HorsesAss.Org

Even the most casual observer of Washington state politics is acutely aware of the Cascade Curtain, the physical and cultural barrier that separates East from West, right from left, and Republicans from Democrats. This pathological East/West divide is the cause of much of the dysfunction that plagues our state political system, yet if you ask an elected official how we might bridge this gap, don’t expect to elicit much more than tired platitudes or a roll of the eyes.

But I wonder if one of the ways to bring the two sides of the state closer together both politically and culturally is to close the physical distance between them… namely, by building high-speed rail from Seattle to Spokane.

That’s exactly what’s happening in Spain, where an ambitious new high-speed rail network is binding historically separate and distinctive regions together into a much more cohesive nation:

Spain opened its first Alta Velocidad Española, or AVE, high-speed train route in 1992, between Madrid and Seville. The network has grown to nearly 2,000 kilometers and stretches from Malaga on the south coast to Barcelona, which is north and east.

Supporters say the AVE has begun to transform the country, binding remote and sometimes restive regions to Madrid and leading traditionally homebound Spaniards to move around for work or leisure.

“Spaniards have rediscovered the train,” said Iñaki Barrón de Angoiti, director of high-speed rail at the International Union of Railways in Paris. “The AVE has changed the way people live, the way they do business. Spaniards don’t move around a lot, but the AVE is even changing that.”

By slashing the time it takes to travel from one city to another, high-speed rail in Spain and elsewhere has increased tourism, altered housing patterns, and lured millions of travelers out of airplanes and cars. According to the International Union of Railways, a high-speed train can carry eight times as many passengers as an airplane over an equal distance, using the the same amount of energy, while emitting a quarter of the CO2 per person. It also creates economic opportunities outside the traditional urban cores that never before existed.

For example, previous studies have suggested that high-speed rail could connect downtown Seattle to Moses Lake in under an hour, with Spokane only another half hour away. That’s downtown Seattle to downtown Spokane in less time than one typically spends at the airport before departure. Such a rail line could instantly transform Moses Lake into a viable international airport, while creating the freedom to live and work anywhere near a station.

Live in Spokane and work in Seattle, or vice versa? That’s a shorter commute, time-wise, than between some parts of Long Island and Manhatten. And just think of the economic opportunity this would create in the half dozen or so counties through which a high-speed line would pass.

When we tie the people and economies of Washington state closer together, when prosperity in King County directly generates prosperity in Kittitas and Grant counties too, that’s when the politics of this state will become less divisive. And as has been proven in other parts of the world, high-speed rail can put us on the fast track toward achieving that goal.

I know a lot of Democrats who are pretty pissed off at King County Councilman Larry Phillips for crossing the aisle and joining Republicans in appointing Jan Drago to fill Dow Constantine’s seat, but I’m not one of them. Yeah, I generally hail from the “Democrats are pussies” camp, routinely berating my own party for failing to play political hardball in the face of the nearly intractable, partisan discipline practiced by their Republican opponents, but well, sometimes reality is reality.

The refusal of the four Republicans on the council to honor the will of Eighth District Democrats by appointing state Sen. Joe McDermott to the seat, was breach of protocol and tradition that I hope comes back to bite them in the ass the next time the council is asked to fill a Republican vacancy, but this was political gambit from which they had little incentive to budge. Had McDermott gained the appointment, his incumbency would have made him such an overwhelming favorite in November that it likely would have dissuaded other serious contenders from waging a challenge. But with an open seat up for grabs, the race could attract several sitting elected officials, thus sowing disruption through the Democratic ranks, and spreading their financial resources ever thinner.

For example, if both McDermott and state Rep. Zack Hudgins run for the council, that will leave both of their otherwise safe legislative seats open in November. But more importantly, it would tie up the surpluses in both of their campaign coffers from being transferred to more competitive districts. That’s just smart politics on the part of the Republican council members, if totally irresponsible when comes to actual governance.

Think I’m giving the goopers too much credit? Then explain to me why they briefly offered Hudgins the council appointment, but only if he agreed, like Drago, to serve only as a caretaker. When Hudgins surprised them by accepting these terms, they asked if Hudgins would run again for his vacated House seat in November, and when he said yes, they withdrew the offer.

Maximum disruption of Democratic legislative races, that’s what the Republicans were shooting for, and perhaps, that’s what they’ll get. So why aren’t I pissed at Phillips for caving to their demands, especially considering that the appointment would have fallen to Gov. Gregoire had the council post remained vacant for another 30 days? Because the cost of waiting another month was simply too high.

Had Phillips and the Democrats waited for Gregoire to appoint McDermott, as she surely would have, it would have meant two legislative seats changing hands in the middle of a crucial short session. First McDermott’s seat would have to be filled, and then Sen. Fred Jarrett’s, whose replacement would have almost surely waited until after Democrats had regained their council majority. Now, with Drago in place, McDermott can continue to prepare for the session, while Randy Gordon’s appointment is little more than a formality.

