One of the pleasures of reimmersing myself in programming these past few weeks is that I haven’t had as much time on my hands to fisk the Seattle Times op-ed page. Unfortunately, I haven’t quite been able to break the nasty habit of reading it, so I’ve accumulated quite a backlog of Blethenesque pontifinuggets just begging for ridicule.
For example, take this gem from a recent editorial castigating the governor for signing the bill repealing Initiative 960’s blatantly unconstitutional two-thirds supermajority requirement for tax increases:
Surely the people wanted it that way. Over the years they have voted three times for the two-thirds rule. They still favor it. In a poll of 500 adults done for KING-TV, 74 percent favored the two-thirds rule, and 68 percent said the Legislature and the governor had done the wrong thing to suspend it.
Huh. I suppose we could run our government along the (small “r”) republican principles laid out in our constitution, or, as the Times suggests, we could just craft our policies based entirely on the latest KING-5/SurveyUSA poll.
And as for its provisions’ alleged support at the ballot box, it might be instructive to remember that I-960 just barely passed in 2007, with only 51% of the vote… and in a relatively low-turnout, off-year election. By comparison, the measure’s 816,000 Yes votes would have amounted to only 27% of the vote in 2008, when turnout was nearly double, and voters handed Democrats overwhelming control of both the legislature and the governor’s mansion.
Perhaps the Times thinks Washington would be better off if we were more like California, where citizens initiatives, of both the tax-cutting and money-spending varieties, are nearly impossible to overturn or amend by anything less than another citizens initiative, thus handcuffing lawmakers in a nearly perpetual state of fiscal crisis. But personally, I prefer a system where our elected officials are forced to make the tough choices we elected them to make, and then face the consequences at the polls.
And you know, the real polls… not the bogus ones conducted by TV stations.
From the Olympian yesterday:
polling done for the House Democratic Campaign Committee showed only 28 percent voter support for using a sales-tax to bridge a piece of the state’s $2.8 billion budget shortfall.
Rep. Sam Hunt, the Olympia Democrat who chairs the HDCC, said yesterday the poll results are a reason he is now leaning against the sales tax. Hunt did not share other poll results but they were part of a discussion House Democrats had as a caucus Thursday night.
Rep. Hunt did not share results of his polling on other tax scenarios. He said the polling was paid for by the HDCC, which operates separate from the caucus as a political arm, and the briefing occurred off-campus.
Chopp is likely to protect 10 of his newest members or those in swing districts from difficult tax votes, just as he did on the bill last week that makes it easier to raise taxes with a simple-majority vote.
Shh, the truth–that the conservatives are in fact the MINORITY per capita–isn’t allowed.
Every new wave of young people coming of age is increasingly (by tiny margins) more progressive and liberal, and the same with each passing immigrant wave, since the GOP & Conservatives don’t care for them.
That’s why the Right is down to showboating tactics like the Tea Party and paid & bought for initiative attacks on society. They see the writing on the wall, and are trying to stick their fingers in the broken dikes.
“I suppose we could run our government along the (small ‘r’) republican principles laid out in our constitution”
If Republicans want minority rule, why don’t they let Democrats run things when we’re the minority party?
You DO have to be careful with these initiatives. One of the reason our magical never wrong Founding Fathers(tm) created a representative republic, not a direct democracy, is because…well…not to be too blunt, but the citizens are crazy.
If you put up a generic tax cut measure saying “do you want money back” it will pass most of the time. If you put up a measure saying “do you want a monorail, light rail, new libraries, new parks, new schools, new roads, etc”…it’ll pass most of the time. People want stuff, they just don’t want to pay for it. That’s what’s happened in California. Everyone (left, right and center) wants THEIR stuff, but they all wants tax cuts and less spending (on OTHER peoples stuff) too.
Someone, either the direct citizens or our representatives (who WE voted in by the way) need to be the adult and say NO, you can’t have a BIGGER military, MORE Medicare, two wars, AND a tax cut at the same time. Or at a state level, you can’t have more roads, and transit, and schools, and parks, and police, and cut taxes at the same time. Wanna be ‘tough on crime’…that means more money (police/courts). It’s easy to say “yes” and just give stuff to the people and ignore the bill, but someone has to be the adult and say you can have this stuff, but it will COST you $x, so hand it over…or you CAN’T have this. Just like you do with children in line at a store.
@5 It seems to me an initiative requiring a two-thirds vote to levy taxes for public services should require approval by two-thirds of the voters. That’s only logical.
Initiatives are stupid. It is clear that the leg doesn’t need a stupid initiative to paralyze itself and come up with unimaginative solutions.
