Will the Republican party endorse I-695? Looks like they probably will.

Republicans expected to endorse car-tab initiative KIRO TV & ASSOCIATED PRESS (Seattle-AP) -- The Republican Party is expected to endorse Initiative 695, which would cut taxes by reducing the annual car-tab fee. State party executive director Cary Evans says the 84-member central committee is expected to endorse the measure at its meeting Saturday in Spokane. Last May, party leaders voted not to take an official stand on the initiative. Polls show more than 60 percent of voters approve the measure they will decide in November.

http://www.seattleinsider.com/news/1999/09/15/695.html

-- Gary Henriksen (henrik@harbornet.com), September 16, 1999

Answers

Better late than never I guess. Washington state STILL needs a two party system. The local Democrat and Republican parties are still Tweedle-dum and Tweedle-dumber. We need a good Populist party, neither in bed with big labor or with big business. I'm for higher taxes on all the AWB members who opposed I-695. Any of you liberals out there want to help me go after big business?

-- Craig Carson (craigcar@crosswinds.net), September 16, 1999.

We want change also, but we're not crazy!!!!!!!!

VOTE NO on I-695!!!!!!!

-- Mike Powell (mkpow62@silverlink.net), September 16, 1999.

Gary,

I can tell by now you're not a politically naive person and have probably already figured out what I'm about to point out, but nonetheless it needs to be emphasized in the wake of the GOP's endorsement of I-695:

The GOP has endorsed I-695 not because they collectively think it's a good idea, but because it's politically advantageous, especially in this post-Monica stage when that ol' elephant just keeps getting whiter and whiter! The GOP need a lifeline, and 60% public approval has made them choose I-695 as that lifeline.

Take it with a grain of salt!

-- Jeff Stevens (chez@u.washington.edu), September 16, 1999.

"We want change also, but we're not crazy!!!!!!!! VOTE NO on I-695!!!!!!!"

I don't know about that. Looks like DSM-IV 296.4x (Bipolar I Disorder, Most Recent Episode Manic) to me. Major depression (over pending voter approval of I-695) a. A distinct period of abnormally and persistently elevated, expansive, or irritable mood. b. During the period of mood disturbance, three (or more) of the following symptoms have persisted. 1. inflated self esteem or grandiosity 2. decreased need for sleep 3. more talkative than usual or pressure to keep talking 4. flight of ideas or subjective experience that thoughts are racing 5. distractibility 6. increase in goal directed behavior or psychomotor agitation 7. excessive involvement in pleasurable activities that have a high potential for painful consequences

Actually, we don't use the word "crazy" any more. We call them clinical disorders.

-- Gary Henriksen (henrik@harbornet.com), September 16, 1999.

Jeff-

I realize that. I got into an e-mail discussion with a local Republican official 6-7 weeks ago when he delivered upon me a load of holier-than-thou anti-695 rhetoric that made the anti-695 types on this bulletin board system seem calm, scholarly, and collegial. It was going to create extra work for him, not impossible problems you understand, just extra work, and it clearly irritated him. But politicians for either party have the ability to do a 180 degree turn in their own lengths. I was not born this cynical with respect to politicians. They earned my cynicism through just such reversals over several decades. I wish it were only the Republican party that did this, it'd only be half the problem. But, for those of us who support I-695, we'll still take the endorsement, even if we question the timing and the motivation.

Cordially

-- Gary Henriksen (henrik@harbornet.com), September 16, 1999.

Gary:

Regardless of timing and motivation by Dale Foreman, you have to at least give him some credit for rediscovering a bit of political truth, i.e. his statement that lower taxes are a fundamental GOP position. Notwithstanding "read-my-lips" Bush, this is true. Remember Reagan's revolutionary 30 percent tax cut. If earlier posts on this site are correct that Foreman originally opposed 695, then his statement today probably also involved some personal embarrassment, not that that should be a big deal to taxpayers.

