Not Exactly Kelli Green !

The desperation of a few to get even with Dan Pike is creating some sort of psycho ward for strange bedfellows.

The strangest of the bunch would be defenders of the environment, protectors of Lake Whatcom, and guardians of our resource lands who are trying to create some fictitious draft for Kelli Linville. What a hoot!

Still others, not Pike haters per se, would have her instead run for county executive in the hope, at long last, of ending the droning of His Mellifluousness.

Talk about "pick your poison." What is more laughable than replacing would be developer, Kremen, with Building Industry Association darling, Linville?

Even worse would be throwing out the mayor who stood up to the UGA scamers intent on Bellingham sprawling into the rural county; the one who leads an effort, more promising than just continuing to sleep with the enemy, aimed at stopping the wholesale rezoning, subdivision and build-out of the land around the city's water supply.

Well, certainly, first find someone at least passingly committed to controlling growth and protecting the environment; not another step and fetch it for the BIA.

Has it occurred to voters, especially those who understand the city's need to control development around the lake, when Linville represented so many local water drinkers, she didn't lift a finger to end the over appropriation of water in its watershed.

When Bellingham proposed to do just that, she stopped the effort with empty promises of action of her own.

Had she encouraged Ecology to enforce instream flows, she'd have, at the same time, stopped the ill managed development that has damaged the lake for decades now, while she and Kremen ducked the issue and happily collected contributions from the growth lobby.

Of course, what sense in expecting help from her. She was busy undermining the courts and helping the BIA loophole laws to get around their decisions and continue a vesting blitzkrieg statewide. The Municipal Water Law was only her most egregious effort on the BIA's behalf.

Let's not let a lack of water, the rights of existing water users, or the importance of current uses get in the way. We got land to subdivide, and lots to flip!

Why, you ask, would Linville carry their water? Just review her campaign contributions for the last few elections. She played a prominent role in the "roadkill caucus", the blueish dems in Olympia with a slightly different definition of "going green."

That propelled her up the committee ladder. The BIA doesn't just make contributions, they collect lots of favors when leadership jobs are decided.

You might also ask what is Linville's motivation for returning to public service. It could be a lot like Kremen's, a nice big pension to vest.

You can't, after seeing the fat on that hog up close and in person, not think about getting yourself a meal-ticket on the gravy train.

But Pete's already made his deal, gone full bore Republican, and has the developers behind him. Kelli's not going to shoulder him out of the way at that trough.

But those folks would be happy to get rid of the mayor now. Only reason they supported him last time was he weren't named McShane. Gotta make you chuckle though. They actually had a better deal with the other Dan!

One of the funnier things I've heard lately, was a remark attributed to Kelli grousing about voters and her recent fall from favor. She complained, after compromising her principles all these years, conservatives still picked a Republican over her.

Guess you could call that, the Blue-dog Blues!

But then, I thought principles were what you stood for even when it meant the goin' would be rough. If you don't stand up for 'em, maybe they're not really your principles.

So, there's the queen bee of local dems, and patron saint of the David Syre Memorial Wilderness, still lookin' to sting Pike.

Then you've got the bald Russian, still trying to foist off his development on the city and hoping to knock off the mayor and get into the UGA.

They're joined by the Fairhaven "progressives" who feel snubbed or disenchanted because the mayor hasn't sufficiently embraced them or adequately pursued their favorite causes.

And of course, there's the good ol' boys from the BIA.

Have I left anyone out? That's the Draft Linville for Mayor movement in a nutshell. As schizophrenic union as might be imagined.

I'm sure the BIA wants to push hard and save the 100 Acre Woods, start enviornmental remediation and keep more yachts off the waterfront. And certainly, they'll be opposed to sprawl, expanding UGAs, and impairing resource lands. Above all, they surely want to save the city's water supply from development!

Hell, the draft Linville crowd doesn't even really care if it's Linville. It's really anybody but Pike for them, and they're thinking Buchanan's just an also-ran. So, bye bye Barry. We ain't gonna let principles get in the way of beatin' the mayor.

Terrified at the prospects, you have the conservation voters desperately hoping to head-off the race. After the last elections, the election of the worst county council in memory, and faced with the return of Crawford and Kremen to continue their damage, the prospect of the developers taking over city hall is too much.

And I'll bet Pike's wondering, whatever possessed him to take a stand and piss these people off! Well sorry, Danny Boy, the goin's gonna be gettin rough.

A Seemingly Unseemly Side of Sam

Sam Crawford's oft repeated pledge, to protect property owners from the egregious regulations of government, and his undying defense of property rights even where they offend the public interest, seem to have, if embarrassingly, put our fearless council leader front and center again.

And again, his Little Shop of Favors, Emerald Lake Consulting, appears to be where the rubber meets the road, in this instance, as usual, it's the vehicle for the constituent to pay Sam for his representation.

According to reports, a company inappropriately known as Standard Properties (inappropriate as it clearly appears they're really sub-standard properties) was just fined some $21,000 for myriad zoning infractions for property they owned and rented along the Guide Meridian. Still more fines and violations are expected as other locations belonging to the company, owned by one Murray D. Wood, are investigated.

County officers received a complaint about the property at the end of November and began their investigation shortly thereafter, finding a business operating out of a cargo container, and people living in illegal apartments that lacked windows and sufficient doors to allow them to escape a fire. These just some amongst a long list of other violations.

One might say Wood was something of a "slumlord."

Being so discovered apparently prompted Wood to seek legal help; and, it seems that took him to Sam Crawford and Belcher-Swanson. (not necessarily in that order)

Nonetheless, and notwithstanding such savvy advisors, the fines did roll.

How many readers think it was our council chairman, Crawford, who advised the Health Department of the sewage that was surfacing there?

You have to wonder how Mr. Wood discovered Sam's quiet little consultancy? Was it Sam's confederate, Jack Swanson, as Wood's attorney, who advised of Crawford's usefulness? Curious. Did Sam introduce Wood to Jack, or did Jack introduce Wood to Sam?

I don't think Wood introduced Sam to Jack. They know each other pretty well!

According to Crawford, he hasn't interceded directly with Planning & Development Services on Wood's behalf. That's reassuring. Seems Sam has become sensitive to these conflicts of interest and may stop abusing the planning department staff for free help, and consideration for his clients.

It's been months now since Crawford offered to disclose the financial dealings of Emerald Lake Consultants. Months with nary a whisper of information. But, we see, it's still business as usual for Sam and his pals.

Rest assured fellow citizens, surely our ever attentive county prosecutor must be more than a little uncomfortable with such a system and its potential for abuse. He must be quietly investigating these matters and will certainly be subpoenaing Emerald Lake Consultants' bank records to assure us no graft's being practiced here. Sure he is!

But local conservatives must be very proud of their man Sam, who clearly seems the unwavering defender of property rights and property owners ... no matter how unseemly.

Red Light, Green Light, Mean Light Tween Lights

The city's plan to introduce surveillance cameras in Bellingham intersections has met with strong, bipartisan opposition.

And so it should. It is a sorry reminder of the changing times, where the public is looked upon as a mere revenue source and special interests use government to extract undeserved profits from the governed.

The cynical part is the cover story, this is about safety, when ample alternatives avail themselves for that purpose, but none, perhaps, with the added revenue kicker for the city and its partners.

Intersections would be safer, and fewer side impact collisions would be likely, if the city merely further delayed the interval between red lights and green lights. Rather than one light turning green at the end of the yellow, wait longer, even after the light is red one direction, before turning it green for traffic coming from the other.

But, I know, few tickets would be issued in that scenario. The fact is this is really all about revenue, the city's and their partners.

And what wonderful partners they have chosen. American Traffic Solutions is an Arizona based corporation touting themselves as providers of traffic safety equipment. Perhaps attracted by that concern for the public, in 2008, Goldman Sachs invested heavily in the company and helped take it national; certainly in an honest effort to bring innovative safety measures to every American. That's the philosophy at Goldman Sachs.

Citizens of Bellingham, and passers through, foolish enough to frequent a downtown already plagued by the parking gestapo, will surely be pleased to contribute to the financially beleaguered masters of the universe while simultaneously paying into the police guild who will, ostensibly, have one of their own watching the cameras over coffee and donuts, and deciding if you should make a contribution to their retirement fund.

How any politician with a lick of sense would want to take ownership of such a scheme defies explanation. Perhaps it's just their being possessed by such nonsense that makes it easy for the pitchmen for the Goldman Sachs' franchise to get at the public.

