Ridenbaugh Press/Northwest

Brad Little

In these days of controversial appointments to high office, here’s one that (overwhelmingly) won’t be: state Senator Brad Little to lieutenant governor of Idaho. And while you so often see many politicians grappling for higher office, here’s one just the opposite: The surprise here isn’t that Governor C.L. “Butch” Otter wanted him for the job, but that Little agreed to take it.

For the better part of a couple of decades, Brad Little has been maybe the foremost name on the Republican bench - the logical candidate for whatever office, or higher office, you’re probably talking about. That has in smaller part to do with his pedigree (one of the big southern Idaho ranching families, and a very politically prominent father) but more his personal qualities. He is a rancher and businessman in Emmett, very much a part of the older Idaho, but also highly plugged in to the new and technical West and a bit of a policy wonk. He’s considered relatively moderate on social issues. But he’s not a Republicrat; Otter surely wanted as lieutenant someone he could work with comfortably, and Little will likely be a solid fit. His political skills are very highly developed. And almost all the way across the political spectrum in Idaho, he’s very highly regarded.

(You’ll not hear many Democrats bad-mouthing him; he is not an ideologue, seeming to have a more practical frame of mind. There are some Republicans, from the hard-core activist crowd, who have blasted him. But the better measure is that Senate Republicans have elected him to leadership.)

For years, the talk has been that Little be an automatically major candidate for almost any office, and at times might clear the field of serious contenders. (Had he wanted the first district House seat in 2006, the betting here is that he would now be entering his second term there, without breaking a sweat.)

But he has been reluctant. People were pleading with him for years to run for the state legislature, before he finally agreed to do it - the kind of thing lots of politicians like to be able to say, but that Little honestly could. Plenty of other Republicans would have been happy to see him run for high office since, but he’s not pursued any of those opportunities. Why? The general understanding has simply been his responsibilities to the family business and his preference to stay where he is. He seems to have no hunger for the title.

So, as noted, the bigger surprise may be that he was willing to move up. Part of it may be that lieutenant governor is a part-time job. But it does raise the question anew of whether Little might be willing to go for a major (full time) office down the line. It now enhances his position on the bench.

Official congressional sites for the four new members of Congress - just now sworn in - from the Northwest are up, more or less. We’ll see how long it takes the offices to get those pages fully up to steam

FOn the Senate side, you’ll see at the moment only preliminary teaser pages for just-sworn senators < strong>Jeff Merkley of Oregon and Jim Risch of Idaho. Mostly just bio information here.

On the House side, preliminary office pages are up, though they’re mostly boilerplate. The sites for Kurt Schrader of Oregon and Walt Minnick of Idaho are up, though, in a fashion.

Walt Minnick

The new Congress, most of it at least, is sworn in tomorrow, and for many that will mark the start of a new career, in some cases an extended period. The two new Oregonians in Congress likely will be there a while. Senator Jeff Merkley will be there for six years anyway (re-election that far out is too hard to predict as yet); and Representative Kurt Schrader looks, for now anyway, to be well positioned for re-election. The same should go for the new Idaho senator, Republican Jim Risch - as matters sit, a strong prospect for re-election if he seeks it.

However, the Hill newspaper today ranks another Northwesterner as the second most endangered new member of Congress (after Louisiana Republican Joseph Cao, whose political difficulties probably are greater than anyone else’s in the new Congress). That would be Democratic Idaho Representative Walt Minnick:

Minnick won in large part thanks to outgoing Rep. Bill Sali’s (R) inability to play nice even with members of his own party. The incoming Democrat will attempt to hold down a district that voted 69 percent for President Bush in 2004, and he has shown the fundraising prowess to do so. Minnick would be well-served if Sali ran again, but, even in that case, the GOP primary would be no cinch for the one-term former representative.

The Hill correctly nails the early interest among Republicans in the seat, throwing in the names of Sali, Attorney General Lawrence Wasden (who was interested in a U.S Senate seat last cycle) and state Senator John McGee of Caldwell. Continue Reading »

Bill Grant

Once, just as the idea of Republicans getting elected from within Seattle was an ordinary and normal thing, there were Democrats - usually relatively conservative, but Democrats - getting elected from the parts of rural Washington east of the Cascades. But there hasn’t been one of those - the rural Democrats from eastern Washington - in many years now, with one exception. Bill Grant, a Democrat who has representd the Walla Walla and surrounding area for 22 years, has been the last of his kind. (Even back then, he was unusual - the legislative seat he won had been held by Republican Doc Hastings, now a U.S. representative.)

