Month: September 2019

Dear Group,

Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich has long been an outspoken critic of Matt Shea (State Rep, Legislative District 4, Spokane valley and points north to Mt. Spokane). As a strong critic of Shea, Knezovich has been a rare voice among elected Republicans. (Read Who’s Mum on Matt Shea?),

As the lone canary in the local Republican coal mine, Sheriff Knezovich is worth hearing. The Town Hall next Tuesday advertised below is that chance. The rest of the ad reads: “A riveting discussion with Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich with John Smith and Jay Pounder.” Jay Pounder is the former Shea body guard who awoke one day to realize the militant far right Christian theocracy Shea promotes is antithetical to Pounder’s Christian values. John Smith was brought up among Christian Identity extremists in southern Idaho and has been involved in Stevens County politics for years. (For more detail on Smith’s history and local Christian Identity politics, read here and here.) This should be a very interesting evening.


The Threats We Face–Live Town Hall Meeting
When: Tuesday, September 24, 6-8PM
Where: Center Place Regional Event Center 2426 North Discovery Place Spokane Valley, WA 99216
Link: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-threats-we-face-with-sheriff-ozzie-knezovich-tickets-71158987447


The event is sponsored by Republicans of Spokane County. Note: Republicans of Spokane County is a group distinct from the Spokane County Republican Party(“SpokaneGOP”). (The Spokane GOP, the larger of the two groups, has multiple connections with and support from Matt Shea allied extremists.)  Judging by a previous meeting that I attended, the Republicans of Spokane County understand the threat that Christian Identity ideology like that of Matt Shea poses–not only to the nation but to the future of the local and national Republican Party. There are many topics on which I disagree with the Republicans of Spokane County, but the group is rightly concerned with the dubious alliances the larger organization, the Spokane GOP, has made.

Put this event on your calendar, attend, mingle, ask questions, learn. (No MAGA hat is required, but I won’t be wearing a Bernie t-shirt either…) At the earlier meeting of theirs that I attended I eventually learned I was sitting next to a Republican who was definitely NOT a Trump supporter. 

Keep to the high ground,
Jerry

P.S. A good friend and I visited the Spokane GOP booth at the Spokane County Interstate Fair last week. Among the questions we asked was, “Who are the Republicans of Spokane County?” It drew a blank until one of the hosts, a middle-aged woman, gamely offered, “Aren’t those the ones who promote the 51st State?” (They definitely are not.) Message: many within a movement have little awareness of the broader contours of the movement itself.

At the same booth we engaged the other host, a thirty-something man who had immigrated to the U.S. and had recently become a naturalized citizen. When asked about the Dreamers (residents of the U.S. without citizenship, brought here as children, many of whom know no other culture), his response was, “They should be deported and have to go through the same process I did.” I’m sure I didn’t change his mind, but he was a bit flustered when I asked, “So you believe like it says in the Old Testament that ‘the sinners of the fathers shall be visited unto the third and fourth generation’?” 

In case you’re wondering if the municipal elections are really “non-partisan,” we collected campaign literature at the Spokane GOP booth for Cathcart, Kiepe, and Wendle and were reassured in a whisper that Woodward and Rathbun were staunch Republicans that were trying to keep that quiet in order to get elected in “liberal” territory. 

Prominent at the Spokane GOP booth were signs for “We Believe We Vote,” in case anyone wonders about the alliance between this Evangelical litmus test and the official Spokane GOP..

 

Dear Group,

Homelessness. The perceived solution depends on one’s worldview  Are the homeless mostly mentally-ill or drug addicted people attracted to our fair city from elsewhere, people lacking the ambition to straighten up their lives? Or are the homeless mostly local folks who have fallen through the economic cracks, people who found themselves unable to keep up with rising rents while working minimum wage jobs and one day found themselves on the street? 

