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Last night, while driving home from Drinking Liberally (two pints of Manny’s over four hours FYI, before any of you trolls start going on about DUI), I ran into a fog bank on 23rd with almost zero visibility.

And it got me wondering… why isn’t anybody bitching about Mayor Nickels’ failure to clear our streets of fog?

I mean, it’s been days now, with no improvement, and what has the Mayor done?  No salt.  No plows.  No fleet of giant fans blowing the mist from major arterials.  Nada.

I’m just sayin’…

Here are a few updates on some recent news items I’ve been following before I head off to Drinking Liberally:

– The marijuana decriminalization bill introduced in the State House is here. After some more asking around, it appears that the bill is being held up by State Representative Chris Hurst (D-31), whose Criminal Justice and Corrections Committee does not plan on holding hearings, or even allowing a vote. I have an email out to his office in the hopes of getting an explanation. As Dominic Holden has pointed out, the bill would potentially save Washington taxpayers roughly $7.5 million per year. And the decriminalization is extremely limited. In fact, the bill’s proposed marijuana possession limits without being a criminal offense would still be more stringent than Ohio’s.

– The pre-trial motions in the Bruce Olson case (previous posts here, here, and here) will be on Monday, January 26 at 9am at the Kitsap County Courthouse (614 Division St. in Port Orchard). Prosecutors are trying to deny Olson’s ability to testify that he’s an authorized medical marijuana patient. Supporters of the Olsons are encouraging people to come to the courthouse to show their support.

Daniell Kirkdorffer of On the Road to 2008,, who created and implemented the innovative Pacific Northwest Topic Hotlist, has rather symbolically announced this morning he will stop blogging, although his archives will remain on-line.

The announcement bears a posting time of 12:01 AM this morning. It’s well worth your time to read the whole thing if you have a chance, as Kirkdorffer captures well the reasons regular folks decided they had to do something during the bleakest, darkest days of the Bush administration. I like this bit:

The road to 2008 that I embarked on took me places I did not envision. A single voice in a multitude of blogs meant that I was never likely to be a heavily read blogger at a national level, but my gradual evolution to writing about more local issues was far more about educating myself about them, than it was about finding a mass audience. Instead I soon developed a dialog with fellow local bloggers, and got to meet most of them in person at gatherings such as Drinking Liberally and other organized events. Today I count many of them as friends that I would never have met otherwise, and as I conclude my own blogging activities I have nothing but admiration for their ongoing efforts.

Unpaid, sometimes reviled, often dismissed, political bloggers spend an awful lot of time writing about issues, and rarely is there any payoff for the effort. We champion candidates or policies, some that win election or passage, but many that don’t, and sometimes we’re lucky if we simply help shape the debate, but I cannot imagine a world anymore without blogs, and the collective impact they’ve had on news coverage, information, and the pursuit of the truth in a matter. Left to their own devices the mainstream media would continue to let us down, and we’d have few places to turn to truly understand an issue. With the demise of daily print news, online resources will only continue to grow, and bloggers will be at the forefront of that change. It isn’t a perfect forum, but it is an invaluable one.

Indeed.

Here’s wishing Daniel the very best in everything he does. Well done, sir.

Heads up… newly elected Commissioner of Public Lands Peter Goldmark will be stopping by the Seattle Chapter of Drinking Liberally tomorrow night, where we can all bask a bit in the afterglow of his sweet victory.  So come on by to chat with Peter and toast a new administration that won’t be in the pockets of the mining and timber industries.

Last night at the 46th Legislative District Democrats monthly meeting, elections activist Jason Osgood announced his intention to run for King County Elections Director… which really didn’t come as much of a surprise considering Jason told me as much Tuesday night at Drinking Liberally.

Hmm.

I like Jason, and I appreciate his activism (if at times I think his focus is misplaced), so I sure hope he hasn’t conflated the 1.2 million votes he received in his recent run for Secretary of State into some sort of base of support.  Sure, Jason ended up pulling in about 41.5% of the vote while barely spending a dime—but that’s still only a few percent of voters greater than those who would pretty much vote for anybody with a “D” next to their name, and not much better than then-Republican Richard Pope, who in the 2000 Attorney General’s race garnered more than 38% of the vote against popular Democratic incumbent Christine Gregoire.  Indeed, Richard actually won 14 of 39 counties, while Jason barely eked out a victory in just tiny San Juan.