However, the fact that it took the Republican Party a long time to stop fumbling and support an issue tailor made to the party's traditional stance tells me that some in the party have forgotten what the GOP stands for. I hope you told the Republican you talked to that he can be as irritated as he wants about 695's likely passage. He only has to carry out the will of the people, and if he is true to his oath, he will revise government, and accomodate the revenue reduction so that government serves the public as cost effectively as possible. This is the obligation of every elected official and bureaucrat in the state.

After they are elected, too many politicians think they know what's best for us, and that they can use our money better than we can. No one will be as aware of and careful of his/her money than the person who earns it. This is one of the conclusions I draw from your posts on transit boondoggles etc.

Craig: There may be hope after all. If Republicans can rediscover that they are the party of lower taxes and less government, then maybe the voters will have a choice besides Remocrats and Depublicans.

-- A.C. Johnson (ajohnson@thefuture.net), September 16, 1999.

"Regardless of timing and motivation by Dale Foreman, you have to at least give him some credit for rediscovering a bit of political truth, i.e. his statement that lower taxes are a fundamental GOP position. "

AC, I wish that I believed that, but I once lived in Washington DC (Well, OK, Alexandria VA, I went to school in DC. I wasn't rich or poor enough to live in DC, there didn't seem to be many apartments for students of modest means). There is a real corrupting influence in politics today, and I'm really not sure what to do about it. I would watch Kennedy and Helms and others in the political establishment "duke it out" in rhetoric on the Senate floor and then see them carouse at the same parties (usually given by lobbyists) and play congenially in the same golf foresomes and, in every way possible, make it obvious that they had more in common with each other than they do with the rest of us. I would watch "new fish" come there and be seduced by the system, the price of being effective was becoming one of the gang. Look at people like Nethercutt who went there to reform the place, and were quickly co-opted by it. What's worse, both parties have cooperated (I'm not a conspiracy theorist) to make it very difficult for any third party with new ideas to get on enough ballots to provide a real choice. In the meantime, lobbyists are pouring money into the election campaigns ON BOTH SIDES. Now, if you are feeding only one side, you may be backing up your principles with your money, but when you're feeding both sides, you're merely buying influence. And this is common and the result of this influence buying can be clearly seen in our tax code and our appropriations budgets. I'm not sure what the answer is. I'm not sure prohibition of political contributions would pass constitutional muster. But it's no more right for Boeing to use their stockholder's money to use for political purposes(which they have done) than for a union to take a members dues and donate them to a political cause that the member doesn't support. It's eroding faith in the system. The politician's desired fix (give me money), publically funded campaigns, probably isn't going to happen. Cynicism is getting so bad that people won't even check off the $3 per head federal campaign box on their tax returns, even if it doesn't cost them anything. I used to be a Republican, but they too are being bought by the special interest groups, just different special interest groups. Of course the real big players continue to pay both sides. I may have to try being a Populist for a while.

-- Gary Henriksen (henrik@harbornet.com), September 16, 1999.

Whether you agree with 695 or not, you've gotta admit this about face by the GOP is pretty damn amazing. I've never heard of a party endorsing a measure that completely destroys another one (R-49) that they spent so much time and energy putting together. This, quite simply, astonishes me.

It'll be interesting to see what they do. It's clear that they're just blowing in the wind. If they were really behind you 695ers, they would have had the guts to endorse the initiative back in May, when they first voted not to.

BB

-- BB (bbquax@hotmail.com), September 17, 1999.

BB

Finally I can agree with you on something. They don't have any guts or anything else that matters. When they run they sound so good, even close friends. But once they get into office they lose their conviction and integorty.

Why? I don't know. But if everything they tell us they were going to use our money for came true, then they could have lowered the budget. Yet even in these good economic times (?) they keep raising it, instead of giving some of it back.

And please don't bring up that slap in the face $30 cut from R-49. That was just something for them to use to say their trying. Well now we the people are going to do something about it ourselfs. Hopefully this is just the first step.

By the way, in one post I saw someone point out that if the govt didn't take out the FIC from each check we wouldn't be able to pay our rent ant taxes for the month it was do. How true. I wish the govt did it this way so the people in this country would truely see just how much is going to the govt.

