Condemned to Republican representation....

With all but 200 votes counted, here is how nearly 40% of Whatcom registered voters cast their ballots for U.S. Senate and Wa Legislative Districts in Whatcom County::

Race	Candidate	Votes	PercentageOfTotalVotes
United States U.S. Senator	Maria Cantwell	24,723	54.973
United States U.S. Senator	Michael Baumgartner	13,296	29.5644
United States U.S. Senator	Art Coday	3,111	6.9175
United States U.S. Senator	Glen (Stocky) R. Stockwell	1,030	2.2903
United States U.S. Senator	Chuck Jackson	886	1.9701
United States U.S. Senator	Timmy (Doc) Wilson	842	1.8722
United States U.S. Senator	Mike the Mover	611	1.3586
United States U.S. Senator	Will Baker	474	1.054
Total		44,973
Legislative District 42 State Representative Pos. 1	Natalie McClendon	13,625	44.111
Legislative District 42 State Representative Pos. 1	Jason Overstreet	17,263	55.889
Total		30,888
Legislative District 42 State Representative Pos. 2	Matthew Krogh	13,626	44.2288
Legislative District 42 State Representative Pos. 2	Vincent Buys	17,182	55.7712
Total		30,808
Legislative District 40 State Representative Pos. 1	Kristine Lytton	9,692	100
Legislative District 40 State Representative Pos. 2	Howard A. Pellett	2,255	20.1663
Legislative District 40 State Representative Pos. 2	Jeff Morris	8,927	79.8337
Total		11,182

Some obvious thoughts:

(1) Populated south Whatcom county (e.g. most of south Bellingham) is now so Democratic the Republicans don't bother to run candidates in the new 40th District.
(2) Overall, Whatcom county leans Democratic as can be evinced by Maria Cantwell's primary victory of nearly 55%.
(3) Krogh and McClendon will need a voter registration and voter turnout miracle to beat Overstreet or Buys in the 42nd.

Redistricting has nearly guaranteed legislative votes that cancel out each other in the Fourth Corner. The gerry-mandering seeds almost the entirety of Whatcom County's geographical presence to the Republicans, links the 40th Orcas Island liberals with South Bellingham of the same and cuts off working class North Bellingham from Democratic support:

And that's probably not going to change much in November unless Matt and Natalie can galvanize farm workers, WCC students and core Democratic neighborhoods like the Lettered Streets, Cornwall, Birchwood,  and Columbia in Bellingham.  Unless they can  find a way to transplant some of the 16,000 returning WWU students to 42nd  district address....I don't see much Democratic legislative representation for those of us who live in neighborhoods north of downtown in Bellingham. Here is about as clear a picture as I can screenshot tonight of those Bellingham neighborhoods north of downtown now condemned eternally to Republican legislative representation:

The Carbon Trade in the Fourth Corner (Part I)

Cherry Point and Lake Whatcom Basin 1 from NASA WorldWind

"Nearly three weeks after the group’s initiative to prohibit the use of gas-powered craft from operating on Lake Whatcom Reservoir, city and county attorneys ordered a recount using a different law than the one usually usedlocally for the validation of signatures.
The new criteria was taken from a state law brought forth by initiativeopponents who call themselves “Lake Whatcom Stewardship Association” (LWSA).”That law would limit the length of time allowed for gathering signatures to sixmonths and would require disregarding more than 400 signatures.
At their Sept. 13 meeting, City Attorney Joan Hoisington told City Councilmembers that they could not try to salvage the initiative for the Novemberballot.. “There is no initiative,” she said.
“This isn’t about boats any more, it’s about democracy,” Crozier said. “The powerful mustn’t be allowed to ignore due process and violate civil rights ofcitizens who are trying to make a difference.”" (quoted from http://groups.yahoo.com/group/whatcomgreenparty/message/2841?o=1&d=-1 )