Still, if this were a normal election, I’d urge Jason to pursue his bliss, as he’ll certainly add some important issues to the debate.  Unfortunately, it’s not a normal election, and as I told him privately Tuesday night, I hope he’s prepared to bow out if support coalesces around a qualified candidate.

See, the Elections Director will be chosen in a February special election, with no primary, top-two or otherwise, to thin out the field.  And while the office is officially nonpartisan, we all know that true nonpartisanship is a fiction that lives only in the minds of editorialists and idiots.

From all accounts, Republican wingnut State Senator Pam Roach intends to throw her hat in the ring as the culmination of her decades long quest to earn a six figure salary from the government she loves to cut.  And given a crowded field of Democrats on the other side, she very well could win.

This would be a disaster.

A number of other names are being bandied about, but if we want this to be a fair fight they’re going to have to agree to agree to winnow themselves down to one.  The name that intrigues me most thus far is Port Commissioner Lloyd Hara, an uninspiring politician, but an auditor by trade, who would arguably bring the appropriate skill set and temperament to the office.  Despite his best efforts to show up at the right events, Hara doesn’t strike me as particularly progressive or Democratic; in fact, from a partisan perspective, he doesn’t strike me as much of anything.  And isn’t that, combined with competence, exactly what we need from an Elections Director to restore and maintain confidence?

So Jason, good for you for acting on your activism, but if you really care about elections integrity, I’m hoping you’ll step aside if the alternative means handing the election to Roach.

I’m sitting in the PDC meeting right now, courtesy of Toby Nixon, who reminded me of it when he stopped by Drinking Liberally last night, and I realize I forgot to report that Toby has announced that he will not be running for the now elected position of King County Elections Director.

Toby was one of the forces behind changing the position from appointed to elected, and given his interest in the elections process (and his failure to win back his seat in the state House), many of us just assumed he’d run for the post.  Well… no.

Given our conversation last night, I wouldn’t rule out another run for the legislature, but as for now, we won’t have Toby Nixon to kick around anymore.

At Hempfest last weekend, posters titled “What’s Gregoire Smoking?” were being circulated through the massive crowds of people checking out the nation’s largest pro-pot gathering. The posters are advertising a rally for the hearing that the state Department of Health will be holding in Tumwater on Monday to discuss the proposed draft limits for medical marijuana patients.

The limits were patterned after Oregon’s limits, and while their limits have managed to protect their patients (even ones who require more than the limits allow), there are some differences between our system and theirs, the major ones being that providers can grow for multiple patients and that there’s a state-run registry system for patients that the police respect. The Cannabis Defense Coalition, a newly formed group of activists working together to protect patients from arrest (I’m a member), details some of the concerns with having to rely primarily on the limits to protect the patients:

1. The definition of a “mature” plant as any plant that reaches twelve inches in height is neither reasonable, nor grounded in science.

2. The new rules as written are absolute upper bounds, not “presumptive amounts” as mandated by SB-6032. If a patient has more than the presumptive amount, the new rules require a doctor to state the amount of marijuana required by that patient. This is illegal under the federal Conant v. Walters case, and doctors risk losing their federal licenses if they abide by this state requirement. This will have a disastrous effect on the legality of medical marijuana in Washington State.

3. That the limit of six “mature plants” — is too low. Cannabis typically takes 8 or more weeks to mature once blooming is triggered. Most patients produce 1-2 ounces per plant, or 6-12 ounces for their 60-day supply. Blooming at twelve inches will decrease yield to under half an ounce per plant, or less than 3 ounces for a sixty day supply.

These numbers are far less than the 24 ounces of dried medicine allowed for under the new rules. In short, the new rules do not honestly take into account the real world mathematics of marijuana growing, let alone the non-scientific, arbitrary limit on plant height written into the rules at the request of Governor Chris Gregoire.

On Saturday at the Hemposium tent, the area of Hempfest where music takes a back seat to politics, there was a lively panel of patients, activists, and attorneys discussing what happened during the process and what still needs to be done to make sure that patients stop getting arrested around the state. During the session, Douglas Hiatt – a local attorney who represents patients across the state – introduced Robert Dalton, a qualified patient who was not only arrested by Kitsap County authorities but may also lose a quarter-million dollars worth of his property.

