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Here are a few updates on some recent news items I’ve been following before I head off to Drinking Liberally:

– The marijuana decriminalization bill introduced in the State House is here. After some more asking around, it appears that the bill is being held up by State Representative Chris Hurst (D-31), whose Criminal Justice and Corrections Committee does not plan on holding hearings, or even allowing a vote. I have an email out to his office in the hopes of getting an explanation. As Dominic Holden has pointed out, the bill would potentially save Washington taxpayers roughly $7.5 million per year. And the decriminalization is extremely limited. In fact, the bill’s proposed marijuana possession limits without being a criminal offense would still be more stringent than Ohio’s.

– The pre-trial motions in the Bruce Olson case (previous posts here, here, and here) will be on Monday, January 26 at 9am at the Kitsap County Courthouse (614 Division St. in Port Orchard). Prosecutors are trying to deny Olson’s ability to testify that he’s an authorized medical marijuana patient. Supporters of the Olsons are encouraging people to come to the courthouse to show their support.

If a person swears on a Bible to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, so help me God,” and the US has laws saying that people must obey international laws against torture, then wouldn’t part of defending the Constitution include at least looking into reasonable suspicions that torture was official policy?

I mean, this is a matter of law, not a matter for the Washington, D.C. press corpse to decide, much as they might try.

And yes, someone saying something other than “yeah!” is horrible and mean and a sign of being a mean person. I’m arguing against torture out of spite and horribleness. Get off my lawn and don’t torture people!

But I am going to watch the concert ball on the tee-vee, if Sally “DC is a small town” Quinn isn’t providing commentary.

I heard Sting is a last minute addition, which sounds kind of cool, if true.

Get your Obama hat on, or whatever the kids are saying. Bring me a Werther’s.

Rumor has it that some sort of celebration is in order tonight. Whatever it take to get you motivated, please join us for an evening of politics under the influence at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally. We start at 8:00 pm at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Some folks will show up earlier for dinner.

If you’re not in the Seattle area, no worries. Swing by the Drinking Liberally web site for dates and times of a chapter within rowing distance of you.

This is only the beginning:

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Tuesday she hoped that incoming US President Barack Obama will consult and cooperate with his international partners, and took a swipe at the unilateralism of George W. Bush by saying no country can solve the world’s problems on its own.

“I hope our cooperation will be characterized by listening to one another and taking decisions on the basis that any one country can’t solve the world’s problems on its own, but that we can only do it together. And I will meet him in that spirit,” Merkel told Germany’s ARD television on Tuesday ahead of Obama’s inauguration.

She said Obama’s inauguration as the first black president of the US was “a truly great hour for America” that offered “a multitude of opportunities.”

It’s worth noting that Merkel is a conservative, and is the leader of Germany’s “center-right” government. She’s another name on a long list of friends and allies excited for change in American foreign policy.

ABC has been discussing on-air that Sen. Ted Kennedy, D-Mass., may have suffered some kind of seizure during the inaugural luncheon at the Capitol.

Reports are not clear about Kennedy’s condition, although a few moments ago President Barack Obama expressed concerns about “Teddy,” stating that while today is a joyous day, it’s also a somber day and that “part of me” is with Kennedy.

Somber indeed.

UPDATE–Noon PST– ABC is reporting that Kennedy did, in fact, suffer a seizure and that Sen. Robert Byrd, D-West Virginia, was so distraught that Byrd required assistance. ABC is showing the occasional shot of an ambulance outside the Capitol. Readers will recall that Kennedy was diagnosed with a brain tumor last year.

UPDATE–2:00 PM PST–Reuters has reported, sourcing a hospital spokesperson, that Kennedy is awake and answering questions.

UPDATE–3:09 PM PST– CNN has reported that Kennedy’s seizure was caused by simple fatigue, according to a doctor at Washington Hospital Center, and the senator will be released in the morning.

Seriously. That invocation was not “presidential inaugural” worthy.

There are plenty of right wing pastors out there who can preach. Instead we get Rick Warren reading the Orange County phonebook.

