I received my ballot weeks ago. I’ve been harassing and tormenting and nagging everyone I know to make sure they fill in their ballots and get them in the mail ASAP.
Yet I’ve yet to fill out my ballots. This wasn’t for laziness, or because I was unsure of which candidate to vote for (save the occasional exception, which I’ll get to below). It was because I so relish the experience, the process, and the last minute details that come out during the election cycle, that I didn’t want to end it prematurely. During the primary, I voted day 1, and then felt like I missed out on all the other pressing issues. I’d meet candidates at local political events, shake their hands, but once I told them I’d already voted, they’d move on to someone else they could flip.
So here, now that there’s only two days left to get the ballot in the mail, I give you my 2009 General Election Endorsements.
I’ll list them in the order I find personally most important, because it’s my blog.
Initiative 1033 is yet another initiative created by Tim Eyman. Eyman has had a history of introducing regressive tax-cutting initiatives to WA State, and has been doing so since before I could vote.I recall the first initiative that passed under my watch, his 1999 Car Tab Fee initiative. This initiative set the Motor Vehicle Excise Tax to a flat fee, rather than one based on the car’s value.I had just turned 16 and been given a 1980-something Ford Tempo. It was a beater, and worth next to nothing. After his initiative passed, my tab fees went up. But the thirty-something who bought a $100,000 dollar mid-life-crisis-mobile managed to save a few bucks. And of course, our local government had less money for important services. Thanks Tim.
And his current initiative is so much worse. Initiative 1033 would cut state spending by holding it at the previous year’s level with adjustments ONLY for inflation and population growth. The excess revenue would be used to reduce property tax values.
The description is terrifyingly simple, and leaves out the fact that state spending levels need to change each year for many different reasons. As just one example, the cost of health care rises drastically faster than the cost of inflation, meaning the state would lose money each year. The only escape, putting potential tax increases to the voters.
It also would start using this year’s state spending, the year we’ve had the worst Washington State budget since the Great Depression.
The bill is already a train wreck, but consider that all of the refunds will go towards property tax reductions. Washington State already has one of the most regressive tax systems in the country (consider I paid equally into our taxes during the six months I was unemployed and had 0 income). Low income WA residents will be denied necessary state services, continue getting stuck with an unfair and rather high sales tax, and the people who own billion dollar malls will get a better deal than we currently give them… which is already pretty fucking good.
Colorado released a similar bill (TABOR) in 1992, leading to drastic cuts in State Spending on schools, health care, and other services states should provide. Initiative 1033 is stricter. Vote No.
This year Governor Gregoire signed into law Senate Bill 5688 - expanding the protections offered to State Registered Domestic Partners. Coined the “Everything but Marriage” bill (although there’s still so much missing), this bill provides all the protections to State Registered Domestic Partners (of which there are approximately 6,000) that Washington State provides to married couples.
The bill is still unable to provide the benefits awarded federally to married couples, such as the right to immigrate to this country or not pay income taxes on shared health benefits, etc.
I was at the hearing for both Senate Bill 5688 and its house equivalent 1727. We were all surprised to see how many bigots showed up to protest the bill (see my coverage here), I think past years gains in gay rights gave us all a false sense of security.
There was pushing, shoving, name-calling, as well as out-and-out lying. This front-and-center bigotry hasn’t changed much as it transitioned into the Referendum, and here we are today, asked to codify a slightly lesser disparity in gay rights through popular vote.
In effect, vote yes on this Referendum to provide some level of equality. We’re already letting the religious nut-jobs who believe marriage is a straight person right set the bar, and after conceding that we wouldn’t ask for Gay Marriage in this state, they’re now trying to push us back even further.
I’m personally sick of this debate. There are a lot of more important things to worry about, but each year we have to defend these rights is another year we can’t work on more pressing issues. Fix it and forget it.
Dow first came into my realm of consciousness when I started looking for a campaign to volunteer with early in the primary. I wanted to get involved, was horribly unemployed, and I was going back and forth as to help out with Larry Phillips or Dow Constantine. (I ended up helping out with the Sigler for Seattle Campaign - great experience, even if we lost.)
Dow won my favor over Larry Phillips because he seemed to be everyone’s champion. He had favorable marks from the gays and people of color. Not only that, he was a progressive champion of everything else under the sun, including a stalwart defender of puppies and kittens. How could you not love him?
