HorsesAss.Org

This is actually happening:

Evidence is mounting of a wholesale change in the way Americans commute. Motorists have driven roughly 30 billion fewer miles in the past six months compared with the same period a year ago, according to federal government estimates.

Meanwhile, commuters took 10.3 billion trips on public transportation last year, the most in 50 years — when the population was about 60 percent the current size — according to the American Public Transportation Association. Ridership is up 3.3 percent in the first three months of 2008 and 30 percent since 1995.

Those trends suggest growing numbers of Americans are reaching their tipping points in how much they’ll spend for the freedom and luxury of personal automobile transportation.

Cars do give you freedom, but that freedom takes you only as far as the bumper of the car in front of you. If it takes 45 minutes to creep your way to the edge of the 520 bridge, how free are you?

To me, freedom is actually going somewhere.

And luxury… If you’re driving a luxury automobile, at least you have something more pleasant to get stuck in traffic in.

Thanks to those of you who donated, I really appreciate it. Now back to regularly scheduled programming…

…for the very nice block party next to your church. It was fun.

Maybe we don’t agree on just how old the earth is, but when it comes to 90’s era Seattle grunge music cover bands, you got it covered.

…stay tuned. Until then, I want to say thank you to everyone who’s had my back since I left my campaign gig a while back. It’s been tough, especially since the gig I went back to (this one) isn’t a paying one.

So if you can chip in a few bucks, I’d be pleased as punch.

Wow, that was quick. Thanks!

Deadenders:

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said she’s “proud” of the U.S. decision to wage the Iraq war and insisted that the world is not more dangerous than it was when George W. Bush took office.

Um, which world is she talking about?

“We’re now beginning to see that perhaps it’s not so popular to be a suicide bomber. We’re beginning to see that perhaps people are questioning whether Osama Bin Laden ought to really be the face of Islam,” Rice, 53, said in an interview to be broadcast this weekend on Bloomberg Television’s “Conversations with Judy Woodruff.”

Osama bin Laden is the Tupac of terrorists. Even though he’s supposed to be dead, he keeps releasing new tracks.

And what’s the baseline of exactly how “popular” being a suicide bomber should be? For a job where the only qualification is “blowing yourself up,” you’d think it would be really, really unpopular. You know, less popular than working at the Westlake Hot Dog On A Stick.

Also, I’d be less worried about who people think is the face of Islam- bin Laden, Cat Stevens, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar- and more concerned about who they think is the face of the anti-Muslim movement.

Which, if you asked them, would be us. Yes, the same country that defended Kosovo, saving the lives of Muslims, has been successfully rebranded as “anti-Muslim.”

Is Condi proud of that?

This letter writer is Seattle passive-aggressive through and through:

Burner family’s pets not just “stuff”

While I am thankful that Darcy Burner, her family and their dog, Bruce Wayne, escaped unharmed, I was taken back by her remark: “We lost stuff. It’s just stuff” [“Screams of Burners’ son led to family escape,” Local News, July 2].

How about Charlotte, their cat, who died in the fire? I do not consider a companion animal “stuff,” and it’s unfortunate that her remark was printed.

I think or hope that she was still in shock when she said it. Indeed, if some of her possessions are “irreplaceable,” such as photos and mementos, I hope Charlotte the kitty will also be missed.

A companion animal is not an object, not “just stuff,” but a furry little friend, and part of the family.

— Claudine Erlandson, Shoreline

You know what? I’m a cat guy. Given the choice, I’d rather have a cat than a dog. But in all my years of owning, loving, and caring for cats, I know one thing to be true.

Cats are stupid little fuckers.

Seriously. They spend their entire lives not giving two shits what their owners think, only showing up for food and to sit on the heat vents. They sleep in your linen closet, crap in your house plants, destroy your toilet paper, and eat all your towels. (Well, sometimes they eat your towels.)

Whenever I read about a house fire, the article usually says “everyone got out OK, including the family dog. Sadly, the families two cats perished.” Article after article. Every fucking time.

The letter writer has her heart in the right place. I loved every cat my family ever adopted. But you know what? They ain’t human, and for 75 bucks, they’ll give you a brand new one down at the animal shelter. Yes, the cat didn’t make it. That’s sad. But the people are OK, and that’s what’s important.

