Tell me again why they're still in office?
Published Wed, Jan 14 2009 2:26 PM
Technorati Tags: Elections, Democrats, Transportation, Annoyances
The stupidity and sheer gullibility of voters in the state of Washington, and in particular the city of Seattle, never ceases to amaze me. But then, I suppose I shouldn't be surprised, since the vast majority of urban residents in the state of Washington are liberals who couldn't vote for a Republican without first checking into a psychiatric clinic to verify that they weren't losing their mind, or going to therapy afterward to assuage their “guilt.” And of course, the vast majority of voters in the state of Washington are urbanites. I present evidence of the stupidity and gullibility of Washington State's voters below.
Many years back there was a decent sized earthquake in the Puget Sound region. As earthquakes do, this one damaged some of the local infrastructure. That was the Nisqually Earthquake of 2001, and the damaged infrastructure was the Alaskan Way Viaduct in Seattle. The damage to the viaduct was so severe that it was called a “public safety emergency.” On February 13, 2007 I wrote about the six year-long public safety emergency mired in personal politics. That wasn't the first time I wrote about this mess, having previously written about the personal pride and childish behavior of mayor Greg Nickels and the Seattle City Council.
At the time, there were several options on the table to resolve this “public safety emergency.” One of those options was to simply repair the damage to the viaduct. Another option, estimated at the time to cost about $2.8 billion was to replace the viaduct with an elevated structure. A third option, favored by Nickels and the city council was a tunnel, estimated at that time to cost around $4.6 billion. The council and Nickels were acting childish about it too. They wanted the tunnel so much that they actually threatened to guarantee that an elevated replacement would end up costing more than the estimate for digging the tunnel.
Governor Gregoire stepped in. She called for a vote of the people. The city council, of course, balked. It was really a challenge to get a vote, and the city council tried to make the tunnel option more palatable by coming up with a way to save $100 million. Of course that wasn't really a significant savings. Going from $4.6 billion to $4.5 billion isn't really that much of a saving when your alternative (sans city council interference) plan only costs $2.8 billion. Nevertheless we got a vote — well, actually the city of Seattle got a vote. The rest of the state was excluded from the vote even though the funds would come from our taxes too.
Do you recall what the results of that vote were? The voters in the city of Seattle said NO! to both the tunnel and to the elevated replacement plans. That's right, they rejected the tunnel!
You'd think that an eight year long (It'll be eight years to the day on February 28th, not counting leap year.) “public safety emergency” would finally be resolved wouldn't you. After all it only took the Bush Administration 30 days (according to some wildly biased accounts) to respond to the state of emergency after Hurricane Katrina. Thank God that hurricane didn't swing by Seattle though.
Of course things are finally moving. Governor Gregoire, or “Queen Christine” as she's less than affectionately known by some of us on the right, has finally made up her mind what to do about this “emergency.” Greg Nickels and the Seattle City Council should be happy. The public should be outraged.
We're getting the damned tunnel. According to the Seattle Times…
Politicians are suggesting as much as $1.4 billion in new local taxes, fees and grant requests to pay for all the desired buses, streetcars, a sea wall, road work, utility relocations and parks associated with the tunnel.
Although a toll hasn't been proposed for the tunnel, it remains a possibility.
The money could be collected without a public vote.
Just as in the past with extortionist sports teams, the vote of the people apparently means nothing to our elected officials and “representatives.”
Tell me again… why do we keep electing these people, these politicians? It's clear they don't represent us.
The electorate in the great State of Washington are fools.
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Layla responded with:
 | Perri I am typing so forgive the brevity of this. My dear hubby is asleep and I cannot due to pain keeping me up.
But perhaps America should revolt. Not vote for these fools and the people, intelligent people like you or your friend David could, would, or perhaps even consider running in your own districts and work your way up.
Politics is still a mans game no matter how women slice it, they just have not really shattered that ceiling like Hildabeast or even Palin would have us believe.
First get in more honest men, and the women then can follow suit. I know it sounds old fashioned, but why change what worked. Look what we have now for doing just that?
Great posting, thanks! |
ablur responded with:
 | it is hard to venture into an arena of lies and deception for the real conservative. I have considered it, but I know my family and friends would be attacked without mercy. My children are not of age to handle the cruelty of the liberal media.
I would gladly support any conservative who would. Point them out please. |
Angel responded with:
 | no indeed they do not represent any of us by a long ways..and dont get me started on our judges either!..ty for the insightful comment at WHT!:) |
David responded with:
 | I still say we need initiative measures placing State amendments on the ballots whenever possible to require including "None of the above" as a viable choice for EVERY elective office. If NOTA were to "win" then ALL others on the ballot for that position would be banned from running for office. Any office. Every again. Period. End of story.
I'd vote NOTA every single time for a decade (assuming I lasted that long), at least, in hopes of seeing a peaceful revolution sweep politics. I wouldn't even care if an "acceptable" pol were running, if I could help NOTA win a few times. |
Stanford Matthews responded with:
 | Taking as much time as possible (or more) to deal with controversial issues or those deemed by POLS to be troublesome or needing pork, etc., is their favorite weapon. Knowing how short the public's memory and patience or persistence level is dragging feet is rule one for POLS to get what they want and avoid damage to themselves.
A small community (15,000) near my humble digs voted down a binding referendum to build a school. Then they did it again because of course the teacher's union and their friends were not going to let one election stop their plans. On a third vote the same thing happened. The last time they held the referendum on a primary voting day/ballot hoping only their own would vote and the thing was defeated again.
I was impressed. The measure's proponents were not. But there it is. |
David responded with:
| Stanford: "A small community (15,000) near my humble digs voted down a binding referendum to build a school."
Funny thing... for ten years the school district here had tried to get a vote for a bpnd to build a new jr high to replace on in my lil town of 1,800 souls. Voted down every year until... the current jr high building was "condemned"... because the district had stopped all maintenance on it!
*sheesh!* They wanted a new building, so they stopped maintaining the old one so it could fall into such disrepair that it was dangerous to use. Shabby manipulation of the process, and yet the voters did not discharge the entire board that'd participated in the scam.
"The fault, dear Brutus, lies not in our stars, but in ourselves... "
The fates do not conspire to give us bad government. Nor can we wholly blame the political "stars" for their malfeasance in office. It is we ourselves who elect these scum and continue, for the most part, to return them to office. We go to the voting booth, :as a dog returns to its vomit" and are no better off because... we ourselves are no better. |
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