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The most disturbing tidbit from yesterday’s airplane terror attempt:

Although transportation officials had not announced new security measures yet, Air Canada said the Transportation Security Agency would make significant changes to the way passengers are able to move about on aircraft. During the final hour of flight, customers will have to remain seated, will not be allowed access to carry-on baggage and cannot have personal belongings or other items on their laps, according to a notice on Air Canada’s Web site.

In effect, that means passengers on flights of about 90 minutes or less will not be able to get out of their seats, since they are not allowed to move about while an airplane is climbing to its cruising altitude.

Air Canada also told its United States bound customers that they would be limited to a single carry-on item and that they would be subjected to personal and baggage searches at security check points and in the gate area. It said this would result in significant delays, canceled flights and missed connections.

As if passengers aren’t already terrorized enough by the airlines as it is.

Of course, the most effective air travel security measure is to discourage people from traveling by air, so I guess at least in that sense, such an over-reaction would be effective.

That’s gotta hurt.

Merry Christmas everyone!

Disappointing as the details might be to most progressives, it’s still historic.

Okay, so here’s how it works.

The Senate version of health care reform absolutely sucks, and progressives need to oppose it as loudly and effectively as they can, even threatening to torpedo health care reform entirely if there aren’t some pretty big changes. And then we all have to bite our tongues and support the final bill that comes out of conference, even if it largely resembles that sucky Senate bill.

Why? Because as sucky as it is compared to what we all wanted, it’s a helluva lot better than what the American people have now. And, if you think the Democrats are going to have a larger majority in either House after 2010, especially after failing to pass health reform, then you’re smoking crack.

The Democrats are going to lose seats in 2010, because that’s the natural order of things for the party in control of the White House during off year elections, and because many of the seats we picked up in 2006 and 2008 are seats the Republicans never should have lost. (ID-01 a Democratic stronghold? Enjoy your crack.) And as President Clinton learned in 1994, promising to deliver on health care only to fall flat on your face, doesn’t much help at the polls.

You want Obama to fail? Reject health care reform. You want the Democrats to lose a ton of seats in 2010? Reject health care reform.  You want to stop insurance companies from denying you coverage due to pre-existing conditions, or dropping your coverage once you get sick? Well, even the sucky Senate bill does that.

Yeah, I know that conservative Dems and insurance industry shills like Lieberman have us over a barrel, and that totally sucks, but that’s the way it is. We lost this debate when Ned Lamont lost in the general, and there’s just not much we can do about it at the moment.

So I’ve got no problem with progressive Dems yelling and screaming and complaining, and doing everything they can to blow the damn thing up. Call your congressman and your senators and tell them they can kiss your vote goodbye if this is what comes out of conference. That’s what I’m planning to do.

But once the deal is done, I’m not embarrassed to admit that I’ll be flip-flopping faster than a flapjack on a hot griddle.

Cynical? Yeah, sorta. But that’s politics.

Yesterday I wrote about how headline writers can influence the perception of news.

At first, the front page of the Seattle Times website reported on new crime statistics with the alarmist headline, “Seattle sees sharp increase in crime.” Later, they walked the headline back to the less provocative and more accurate, “Seattle sees increase in crime after two record-low years.”

Meanwhile, both headlines linked to the same article with the same confusingly written headline: “Sharp increase in Seattle robberies, assaults; murders, rapes down.” (I’m betting I’m not the only one who initially missed the semicolon.)

But after stumbling across a print edition of the Times (it was being used as a coaster in a bar), I’m not sure what all the online indecision and confusion was about:

I dunno… looks to me that the headline in the print edition got it just about right. Why couldn’t the online edition just go with that?

It never occurred to me before, but are different editors writing the headlines for the online edition than the print edition, and if so, what could possibly account for translating “up slightly” into “sharp increase” other than a desire to use hyperbole to trick readers into clicking through?

If online really is the future of news, it doesn’t bode well that the Times apparently holds its online edition to a lower standard than its print.

The Seattle Times once again argues that President Obama should abandon health care reform, because, you know, failing to deliver on the issue worked out so well for President Clinton and the Democrats in 1994.

But what really struck me from this morning’s editorial was the odd construction of the following sentence:

Whether senators fully understand it we doubt.

Who wrote this editorial? Yoda?

Here’s hoping he can persuade the rest of the editorial board from continuing down the path to the dark side.

The Cannabis Defense Coalition just received the second document dump from the State Department of Corrections. The documents are now posted at their website. I’m looking through them now and hope to provide an update on my previous post on their (and the AG’s) attempts to undermine the medical marijuana law here in Washington.

Join us tonight for a little dose of Christmas spirit and some politics under the influence at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally. Festivities take place at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. beginning about 8:00 pm. Or stop by earlier and enjoy dinner.

Not in Seattle? There is a good chance you live near one of the 340 other chapters of Drinking Liberally.

(From Crooks and Liars, via BlatherWatch)

Jesus… could Chris Matthews let Darcy Burner finish a single sentence? Um, no, but I think Darcy stood up to it pretty well. She never lost her patience, and kept a smile on her face, making Matthews come off as a bit of an asshole.