Among the panelists, there was little disagreement over how we got into this mess. The State Department of Health originally came to a very workable proposal for the limits, 35 ounces and a 10ft by 10ft growing area. The Governor then told the DOH to solicit more input from doctors and law enforcement. The proposed limits were far more restrictive, and as Hiatt pointed out, every patient he knows is now at risk of arrest, and that some arrests have already taken place in Spokane County.

Where there’s a lot of disagreement is on why the Governor stepped into the process and told the Department of Health to revise the numbers. Some are chalking it up to cluelessness or apathy, but others think the Governor is deliberately making the limits unworkable in order to keep law enforcement happy (although Steve Sarich, the loudest voice in that camp, had to be corrected by the crowd when he asserted that every single police group in Washington State supports Gregoire, which we know pretty well by now is not true).

After getting a chance to ask the Governor about this mess in person at her recent pop-in to Drinking Liberally, I’m still in the camp that chalks this up to cluelessness and apathy. I don’t think she understands how disingenuous the concerns from law enforcement are, and I don’t get the impression that she cares enough about authorized patients getting arrested. After I pressed the issue, she said that if patients continue to get arrested after the limits are set that she’d work with the police chiefs to have the situation resolved. However, when you have rogue prosecutors like Russell Hauge in Kitsap County, I’m not sure how much the Governor can do.

Monday’s hearing is at 11AM at the Department of Health offices at 310 Israel Rd. SE in Tumwater. This may be the last chance to get this right, so whether you care about protecting patients or just don’t like law enforcement wasting more of your taxpayer dollars to throw sick people in jail, it’s your chance to be heard.

Primary night festivities for me began at Drinking Liberally in Seattle. But “festive” didn’t really describe my mood. Rather I was feeling about 80 years old and in pain owning to a back injury I sustained Monday morning.

At 9:00, I shuffled back to my car and began the slow process of climbing in without the use of specific back muscles. I almost went straight home. But heading back to Redmond, I swung by the Darcy Burner party in Bellevue.

Perhaps it was my heightened sense of senescence, but I ended up in lengthy conversation with an older woman. She had something to get off of her chest and was eager to share it. I didn’t catch her name, but I’ll call her Daisy.

Daisy’s issue was the Bush prescription drug plan that, she felt, had needlessly cost her money. But, more importantly, the plan had made it impossible for some of her less healthy friends to afford the medications they needed. She mentioned cost issues (resulting in maxing out on benefits) and problems that some needed medications were simply not covered by the plan.

Daisy felt strongly enough about the issue that she had talked to Dave Reichert. She reenacted her conversation with Reichert, in which he didn’t seem to “get it.” Rather than listening to the specifics, Reichert simply asserted that she and her friends must be better off under the plan. That’s what it was supposed to do.

When she finished with her story I asked, “So that’s how you became a Darcy Burner supporter?”

Daisy responded emphatically, “No…that’s how I became: ‘Anyone. But. Reichert.'”

Fair enough!

Thirty minutes later, I noticed that Daisy had struck up a conversation with someone else:

In the middle of a busy night filled with media, hugs, handshakes, and cheers, Darcy Burner took some time to listen to Daisy’s story. I’m guessing that’s how Daisy became a Darcy Burner supporter.

On my way out the door, I ran into Darcy and asked, “Can you share a few words with HorsesAss readers about tonight?” And she graciously obliged:

[Audio:http://horsesass.org/wp-content/uploads/darcy19aug2008.mp3]

So that, dear readers, will have to serve as our podcast—let’s call it our micro-podcast—for this week.

The appearance of Gov. Christine Gregoire at Drinking Liberally last night offered me the perfect opportunity for some gonzo-journalism. All politicians are alike, right? So in the interest of being “fair and balanced” in my journalistic endeavors I pulled out my video camera….

Earlier this morning, Postman wrote:

I was talking to a smart friend over the weekend who bemoaned the oh-so-careful approach Gov. Chris Gregoire is taking to governing. He’s a supporter. But he worries that out of fear of alienating someone, somewhere, Gregoire has traded activism for near-paralysis.