Combine that with the fact that the biggest knock against Drago is that she’s not McDermott, and it just didn’t make sense to drag out this four-four deadlock any longer… at least if your primary concern is governance. We needed to settle this before the start of the session, even if it meant caving to the Republicans’ irresponsible and petty demands. So in my opinion, Phillips probably did the right thing in breaking ranks.

That said, I hope we can count on him for demanding political payback, when payback is ultimately due.

UPDATE:
Apparently, the governor cannot break a deadlock over a nonpartisan seat. So I guess I was wrong. It’s been known to happen.

The 520 bridge replacement project is more than another transportation project.

It is an opportunity to build healthy places to live, work, and play that our region won’t see again for at least another half century.

It is an opportunity to be good stewards of the environment and to address climate change.

It is an opportunity for our many local communities to come together and act as a region.

It is an opportunity for us to determine what kind of city we want and the quality of life of our neighborhoods.

It is an opportunity for our state to offer a vision of transportation for the 21^st Century and not just building roads like its 1959.

Finally it is again an opportunity to move our transportation system forward.

It will take leadership to bring together all the many points of view on how to best move forward on transportation. But we have done it before.

During my time as Chair of the House Transportation Committee, working with my Republican and Democratic counterparts in both the House and the Senate, we passed fourteen and half cents in gas taxes by bringing road and transit advocates from the east and west side together.

(I point out the fact that I worked to pass the largest financing package for roads in our state’s history only to preempt the pigeonholing of my perspective here as that of another Seattle Democrat transit advocate.)

It will take leadership from the environmental community to get transit right. Transportation remains the single largest contributor to global warming in Washington State – over half our greenhouse emissions come from vehicles. The 520 bridge project offers a real opportunity to build a transportation structure of the future that contributes to the solution.

Neither the legislation authorizing the new 520 bridge, nor any of the current designs, integrate transit into the design or planning of the project. Nor is there any financing mechanism for new transit in the corridor, particularly for high capacity transit. The name alone — “The 520 Bridge and HOV Replacement Project” – is proof that again we are building a road to move cars, and not a transportation corridor to move people and goods. The current plan amounts to placing existing buses onto new HOV lanes to share with cars. Glaringly, it lacks a streamlined connection for transit riders between the north/south transit corridor at new Sound Transit Station at Montlake and any future transit riders moving east/west from the new 520.

It will take leadership from the City to bring neighborhoods that currently disagree amongst themselves together. Far more people live and work near the 520 bridges then the Viaduct. The City should use the model it developed during the creation of urban villages to approach the project in a comprehensive manner. It should put the Departments of Planning, Neighborhoods, and Transportation on the ground and bring together neighborhoods that are currently divided, creating an all-neighborhoods comprehensive mitigation and transportation plan. It is impossible for the Seattle legislators to support a city position when one is lacking.

It will take leadership on the part of the county to bring urban and suburban interests together. The county with the new leadership of Dow Constantine from Seattle and Fred Jarrett from the east side of Lake Washington is uniquely positioned to bring both sides of the lake together and act as a region. The state should consider allowing the County to assume all coordination for planning and financing for a new 520 and I-90 corridor transportation authority.

It will take leadership in the Legislature to address the fact that the current financial plan is unattainable. During the negotiations to pass the nine-and-a-half-cent gas tax east of the lake, legislators insisted on moving $1.5 billion out of 520 and applying it to I-405. Now we have a shortfall. The solution is to toll I-90 in addition to 520, and committing toll revenues to the construction, maintenance and operations of the bridge and of transit.

If we fail to come together as a region on a project that is crucial to our economic future, I believe we will destroy the coalition that moved our transportation system forward and return again to the defeats we suffered in years past.

We have succeeded in the past and we can do it again. Let’s capitalize on the many unique opportunities we face. Let’s move our transportation system forward.

— Sen. Ed Murray

U.S. House Republican Whip Eric Cantor has sent out a memo naming the 37 Dems who voted for the House health care reform bill, but who he believes can be persuaded to vote against final passage. And our very own Rep. Adam Smith (WA-9) is listed amongst them.

According to Cantor, he only needs to turn 3 of the 37 to kill the bill.

While it remains to be seen what the final bill will look like, Rep. Smith’s constituents should be prepared to vigorously lobby their congressman until and unless he confirms his support. Cantor and his colleagues can bluster all they want, but it’s local voters who politicians listen to most.

Newly elected Bellevue Mayor Don Davidson on the future of light rail in his fair city:

“They haven’t figured out how to get across Lake Washington. It’s going to be quite a bit of time before we see light rail being laid here.”