But the push-back from all shades on the political spectrum, from liberals to libertarians and from Republicans and Democrats alike, has come quickly. An initiative to remove the devices is well on its way to certification. And a bipartisan bill has been filed in the legislature to keep the scam from spreading across the state.

But Bellingham's mayor, with plenty of support from the city council, pushes on. They can't seem to get the smell of money out of their noses.

For a guy I once thought had pretty good political instincts, Pike has really lost it on this one; and in an election year nonetheless. How he thinks he will win friends snatching their wallets is beyond me.

Characterizing every distracted mother misjudging intersection timing as scofflaws and public enemies is not the road to reelection.

If the mayor and the council come to their senses they'll run away from this Orwellian nightmare post-haste; at least not implement the program until some formal public support was shown for the same.

If Pike can convince the voters that this is the only way to ensure their safety, and their safety is more important than protecting them from such intrusion by Big Brother; god bless 'em!

Perhaps Franklin said it best, "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

Bellingham's Waterlooloo

Let them drink Coke!     

It seems city politics has gotten in the way of protecting Lake Whatcom, Bellingham's water supply.

The mayor's political opponents, old and new, have, since his election, discounted and criticized most every effort he's made to curb development in the reservoir's watershed, in the hope, apparently, that denying him success, by frustrating and trivializing his efforts, just might help deny him reelection.

One of the generals in this little war apparently turns out to be City Council chairman Stan Snapp.

Recently, when the mayor announced Bellingham finally petitioned Ecology to close the lands around the lake to new water withdrawals, as a consequence forestalling any further build out there, Snapp's public reaction was strange.

With feint praise he applauded the mayor for taking this step, but went on, ingenuously, lamenting the confrontation with the county, and criticizing the lack of transparent public process.

The fact seems to be the council chairman, a devoted supporter of the loser in the last mayoral election and de facto campaign consultant to the mayor's current opponent, just can't stand Pike getting even a little credit for trying to protect the lake.

Given this great concern for "public" process, then explain the secret council session where Snapp recently led the opposition to Bellingham appealing the Whatcom County Hearing Examiner decision to allow new roads in the watershed on Squalicum Mountain.

Vineyard Development wants to put a road up from Academy to the site of their project. Keep in mind, in the fall of 2005, county executive Kremen cleverly got the Whatcom county council to approve an agreement that allows Lake Whatcom Water & Sewer District to run water and other utilities along any roads within its boundaries; and even beyond its boundaries if the roads originate within the district boundaries or abut such a road.

Hello, so it seems the water district would be pre-approved to run water lines up to Vineyard Development, and maybe even beyond to Kremen's property if someone would just put in a road for him.

And of course we already know, in Kremen County, water lines capable of delivering service to development at the same scale we find in the city are "rural levels of service."  

Screw the GMA!  We got land to develop.

Bellingham opposed creation of the road. The city was faced with the usual preliminary skirmishes county ordinances put in the way of bringing their land use decisions to court; the county Hearing Examiner (sort of a running joke in legal circles) and the further delay of an appeal of his rubber stamping developers' plans to that esteemed body of legal experts, the Whatcom County Council.

It goes without further discussion, you must go through these delaying steps to get to a court where real laws are applied by real judges. And Bellingham, as would be expected, was rebuffed by the Hearing Examiner.

But now it seems Bellingham will simply give up, back down, and watch the road go forward, the water lines go in, and allow the water district to continue its expansion along Northshore Drive and up Squalicum Mtn. The city's right to appeal will quietly be allowed to lapse.

So, if, as it should be, the city's petition to Ecology prompts the state to follow the law, or if subsequently the courts reverse Ecology, should they decline to follow the law on their own, Vineyard development will have the water to build.  A ban on new wells will not stop LWW&SD without a huge legal battle; the kind of battle the city council seems unwilling to fight.

Hey boys. Can't you find enough in Pike's record to defeat him without sacrificing Lake Whatcom?

So who are the other heroes on the city council too cheap to fight on?  The vote's a secret. That's understandable. What a loo-loo.


Extra credit reading:
http://www.nwcitizen.com/entry/the-significance-of-insignificance
http://www.nwcitizen.com/entry/2008/06

No New Taxes ??

When Mr. Barnum pointed out, “there's a sucker born every minute … and two to take 'em!” could he possibly have foreseen the future relationship between taxpayers and the folks who govern them?

The tax paying public sure is doing their part. And here in Whatcom county, Pete Kremen and Sam Crawford make something of a gruesome twosome.

Particularly entertaining is the legerdemain our pals employ as they trot out the latest budget fiction with its oft lauded tax neutrality.

Having been exposed in their earlier attempt to punish Bellingham while keeping a lid on taxes in the development zone, the latest ploy appears to be a particularly cynical game of rob Peter to pay Paul. Peter being the funds set aside specifically to protect agricultural lands and fund remedial water projects. Paul, of course, being the insatiable beast they created with decades of poor planning and sprawling growth that now sucks unrelenting at county revenues.

I say “cynical” because when the public voted to create a conservation futures fund they weren't told it would also be a slush fund to save developers from paying the costs their projects caused the county. “Cynical” because just last year the county council's neo-cons nearly busted their soap boxes in their fervor to decry tax increases not approved by voters. What a difference a year makes!

And “cynical” because in opposition to the program to raise taxes to fund water remediation and flood control efforts (opposed by Kremen), Crawford called the taxes unfair to county residents. He, and his, swore they would repeal the tax and the program; apparently in the belief that the Lake would cure itself, and we'd seen the end of floods.

Now there is no discussion of repealing the tax. Now it's just gut the program and use the tax revenue to pave for their constituents. No, not you voters; the people who get them elected and reelected.

When you go to the grocery store, and you pick up a box of cereal, shake it and notice that it's no longer full, does it bother you that the price for 13 ounces is the same as 16 ounces used to be? Would you say the price of cereal has gone up, or there's no increase in cost?

Same game with taxes and the budget: fewer services same taxes. So who's hiding the little pea?

When will they get honest about the structural problem in the county budget and take responsibility for putting us in this pickle? Is it lost on the public that their taxes don't buy them services but are just a transfer to the people who finance elections around here?

Pretty soon you'll be wonderin' if the box is half empty, or half full.

Wake up suckers!

The Campaign Against Jean Melious

The campaign to prevent Jean Melious's election to the county council is a curious one. But it's right out of the current right-wing TEA Party play book.

Sound bites, talking points and repeat the stuff until enough fools believe it. Keep 'em angry. Keep 'em afraid. Keep 'em looking the other way.

In public venues, her opponent prattles on about much he doesn't understand. And he can, with a straight face, tell workers Melious wants to shut down their plants. He can tell rural voters she's after their property. That he doesn't know anything and his allegations are untrue doesn't matter. Repeat, repeat, repeat.

A lack luster, run of the mill alternative for sure, he employs surrogates from the ridiculous right to condemn Melious with feint praise and continue a coded attack on her qualifications.

Characteristic of the cynical effort by the right to tap a too common weakness in the electorate, hard earned achievement is twisted into a liability.

Melious, who as a country girl managed to win admission and graduate from a prestigious university (without being a legacy student or child of some Wall Street aristocrat), is characterized as being a member of some evil elite.

In addition to all the responsibilities of a parent, Melious, a highly qualified lawyer with all the associated earning power, gives her time to teach at our local university. This makes her an enemy of real people?

If there is one area in which the Whatcom county council has long demonstrated ignorance: zoning, growth management, and the requirements of planning; Melious is an expert. This, of course, is the last thing the landed gentry wants to see added to the public process.

They are completely satisfied with the lame representation provided by their boy McEachran's staff. They have ample access, thank you, through their own attorneys, who are all on Sam Crawford's speed dial.

Why would they want a legal expert who might challenge their self serving interpretation (abuse) of the law?

So, the story becomes: she's biased towards planning and the environment. Ignore her record as a moderate planning commissioner, they don't want an independent, moderate vote when they come for a handout, they need a rubber stamp.

But hey, wouldn't it be great to have someone on the council who knew enough to keep us from making these stupid policies we pay so much to defend, unsuccessfully?

A favorite smear on Melious has been to suggest she came up with the idea of impact fees on development, and that's what makes housing so expensive.