 It may be the case that Judge Snyder's rejection of anti coal initiative represents sound legal practice. But if water quality activist Sharon Crozier were still with us, she might beg to differ.  Sharon, a fiery grandmother and cancer survivor (a phrase she didn't like), had a golden heart. She was the type of activist Noam Chomsky's prototypical 'elite' would hate the most: a committed idealist with a passion for truth and reform. And thus the legal and political system of Whatcom County tormented her. She shrugged off flailing criticism from liberal and moderates and political intimidation and from the right wing in Whatcom County.  All of this criticism simply because she wanted to remove motor boats from our drinking water source. Her worst opponents, the 'property rightista' class attacked her campaign savagely. At one point she received a death threat in a Hagen's parking lot while seeking signatures for the "Motor Boats Off" petition . I believe the exact words of her tormentor were: "If you f*ck with my property values b*tch, I'm going to take you out to that lake and drown you."  Sharon devoted herself to the cause despite all the hatred and intimidation that was sent her way. She had good reason to. Still today, Whatcom County's cancer incident rates are number three in a state with higher than the national average incidence rates to begin with:

County	Annual Incidence Rate† over rate period(95% Confidence Interval)	Average Annual Count	Rate Period
Washington 5	476.8 (474.4, 479.1)	31,534	2005-2009
US (SEER+NPCR) 1	465.0 (464.7, 465.4)	§	2005-2009
Mason County 7	554.6 (530.3, 579.8)	413	2005-2009
Grays Harbor County 7	540.0 (518.1, 562.6)	474	2005-2009
Whatcom County 7	527.5 (513.2, 542.1)	1,064	2005-2009
Pierce County 7	521.6 (514.1, 529.1)	3,816	2005-2009
Snohomish County 7	517.6 (509.4, 525.9)	3,187	2005-2009
Skagit County 7	509.8 (492.8, 527.1)	704	2005-2009
Thurston County 7	506.7 (494.2, 519.4)	1,299	2005-2009
Jefferson County 7	497.2 (467.7, 528.5)	251	2005-2009
Cowlitz County 6	495.3 (476.7, 514.3)	555	2005-2009
Kitsap County 7	489.8 (477.6, 502.2)	1,278	2005-2009

Yet somehow, Whatcom county residents can't put together the fact that dumping unburned hydrocarbons into their water supply is a toxic practice that may be killing them. Sharon and her environmental partner Tim Paxton, never got the chance to put their initiative on the ballot. I doubt Coal-Free Bellingham ever will either.

Personally, I find the arguments against a Coal-free Bellingham contrived. Sure, we need a strong interstate trade act. But you could extend that argument to justify everything from the shipping of toxic waste to continuance of the slave trade. A community like Bellingham should have some control over the burdens placed on it from the mountains of coal that will eventually be trafficked through their downtown and residences.  Currently, there is no legal framework to give a community such control.  In another era, would we have been justified in using the laws that govern interstate trade to allow the transport of slaves from free to slave states? Fifty globally warmed and polluted years from now, equating the carbon trade with the slave trade may not seem so outrageous.

The problem is that the law is subsumed by needs of power and money in a capitalist society. The needs of the people count second. Whatcom County has historically always been a "resource class" colony : Timber, Coal, Silver, Salmon, Raspberries, Dairy, Energy, Oil. Here in Whatcom County, we ship our resource products the world over.  Only recently have we established strong service sector economies in health, education, tourism, property. To understand how the carbon trade may come to dominate the fourth corner, consider our region's strategic energy assets:

"Kiss the concrete"...

When I was younger and growing up in east Oakland, I would listen to news stories about drive by shootings. The cops would be called on the carpet because indiscriminate drive by shootings were tragically killing the old and very young.  The gangs were just bulleting neighborhoods to establish territory, but if you were too young to react to the street or too old to "kiss the concrete" fast enough, you ended up full 9mm slugs. "Kiss the concrete" is the operative phrase to keep in mind.  "Keep your head up" is one I kept in mind when I walked the mean streets.

I find it ironic that the recent great 'terrorist' events of our time have been the work of young, male college students apparently all suffering from a disturbing mental illness: Seung-Hui Cho, Jared Loughner, James Eagan Holmes.  Worse than this are the revelations that university officials in all three cases had forewarning of their illness and (for one reason  and to some degree or another) punted the ball. Existing media reports make the case of James Eagan Holmes to appear to be especially disturbing and noteworthy in this regard.  Of course, plenty of other mass shootings have occurred recently by non-students in America and around the world.

The Progressive Voters Guide....

REMEMBER TO VOTE TONIGHT:

If you are a 'progressive'  in the 42nd district (Whatcom County) and you are looking for someone to list their recommendations and compile supporters for each candidate you could try here:

http://progressivevotersguide.com/2012/washington/primary/county/whatcom/42nd/

The ballot is long this primary...

