Offering frequent news and analysis from the majestic Evergreen State and beyond, The Cascadia Advocate is the Northwest Progressive Institute's unconventional perspective on world, national, and local politics.

Wednesday, November 14, 2007

Eyman on simple majority: "Another election stolen by King County?"

The Associated Press, which frequently goes out of its way to feature Tim Eyman in articles that aren't about him or his measures, has quite the quote from the state's most prominent libertarian moneymaker on simple majority:
"Three or four million dollars spent, with no opposition, and yet they barely eke out a victory?" Eyman said. "Yeah, voters love tax increases. This is just gasoline on the fire."
Gasoline on what fire?

If you're implying that SJR 4204 is going to be reversed, you're wrong, Tim.

And I know you're not an expert on the Constitution...you never have been...but let me make this crystal clear for you: Constitutional amendments, once passed, cannot be undone except by constitutional amendment. There's a process for that and it starts in the Legislature.

There. Got it? If simple majority passes, it's the supreme law of the land. School levies can pass without those antiquated requirements.

You know, Tim, when a majority of the electorate passes or reject a ballot measure, people who voted the other way typically just accept the outcome and the will of the majority. If they didn't, democracy would not work.

Of course, in your case, Tim, since the initiatives you write are usually unconstitutional, those that make it to the ballot and pass get challenged in court. Because no matter how much support a proposed law may have in the Legislature or among the people, it cannot conflict with the Constitution. It's a ground rule we have to protect majority rule with minority rights.

On to the next excerpt. Here's the real gem of Eyman's comments:
He also said King County putting the measure over the top would awaken conservatives' bitter memories of 2004, when two statewide recounts reversed the outcome of the governor's race and gave the victory to Democrat Chris Gregoire over Republican Dino Rossi.

"Another election stolen by King County?" Eyman said. "You can't say that people aren't saying it and aren't thinking it."
No wonder simple majority is suddenly passing! It was RON SIMS! He told the Elections Division that simple majority had to be passing by yesterday or else - and sure enough, they delivered for him.

Yeah, that must be it....

How much more of this nonsense are we going to be hearing from people like Eyman, Sharkansky, et. al? It's a close election, they don't like the outcome now, and suddenly...we have completely baseless accusations of fraud or ballot stuffing or whatever wild fantasies these guys can concoct.

The reason King County's voters are able to tip the balance on simple majority (Tim is apparently not intelligent enough to understand this) is because it's passing in a few other well populated counties, including Snohomish and Spokane.

When most of the other counties in the state are united against King County, they can outvote it. Anybody reading this post with half a brain knows what I'm talking about. This is the reason why several Eyman measures over the last decade have passed despite failing in King County.

But whenever enough "swing" counties side with King, the outcome changes. Many of the swing counties are located in the Interstate 5 corridor - the two most important are Pierce and Snohomish. As we saw with Initiative 912, the swing counties form the real electoral powerhouse in Washington State.

In this case, Snohomish County is playing a critical role by siding with King County, even though Snohomish is only barely in favor of 4204.

(Snohomish is not alone in joining King, but because of its size, it's the most important ally King has in this contest).

It's actually the people of Snohomish County who are providing the foundation for King County's more lopsided vote to put simple majority over the top. So Tim can thank his neighbors for what's happening.

We in King County couldn't have done it without them.

Comments:

Blogger Librocrat said...

Can we give Spokane to Idaho? I don't really want it here.

November 14, 2007 12:15 PM  
Blogger Greg said...

This is just rhetoric, right? Surely there's no one out there who truly believes that Florida 2000 or Ohio 2004 were valid, but SJR 4204 is a "stolen" election, is there?

November 14, 2007 1:49 PM  
Blogger Jonathan said...

Interesting enough, I called KOMO's news line about this quote and how irresponsible it was that they even included it without mentioning that there is no proof for such a suspect comment. In 20 minutes they changed the article to take the quote out. Sometimes they do listen. Just a ridiculous quote with no validation or evidence to back it up.

November 14, 2007 7:18 PM  

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