Of course a sales tax increase is unpopular because thinking citizens believe that a better tax structure should be explored
@1 Goldy, you really ought to charge Timmy Eyman for posting his ads here.
@1 Of course raising the sales tax is a lousy idea. It’s regressive as hell and will hit the people least able to afford it. The legislature should be talking about an income tax.
@5 That’s brilliant. Democracy and all. If 2/3 of the voters WANT this and it should take 2/3 of our elected representatives to pass a tax bill, then the initiative should have to be passed by 2/3.
What are we saying otherwise? A 51% vote should be enough to make our legislature need 66% votes to pass taxes? What? If this is so popular with everyone, just vote in representatives that support your ‘low tax’ view.
Our Founding Fathers(tm) who are ALWAYS right, never put in anything about super majorities in the Constitution (except about changing the Constitution itself). All bills, like current health care debate, were supposed to be passed by 50%+1 votes…that’s what THEY wanted. These hippy modern ideas about super majorities should be HORRIBLE to the “strict constructionists”. This isn’t how democracy was supposed to work. If your representatives aren’t doing what you want, vote in new ones. But then once the voting is done, 50%+1 of the representatives can pass a bill. Or do you think our “Founding Fathers”(tm) were stupid! Do you support these “modern” new hippy new-century made up government ideas like super majorities?
@6 “Initiatives are stupid.”
The Seattle Times editorial board is stupid (or perhaps disingenuous is a better word). Initiatives aren’t inherently stupid or smart, good or bad. The most progressive legislation in our state’s history came from initiatives, albeit most of it 100 years ago. Recently, the initiative process has been getting a bad name because it’s been co-opted by the rightwing movement for their demagogic purposes, but that’s a bad rap because it’s the rightwing movement, not the initiative process, that’s mala per se. We shouldn’t be hasty about tearing down the initiative structure, because there may someday again be a responsible role for initiatives in the governance of our state.
Fear not, Goldy! Your leftist loonies and the SEIU will soon have us in the same bankrupt predicament that they brought about in California. Even that turncoat asshole, Sen. Rodney Tom (D-Moscow) thinks the budget can’t be balanced due to the overspending, and he’s the Democrat chief budget guy in the state Senate.
I figure Blethen is hedge nobility. Got to show loyalty to his class–maybe one of the big boys will reward him.
Croak!
@1: Timmah!
You goatfucking, fascist piece of shit!
It ought to give you pause: all we have to do now is let folks know it’s your shit they’re voting on and voila — Epic Fail!
BTW: Since your shit stinks, have Kemper or Mikie made you their domestic bitch? Gotta make a living somehow, right? Cuz no one wears watches anymore.
Wrong headline, Goldie. Eyeman and the Times want this to be more like Mississippi, where the poor can be kept poor and in their place while their betters live off the fat of the land on their parents bequests.
Strongly agree with Roger and Alki on their It takes one to impose one rule. Also agree with Roger in #10 on the history and use of the initiative process. Alki in #9, the Framers were aware of the filibuster as a technique of debate, but the abuse of the rule is modern, and reactionary. The system empowers individual Senators, they like that power on both sides of the aisle, and the rule will only be changed if it becomes an issue with the voters. Have you made a nuisance of yourself calling Cantwell and Murray? Popular opinion can’t be heeded if it’s not heard, another lesson the wingnuts have learned better than we have.
Hmmm…what part of California would Uncle Frankie like to see Washington come to resemble? Certainly not uber-liberal Santa Monica or Frisco.
How about Lathrop? http://www.lewrockwell.com/spl2/slumburbia.html
11. John425
That’s a good one! I don’t mean it’s funny, because you guys don’t have the funny, but because it reeks of typical Republican ignorance and stupidity. You see, California is totally fucked, and the reason is because they have a two-thirds majority requirement to pass not just any tax increases, but to pass the budget at all. And the minority Republicans are sticking it to Californians by using their minority to block passage of the budget.
This requirement was a Consitutional amendment that was passed by initiative. Although the CA constitution allow the consitution to be amended by nitiative, the legislature can amend it only with a two-thirds vote of both Houses of the Assembly.
There will be an initiative on the 2010 ballot to reverse this requirement.
So here’s how your ignorance made you say something stupid: Our legislature just saved us from California’s woes by striking down I-960.
Government regulation may be necessary to bring salt levels in processed foods down to safe levels, the conservative pro-business newsmagazine Business Week says.
http://www.businessweek.com/ne.....-says.html
Roger Rabbit Commentary: So what’s new? Another fucking market failure.