Oil tankers from Vancouver...

Excellent article from the Globe and Mail on the Kinder Morgan proposal to double existing pipeline capacity and ship Suezmax style tankers from Vancouver. Great graphic features here.  With the addition of multiple coal ports, Shale Gas facilities, and Alberta oil exports, the fourth corner could become the Rotterdam of the West.

We thank the PDC of WA...

We thank the PDC of WA for the detailed maintenance of its political contribution database. Although the PDC has its critics, it is the essence of democracy to understand who is driving the political process. Sorting by contributions for all Washington elections in 2012, these are the contributions over $100K to date (August 4th, 2012) :

Name	Contributor	Date	Amount
YES ON 1240 WA COALITION FOR PUBLIC CHARTER SCHOOLS	GATES BILL	2012-06-19	800000.00
VOTERS WANT MORE CHOICES - SAVE THE 2/3RDS (MIKE FAGAN)	ASSOCIATION OF WASHINGTON BUSINESS PAC	2012-06-29	265000.00
NEW APPROACH WA	STEVES RICK	2012-07-17	250000.00
YES ON 1240 WA COALITION FOR PUBLIC CHARTER SCHOOLS	GATES BILL	2012-06-07	200000.00
VOTERS WANT MORE CHOICES - SAVE THE 2/3RDS (MIKE FAGAN)	ASSOCIATION OF WASHINGTON BUSINESS PAC	2012-05-30	185000.00
SERVICE EMPLOYEES INTL UNION WA ST COUNCIL PAC	SEIU WASHINGTON STATE COUNCIL	2012-04-24	150000.00
YES ON 1240 WA COALITION FOR PUBLIC CHARTER SCHOOLS	BEZOS JACKIE	2012-06-13	125000.00
YES ON 1240 WA COALITION FOR PUBLIC CHARTER SCHOOLS	BEZOS MIKE	2012-06-13	125000.00
NEW APPROACH WA	AMERICAN CIVIL LIBERTIES UNION OF WA FOUNDATION	2012-07-19	100000.00
NEW APPROACH WA	STEVES RICK	2012-06-29	100000.00
OUR WASHINGTON	SEIU 1199 NW	2012-07-07	100000.00
SEIU HEALTHCARE 1199 NW PAC	SEIU HEALTHCARE 1199 NW	2012-06-26	100000.00
VOTERS WANT MORE CHOICES - SAVE THE 2/3RDS (MIKE FAGAN)	WASHINGTON BEER & WINE DISTRIBUTORS ASSOCIATION	2012-05-11	100000.00
WA UNITED FOR MARRIAGE	SEIU WASHINGTON STATE COUNCIL	2012-05-24	100000.00
YES ON 1240 WA COALITION FOR PUBLIC CHARTER SCHOOLS	BEZOS JACKIE	2012-06-22	100000.00
YES ON 1240 WA COALITION FOR PUBLIC CHARTER SCHOOLS	BEZOS MIKE	2012-06-22	100000.00

Remember to Vote!!

The Whatcom County Primary Election is Tuesday, August 7th!!  Remember to return your mail-in ballots soon! You can find further information from the WA Secretary of State at "My Vote"  County ballots locations are pictured here.   Please make sure you have your ballot and have voted before August 7th!.

The Bellingham Festival of Music is here!!

This season's internationally acclaimed [1] Bellingham Festival of Music opens tonight at WWU's PAC, featuring Jeremy Denk on piano. On Monday, classical violinist Joshua Bell will rock the Mt. Baker.  The full schedule for the next two weeks features these guests for artistic director Michael Palmer's classical extravaganza:

• Pablo Sanz Villegas
• Paul Johsnon
• Lynn Harrel
• Rita Costanzi
• Tamara Mumford
• Charles Robert Stephens 

and many others[3,4].