Um… when are anti-rail, Kemper Freeman toadies like Davidson going to pull their collective head out of the sand (or whatever dark hole in which they keep it)?  Sound Transit has figured out how to get light rail across Lake Washington. It’s this fancy new technology they call a bridge. In fact, they plan to use the same center span of the I-90 floating bridge that was specifically designed to accommodate light rail in accordance with a memorandum signed by the city of Bellevue way back in 1976.

I understand that Davidson would prefer that East Link pass by the outskirts of Bellevue, or pass unseen through a half billion dollar tunnel (paid for by anyone but Bellevue taxpayers), or ideally, not be built at all. But statements like this one just makes him sound like an idiot.

Last night the Democratic Precinct Committee Officers of the 41st Legislative District overwhelmingly selected attorney and activist Randy Gordon as their first choice to fill state Sen. Fred Jarrett’s recently vacated office. The final tally:

Randy Gordon     54
Aaron Belenky     9
George Pieper     8

Legally, the King County Council can appoint any of the three nominees above as Jarrett’s replacement, but according to protocol and precedent, the council almost always selects the first choice of the PCOs, and unanimously. And with such a decisive victory last night, it’s hard to imagine the council breaking with tradition.

So my congratulations to soon-to-be-senator Gordon, who has certainly worked hard enough over the past few years to put him in this position, and who I am confident will well represent the progressive values of Democrats throughout the district, the region and the state. As I previously mentioned, I first met Gordon in 2005 when he was a classmate of mine at Camp Wellstone. Other graduates from my class include state Representatives Marko Liias (D-21) and Tina Orwall (D-33), and state Sen. Eric Oemig (D-45), not to mention Darcy Burner.

That’s quite a group of accomplished alumnae, and both Wellstone Action and Progressive Majority deserve your support for bringing this valuable candidate training program into Washington state.

It’s about time to break that New Year resolution by joining us tonight for a little politics under the influence at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally. We meet at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. beginning about 8:00 pm. Or stop by earlier and join me for dinner.

Not in Seattle? There is a good chance you live near one of the 341 other chapters of Drinking Liberally.

North Dakota Sen. Byron Dorgan will not seek reelection.

Anybody who thinks the Dems won’t have fewer seats in both houses next year than they have this year is crazy, and anybody who thinks we’ll get a better health care reform bill with fewer Dems than with more, is out of their fucking mind.

It would have been nice if the Senate leadership had the balls to go nuclear and do away with the filibuster, but they don’t and they won’t. So the bill we get out of conference is the bill we get. And if we don’t pass anything, the Democratic loses next November will be even steeper than they otherwise would be.

Time to pass health care reform, claim victory, and then start the arduous process of incrementally improving on it bit by bit.

Folks around these parts sure do love the illusion of nonpartisanship, but as demonstrated by yesterday’s Mercer Island mayoral brouhaha, it is in practice exactly that.

The putatively nonpartisan Mercer Island City Council met yesterday to select a new mayor, and under much pressure, the council split on party lines to elect not-so-secret Democrat Jim Pearman to another term. Everybody knows who the four Democrats and three Republicans are, so the outcome should not have been a surprise, but not-so-secret Democrat Dan Grausz, unhappy with Pearman’s performance in office, had strongly signaled that he was planning to vote for not-so-secret Republican Steve Litzow.

It’s not like the mayor does all that much other than chair city council meetings, so one wouldn’t think such a fit of party line crossing would be such a big deal. But the mayorship has proven a valuable bullet point on one’s political resume, and a reliable steppingstone to higher office. Both state Sen. Fred Jarrett and state Rep. Judy Clibborn are former Mercer Island mayors, as have been other past 41st District legislators. And Litzow clearly has his heart set on higher office.

So the biggest issue before the city council yesterday was not really about who would get to chair the meetings over the next two years, as it was about whether they would give Litzow a big leg up in his campaign this November. Last year, Litzow ran as a Republican against freshman Rep. Marcie Maxwell for her seat, and this year he is widely expected to pursue the open senate seat Jarrett is vacating. However disappointed Grausz was with the way Pearman runs the meetings, did he really want to be responsible for potentially helping Republicans pick up a seat in the state senate?

Apparently not. And as much as some might bemoan the incursion of partisan politics into the deliberations of a nonpartisan council, well, welcome to the real world.

Politics is an adversarial process. Deal with it.

Tell them you’re taking them to the Fun Forest at the Seattle Center to go on the rides, only to show up and find that it’s gone.

They’ll look back and laugh, someday.

Let’s see… so the Seattle Times consistently opposes spending tax dollars to build a light rail system approved by a popular vote of the people, yet it supports spending tax dollars to build a passenger terminal at Everett’s Paine Field to support commercial airline service that is widely opposed by the surrounding neighborhoods.

Good to see that they are clearly in touch with the values of their community.

