The Blag Switch

Washington State Elections turned out WAY better than I hoped.  Randy Dorn wins Superintendent of Public Instruction, which is a victory for education.  Rob McKenna wins Attorney General, which is a victory for personal rights.  Cathy McMorris Rodgers gets re-elected which is a win for energy policy and the energy economy of Eastern Washington.  Chris Gregoire gets re-elected to the governorship (and by a kvetch-proof margin this time, THANK GOD), which is a vote for hands-off governance.  (Some might say that’s a bug; I say it’s a feature.)

Even on the local level, Todd Mielke won, which should mean someone with a keen grasp of local economics in a position to help make some positive changes in the local economy.

Honestly, I don’t think I could have asked for a better outcome in local elections.

I hope you all voted.  You all know, I hope, that if you didn’t vote you made the baby Thomas Paine cry.

Also, you make Sam Adams have to get all up in your grill:

“If ye love wealth greater than liberty,
the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom,
go home from us in peace.
We seek not your counsel, nor your arms.
Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you;
May your chains set lightly upon you,
and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.”

–Samuel Adams

Happy Election Day!

Well, after much research and pondering, my 2008 election ballot is nearly completed.  Despite there really only being a few very tough choices for me to make on the ballot, it wound up taking me quite a bit of time.  Voting can be exhausting when every race doesn’t have a clearly superior candidate.  (*Whine whine, whinge whinge*)

One novel experience that this ballot afforded me was voting in a new sort of race.  A race in which I genuinely liked both candidates.  This race was, unfortunately, not any of the “big” races, but rather the race for District 1 County Commissioner.  Both candidates, Todd Mielke and Dr. Kim Thorburn, seem like bang-up choices for the job.  They both have tight ties to the local community, excellent credentials, and a strong commitment to fiscal responsibility and infrastructure.

When faced with such a choice between two stellar candidates, I have to admit, I was just kind of stuck.  So stuck in fact that I was driven to do more research to find some sort of deal-killer with respect to one candidate or the other.  Really, though, the worst I could find about either were just small things on each side with which I don’t quite agree.  (E.g. Mielke’s vague references to “family values” in his campaign materials, which is all-to-often a synonym for intolerant, blinkered social policy, but isn’t always.)

In the end, it seems like my vote’s going to have to come down not to qualifications or belief, but rather to priorities.  One of the big differences between the candidates seems to be their top priorities.  Dr. Thorburn’s running with a public health emphasis and Todd Mielke on an economics and infrastructure platform.  Quite frankly, while public health is indeed important, what Spokane needs right now is some serious attention paid to insuring that our economic growth continues despite the tanking economy.  We also need some serious work put into shoring up a transportation and services infrastructure that has been, quite frankly, laughable for as long as most residents can remember.

Honestly, I feel bad about casting a vote in the race because whoever I vote for it means that a totally qualified candidate will be losing out on the position.  Who knew that a race between great candidates could be so much tougher to decide that one between terrible candidates?  Still, as frustrating as the choice is, I sincerely hope that I get to make a lot more tough decisions like this in the future.

Okay, a few things.  1.) I would have been blogging more in this space but I’ve been slammed with work of various kinds.  Also, I recently discovered the hilarity that is Zero Punctuation, which is a weekly video game review.  It’s hilarious to the point that I’m pretty sure I enjoyed the four minute review of some games more than I enjoyed the game itself.  Case in point.

2.) If any rich admirers out there are wondering what to get me for Christmas, I’d like one of these in .300 Win Mag or this ludicrously nice amp or a copy of the Secret Museum of Mankind if you can find one.

3.) Well, my Washington State ballot arrived a couple of days ago.  (WA ballots are all mail-in.)  Which means I finally have to figure out who I’m voting for for President.  I still haven’t ruled out writing in one of the Roosevelts.

My mom, who among many other things runs the blog 46 Degrees North, has been asking me to try and drum up some folk who might be interested in talking politics over there in the comments.  She’s got some great posts up, but doesn’t have enough eyeballs to get a really interesting discussion going.  So if any of you are at all politically inclined, you should head over there and put in your $.02.

Well, it looks like Ukraine’s recent political rifts continue apace.  Ukraine’s pro-Europe President, Viktor Yushchenko, dissolved parliament earlier today, due to the (pro-Russian) Prime Minister’s inability to form a coalition.