Arctic drilling creeps forward now, and in 5 years | ajc.com

Bellingham, WA is in the news nationwide this week:

Arctic drilling creeps forward now, and in 5 years  | ajc.com

Troop hospitalizations show mental toll of war - News - Stripes

Troop hospitalizations show mental toll of war - News - Stripes

"Iran threatens Israel; New EU Sanctions take force"

Iran threatens Israel; New EU Sanctions take force

People for Natalie McClendon

""The State Democratic Party, and each of the local party organizations, work for the rank-and-file Democratic voters, not the other way around. We need to trust and respect the Democratic voters of the state to know what their best interests are and to make good choices for our communities, state and nation. We need to build a party that reflects this reality."
From Natalie McClendon Previous Chair of Whatcom County Democrats 

I am very slow to endorse politicians or contribute to existing political parties.  An observer would say that I am a victim of my own self-developed cynicism and disappointment with the democratic process.  But then, I may not be the only one who is afflicted as such.  Nevertheless, every now and then there is reason to pull back from the darkness and wish for hope and change, even knowing that it might not come.   And so, dear reader, I recommend you invest some time considering supporting once Democrat county chair Natalie McClendon for the 42nd legislative district. As a distant observer of Ms. McClendon, what I like most is her  marked ability to combine effectiveness with a passion  for electoral participation. Under her chair, Whatcom County has significantly increased voter registration and turnout. Whatcom County has also returned some remarkably important electoral results. Most notably, the turn out for President Obama in 2008 and the turnout for Rick Larsen in 2010. I'm sure Ms. McClendon would graciously credit others for some of these achievements.  In reality, few leaders  in local  politics bear the responsibility for energizing a local voter base more than the county chairs of the various local political parties.

Egyptian junta stages coup against parliament

Egyptian junta stages coup against parliament

Russia prepares army for Syrian deployment

Russia prepares army for Syrian deployment

Some film and quotes for Memorial Day

My recommendation for two brilliant films to see for Memorial Day:

• "The Ground Truth" (2006)
• "The Veteran" (2011)

Both available on Netflix. Some quotes I find appropriate for this Memorial Day: 

"About 18 veterans kill themselves each day. Thousands from the current wars have already done so. In fact, the number of U.S. soldiers who have died by their own hand is now estimated to be greater than the number (6,460) who have died in combat in Afghanistan and Iraq. Eleven years of war in two operating theaters have taken a severe toll on America’s military. An estimated 2.3 million Americans have served in Iraq or Afghanistan, and 800,000 of those service members have been deployed multiple times."
"Anthony Swofford on the Epidemic of Military Suicides"
http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/05/20/anthony-swofford-on-the-epidemic-of-military-suicides.html

"The organizing principle of any society is for war. The basic authority of the modern state over its people resides in its war powers. Today it's oil, tommorrow water. It's what we like to call the GOD business: guns, oil, and drugs. But there's a problem. Our way of life. It's over. It's unsustainable and in rapid decline. That's why we implement demand destruction. We continue to make money as the world burns. But for this to work, the people have to remain ignorant of the problem until it is too late. That's why we have triggers in place: 911, 77, WMDs. A population in a permanent state of fear does not ask questions. Our desire for war becomes its desire : a willing sacrifice. You see? Fear is justification, fear is control, fear is money. You're a brilliant soldier and I could still use someone like you."
Actor Brian Cox in "The Veteran" (2011)

Is War with Iran next?

It is a beautiful, bright spring day in Bellingham, WA.  Here at the edge of contiguous United States, busy educated professionals mingle with international visitors who are mostly British Columbian shoppers, but anyway...at least they're polite most of the time. Lulled by the serenity of North Puget Sound, the Salish Sea, Bellingham Bay...and protected by Joint Base Lewis McChord,  Everett Naval Station, Bremerton and Bangor/Kitsap Nuclear Submarine Base, Whidbey Island Air Force Base.  Here in the topmost corner of what was anti-communist Henry M. 'Scoop' Jackson  second WA congressional district, most of us don't often think too much about being the gateway to the most important West coast naval bases in the United States.

Even most war protesting here is often a sedate affair. But a new war in the Middle East could change this. The drumbeats for 'War with Iran' have been beaten by two U.S. Presidential administrations for almost ten years now. For my money (which mean free analysis only), William Engdahl covers the roots of the Iranian-U.S. conflict with as little nonsense as possible (1, 2, 3, 4) . I will sum up his viewpoint: 'Never mind all the crap you read about a nuclear Iran threatening Israel. Our government wants a friendly client state in the Middle East so they can neutralize Russia and China.'  It looks like Russia and China have no illusions about about our imperial motivations.  So will Iran become the flashpoint that re-ignites the cold war? What would the effect of such a war be on our national and local economy? Not exactly topics that the main stream media is covering now, are they?  Perhaps there won't be any media build up to such a war. After all, trying to rationalize the Iraq war through the "Weapons of Mass Destruction" logic wasn't a stunning publicity coup last time round.