I didn’t go to DC this week as so many other political obsessives urged me, and I didn’t go out to any inauguration watch parties or breakfasts or gatherings this morning, despite numerous invitations.  I just watched from my living room, my dog at my feet, my cat on my lap and a hot mug of green tea in my hands.

But on this day filled with symbolic imagery I did celebrate the historic event by making a personal, symbolic gesture of my own.  After more than four years of obstinate protest I finally removed the Kerry/Edwards sign from the front of my house.

10:22 AM PT, January 20, 2009:
 

10:24 AM PT, January 20, 2009:

I guess after listening to President Obama’s speech, I was just feeling that it’s time for a change.

“The terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January, and the terms of Senators and Representatives at noon on the 3d day of January, of the years in which such terms would have ended if this article had not been ratified; and the terms of their successors shall then begin.”
— US Constitution, 20th Amendment

UPDATE:
Publicola: read the text of President Obama’s inaugural speech.

There was a lot of mention of God and faith in the speech, which has become pretty standard fare in modern American politics, but Obama did make a shout out to us “non-believers.”  I don’t know for sure, but I’m guessing that might be a first for a presidential inauguration speech.

Daniell Kirkdorffer of On the Road to 2008,, who created and implemented the innovative Pacific Northwest Topic Hotlist, has rather symbolically announced this morning he will stop blogging, although his archives will remain on-line.

The announcement bears a posting time of 12:01 AM this morning. It’s well worth your time to read the whole thing if you have a chance, as Kirkdorffer captures well the reasons regular folks decided they had to do something during the bleakest, darkest days of the Bush administration. I like this bit:

The road to 2008 that I embarked on took me places I did not envision. A single voice in a multitude of blogs meant that I was never likely to be a heavily read blogger at a national level, but my gradual evolution to writing about more local issues was far more about educating myself about them, than it was about finding a mass audience. Instead I soon developed a dialog with fellow local bloggers, and got to meet most of them in person at gatherings such as Drinking Liberally and other organized events. Today I count many of them as friends that I would never have met otherwise, and as I conclude my own blogging activities I have nothing but admiration for their ongoing efforts.

Unpaid, sometimes reviled, often dismissed, political bloggers spend an awful lot of time writing about issues, and rarely is there any payoff for the effort. We champion candidates or policies, some that win election or passage, but many that don’t, and sometimes we’re lucky if we simply help shape the debate, but I cannot imagine a world anymore without blogs, and the collective impact they’ve had on news coverage, information, and the pursuit of the truth in a matter. Left to their own devices the mainstream media would continue to let us down, and we’d have few places to turn to truly understand an issue. With the demise of daily print news, online resources will only continue to grow, and bloggers will be at the forefront of that change. It isn’t a perfect forum, but it is an invaluable one.

Indeed.

Here’s wishing Daniel the very best in everything he does. Well done, sir.

I started wearing this hat, which I got from the Not A Number shop in Wallingford, a couple of years ago. I’m of the age, style and hairline where a baseball cap is an integral part of my wardrobe, and I’ve got lots of them. But this one soon became special.

It was kind of amusing back then. People would do a double take and you could see the gears spinning while they tried to figure out what the date meant. About a third knew right off. Some guessed after a few seconds, some squinted to read the inscription. But most simply asked right off what it referred to.

Back then, of course, the concept was simply to get rid of Bush, the worst president ever and a guy I like to call history’s biggest loser of all time (redundancy deliberate for emphasis). If he didn’t completely exterminate all life on earth by then, January 20, 2009 represented blessed merciful relief. The goal was the absence of an individual. And his associates. And hopefully all they represented.

Nothing could be worse than Bush, so I didn’t give much thought to 01.21.09. Anything, literally and absolutely, would be better.