“I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it.”
– Thomas Jefferson

Yesterday, the Seattle Times printed an op-ed from Booth Gardner, the former Governor and supporter of the Death with Dignity Initiative. Curiously, though, this was the picture that ran alongside it online:

I don’t think I really need to describe the image any more than what’s obvious about it. It shows a doctor preparing a needle with an elderly woman (with a concerned look on her face) next to it. There’s one obvious problems with this – with I-1000, the medication is orally self-administered. Right within the column, Gardner lists out the safeguards:

The basic provisions of the Oregon Death with Dignity Act that have been included in Washington’s Initiative 1000 include:

• The patient must be diagnosed by two physicians as being terminally ill with less than six months to live

• The patient must repeat the request in writing twice with at least two weeks between requests

• If either physician suspects the person is not mentally competent to make the decision, a mental-health evaluation is required.

• The patient must be provided with information about and access to palliative (hospice) care.

• A prescription may not be written if there is any indication of coercion. Coercion is punishable as a felony.

• The patient must self-administer the medication.

All of these rules are meant to make it impossible for the slippery slope scenarios of this initiative’s opponents to come true. This is copied from Oregon, where the law has worked just fine, allowing for only a few hundred patients to make this choice about the end of their life, and with no stories of doctors forcing elderly patients to end their lives against their will.

The Seattle Times has long been the beacon of nanny statism within Washington. It’s probably not as bad today as it was back when Lou Guzzo was there, but it still carries the torch for just about any cause that is meant to protect the citizens of this state from themselves and their own decision-making ability. And if you’re not clear on whether or not the Times is carrying water for I-1000 opposition, check out the title they put on this article.

The ideals of liberty that people like Thomas Jefferson fought for are illustrated quite well by the quote above. He knew that the risks of having too much liberty were far more appealing that the risks of having too little. But the Seattle Times reminds us again that they seem to always arrive at the opposite formulation, that any time people are demanding greater liberty to make choices about their own lives, it’s equated with an unforeseen (and in this case, unfounded) danger. It’s the nanny state mindset, one that constantly seeks to equate choice with peril and freedom with disaster.

In this episode, Goldy and friends offer condolences to congressional candidate Darcy Burner over the loss of her house (and cat) earlier in the day. Next they dive into a multi-threaded discussion of the Washington state gubernatorial rematch, surrogate attack dogs, fake scandals and all. The podcast ends with a brief (roughly…seven word) tribute to the late George Carlin.

Goldy was joined by Seattle P-I columnist Joel Connelly, Seattle’s blogging pioneer N in Seattle, HorsesAss and EFFin’ Unsound’s Carl Ballard and HorsesAss’ former blogger emeritus Will.

The show is 51:19, and is available here as an MP3.

[audio:http://www.podcastingliberally.com/podcasts/podcasting_liberally_july_1_2008.mp3]

[Recorded live at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally. Special thanks to creators Gavin and Richard for hosting the site.]

I support Friends of Seattle, and so should you. I like groups that try to make civic involvement fun, and FoS does this really well.

Now that summer is here, Friends of Seattle wants you to come out and play. We’re having a Summer Meet ‘n’ Greet to say thanks and to let you know what we’re up to in ’08.

And, with Friends of Seattle working to get the Pro Parks Levy on the 2008 ballot, we’re excited to celebrate in one of our exceptional City parks.

Where: Golden Gardens Park , Shelter #2
When: Sunday, July 13th, 3:00-5:00 PM
Who: Members and non-members alike
Questions? Contact events@friendsofseattle.org

Hope to see you there!

For more info go to friendsofseattle.org

This headline is just too precious:

Suburbs aren’t a wasteland — they even have brie out here

Bless your cotton socks, sweetheart. You mean they have cheese in Bellevue? Really? Really? I would never have guessed that cheese- expensive cheese- could have made it over the I-90 bridge. Simply amazing.

Child care, not soaring fuel costs, led to my recent, brief stint telecommuting, and the experiment was rewarding from a financial, parenting and policy standpoint.

Good news: I saved a half tank of gas!

Bad news: Reports of the demise of the automobile are greatly exaggerated.

I have discovered my car, my suburban lifestyle and I can coexist.