I’ve been quite interested in the situation in the Ukraine, Georgia, and other former Soviet states in the past year.  It seems like all of them are fighting some sort of their own post-Cold-War Europe vs. Russia grudge match.  The roots of the recent conflict in Georgia ultimately rest in the break up of the Soviet Union and in the current Georgian government’s desire to have closer ties to Europe and the West.  Meanwhile Ukraine has had a great deal of political turmoil (this is, in fact, the second time this year that Yuschenko has dissolved parliament and called for new elections), huge parts of the government arrayed against one another.

Combine these wide-spread intranational power struggles with Dmitry Medvedev and Vladimir Putin increasingly flexing Russian military muscle and selling arms to anyone who will by them (Iran, Venezuela: I’m looking at you, here) and it looks increasingly like the Cold War may not be quite as over as everyone thought it was.  To top it all off, the Bush administration continues to lay ground in Eastern Europe for a missile shield.  Meanwhile, Medvedev is all hot to start development of a Russian shield, and both the Russians and the Chinese seem a bit miffed that the US doesn’t appear to trust them with nuclear-tipped ICBMs.

The result is a 2nd World that, well, looks a lot like a Cold War battle ground.  The only difference is that this time the game is being played a little closer to the Kremlin.  All over Asia and Eastern Europe there are intense struggles which are still aligned to the political poles of Washington and Moscow.

And then of course there’s the whole North Korea thing, where Mr. Kim is spending an awful lot of time, money, and energy on figuring out how to build nukes.  Some dissenters in those parts seem to think that those resources would be better spent feeding his people, but I’m sure they’ll see the error of their ways eventually.  Possibly shortly before they wind up on the wrong end of a Tokarev.

So with all that being the state of things in Eurasia, the Middle East, and assorted other parts, I’m well-comforted that our media and politicians are discussing the pressing international issues of our day.  Like whether McCain’s evil or just senile and whether Obama is a terrorist or if he just hangs out with them.

Oy. If anyone needs me, I think I’ll be under my desk with a bottle of Monarch until further notice.

Pope Benedict XVI recently came out and claimed that “he who builds only on visible and tangible things like success, career and money builds the house of his life on sand.” He also said that only works of God have “solid reality.”

Let me put that another way.  A man who lives in a palace, on what amounts to a 110 acre urban estate, and surrounded by opulence that would make Saudi princes blush had the temerity to say that money sucks and we should all focus ourselves on God.  He leads a religion that claims to denounce conspicuous wealth, and yet his holdings made him over $8,000,000 in the 2000 fiscal year and lives surrounded by the finest amenities life has to offer.

Well I say, you first, Mr. Ratzinger.  If “only God’s word is solid reality”, why don’t you just go ahead and throw open the doors of your palace to Italy’s homeless?  Or sell off your jewels and trappings to feed the starving?  How about tearing down St. Peter’s Basilica and replacing it with shelter for the world’s needy?

Or you could just keep up with your Janus-faced ways and try not be surprised when the rest of the world sees you for the wealth-bestrewn hypocrite you are.  As far as I’m concerned it’s win-win.

I mean, picking Hastur as VP?  Seriously?  There’s no way in R’lyeh that I’m voting for a Cthulu/Hastur ticket.  If he wanted my support, He should have gone with Shub-Niggurath, the Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young.

I mean, hell, that’s an extra thousand votes right there…  (Assuming, of course, that the spawn of Great Old Ones can vote.  Not quite sure on that.)

Update: I love the internet: the GeoHack entry for R’lyeh!

Money quote:

“Every election then turns into a sort of nose-holding game, where we are faced with the choice of sacrificing one of our guiding principles for another, purely on the speculation of which candidate is just a little less dangerous to those principles at that moment.  If I want the candidate who recognizes my right to self-defense and a larger portion of my own paycheck, I have to tolerate his flag-waving authoritarianism and his religious favoritism.  If I want the candidate who will keep his hands out of my sock drawer and his holy book out of my public school, I have to contend with his opinion that someone else has a claim to my paycheck as well, and that I can’t be trusted with the means to defend myself.”

Seriously, go read the whole thing.