This is all part of a self serving effort by some builders and land speculators to avoid paying their own way, and pass the expense off on the public.  Like the developers would ever charge less than the market will bear.  Right!

Of course, her opponent is convinced planning and regulation of such self interests is the reason for the economic morass we find ourselves in; sure!

Her opponent has fumbled this one for a long time. There's his stupid theory how the government caused the financial meltdown; with the help of those despicable minorities.

And then there's his fantasies about county government delaying permitting and, forbid, following state and federal laws.  And the illusions of his supporters that he's an "economist" and a "business man."  Just the right prescription for what ails us.  He'll bring jobs back to Whatcom county.

Please, spare me!   If he could, why hasn't he?  Has he been holding out on us?  As a business man, he couldn't even get to second base.  And he owned the baseball team!  Briefly.

The problem for Melious, her expertise won't allow her to make such silly statements. Meanwhile her opponent can blather on, mislead, and when he can't deliver, blame government.  How convenient!

Oh yeah, there's the other usual fare: she wasn't born here; she lives in Bellingham. Need a reason to dislike this woman? We got something for you. How about this, she's smarter, more successful, and has worked harder than you.  She didn't earn it, she's an elitist.  You gotta hate her!

If you've read this far, you probably wouldn't be opposed to seeing Melious on the county council. Candidly, if she isn't elected, the consequences are truly dire. You need to cast your vote, for sure. But you also need to take the time, and go to the trouble, to make sure others do the same.

It matters!

TEA is for Tony ?

The country's been witness to quite a display of new-politic this season.  Most entertaining has been the spectacle of the Repugnantones, attempting to embrace the enthusiasm of a group of newcomers, frankly, not quite ready for prime time. 

The Dumocrats have been spared a similar agony, largely because their franchise has wasted any opportunity to continue sloganeering for "change you can believe in." 

Evidently more interested in keeping favor with corporate contributors, they pissed away an opportunity to reach a super-majority when they ignored the hope of 70% of the electorate to establish a public alternative to the health care monopoly.

Not content to just disappoint the electorate once, the Ds then flubbed financial reform.  But hey, they're leading in campaign contributions!

Not to be outdone in political incompetence, dusting off their tuxes to celebrate retaking congress, the Rs, Bush-whacked in the last election, have been tripped up by wackos right out of an open call from Comedy Central casting.

So far, all the infant TEA Party has demonstrated is an infantile inability to vet candidates.  In a galaxy of dim lights, they've offered the likes of Sharon Angle and Christine O'Donnell.

Angle is famous for her remark, "...you know if this Congress keeps going the way it is, people are really looking toward those Second Amendment (the right to bear arms) remedies." And added, "my goodness what can we do to turn this country around? I’ll tell you the first thing we need to do is take Harry Reid out.”

And of course we all know about Christine (I'm not a witch anymore) O'Donnell. "Well, I don’t think that the Obama administration knows what’s Jesus's, what belongs to Jesus, and what belongs to them. That’s my big gripe. Apparently, he doesn’t know. But then, that’s because he’s not a Christian. He’s Muslim,”

“It’s a proven fact he’s Muslim. He wasn’t born in this country. He was born in Kenya. There are people who know it, people who know where the birth certificate is. It’s locked up and our government can’t get a hold of it. He’s a illegitimate president, in my estimation.”

Well there's two for TEA, and TEA for two, really well grounded and ready to lead.  But there's more.  Rand Paul, Carl Paladino, the list goes on. 

Locally, they would have us install a similarly qualified, untested new-comer, Tony Larson, on the county council. Larson's basically a cheerleader for the development community ready to keep sticking taxpayers with the costs of growth created by his backers.

The funny thing is, once Larson beat the Republican candidate, Theresa Sygitowicz, in the primary, he has tried to distance himself from his TEA Party supporters; even declining their invitation to participate in the TEA Party forum related to his race.

Like the other TEA Party candidates though, Larson spins out some doozies when he gets loose of his handlers. He stepped in it recently with a wild claim that the county was holding up a project at the BP refinery; only to have BP dismiss his claim out of hand.

But my favorite "Larsony" was his explanation of the financial crisis and housing bubble being the work of government, abetted by minorities. Those poor bankers, scammed by a bunch of clever black and Hispanic families out to get loans they couldn't afford.

No, at this point, the TEA Party has provided comics an embarrassment of riches. But fortunately, there is the secret ballot. No one will know you were stupid enough to vote for one of these goofballs.

To steal a line from P.J. O'Rourke, commenting on the Rs step-children from the right, "we hate government, just look at the candidates we've chosen."

In the bigger picture however, the TEA Party will mature. They will produce candidates who can stand up better to scrutiny and leave the air clear for a debate of their ideas. On another level, this is perhaps the welcome beginning of the disintegration of a two party system that has been thoroughly corrupted.

At no time since the turn of the 20th century has there been such an opening for populism; a reaction to rule by elites. Identifying the elites is a trick the TEA Party's yet to learn.

Jefferson's Republicans were populists opposed to the policies of elites in post-revolution America. His vice-president actually shot and killed Alexander Hamilton, former Secretary of the Treasury and a representative of Rothschild's Bank of England in the US.

How do you like them apples, Sharon? Now that's what I call financial reform.

The Economics of Environmental Destruction; False Choices

Tony Larson says he feels like an environmentalist because he enjoys hiking and the natural world. 

"But (he says) we've been given this choice: either we preserve and protect the environment or we have a strong economy."

Larson's proposal? We must, "support and encourage people that create jobs as opposed to stifling and choking off people who want to do good things.”

I suppose, if you buy the false choice that is the premise of his polemic, you are stuck accepting Larson's conclusion: sacrificing the environment is a good thing.

Now, when it comes to managing resources, I'm something of a conservative. No, not one of those corporate spinmasters selling the idea that green is the new gold. More of the old school, the don't eat your seed corn variety.

Larson and his ilk are what I call expedient conservatives. Worry about today, and tomorrow will take care of itself. They seem particularly fond of the business model that internalizes profit while externalizing costs; that is increasing their wealth at the publics expense.

All the trappings of practicality and realism aside, these folks need demagogues like Larson to convince the public to take the bitter pill that is their prescription for what ails us. In fact, the result will be another bout of the disease that still infects us. But then demagogues were created to preach unbelievable doctrines to those so slow they will believe it.

And in the present economic environment, with the consequences of unregulated enterprise dragging us into depression, the villains of the piece need plenty of fools repeating the mantra, regulation is the problem

The people who need a free hand to reach into the public purse are quite willing to make the necessary contributions to buy government.

People who would have us believe that creating jobs entails foregoing protecting the environment are not "people who want to do good things." Larson's backers want us to accept, what's good for them financially, justifies the permissiveness they seek.

Larson can be ridiculous in the excesses he uses to mislead the public and pose command of the issues. Recently he made a big deal, yelling and pounding the table, about how BP couldn't get a diesel-hydrogen unit going.

"Why isn't that permit issued?" he demanded. He bragged, "I'll pass a resolution that says that the County and the Clean Air Agency have to get together and get this passed."

Great theater. But after his posturing was over, BP's corporate representative had to explain to Tony that the company had no problems with either the County or the Clean Air Agency. The only holdup was BP itself.

But let's not let the facts get in the way.

As Larson is flushed out, and forced onto the public stage, his limited understanding of county issues becomes apparent. And as he delivers one after another contrived speech, the real purpose of his candidacy becomes apparent: maintain a majority on the council to help Sam Crawford.

They intend to minimize protection of critical areas, forgo preservation of resource lands, and gut regulation of the building industry.

They intend to keep Whatcom county out of compliance with state and federal laws intended to bring reasonable order and conserve our critical resources for the long run.

They will eat our seed corn.

Larson proposes a false choice: the economy or the environment. His program is based on a phony paradigm.

In this election the choice is between expediency and experience.

Party of the Living Dead

Apparently, my recent article on the malaise that strangles the local Dems was enough to raise the political dead.

Local blogmeister, Sam Taylor chose to link to it, and that brought out the anonymosity of perennial partisans, and bellowing from the usual political hacks.

Noteworthy amongst the critics of my criticism were Dan McShane, and his sweet wife, who seems intent on forcing the poor man into political battle until all life is sucked from him for failure.

Lenny Bruce had it right. "Liberals can understand anyone, except someone who doesn't understand them."

Let's try and understand them.

