Goldy

Kudos to Seattle Times reporter Emily Heffter for giving a little space to the well documented thesis that Rep. Dave Reichert has been manipulating his voting record to appear more moderate than he is:

Often, he votes with Republicans on procedural motions, then switches sides and votes with Democrats in the final roll call.

For example, on an energy bill last year, Reichert voted with his fellow Republicans several times — against Democratic motions to close the bill to amendments and bring it to a vote. But in the final vote, he sided with Democrats to pass the bill.

“How can you end up on both sides of the vote?” asked Sandeep Kaushik, Burner’s spokesman.

Kaushik says Reichert in fact is trying to manipulate his image to ensure his re-election. Reichert rarely casts the deciding vote when going against his party on an important issue, Kaushik says, and he joins the Democrats when they are going to win anyway.

Sure the refutation doesn’t come until more than halfway through Heffter’s 1200 word piece, and well away from the prime front page real estate on which the article starts, but no reporter has given more thought or space to exploring beneath the surface of Reichert’s actual voting record, despite the fact that his tactics are both common and, well, obvious. How common?

Reichert wouldn’t be the first to use that strategy, said Matt Barreto, a UW political-science professor.

“It is a common thing that you see a lot that allows a politician to portray themselves a moderate,” he said.

And how obvious? Well, listen to Reichert explain his voting record before a gathering of Republicans back in 2006 (courtesy of TVW’s new player widget):

“So when the leadership comes to me and says , Dave you have to vote over here because we want to protect you and keep this majority, I do it.”

That’s Dave Reichert, “conscience driven independent,” in his own damn words… words backed up by Dan Kirkdorffer’s meticulous fisking of Reichert’s voting record, but words which the media have for the most part ignored when addressing the issue of Reichert’s alleged political moderation.  Reichert explains “how things work” back in the other Washington, political science professors validate it and his own voting record demonstrates it.  And yet our local news media, desperately longing for that mythical creature known as the modern moderate Republican, have been complicit in presenting this pro-war, pro-Bush, anti-choice congressman as somehow a perfect fit for his suburban swing district.

Darcy Burner, on the other hand, has somehow been given the label of being too progressive for her district, though on what specific issues the gatekeepers of conventional wisdom never bother to tell us.  On the war?  You can read her Responsible Plan on ending the war for yourself, and see if it’s out of step with the voters in WA-08.  Too progressive on reproductive rights?  On FISA?  On the economy?

Heffter’s piece is a great first step toward setting the record straight on Reichert’s record, but we can’t rely on our local media to tell the whole story.  Darcy is going to have to do that herself, and it’s going to cost a lot of money.  That’s why she needs your help.

Today is the last day of the fundraising quarter, and heading into the homestretch, pundits and big donors are going to size up the competitiveness of the various races based on its outcome.  So please give today and help Darcy hit her end of quarter target.  That’s the only way we’re going to dispel the Reichert myth.

Stephen McDonald is serving life in prison without the possibility of parole, for allegedly burning a doormat at a Mount Vernon, WA motel. As the trial appeals judge snidely remarks in the transcript: “Prisoners now have two rights, the right to go to jail and the right to stay there until their term is up.”

Regardless of whether McDonald actually committed the crime (and McDonald effectively argues that he was railroaded), a sentence of life in prison without parole is ridiculous, immoral, and an unjustifiable expense of taxpayer dollars for a minor property crime, regardless of his prior record. But then “Three Strikes and You’re Out” is a popular string of rhetorical bullshit with both the political and media establishments, so good luck Mr. McDonald in finding a politician or journalist to champion your cause.

Noemie has much more at WashBlog.

The solemn defenders of public civility at the Seattle Times editorial board spank the WA Dems today, arguing that “Ethnic slurs have no place in political advertising in our state.”

I don’t really disagree, and had the Dems called Dino Rossi a wop or a dago or a greaseball or a guinea or a spaghetti nigger, well, that would have been offensive, and clearly out of bounds. But they didn’t. They merely soundtracked a web video with the theme song to The Sopranos—a critically acclaimed TV show—because the tune was catchy, energetic and a well-paced fit to the accompanying footage… and I can only assume, because they wanted to highlight the fact that the political thugs at the BIAW are about as close as we come to mobsters in this state, at least in attitude, short of the actual Colacurcio crime family and their consiglieri (and proud Italian Club of Seattle member) Albert Rosellini.