During the primary, he was also the only candidate to call out Susan Hutchinson’s ludicrous assertion that she was non-Partisan. Hutchinson has only donated cash to Republican candidates (Bush, Rossi, Huckabee) and once sat on the board of the Discovery Institute, a hyper-conservative group looking to teach Intelligent Design in schools.
Hutchinson has name recognition from being a news-anchor on KIRO TV. This recognition has helped her in the polls - ironic, as she left KIRO with a bitter lawsuit and lots of burned bridges.
Other than that, she’s run on empty pleonasms for her entire campaign (”bringing people together”, “non-partisan solutions”, “outsider”). She seems to have NO idea as to what she’d really do for the County (or has an idea and won’t tell us) and comes across rather vapid in most of her public appearances.
And trick-or-treat, the King County Executive used to be a partisan position, and candidates had to declare their political affiliations. Susan Hutchinson was part of the campaign to make the position non-partisan.
One of my first baby-sitting jobs was for a girl with a number of disabilities. To this day, I couldn’t name them all, but she was confined to a wheelchair, failed to grow more than about a foot and a half tall throughout her lifetime, and was an amazing presence in my life. Her energy, optimism, and level of pure fun made her great to be around. I’m certainly glad she was able to get the help she needed as a child.
Imagine my surprise and nostalgia when that same child was on the flyer for the Low Income Housing Levy. A grown woman now, she’s now one of the many people who have been helped by Seattle’s low-income housing options.
I’ve always been a compassionate person, and I’d have voted for the levy without realizing it was helping someone I knew. But seeing this woman there reminds me that we’ve all come into contact with those that are slightly less fortunate than us, whether it’s for a short period of time (we’re still at around 10% official unemployment rate, which means closer to 20% of our population is really unemployed or under-employed) or for life.
Vote to take care of those who need it. It could come back to help you. And even if somehow it doesn’t, you’re a better person for it.
Full disclosure - I volunteered for the Mike McGinn campaign. So did a shitload of other Seattleites. When I went into the office to offer up some of my time, their volunteer coordinator, Sol, took me into a back office and ran a quick mini-interview to get to know me and my strengths. He then told me about his background working in the Obama campaign and why he cared for McGinn.
Within minutes, I was working alongside fellow twenty-somethings with time to give and a penchant for McGinn’s grasp of the issues, care for the city, and electric biking.
In contrast, Joe Mallahan’s campaign has been run by high-paid staffers who protect him from the media and try to prevent as many blunders as possible (e.g. “Africans endorse me”, “Hello my Brothers and Sisters”, and of course, everything he’s said during his multiple debates).
McGinn threw multiple town halls throughout the city (I attended three). During each, he was able to charm Seattle’s citizens with ease (he’s got a killer wink) and show that he really understands the issues at hand during this election.
The viaduct replacement, a $4.2 billion dollar tunnel that won’t even have any exits in downtown Seattle, has been a contentious issue throughout this entire campaign.
Many Seattleites (rightly) fear the viaduct will end up falling down before our local government acts. Washington State Department of Transportation released a video of what would happen to the viaduct if a strong enough earthquake hit us.
And McGinn’s protests about the tunnel stoked some of those fears. At the same time, the current tunnel budget leaves Seattle paying nearly a billion dollars for a state highway that runs through it, AND leaves the city on the hook for all overruns.
After the city council entered into an agreement with the current wayward Mayor Nickels, McGinn has signaled he would no longer oppose the tunnel (what’s done is done) but will continue to fight the provision leaving Seattle on the hook for overruns.
Deep bore tunnels don’t have the best track record for coming in under budget (few government projects do), but some estimates show the tunnel coming in another $2 billion over. This would (according to McGinn) saddle Seattle taxpayers with potentially $15,000 in taxes for the average family of four. At a time when we’re already heavily hit, that money could instead be invested in things that I (and I’d say most of Seattle) cares for.
Like:
Expanded Light Rail: While neither candidate is against Light Rail, McGinn wants to put Light Rail expansion up to the citizens for a vote within two years, and connect our high density neighborhoods: Wallingford, Fremont, Ballard, Queen Anne, Belltown, and West Seattle.
Offer a Publicly Owned Fiber Optic Network for Internet: Some people see him as a crazy dreamer for trying to offer such a “luxury” as a public utility. The Internet is not a luxury, any more than roads or running water is. In this day and age, the Internet is an economic engine of it’s own. At the same time, local Cable companies have shown no interest in upgrading their services despite a desire to continue to increase prices. A public option (as in health care) would create a stronger infrastructure, and be offered to Seattleites for less money. This is a good idea. Period. Send.
