Search Results for: Reichert

Again, isn’t it ironic that Darcy Burner is having a greater impact in the health care debate than Dave Reichert.

Isn’t it at least a little ironic that while Dave Reichert may have won a third term in Congress, Darcy Burner is actually having a greater impact on the all important health care reform debate?

An organizer for liberal House Democrats says the bloc “isn’t bluffing” as it prepares to take a reputation-defining stand to protect a public insurance option in the health care overhaul.

Darcy Burner, executive director of the American Progressive Caucus Policy Foundation, said the health care debate has rallied traditionally disparate Congressional liberals to hang together, while galvanizing support for their position from an array of left-leaning outside groups. The result, she said, is that Democratic leaders will not be able to clear a package through the House if it does not include the public plan.

“We have never had the Progressive Caucus organized the way it is right now,” Burner said during a Friday roundtable with Roll Call. “This is not the normal scenario. And Speaker [Nancy] Pelosi [D-Calif.] knows it.”

Not that you’re likely to read anything about Darcy’s efforts in a local press that made up its mind about her early on, and is about as likely to reevaluate her as it is to admit the truth that Reichert did not really catch the Green River Killer.

Back home in Washington State, Darcy Burner is a loser. Twice over. But you wouldn’t know it from the reception she’s getting here in Pittsburgh at Netroots Nation, where she was definitely the most popular person in the hotel bar last night, and where they just announced that she would be the closing keynote speaker at Netroots Nation.

Saturday night’s closing keynote will be headlined by Darcy Burner, director of the American Progressive Caucus Policy Foundation. After three days of strategizing around progressive change, Burner will close out the convention with a message on how we make that a reality after everyone has left Pittsburgh. She believes activists must strike a balance between applying sophisticated pressure on their elected leaders and amplifying their efforts to create space for progressive policy.

Opening keynote: President Bill Clinton. Closing keynote: Darcy Burner. That should provide a little perspective.

Darcy may have lost her race last November, but in her new job as director of the American Progressive Caucus Policy Foundation, she’s playing a much bigger role in the health care debate than the winner, Dave Reichert.

A couple weeks ago I challenged Rep. Dave Reichert to prove me wrong about my cynicism over his self-proclaimed moderation, by taking the lead on climate change legislation:

Indeed, not only does Reichert have the chance to cast one of the only Republican votes for this legislation, he has the unparalleled opportunity to be the lone Republican getting out in front of this bill and leading the way. He and his handlers must know that climate change legislation has overwhelming support in his district—a pro-environment, hydro-powered district less economically dependent on fossil fuels than nearly any in the nation—so if he really wants to prove his moderation and independence (not to mention his legislative competence), now’s the time to show a little leadership and help shepherd this important piece of legislation through Congress.

But I’m not holding my breath.

Well, Reichert never took the lead on this legislation, but he was one of only 8 Republicans crossing the aisle to vote for it, so credit where credit is due, I guess. Still, he followed his usual pattern of voting with his party on procedural votes (here, here and here) before flipping sides on final passage, and as CQ points out, this vote on its on own doesn’t much qualify as a profile in courage:

Most of the 52 House members who didn’t side with their party on Friday’s climate change vote represent congressional districts that backed the presidential nominee of the opposite party in last year’s election.

A lot of these members will face competitive races in 2010, and no doubt they will be brandishing this against-the-grain vote as evidence of their political independence.

He certainly will. But whether Reichert’s independence is driven by conscience or expedience remains to be seen.

In the end, most of our delegation voted for Waxman-Markley, including Dave Reichert and Brian Baird. (Props to Northwest Progressive Institute.)

Hopefully overall a start.

Publicola has been giving ink (pixels?) to one health care advocate’s disappointment with Darcy Burner’s performance as Executive Director of ProgressiveCongress.org. Okay, fair enough. But as long we’re critiquing HA’s favorite twice-failed congressional candidate, I thought I’d give voice to one of Darcy’s most prominent fans, Katrina Vanden Heuvel, Editor of The Nation:

When it comes to the big issues of our time — like healthcare, energy and climate change, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and building a more just economy — I’ve long believed it will require a strong inside-outside strategy to push progressive solutions through Congress. That’s why I was so pleased when Darcy Burner was recently named Executive Director ofProgressiveCongress.org. (Full disclosure: I’m a board member.)