Ever prudish, most were satisfied to merely express sanctimonious outrage at a satirical graphic portraying the county's two highest Democrats in a bed of money; confusing sex with cash.  But hey, it worked.  Never have so many looked at this site.

For his part, Dan (also fondly known as "Mr. Science") otherwise limited his complaining to what he characterized a vicious text, "filled with errors and innuendo as well as a nasty attack on the spouse of an elected official - an individual who has given a great deal of his time to the community."

Dan's sensitivity on the subject of spousal favor seeking is understandable. The second placing candidate in the '07 mayoral race, and runner up in the contest for county council last year, apparently still is waiting for the call from Olympia and his own appointment from the governor's office in return for Susie Q's campaign work for Gregoire.

Notwithstanding the lack of specificity regards actual errors, McShane (and other Democrat hangers on) contented themselves to lament an alleged attack on Linvilles's husband. The article criticized the representative for using her position for personal gain; not her spouse as McShane and others erroneously claimed.

The push back by local Dems, who felt obligated to kiss up to the chair of Ways and Means, really underscores the theme of that horrible article: Democrats at all levels are unable to be self critical, don't expect their elected fellows be democrats, and no matter how they betray the published agenda of the gang, must not be outed, and must be re-elected. 

Democrats are satisfied to have the appearance of a program, which is maintained by having Democrats in office regardless how un-democratic their actual program.

Where to begin?  Has Obama, the constitutional legal scholar, repealed the Bush policies on domestic surveillance?  No.  As a matter of fact, the Obama regime has gone one more and granted themselves even more egregious powers, including murdering US citizens fingered to die without due process or appeal.  These are real "death panels."   Where is the right wing outrage?

Had "W" created such a system the Democrats would rightly be on their chairs screaming.  How much have we heard about it?  Nada.

The ruling class uses Obama like a great Valium cloud to calm the opposition and steadily increase their control in the class war that is America.

Locally, ask yourself why, after almost three years, the City of Bellingham still can not stand up and do something to stop the degradation of Lake Whatcom.  We've got a Democrat in Olympia, who's constituency all drink from the lake, serving as the powerful Ways and Means chair. 

We've got some sort of Democrat as county executive.  But with his pals on the right running a most undemocratic slate in last falls county elections, Pete Kremen (D?) wouldn't endorse any of his fellow party members.  But did endorse the opponent of the only Dem with the guts to criticize him. 

Did the Democrats say booo?  Hell no. 

It has been more than two years since Bellingham's mayor boldly told the executive and the Department of Ecology, Bellingham would formally demand DOE enforce the law, protect its water right, and close the Lake Whatcom watershed to further appropriation of water; thereby bringing a halt to the building and subdividing that is ruining the water supply.  Why nothing?

The simple answer is Linville is more concerned about the interests of the Building Industry in the state, and Kremen's campaigns have been generously funded by local developers and advocates of growth at any cost to the taxpayers.

This leaves the mayor waiting for political permission while the Democrats wait to elect his replacement.

With DOE literally inviting someone, anyone, to petition or sue them for failing to follow the law, who is protecting the builders and developers and standing in the way?

Could it be the two most powerful Democrats in Whatcom county?

Why does Susie Q, who would have you believe she's the Joan de Arc of lake protection, spew bile and support expansion of the Lake Whatcom Water & Sewer District? 

Because without expansion of the water district there can not be more development in the watershed.  If the basin were closed to new water withdrawals, the water district would have no water to provide to developers.

Why did the McShanes throw in with the developers years ago?  Because that's where the money is in county politics, and that makes them the power brokers.  Susie Q and Mr. Science had a plan for themselves, and they needed to tap into the same power that Kremen and Linville so wisely and artfully developed.

But something went terribly wrong on the way to the winner's circle.  Some interloper, named Pike, appeared out of nowhere and stole the show.  Even after all the "tri-angulation" with the BIAW, Bill Geyer and others, the Realtors, and most of the building industry, couldn't forget McShane's old rhetoric, even though Susie Q promised he had changed. 

The Realtors put their money on Pike, who won by default.

Most of the local Dem clique were aghast.  Almost immediately they started the search for their 2011 candidate.  The best they could do was Barry Buchanan.  Meanwhile the opposition watched. 

What they saw was not what they wanted to see.  The new mayor was an impediment to expansion of the land supply, UGAs.  Then he attempted to thwart LWW&SD expanding water and sewer services to them and theirs on the north shore of Lake Whatcom. 

The Realtors weren't getting their money's worth.  While Buchanan quietly offers them his help, they seem to have another strategy: they're testing their own boy out in a race this fall, Tony Larson. 

Should he make it, he'll be in position to move into the office on Lottie Street.  Will Pete endorse the Realtor/BIAW boy's opponent this fall?  Hell no!  Will he endorse Pike's opponent? Hell yes!  Kremen's already on board for Buchanan and Larson.

So where, you might ask, are the democrats amongst the Democrats?  Depressed and disillusioned, they are at home trying to figure out what happened, what went wrong. 

Unfortunately, as the two parties shrink from relevance, they retain undue influence because the independent, by definition, don't market candidates or have a machine like the Republicans and Democrats have built over the years.

Paradoxically, it's just that machine, and the compromising for control of it or favors from it, that makes the parties increasingly distrusted by voters.  The Democrats react bitterly when it is suggested their electeds are excessively concerned with providing for themselves. The sting of the reproach is the truth of it.

Will things change?  How will they change?  When will they change?  I don't know. 

With unemployment growing, it seems curious that so many lusting after our best paid elected offices are un or under employed.  I wonder when some Microsoft millionaire will decide to buy the mayor or executive spot.  2011 is gonna be one hell of an interesting political season.

In the meantime it's the political zombies, who can't be kept in their graves, standing between us and democracy in the republic, and here at home.

Crawford, Corruption & Larsony

It's no secret anymore, Sam Crawford is the man behind Tony Larson.

Apparently, Larson hopes to quickly get hitched with Whatcom county's premier "land use consultant"  (no, not Jack, it's a fact!, Petree) so some of the gravy, grease, graft, or whatever euphemism this current crowd of crooks has adopted, will trickle down to his feeble publishing business, sort of like the fees roll into Sam's little shop of favors. 

If Larson's elected, expect a rise in advertising revenues at his Northwest Business Monthly.  Coming soon, a glossy new real estate section! 

Think I'm joking?  One developer makes a measly $800 contribution to the Larson campaign and, kabing!, NW-BM has a glowing story on how he's saving Whatcom county, starting with Blaine, by bending over one small town at a time. 

Larson laments, "imposing costly regulations on businesses and productive individuals.  Instead, officials should re-examine their priorities and be prepared to make some tough choices."

To wit, Blaine was conned into dropping their impact fees ordinarily required of developers to defray at least part of the costs to the public.  In this case though, it's simple, out of the public purse into Larson's supporter's wallet. 

Can hardly wait to hear what he's got to offer his other contributors and advertisers if he makes it onto the county council.

Am I the only one who remembers when the Alaska Packers Association operated the largest cannery in the world across the bay at Point Roberst, with a shipyard, additional canning facilites and warehousing at Semiahmo, where Syre and Imus will now bring us this "new economy"?

It may only be petty Larsony to scapegoat struggling families, like Tony does, turned out of their homes by predatory lenders, banksters who sold them on mortgages that couldn't survive a housing bubble; but for Tony, the victims are responsible for bringing down the financial system and propelling us into a depression. 

That's just the kind a guy he is.  Who needs to kiss babies when there are big, fat, rich asses available?

But it's gotta be grand Larsony, or some kind of fraud, to put a sign in your yard that says We the People and then go to work for the landed gentry we the people are taxed like serfs to enrich; all to keep their real estate schemes going a little longer.

Who do you think's payin' for those big signs all over the county?  (hell if I know, I can't find an expenditure reporting them at the PDC)  But you can be sure of one thing: somewhere, back there behind the scenes, it's the BIAW crowd puttin' up the plywood for Larson.

If you were active politically around the state, you'd have learned that Kremen County is famous for its foolishness in growth management; pretty much the laughing stock of Washington. 

Not only was Kremen considered the village idiot when he was in Olympia, our anointing him to lead the county, and our inability to unseat him all these years, has left us indelibly marked as the kind of community characterized in such epics as the Dukes of Hazard.

And now, here comes Tony Larson hoping to join such powerhouses as Billy Knutzen and Kathy Kershner in Crawford's club.  All bought and paid for by the least civicly responsible lobby in the state, the BIAW and their hangers on.  I can guarantee you Kremen won't endorse Larson's opponent.