Oops! Did I cross a line there by suggesting that former Gov. Rosellini has known mob connections? Does that constitute an ethnic slur, despite the supporting evidence, simply because Rosellini is Italian? (Apparently yes, judging from the way our local media gingerly dances around Rosellini’s connections to the Colacurcios and their mob activities out of fear of offending Italian-Americans… or, perhaps, getting whacked.)

Indeed, the very same day the Dems released their video, Rossi gave a stump speech in which he directly compared Gov. Gregoire’s policies to that of Tony Soprano, by name, and yet the Times didn’t find that slur “sleazy” because, I guess, Gregoire is of Irish descent. So by the Times’ standards, it is acceptable public discourse to groundlessly accuse Rossi of being a whiskey swilling drunk, but not Gregoire, whereas mob related epithets are okay when launched at our Irish-American governor, but not Rossi, or even actual Italian-American mobsters like the Colacurcios.

No really… I want to get this stuff straight, because after 16 years out here I’m still trying to wrap my mind around West Coast etiquette, and I wouldn’t want to offend anyone to the point where I’m beaten to a pulp with a baseball bat. (Though if I were, no doubt the genteel folks at the Times would write an editorial cheering my attacker.)

Clearly, I just don’t get it. I don’t get why, when complaining about “sleaze,” the Times sees fit to devote an entire Sunday editorial to attacking the Dems’ Sopranos reference yet don’t see the need to even mention Rossi’s. And, I don’t get why the Times’ editors think it’s so sleazy to highlight Rossi’s cozy relationship with BIAW along with that organization’s actual positions on actual issues, while totally ignoring BIAW’s insane rants linking environmentalism to Hitler, and equating BIAW’s own suffering under DOE’s stormwater regulations with that of the millions of Jews exterminated in Nazi death camps.

The Anti-Defamation League complained just as vociferously as the Italian Club of Seattle, so where was the editorial decrying that outrage, Mr. Blethen? I guess I must have missed it.

Jesus Christ, this isn’t some tawdry little blog here. The editors at the Times have the most widely read op/ed page in the state at their disposal, and this is what they choose to write about this Sunday? Not our collapsing economy or the Bush administration’s warmongering with Iran or illegal Justice Department hiring practices? Not an honest explication of the Spokane gaming compact and how they and the rest of the media got the story entirely backwards? No, Jim Vesely and his crew determined that the most important issues facing Seattle’s citizenry today are the declining standards of a college football team, and a four-day-old manufactroversy over a measly web video for chrissakes, and the failure of a political hack to apologize in strong enough terms.

(See Kelly, this is why I urged you not to back down over what was never intended to be an ethnic slur… because no matter how sincerely expiatory your apology, those goddamn Rossi-loving bastards at the Times were never going to give you any credit. Pussy.)

Of course on the bright side, the R’s mock outrage has clearly backfired, leading to over 12,000 views of a video that would have been seen no more than a few hundred times if not for the controversy. And yes, this is a good thing for the Dems, because whatever you think of the choice of music, the content of the video itself is compelling (and totally accurate) on its own. Go see for yourself here. Or check out my genuinely (and intentionally) offensive ethnic remixes here and here.

And as a final middle finger in the face of Seattle’s morbidly polite society, here’s yet another remix, this time with a tune that in no way references either organized crime or Rossi’s half-Italian heritage, yet somehow manages to be entirely appropriate to the video’s protagonists… not to mention the editors at the Times. Enjoy.

During my time at KIRO I think I only had one extended conversation with conservative host Michael Medved, and surprisingly it was on a subject on which we both agreed, the animated children’s film Happy Feet. We both hated it.

Medved, who made his name as a movie reviewer, hated the film because of its preachy environmental message. He went on a bit about a lack of consensus on global warming, the film’s manipulative storyline and its many allegedly factual and scientific errors. I, who made my name as a purely political blogger and talker, hated the film because it had a sucky script. It was visually beautiful and all that, but it was godawful boring. It was a bad, forgettable, waste of a theater ticket and a bag of popcorn.

Well, my daughter and I just returned from an opening day matinée of Pixar’s Wall-E, and I’m afraid this instant classic is going to pose a tough dilemma for conservative critics like Medved, who are no doubt going to hate the film’s environmental, political and social message, but are going to have a tough time panning what is possibly the best feature length animated film ever.

Oh, it’s certainly not the funniest animated film ever made, or even the most entertaining; I can think of a couple of Pixar films that beat it in both categories. And while Pixar’s animation is of course stunning, the visuals are at times so bleak that it’s breathtaking beauty goes by unnoticed. Indeed, the very fact that it is animated at all often goes by unnoticed, an amazing feat for a film that features two anthropomorphized robots.

