Tag: Washington state

Categories
initiative, referendum, and recall too much government

The People Speak

Mainstream media often become so fixed on the major players in Washington, DC, that journalists miss the most telling democratic action: At state and local levels, regarding initiatives.

Nicely, there are exceptions. An editorial, last week, in The Washington Times was subtitled “Ballot initiatives advance a limited government agenda in the heartland,” and explained how “voters showed their displeasure with the country’s direction with their votes” … on particular ballot measures.

The editorial lists numerous important initiatives around the country: 

  • Oklahoma’s and Arizona’s nullification of Obamacare provisions (and Colorado’s failure to do so);
  • Nevada citizens killing “a sneaky amendment designed to undermine protections from eminent-​domain seizures for private gain”;
  • Several states blocking our president’s union-​vote rule revisions, known as card-check;
  • Louisiana “stopped public officials from voting themselves a salary boost until after they stand for re-election”;
  • Washington citizens overturned sales taxes on foodstuffs that left-​leaning folk regard as sinful, such as soda pop and candy and the like.

Washington State sported an even weightier initiative, one famously sponsored by Bill Gates’s dad. TV ads featured Bill Sr. getting dunked. It wasn’t a baptism. He was pitching for a “soak the rich” income tax in the state. The ad didn’t make a great deal of sense, and Evergreen State voters nixed the income tax once again. 

The Times editorial ends advising Democrats that they need “to listen to what the public has to say.” But, obviously, Republicans need to listen, too.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
ballot access general freedom

Sore Winners?

In 2009, Washington state voters considered a ballot question, Referendum 71, on whether to uphold a new law expanding domestic partnership rights. The referendum was the work of opponents of the controversial law; supporters, obviously, would have been happy to see it enacted without challenge.

Some 138,000 Washingtonians signed the petition to post the question. But they failed to prevent the law from taking effect: It was approved last November 53 percent to 47 percent.

Now there’s controversy about whether publicly releasing the names of petition signers can be justified in the name of transparency.

Of course, this is transparency not of government — allowing civic monitoring of power and purse — but of citizens’ political acts. Those eager to see the names mostly claim they want to make sure the signatures are valid. But with 47 percent of the electorate having voted No, is there really any doubt that opposition was widespread enough to yield the required number of petition signatures?

In June, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that petition signers enjoy no First-​Amendment-​implied right to anonymity. But the court suggested that disclosure of the petitioners’ names might be blocked on the grounds of a plausible threat that signers would be harassed, as some foes of the law have been already.

So a group called Protect Marriage Washington has secured a court order to keep the names sealed until it can argue in court that intimidation of petition signers is indeed likely.

Stay tuned.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
initiative, referendum, and recall tax policy

How to Raise Taxes

Times are tough; state revenues, down. So politicians have a choice: 1. Do the one thing economists definitely warn not to do, raise taxes; or 2. Do the one thing powerful lobbies say not to do, cut spending.

In Washington State, guess which one politicians are doing.

Washington’s governor and majorities in both houses are Democrats, and they’re looking to raise taxes. But they have (or had) one little problem: the voters.

In 2007, Evergreen State citizens had voted in a tax limitation measure, I‑960, requiring a public two-​thirds legislative vote to raise any tax. The Democrats are balking at this. By a simple majority vote they have in effect nullified the law made directly by their constituents.

This galls supporters of the citizen-​made law, especially so since I‑960 was the THIRD such initiative. Similar measures had passed earlier, in 1993 and 1998.

House Finance Committee Chairman Ross Hunter says that requiring a two-​thirds vote for tax increases makes the budget process “unworkable.” By this he means he can’t spend as much as he’d like. 