The organization’s purpose is to bring together progressives both inside and outside of Congress to craft strong policies and work cooperatively to implement them. Burner knows the grassroots, netroots, and political landscape as well as anyone, and her close Congressional races in Washington state against a Republican incumbent in 2006 and 2008 are a testament to that fact. A former Microsoft manager, she was also the architect of the “Responsible Plan to End the War In Iraq“.

Vanden Heuvel pretty much kvells over what Darcy has achieved at ProgressiveCongress.org in her few weeks on the job at the startup organization.

Last month, ProgressiveCongress.org asked people to submit and vote on questions regarding healthcare reform via its website. Members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) then answered the questions on the House floor, where proceedings are broadcast on C-SPAN and entered into the Congressional Record.

The results exceeded all expectations.

Tens of thousands of people responded and Caucus members were “very enthusiastic” about “having more direct interaction with normal Americans out there who are interested in [these] issues.” Then this past week there were approximately 47,000 votes on which Energy Bill questions to ask — a response Burner called “unbelievable.” (Caucus members answered those questions on the floor this past Thursday and video will soon be available.)

“This was an experiment,” Burner said. “My tech background tells me you try ten things, eight of them will fail, and the other two will succeed. The catch-though, is you can never predict ahead of time which two things it’s going to be. So, this being our first foray in trying to connect some of the progressive grassroots to the Caucus… it has succeeded spectacularly.”

This is exactly the kind of creative experimentation people can expect from Burner and ProgressiveCongress as it works to connect progressives outside of the beltway with those on the inside — leveraging the strength of both.

And this is exactly the kind of creative experimentation that got netroots progressives so excited about Darcy’s potential in Congress.

I don’t think Josh or Sandeep or most in the legacy media ever really grokked the Darcy thing, preferring to write it off as some kinda naive self-deception on the part of the netroots, or even worse, a cult of personality. Oh, please.

I like Darcy well enough, and consider her a friend, but her quirky eggheadedness doesn’t exactly inspire a cult-like devotion, and to be honest… ideologically… she’s rarely the most progressive person in the room. No, what we saw in Darcy was something we see in ourselves: the passion, creativity, and willingness to fail that is so often missing in a political culture that at times appears to be totally defined and constrained by the electoral cycle.

(And, oh yeah, she’s smart. Damn smart. I don’t hear anybody saying that about Dave Reichert.)

It would have been exciting to see how well those qualities served her in Congress.  And I guess, her service there will be exciting, if in a slightly different capacity.

From Political Buzz:

The Society of Professional Journalists national ethics committee is calling foul on the Washington News Council for conducting an online poll on a complaint against KIRO TV.

The Washington Secretary of State had complained to the News Council, a self-appointed watchdog group, about KIRO’s pieces on voter registration irregularities. KIRO declined to participate in a hearing. So the News Council posted an online poll, which turned out lopsided against KIRO.

“A hearing can be worthwhile if all parties voluntarily participate and work toward a common understanding,” the SPJ said in a news release. “The committee strongly objects to having a public online vote, or virtual hearing, on journalism ethics.

Now, the KIRO stories were suspect and full of factual errors, basically part of the noise machine crap about ghost voters and such. You can read all about it at the Washington News Council web site. KIRO did eventually pull the stories down, so that was good.

Still, I’m amazed that the Washington News Council, this self-appointed collection of rich people and formerly powerful traditional journalists, could make such an error in judgment by conducting an on-line kangaroo court.

Many readers likely recall that the P-I refused to appear before WNC in 2006 concerning an expose of the King County sheriff’s office, citing, among other reasons, the fact that WNC director John Hamer was married to a district director for Rep. Dave Reichert. (By way of clarification, Reichert used to be sheriff, and I have no idea what Hamer and his wife currently do, nor is that the point.) The P-I stood by its reporting in the face of the attempts by WNC to intimidate them.

The point is that the Washington News Council has little credibility, and deservedly so. But I’m not all that worked up about it, frankly, because this blog isn’t a “real” journalism outfit, and thus doesn’t fall under WNC’s self-defined jurisdiction, as far as I can tell.