How perfect is this film? Perfect enough, I’m not ashamed to admit, that this 45-year-old cynic, sitting in a darkened theater on a Friday afternoon, had tears well up in his eyes at the sight of two robots just, well, holding hands.

Wall-E isn’t a mere cartoon, it is a work of art, a G-rated animated film that transcends the genre of G-rated animated films, and sets new standards for what is possible in the medium. It is a love story. It is a comedy. But it is also a morality tale that directly challenges the consumer culture that defines our nation, and the irresponsible environmental stewardship that threatens our planet.

Judged solely on its merits, and not its message, it is difficult to imagine anybody with a passion for cinema giving Wall-E a bad review. It will be interesting to see if critics like Medved are willing and able to rise to that daunting challenge.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed down another 100+ points again today at 11,346.51, just 759 points above where it stood the day President Bush took office.  That’s an annualized return of under one percent, but then it’s still better than Herbert Hoover, so who’s complaining?

Oh. My. God.

Here I am, genuinely trying to make amends with my many friends in Washington’s Italian-Tlingit-American Republican community, and I just inadvertently step in it. I am soooooo embarrassed!

Out of respect to Bruno Brian and the delicate sensibilities of Italian-Tlingit-American Republicans everywhere, I remixed the WA Dems’ “controversial” Rossi/BIAW web video to remove the allegedly offensive theme song from The Sopranos, and replace it with a beautiful melody that I found as haunting as Rossi must find the bitter memories of his narrow loss in the 2004 gubernatorial election… and his total ass-whooping in a court of law seven months later.

At first I was stunned by the negative reactions the new music generated in the comment thread, until a helpful reader emailed me to tell me that this captivating orchestral piece was actually the theme to The Godfather, a somewhat obscure film that apparently includes a subplot revolving around Italian mobsters or something. Who knew? (I’d always thought The Godfather was a prequel to The Deer Hunter, due to John Cazale’s brilliant recurring role in both films, but my recollection may have been blurred by age and cheap chianti.)

So in attempting to replace a vague musical reference to organized crime (certainly vaguer than Dino Rossi directly comparing Gov. Gregoire to Tony Soprano the very same day the video was released), I accidentally stumbled upon the one melody that most reliably evokes the popular image of Italian mobsters. Talk about irony. I mean, if the state Dems, regardless of ethnic sensitivities, had really intended to imply that BIAW is somewhat mob-like in the way that it launders money through multiple PACs and thuggishly inserts itself into political campaigns for the sole purpose of kneecapping their opponents, they would have chosen this exact tune. But they didn’t.

Yet I did, and for that I am truly, truly sorry. So please don’t view the original offensive video here. Or for that matter, here, here, or here. And whatever you do, don’t view my unfortunate remix here. (Or here.)

In fact I’m so sorry, that I’ve actually remixed the video once again, this time using a song that I’m confident in no way references Rossi’s Italian-Tlingit heritage. Indeed, in light of my obvious pop-culture deficiencies, and just to be on the safe side, I’ve chosen a mambo, a musical form of distinctly non-Italian, Afro-Caribbean origins, which I now offer to Dino, Bruno and the rest of you with my sincerest apologies. Enjoy:

I’ve done a good deal of soul searching over the past few hours.

In my zeal to get my message out, while dishing back to the other side as good as they dish to us, I admit that I sometimes say and write things that are insensitive, even hurtful. Teasing the executive director of the Republican Governors Association about his obvious drinking problem…? That showed a regrettable lack of compassion and maturity. Accusing a sitting state senator of fucking pigs…? Impolite, at the very least.

And after reading the many thoughtful and compelling comments in the threads on several of my recent posts, I now realize that I’ve committed yet another lamentable error in judgment.

When the state Dems released their recent web video highlighting the disturbing connection between Dino Rossi and his pals at the BIAW—an organization that equates stormwater regulations with Nazi death camps—I enthusiastically posted it here at HA. It was pointed, well paced, and featured a catchy tune; all in all a nicely produced piece of work. So when the Italian Club of Seattle issued a letter condemning its use of the theme song to The Sopranos as offensive and anti-Italian, I admit I reacted defensively.

I hadn’t recognized the music, and to be honest, had listened to so many Rossi stump speeches in which he dwelled on his Tlingit heritage that I’d almost forgotten he was Italian. I just figured the complaint was political posturing, so even when the state Dems edited their video, replacing the music with something less… something, I defiantly reposted the original here. And here. And here.