I have to admit - I’m torn. I like David Bloom’s attention to the impoverished and needy in this city, a group of people often overlooked by… well everybody. But he’s come out against certain infrastructure developments that pretty much sway how I vote (No on Light Rail to Ballard and West Seattle?!?!?!).
At the same time, Sally Bagshaw seems to be a pretty swell chick, if not somewhat pro-establishment. During the City Council Candidate Survivor, Bagshaw admitted to having sex on a plane, and was charismatic when I met her when I was drunk at a Politico event. (She was quick to tell me she supported defending the rights of Trans people who are incarcerated, which is good, but seemed a bit like pandering.)
I was also a little too in love with Dorsal Plants, the youthful activist who ran against both of them in the primary. Sally came in with over half the votes. Her win may be a foregone conclusion.
I think I’ll fill in the bubble for Sally, but I can’t say I’m doing it with the same conviction I have about the other candidates. You’re on your own.
Here’s two good endorsements of each candidate. You choose.
Friends of Seattle’s Primary Endorsement of Bagshaw
I voted for Jessie Israel during the primary. Back then, I decided I liked both candidates and what they had to offer, and I figured a vote for Israel would guarantee I got to hear more from each of them.
After the primary, it seemed like Israel continued to go negative on Licata, touting his record of being a “No Vote” against the rest of the council. This didn’t seem to be based on any statistical record of Licata’s, and I also didn’t really care.
By failing to show me what she was able to offer, she lost my interest.
Licata, on the other hand, has been on the side of increased police accountability (while also offering better services), been a nightlife advocate, and created a study to see if we could avoid building another Jail here in Seattle (we shouldn’t). Keep him in.
Posted 4 months, 1 week ago at 3:14 pm. Add a comment
Mike O’Brien is a tall, skinnier Mike McGinn. Both have claims to fame from fighting the 2007 Roads and Transit levy (the one Seattle rejected in order to come back with a transit-only levy). Both were high-ranking members of the Sierra Club. Both bike everywhere.
O’Brien has an MBA from the UW, an economic degree from Duke University, and has a comprehensive view of what we need to improve pedestrian and bike safety and accessibility in this city.
His opponent, Robert Rosencrantz, refuses to answer his positions on abortions (opting instead to quote Obama’s “agree to disagree” stance, and just kind of comes across as a weasel).
Vote for Pete Holmes, because Tom Carr is a crazy man with an agenda.
Tom Carr has repeatedly used his power as City Attorney to bully small bars and businesses. With Mayor Nickels by his side, they enacted Operation Sobering Thought: a completely unsuccessful sting leading to 20 bar employees being arrested, none of them charged with a single crime.
As City Attorney, Carr has continued to prosecute people arrested for marijuana infractions, despite Seattle voters approving a measure that would make them the “lowest possible law-enforcement priority”.
Currently he’s working to close down the Columbia City bar Angie’s, one of the last hold-outs to gentrification in the area. While Angie’s has had its share of abuses, closing down the bar is only going to make race relations uglier in the south end.
He’s also admitted to having a personal vendetta against alcohol after his father died of an alcohol-related accident at the age of 14. While my condolences go out to the adolescent Carr, the adult City Attorney has been using his power to go after everyone who drinks, responsibly or not.
And as one more nail in Carr’s coffin, police started aggressive audits of Gay bars in an attempt to shut them down for erotic or pornographic imagery on their walls. Gay bars have long used porn as a way to non-violently deter bigots from entering their establishments, keeping them safe.
Throw him out, and vote for Pete Holmes, a reasonable man who wants to defend the people of the city (those who elected him).
Noam Chomsky was on Democracy Now the other day, and I pulled up the entire interview via YouTube. (I didn’t realize they put all of their interviews on YouTube. Personally, Amy Goodman looked very different in my mind.)
While he’s always a great speaker, one of the things Chomsky discussed sent a chill through me. Amy Goodman asked what he thought of the current populace rage, if he thought anything good could come of it.
Chomsky compared our current economic situation with the Germany of the 1920s. You know. And his comparisons are startlingly astute.
“In the 1920s, Germany was the absolute peak of civilization. Ten years later it was the absolute depths of barbarism. Now, if you listen to early Nazi propaganda, and you listen to talk radio in the United States, there is a resemblance. In both cases, we have a lot of demagogues, appealing to people with real grievances.
