Bosnia footage found!

Maria Cantwell, Superdelegate

Flip Flopper?

This little bit of news slipped by me earlier. Maria Cantwell, junior Senator from Washington, is making noises about jumping ship from the Clinton campaign if Obama shows up in Denver with the most pledged normal delegates. This is especially notable because, if I recall correctly, Mrs. Clinton was a major force behind getting her elected to her seat in the first place after she lost a lot of money when the dot com bubble burst in the middle of her campaign (anyone please correct me if I'm wrong).

Might as well spell out my current views on the Presidential race. I used to think McCain couldn't win in what was supposed to be a bad year for Republicans generally, and especially if the Dem nominee wound up being Obama. I just didn't see grumpy old white guy winning out over charismatic young black man. My view has changed over time, and I can actually see McCain winning against either Dem, so I don't really care who they nominate - they're both disasters on policy grounds well beyond any criticisms I might have of McCain, but if I had to pick one to be President I'd pick Hillary because I think she'd be more likely to kill this nation's enemies.

Anyways, the focus of this blog (right now anyways) isn't the Presidential race, but since a WA Senator was involved I thought I'd bring it up.

A little slow...

So things seemed a little slow this week locally with the legislature out of session. No updates on the Senate GOP caucus drama. About the biggest thing of note was that the Portland City council, unsurprisingly, claimed veto power over a new I-5 bridge if it doesn't include Light Rail, which later developed into saying defamatory things about Clark County and Battle Ground, which of course has stirred up folks on this side of the river. I'll try to keep an eye on this stuff, but I'm pretty sure I'll enjoy writing about the County Conventions more. I only wish I could clone myself to send someone to observe the Democrats.

Tough Words for GOP Senate Leadership from Benton

As further fall-out from the Sen. Pam Roach situation noted below, Senator Don Benton comes to her defense and proceeds to rip the Senate GOP caucus leadership a new one.

Some highlights, but it's so good I've highlighted half the piece. Read the whole thing:

Now that the session is over and I have had a few days to think about it I wanted to write to you to express my deep disgust with the way the caucus campaign meeting was conducted last Friday. I also want to voice my serious concern with the inexcusable position our caucus finds itself concerning our ability to conduct campaigns this season.

....

First, the fact that our elected leader, Senator Hewitt screamed uncontrollably at both Senator Roach and myself during the meeting was degrading and embarrassing.

....

I was shocked to discover at the meeting that $300,000 of the $400,000 raised in 2007 was also spent in 2007 even though we had no races that year at all. It appears that no attempt whatsoever was made to conserve funds for the crucial 2008 election cycle. This is greatly disturbing. A statewide mailing list composed of only 2600 donors is pathetic. And I hope you caught the fact that $100,000 was spent on direct mail to break even and only add 200 or so additional names to our list. If this wasn't so sad it would be laughable.

....

The other serious concern after spending over $300,000 last year is the fact that we still have no candidates recruited for 14 of the 16 "D" seats that are up this cycle. The filing period is only 2 months away. In fact, we only have two candidates, one of which found us. This is a sad commentary on the effectiveness of our whole team in recruiting candidates. Think about it seriously, 16 Democrat seats up, 7 where we stand a good chance (1st, 2nd, 10th, 23rd, 25th, 40th, and 41st where we lost the house member to the Democrats!) and only 2 candidates. Holy cow does anyone see a problem here?

....

With Senator Hewitt's crude behavior demonstrated last Friday night, lobbyists in open criticism and not enough money in the bank to fund even one race let alone 16 and the defense of a couple of our own that we know are in trouble, I have found myself embarrassed to be a member of this dysfunctional caucus. Just what will the rest of you do? I have a serious race to run and I need your help as well as the caucus.

Only a fool continues to do the same thing over and over and expects a different outcome. I strongly suggest serious change if we are to be effective in the future. Please let me know your ideas on how we can fix this serious problem. If you do not view it as a serious problem then, in my opinion, we are doomed and unfortunately so are the people of Washington due to our lack of will to make the difficult changes necessary to save us all.

Tidbits

Pam Roach is staging a rebellion against the House GOP leadership.

The Washington State Senate Republican leadership that has watched its numbers drop to near historical lows and has no substantive input regarding the issues confronting the people of Washington, have now chosen to attack members of their own caucus to stifle the growing unrest of failed leadership.

.....


"Our leadership is a disaster. We offer no plan for regaining the majority, we have no money to support viable candidates and now we attack our own," said Roach.

Roach has been accused of speaking critically of leadership around staff.

.....

Minority Leader Mike Hewitt (R-Walla Walla) has verbally abused members in caucus, and has bent and exposed his backside to a female senator while screaming at her during a caucus meeting.
"He is a desperate man with personal problems," said Roach.
"Mike Hewitt has failed the Republicans on all fronts. Our leadership is drowning and like those who drown they are lashing out at and pulling down those who may be able to save them. Hewitt's personal issues and unprofessional conduct will drop us even further into the abyss of becoming a meaningless entity."

The leadership responds:

“Sen. Roach has distorted events that happened off campus to distract attention from internal personnel issues for which she was disciplined.