Nadine Woodward, candidate for mayor of Spokane, has tried to implant her view of the homeless in the public mind since she first announced her candidacy: Be fearful! Those homeless people are scary. They’re “80%” mentally ill and/or drug addicted. [She frames drug addiction as cause, not effect. You’re homeless because you are addicted rather than you became addicted because you became homeless and hopeless, and sought refuge.] Ms. Woodward wants to deal with them sternly: If we don’t, they’ll take over the city and we’ll become just like the Seattle [selectively] depicted in “Seattle is Dying,” [the brazenly slanted political video she posted on Facebook]; if we don’t clear them out we’ll have to abandon downtown to them! It is a great tactic: selectively video and present the craziest ones (of course there are some glaring examples) and then suggest those folk are representative of all the Spokane homeless. 

Nadine’s “solutions”: move the police station, build a bigger jail, force these people into rehab [but she steadfastly claims she will do all this with no new revenue]. 

Even as staunch a conservative Republican as Stacey Cowles rejects Nadine’s framing (although he carefully avoids mentioning her by name). As the only member of the Spokesman Reivew’s Editorial Board, Mr. Cowles has published two pieces that contradict her, one on the myths of homelessness and the other on the “Curing Spokane” video, a production of a local developer, Larry Stone, a video Shawn Vestal writes: “…should be reported as a contribution to the Nadine Woodward campaign.” Of course, it remains to be seen if Mr. Cowles can bring himself to endorse Ben Stuckart for mayor, Ben Stuckart, a man who is actively chipping away at the issue of homelessness as the City Council President. 

What of the other view, the view supported by the actual data on Spokane homelessness, the idea that a majority of the homeless are local economic and social refugees, people lacking an affordable place to live, seeking refuge from domestic abuse, some of them managing to keep working at low wage jobs while living without secure shelter? Those facts don’t make dramatic video–and the complex solutions for their plight don’t lend themselves to 30 second soundbites: affordable housing, shelters, streamlined connections to services offering people a leg up on reorganizing their lives. 

Homelessness is a longstanding national issue, always present, but varying in its visibility and the scariness and “otherness” with which it is depicted. One’s reaction to it is molded to some people’s political advantage. Do we take an Old Testament style punishment-centered view of the issue or a New Testament view–and offer a helping hand? 

The following article entitled “Living on the Streets” is a (mostly) clear-eyed look at the issue of homelessness, an issue that four candidates for municipal office in the City of Spokane (Woodward, Cathcart, Wendle, and Rathbun) and a group of wealthy real estate magnates are trying to leverage for partisan advantage. 

The article appeared on August 4 in The Week, a sober weekly print and internet magazine. (The bold is mine.)

Living on the Streets

West Coast cities have booming economies but neighborhoods that are filled with homeless people. Why? Here’s everything you need to know:

How bad is it?
A tragic paradox is on display in Los Angeles and San Francisco: Their economies are vibrant, and legions of wealthy young professionals spend small fortunes on food, cars, and other consumer goods. Yet in some neighborhoods, people live as if in Third World slums. In L.A., tent cities line freeway underpasses, armies of rats stoke fears of disease, and thousands of homeless people share a dozen toilets. In San Francisco, drug needles and garbage line the streets, and the city employs four full-time workers to sweep up feces. Throughout the nation, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the homeless population has been relatively stable in recent years, with about 550,000 Americans living without homes. California accounts for 12 percent of the U.S. population but a quarter of its homeless, and it’s getting worse: Los Angeles County’s homeless population jumped 12 percent this year, to nearly 59,000, while San Francisco’s homeless count grew 17 percent over the past two years, to about 8,000 — nearly 1 percent of the city’s population.