And that’s just fine with me, because every time I hear the word “ethics” and “journalism” I flash on Commander Codpiece, and that’s something I really don’t like popping into my brain.

Yeah, let’s talk some more about ethics, guys. Here’s a topic: let’s say a reporter falsely accuses a candidate of lying about her education, writes a story full of half-truths and distortions spoon fed to reporters by the other side, and the candidate then loses by a cat’s whisker.

What should happen? Or more to the point, what did happen? As we all know, the answer is: nothing at all. Ethics, yeah, Uh-uh.

Survey USA recently posted the latest results of its Senate approval ratings tracking poll, and Senate Guru has a concise analysis of what the reelection landscape looks like for Washington’s Sen. Patty Murray:

Patty Murray	Jan. ’09	Feb. ’09	Mar. ’09	Apr. ’09
Approve	55	54	54	54
Disapprove	36	37	34	32

Senator Murray’s numbers remain remarkably stable and quite safe with little Republican opposition on the horizon.

I dunno, perhaps after losing her King County Executive race, Susan Hutchison will offer herself up for another beating, this time at the hands of the diminutive Sen. Murray, but for the life of me, I can’t think of any other prominent Republican who might be willing to jump into the race.  Certainly not Dino Rossi, who seems contentedly devoted to making himself some more money. And while I’ve heard rumors that Rep. Dave Reichert might be considering a challenge, I have a hard time believing he’s that stupid.

No, as things stand, the only Republican with a hope of taking down Sen. Murray is State Attorney General Rob McKenna, and I’d be shocked if he isn’t wisely biding his time in preparation for a 2012 run at the governor’s mansion.

Of course, there’s plenty of time for things to change.  The economy could go even further down the toilet, causing voters to blame President Obama and the Democratic Congress.  Or some other disaster, political or otherwise, could strike.

But Sen. Murray has always been a much more adept politician than her opponents have ever acknowledged (publicly, or to themselves,) and to describe WA’s Republican bench as weak is to deceptively imply that the state GOP actually has a bench.  It’s more like a three-legged stool.  With two of its legs missing.

Local R’s sure do enjoy mocking Murray as the dumbest Senator in the other Washington, yet they can’t ever manage to scrape up a credible challenger.  Huh.  I wonder what that says about them?

Nothing says “silly” like dismissing the concerns of regular folks.

SIX Democratic legislators have introduced a bill to stop Boeing from threatening to move out of Washington. That’s right: threatening to move. Such is a silly end to a silly story.

Um, I think those six were trying to make a larger point. But I wager the editorial writers know that.

These editorial keepers of the gate, freshly content with their re-installation of Dave Reichert, probably don’t like how this labor bill issue actually became a big story in the first place. As they admit in their editorial, the newspaper can’t possibly abide a law that keeps corporations from forcing workers to attend anti-union pep rallies against their will. So to them, anyone who cares about the issue is silly.

Have you ever noticed that anyone or anything who isn’t approved by The Seattle Times winds up being portrayed as not serious? And the legacy media wonders why people have it in for them. After nearly four decades of class warfare waged against the earning power of regular citizens, a key worker’s rights issue is demoted to a mocking editorial.

Nothing the Seattle Times editorial board (or most editorial boards, frankly) does comes as much of a surprise, especially when it comes to labor issues. Basically these editorial writers are a sort of mini-derivatives trader of the written word, whose currency is not phony-baloney financial products but the equally phony and intellectually dishonest job of defending concentrated and corrupt economic power while trying to appear compassionate, thoughtful and pro-democracy. It’s getting hard and harder to do without reality smacking them in the face, though.

These derivative-editorialists also must make sure only the “right” kind of people and ideas are allowed into the sandbox of democracy, because after all it’s their sandbox. Only certain types of candidates are truly allowed, and while the will of the people must be respected, it need only be respected to a point, or more accurately, along a certain spectrum of conventional thought. Should anyone question excessive militarism or promote clean energy and worker rights too loudly, they risk being sent packing without their pail and shovel.

In the sandbox, it’s okay for corporate lobbyists to put out the word to kill legislation that was likely going to pass, because the media, economic and political elites of this state deem it acceptable practice. Nothing silly about that, for certain. It’s probably the most not-silly thing I can recall while living in this state for the last 19 years, at least in terms of revealing in very stark terms who pulls what levers.