....

“Finally, Sen. Roach’s allegation that Sen. Hewitt ‘exposed his backside to a female senator’ is factually deceptive and personally harmful.

“We are disappointed that Sen. Roach has decided to make a private personnel matter public.”

Looks to me this "private personnel matter" is the accusation noted in the first quote of badmouthing the leadership with staffers. From where I sit in the GOP trenches, plus from where the "female senator" was sitting, looks like the badmouthing was well deserved.

Of course, Roach apparently has quite the reputation of saying and doing odd things, but most of that news was before I paid attention, so I'll pretend it's never happened.

Meanwhile, Brian Baird is fomenting rebellion of his own in D.C.

House Democratic leaders are facing repeated challenges from their rank-and-file members, who are bucking them on procedural motions and other votes that usually fall along party lines.

That trend was exemplified last week when 18 members, including a member of the Democratic whip team and a committee chairman, defied House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) by rejecting a motion to bring an ethics bill to a floor vote. The defections nearly brought down the bill, a key Pelosi priority.

......

But it’s far from the only case where Democrats, particularly conservative ones, have gone against their leadership.

......

Rep. Brian Baird (D-Wash.), who voted against leadership on the ethics bill, said he’d like to see broad changes in how Democratic and Republican leaders handle procedural fights, such as allowing more time to review the motions from the minority.

“ ‘Gotcha’ amendments come with being in the majority. We’ve got to have the intestinal fortitude to deal with them,” Baird said. “But having 15 minutes to read them and vote does a disservice to the process.”

Is Baird "conservative"? News to me, but I haven't paid much attention to what he's been up to. I do know he's taken a responsible stance on Iraq, which some view as a flip from his opposition to going there in the first place. Of course, with Delavar in the race, we may have a situation where the Republican is to the left of the Democrat on the War, although Delavar hasn't spelled out his view of when/how we should get out.

Finally, last tidbit, The Supremes approve the top-two "Cajun" primary for Washington. Read the link. Of course, Sam Reed is pleased as punch. I know my fellow GOPers think he sold us short in the Rossi recount, as well as the senate race (before I came into the state so I don't care :P). But I liked the blanket primary, and while I personally prefer the open primary to the cajun, I have a total lack of outrage over it passing, and applaud Sam Reed for standing by his views on electoral openness.

Implications: Biggest ones for Clark County - The commissioner's race, where there's already 3 Republicans and 1 Dem declared, and one person threatening an indy run. Could wind up with 2 republicans on the general ballot. 17th District Legislature - Joseph James is challenging disgraced incumbent Republican Jim Dunn. It's a conservative leaning district (Deb Wallace does every thing she can to portray a conservativish image), so again could conceivably have two Republicans on the general ballot. It already causes enough headaches for local party officials to tread carefully around the candidates before the primary - this might just prolong the agony for them.

Too bad, I say. I stand by the proposition that states can run elections however they want, including primaries. You want the state to put the convenient party labels by the candidate names on the ballot? OK, then you play by whatever rules the state wants. I don't think any of the parties' rights are violated by that rule.

Delavar is official. (plus I found other blogs)

Lo and behold, I've accidentally discovered some other local blogs, primarily of the lefty persuasion, when I conducted a quick Google on Jaime Herrera. And I actually remember reading one of them before. Anyways, I'll reorganize my blogroll on the right to house them all.

Interesting thing they've caught on to is Michael Delavar's just announced run for the 3rd Congressional District seat currently held by Brian Baird. Both Aneurin at "Politics is a Blood Sport" and Jon Devore of his eponymous blog wonder why they can't find any traditional media announcement. I've got the simple answer for that. Delavar just declared yesterday, which I learned from his wife Katja at Kimsey's party. She told me the official press releases were going out today. As such I estimate it will be in Sunday's Columbian.

I met both Delavars while I was manning the GOP booth at the county fair. They were running the Ron Paul booth that day, so I decided to go over and start an argument (fun fun!). Anyways, they were both good sports, even though I continued to disagree with them on some stuff. I've chatted with them several times since then, and I like them both. They were the prime movers and shakers among the local Paul crowd, the closest thing to county campaign chairs (unofficial, of course - the Paul campaign was very organic that way).

I was excited to see them jump into the 3rd CD race (which I knew they were feeling out a few weeks ago) because it means many things.

• Baird doesn't go unchallenged. I hate it when any Dem goes unchallenged. It's cowardice and un-American to not challenge an incumbent. I don't care how entrenched they are.
  
• Local Ron Paul supporters don't just disappear from whence they came as the Presidential race moves past them. Instead, they stick around and get invested in the local party. They maybe even do some work for other local candidates and Dino Rossi. Example: the Joseph James campaign was able to recruit some of their highly effective sign placers.
  
• Even though I disagree with him on some things, I think it would do the US Congress good to have more Ron Pauls in it. Plus Paul's getting old - someone has to be there to carry the banner.

So there you have it. Good thing all around. And I like his website. And commissioning pirates to go after terrorists sounds fun. The fact that it's a blatant violation of the Paris Declaration Respecting Maritime Law, which we never signed but may nevertheless be customary international law, just makes it all the cooler.

Top of the Morning to You!

So yesterday was Greg Kimsey's annual St. Paddy's Day party. Always good fun for local political nerds like myself, the mailer for this event promised even greater things with appearances by Dino Rossi and Rob McKenna. Sadly, Dino had to cancel. He needs to find a way to stop snubbing us in Clark County - first Lincoln Day Dinner, now this. I talked to at least one person who came just because Dino was supposed to be there. Oh well. I also managed to totally miss McKenna's shpiel, being in the other room chatting with someone else and eating food. Still good fun.

Columbia River Crossing

Many trees have been felled over this issue locally, that I won't put too much time into detailing (it's all over clarkblog.org and the columbian web pages if you care to look). All I'll do right now is throw in my $0.02.

I don't regularly commute into Portland. In fact, I can't think of a time I've been stuck in morning traffic. Afternoon traffic, on the other hand, I've had enough experience with to say this much. The I-5 bridge is clearly not the bottleneck. Traffic begins moving with actual flow around Delta Park (right as the HOV lanes end as a matter of fact), and only gets faster as it approaches and crosses the bridge. And traffic on I-5 virtually disappears immediately after crossing. The only apparent cause for that is SR-14 heading off to the east. It's clear a large chunk of traffic - the chuck most most immediately responsible for any slow downs on the bridge itself - is only interested in crossing the bridge to then head east. Although I don't claim to be a traffic engineer, this information leads me to favor a new third bridge to the east, probably east of I-205 (although I don't have near as good a sense of where the traffic goes from that crossing).

So there's what I tend to favor at the moment. But the CRCP folks apparently decided quite some time ago an additional bridge wasn't going to be in their plans. All they're talking about now is replacing the I-5 bridge, and the only questions circle around whether and how to implement light rail/mass transit on said new bridge.

The original bridge in 1917.

Now, the bridge almost certainly needs replacing. Half of it is nearly 100 years old, the lift span brings southbound traffic to a halt repeatedly through the morning (but I don't think it's a major factor in the over-all average congestion - once the bridge comes down that traffic just slides back into place in the PDX gridlock), there are no shoulders (three lanes of traffic on a bridge only built for 2), it's not safe, and could topple over with the right kind of earthquake. All very good reasons to replace the bridge.

Here's the problem though - the CRCP, the local politicos, and the press all have this tendency to present the bridge replacement as The Solution™ to the cross-river traffic woes. But however necessary the replacement might be, it clearly will not relieve traffic congestion to any significant degree. It will still only be 3 lanes (although safer and presumably better flowing 3 lanes), and light rail has been shown to have only negligible impacts on congestion (new light rail riders tend to be former bus riders, not former car drivers). Every politician on the I-5 corridor promises to solve traffic congestion, so when the Big Project of the era turns out to have only an incidental impact on congestion people get mad. To top it off, the plan includes tolls that will likely cost the typical commuter over $1,200 a year, making people even madder. When people get mad, city councils and county commissioners get paper-bombed, local newspapers get lots of angry opinion letters, and politicians who promise to push a new bridge get lots of coverage and votes. See: Debbie Peterson, Don Benton, Joseph James.

In short, it's my sense that we need to BOTH replace the I-5 Bridge, and build a new bridge. Sadly, the money probably isn't there for both, which results in the present showdown between light-rail coveting powers-that-be and an angry citizenry more concerned with congestion than safety (at the moment).

Too good not to save

Good use of one of my favorite songs from my favorite band.

The Columbian manages to say Nice Things about a Republican

What prompted starting this blog was a long article in the local rag, The Columbian, which actually went well over half a page chronicling the adventures of Jaime Herrera, newly appointed State Representative for the 18th District. Herrera, from Ridgefield, was selected by the County Commissioners of Clark and Cowlitz counties (almost all Dems) from a slate of 3 presented by GOP precinct committee officers in the 18th district, which covers most of both counties. She replaced Richard Curtis, who resigned after the exposure of his, er, "unique" habits.

Anyways, the whole thing is worth a read. The only qualm I have about the article is she definitely looks "rookie" at certain points, i.e. the odd picture, and the quotes from the Dem leader about essentially giving her a free bill.

I was surprised at her turning down the assistant whip spot - why would you turn down a leadership post? Then I realized she was right - she needs to learn what her district needs (she's been in DC since college), not play enforcer for the state party line (and we all know they know what they're doing, hah!).

Welcome to the Creek

Hello all. I've decided to start this blog because there's a distinct lack of a blog on what's happening in Clark County, Washington. Oh, the folks at ClarkBlog.org are great and all, and put alot of work into making their thing functional, but it's not really a "blog" as most people understand it. Rather, it's an older style bulletin board they just call a blog. Secondly, Clark County Politics hasn't had an update since late 2005. Now, I've been known to slack on my blog posting elsewhere (but I'm not telling where, that'd spoil it), but I'm pretty serious about this. And those are the only one's I know of. I'll link whatever I find though.

So, let's commence, shall we?