Well, it's a marriage made in heaven; and portends to be a very interesting menage a trois going forward. 

For a group that's primary purpose is misdirecting public attention, Tony's the perfect candidate.  Plenty of experience selling the sizzle without a stake in the action, his business basically manufactures hot air.  So who better to partner up with than the crew that's been puffin' at the publics posterior for decades now.

Larson writes, "The political class has dug an enormous economic hole for us."  (I'm not kiddin!)  It wasn't the fraudsters of finance and their bang up job with the housing bubble economists recognize. 

Given Larson's absolution of the bailout beneficiaries on Wall Street, it's hard to figure who's dumb and dumber, him or the Tea Party folks who can't figure out it's his crap that stinks. 

But they say he's their boy.  I hear they're even puttin' on a "teabate" for him to star in.  And (I ain't makin' this up) it's gonna be at the Building Industry headquarters.  (I swear!  It's true!  That's right, the same place Sam has his barbecues!)

Oh, it's just so precious; the way they keep it all in the family. 

Next I expect Nick Kaiser and his right handpuppet, Brent Bonner (Whatcom dis-Information Center) to ratchet up the rhetoric to make us believe the county council can turn around the jobs market; and without mentioning their boy Tony by name, infer the hypster's campaign propaganda is just the ticket out of this morass.

The only industry Whatcom county government has ever been able to help is the local land use bar.  And that's why Larson will be their boy.  Along with Crawford, Kershner and Knutzen, Larson represents the winning vote for a whole grab bag of policies that will ultimately keep them and their clients face down in the trough for decades to come.

And when Larson talks about "imposing costly regulations" on "productive individuals" he means enforcing land use regulations on the developers that fund him, because that's about the only regulation county government has much of a hand in.  

And when he says, "if we’re going to create jobs, it’s going to require our government officials backing up their rhetoric with action," he actually means, with inaction in regulating building and development.

Trouble is, as job creators go, it's a fraud.  Who's gonna buy these houses everyone's ostensibly going to build?  Helloooooo!  The bubble's burst and the housing market's cratering. 

Larson's rhetoric is completely hollow.  There are no jobs to be created by increasing the land supply for residential development and relaxing environmental regulations already proven inadequate to protect Lake Whatcom; it's just a big favor to the money behind his campaign, and his campaign next year.  Folks still in denial.

The more you look at Tony Larson, the less you see.  My advice to the candidate is don't say any more, and disappear until after the election.  Let your friends buy the election like they did last time.

Not Such Strange Bedfellows

Kelli Linville's fall from grace has gotten a lot of digital ink this past week. 

Her own explanation for her loss in the recent primary, to an  unknown young man from Lynden, was that her usual supporters didn't take the time to vote.

This apathy seems to have carried over from last November's county elections; where old Democrat insiders similarly failed to generate sufficient enthusiasm to motivate their base.

Could it be, after the national disillusionment, with the hollowness of  the slogans echoing emptily in our ears, the Dem base has come to realize it just doesn't matter. 

While Republicans make no bones about it, they're there to serve the ruling class; have voters come to understand the only difference with Democrats is they pretend they don't.

During the so called reforms of healthcare and banking, the outcome of which was little more than surrender to the medical, drug and insurance industries and hypothecation of the Treasury to the Fed and banks too big for bankruptcy; the Democrats made a spectacle of themselves, debating reform during the day while collecting campaign contributions from the interested lobbies at night.

Does anyone besides me wonder why the Democrats, with a majority in both houses, not only couldn't reform the parasitic beasts dragging down the republic, but made no effort at campaign finance reform, and sat on their hands when the Supremes opened the floodgates of corporate influence in our elections.

Since the end of Camelot, and particularly with Clinton, Obama, and the rest of the Democratic Leadership Council types, campaigning has devolved into campaign financing.  And the pitch men for the Dems opener is now, "and what can your country do for you, sir?"

Closer to home, according to recent reports, Linville's opponent, Vincent Buys, raised and spent less than $15,000 to win the primary, while the incumbent chair of Ways & Means was rolling in the dough, some $90,000. With special interests, and their PACs, all over the state currying favor with our representative in Olympia, her disclosure report reads like a political who's who.  Buys should have been buried.

But it seems local voters are weary of the Whatcom Democrats.  And why not?  The party has become more of a clique.  It seems unwilling to demand its elected members embrace standards the public is coming to expect, and likewise unable to understand the growing frustration with public servants who first serve themselves. 

Frankly, the Dems seem satisfied just to keep their pals in office regardless what they do after they're in.  And too many don't seem to understand, in this brave new world, that public employees are not above the law of supply and demand.

The upshot for voters: it matters little who is elected.  The publics business is an afterthought, a distant concern after re-election, cost of living adjustments, and pleasing your financiers.

Linville, like Pete Kremen (another pseudo democrat) has been caught up in her own career, and personal financial reward.  Linville, since her first election back in 1996, has used committee assignments and leadership positions to first assure her repeated re-election and then to feather her nest much as Kremen has done.  These two have more in common than a couple of DUIs.

Her next move will surely be into some state or county position allowing her to parlay her years in low paying elected office into a generous pension based on her final years of public service.  Maybe Pete will move on and make room for her in bed.

She was successful, from her position in the legislature, to assure the governor appointed her husband to a well paid board position.  (And dutifully, he too contributed to her campaign!) The final step will be finding a similar role for herself in order to vest a big fat pension.  After her scare in the primary last week, I'll bet she's wishin' she'd cut a deal for that golden parachute last term!

This would only be mildly egregious in itself had she climbed the ladder on merit, not by doing favors for special interests who could not only fund her re-elections, but push her ahead in the pecking order in Olympia.

It is particularly strange how she came to be a darling of the Building Industry of Washington.  But darling she is. 

When the state courts repeatedly ruled against the developers and protected water rights that prevented them from appropriating water needed for salmon and other existing uses, like agriculture, Linville literally carried the water for the BIAW, sponsored and got their so called Municipal Water Law passed, redefining developers to be municipalities, affording them the same right to water enjoyed by cities and towns and facilitating sprawl statewide. 

Fortunately, the law was found unconstitutional; but the development industry presses on with appeals.

The power of special interest money is not just the amount they contribute to an incumbent, but the money they don't contribute to an opponent.  And even more, their not recruiting a strong candidate to replace an incumbent.  Just like in business, monopolizing the field entails eliminating strong competition.  And the absence of better regulation assures monopoly opportunities and eliminates the need to compete with a better product, or policies, for the public.

So it's not really so surprising that voters, understanding that Democrats like Linville or Kremen will not make any difference in the political outcome, don't vote.  Will Buys be any better?  No, probably not.  He'll be an impotent representative much like Ericksen and Brandland have been. 

As much as Linville has done for herself, and as little good as she has done for the public, Buys is unlikely to do much harm.  Maybe he dreams of becoming the engineer on the gravy train like Linville; time will tell.  But its's not likely he'll ever be more than along for the ride.

Maybe the local Democrats will learn a lesson if Linville loses the general election.  Maybe you should sit on your vote, or take a free shot, send a message, and vote for Buys.

It's a lesson Democrats everywhere need.

Sure Makes You Wonderland

As if Whatcom County wasn't already headed down a rabbit hole fast enough, here comes another mad-hatter thinks he's gonna turn county council meetings into a Tea Party.

Their local darling, Tony Larson, is here to tell ya they've come to take back government. So sorry Tony, the inmates are already running the asylum.

Local promoter Larson was recruited at the last minute by Sam Crawford when Sam's pals at the Building Industry Association, faced with backing Theresa Sygitowicz, realized the faster she'd run, the behinder she'd get. So it was off with her head!

It makes you wonder, what part of the Tea Party platform Larson intends to stand on. Will he campaign to end giveaways to a Whatcom county plutocracy that assumes a hereditary right to direct and profit from unregulated growth?

Or will he just be all-in on de-regulating the masters of our little universe, the folks who'll finance him, and help them vest more rights taxpayers will have to repurchase?  Maybe there's a spot for him in Crawford's "consulting" business.

Do you really think he's come to throw the special interests out of the temple, and tell 'em to get their hand out of the public purse? 