Sadly for these editorial traders in derivative thought, their market is collapsing as badly as the real derivatives market did, and predictably enough newspaper owners have asked for their own bailout in the form of a tax break.

What would be truly silly is wasting taxpayer dollars on a special tax break for newspapers that relentlessly attack and mock the democratic process itself. Given the budget situation, you’d be better off buying some extra paste and construction paper for the wee kiddies; at least first graders have some dignity and original ideas.

This is America, land of laissez-faire promise you know! If The Seattle Times and the rest truly believe in the business uber alles world view they constantly espouse, they don’t need government help. Neo-liberal philosophy itself says so. The grand results of this philosophy touch Washington state households every day in the form of decimated 401(k) statements, job losses, foreclosure notices and ruinous medical bills.

Or is it “silly” to point all that out?

Man, those righties sure are obsessed with Darcy Burner’s resume… obsessed with getting it wrong.

Yesterday, (u)SP’s Eric Earling “reported” that Darcy would be taking the Executive Director position at the Congressional Progressive Caucus, prompting the usual wingnut mirth about Darcy being some sort of hard left socialist or something.  His reliable source?  A Facebook update from former Reichert Chief of Staff Mike Shields, a man who made a career out of lying about Darcy and her accomplishments.

In fact, Darcy is taking an ED job in the other Washington, but it most definitely is not with the Progressive Caucus.  I know this because I actually bothered to ask Darcy, who sounded very excited about the opportunity to head up a new not-for-profit policy foundation; details will be forthcoming she promised, once it is officially announced.

In the meanwhile, I wouldn’t count on (u)SP to fill the news void left by the collapse of the P-I.

As a follow up to Jon’s Deep Thought yesterday and post today, I’ve emailed the 3 Republican congresspeople what they think of Rush Limbaugh. Specifically:

Dear XX

I’m a blogger at HASeattle, and we were wondering what your thoughts were on Rush Limbaugh. Would you call him a leader of the Republican party?

Love,

Carl Ballard

If they want to stand up to the heroin addict who runs their party, I’ll post a response. I sent it to the addresses listed on the campaign websites, so I don’t know how staffed up they are at this point and they have no reason to respond, so we’ll see.

…Afternoon update, the email I sent Reichert’s campaign bounced back. Does anybody have a good email address for his campaign? I don’t want this to go to the Congressional staff. No word from the Eastern Washington Reps.

The first poll in Washington’s 2010 US Senate race has been released, and it looks good for incumbent Democrat Patty Murray.

The Daily Kos/Research 2000 survey polled head-to-head matchups between Sen. Murray and both Dave Reichert and Rob McKenna, both of whom Murray led by double-digit margins.  Sen. Murray scored a respectable 55% favorable rating, whereas Reichert and McKenna registered 38% and 34% favorable respectively.

Not surprising really, though apart from Murray’s strength I think the survey also reveals the inherent weakness of the Republican bench here in Washington state. Indeed, that DKos/R2K would even bother to poll head-to-head with Reichert and McKenna is telling, considering that neither is likely to challenge Murray in 2010.

Reichert is a political lightweight with demonstrated shallow support even within his own district.  There is absolutely nothing to suggest that a Reichert Senate run would end up any differently than 2004, when an equally politically diminutive George Nethercutt got his ass whipped by the physically diminutive Murray.  Reichert might be stupid enough to give it go, but I doubt his handlers are.

Meanwhile, only 63% of respondents even had an opinion of McKenna, despite him being the highest ranking Republican official statewide, and arguably the most talented politician in the WSRP.  McKenna is widely considered to be biding his time in preparation for a 2012 gubernatorial run, a race for which, four years out, many political insiders rank him the frontrunner, despite his obvious handicap (ie, his Republicanism).  McKenna would have to be absolutely crazy to risk his gubernatorial bid on a quixotic challenge of Murray.  And McKenna is not crazy.

Of course, if DKos/R2K was going to run a poll, they had to do a head to head with somebody, and for the life of me I don’t have any better suggestions.  Dino Rossi?  Cathy McMorris-Rodgers? Mike!™ McGavick?  I don’t expect any of them to run, and I wouldn’t expect them to win if they did.  But who else does the WSRP have?