-- Ed (ed_brigdes@yahoo.com), September 17, 1999.

Ed writes:

"Finally I can agree with you on something."

Pigs are apparently flying somewhere.

"And please don't bring up that slap in the face $30 cut from R-49. That was just something for them to use to say their trying."

The $30 tax cut in R-49 is probably the least important aspect of R- 49. R-49 shifted MVET money from the general fund to go directly to road construction. It addressed a common complaint, that MVET money didn't go to roads. Well, R-49 put a bunch of MVET money into road construction.

R-49 designated $2 billion of MVET money for roads. So if 695 passes, that money is gone. For example, Spokane can kiss its north/south freeway goodbye. If I remember correctly, R-49 was going to extend highway 509 from SeaTac airport down to Tacoma to have a second freeway corridor west of I-5. That's gone too.

I'm just floored that the GOP appears to be willing to sabotage their own gigantic project.

BB

-- BB (bbquax@hotmail.com), September 17, 1999.

BB writes

"Pigs are apparently flying somewhere."

Yes in Olympia and D.c. like vultures around our money

-- Ed (ed_brigdes@yahoo.com), September 17, 1999.

To BB: The R-49 proposed tax cut of $30 was a Republican bribe to get the people to vote for "their" R-49. Most taxpayers everywhere really do want some meaningful tax relief at all levels. In Washington, on the state level, we especially want the license tab fees cut to something we can handle. But in the absence of any better alternatives, R-49 was approved strictly because of the $30 bribe. It wasn't about the roads or any of the other complicated dividing of the MVET spoils. I seriously doubt any voters read the 9 pages of fine print published in the voters guide to know what they were getting. When the people of this state were complaining that the MVET money was not being used for the roads, what we hoped for was serious recduction of the tab tax. The Republicrats never ask questions to find out what "the people" really want when we are complaining, so they always come up with the wrong solution. I-695 says to all the people who take our money: "THIS IS WHAT WE REALLY MEANT...DO YOU GET IT NOW??????".

None of the road projects have started yet, so we will be no worse off when I-695 passes than we are now. The state now has the opportunity to come up with another way to fund the road projects we demand by using some of the other $45 Billion dollars they are taking from us over the next two years. If they don't get the message again, be looking for another initiative next year that will communicate exactly what we do mean. We want them to fund the priorities first. What falls out at the BOTTOM of the priorities list are things that NOBODY needs. If we must be taxed, we want to be sure we are taxed only for what is absolutely necessary, and for that which free enterprise is forbidden to provide. That really shouldn't cost us too much.

Article I, Section 1 of the State Constitution states this: "POLITICAL POWER. All political power is inherent in the people, and governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, and are established to protect and maintain individual rights".

This is only about a century old, so is that current enough to apply today? I think so. How much legislation and money is spent in this state protecting and maintaining INDIVUDUAL rights? Who really has the political power today? I-695 kindly informs the people who take our money that WE ARE TAKING THE POLITICAL POWER BACK!!! And we ain't done when I-695 passes.

Further, I am more than ready to start rejecting all the fee and tax increases that are unnecessarily and routinely rubber stamped by every unelected department head in every juristiction of the state. Need examples???? I can cite many. I-695 is only the beginning. SP

-- SP (sp@hotmail.com), September 17, 1999.

SP writes:

"In Washington, on the state level, we especially want the license tab fees cut to something we can handle. But in the absence of any better alternatives, R-49 was approved strictly because of the $30 bribe. It wasn't about the roads or any of the other complicated dividing of the MVET spoils."

Prove it. I want to see a survey of the residents of this state that says that they passed R-49 strictly because of the $30 rebate and not because it will build roads.

"None of the road projects have started yet, so we will be no worse off when I-695 passes than we are now."

Um, hello?!?! Been to Spokane lately? They've started tearing up houses to build the North/South freeway and it's toast if 695 passes.

BB

-- BB (bbquax@hotmail.com), September 17, 1999.