Tim Eyman, who worked to put the measure on the ballot, counters that this kind of attitude is “an admission that Olympia can’t function if it’s forced to obey the law.” Riffing on the theme, Eyman mocked legislators’ arguments as nothing more than “you peasants don’t understand, the rules don’t apply to us.”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
ballot access

Citizen Canes

Gutta-​percha is a Southeast Asian tree. A cane made from its wood was wielded in the U.S. Senate by Congressman Preston Brooks, against a sitting senator, Charles Sumner — literally sitting there at his desk. Sumner nearly died from the beating.

Congressman Brooks hailed from South Carolina. His constituents so approved his violence that they sent him dozens of replacement canes. One was engraved “hit him again.”

One-​hundred fifty-​three years later and we’re still much exericized by the actions of a South Carolinian congressman, this time one Joe Wilson, who shouted “You lie!” at the president. The in-​crowd reacts as if those words were gutta-percha.

Jonathan Alter, in Newsweek, says today’s problem is too many “jackasses.” According to his assessment, if we adopted the new electoral system adopted in Washington state, which he calls the “open primary,” the “jackass quotient” among our representatives would decrease. 

Alter seriously errs. Washington’s new electoral system, usually called “Top Two primary,” replaces the state’s historic — and justly named — “open primary.” But this new “Top Two” scheme marginalizes minor parties and independent candidates, raises campaign costs, and makes it easier for incumbents to stay in office. I’ve argued against it before.

Good thing is, next June, Californians can beat down this idea, when “Top Two” hits the state’s ballot, courtesy of the incumbent politicians who placed it there. 

Citizens won’t need canes. Just votes.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
ballot access local leaders

Grange Party and Grunge Vote

A few weeks ago, a rock bassist, Krist Novoselic of Nirvana fame, signed up to run for the clerk position in his small, rural county in Washington state. Now that he’s withdrawn his candidacy, it is worth looking at what he was trying to accomplish.

Novoselic ran under the Grange Party — not the “Grunge Party.” Next to his name on the ballot it would have appeared “prefers Grange Party” had he continued the campaign.

But there is no “Grange Party.” The Grange is a farmers’ association that endorses, but does not run, candidates.

He ran to demonstrate a flaw in Washington state’s “Top Two Primary” system. A person can run as “preferring” any political party — imaginary, defunct, or alive and kicking. The identified party has nothing to say about it. Lyndon LaRouche could’ve run as “preferring Democrat” without any Democratic organization’s vote; David Duke could run as “preferring Republican” without one drop of support from any GOP affiliate.

This offends Novoselic’s support for free association. Party affiliation and participation should mean something, he believes. In fact, he supports firehouse primaries wherein the parties pay for their own nominating procedures.

Before he withdrew, Novoselic got a fair amount of media attention. His stunt may actually effect a change for the good in the Evergreen state. 

We could use more celebrities who are as thoughtful as Novoselic about the means of politics, not just the ends.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

Categories
initiative, referendum, and recall too much government

No Exaggeration Necessary

Artful exaggeration is a part of good writing. Take this example from Yakima Valley Business Times editor Bruce Smith: “All of us who think we already pay too many taxes should bow west toward Mukilteo at least once a day.”

Smith did not figure he could set up a new religion. He was figuratively conveying the importance to the state of Washington of initiative activist Tim Eyman’s recent, successful measure requiring a two-​thirds’ vote of the Legislature to hike taxes.

Smith also went on to talk about Tim Eyman’s newest proposal, which he is petitioning to place on the 2009 ballot. The measure is called I‑1033, and officially dubbed the Lower Property Taxes Initiative. But Smith notes a feature of the proposal that stretches it, in a sense, beyond a mere property tax lowering device. “What I like most about the measure is that it reins in government growth,” writes Smith. “It limits the rate of government expansion to that of the overall economy.”

But here Smith doesn’t exaggerate at all. “Currently government grows at a level that is about 50 percent higher than that of the private sector,” he explains. 

“[B]ureaucrats and the apologists have all sorts of excuses to rationalize why those levels of growth are necessary, but here’s the bottom line: Unless things change, government will become unsustainable.”

Exactly. No hyperbole.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.