If it was so, it might be, and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't!"  (Tweedledee)

Jeeeeez, they're his backers!  Maybe he means "we've come to take government backwards."   No, the Tony Larson version of Tea Party wisdom is the same o' same o' locally; and nothing more than an unthinking repetition of the most ludicrous neo-liberal propaganda generally.

For instance, according to Tony, "Wall Street didn’t cause the financial collapse we experienced — government did."

Simple huh? You don't have to understand credit default swaps, securitization, regulatory capture; figure out who was doin' who between AIG, Goldman-Sachs, Lehman Brothers, the Fed and the Treasury; it's simple, any fool who looks at the thing could tell you, "guvmit done it!" Yep, any fool.

"Well, I never heard it before, but it sounds uncommon nonsense."  (Mock Turtle)

The real culprits were, according to Larson, the "minorities" who obviously control government, out swat the bankers, and, demanding an end to redlining and such, made the banks loan 'em the money.

You get the picture: scads of black and brown folks in bandannas holding pistols to the heads of loan officers all over the country sayin', "Let me sign it sucker, I wanna go through foreclosure like the white folk."

But according to data compiled for The New York Times by the real estate analytics firm CoreLogic, the biggest defaulters on mortgages are the rich, with about 14% of mortgages in excess of one million dollars in default.  Whereas more modest housing's default rate is about 8%. 

But don't confuse him with the facts.  Tony'd rather take his tea with folks who believe the housing bubble and ensuing financial  collapse was Barney Frank's fault; do-gooder policies he somehow imposed on a Republican Congress.

Tony Larson's message: why be outraged by the bailout of Wall Street tycoons. It weren't their fault. Taxpayers owed it to 'em cuz government's to blame. But that's not such a stretch, 'bout what you'd expect from a guy who blamed Bellingham for not bailing out his business.

Seems Tony Larson can talk the talk, but when government money's in reach, he walks the walk right over with his hand out; as was the case when some millions became available to upgrade Bellingham off Lakeway.

Remember when the whole house of cards was coming down for those free market masters of the universe, and the rest of the Park Avenue parasites? Somebody pointed out, "there are no libertarians in a financial crisis."

Big part of the Tea Party philosophy is laissez faire, just get government out of our lives.

But when "we the people" shunned a measure that would have benefited Tony's ball team using Joe Martin field, (though at the time we supported bond measures for other purposes, fire stations and schools) Larson sued to get local government to bailout his failing business.

Nonetheless, Larson tells the flock, "When we expect and ask our government to solve our problems, we are in trouble. So, be careful what you wish for."

`I quite agree with you,' said the Duchess; `and the moral of that is--"Be what you would seem to be"--or if you'd like it put more simply--"Never imagine yourself not to be otherwise than what it might appear to others that what you were or might have been was not otherwise than what you had been would have appeared to them to be otherwise."'

Tony explains, "Most don’t understand we are not a democracy. We are a Republic and are supposed to be directed by our Constitution, which limits the role of government and protects individuals against intrusive government power."

(Just an aside: the Constitution is also the basis for laws protecting individuals from "intrusive" individuals too. Yeah, really!)

And he's about half right on the democracy vs. republic thing.  Ours is a representative government elected democratically rather than being based on heredity or wealth.   Though it seems, these days, when it comes to political discussion, money does most the talkin' and most the money's inherited.

Hopefully he's conservative enough to understand that the powers not granted the federal government at the founding remained with the states, save for the natural rights we were said to be endowed with, life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

And as you would expect, our state too is governed by a constitution in which counties were created, all of which democratically elect representatives to send to the state capitol to pass our laws, and then follow 'em.  And Whatcom county, as allowed by state law, adopted a charter by which its democratically elected representatives would govern.

The charter includes the requirement, upon entering office, to take an oath to support the Constitutions of the United States, the State of Washington and its laws as well as the ordinances of Whatcom County.

"What is the use of repeating all that stuff, if you don't explain it as you go on? It's by far the most confusing thing I ever heard!" (Mock Turtle)

Well, because when Tony talks about protecting individuals from "intrusive government power" that's code. 

‘When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean, neither more nor less.’

‘The question is,’ said Alice, ‘whether you can make words mean so many different things.’

Larson recently wrote, "Many people who own their property cannot do with it what they want without paying fees and gaining approval from government" obviously implying this is wrong, intrusive and an abuse of government power.  Not something Tony Larson would support.

How can he square that with the oath he would take to uphold the laws of the state, including the Growth Management Act and the rulings by courts and quasi judicial bodies that interpret and enforce it?  Or is he telling us he'll be another scoff-law like Crawford and company.

Boy, it does sound better, if you want to sucker voters, to shout 'guvmit's grabbin' yer property rights', than tellin' them they gotta build you a road or pave your parking lot. 

Or how about government disapprovin' your wrecking the neighborhood or polluting drinking water?  What the hell's with that?

Well, like most demagogues, Tony and his pals like to keep 'em dumb and angry.  That way they'll happily screw themselves.  In this case, the boys with lots of land to develop would rather have the taxpayers pay for the improvements that make 'em rich.  Sure beats havin' to pay for 'em yourself. 

And of course they don't want other folks, who want to keep things pretty much the way they are, gettin' in the way of their vesting lots of "rights" we will have to buy back to protect the county.

The real rub for the folks Tony's cozied up to came back in 1926 (the heyday of socialism!) when the U.S. Supreme Court told the landed gentry that zoning based on comprehensive planning was a proper exercise of a state’s power to regulate the use of private property in order to protect the health and safety, and general welfare of the community.

Just this June, the US Supreme Court, as conservative as we've seen in a long while, again observed that the State's laws of property and nuisance, which place restrictions on land ownership, "inhere in the title itself."

And Justice Scalia, of all people, wrote for the majority, "The takings clause (of the fifth amendment) only protects property rights as they are established under state law, not as they might have been established or ought to have been established."
 
So, when the property rightswingers claim the county can pass no regulation or ordinance without compensation to those unduly burdened, keep in mind what "unduly" means; that title came with an important proviso, handle with care.  It makes all the puffing and swaggering about "land grabs" seem quite the pose.  But to what end?

"Tut, tut, child! Everything's got a moral, if only you can find it."  (the Duchess)

It seems Larson is signaling his Tea Party philosophy is more like Dick Armey, Tom DeLay and that crowd's.  There are a lot of folks in politics who want to be at the table when the cake is cut.  Funny how self promoters gravitate to the game.  I suspect Larson will happily lead the less informed down the garden path to get his feet under the table.

I expect he believes, if he even thinks about it, as the cost of government keeps rising, the quality of life keeps slipping, the rich get richer and the rest of us keep trying to get by, the Tea Party will lap up the rhetoric and keep missing the reality: that the continued sprawl and vesting of building rights will lead to ever increasing needs for government services, infrastructure and rehabilitation of the environment. 

And that means more, not less, taxes on you and me; not the latecomers or the folks who profit from development.

These costs, like restoring Lake Whatcom, "we the people" will pay, while the landowners who wrecked the lake will expect us to pay them to stop.  At the same time the beneficiaries of this public largess will blame it all on guvmit'.

Pretty much the same Tony Larson take as on the financial bailout: "Wall Street didn’t cause the financial collapse we experienced — government did."

"And the moral of that is -- The more there is of mine, the less there is of yours."  (the Duchess)

These kind a guys sure do make you wonder.  It would indeed be a wonderland if we could find a little less facile representative, one a little more frank about the economy and government spending.  Maybe someone who's willing to shift the burden of taxation off regular, working folks and onto the buggers making the big bucks on development.

And you do remember Alice? "It would be so nice if something made sense for a change."

Thanks to Lewis Carroll for wisdom and inspiration  (editor)

Gettin' Ready for a Court Date

Barbara Brenner's not as dumb as some think.  In fact, she showed herself to be considerably smarter than council chairman Sam Crawford last night. 

The "spitfire" from once rural north Bellingham, faced down by an overwhelming number opposed to another give-away of their taxes, knew she wouldn't win any popularity contests voting with the developers last night.

Perhaps it was a keener nose for the barnyard aroma of Crawford's program that made Barbara realize this ordinance was no truffle, and a yes vote would not suit what she likes us to believe are populist lips.

But unlike Crawford, Napoleonic and unable to appreciate the purpose of a little foreplay before screwing the public, maybe Brenner was listening.  And my guess is Barbara, suddenly made aware of the scrutiny to come, looked at this cobbled together ordinance, riddled with redactions and covered with the fingerprints of developers, and appreciated, if this pig was going to fly, the ordinance couldn't be passed with all these warts and blemishes. 