Until now. Grant, diagnosed with lung cancer only last month, died on Sunday at Walla Walla.

There will be the usual laudatory remarks following his passing. I his case, they will generally match with the favorable descriptors he tended to get from around the political sphere. They also match up with this: A person who could get elected as long and convincingly in such strong territory for the opposing party, must have been doing something right all those years.

One of the Web’s utilities, in addition to moving information quickly, is its use as a standing reference sheet. We’ve used it for that purpose here, with information about subjects ranging from candidates for office to whatever happened to former journalists.

We ran across another use a short time ago: A tracking location for keeping up with radio announcer Zeb Bell.

Posted by the editors of The MountainGoat Report and The Political Game, the page about Bell - actually Ronald Zebell - is of note as provider of one of the more extreme radio voices in southern Idaho. The bloggers describe him: “an ultra-conservative talk radio host who leases time on a Rupert, Idaho AM radio station owned by Lee Family Broadcasting. His show, ‘Zeb at the Ranch’ currently airs four days a week on KBAR which he hosts from his home in Murtaugh, Idaho and which is broadcast throughout the Magic Valley and Mini-Cassia areas and online through a live stream. Bell’s show is a call-in/talk format where topics range from political to agricultural to promoting community events. ”

It is, of course, not the agricultural or community events discussion that tends to bring the outside interest. The tracking page and Bell’s own site provide plenty more background, better digested at length there than by summary here . . .

Clearing the Spokane snow/Spokane Street Department

Two days ago we were plowing through water - some rain, some snow melt - and barely made it through the Coast Range before the road we were on was closed due to flooding. But if it’s snow you want . . .

The situation is getting really bad around Spokane. This is a city accustomed to snowfall, and generally fairly prepared for it; the city says it has “a total of 35 plows for use, 7 of which can sand at the same time and 6 of which can de-ice at the same time. Additional sander trucks and 3 de-icer trucks are available.” Which would seem enough.

But this is really unusual snow - mass drop after mass drop, with no change for meltoff. And it’s not just the roads. The city’s web site also says this: “With an additional 6 inches of snow last night, many buildings which had sustained the weight of recent snow storms finally succumbed last night. An additional four buildings suffered from collapsed roofs this morning bringing this week’s roof collapse total in the City of Spokane to about 28, which include a mix of commercial buildings, industrial buildings, awnings, carports, and residential garages.”

The Spokesman-Review is running a backgrounder on “cabin fever throughout history.”

Another storm is scheduled for Sunday night.

Lenticular clouds/photo by Kathy Marshall

There’s something almost hypnotic about this shot we received in email today via the feds: The clouds almost seem like something out of Close Encounters.

From the mail: “Those are called ‘lenticular clouds.’ They’re caused when the air flow is just right so when it flows over Mt. Rainier, the air gets pushed upward where it cools and condenses into clouds. Depending on how smooth the flow is, you can get some amazing clouds formations. (Photo: submitted by Kathy Marshall, Assistant PN Regional RD)”

The latest Tim Eyman special is truly classic misdirection - an initiative that would, if passed, seek to do something a whole lot different than its backers are proclaiming. Without telling you very exactly what that something different is.

Here’s what Eyman says: “We have a proposal for 2009 that aggressively tackles our state’s property tax crisis. It’s called the Lower Property Taxes Initiative. Our tax burden keeps growing faster and faster and government keeps getting bigger and bigger - the people are losing control. The Lower Property Taxes Initiative is our last, best chance to gain control of our government.”

It is spun as a property tax limitation proposal. But that’s not exactly what it does; the core of that comes in this a little further down: “This measure would limit the growth of state, county, and city general fund revenue, not including new voter-approved revenue, to the annual rate of inflation. Revenue above this limit would be used to reduce property taxes.”

In other words, what it gets at directly is overall spending limits, the same sort of trouble-prone device we’ve seen across the last generation. What it has in common with those long list of efforts (which started with California’s Prop 13 all of 30 years ago) is the placing of a ceiling on governmental spending, but no indication of how those budget limitations will be managed - where the resulting cuts will be. Like so many other initiatives before it, it says, “I don’t wanna pay,” but is silent on the other side of the equation: What should be tossed overboard.

Which is why it explicitly isn’t the “last, best chance to gain control of our government.” It might be if Eyman filled in both sides of the equation; by leaving one side blank, voters would be no more in control of their government with the initiative than without it. (We’ve long thought an initiative aimed at cutting specific government activities would be a far for responsible approach than cuts on the revenue side.)

