Political consultant Christian Sinderman calls Tim Eyman “the state’s highest paid panhandler,” and Timmy’s out rattling his tin cup once again. [Eyman again solicits salary fund – despite setback]
Personally, I find it hard to believe that even his most fervent supporters will continue throwing good money after bad if Tim continues to fail to get his so-called “grassroots” initiatives on the ballot.
Last year it was I-807, this year I-864. Tim often asks supporters to “reinvest” their car-tab savings in his current tax-cutting scheme, but over the past two years contributors haven’t seen much return on their investment.
Tim claims to have collected 160,000 signatures for I-864, about two-thirds of his target… but I don’t really believe he came even that close. Hell, if I had been standing in front of cameras at the Secretary of State’s office trying to spin victory out of a failed petition drive, I might have exaggerated the numbers too. It’s hard to imagine an admitted liar like Tim could resist the temptation.
My educated guess is he didn’t break 100,000 valid signatures, and probably significantly less. I could write a week of blogs on how Tim screwed up this campaign, but I don’t need to give him any free advice.
Suffice it to say that the fact that Tim can’t raise enough money to hire the signature gatherers needed to qualify his “grassroots” initiatives for the ballot, suggests that there isn’t much grassroots support in Washington state for his anti-government, tax-cutting agenda. Tim might point to his gambling industry financed I-892 as evidence to the contrary, but if that campaign hints at any anti-tax fervor, it seems limited to corporate boardrooms in Nevada and British Columbia, where much of the contributions originated.
As far as I’m concerned, if Tim’s true believers want to spend their hard earned dollars paying the mortgage on his Mukilteo McMansion, more power to them. Those are dollars that won’t be spent on some other, more destructive cause.
I really enjoy your commentary, even when I don\’t agree with it (although everything you\’ve said about Eyman is right on). I find it funny that Eyman still continues to get away with lying. He said on his site about 864 in January: \”I\’m on the phones full time now, calling our supporters and asking them to generously donate to this critical effort. It is and must be my sole focus, especially during the signature gathering drive…We\’ve got a great team working full-time on this effort.\” Well, anybody can see now that he must of had 892 in the works when he wrote this email.
Also, I can\’t believe he is running 892 which many conservatives that I know (and have been his supporters) are opposing because of the gambling expansion. I wonder what his excuse will be if 892 is defeated and 881 goes through. Anyway, keep up the good commentary!
Thanks for the comments, Jon. I especially like hearing from readers who don\’t agree with me all the time.
I genuinely believe that I-892 can be used as a wedge issue to split off some of Eyman\’s support from traditional conservatives, as expanded gambling is at odds with their values.