Good for you. Do you want a medal? (And who exactly is saying the automobile is dead? Lynne doesn’t let on. From seeing the run on Prius’, my only guess is that the automobile she’s referring to is the H2 or Frank Blethen’s ride, the Porsche Cayenne.)

That’s likely to be disappointing news to many. The New York Times recently published essays from writers expressing the national angst over skyrocketing gas prices. The mood was funereal.

One was titled “Goodbye to the Great American Road Trip,” and needs no further explanation. “Ghosts of the Cul-de-sac” announced, a tad gleefully, a mass exodus from the suburbs and exurbs as people escape their cars for city living.

The difference between our area and many areas of the country is that Seattle has held up much better than lots of other markets. Big subdivisions outside D.C. are vacant, and the Las Vegas exurbs are imploding just as quickly as they were built.

Blog postings on the subject ranged from expressions of schadenfreude to something more venal. Suburbanites are stereotyped as gas guzzlers commuting to McMansions, the values of which are dropping like granite countertops. One poster predicted rising gas prices will scatter suburbanites like rodents. OK, I like cheese — particularly soft brie — but comparing us to rats? Not as bad, however, as the poster who crowed that the rise of gas prices was for commuters, “the chickens coming home to roost.”

There’s something to be said for folks living with the decisions they’ve made. You know, free markets and what not.

I get the fear and pessimism. We’re all reeling, and relief is not forthcoming. The World Petroleum Congress is meeting this week in Madrid, Spain. But the Saudis and other OPEC oil ministers are more likely to concur on the best tapas than agree to lower the price of crude oil.

Lynne’s idea of relief is cheaper gas for people who don’t want to change their behavior. Totally off the table is relief in the form of driving less. That’s Commie bullshit!

Barring a change in price, we’re going to have to change the level of demand. It has already started. Cruising is down, making the drive along West Seattle’s Alki Beach doable in less than two hours. Farther from home, driving on empty is up. AAA reports a 7 percent increase in calls from Southern California motorists running out of gas.

How are people lowering demand? By cruising less, and by being irresponsibly driving around on empty. Amazing sacrifices, America. Simply amazing. I want every one of our boys currently holed up in Tikrit and Karbala to know that we’re doing our part.

Yet, the rise-and-fall-of-the-suburbs-type prognostications march on unchallenged. But jumping on the for-sale signs littering the landscape as symbolic of an American shift to living next door to work is premature. Right now, empty houses are more about the subprime-mortgage fallout than gas mileage.

Uh, ok. Then riddle me this one, Lynne: Why are housing prices stable in transit-oriented development? I saw plenty of “For Sale: Price Reduced” signs in Kent’s East Hill, but not so many in SE Seattle, where light rail is coming in 2009.

The urge to blame someone — who better than affluent suburbanites and their cars? — is understandable, but a waste. Smart public policy will fail if its relies on emotional attempts to lure people back to the city or offer a bike for every garage.

I agree with Lynne. I’m all for guilt-trip reduction. Let’s add buses and build more rail out to the ‘burbs. Telling someone to ride Metro for the sake of the polar bears is bullshit, and will never work. People will only ditch their cars if the train gets them to work faster than driving.

Better solutions are to continue efforts belatedly launched around telecommuting, fuel-efficient vehicle standards and increasing funding for public transit.

Of course we should have seen this coming, whether we live in the city or a rural hamlet. Demand for fuel-efficient cars has resonance now, but Congress and Detroit automakers made sure we were slow getting to this point.

There are fewer American institutions that move slower than Detroit’s car industry. Toyota is eating GM’s lunch on hybrid technology, while Honda is releasing (to a few hundred handpicked customers) a car than runs on hydrogen.

Now we’ll have to dig into our collective pockets to pay for light rail, buses and additional lanes on our highways.

Uh, ok. Two out of three ain’t bad. Demand is way up on Metro and Sound Transit, that’s for sure. But more highway miles? Really? As gas prices rise steadily year after year, I wonder why we would want to invest billions in a product that’s losing it’s market share.

The need is dire. State transportation officials often present worse-case scenarios to get our attention, but one prediction is untenable at the lowest and highest ends. By 2030, the portion of Interstate 90 running through Issaquah will slow to 30 miles per hour as a rising population runs into stagnant road planning. Traffic is expected to increase from 43 percent to 72 percent in this area.