What’s driving the problem?
Homelessness is a complex phenomenon with many causes, in­clud­ing mental illness and drug addiction. But the primary factor in Cal­i­for­nia is the skyrocketing cost of housing. Over the past six years in L.A., the median household income grew 23 percent, while the median rent increased 67 percent. An Angeleno must earn $47.52 an hour — more than triple the minimum wage — to afford the average monthly rent of $2,471. As a result, one-third of renters qualify as “severely rent burdened,” meaning they spend at least half of their income on housing. In those circumstances, an unexpected cost or job loss can quickly result in people failing to pay the rent and landing on the street. For every 2 percent increase in L.A. rent, 4,227 people are likely to become homeless, according to the real estate database Zillow. In Oakland, one of the Bay Area’s most rapidly gentrifying cities, homelessness has exploded by 47 percent since 2017. Across the bridge in San Francisco, the median one-bedroom apartment now rents for $3,690 per month.

Are there other factors?
The cities’ temperate climates make it possible for people to live outdoors. Spending nights on the street can be nearly impossible during New York City’s cold winters, which helps explain why just 5 percent of the city’s homeless population is unsheltered. (The Big Apple houses more than 61,000 people every night in about 745 shelters.) Seventy-five percent of L.A.’s homeless are unsheltered, as are about 70 percent in San Francisco. San Francisco recently designated a city-owned parking lot for people living out of vans and RVs, allowing them to stay in this “triage lot” for up to 90 days. In 2007, Los Angeles officials agreed to stop enforcing an ordinance banning sleeping on the sidewalk. That allows as many as 10,000 people to live in the 50-block district known as Skid Row, a dystopian encampment where assaults and robberies run rampant.

What is the impact of drug use?
Drug abuse can be either a cause or a consequence of homelessness. Some people lose jobs and homes because of addiction, while others land on the street first and become drug abusers to blot out the shame and misery of their lives. That’s why dealers brazenly target homeless encampments. In Seattle, city officials say that the majority of homeless people are hooked on opioids. Among the unsheltered, 80 percent are believed to have a substance-abuse disorder. In Los Angeles, some homeless people smoke crystal meth to stay awake at night so they can fend off thieves and assailants. [This 80 percent is a pseudo-statistic from an unidentified source, an impression presented as a statistic, the same number Nadine Woodward persistently quotes.] San Francisco employs a crew to pick up used syringes 12 hours a day, collecting more than 140,000 in the past year.

What can be done?
Municipalities already are spending a lot of money on the problem. Private and public organizations in the Seattle metro area spend $1 billion each year fighting ­homelessness — nearly $88,000 for every homeless person. Last year Los Angeles spent $619 million to bring 20,000 people off the streets, largely thanks to a sales tax passed in 2017. A year earlier, L.A. voters overwhelmingly approved raising property taxes to generate $1.2 bil­lion for 10,000 new housing units. Willingness to spend, however, is half the battle. Building low-income housing always generates powerful “not in my backyard” opposition among existing homeowners, who fear it will hurt their property values. But without many more affordable apartments, homelessness can’t be reduced. “Housing is an inescapable, unavoidable part of the solution,” said Uni­ver­sity of Cal­­i­­for­­nia, San Fran­­­cis­­co professor Dr. Mar­got Kushel, one of the nation’s top experts on homelessness. She says that is no less true for people with substance abuse or mental health problems. “It makes treatment so, so, so ­difficult — ­bordering on ­impossible — if people are living on the street.”

The era of ‘hostile architecture’
Business owners in Los Angeles are adopting aggressive tactics to keep the homeless away from camping out near their front doors. Some are putting large arrays of cactus plants, thorny rosebushes, and even metal spikes on the sidewalks. Peter Mozgo, operator of downtown L.A.’s Hungarian Cultural Alliance, says dozens of homeless people began congregating outside his building, which happens to be next to a food bank. Potential clients would tell him, “I’m sorry, I really like your place, but the street is unacceptable.” So, without bothering to get a permit, Mozgo bought 140 large planter boxes, filled them with dirt, and arranged them around his building to prevent people from sleeping on the sidewalk. In cities plagued by street dwellers, “hostile architecture” is increasingly used to drive the homeless away: benches with extra armrests to prevent lying down, boulders placed under bridges, grates raised off the ground. Chris Homandberg, an activist for the homeless in L.A., says getting people “out of sight” does nothing to fix the problem. He cites a sidewalk outside a Catholic church where someone planted a thorny bush. “There’s some metaphor there about a crown of thorns,” he said.