Is the Obama administration militarism based on getting American imperialism done as quietly as possible while mollifying domestic liberals with leftist social policies?  Hard to know, I suppose.  However, we can know that war with Iran (and indirectly with Russia and China) could have unique international and domestic consequences. Clearly, Russian under Putin is signalling it will respond.  Here are some recent links on  War with Iran:

• US 'tells Russia to warn Iran of last chance' 
• US amasses stealth jet armada near Iran 
• US intensifies confrontation with Iran 
• Russia prepares for a US-Israeli military strike against Iran
• Azerbaijan and Israel work against Iran  
• Rethinking Our Approach to Iran's Search for the Bomb 

From Bernie Saunders..."Ending Polluter Welfare"

http://www.sanders.senate.gov/end-polluter-welfare/ "

• "Fossil fuels are subsidized at nearly 6 times the rate of renewable energy. From 2002 to 2008, the US Government gave the mature fossil fuel industry over $72 billion in subsidies, while investments in the emerging renewable industry totaled $12.2 billion. 
• The fossil fuel energy industry does not need taxpayer subsidies. In 2011, the Big Five oil companies alone made $137 billion in profits. During the first quarter of 2012, the Big Five oil companies earned a combined $33.5 billion, or $368 million per day. 
• Unlike renewable energy incentives which periodically expire and require Congress to approve extensions, the fossil fuel industry has dozens of subsidies permanently engrained in the tax code from decades of successful lobbying. In 2011, the oil, gas, and coal industries spent a combined $167 million on lobbying the federal government. "

And check out Bernie Saunders' list of coal deductions and subsidies:

The attack on civil liberties...

On September 11, 2001, my wife called me in to watch the TV. Incredulous, I saw a passenger jet plane fly into a skyscraper and casually remarked to her, "The CIA did that. I'm going to work."  Only, when I got to work, no one was in my building.  Apparently, those who followed after I arrived were not being let in the door!  Since that day, I have watched fools, idiots, liberals, conservatives,and  so called "patriots" sit idly by while the military-industrial complex has waged war on the American middle class.  I stopped believing almost instantly in the "War on Terror", seeing clearly then what it has become today: a poorly disguised attempt to destroy our country and democracy by fascist elements who need a weakened American populace to support their ambitions and greed. To accomplish these ends, our country has nearly bankrupted itself by creating a massive surveillance state that hourly abrogates the first ten amendments while using an unknown number of internal security forces to violate the privacy of, and terrorize our fellow citizens.

There are a number of organizations and writers who cover this topic with some authority on a technical and sometimes political level: James Bamford, Naomi Wolf, Jennifer Stisa Granick, Bruce Schneier, Christopher Soghoian, the ACLU,  the EFF, Wired Magazine, "The Lawfare Blog" are some people and places that come to mind.  Every now and then, I read a story that exemplifies our country's new found identity as "The Fourth Reich". Journalist Glenn Greenwald has published just such a piece this Sunday about award winning  film maker Laura Poitras. If his blog is real, one can only wonder how Ms. Poitras puts up with so much crap from the DHS without going postal. From Glenn Greenwald's blog:

"Since the 2006 release of “My Country, My Country,” Poitras has left and re-entered the U.S. roughly 40 times. Virtually every time during that six-year-period that she has returned to the U.S., her plane has been met by DHS agents who stand at the airplane door or tarmac and inspect the passports of every de-planing passenger until they find her (on the handful of occasions where they did not meet her at the plane, agents were called when she arrived at immigration). Each time, they detain her, and then interrogate her at length about where she went and with whom she met or spoke. They have exhibited a particular interest in finding out for whom she works."

Blog is almost dead for now...

Fatherhood for two has overwhelmed me. I apologize for the low rate of posts for the last three months.  One of the most important realities of blogging is that no one pays you to do it... This means various 'stumbling blocks' (fatherhood, career, lack of sleep, etc) can stop political interests quickly.  I hope to recover some energy soon for blogging...my apologies for now...