All that aside, isn’t it interesting that when the cable news folks are looking for someone credible to talk to about health care reform, they come to Darcy Burner, and not Do Nuthin’ Dave Reichert?  Hmm.

In the midst of a controversy over her appointment to the Nike board of directors, UW Provost Phyllis Wise has finally submitted the terms the agreement to the UW School of Medicine, where she also sits as a professor. The dean of the Medical School declined to review Wise’s Nike agreement, and instead passed it on to UW President Mark Emmert, who gave his approval.

Whether that strictly meets the letter of the Medical School’s policies, I don’t know, but presumably this now makes Wise’s compensation package with Nike a public record, available for full disclosure.

Personally, I have a hard time understanding why an educator earning a more than comfy $535,000 a year would do anything that might call into question her professional ethics, but then, I guess I’ve never been as enamored with money as some people.

Last night I climbed into bed knowing exactly what I would write about in the morning, but alas, I awoke to find that the Seattle Times had snatched my precious snark right out from under my pillow. Sorta.

The headline on the front page of the Times last night was stark and scary: “Seattle sees sharp increase in crime.” Oh no! Good thing we’ve kicked out that incompetent Mayor Nickels and his soft-on-crime staff.

But the lede of the article the headline linked to seemed to hail from a different story:

Even though Seattle saw increases in both violent crimes and property crimes during the first half of 2009 compared to the same period in 2008, the slight rise came after back-to-back years that saw crime dip to lows not seen since the 1960s.

Wait… the headline said “sharp increase,” but the lede says “slight rise”… and from record lows.  And while the lede says that “violent crimes” rose during the first half of 2009, the article goes on to point out that the worst of these crimes—murders and rapes—both decreased from the same period a year ago.

Ahh… this is the sort of irresponsible hyperbole for which I live to abuse the Times. Unfortunately, as I slept, the editors repented and changed the headline to the less provocative and much more accurate: “Seattle sees increase in crime after two record-low years.”

Oh. I guess Mayor Nickels didn’t do such a bad job after all.

The point is, as I’ve argued before, headlines matter, and can do more to influence public perception than the articles themselves. Because quite honestly, more people will read the headline than the actual article.

And now, with only one major Seattle newspaper left in publication, the Times’ headline writers have more influence than ever before… and thus more responsibility than ever before to get it right.

Right here

[via Reddit]

Whatever the outcome of budget negotiations in the coming legislative session, local school districts shouldn’t expect any additional state funding coming their way. In fact, even with new revenue added to the equation, I wouldn’t be surprised to see an additional bite taken out of K-12 education as the legislature struggles to balance a $2.6 billion shortfall in the last year of our current two-year budget.

What seems increasingly likely however, is a temporary or even permanent lift in the state imposed local school levy lid, that currently limits local, voter-approved school levies to a maximum of 24% of a district’s operating budget, or as high as 33% for a handful of districts that were grandfathered in at a higher rate. The logic is that with state funding in short supply, local districts should be able to ask local voters to make up the difference.

At the same time, I also expect the governor and legislature to yield to pressure to save “levy-equalization” payments, state funds that go to “property poor” districts to help offset their residents’ inability (or unwillingness) to raise adequate local school levies. Individual, one can make rational arguments for and against both lifting the levy lid, and maintaining levy-equalization, but combined, I fear that the policies will only serve to undermine broad support for state K-12 funding over the long term.

Why? Consider the rational self-interest of a Mercer Island parent and taxpayer. Freed from the shackles of the school levy lid, the Mercer Island School District can now raise all the money it needs and wants, with little if any concern for what goes on in Olympia. Even better, all of the additional money raised locally is kept local; not a dime goes to subsidizing education in less affluent districts.

Now consider the rational self-interest of taxpayers in those “property-poor” districts. These are the same parts of the state that generally oppose new taxes, and support tax cuts… a statewide voting block that makes it nearly impossible to fund K-12 education at adequate levels. Yet despite their steady opposition to new state taxes, and their lack of support for local levies, they get the levy-equalization payments nonetheless. It might be unfair to say that the state is rewarding them for failing to raise school funds locally, but such anti-tax sentiment certainly appears to come at little cost. I mean, why should residents vote to raise their own taxes at either the state or local level, if they think their schools are going to get the money regardless?

Like I said, rational self-interest. And it’s hard to see how either lid-lifts or levy-equalization provide much incentive for voters in both wealthy and poor districts to support statewide funding for K-12 education.

If, on the other hand, these less affluent districts feared their levy-equalization payments might get cut off, they might be more supportive of statewide revenue increases that could stave off such an educational calamity. And if the residents of affluent districts continue to have the quality of their children’s education somewhat tied to that of the state as a whole, they too will remain advocates for adequate statewide K-12 funding.

For all the legitimate criticisms one can make of K-12 funding in Washington state, it still remains far more equitable than that of my native Pennsylvania, were the state/local funding formula is reversed, and thus the quality of your education is largely determined by the property tax base of the school district in which you are raised. And when it comes to equity, it would be a shame for our current budget crisis to permanently push us in the wrong direction.