But rather than listening to my own sense of outrage, I should have listened to that of my Italian friends, whose food I adore, whose culture I admire and whose love of democracy is so strong that they’ve elected nearly sixty governments in the sixty-two years since the end of World War II. After all, it’s not a question of whether I find the music offensive, but whether my Italian-American neighbors do. So if some pale-skinned guy named Brian tells me the use of a dance tune from a British “acid house” band inherently implies a connection between Italian-Tlingit-Americans and organized crime, who am I to disagree?

And so as a mea culpa, and a personal apology to Italian-Tlingit-Americans everywhere—but especially those in the Republican Party—I have taken it upon myself to remix the video on my own, inserting a hauntingly beautiful yet oddly appropriate piece of music I stumbled upon that couldn’t be further stylistically from the theme song to The Sopranos. Enjoy:

It is curious to note that in all the press coverage of the Dems use of The Sopranos theme song in their Rossi/BIAW video, only Postman bothered to mention that Rossi himself routinely tries to paint Gov. Gregoire as a mobster, by directly referencing Tony Soprano his stump speech.

Huh. So, the TV news folks et al didn’t think this a relevant tidbit of information, I guess because the Dems’ choice of music is somehow a more unambiguous reference to Tony Soprano than an actual unambiguous reference to Tony Soprano? Are they shittin’ me?

And while we’re on the subject of ethnic slurs, when is the Italian Club of Seattle going to condemn KVI’s Kirby Wilbur for saying that Dino Rossi looks like a “crime mob boss” …?

[audio:https://horsesass.org/wp-content/uploads/kirbywilburrossi.mp3]

Dino and Kirby (far right) during happier days

Actually, Dino looks nothing like a mob boss; he’s too, well, foppish. Kirby on the other hand, cuts a more, um, imposing figure—give him a scowl, a cigar and a Brooklyn accent, and he just might pass.

See, the thing about these Italian mobster stereotypes is that they’re actually based on reality, which I imagine is one of the things that made The Sopranos such a compelling show. I lived in an Italian neighborhood in Brooklyn, around the corner from the church where the funeral for John Gotti’s driver was held (after he was gunned down), and thanks to the local goombahs it was an incredibly safe place to live, you know… if you were white. A few blocks away it wasn’t an uncommon sight to see a parked car stripped to its bones overnight, but I once parked my mother’s convertible in front of my building for nearly a week without fear, because if you broke into the wrong car in my neighborhood, they’d hunt you down and kill you.

Are all Italian-Americans mobsters? No way. But in the mob-controlled neighborhoods of Brooklyn and South Philly with which I was familiar, most of the mobsters were definitely Italian, and they cultivated their own stereotypical look and feel in much the same way that my father and his Jewish psychiatrist friends tended to come off as Sigmund Freud impersonators.

Tony Soprano your stereotypical mob boss? You betcha. Kirby Wilbur a passable knockoff? Maybe. But Dino Rossi…? Not so much.

A song is just a song, but a picture’s worth a thousand words and all that, so trust me… nobody is ever going to confuse Dino Rossi for a Tony Soprano style mob boss.

No doubt Dino Rossi, Luke Esser and the solemn gatekeepers of public decorum in our corporate media are patting themselves on the back right now, after the state Dems switched the soundtrack on their Rossi/BIAW video in response to bullshit complaints that it was anti-Italian. (Jesus… when did Republicans get so PC? Oh yeah… when it suits their purpose.)

Here’s what the Dems’ Kelly Steele emailed the TV news programs last night around 10PM, after they made the switch:

As promised, the WA State Democrats have changed (not pulled, as previous wire stories indicated) our video regarding Rossi and his relationship with Olympia’s most powerful special interest lobbying group — the BIAW — who are Rossi’s designated attack squad and continue to pour millions into false and misleading attack ads against Gov. Gregoire.

The new video can be viewed here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIjkx0ScWPw

The video was in no way meant to allege or imply that Republican Dino Rossi or his extremist, right-wing developer allies have ties to the mafia or organized crime, nor did we intend to offend anyone, which is why we changed the song. We were happy to err on the side of sensitivity in response to a very reasonable criticism/observation by Mr. DiJulio, regardless of his political motives.

Yeah, well, as I emailed Kelly, I still think he’s a pussy for backing down like this (Kelly… my cat’s got bigger balls than you do… and he was neutered as a kitten), but it’s interesting to note that the end result of this mini manufactroversy is that the actual message in the Dems’ hitherto obscure web video has reached a much wider audience than would have been possible without the Republicans’ help.