Similar predictions can be made about roadways from Mercer Street in Seattle to Route 202 on the Eastside. In the languid days of summer, it is easy to agree our problems will be eased by getting out of our cars, selling our homes for close-in condos or simply busing ourselves across Lake Washington. When the water sparkles like clear gems, as it has the last few days, I, too, am vulnerable to such fantasy.

You mean, if we do nothing for twenty years, I-90 will be jammed on the freeway through Issaquah? (Isn’t I-90 already jammed through Issaquah?) Yeah, like I trust the highway-building clowns who got us into this mess to get us out of it.

But it’s nice to read that Lynne’s thinking outside the box by maybe, just maybe, taking personal responsibility for her commute.

Then I snap out of it.

Nevermind.

The suburbs aren’t dead.

Lynne Varner 1, Strawman 0.

They’re more vibrant than ever. Technology has pushed the work-at-home concept and large employers such as Microsoft have turned the burbs into employment centers.

That must be why Microsoft hired a fleet of buses and vans to get their employees to and form work… because they’re all telecommuting. Right.

City dwellers aren’t the only ones interested in doing errands on foot. Planning for suburban communities includes retail, employment and entertainment options that operate as mini-Seattles.

Good for you. Want another medal? The Distinguished Cross for Stating The Obvious?

More creativity, less blame, can give us four-day work weeks, telecommutes and a viable school option across the street rather than across town.

Less blame, absolutely. Don’t blame me for laughing at you when you’re stuck in traffic, burning seven dollar Saudi vintage, when I’m not, all because you don’t want to change your behavior, ever.

Gas-guzzling suburbanites and sweaty bicycle-riding urbanites unite!

I prefer a policy of detente, but any move by you towards a rational, evidence-based transportation policy will be welcomed.

In 2004, Washington state witnessed the closest gubernatorial election in history, as then Attorney General Christine Gregoire defeated then real estate broker salesman Dino Rossi by 129 votes (later changed to 133 by a court).

A year and some later (April, 2006), the now defunct East Side King County Journal asked about Rossi What’s his shelf life?:

The charismatic and smooth conservative came within a whisker of winning the governor’s mansion in 2004 and is widely expected to seek a rematch with Democrat Chris Gregoire in 2008. Will it be “Dino Who?” by then?

In politics, it is said that a year is an eternity. So what does that make Rossi’s four-year hiatus with no political office or bully pulpit while Gregoire relentlessly dominates news cycles week after week?

It was an interesting time to ask the question. At the time, Rossi was leading Gregoire by 51% to 38% in a Strategic Vision poll asking about the 2008 election. In fact, Rossi had led Gregoire by more than 50% to Gregoire’s less than 40% in the five other polls taken after the election contest and before April 2006.

The Republicans resoundingly lost the legal battle in the election contest of 2005, but they won the PR battle. Governor Gregoire began her first term polling as less popular than the loser of the election. After a highly contentious, close election, followed by a multi-million dollar Republican dis-information campaign (a.k.a. the election contest), Gregoire’s approval–disapproval spread started out strongly negative, and remained in negative territory for her first year in office. Then, after a 6 months period of nearly even approval (Jan 2006 until June 2006), Gregoire emerged from negative approval-disapproval territory.

Starting from a very bad position, Gov. Gregoire genuinely won over the electorate.

But what about Rossi? When he launched his 2008 gubernatorial campaign (umm…for the second time), Rossi routinely quipped:

“Last time I started with a 12 percent name identity statewide. Most everybody thought Dino Rossi was some kind of wine at that point. A cheap wine at that,” Rossi said….

But name recognition isn’t enough. On the public’s perceptional palette, had Rossi matured into a vintage wine? Or had Rossi’s cheap wine turned to vinegar?

In 2005, Pollster Stuart Elway pointed out:

“’We wuz robbed’ won’t be a strong campaign theme, and Dino will have to present a credible challenge to an incumbent this time. It won’t be like he’s a challenger coming from out of nowhere, but my question is how he stays on the radar screen when he doesn’t hold any office.”

