Public Referendum Powers Dead - 7/14/05 - R.I.P.

In yet another setback for the citizens of Washington the state supreme court has ruled that the state legislature may use the emergency clause whenever it wants to avoid a public referendum on the legislation. At issue was a challenge to tax increases with less than a 2/3 majority vote. The 2/3 majority provision for increased taxes was at the heart of a voter initiative passed several years ago.

But a majority of the legislature declared an emergency existed, and the 2/3 majority requirement had to go. The irony--What is the nature of an emergency when less than 2/3 of those voting believe an emergency sufficient to require the tax increases exists?--apparently received no attention from the court, which relied on another case debacle, a challenge to the legislation that authorized construction of "Large Insurance Company" Field, in which the court adopted a fully deferential view of legislative determinations of emergency.

Stated alternatively, the court has adopted the position that if the legislature says an emergency exists then one exists, and the referendum powers do not exist. Period. End of discussion.

Justice Charles Johnson authored the majority opinion. He has twice sought, and received, endorsements from the Libertarian Party in past elections. In my view, he should not receive another, ever. After all, its an emergency.

Blind justice gets a new guide elephant

This drawing accompanied Frank Rich's New York Times 7/12 article We're Not in Watergate Anymore in which he recounts the similarities between the Watergate coverup and the coverup of the retaliatory "outing" of CIA agent Valerie Plame.

The last laugh

There's an old saying: What goes around comes around.

Twenty years ago urban planners worried about sprawl and gridlock. For some reason local regulation seemed inadequate. So they appealed to the state for help. The result was the Growth Management Act.

Property owners and developers screamed themselves hoarse, all to no avail. After all, our quality of life was at stake.

Now, it appears the property owners and developers have had the last laugh. Using the same powers that the urban planners used to get statewide regulation of land use, the developers have figured a way to make a buck anyway, manufactured homes in residential neighborhoods, regardless what local regulations may say.

Here is another old saying: The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Fighting morbid obesity of the mind

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram has this interesting op-ed about Judith Miller, the New York Times reporter who went to jail rather than reveal a source.

The writer, a retired journalist himself, remembers the days of Watergate, when the media was much fiercer about getting the "real news." He quotes historian Richard Rider: "Real news is the news you and I need to keep our freedom."

But, sad to say, I wonder how much difference it makes anymore.

We have known for months that the War in Iraq was shamelessly based on pretense and the most dangerous (and wrong headed) foreign policy the United States has had since the days of the Cuban missle crisis. And so what happens? Subways get bombed and civilians get beheaded. And America goes on about its business, marketing video games containing explicit sex scenes and buying designer clothes made in China.

As reported in the Wall Street Journal, some have taken the business of what is newsworthy into their own hands. Shortly after the infamous Downing Street memo was published in the London Sunday Times, a group of IT wonks created The Downing Street Memo :: What is it?, and began contacting the news media.

Their effect has even drawn the notice and dismay of the Bush supportering Wall Street Journal: "'It really is just six people, and I don't even know the name[s] of two of them,' spokesman Bob Fesmire said. 'People find it hard to believe it when I tell them that for a $20 Web-hosting fee, you too can get something like this going.'"