The topic of that post had nothing to do with drug policy, but with the deadline for having the State Department of Health establish the 60-day supply limits for medical marijuana patients coming up tomorrow, I find myself in the same boat as Postman’s unnamed friend – if not even more critical of the Governor.

As of my typing this, I still have no idea what the released limits will be. Earlier this year, it was revealed that preliminary numbers of 35 ounces and a 100 sq ft growing area caused the Governor to get more involved in the process and demand more feedback from law enforcement and medical professionals. Many patients and advocates within the medical marijuana community saw this as an attempt by the Governor to derail the process in support of the state’s law enforcement union, while the Governor’s dishonesty about why the process was derailed didn’t exactly convince people that she was acting in good faith.

At the follow-up meeting (which the DOH attempted to keep closed to the public, but failed), the two parties who the Governor claimed were underrepresented in the initial round of workshops were in attendance. The law enforcement officials again iterated that the decision should be left up the medical professionals, and the one medical professional who showed up said that 35 ounces might be too low of a limit for some patients who ingest it within food. Law enforcement officials also asserted that the limit shouldn’t be so high that criminals could hide behind it, but believing that someone with a small growing area in their basement could launch a massive criminal enterprise is more than a little absurd, considering that marijuana is already the most lucrative cash crop in the state of Washington.

The released limits tomorrow (if they’re even released) will go a long way towards showing whether or not Governor Gregoire is someone who can put politics and special interests aside and do what’s right for the citizens of this state.

Earlier this month, I visited a partially disabled medical marijuana patient in Tacoma who spent over a week in jail this winter. She was kept from receiving the special liquid meals she requires for nearly the entire time. In her mid-40s, she was a former nurse who told me she was staunchly anti-drug before discovering that marijuana worked best for her illnesses. She and her husband then became active in helping other registered patients learn how to grow for themselves.

Stories like that one are common. The list of other patients being hauled into court across the state has been growing. At Drinking Liberally and other events, I occasionally talk to people close to the Governor, and they rarely seem to understand that this is more than just a number. It could be the difference that causes someone to lose their house, their livelihood, or what’s left of their health, should they be sent to jail without adequate medical needs being met. Hopefully, the Governor herself doesn’t suffer from her own paralysis on this one.

As Goldy mentioned below, things got pretty heated in the podcast last night over I-1000, the Death With Dignity initiative in Washington State. This initiative would bring Oregon’s assisted suicide law to this state. While Oregon remains the only state with such a law, the predictions of innocent old people being preyed on by doctors and alarmingly high levels of suicides never materialized. In fact, less than 300 people have taken advantage of the law to end their lives on their own terms in the decade it’s been on the books. More data here from Oregon shows that the law has been effective and has served the function that it was meant to serve.

On my way over to Drinking Liberally yesterday, I found an I-1000 petition to sign along Pike St downtown, and a few hours (and vodka tonics) later, I was berating Joel Connelly over his opposition to the measure, which I find to be extremely hypocritical for someone who is pro-choice when it comes to abortion. I want to elaborate on why that’s the case here.

Here’s what he wrote in today’s edition of the PI:

The view here: I oppose allowing the state to sanction a decision by people to kill themselves.

It’s part personal, a father who wanted to “go quietly” after a cancer diagnosis, but who lived and was loved for 2 1/2 more years. And we’re not Sparta. The state exists to protect its most vulnerable citizens, the very young and the very old.

While I agree that the state has a duty to protect its most vulnerable citizens, I do not automatically equate the very young with the very old. Not all individuals at the end of their lives are incapable of making informed adult decisions. Many people, when faced with the prospect of imminent death, are extremely clear in their thinking and their choices.

And beyond that, I strongly reject the idea that the state exists to protect citizens from their own moral decisions. This is the foundation that leads to my pro-choice beliefs and my overall libertarian outlook. One could easily argue that a woman with an unwanted pregnancy is “vulnerable,” and could in turn use the same logic that Joel uses here to demand that the state make the decision for her.