The Kahn Academy

"I've been approached several times, but it just didn't feel right. When I'm 80, I want to feel that I helped give access to a world-class education to billions of students around the world. Sounds a lot better than starting a business that educates some subset of the developed world that can pay $19.95/month and eventually selling it to some text book company or something. I already have a beautiful wife, a hilarious son, two hondas and a decent house. What else does a man need?"


Sal Kahn from The Kahn Academy

'Gasland' Journalists Arrested At Hearing By Order Of House Republicans (UPDATES)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/blackberry/p.html?id=1246971

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Quotes of the Week

[From The Pirate Bay on SOPA]:
"To fix the "problem of piracy" one should go to the source of the problem. The entertainment industry say they're creating "culture" but what they really do is stuff like selling overpriced plushy dolls and making 11 year old girls become anorexic. Either from working in the factories that creates the dolls for basically no salary or by watching movies and tv shows that make them think that they're fat."


[From Julian Assange in The Rolling Stone interview]
"Leave your mobile phones behind. Don't turn them off, but tell your source to leave electronic devices in their offices.  We are now in a situation where countries are recording billions of hours of conversations, and proudly proclaiming that you don't have to select which telephone call you're intercepting, because you intercept every telephone call."

Blog paused...

This blog is on pause until the New Year...Sorry...other responsibilities call.  THX -RMF

2011 Whatcom County General Election Charts

Do you believe in what you see?...Wastin my timein the waitin lineDo you believe in what you see?
(from "Do You Believe" by Zero7)

Preliminary Election Charts.Standard disclaimer applies: Accuracy of this data and these charts cannot be guaranteed. You should crunch your own numbers and not present my work as your own. Send me any corrections or comments you may have.  Data  is here. I am missing 11/10 count such that 11/10 and 11/12 roll up into one large sample.  I have not bothered with the last counts of a few hundred voters. Clicking on my screenshot open office charts enlarges them in blogger.


Some concepts appropriate for the 'science' for "[registered] voter participation": "Fall off" describes the decreasing voter participation rate. The theory, as statistically demonstrated below, is that early voters complete greater percentages of their ballot than later voters. "Ballot fatigue" describes the tendency of voters to complete less and less of their individual ballot. "Ballot fatigue" is such an important issue that states, like WA, mandate the ballot order in such a fashion so that state based initiatives and offices receive 'priority' or an earlier position on the ballot.  Both phenomena also help us here in this election to [possibly] infer that the ballots received and counted later were actually mailed or 'drop boxed' later.

Participation Rates: Left hand are cumulative. Right side are per count.

Below we see that voter participation (per count) for Larson/Kremen was statistically similar for Ericksen/Louws.  Despite the fact that Crawford/Maginnis was arguably Whatcom County's the most defined left/right county race (HE a land use consultant for developers/SHE a regulatory scientist with ECY), the race suffered a collapse in voter participation rate. It is true that port commissioner, auditor, and Brenner vs. Black races had  lower participation rates. But these races started out at lower participation rates as well.

Vote counts come in different sized samples in a 'Vote By Mail' election. After the sample that counted 57,044 (11/12) ballots, the vote swung decidedly against the Democratic backed candidates. Maginnis lost her race on the 11/14 count. She went in up 601 and came out down 623. A 1222 vote swing in a count of less than 5396 votes for that race! She never recovered.  As I see it, Crawford increased his percentage of the vote in over 100 of 120 precincts in that count. And yet, the participation rate in the vote steadily declined with every count, suggesting that these were truly 'late, conservative' voters.

This is the existing precinct vote totals for '(Crawford -Maginnis on 11/12)/(Crawford-Maginnis on 11/12)' . (e.g. a ratio   of increase/decrease per precinct).  For the 11/14 count (5396 total votes for the Maginnis/Crawford race), Crawford appears to have increased his percentage of the vote in 100 out of 120 precincts for that vote count. This statistic is fairly contrived. 

Participation Rates...

This chart is updated after yesterday's misleading post.  I had totaled the County Executive votes incorrectly.

$322K raised for the top two races ...and counting....

These are the funding stats for the Mayor's Race and County Executive Race as of tonight (11/06/2011). Last minute spending yet to come? Looks like Dan Pike is pulling away in money raised and spent. Debt as well....

As of yesterday at 11:30 AM, 34,122 ballots have been returned. Remember to Vote.