Keep to the high ground,

Jerry

Dear Group,

Ahead of the Spokane municipal Primary Election this August Nadine Woodward’s campaign for Spokane Mayor had raised $182,000 in amounts of $1000 or less (the legal limit), $8,000 less than Ben Stuckart’s campaign. Then WA Realtors PAC (WA RPAC) stepped in with “independent expenditures” of $93,600 on Ms Woodward’s behalf. 

Amid the media coverage (and my attention) to WA RPAC’s money, another $60,000 of “independent expenditure” on Nadine Woodward and $20,000 on Cindy Wendle’s campaign for Spokane City Council President went mostly unnoticed. Read on.

If you believe large amounts of corporate and private money are a corrupting influence in politics, what follows may make you angry, even more so if you thought that such money only weighed into politics around national elections.

$50,620.72 of that additional $60,000 spent on behalf of Nadine Woodward came from the Spokane Good Governance Alliance PAC. The other $9,000 came from Concerned Taxpayers of WA State PAC. (The “Concerned Taxpayers” also provided the $20,000 in support of Cindy Wendle.)

Stop for a minute and consider what frame these names are supposed to light up in the mind when one bothers to pay attention to the legally required disclosure that appears on campaign fliers and on line ads. Spokane Good Governance Alliance and Concerned Taxpayers of WA State must be large groups of concerned regular citizens, interested people banded together to improve our governance, right? Well, maybe not.

Before the Primary on August 6, Spokane Good Governance Alliance, 2019, had precisely eight contributors: $55,000 from Fritz and Katie Wolff of The Wolfe Company, $25,000 from RA Pearson Co., $15,000 from Worthy Hotels, Inc,, and $10,000 from Inland NW AGC (Inland Northwest Associated General Contractors). 

A more apt name for the Spokane Good Governance Alliance might be the “Wealthy Real Estate Developers Alliance,” but that wouldn’t look good on the disclosure forms. These are people who apparently aren’t satisfied with private sector ownership of large tracts of real estate. They want the voters of Spokane to elect a compliant, developer-friendly slate of candidates to Spokane City government to smooth the way for the most profitable projects.

I would have no problem if these people (and they are people, not just some “company” as if a company had a mind of its own) if these people wanted to use their money (Citizens United: money = speech) in a completely open fashion. For example, Walt Worthy or Fritz Wolfe might appear in a television ad and say “I endorse Nadine Woodward for these reasons.” Instead, they establish PACs with benign names to disguise their support and avoid question of their motivation. 

Equally gut-churning are two other facts: 1) If you click on the company names three paragraphs above and look over the websites you will quickly realize the money wielded by these two deceitfully-named PACs derives from company interests that lie well beyond Spokane. These are not just local presences. 2) If you explore the Public Disclosure filings in detail you will also see that nearly all of these “independent expenditures” were made to companies that have no relationship to Spokane, companies with addresses in Alexandria, Virginia or Phoenix, Arizona. Only a tiny percentage of the money was spent in Spokane on Spokane businesses. Taken together these facts impart to me a sense of violation, of a takeover by far flung monied interests.

There was recently a flap in the national newssuggesting that exposing the names of donors was “shameful and dangerous,” an example of  “targeting and harassing Americans because of their political beliefs.” Mega-donors hiding in the shadows of the PDC database behind deceitful names need exposure, especially when they wield large sums of money to sway local elections.

Keep to the high ground,
Jerry

P.S. The money behind Concerned Taxpayers of WA State PAC, (the main supplier of “independent expenditure” in support of Cindy Wendle and tertiary support for Ms. Woodward) is a similar story. Of the current $91,500 of contributions to the PAC from a grand total of nine “concerned taxpayers,” $70,000 came from Steve Gordon of Lake Tapps, WA. Only $2,500 comes from Spokane, specifically “Build East PAC.” Expenditures by the Concerned Taxpayers were made primarily in Seattle and Gig Harbor, WA. 