Will it pass? Maybe - anti-tax initiatives are always popular. But then, voters should see the impact of this coming a mile away.

A few blocks down the street is a pub that features, besides its beverages and pool tournaments, some above-average burgers, fries and other comfort food. We’ve eaten there only occasionally, though; the barrier has been its status as a smoking-allowed establishment.

After today, that will be no more, and the smoke and tobacco gradually will start to clear out. And we may become more consistent customers. The turning point is a change in Oregon law, banning smoking in most of the remaining business and public places where it has been allowed until now - a law that generally matches with one passed not long ago in Washington. Studies there showed a period of static business for some months after the change, and then growth - in many cases, new prosperity for establishments that went no-smoke. We’ll be watching to see if that happens in Oregon too. We guess it will.

Memorializing the occasion, a longish set of posts - linking here to the first one - in the Portland Mercury blog - touring the end of an era in the Portland bar scene.

Hard to know exactly how seriously to take this: It is marked in a number of places (seen here via the Slog, twice removed) somewhat as rumor, and yet the details of a mass layoff at Microsoft seem quite specific:

Currently Microsoft employs about 90,000 people across the world and from what we’re hearing, some 15,000 of those are expected to be giving marching orders come January 15th. That’s almost 17 percent of Microsoft’s total work force, not exactly a small number. So far, we haven’t managed to confirm what departments or regions will be hit the worst, but we’re hearing that MSN might be carrying the brunt of the layoffs. We’re also hearing rumors about the possibility of somewhat larger staff cuts at Microsoft EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa).

The source is described as ordinarily sound but not entirely reliable. But, as we begin 2009, something to watch for.

Idaho Governor C.L. “Butch” Otter’s office has released a large batch of names under consideration for appointment to lieutenant governor, the office Jim Risch will be leaving soon to join the U.S. Senate. Which prompts a thought or two.

There’s nothing especially wrong with the names under consideration. An appointee to a major office like lieutenant governor (yeah it’s statewide, so it’s major enough) is getting the office by a single unilateral decision, that of the governor, so it makes sense that this be someone who has also gotten backing from voters in other capacities, as well as demonstrating some substantial public service. (Hello, New York Governor Patterson.) And most of those on the Otter list and apparently interested in the job meet that standard. Representative Scott Bedke, R-Oakley; Senator Dean Cameron, R-Rupert; Senate President Pro-Tem Bob Geddes, R-Soda Springs; Department of Administration Director Mike Gwartney; former state Representative Dean Haagenson, R-Coeur d’Alene; Senator Mike Jorgenson, R-Hayden Lake; Senator Shawn Keough, R-Sandpoint; Senator Brad Little, R-Emmett; Senator Patti Anne Lodge, R-Huston; Senator John McGee, R-Caldwell; Representative Mike Moyle, R-Star; and former state Senator Sheila Sorensen, R-Boise, all hit the minimum threshold for credibility at least, and many do more than that.

The question here is a different one (than, say, apparently, in New York or, God save us, Illinois). Otter has deep experience in Idaho politics, has been in and around it for what’s approaching four decades; he’s a gregarious person, knows all the players; and he surely knows quite well all his options. The questions before him are more a matter of policy than personnel: Does he want a placeholder, or someone who will run for re-election in 2010? Or - should he decide not to run for governor again - who might follow him? Or to groom for another office (like Idaho’s 1st U.S. House district)? Might he want someone to undertake some particular task? But then, none of these questions really require any fresh research, either.

Otter is said to be prepared to make the appointment by next Tuesday or so. What’s unclear is why - especially since we’ve all known about the opening since November 4 - it needs to take that long.

Dino Rossi

In 2008, Dino Rossi was not so much “the man who” as “the man without who(m)” . . .

He was the measuring point, and may continue to be for a while.

Dial it back a year ago, and imagine Rossi, the photo-finisher for governor in 2004 who didn’t become governor, decided that, nah, a second run wasn’t in the cards. That little counterfactual leads to a surprisingly long list of events and trends that probably would have played out differently in Washington over the last year. Not so much in terms of overall final political results: Washington wound up with a Democratic-dominated general election as it was. But the changes would have been quite real anyway.

