

Yeah…typical fucking G.O.P. hypocrisy!

6:37: Mmmmm…Mexican pasta! I enjoyed it without reservation….I must hate America.

6:40: According to my sources (namely, Google), just over half the votes are counted:

• Romney: 49.3%
• Santorum: 33.2%
• Paul: 9.1%
• Gingrich: 7.5%

It looks like Santorum is going to lose by double digits. Even so, how pathetic is Gingrich!

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