Allen Quist, a Republican former state representative challenging U.S. Rep. Tim Walz (D-MN), explains why he’s running for office:

“It’s because I, like you, have seen that our country is being destroyed. I mean, this is — every generation has had to fight the fight for freedom. This is our fight. And this is our time. This is it. Terrorism, yes — but that’s not the big battle. The big battle is in D.C., with the radicals. They aren’t liberals, they’re radicals. Obama, Pelosi, Walz — they’re not liberals, they’re radicals. They are destroying our country. And people all over are figuring that out.”

Hear that? The big battle isn’t against the terrorists… it’s against us liberals. Because, I suppose, we’re, um, worse than the terrorists.

It’s good to see that Republicans haven’t lost their perspective.

With former Seattle City Council member Jan Drago appointed as a caretaker to fill Dow Constantine’s vacated King County Council seat through the end of the year, the rest of the dominoes are beginning to fall into place.

State Sen. Joe McDermott (D-34), the first choice of Democrats on the council as well as West Seattle party loyalists, will return to Olympia for the coming session, before running to fill the seat permanently next November. No doubt state Rep. Zack Hudgins (D-11) will be awfully tempted to take a crack at the race too, but at this point you gotta consider McDermott the frontrunner.

And with Constantine’s seat settled, and a Democratic majority back in control of the council, the once crowded field to replace state Sen. Fred Jarrett (D-41) is starting to clear out. Last week Vicki Orrico withdrew her name from consideration, and today Maureen Judge (who I call “Mo” and my daughter calls “mom”) announced her withdrawal too:

I have decided today that I am withdrawing my name from consideration for the 41st State Senate appointment.

Because these are difficult times, because we face so many challenges throughout the district and state, I feel my most vital and important contribution to our community is in my current role role as Executive Director of the Washington Toxics Coalition and getting the Safe Baby Bottle Act of 2010 passed in Washington state.

The only inside information I’ll pass on is that it wasn’t an easy decision, but it’s probably for the best… at least for me. Mo would have made a great progressive addition to the state senate, but I have to admit a little selfish relief at her withdrawal. Had she won the appointment, the next two months would have been rather hellish from a scheduling perspective, and then once the session was done the campaign would begin.

As for the rest of the field, considering the number of endorsements and commitments he’s already locked up, you gotta consider Randy Gordon the clear frontrunner in tomorrow’s vote of 41st District Democratic PCOs. And as a matter of protocol, the council almost always goes with the PCO’s first choice.

Over at Crosscut, real Ted Van Dyk laments the decline in public civility.

We face unacceptable losses of civility. The in-your-face insults characteristic of many blogs and even traditional media reflect a general loss of respect for each other. The old political dictum, “Tough on issues; soft on people,” has long since been breeched. How many angry print or on-line columns, broadcast commentaries, or political rants have you seen in recent months, flowing from mention of the names Sarah Palin, Dick Cheney, Joe Lieberman, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, George W. Bush, Barney Frank or, locally, Tim Eyman? Not critiques of their policy views but insulting personal attacks and characterizations. The communications flowing from partisan political committees and true believing single-issue groups are often toxic.

Yeah… well… um… in your face, Van Dyk!

First of all, as our state’s best known purveyor of insulting personal attacks on Tim Eyman, I just want to calmly and maturely point out that he started it. If not for Eyman’s own infamous lack of civility, my tit for tat response would never have garnered so many headlines in return. As I explained at the time, in seeking to officially proclaim Eyman a “horse’s ass,” I was not making a mockery of the initiative process; rather, I was just pointing out the mockery that Eyman had already made of it. Eyman is a horse’s ass, and that’s the uncomfortable truth that made my initiative both funny and compelling.

Furthermore, as I have well demonstrated, it is possible to methodically and rationally critique one’s policies, while simultaneously indulging in personal attacks. Indeed, I’d wager that nobody has written more substantively and at greater length on the policy implications of Eyman’s various initiatives than I have over the past six years. Do I resort to name-calling and hyperbole from time to time? Sure. Timmy deserves it. But when it comes to a factual and substantive debate on tax structure issues, I consistently kick Eyman’s sound-bite-repeating equine ass. (Which, by the way, is why Tim won’t even make eye contact with me anymore, let alone engage me in live debate.)

Likewise, it is also possible to maintain an air of civility while, intentionally or not, consistently repeating the same pack of discredited lies, as Van Dyk has relentlessly done in opposing Sound Transit. I suppose Van Dyk might be offended by such bluntness of opinion, but I personally prefer rude truths to polite lies, and unlike him I strive never to conflate solemnity with seriousness, nor civility with being civic-minded.

No doubt Van Dyk pines for the oh-so-civil, bipartisan days when political operatives from both parties might deliver a suitcase full of $100 bills to Richard Nixon, but not me. For if that’s what civility looks like, I want nothing to do with it.