P.P.S. Note that all of what is covered here is NOT “Dark Money,” at least not in the sense of Jane Mayer’s exposé of Koch donor group money the origins of which are hidden in a huge network of “think tanks” (including the Washington Policy Center). Instead, what is covered here is, thanks to campaign finance regulations, publicly available information. It’s not “dark,” it just takes time to dig it out.

Dear Group, I used to think voters, especially local voters, were paying enough attention so they would identify undue influence when presented with it. Surely everyone checks the legally required line at the bottom of those campaign mailers that identifies who is funding them, and surely they research the funding of the PACs? Surely people can see through the motives of the folks directing the money, like Mr. Hormel and his committee at WA RPAC (WA Realtors Political Action Committee). Certainly a well-worded Letter to the Editor in the Spokesman will counteract the effect of $175,000 spent in Denver on mailers and internet ads and then rained on the Spokane municipal elections, won’t it? I wish I still believed that, but I do not. I was naive. Even if all those who will vote in the General Election in November read the Spokesman each day (they don’t), and even if all of them read that well-worded Letter to the Editor (even I don’t read every one), that letter is just one more drip in the drip, drip, drip of material that passes by the eyes and ears of the average voter in the pre-election season, a drip, drip, drip that tugs at or feeds all the pre-judgements each of us carries around with us. There is only one way to counter-influence those eyes and ears reached by the outside money controlled by a few political operatives in the WA Realtors PAC and a few big money donors funding other PACs. That is to mount a counter campaign. I wish everyone were paying close attention and there were no need to spend money to counteract those put who put their big thumbs on the electoral scales, but I am no longer naive. Please read the piece below and make a donation. I have done so.   Outside Interests are Influencing Spokane’s Election Here’s your opportunity to fight! Outside special interests (click here, here, and here for details) have already spent a record $255,000 to buy Spokane’s next mayor and city council. Their primary goal is to elect a very Republican TV personality, Nadine Woodward, as our next Mayor. Other staunch Republican beneficiaries of these “independent expenditures” are Cindy Wendle for City Council President, and Andy Rathburn and Michael Cathcart for City Council. Woodward’s messaging is divisive and her policies very conservative  She has a blatant disregard for facts, and is using hate and fear to turn members of our Spokane community against each other. She has proposed illegal or outlandish proposals like banning homeless people from the library. She supports Border Patrol racially profiling passengers at the Greyhound station and opposes the city council’s resolution on climate change.   In a nod to the developers who have contributed the limit to her campaign and prop up her message with “independent expenditures,” Woodward has “expressed an openness to partnering in development outside the city limits“ according to the Spokesman. In other, more direct, words, she is open to subsidizing sprawl, creating more traffic and higher utility rates for current residents while padding the profits of developers. This is how she will  “preserve what’s made Spokane so great,” Sound familiar?  It’s critical that the progressive community fight back! We need to fight back against these outside influences on this election and make sure we elect Ben Stuckart for Mayor and help progressives up and down the ballot to win. Spokane is a progressive city where Rep. McMorris Rodgers lost by 17 points in 2018. We know that when we work together, we can win these critical races for the future of our community.  Here’s how we fight back! Fuse, is working with a strong coalition of progressive partners locally to counter these big businesses. Partners include the Firefighters, Planned Parenthood, SEIU, Washington Conservation Voters, other labor union and many individuals.The goal for this project is to raise at least $200,000 to educate voters about the candidates and mobilize progressives to vote. The campaign will include polling our community on key issues, developing the most effective messaging based on the polling, and implementing the most powerful communication plan possible with the available funding. We can’t do it without your support!  Donate here to make sure special interests aren’t running our city in 2020.  Fuse will cover 100% of the overhead so that all of your money will fund the campaign to connect with voters directly.  Please share this with your friends and family who don’t want outside interests to influence the direction of our great city. Thanks for all you do!  Jim and the entire team at Fuse   P.S. Also, go to the Progressive Voters Guide to get the best information on all the elections in Spokane.  Keep to the high ground, Jerry