So before the new majority turned their ample rears to the pitchforks, Barbara quickly called a time out to huddle outside of public view with the lawyers.  And, probably having her worst fears confirmed, came back and moved to hold the ordinance until some cosmetic work could be done in anticipation of the expected challenge in court. 

Time to drop back and put a little lipstick on this pig.  But just what kind of pig are we dealing with here?

The public hearing filled the council chambers.  Almost sixty took their three minute opportunity to speak. 

There were about a dozen who supported Crawford's attack on past planning decisions; two electeds from small towns, four paid lobbyists for developers, and five or six,  property owners surprisingly interested in becoming recipients of the give-away, struggling to find some, any, general principle to further their particular interest.

The overwhelming majority who came were there to oppose Crawford, and the new council out to undo development regulation and redo the Comprehensive Plan and various ordinances related to planning under the Growth Management Act.

The opposition was largely rural county residents with strong support from Bellingham, including its mayor.

While many spoke to their distaste for urban sprawl, and most articulated objection to being taxed to subsidize a few who would benefit from this largess,  two or three raised the subject that is really central to what is afoot here: corruption.

As such, this ordinance adds relatively little land to the small towns in question.  And in many cases, the land added is either internal or contiguous to the related urban area.  Further, it's true that the increased tax burden these additions entail is relatively small by comparison to others that are in the wings. 

And believe me, there are many more in the wings.  So many that Crawford and company need to change the code so they can bring them, one by one, any time they want, changing zoning and/or the Comprehensive Plan virtually at will, piecemealing the opposition and circumventing truly "comprehensive" planning.

Crawford intends to bring client projects forward at his discretion, and will have a whole new service he can collect for: if you can afford it, you need no longer suffer through the cumbersome process of amending zoning. If you've got the right lawyers, the whole thing can be handled, for a fee, over at his firm, Emerald Lake Consulting.

If you don't think so, then you didn't really watch what just happened. This little ordinance they're going to pass in two weeks is the first of many nicely tailored treats for those with a special interest in favors from the well connected.

No, the words and advice which were to the real issue concerned the corruption of public process and the abandonment of the rule of law. 

Some time back, erstwhile County Planning Director, David Stalheim pushed back against Crawford, the development attorneys, and told the executive, Pete Kremen,

"Staff, as well as property owners, need the certainty of law so that regulations are not implemented in an arbitrary and discriminatory manner.  The suggestion that we have flexibility infers that we pick and choose which development regulations to enforce.  This might mean that the department treats applicants differently, and decisions are made outside of public view or identified standards."

For taking such stands, Crawford and company forced Stalheim to resign.  Obviously integrity is not much esteemed amongst these folks.  The whole process that created the ordinance so many oppose was made entirely "outside public view."

With the new majority, indeed, the animals are in charge.  And Crawford and company will do quite well for themselves on Manor Farm where, "all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others."  

Hail Napoleon!  Hail to the pigs! 

Tuesday's Free Lunch

"Land Grab Country" is a clever slogan to mislead voters with; simultaneously frightening those with little to fear, and distracting them while the real folks to fear "grab" their taxes.

And their boy, Sam Crawford, is the face of the threat. 

Tuesday, he will deliver the goods to his pals who pay him behind the scenes as their "consultant."

Crawford and company are out to vest more rights for you to buy back in the future. Pay attention, fellow taxpayers. Once again the usual suspects are posing as populists to get theirs at your expense.

If county residents don't start thinking, they will wake up wondering why the sheriff doesn't show up when they call; asking where the firefighters are while the barn burns; and wishing someone, anyone, would protect the place we love while all the time we pay a landed gentry not to further subdivide the county's farms and forests because this council gave them the "rights" to do so.

Just as Tea Party troops nationally have been tricked into believing "regulation" and "government" are our biggest problems, local voters, frustrated by the growing pressures that followed the financial collapse, are being convinced zoning regulation is the problem.

But in fact, it's fat cats and special interests who have taken over government and are (and plan to continue) milking us like their own little herd.

And with the local building industry folks, chamber of commerce crew, and the rest of the country club set controlling county government, while they butter their bread they want you to believe regulating them costs jobs.  They want you to think regulating them is not only economically unwise, but unconstitutional and downright un-American.

They may not like it, but again just this year, writing for what is unquestionably the most conservative Supreme Court majority we've known, Justice Scalia explained that property rights are not anything more than the rights granted by the States.  They are not some divine legacy.

Scalia wrote for the majority,

“The takings clause only protects property rights as they are established under state law, not as they might have been established or ought to have been established.”

 And following Lucas v. S.Carolina Coastal Council, Scalia continued,

"a regulation that deprives a property owner of [even] all economically beneficial use of this property is not a taking if the restriction inheres in the title itself, in the restrictions that background principles of the State's law of property and nuisance already place upon land ownership." [emphasis added]

In the state of Washington, the restrictions that inhere in title to its lands include the protections created by the Growth Management Act. 

Notwithstanding the decades long battle by property rights true-believers opposed to this legislation passed in the early '90s, and their use of political connections with the county administration to vest alleged rights to subdivide and build; because the county has refused to follow the law, Whatcom county is routinely defeated in this effort to avoid the law. 

All this will place future county governments in the unattractive situation of having to unwind the wrong doing in the face of angry citizens unwilling to give up windfalls created by extra-legal means like the effort you will witness Tuesday.

You see, the problem with government is it's been taken away from the people by the very forces that government was meant to regulate to protect the people.  And those forces have one thing in mind, profit themselves while leaving us with the costs and/or getting government to tax its citizens and pay them. 

To that end they want to make believe their title to some land puts them above the law, or that the law abridges some right or freedom they allege is being violated.

Again, in our state, the whole sorry thing started years ago with passage of the Growth Management Act, intended to safeguard farmland, forests, critical areas and other resources necessary to conserve and protect the traditional industries that rely on them; industries that had long supported real jobs.

In Whatcom County the law was met with disdain by politically influential landowners grown accustomed to converting these resource lands, at great profit, into sprawling residential developments uncharacteristic of the rural county; often replacing pastures and cropland with golf courses surrounded by what have come to be called "McMansions" given their similarity to the ubiquitous structures elsewhere polluting the landscape wherever we go.

The landed gentry immediately got control of the zoning process locally.  The upshot? Instead of protecting lands as the Act intended, the landed gentry managed to gerrymander the zoning map and set themselves up for the future. And they elected themselves a county council that became notorious in the state as reactionaries.

Basically to get around the law, these folks created excessively large areas for more intense development in forests and farmland, including a nice little piece for our current county executive. 

They designated other resource lands, near the county's cities, for urban growth to the great satisfaction of landowners, many of whom had acquired the land speculating on future growth, that was now to be protected under the new state law.

Relevant to the giveaway planned for Tuesday, the state board created to interpret and rule on matters related to growth found the areas the development community created around smaller cities to be excessively large and would lead to sprawl inconsistent with preserving the rural character as the Act mandated.

As a consequence, the county's planning department was sent back to the drawing board to re-size these urban growth areas. After months and months of work, the areas were better planned and the county council, after much debate, approved that plan.

Of course the landed gentry challenged the zoning decision, and of course they again lost in court.

But the building industry, and landowners left out, didn't give up and invested heavily in electing new council members who would see things their way.   Succeeding at that, their new council appointed planning commissioners that could be counted on to rubber stamp policies and proposals put forward by the land speculation community.  And they lobbied Kremen successfully to drive out the planning director and give them free reign over the department.

Now, this group and their representatives on the council, plan to undue the work ordered by the state and enlarge the zones once again without any effort to rationalize their scheme to the Act or allow meaningful public process.

Next, the developers' council will be re-writing the Comprehensive Plan in an attempt to redefine rural character so they can retain the zoning densities in rural areas the state has already objected to and ruled against.

Besides making us something of a laughing stock around the state, this persistent, feigned ignorance of the law costs us hours and hours of human resource time to undo and redo staff work. Which work has little or no chance of meeting approval beyond the representatives of the local development fraternity.

But the real losers in this will be Whatcom county taxpayers.  The developers haven't really got any immediate plans to build anything.  But they are in a hurry to vest the rights to do so.  For you see, the free lunch these fat cats are after is getting in line for the hand out of development rights taxpayers will be forced to redeem for years to come.