The Barbara Brenner Interview

The amount of money raised for local elections in Bellingham and Whatcom County (pop ~200,00) as of November 3, 2011 looks like this:

	Contributions	Expenditures	Debt	Ind Sup	Ind Opp
Whatcom	$452,569.07	$381,527.07	$42,351.11	$22,721.31	$16,328.23
Bellingham	$214,980.95	$198,116.36	$21,445.44	$5,815.76	$0.00
Totals	$667,550.02	$579,643.43	$63,796.55	$28,537.07	$16,328.23

All told, well over three quarters of a million dollars will probably be spent before next Tuesday (from contributions,debt,indedependent support and oppostion)  in some of the most dramatic, well-debated, well-funded and (clearly) well-advised local races seen here in some time. Clearly the consequences of such levels of spending will not be trivial for the politics of Bellingham and Whatcom County. Not now, nor in the future.

Although I will not recommend any candidates for this election, I decided to interview Barbara Brenner after listening to a number of the debates. I was fascinated with a number of facets of Barbara Brenner: her self-imposed financial restrictions, her enthusiasm, her call to personal responsibility, and her apparent intelligence and charisma. After emailing her a request for an interview, she called me immediately and left a number. I found Ms. Brenner exceptionally approachable in our phone conversation. I was very interested in talking with her because among all this year's local candidates, Barbara Brenner stands out for her dogged refusal to accept political donations of any type. "I just sent a $50 and a $250 donation back last week. I told them I couldn't accept it."

Renowned for her ability to represent the community, she likes to stay focused on digging through the details of most legislation and proposals for their impact on the community. "Part of the reason I run as an independent is centered around my belief that if we lose the local level to big money, we've lost local politics." The candidate to date has spent less than $4000 of her money on her campaign despite receiving only a $20,000 salary as a council member. "Donations", Ms. Brenner believes, "make it a lot harder to remain independent as a local resource." "It is really important to me that I don't get labeled as beholden to anyone." Recently, Ms. Brenner designed her own campaign flyers and had them printed at a local business. Her husband built her website which they rent for $15/month.

Such fiscal conservatism is part of the Brenner campaign rhetoric with regards to perks, salaries and administrative expenditures in the County Council budget. However, she believes

strongly in supporting social services like the Food Bank and WIC. "Not only have I always supported the Food Bank, I have always pushed for more dollars for them... I did not accept any donations to my campaign and told people to please send that money to the food bank."  Ms. Brenner makes the point that "she understands how hard it can be for most citizens in need to access government and get services: "It's about the local level. Who can those in need in Whatcom County depend upon if it is not politicians at the local level? That's who we should be here for."

Since the state and local budgetary cutbacks, Council member Brenner has been somewhat disappointed by a lack of cooperation at the state and federal level. This she attributes to declining budgets: "When the economy was stronger, we saw a greater flow of income from the state. It's easier for state and local officials to work together when there is more funding for local services." Ms. Brenner intuits that her reputation as an independent may have lost her some support from the Democratic party. "I like all the local officials, but sometimes because of my frankness I am not sure they are able to appreciate me." She rejects as hypocritical some of the personal attacks against her person in the recent election:

"I'm a person who cares and I won't turn on anyone. People have to be able to trust politicians at the local level. Trust is really important...Whether I am re-elected or not, all you have to do is ask because I don't ever turn my back on those about whom I care about. I don't even turn my back on those I don't."

As a personal note, Councilmember Brenner has been accused of having 'outbursts'. To vet such accusations, I watched a small number of hours (2 sessions) of County Council on DVD from the Bellingham Public Library which you can do by loading a media viewer like VLC Media player on your PC. I didn't see anything that looked like 'outbursts' in the August and September 2011 meetings. What I saw instead was an extraordinarily intelligent council person attempting to get public officials to answer important questions. I thought Ms. Brenner looked like the brightest tool in the shed in these meetings. Her ability to dig through documentation and create meaningful comment about the issues was impressive. So was her patient but persistent method in querying public officials.

This election may see Bellingham and Whatcom County candidates spending over $750,000 in campaign expenditures. Has politics in Whatcom County really become so well-monied that we can no longer appreciate the honesty, gifts, and integrity of a long term community stalwart like Barbara Brenner?