Business Week reports the gun industry’s solution to the growing use of military-style weapons by hunters is to rebrand assault rifles as “modern sporting rifles.” In other words, changing what you call something makes everything happy.
http://www.businessweek.com/ma.....665633.htm
Roger Rabbit Commentary: Torture has already rebranded as “enhancement interrogation techniques,” greedy preachers have rebranded as “prosperity churches,” Blackwater has rebranded as “Xe,” and it’s just a matter of time before the Republican Party rebrands as “the America Party” or some damn nonsense like that. Innumerable bankrupt companies have rebranded, too — they don’t go away, they just wipe out the creditors and shareholders, and get a new name. In fact, the only outfit I can think of that hasn’t rebranded is the Democratic Party. It doesn’t need to — it’s still democratic.
Of course, Timmy’s strategy all along has been to keep hammering away with initiatives at every opportunity. It’s a shotgun approach – he can miss with most of them, but he needs only one to hit. Of course, the one that hits might be in an off-year election where he slips through without a lot of notice from the general electorate. But his idea is that 51% of that one election can cancel out the votes of 65.9% of the voters in every subsequent election.
As for the Times, notice that they keep calling attempts to close tax loopholes as an “increase” in taxes, without explaining the details. It’s hardly an accident, or just being intellectually lazy, or due to lack of space. They want the average person to think that attempts to close tax loopholes (and there are SO MANY) would result in a sales tax increase to everything they purchase. Perhaps Blethen doesn’t want to pay a sales tax on his lawyer’s bills?
As for a general sales tax increase, I’m opposed to it. As Roger Rabbit pointed out, its a regressive tax which hits the poor and the middle-class hardest. We need real tax reform, which would primarily require an income tax.
Roger @ 18: Anybody who needs a semi-automatic assault rifle to hunt has no business carrying a weapon in the woods. If you can’t hit your target with the first shot at 300 yards, then stay on the practice range until you can. A hunter with a semi-automatic that can’t hit his target is just going to start spraying the forest after his first shot misses, and that’s dangerous for everybody (except his target, which will probably escape unharmed).
I’ve shot an M-14 and an SKS before, but I much prefer a bolt-action rifle for target shooting.
We need an initiative that would have Timmy deported to Oklahoma. He would be happy there. He could hang out with Clay Bennett.
rhp6033, The Times has a vested interest in loopholes, I mean state tax exemptions.
And Goldie has called for a state income tax to supplant the regressive sales tax.
proud leftist, Eyeman is a creation of a vested interest, if Tim were to thrown in with the left at dinner tonight his replacement would be ready by breakfast. Eliminationist thinking is their tool, reason and education serve our side much better. And humor. As in laughing last and loudest.
22
I know, I know, but still, wouldn’t it be deeply satisfying if Timmy got deported to Oklahoma? I, for one, would throw a party.
@23: Wouldn’t OK have to secede 1st in order for Timmah! to be deported there?
Not that I would have a problem with OK seceding or anything…
24
I think that would be an excellent development.
Daddylove has played with himself too long. California is fucked because they have overspent themselves into the poorhouse; by $20 billion fucking dollars! Democrats control the Legislature, moron, just like here. They are in danger of losing their already fucked credit rating. BTW, dickhead; A budget is supposedly prepared that matches income with expenditures. At least that’s the way sane people go about but you’re a LoonyTunesLib so you go about it ass-backwards.
I for one would trade Tim for the Sonics in a heartbeat, but not by force. Besides, the Zombie Sonics have value, and Tim is worthless to his funders as an Okie, or an Oklahoman, or whatever handle they prefer these days. I’d Sooner he left on his own initiative. I could happily vote yes on such a measure.
i seriously doubt california went broke for its inability to tax its people.
@20 In war, if you can’t hit your target at 300 yards with the first shot, you’re dead.
@22 I don’t quite understand why the Daily Columbian got a tax break just because its owner made bad real estate investments.
@24 Not if the wingnuts reinstate the Articles of Confederation.
@26 Yeah, after Republicans froze revenues at 1898 levels, California’s budget would have been fine if the Democratic legislature had just done away with schools, colleges, highways, prisons, school vaccinations, courts and judges, and everything else including itself.
@30
the daily columbian, by nature of being a paper newspaper, made some poor business investments.
@32 Stop it, Roger! You’ll make old “John” come all over himself.
Trivia: In 1939, a California writer couldn’t think of a title for a novel he had just written. His wife suggested The Grapes of Wrath.
@33 The Daily Columbian, by nature of being inherited by a guy who isn’t as good a businessman as his father, grandfather, and great-grandfather, threw away its solvency on a flashy building it couldn’t afford.
Trivia: 60% of Washington’s elected judges were appointed by the governor to fill vacancies.
Maybe we should cut judges’ pay so the governor can appoint them all. This also will create job opportunities for new law school graduates.