About 24 hours after the video was released no more than a few hundred people had viewed it on YouTube, most of them via my post here on HA. But between the time Postman breathed life into the story and the time the state Dems changed the soundtrack a few hours later, the YouTube counter had flipped past the 2000 mark. And that’s on top of the tens of thousands of viewers who saw extended clips on the TV newscasts last night… viewers who I’m guessing found Rossi’s cozy relationship with the BIAW more disturbing than the Dems’ choice of musical accompaniment.

So Rossi, Esser, DiJulio et al… thanks for getting the message out, and for free. We couldn’t have done it without you. (Chumps.)

As for the new soundtrack, I don’t know what the tune is, but it sucks by comparison. You can view the revised video here, or as I public service, here once again is the original video, which I had the forethought to download from YouTube and upload to my own account as a public service:

As I predicted yesterday, the US Supreme Court just overturned 150 years of legal precedent, interpreting for the first time the Second Amendment to grant an unambiguous individual right to bear arms. Good thing too, as you never know when that drunk stranger passed out on your couch might wake up, so better safe than sorry.

Let this be a lesson to those who think the Supreme Court isn’t one of the top issues in this presidential race. While the court just reinterpreted the Second Amendment by a single vote margin, they’re also a single vote away from dismantling the Fourth Amendment, and overturning Roe v. Wade.

NRA executive director Wayne LaPierre called this decision the “opening salvo,” and no doubt he chose his violent words carefully.  Pack the bench with a couple more of those Federalist Society justices and it might be prudent for us liberals to start availing ourselves of some of those guns.

UPDATE:
In another 5-4 decision:

The Supreme Court on Thursday struck down the “millionaire’s amendment” as an unfair way to help opponents of wealthy candidates who spend from their personal fortunes.

The law allows candidates to receive larger contributions when their wealthy opponents spend heavily from their personal fortunes.

Understand, the millionaires amendment didn’t limit how much self-financed candidates could spend on their own campaigns, it merely increased the limits their opponents could raise.  But you know, anything that attempts to even the political playfield between the very wealthy and the rest of us is a violation of the First Amendment in the eyes of a court that views money to be more speech than, well, speech.

Postman does the kind of hard-nosed reporting for which we’ve come to rely on the dailies, reprinting a letter from the Italian Club of Seattle, attacking the state Dems for posting an allegedly “racist” video.

Whether the State Democratic Party thought it clever to link Rossi to Italian-American criminals through the use of a popular mobster TV show is irrelevant; it is distasteful, and it is racist. Governor Gregoire, we believe we have your sympathy when we assert that using someone’s ethnic heritage as a negative should not be condoned in this campaign.

Huh. A few thoughts come to mind. First, not having cable, I had no idea that the soundtrack was the theme song to The Sopranos; I just thought it was a particularly catchy tune.

Second… oh, so now he’s Italian. Up until Republicans GOP Partiers started riling up anti-tribal sentiment with their manufactured controversy over the Spokane gaming compact, Rossi was traveling the state emphasizing his Tlingit heritage. How convenient.

And finally…

The letter, from club president Brian DiJulio, mentions that former Democratic Gov. Albert Rosellini is a member.

You mean the same Rossellini who is also a known “associate of the Colacurcios,” the local crime family who pleaded guilty in the Strippergate scandal, and who is now at the center of a five-year FBI investigation into organized crime and prostitution? Hey, way to disassociate Italian-Americans from that Mafia stereotype, Brian.

And you know, if Rossi is so offended by an alleged Sopranos reference, however tenuous, perhaps he should avoid referencing Tony Soprano by name when criticizing Gov. Gregoire’s tax policies:

[Rossi] criticized the state’s reliance on the gas tax and “sin” taxes from alcohol and cigarette sales.

“Sin taxes are so easy to raise,” he said. “But they are already so high they are one of the highest in the nation. If we raised them anymore, Tony Soprano would want to get some of that action.“

Oops.

DiJulio wants Gov. Gregoire to pull the video and fire state party chair Dwight Pelz… two things she has no authority to do. My suggestion is that if he really wants to get some of that action, he should have somebody put a horse’s head in the governor’s bed. I hear Frankie Sr. knows a guy….

The end of another quarter is upon us, and Darcy Burner has set a $30,000 online fundraising target between now and June 30th.  I wish money didn’t play such an important part elections, but it does. So please give today.

What with gasoline prices now topping $4.40 a gallon, thank God somebody is looking out for the interests of Exxon Mobil shareholders.

(And a heads up, tomorrow the Supreme Court reinterprets the 2nd Amendment, tossing aside a century and a half of legal precedent. Good thing we don’t have any of those damn “activist judges.”)