“For the American Population, the last 30 years have been some of the worst in economic history. It’s a rich country, but real wages have stagnated or declined. Working hours have shot up. Benefits have gone down, and people are in real trouble, very real trouble after the bubbles burst.
“And they are angry, they want to know ‘what happened to me’. I’m a hardworking, white, god-fearing American. How come this is happening to me. That’s pretty much the Nazi appeal.”
I think he’s right in making this comparison. We’re really living in a very fragmented country. As the official unemployment toll reaches 10% (which could put the real numbers in the 20s) we’re seeing a huge divide between the haves and the have-nots. And the ‘have’ we’re talking about in this situation is way more than just flat screen TVs or fancy cars. We’re talking about food, homes, and health care. And unemployment is affecting everyone.
Beyond just unemployment, there is the ongoing huge cultural divide that’s the product of our expensive and sometimes unattainable educational system, and our geographical distance. I’m part of this divide. I take solace in big gay cities. When my previous employer would ask to send me to “Butt-Fucking-Nowhere”, I’d decline and let them send one of my sturdier, (sometimes smellier) and more red blooded colleagues. This even included Austin, Texas, which I’ve been told is a cultural and homosexual mecca, but well… I’m afraid of Texas.
I think this fear is unfortunately very real, if not inappropriate. Years ago my family found themselves in a very scary conflict with some hill-folk in Canada. We were river rafting, and after three days of being treated as sisters, my mother and her partner decided to give each other a peck on the cheek for shits and giggles.
The tour guide called them dykes. The person we were paying to protect us “out in the wilderness” felt completely comfortable issuing that statement. Immediately before calling them dykes, the tour guide called us city-folk. (Admittedly, our reaction was “Yeah…and?”).
While that anecdote occured beyond the border, I think it’s a genuine fear. We “city-folk” certainly don’t understand them. We call them the fly-over states, we make jokes about the Appalachians on national TV, and we mocked their beauty queen Sarah Palin. She wasn’t smart enough. Which was true. But by our standards. Not theirs.
Chomsky goes on to say:
“One of the [possible scapegoats] is what Rush Limbaugh tells you. In the Nazi case, it was the Jews and the Bolshevikz. Here it is the rich Democrats who run Wall Street and run the media and give everything away to illegal immigrants and so on and so forth.
“It kind of peaked during the Sarah Palin experience. Of all the candidates, Palin was the only one who used the phrase working class.
“The talk radio mob went crazy over her. One shouldn’t demean it. They describe themselves as ‘we are a fly by country’ and ‘they don’t care about us, those rich democrats on the west coast and the east coast are all interested in gay rights and giving things away to illegal immigrants.’
“They don’t care about us, the hardworking, god-fearing people. We’ve got to somehow rise up and take over and elect Rush Limbaugh or Sarah Palin or something like that.
“If by the next congressional election, the economy has not started to recover, this rage could boil over, and could have dangerous consequences.
“This country has a long history of being ridden by fear, it’s a very frightened country, it goes back to colonial times. We’re very lucky we’ve never had an honest demagogue. The demagogues we’ve had, they’ve never gotten anywhere. Suppose we had an honest Demagogue, Hitler-type, who was not corrupt.
“There is a background of concern and tremendous fear, searching for some answer which they are not getting from the establishment.
“Unless there is active, effective organizing and education, it’s dangerous.”
I think he’s right. In the gay marriage debate (a debate I’m thoroughly sick of, mind you) advocates encouraged people to go outside their boundaries. Reach out to voters outside of metropolitan areas.
I think this needs to be done in a manner which is all-inclusive and extends beyond gay rights. As a whole, this country needs to shed it’s differences, and reach out to the working class people. Try to get them on board. Have a realistic discussion with someone who has seen livestock outside of a zoo. If we don’t, I think Chomsky’s prediction could end up being tragically prescient.
Here’s the entire interview.
Part 1.
Part 2
Part 3
Part 4
Part 5
Part 6
Posted 10 months, 1 week ago at 2:45 pm. 1 comment
I’ve clearly been busy (or just negligent). I’ve got a few projects I’m working on, (you know, projects like cleaning my living room and putting together Magic the Gathering decks)…
So until I get back into a writing groove, enjoy this:
Posted 10 months, 3 weeks ago at 9:59 am. 2 comments