Elway’s concerns were prophetic. Rossi was never able to remain an important player in Washington politics. (Hell…he wasn’t much of a player in Washington state Republican politics, either.) For example, Rossi refused to take a stance in Initiative 912 that would have repealed a state gas tax increase. Neither has Rossi grown in the interim. His campaign stump speech has evolved minimally since 2004. And, at least early in the campaign, Rossi was still running on the “We Wuz Robbed” platform.

The inevitable result is that Rossi has squandered his position of great strength from 2005 and 2006. Just look at the polling. Here is a compilation of every publicly-released head-to-head Gregoire–Rossi poll for the 2008 election:

(Note: different pollsters probe undecided voters to very different degrees. To make the numbers comparable, I have normalized the results so that the Gregoire% + Rossi% sum to 100%.)

After leading in the first 15 polls in a row (through November 2006), Rossi has lost all but one of the most recent 15 polls. A running average puts Rossi about 7% below Gregoire. At this time during the 2006 election cycle, senatorial candidate Mike McGavick, running against an incumbent Sen. Maria Cantwell, had just peaked at 9% below Cantwell. In other words, beginning with a huge advantage in 2005, it looks like Rossi’s residual advantage of the 2004 election (and contest) has shrunk to, roughly, a 2% advantage over McGavick’s unimpressive performance.

The electorate just isn’t taking a liking to the Rossi-brand whine. (Perhaps Rossi shouldn’t be building a campaign on sour grapes.)

(Cross-posted at Hominid Views.)

[via Slog]

Yesterday started out with a modest goal. About $5,000 a day is what Darcy Burner needs to raise through the month of July just to keep pace with Dave Reichert, so every $5,000 chunk we raised for her would be one day more that she could devote to herself and her family after the devastating loss of their home and all their possessions in Monday’s fire. I didn’t know how many $5,000 chunks we could raise, but I was confident we could help lift at least a few days of fundraising off Darcy’s shoulders.

Well, thanks largely to the overwhelming support of the national netroots we’ve already raised over $85,000 in just 24 hours… that’s roughly equivalent to 17 days of fundraising this time of the year. Wow. And Markos is determined to raise $150,000 in online contributions, Darcy’s entire target for the month of July.

This is more than just money, it is a gift of time and an outpouring of affection that has buoyed Darcy’s spirits just as the full impact of her loss finally started to sink in. The campaign tells me she has canceled her schedule at least through the end of the week and will reevaluate day by day after that.

So if you haven’t already, please give to Darcy so that she and her family have the time to heal, without giving up an inch in her race against Reichert.

Give Darcy some time:

So, the Sonics will pay the city $45 million to break the final two years of their Key Arena lease (up from the $26.5 million offer the city rejected in February), and move to Oklahoma City for the 2008-2009 season, leaving their name and team history behind like a ghostly echo. Ah well.

Sure, the move was inevitable from the day Clay Bennett bought the team, and I suppose the mayor and his minions should be congratulated for squeezing an extra $18.5 million out of the lying bastard. But rather than settle (and it does feel like settling in more than one sense of the word), I would have preferred watching the team’s owners bled dry over the final two years of the lease, the arena as empty as Bennett’s promise of good faith negotiations.

Nothing wrong with a little spite now and then.

UPDATE:
The Seattle Times editorial board chimes in:

Seattle sports fans can only feel despair as the high-tech shining city of the future loses its 40-year basketball franchise and a ton of civic pride to a group of dishonest brokers from Oklahoma City.

The team is leaving town. That is all anyone will remember.

Huh. Actually, that’s not all anyone will remember. Some of us will remember that the Times ed board itself was unintentionally complicit in Bennett’s deception, vouching for his integrity at the same time he was brokering so dishonestly.

There have been whispers and shouts that SuperSonics owner Clay Bennett is only buying time until he can move the teams to his home state of Oklahoma. This is an unfair claim. Bennett has done nothing to suggest that moving the teams is a foregone conclusion.

If the Times had devoted only half the cynicism toward Bennett that they showed toward Darcy Burner, perhaps they might have helped foster a consensus in which elected officials and civic leaders could have pursued a more pragmatic approach toward defending our team from poachers. Or perhaps not. Either way, the Team Blethen blew it.

UPDATE, UPDATE:
A more terse goodbye to the Sonics.