The time has come to understand the difference between a public relations campaign and a public outcry. The main course at Tuesday's free lunch will be your taxes re-directed to the propagandists.

Same Old Newspeak

In 1984, Doublethink was the ability to know what should be said while carefully circumventing the truth with cleverly constructed lies. 

Yesterday, Sam Crawford led a discussion of zoning changes in rural areas in anticipation of completing work to, after almost two decades, bring Whatcom County into compliance with the Growth Management Act as ordered by a state judicial board after much of its rural zoning was deemed urban sprawl.

Listening to this discussion was strange and a little shocking.  You'd think one would be a bit more circumspect when basically undertaking to re-gerrymander the zoning map to avoid compliance with the law. 

But in fact, Crawford and his clients, and their attorneys, had given the left-overs at the Planning Department orders (and a rationale) for rural zoning that would not sacrifice the old carve outs for friends and clients. 

Sitting there, as slide after slide illustrated rural areas around the county, I couldn't help but wonder how many of Crawford's clients had interests, ownership or options, in land in one or another of these areas.

And it was particularly amusing when old Sam indulged in some very transparent theatrics, pounding the dais and pronouncing, "I wasn't elected to downzone my constituents,  I'm here to protect their property rights."  Right on Sam! High fives all 'round.

Were there qualms about supporting state laws or ignoring oaths to do the same?  No, for Crawford and company, the whole exercise was a search for any loophole, or any, even the thinnest, excuse to ignore the broad purpose of the laws to regulate growth; find cover of any color-able exception, and search for the least obnoxious, though uncompelling, interpretation of rulings in other counties.

Time and space do not allow a complete account of this absurd side-show.  My favorite moment, though, was when Sam, Barbara Brenner and Bill Knutzen seized on an idea to get around the law's requirement that zoning preserve rural character.

After honestly designating resource lands, GMA only mandated two things.  First, protect those designated resource lands, and second, preserve the rural character of our state's rural counties. 

In Whatcom county in the early '90s, however, this process entailed creating commissions of landowners, insiders, and others keen on profiting from prospective regulations, most of whom were entirely self-interested.  The result was huge amounts of resource lands zoned rural, and even more blatantly abusing the intent of the Act, some resource lands were even designated for more intense suburban development where no rationale in the law existed.

The upshot, large amounts of forest and agricultural lands were zoned rural for special interests.  And to further add injury to this insult to intelligence, most of these newly ruralized areas were allowed to develop at the highest possible density under the law.  Five acre tracts, and even less, as far as the eye could see was their idea of rural character.

This instead of a rural element as described in the Act: where the natural environment dominates over the built, and there are a variety of lot sizes, 10, 20 and 80 acres.

So, now the council is trying to redo, but not undo, zoning the Hearings Board has rejected. They announced they will accomplish this légère de la main in large part by tailoring the meaning of "rural character" to suit their desire to maximize developable lots thus minimizing the impact of the Act. 

Each of the areas earlier mis-zoned will be redefined to have their own, unique rural character.  Like beauty and the eye of the beholder, the idea here is that rural character will mean different things in different places. 

Sort of like "moral virtue" meaning something different depending where you are or who you're with.  In Lynden it might mean a chaste and charitable woman in the church choir.  But if you happened to be in a local bar or brothel, moral virtuousness might be the bar fly or care-giver free of venereal disease.  

Or, you could say, like pornography, Sam, Bill and Barbara know sprawl when they see it, and this is art.  The law should be flexible.

The council will apply this new and unique concept (we'll call it "rural relativity") to the problem and, wallah, black is white, old is new, sprawl is rural character, and the Hearing Board's ruling is oldthink.

Another skill of doublethinkers is the ability to hold two contradictory beliefs simultaneously.  I of course have always enjoyed property rightswingers complaint that Futurewise, or other opponents, suits challenging county excesses are an abuse of taxpayers, but when their own lawyers sue us, they are silent. 

Obviously this hypocrisy is the result of goodthink, ideological exceptionalism in the name of orthodoxy. 

But even more remarkable doublethink is the blind faith (maybe better described as "blinded" faith) or groupthink, which holds they can create ever increasing demands for costly government services by planning more sprawling, scattered, far flung development, and simultaneously claim we should cut taxes and defund government, all the while decrying planning as an evil enterprise, a socialist plot, meant to enslave us.

You could call this doublespeak, but listening to Sam Crawford, all I hear is the same old double talk half-baked demagogues customarily leave us with; like a horse ahead on the trail.

But it's nice that the newly ordained high-priests and priestesses of gobbledygook are making headway on one critical problem in the community, employment.  Too bad, though, when they submit the same old zoning densities in their brand new wrapper, the only jobs will go to lawyers.

Who'll Stop the Machine?

Last Tuesday, the county council had a chance to show some courage and take a small step to protect Lake Whatcom by ending further subdivision of its watershed.

With state and federal agencies waiting for a plan, watching for any sign of a serious effort to reverse the deterioration of the lake that serves as the water supply for tens of thousands, the county showed they remain a bunch of cowards more afraid of offending "property rights" zealots than failing to protect Bellingham's reservoir.

So now the battle lines are drawn. Whatcom county emasculates growth regulation, disregards state law, and ignores state agencies demanding action to rehabilitate Lake Whatcom. Alone at the ramparts, is the city of Bellingham.

With Sam Crawford initiating a blitzkrieg on the watershed before his reign of terror comes to an end, an army of lawyers, representing land speculators around the lake and elsewhere, attack the county planning department to weaken enforcement of regulations on residential development.

Simultaneously Crawford mounts a campaign to cut the funding for water projects that could contribute to protecting the reservoir.

In a rear guard action, predictably, Lake Whatcom Water & Sewer District's plan is in place to assist development all along the north shore by increasing withdrawals from two wells and expanding the delivery system, allegedly put in place just to serve the Lake Whatcom Residential Treatment Center.

And the coupe de grace; the council, with the exception of Carl Weimer, voted against prohibiting further sub-division of the watershed and left the moratorium on the same to expire at the end of August.

If things go as I expect, LWW&SD will claim to have water for any of the new lots, clusters and subdivisions that can't rely on unpermitted wells, though their own sources are closed to new withdrawals. And the county will allow developers to vest alleged "rights" after the moratorium expires.

Opposing them we have little more than a scrappy mayor and a dedicated council, all quite aware of what's at stake.

They have few allies on the county side, and the council members not for out and out development in the watershed are either confused by flaks or push naive proposals to compensate speculators for rights they don't even possess. 

While councilwoman Brenner makes sounds like she would put the lake ahead of private interests, given the opportunity, she could not bring herself to vote to protect the watershed because she isn't sure of it's boundaries. Apparently she's only for protecting the lake if its watershed boundaries fall in the right place.

And Ken Mann, when push came to shove, voted with Crawford, ostensibly planning to lead an effort to create development rights for landowners who, in fact, lack a source of water to develop.  Given that similar programs to protect farm lands largely rely on taxing the public, this approach promises to be little more than a transfer from the many to enrich a few.

And Bellingham has no allies in the administration or county attorney's office. The county executive and legal officer refuse to respect state laws and rules that would prevent more development in the lake's surrounding watershed. They turn a blind eye to allow the landed gentry to build and subdivide where they know water is unavailable.

At this point the city stands pretty much alone in the effort to address the demands of the state to protect the lake. It was unfortunate that county residents dedicated to the stewardship of our resources relaxed prematurely, and allowed the county council to be captured by a group in the service of special interests.

Now Crawford's council takes its direction from attorneys representing property owners anxious to cash in while they can; land speculators hoping to expand urban growth areas, maximize areas allowing denser development outside urban centers, and in particular, developers interested in vesting rights around Lake Whatcom and escaping regulations intended to stop and reverse degradation of the water supply.

So egregious and mistaken is the thinking of these newly elected council-members, they actually believe the taxpayers should pay people who are prevented from damaging the water supply; compensate them for infringement of some inalienable property right to pollute and build even where water is unavailable for new development.

The rush is on to create new rights for a clever few that the rest of us will be required to purchase simply to have safe water to drink. Ultimately, we will have to choose between more lakeside McMansions and the water supply. If they can't build, at least they'll be able to pass off their losses on us.

It is indeed time for conscientious citizens to get involved and add their voices to the mayor's and the city council-members who fight this travesty. Above all else, it's time to fix county government and stop the machine.