During the podcast, I had to point out to Joel several times that he was using arguments that were identical to arguments I’ve heard and read from anti-choice activists. There’s little distinction between the value judgement that a person makes towards their own life and the value judgement that a pregnant mother makes towards the life that is growing inside of her (even though the latter is technically not a human life yet). Both value judgements are for the individual to make, and the state should not be involved. Believing that one judgement is sacred to the individual, while the other is not, is a hypocritical stance. Either human beings have domain over their own bodies or they don’t.

There’s a lot that Joel and I agree on in the political realm and I still enjoy talking to him, but I’m profoundly disappointed that he’s allowing emotion to get in the way of reason here and working against establishing a right in this state that should be as fundamental as the right to an abortion.

HuffPo cofounder Arianna Huffington is speaking at Seattle’s Town Hall tonight at 7:30PM, and signing her new book “Right Is Wrong: How the Lunatic Fringe Hijacked America, Shredded the Constitution, and Made Us All Less Safe.” Eighth and Seneca.

In a more intimate setting, FrameShop founder Jeffrey Feldman will be stopping by Drinking Liberally tonight, chatting with folks and signing his new book “Outright Barbarous: How the Violent Language of the Right Poisons American Democracy.” 8PM, Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E.

See a theme there?  Somehow, I’m going to manage to attend both.

Just before 10PM last night, on the final day of Pledge Week, a $100 contribution came in, just sliding the needle past our $6,000 target. A heartfelt thanks to all 119 contributors for your generosity and support.

When I announced the milestone at Drinking Liberally, a fellow blogger exclaimed that they thought I was smoking crack to set such an ambitious target, to which I replied that I wasn’t afraid to fail. Nothing ventured nothing gained, and all that. But I guess I also had faith that the HA community had my back. And you did. 119 donors contributed $6,015 dollars, at an average of over $50.00 per donation, a truly amazing show of support, and while some of the righties may have trouble understanding the sentiment, the simple fact that so many of my readers were willing to show their appreciation in such a generous manner is at least as gratifying as the money itself.

Of course, we didn’t quite reach our 150 donor target, so I’m going to leave up the pledge bar at the top of the right column a little while longer for those of you who still want to chip in five or ten bucks, but I’m done with the fundraising appeals for now. Your contributions have made it possible for me to continue my work improving and expanding HA, and that’s exactly what I’m going to get back to doing after a good night’s sleep. A lot of great new features are coming your way, and I can’t wait to get them out the door.

Again, thank you all for your generous support, and for making HA a regular part of your daily routine.

* Thank God I knew some people from Drinking Liberally, or I would have been bored out of my mind. I do appreciate the earnestness of the people there to debate resolutions, but holy shit did we really need to hand count the public financing resolution? I was there with a pregnant woman; standing in a hot sweaty gym for 4 hours was tough for me; I’m sure that extra 20 minutes of standing wasn’t good for her; and hello, the final four started at 3:00.

* Maybe it was a sense memory from being in a high school gym and later a high school auditorium, maybe it was the people I was with, maybe it’s just the events, but I was just asshole comment after asshole comment about the day’s events. It was like Mystery Science Theater 3000 except with politics.

* Sean Astin gave a good Clinton speech, but got cut off before he was done. It was good to hear him praise Obama but still be solidly in the Clinton camp. The first lady stuff, comparing Hillary positively to Abigail Adams and Elenore Roosevelt was marvelous. I feel bad about yelling, “thank you Frodo!” Especially since he didn’t actually play that part: “Rudy, Rudy, Rudy” would have been better.

* A bit better than 3 to 1 for Obama (I forget the actual count and it isn’t on the website yet, sorry if this is off). This seems fairly typical for Seattle.

* The Clinton subcaucus was a hoot. It was amazing to hear from all the people who are still going for her. A lot of great energy even in 30 second chunks. Also: Comfortable chairs in the auditorium.

* I put my name up for the state convention, and was able to keep under the allocated 30 seconds: My real name and number. There are plenty of under 30’s who support Hillary Clinton, and I’m one glad to be one of them. I’m supporting her because we can have a president who’ll work to make universal healthcare in this country and womens’ rights around the world a reality. My name and number.

* Thank Christ for the timekeepers. Molly, you rule! Janis, thank goodness you were there! It could have been a long ass break out session.

* How the hell long does it take to count the votes for delegate? Seriously, I still don’t know if I’m headed to the next level.