Start with this: When it came to the governor’s race, the one big contest on the dock this year in Washington, Republicans were up against the wall. They had scant bench: If their nominee would not be Rossi, the descent to the next most serious contender would have been precipitous. Democrat Chris Gregoire was well positioned for re-election, and against almost any Republican in the state other than Rossi, the race would have been seen as a runaway re-elect from the outset. It would have gotten modest attention, and the psychology would have developed that Washington was set up to be a Democratic sweep state this year. That swiftly would have turned into a self-fulfilling prophecy.

In turn, that might have made some difference in a number of spots. It could have depressed Republican activity overall and especially around Rossi’s home turf in eastern King County; the 8th District U.S. House race was close enough that it could have switched. So might several state legislative races, which might have dug the Republican hole deeper still.

Put it this way. Republicans in Washington are in a deep minority, but this year may have marked the end of the fall; taken as a whole, Republicans in the Everegreen did not lose substantial ground again, as they had in very election for a decade. Apart from the loss of a statewide office (lands commissioner), they were able at least to hold their own, which gives them the opportunity to start working their way back. They would have been in worst shape than that, but for Rossi; and that’s not a small thing. Continue Reading »

Among the many reviews of the year nearly past, we’ll recommend one out today - Washington-focused, with national components too - from the entertaining Tacoma News Tribune columnist Peter Callaghan.

In, as he says, 607 words. Sample, from around springtime: “State bans cell phones when driving, sort of. Democrats use ‘Sopranos’ music in video critical of Rossi; Italian Americans protest. Pollster says 25 percent of state voters don’t know that GOP means Republican. Sonics allowed to move to Oklahoma City where fans rejoice, until they see them play.”

Ted Kulongoski

In many places around the country, and west of the Cascades more than most, “green” is all the rage. It’s not just the interest groups or the media, but businesses and governments - green is hot. But how much is this green heat generating real change in the way our communities function? And to what extent might it be just fad?

In 2008 Governor Ted Kulongoski set up a framework that could make green uncommonly central in Oregon, from the big picture down to the exercise of daily lives. While there’s a rap on him that he’s not one of the most charismatic of leaders, and while any number of critics expressed disappointment with him in his first term on environmental matters, what he seems to be setting into place could mark a genuinely big change in Oregon in the next few years.

This is, to be sure, speculative. But in 2008 Kulongoski merged with the trend and tides in greening the state’s economy, and was given the political advantages he would logically need to press forward. And almost many kinds of initiatives might be curtailed by weak tax revenues and a tough economy, this won’t necessarily fall to that: He has estimated state spending for his proposals at only about $10 million, a figure low enough to slip through. Atop that, he now has a strongly Democratic legislature - the house was only barely just last cycle - and a strongly cooperative congressional delegation for the federal level.

And, crucially, he has a cearl set of proposals that plug neatly into the economic moment.

An Oregonian story put it this way: “If the Legislature approves the plan, Oregon would become a national leader in renewable energy production, electric car use and ‘green’ building construction, he said. ‘How we live, how we move, how we work is going to change.’” Continue Reading »

Bonner County

One of the macro issues in our system of justice has to do with what we do with all those criminal convicts: Are we really making the smartest, most effective or even the safest choices in locking up so many people at tens of thousands of dollars of taxpayer fund each? Sure, some have to be segregated from the rest of us, but is that the only real option available to us?

Question comes to mind in the case of Idaho 1st District Magistrate Justin Julian and convicted stop-sign runner Daniel J. Malone.

Last September, a law officer charged Malone with failing to stop at a stop sign at Larch Street and Ella Avenue in Sandpoint. Malone contested the ticket, saying he wasn’t guilty, and on Christmas Even the case went to trial at the Bonner County Courthouse, Julian presiding. Julian found him guilty and imposed a $75 fine.

Malone responded, “bah, humbug,” in reference to the season. Then his case over, he left the courtroom, but not by much. He apparently stood outside the courtroom and kept looking at Julian, in “a menacing fashion,” Julian said. Exactly what make his stare menacing wasn’t completely clear.

Malone’s attitude was made clear enough, though by what Julian said happened next: “Once I made direct eye contact with the Defendant, he demonstrated his contempt for the Court by willfully and maliciously expelling a large amount of saliva in the direction of the Court, and onto the carpet of the Courthouse hallway.” After which, he left the building and went to his car in the parking lot.

Then the chief bailiff, Mark Johnson, stopped him from leaving and took him back to the courtroom. There, Julian confronted him and (a news report says) told him, “There is no excuse for your disruptive and disgusting behavior. I’m holding you in contempt. You’re serving the next two days in jail.”

Which he did. Malone was released on Friday, having spent Christmas in jail. Continue Reading »