NPI's Cascadia Advocate

Offering commentary and analysis from Washington, Oregon, and Idaho, The Cascadia Advocate provides the Northwest Progressive Institute's uplifting perspective on world, national, and local politics.

Monthly Archives: December 2016

Tim Eyman’s brutal 2016

Excerpt: Count Tim Eyman among those who will sure­ly be glad to see 2016 dis­ap­pear into the rearview mir­ror. The brash-talk­ing, brag­gado­cios ini­tia­tive prof­i­teer had arguably his worst year yet since estab­lish­ing his ini­tia­tive fac­to­ry around the turn of the cen­tu­ry. In this post, we’re going to look back at Eyman’s awful year with a blow-by-blow […]
Written by:Andrew Villeneuve
Categories:Elections
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Banished Words for 2017

Excerpt: Every year since 1976, Michigan’s Lake Supe­ri­or State Uni­ver­si­ty has released a thought­ful and humor­ous “List of Words Ban­ished from the Queen’s Eng­lish for Mis­use, Overuse and Gen­er­al Use­less­ness”. Here is the 2017 (and forty-sec­ond annu­al) edi­tion, for your read­ing enjoy­ment on this New Year’s Eve: YOU, SIR - Hails from a more civ­i­lized era […]
Written by:Andrew Villeneuve
Categories:Holidays
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Obama administration strikes back at Putin regime for interfering in 2016 U.S. elections

Excerpt: It’s a start: Pres­i­dent Oba­ma struck back at Rus­sia on Thurs­day for its efforts to influ­ence the 2016 elec­tion, eject­ing 35 sus­pect­ed Russ­ian intel­li­gence oper­a­tives from the Unit­ed States and impos­ing sanc­tions on Russia’s two lead­ing intel­li­gence services. The admin­is­tra­tion also penal­ized four top offi­cers of one of those ser­vices, the pow­er­ful mil­i­tary intel­li­gence unit […]
Written by:Andrew Villeneuve
Categories:Policy Topics, Technology, World Commmunity
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Thanks, Tim Eyman, for reminding us you’re incapable of comprehending our Constitution

Excerpt: Noto­ri­ous ini­tia­tive prof­i­teer Tim Eyman has been active in Wash­ing­ton State pol­i­tics a very long time — around twen­ty years, in fact. And as read­ers of the Cas­ca­dia Advo­cate are well aware, Tim has made sell­ing destruc­tive right-wing ini­tia­tives his full time occu­pa­tion… to the detri­ment of Wash­ing­ton State. The major­i­ty of the ini­tia­tives Eyman has […]
Written by:Andrew Villeneuve
Categories:Elections, Party Politics, Public Service
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Tim Eyman quietly abandons I‑869 and resumes explicitly fundraising for himself

Excerpt: Tim Eyman has thrown in the towel on his most recent attempt to defund Sound Transit and Amtrak Cascades, even if he isn't ready to overtly say so yet.
Written by:Andrew Villeneuve
Categories:Elections
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Seattle rallies to celebrate the Sounders’ historic MLS Cup victory

Excerpt: After an ardu­ous elec­tion year with shock­ing results, Wash­ing­to­ni­ans were in des­per­ate need of a feel-good sto­ry to close out 2016. Cue the under­dog Sounders’ barn­storm­ing through the MLS Cup playoffs. The unex­pect­ed loss of the team’s two top scor­ers and mid-sea­son fir­ing of head coach Sigi Schmid set the stage for a sto­ry­book turn-around that […]
Written by:Dominic Barrera
Categories:Unscheduled Programming
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Go Jay Inslee! Governor proposes $3.9 billion in new revenue for our K‑12 public schools

Excerpt: Declar­ing that we have a duty to fol­low our Con­sti­tu­tion and pro­vide a qual­i­ty edu­ca­tion to every child in our state, Gov­er­nor Inslee today unveiled a bold plan to ful­ly fund our state’s K‑12 pub­lic schools and end the McCleary litigation. “We face an oppor­tu­ni­ty — and an oblig­a­tion — in this upcom­ing ses­sion to […]
Written by:Andrew Villeneuve
Categories:Education, Policy Topics
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WE ARE THE CHAMPIONS!!!! Seattle Sounders FC win 2016 MLS Cup, defeating Toronto FC

Excerpt: Break out the blue and green vic­to­ry ban­ners — the MLS Cup is com­ing to Seattle! After many years of com­ing up short in the play­offs, the Seat­tle Sounders FC have final­ly won it all, defeat­ing Toron­to FC on their home turf in Canada’s largest city to bring home their first cham­pi­onship. It was a […]
Written by:Andrew Villeneuve
Categories:Unscheduled Programming
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Republican Cathy McMorris Rodgers (WA-05) said to be Trump’s Interior Secretary pick

Excerpt: If news reports are to be believed, Don­ald Trump is on the verge of nam­ing Repub­li­can Con­gress­woman Cathy McMor­ris Rodgers as his choice for Sec­re­tary of the Inte­ri­or. McMor­ris Rodgers has rep­re­sent­ed East­ern Wash­ing­ton in Con­gress for near­ly ten years, hav­ing been elect­ed and reelect­ed five times. Ms. McMor­ris Rodgers, the high­est-rank­ing woman in the House […]
Written by:Andrew Villeneuve
Categories:Breaking News, Elections, Party Politics, Public Service
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Starting in 2017, WA initiatives will require an additional 13,250 valid signatures to qualify

Excerpt: Begin­ning in 2017, the num­ber of sig­na­tures required to secure a spot on Wash­ing­ton’s statewide bal­lot will be increas­ing to near­ly 260,000, the Sec­re­tary of State’s office announced in an advi­so­ry today, The increase is a con­se­quence of turnout in the Wash­ing­ton’s 2016 guber­na­to­r­i­al elec­tion. The Wash­ing­ton State Con­sti­tu­tion says that the sig­na­ture require­ment for ini­tia­tives […]
Written by:Andrew Villeneuve
Categories:Elections
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Tim Eyman pal Michael Baumgartner prefiles amendment to repeal “paramount duty” language in Washington State Constitution

Excerpt: In a fair­ly bla­tant attempt to get some atten­tion for him­self and steer pub­lic dis­course away from ful­ly fund­ing our pub­lic schools, extrem­ist right wing Sen­a­tor Michael Baum­gart­ner of Spokane has pre­filed a con­sti­tu­tion­al amend­ment that would repeal the mem­o­rable open­ing words of Arti­cle IX of the Wash­ing­ton State Con­sti­tu­tion (“It is the para­mount duty […]
Written by:Andrew Villeneuve
Categories:Education, Policy Topics
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LIVE from Seattle: Special nominating caucus to replace Pramila Jayapal in 37th underway

Excerpt: Good evening from Seat­tle. I’m here at the Rainier Arts Cen­ter, where the Demo­c­ra­t­ic precinct com­mit­tee offi­cers of the 37th Leg­isla­tive Dis­trict are gath­ered to draw up a list of can­di­dates to suc­ceed U.S. Rep­re­sen­ta­tive-elect Prami­la Jaya­pal, who has sub­mit­ted her res­ig­na­tion effec­tive Decem­ber 11th, 2016. Because Prami­la is head­ing to the Oth­er Wash­ing­ton to rep­re­sent […]
Written by:Andrew Villeneuve
Categories:Elections
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