Just goes to show you how weak the Republican bench is in Washington state these days.

The Seattle Times wants to change the deadline for mail-in ballots:

WASHINGTON voters are no strangers to suspenseful elections — but our state has a habit of dragging the suspense out for way too long.

Secretary of State Sam Reed wants to bring elections to more decisive ends sooner. His proposal would require ballots be received in election offices by Election Day. Now, the ballots need only be postmarked by Election Day. That means ballots straggle in throughout election week, often putting off the decisive conclusion for days — given Washington’s propensity for razor-thin margins.

This, of course, is a huge problem for newspaper headline writers who require definitive results by midnight, but for the rest of us… eh, not so much.  In fact, you’d think especially with our state’s “propensity for razor-thin margins” the emphasis should be on counting the ballot of every single registered voter, rather than finishing the counting on election night.

On Election Night in November, Democratic challenger Darcy Burner was leading in her bid to unseat incumbent Republican Dave Reichert for the 8th Congressional District seat. But Reichert pulled comfortably ahead over several King County and Pierce County ballot counts by Friday to win re-election.

Again, apart from the anxiety it caused the candidates and their most fervent supporters, I don’t really see what the problem is.  Speedy results would be nice, but voter participation and tabulation accuracy are what we really should be shooting for when it comes to running an election.  So I just don’t see why we have to make voting more difficult, and inevitably disenfranchise pathological procrastinators like me, just to get things over and done with by Tuesday night.

Think about it.  Right now the deadline is clear, precise and uniform:  postmarked by election day.  That means in the recent special election I dropped my ballot off at the Columbia City post office by about 4PM, a good hour or so under the wire.  But under the new, stricter law Sam Reed and the Times are proposing, the deadline would have been Saturday, or if you’re  lucky, Monday, or maybe Friday or Thursday or even earlier, depending on where you live.  Different voters would effectively have different deadlines, and they would change for every election.

That totally sucks.

No doubt Reed’s “reforms” would make things easier for election officials and the news media, but at the inevitable cost of disenfranchising voters.  The Times looks at Oregon and argues the change would likely invalidate “only” a few hundred ballots… which I guess doesn’t sound like all that many unless one of those ballots is yours.

A local pol, via email, rightly rants about our media’s googly-eyed infatuation with bipartisanship:

What the stupid media don’t realize is that it’s a tactic, not a goal. The goal is to get something accomplished. If that something requires bipartisanship to do it, so be it. If it doesn’t, who cares. They’ve made the classic mistake of not caring what the goal is, as long as it’s bipartisan. It’s not a surprising conclusion, really, as long as you frame in the media’s so-called “objectivity” frame. That frame forces themselves to gravitate to the holy grail of bipartisanship, because they are too lame to call some actual goals bullshit, or praise some as actually being worthy. Thus their choices comes down to partisan=bad, bi-partisan=good. No wonder why people have stopped reading their drivel.

And in my opinion, it’s even worse than that, because good or bad, the very notion of “bipartisanship” is usually as illusory as that whole “objectivity” crap.

For example… Obama goes to the Hill.  He meets with Republicans on their turf.  The Dems compromise, making the stimulus package smaller, less progressive, and less effective.  And then House Republicans still vote unanimously against it, including our own local, conscience-driven independent, Dave Reichert.  Bipartisanship my ass.

See, the problem is, even as a tactic, bipartisanship is pointless if not counterproductive if you don’t have an honest, trustworthy partner across the aisle.  And currently, the Dems don’t.

Marco Lowe, Dave Ross’s campaign manager in 2004—when the radio host ran against Sheriff Dave Reichert for the then-open seat in the 8th Congressional District, has an essay  up at the Stranger with a game plan for winning the district. 

His main point, start working on it now. Other suggestions: Talk about nitty-gritty local issues rather than the sweeping ideological headline issues and go after Reichert’s shoddy record at the Sheriff’s office (Dan Ring case and, yes, the Green River Killer case). 

Lowe’s piece doesn’t look back at the Burner campaign, but rather urges Democrats to look forward. It’s worth reading.