When I graduated from law school in the early ’70s, the state was going through the “Boeing bust” and one of its periodic budget crises, and judges’ pay hadn’t been adjusted for inflation for a number of years.
Immediately after my class graduated, and we all were looking for jobs, one of my classmates ran for a superior court seat because no experienced lawyer would run for it. The incumbent had quit to return to private practice.
We’re now in another budget crisis, and the people who think we should pay minimum wage to public servants are still fucking horses, goats, and pigs.
So the only way to balance the Budget is tax increases?
No impact whatsoever on State Employees?
My, what a powerful Union!
The battleground in 2010 is going to be the impact of the State Employees Union on our Economy & Budget.
60% of the Budget is Wages & Benefits…yet nothing substantive is being done but a few token layoffs (which are likely retirements where the job isn’t refilled…hope someone checks into exactly WHO is getting laid-off).
The shell-games by Democrats will be untangled..and the voters will be outraged.
Hey Rabbit..
Take a guess at how many accumulated, unused Sick Leave Days the taxpayers of Washington are on the hook for…and what the value is?
Do you think the unused Sick Leave is “funded”…or is it just hidden, like lots of other stuff?
No one said pay Minimum Wage to State Employees you silly Rabbit. Man do you exagerrate! The truth is often so far away from your post so many times…where I live they’d call you a BULLSHITTER!
Tim–
The HorsesAss Atheist Progressive Northwest Division of Lunatic Moonbats cannot possible comprehend the possibility of Government overspending. It’s always too little taxes.
21. proud leftist spews:
Typical leftist. Cannot win an intellectual debate…get rid of the smart guy and perhaps folks won’t notice how stupid YOU are!
Suggesting someone who stands up to those in power should leave is scarey stuff.
I thought you KLOWNS welcomed diversity
…a rainbow of opinions??
Apparently, it’s only allowable diversity when folks agree with you.
The World According to Proud Leftist!
No debate…no questioning allowed.
If you question, PL will start anInitiative to deport you!
That’s what you are essentially saying PL.
Grow up, wise up and make a cogent argument for a change rather that wallow in the murk of your alleged mind.
Actually KLOWNS, Seattle may be worse off than California and it has nothing to do with finances.
http://seattletimes.nwsource.c.....anger.html
I’ve been telling y’all the Cascadian Faultline breaking loose will clean up the mess the Progressive’s have made…and I’ll come back and help start over.
Do you KLOWNS have a Survival Kit?
What’s in it?
Glen Beck is hawking some backpacks filled with essentials so you can survive a couple weeks.
Watch Glen Beck…he’ll help you live thru it.
funny how my best comments are always ignored.
but then, who is to appreciate them? i might as well write them in ancient latin. none of you posses the intellectual capacity to comprehend it.
i don’t even need capital letters to blow your mind.
@44 “I’ll come back and help start over.”
How, by laughing at the dead and dying? You’re such a hate-spewing asswipe, wishing as you are for tens of thousands of Americans to die.
Steve@46- you’ve got that right.
Hey Cynical, California has a few fault lines of its own. Have you heard of them? They aren’t quite as rich in volcanoes as we are, but that could change anytime. And you do know there are plenty of your wingnut friends along the coast who would be wiped out with us godless liberals in a really big one, but don’t let that get in the way of your gloating.
Cynny @ 43
Damn, you are humorless.
Sorry, have to strongly disagree. Have you ever seen this sort when someone is taking a beating?
49
I don’t believe Cynny recognizes when he is taking a beating. He is too deluded to know when his ass is being handed to him. I’m kind of jealous of him, in a way. It would be a real luxury to always think you’re on top and ahead. Of course, the downside is that you have to be a wingnut.
50, pl
Oh it’s an entirely different matter when they are the one taking a beating, when someone else is doing the taking- that is hilarious.
Unfortunately, 960 is not “struck down.” It’s effects are simply postponed until next year, after the 2011 legislative session is over. So we’ll have to do this again in 2012. Although in the meantime, Eyman’s puppeteer will probably pay for another initiative that will do the same thing as 960 next year BEFORE the legislative session starts. So we’re still screwed.
We can eliminate 99% of the blather about representative republicanism vs. pure democracy if we just ask: “whose ox is gored?”
Democrats right now cry about the ills of direct democracy and inits, because they are being used to limit taxes by Tim Eyman. This summer and fall it is pretty much guaranteed that HA posters will reverse course as the debate over marijuana legalization burns brighter. And of course, anti-drug conservatives will start to mumur about the dangers of direct democracy if it looks like legalization might passs.
It never fails.
53, I’d agree with you, but I have a side bet that 1068 will not actually be allowed to stand. Gut feeling, won’t defend it, but that’s what I expect to happen.