Expenditures and Contributions

Pulled down and summed up from the PDC tonight:

	Contributions	Expenditures	Debt	Ind Sup	Ind Opp
Whatcom	$451,128.28	$362,891.36	$42,351.11	$22,521.31	$16,328.23
Bellingham	$213,822.90	$168,459.80	$9,087.44	$4,221.58	$0.00
Totals	$664,951.18	$531,351.16	$51,438.55	$26,742.89	$16,328.23

The Whatcom County "Turn Out" 2005 - 2010 Part I

This post is probably designed for serious politicos...The rest of you may want to spare yourself the brain drain of my numbers and less than snazy Open Office charts. -RMF

[Note: The data and graphs below are the work of one [unpaid] blogger with the help of  SQL Server Express, SQL Management Studio, Open Office, and Powershell. My work comes with no promises or guarantees. Please verify the data for your purposes. For my purposes, "registered voters" includes only those voters whose ballot had a disposition of some type (e.g. not a blank 'VotingMethodDesc' field) and "turn out" is defined only by a successful  disposition (e.g. 'Provisional voter' or 'Voted By Mail Ballot'). See the Methodology worksheet of my data for more information. ]

"Registered Voters" and election "Turn Out" numbers in Whatcom County appear to have averaged growth more than twice as fast per year from 2005 - 2010 as the population increase (20.6%)  for the last decade (2000 - 2010). Some precincts have seen over 500 new registered voters since the 2005 General Election. Whether this is more attributable to

(A)"Vote By Mail" efficiencies or
(B) the hyper-charged political climate of Bellingham and Whatcom County or
(C) urban and rural growth and annexations  or
(D) all of the above,

I do not know.  However, a few hours spent in SQL Server Management Studio [see spreadsheet here] demonstrates the current impressive responsiveness of the Whatcom County electorate to their civic obligation to vote:

Many precints in Whatcom County "turned out" over 70% in the 2010 General Election.

These are the valid registration numbers that I came up with at the point of each General Election from 2005 - 2010. There are now reputedly  117,000 registrants for the upcoming 2011 election. (The auditor's office may have recently pruned this from over 118,000...) Below, note the turnout spike from the 2008 General Election (of Barack Obama):

Where have all the new registrants come from and are they voting?  Yes, many of them are voting and the increases in registrants appear to be county wide. Some precincts have seen increases  of 500 of more registered voters from 2005 - 2010.  Many of these precincts are recent urban annexations or rural county areas. (See 1,2,3)

Looking below at the "Top 20 Precincts Increase in Turnout between 2005 - 2010"  we see:

Precincts from Whatcom County: 109,102,149,128,103,141,130,150
Precincts from Bellingham: 209,201,208,204
Precncts from Ferndale: 604,602,605,501,504,502

Venturing into even more granular analysis of voting trends, if we compare five year increases in registration and turnout of  the 48 Bellingham Precincts with the 73 ROC ("Rest of County") precincts, we see strong registration and turn out increases in Bellingham and "ROC", with exceptionally strong increases in "turn out" in "ROC" precincts:


[Registration Increases for 2005-2010 (REGINC5Y) and Turnout increases for 2005-2010 (TOINC5Y)]

Bellingham	REGINC5Y		TOINC5Y
totals	12,556		11,290
per prec ave	261.58		235.2

“ROC” REGINC5Y TOINC5Y totals 16,788 18,564 per prec ave 229.97 254.3
There are now reputedly  117,000 registrants for the upcoming 2011 election next November 8th. The local election includes a tight mayor's race, a 'conservatives only' County Executive race, a Sheriff's race, county and city council races, an initiative to stop Red Light Cameras, and lots of discussion about Gateway Pacific Terminal. Be interesting to see what the turnout numbers will be!

The Way Forward....

Daniel Alpert, Robert Hackett, Noriel Roubini : "The Way Forward Moving From the Post-Bubble, Post-Bust Economy to Renewed Growth and Competitiveness":

Reuters video here:

"We use infrastructure as convenient way to create demand...The only was to create demand in a capitalistic society is to create employment...Our monetary policy has not successful because excess supply is so plentiful...What it does it relies on is the government as the employer of last resort. ...We are effectively at that point."

Bright shiny graphs...

And you were wondering why they are going to camp out in your city parks?


Snapshots from dynamic charting of unemployment rates (U-3!) of Washington Counties from Google public data - October 2006 vs. August 2011:

From the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Total All Employees, All Occupations for Whatcom County: