– Matt Driscoll will be missed.
– Chief Rahr just out here making up nonsense. You can really tell the so called reformers are serious when they believe any bullshit.
– Claudia Balducci pushing road safety like a champ.
– Anyway, please wash your hands right now and get vaccinated or boosted if you’re eligible.
Bruce W. Nelson: ♫ Bernie Sanders on a folding chair ♬
The Daily Show: Legendary Black leaders
Stephen: Harriet Tubman will finally become the face of America’s $20 bill
Amber Ruffin: Why we need a White history month
Roll Call: Congressional hits and misses of the week
President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris:
Now This: All the bonkers news that happened in January 2021
Jimmy Kimmel: The week in unnecessary censorship
Trevor: Rep. Cori Bush—Standing up for her constituents in Congress
Founders Sing: ♫ ARE YOU WITH ME? (The Climate Song) ♬
Samantha Bee: Whose PPP loan is it, anyway?
The Dotard Трамп and Other Liars, Conspiracy Theorists & Seditionists:
It’s Not Easy Being Greene
SNL: What still works in America?
Andres Antunes: ♫ “How Dare You” pastor goes heavy metal! [Mark Driscoll remix] ♬
Bill Maher: America’s mass delusion
Samantha Bee: Environmental racism—How it started vs. how it’s going
Trevor: House Dems crack down on guns & Newsmax cracks down on Mr. Pillow
Now This: GOP hypocrisy on debt and deficit
ТрампPlague:
Bill Maher: Political monologue for the week
Trevor: America’s child care crisis
Robert Reich: Wall Street kingpin admits the game is rigged
SNL: Blue Georgia
Trevor: Ibram X. Kendi on honoring Black America’s diverse history
Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.
OK, which of the gentlemen (sic) shown below is sleazy discredited pastor Mark Driscoll? Which one is sleazy discredited initiative whore Tim Eyman?
I’m sure I’m not the only person around who’s noticed a resemblance between these characters.
Yes, I’m coming out of a long hiatus on HA just to publish this bit of frivolity. If you wish, you can consider this to be an open thread.
– Glad to see the Angry Black Lady Chronicles returning.
– And you thought the end of Obama’s presidency might mean the end of the GOP’s Saul Alinsky Saul the time obsession.
– As important as it is to call out Mars Hill, how churches avoid becoming the next Mars Hill is probably more important going forward.
– Wasteful as it would be, I would dig the hell out of flame decals on Metro.
– The story of the Indian shirt story is pretty fascinating.
– There’s a shooting happening in Fort Lee.
– Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy. In conclusion, look at his fucking necklace.
– White Center needs more bike parking.
– Why not blame a rain delay on Obamacare too?
– I don’t know what one does with a used fire boat, but I think I would like one.
– Solid diplomacy there, UK.
– Explain all that and then explain to me why the hell we should be anything less than angry.
– If you want, you can fit plenty of people on gondolas.
– The National Religious Broadcasters make their awards worthless when they give them out to racists.
– Women in the Workplace: Joanne Ort CPA
– As much as Mark Driscoll not being invited to Act Like Men conferences surely is a good thing, the problem is still that his ideas make Act Like Men conferences a thing.
– I think we can all agree that Rick Perry is awesome having no better judge than Rick Perry.
A special Pastor Mark Driscoll edition of HA Bible Study:
Jeremiah 23:30
Therefore, behold, I am against the prophets, declares the Lord, who steal my words from one another.
Discuss.
– Mark Driscoll still seems problematic in all sorts of ways, but at least he understood one bad thing he did was bad. Maybe he can cool it with the homophobia and hating women next?
– Here’s wishing Justice Jim Johnson a pleasant retirement (Spokesman-Review link). He wasn’t a favorite around here, but you always hope to beat people you don’t like at the ballot not for health reasons.
– Quite a disparity on bylines by gender.
– The Strange Bedfellows of the Anti-Contraception Alliance
– KUOW is having their membership drive soon if you want to help out.
– RIP Jim Compton.
– Mark Driscoll should probably consider just stopping for a while until he can get past the plagiarism stuff. Don’t worry, buddy. The asshole church you built will still be there when you get back.
– This is a lovely story from when Multnomah County issued marriage licenses to gay couples.
– It’s sort of dizzying to look at the map of bikes that have been stolen in Seattle.
– In a previous Open Thread, I said that I was sorry for the people who lost money on Bitcoin. That’s still mostly true, but there are exceptions.
– I try not to link to the same blog twice in one open thread, but there are two really good pieces at Seattle Transit Blog recently. So please, either read this about standing on the bus or this on the rail options to Ballard. But not both!!!
– 6 questions for the media about the Soho anti-prostitution raids
– Things that aren’t gaffes if they’re fine in context aren’t gaffes.
– I knew most of the Mark Driscoll is terrible stuff here, but it’s helpful to see it in one place.
– Mark Deiscoll is the worst and he steals from the worst.
– Oh look people are actually getting health care coverage.
– I’m rather excited for the campaign for a $15 minimum wage coming to Seattle
– Jameis Winston, and the Overlapping of Football Culture and Rape Culture
– This is maybe the least thought out heist of all time (Seattle Times link).
– Are you ready for some traffic between Monday Night Football and maybe some snow?
So…the President walks into this bar…
Michael Brooks: The fraud, Chris Christie.
So…’sup in Canada?
The GOP: Not fresh, not new:
Mental Floss: 24 untended scientific discoveries.
Thom: The real web of economic life.
Audience laughs as Sen. Ted Cruz claims he didn’t want a shutdown (via Crooks and Liars).
Is Bitcoin coming to a campaign near you?
The Tragedy of Affordable Health Care for All:
Red State Update: Episode 52, The Fat Elephant in the Room.
Chris Hayes: Shrub and Jews for Jesus.
Young Turks: Koch brothers’ corruption on steroids.
Kshama Sawant goes national (via Slog).
Mark Fiore: Right-Winglandia.
Bill Maher with some new rules (via Crooks and Liars).
Minority Report:
Sam Seder: Gun rights group terrorizes mothers advocating for gun safety.
White House: West Wing Week.
Ed and Pap: The Rick Scott $1.4 billion fraud.
Young Turks: Trolls Invade AMA of Seattle Pastor Mark Driscoll.
Ann Telnaes: Our perpetual state of war.
Michael Brooks and Cliff Schecter: The Democratic Party’s future is progressive.
Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.
With the passage of I-502, I’m hoping to get back into some more regular blogging here. I’ve waited a long time for this day, and now that it’s here, I want to closely follow how this all plays out. Here are some of the early developments in this new era:
– You’ve probably already seen the news that King and Pierce Counties have dismissed 220 marijuana possession cases. But at the end of that post from Jonathan Martin was another interesting nugget:
Earlier this week, the chief criminal deputy prosecutor in Spokane County, Jack Driscoll, appeared to take a more conservative position. He told the Spokesman-Review that, even after Dec. 6, the only marijuana which was legal to possess was pot sold in the state-licensed stores called for in I-502. Those stores won’t be created for at least a year.
“The only thing that is legal is selling marijuana through those stores,” Driscoll said. “That will be regulated by the state. You can’t under this initiative have an ounce of marijuana that doesn’t come from a state-issued provider. You still can’t have black-market marijuana.”
Looking forward to the first judge who gets to laugh out loud at that argument.
– One of the most interesting things to watch now is the international reaction to what Colorado and Washington voters have done. Especially in Mexico, where over $1,000,000,000/year pours into the pockets of drug gangs from the illegal marijuana trade.
– NCAA student-athletes in both Washington and Colorado still won’t be able to use marijuana, even if they’re over 21. Last year, Pullman police arrested several Washington State basketball players for pot possession. Considering that underage use is still illegal, that’s likely to keep happening.
– Of course, even with the passage of marijuana legalization, reefer madness isn’t going to just disappear. This gem – from the New York Daily News, but featuring a “chemical dependency professional” at Argosy University in Seattle – is about how this initiative will somehow cause Boeing and Microsoft to suck at building planes and software unless the feds intervene. As someone who worked at both companies in my 20s (quite successfully) while also being a regular marijuana consumer, I’m not sure I even know how to start making fun of that. It’s a good reminder that even though initiatives can fix a broken policy, they can’t fix stupid.
Rasmussen Reports released a new poll today that shows former Rep. Jay Inslee (D) barely leading Washington Attorney General Rob McKenna (R) in the Washington state Governor’s race. The poll of 500 people (4.5 M.O.E), taken on Wednesday, has Inslee up 46% to 45%.
Inslee has now led in the last four consecutive polls. The last time McKenna led was in a SurveyUSA poll from mid-July.
In the two previous September polls, Inslee has led by 44% to 41% and 49% to 44%. The current poll might signal that the race is tightened…alternatively, the variability we see is simply sampling error.
To assess the state of the race, I performed a Monte Carlo analysis using a million simulated elections using the sample size and proportions found only in today’s Rasmussen poll. Inslee won 558,701 times and McKenna won 428,130 times. This suggests that, if the race was held today, we could expect Inslee to win with a 56.6% probability. Here is the distribution of electoral votes:
If you believe the race has been stable over the past couple of weeks, we can combine the last two September polls. Now, Inslee takes 761,308 wins to McKenna’s 231,884 wins. The evidence from the past two weeks suggests that Inslee would have a 76.7% probability of coming out ahead in an election held now:
In other polling news, Survey USA released a new poll in Washington’s 6th district. The poll of 628 likely voters taken last Friday through Sunday finds Derek Kilmer (D) leading Bill Driscoll (R) by 52% to 37%.
The seat is currently held by Rep. Norman Dicks (D) who is retiring at the end of this term.
Sometimes, the Seattle Times makes it too easy to criticize their endorsements. Really, Frank, what were you thinking??
Even when they get one right, they often get something wrong. Consider state Supreme Court Position 8. In that particular race, with only two candidates on the ballot, the primary will decide who earns a full term on the Court. Like everyone who actually examines the candidates, the Times is endorsing the appointed incumbent, Justice Steven Gonzalez. His opponent is a little-known “strict construction” type, whose sole attribute is that he bears an Anglo-Saxon name. It’s well known, of course, that odd results may ensue in low-turnout, low-information elections. It’s also well known that in such races higher ballot position is a distinct advantage (the other guy’s name is above Justice Gonzalez’s on the ballot), and unfortunately it’s also known that in a state with Washington’s demographics a non-“ethnic” surname is a big edge in low-turnout, low-information races.
That’s why I find it rather disingenuous of the Seattle Times to have chosen the photo of Justice Gonzalez displayed here when they published their endorsement on July 5. Mr. Gonzalez certainly looks, well, ethnic in this image.
But that’s not at all the way he looks these days. For that matter, it’s not what he has looked like for quite a long time. For example, video of the news story broadcast on KING-5 when Justice Gonzalez was sworn in is shown below. That video was shot on January 9, 2012, fully six months ago:
As further evidence, I offer several additional recent photos. The first one shown below is from his page on the Supreme Court website. Presumably, it’s his current official portrait. Also displayed here is a shot from his campaign’s photo page. Now, I could have chosen one of the three pictures showing him with a beard, but I instead picked one of the 48 clean-shaven photos. Incidentally, all of the with-beard photos on the campaign site show his facial hair in a much softer, much gentler, less “bandito” light than the one attached to the Times endorsement. (Yes, that’s Edgar Martinez with him.)
.jpg "with Edgar Martinez")
How difficult would it have been for the Seattle Times to locate a current photograph of the candidate they were endorsing for a vital spot on the state’s highest court? Is it presumptuous of me to ask whether anyone of the editorial board of the Times noticed that Justice Gonzalez was clean-shaven when they interviewed him in preparation for making their endorsement decision? Yet they still chose to accompany their endorsement of the Justice with a picture that could easily play into the worst preconceptions held by voters in the low-turnout, low-information primary election for Supreme Court Position 8.
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