Then came Obama. Sometime last winter, after Super Tuesday fizzled for Hillary and it became apparent Edwards was not going to make the cut (thank God for that one!), the easygoing guy who at first seemed too young, shallow and inexperienced began to ignite the slightest spark, a brief flicker really, of inspiration. Things I’d not seen in him before began to stand out: His ability to turn a joke with Hillary (“I’m looking forward to having you advise me”), to smile at the least expected moment, to disarm a potential Swiftboat with an I-can-relate-to-that quip (“Of course I inhaled; that was the point”), to not only attempt (with cameras running and the world watching) but drop that incredible 3-pointer. Most of all, to be authentic, someone you felt like you could strike up a conversation with in a grocery line or go jogging with. Someone who not only was who he appeared to be, but who became smarter the longer you listened to him. Someone who finally made sense.

About that time, late winter or early spring, the hat took on a whole different meaning. January 20 became a day for more than relief. It was a day to actually look forward to. A day of redemption. To anticipate. To hope for. Deleting a negative was replaced by positing an affirmative. By summer it was the only hat I would wear, dingy and threadbare as it was becoming.

Once Nov. 4 happened, there were no more quizzical looks or questions about what the date referred to. Then, wherever I went, it was, “Hey, like the hat.” It started countless conversations, all with the same theme: Can’t wait. None too soon. It’s a new day coming.

After today I’m retiring the hat. Its job is done. For me it will always signify the power of belief, the hackneyed but resilient American credo that somehow if you just keep the faith and hang in there, bad will eventually turn to good. It may be only a hat, but it helped pull me through the darkest, most depraved desolation my country has experienced in my lifetime. One could hardly ask more from a piece of apparel.

More details are emerging about the failure of Bank of Clark County. In an interesting development, it appears that the total dollar amount of uninsured accounts will be substantially less than the approximately $39 million that was widely report initially. Reported figures are now more in the $10 million range.

Most press accounts describe Bank of Clark County as a “community bank,” which is accurate enough, but it’s important to understand that this bank was essentially set up by and for real estate developers and builders. The bank’s web site disappeared Friday night, but thanks to the Google cache you can peruse the backgrounds of its board of directors.

News accounts tonight suggest the bank was heavily exposed to a collapsing construction and real estate sector, while at the same time it was reluctant to deal with problem properties. A substantial amount of money was withdrawn in the last four days of operation, according to published accounts.

[Read more…]

How fitting…

I can’t get Willamette Week, who broke this story, to load right now, so I’ll link to this Oregonian article that doesn’t even bother to mention Willamette Week!

Mayor Sam Adams acknowledged today that he had a sexual relationship in 2005 with an 18-year-old man he had mentored. He said he lied when asked about it in 2007 and told the young man, Beau Breedlove, to lie about it, too.

Okay, yeah, another politician, another sex scandal. All the points that will now be made are utterly predictable. On the one hand who cares what politicians do in their private lives? On the other hand, he was doing it with a man far younger than himself while serving on the city commission, and then lied about the relationship, portraying it as “mentoring.”

Oh lord. What is it with politicians and their inability to keep their pants zipped? Adams just took office as mayor this month. Bad news for Portland during a tough patch in history. As if any citizens need this kind of distraction right now.

(And that’s real classy, Oregonian, to not even mention your local competitor that ran circles around you.)

The sudden collapse of our local news industry and the resulting mass exodus of political reporters is a bitter pill to swallow for those of us who believe that maintaining a vibrant Fourth Estate is absolutely critical to maintaining a vibrant democracy… but… well… every crisis also presents an opportunity.

That’s why I’m pleased to be playing my part in the launch of Publicola, Washington state’s newest news and opinion site.  Largely the editorial creation of former Stranger news editor Josh Feit, Publicola strives to help fill the void in state political reporting, while providing the kind of fresh writing and analysis online readers demand, and Josh has made great strides toward that goal by recruiting the likes of Sandeep Kaushik and Glenn Fleishman to help contribute to the site.

Publicola is also the first of a series of new and existing blogs and other websites to join HA under the umbrella of the newly created JOA News Co-op, an ambitious effort to share resources, content, traffic and revenues while creating a sustainable (and ultimately profitable) business model.  This new JOA is less of a business agreement and more of an ecosystem of tools and services… but more on that later.

In the meanwhile, be prepared for some big changes here at HA as I start to roll out the full suite of new features I’ve been developing.  And wish us luck.