Dear Group, We know that the WA Realtors PAC has spent $175,000 in “independent expenditures” hoping to buy a place on the November General Election ballot for four candidates: Nadine Woodward, Cindy Wendle, Andy Rathbun, and Michael Cathcart. We know that nearly 2/3 of the that money ($117,132.70) came from PAC donors with addresses outside Spokane and Spokane Valley. We know that every penny of the money WA Realtors PAC spent went to “Access Marketing” in Denver, Colorado for internet and print media. Not a penny benefitted a Spokane firm.  What do they think they’re buying? Here’s the official version found in the Spokesman: The impetus behind the spike in campaign activity is addressing “a crisis with housing availability and affordability,” according to Tom Hormel, chair of the WA Realtors PAC and a member of the Spokane Association of Realtors’ government affairs committee. “That’s why we’re playing big this year,” Hormel said. “We took an opportunity to change the face of the City Council to help get us out of this crisis.”   Ben Stuckart, Breean Beggs, and a majority of the City Council have been promoting infill housing, the revitalization of Spokane neighborhoods, and public/private partnerships to provide affordable housing for years. Ignoring their efforts, Tom Hormel offers the self-serving idea that only the Realtors’ (and Developers’) candidates can make Spokane housing available and affordable. Horse manure. (We’ll explore Mr. Hormel’s premise in a later post.) How did it happen that the Washington Realtors Political Action Committee (WA RPAC) was induced to spend so much money from outside Spokane to take over the Spokane City Council and retain the Spokane Mayorship? What’s the connection? Let’s look at the details. WA Realtors PAC is just Washington state’s arm of a rich lobbying and political influence network under the umbrella of the National Association of Realtors (NAR). At a national level the Political Action Committee of NAR (the National Association of Realtors PAC, often abbreviated RPAC), spent more money on the federal midterm elections in 2014 than any other PAC. The National Rifle Association didn’t even make the top ten, but its spending gets a lot more news. Why? Nationally and traditionally, RPAC has supported both Republican and Democratic candidates who the leaders of RPAC felt were most aligned with RPAC’s goals. When a national trade union of realtors and developers (that’s what NAR’s RPAC functionally is, of course) sprinkles money over both sides of the aisle it doesn’t make news. (The NRA, by contrast, is essentially a combative wing of the Republican Party–so NRA spending raises eyebrows.) What feels new here in Spokane is the realtors and developers weighing in with big bucks in support of slate of Republican/Libertarian candidates. (Anyone who thinks the municipal elections are really “non-partisan” is not paying attention.) To understand how that $175,000 came to the Spokane municipal primary elections one needs to get clear on the players. The abbreviations and relationships among the Realtors and their PACs get confusing really fast. First we have SAR, WAR, and NAR, the Spokane, Washington, and National Associations of Realtors, respectively. (WAR is now officially WR, Washington REALTORS. Apparently, the WAR acronym was too suggestive.) Think of each of these as a trade union wielding influence at three levels of government on behalf of developers, bankers, and other real estate people. The Spokane Association of Realtors (SAR) does not have its own political action committee. The $175,000 spent in Denver to influence the Spokane municipal primaries came from the state-level WA Realtors PAC.*  WA Realtors PAC, according to PDC filings as of August 30, has a total cash balance of $2,013,664.05. Only $58,000 of that 2 million dollars came this year from contributors with addresses in Spokane or Spokane Valley. WA Realtors PAC has spent only $300,926.67 of that 2 million. That does not include the 175K we’ve been talking about. At the WA Public Disclosure Commission website that $175,044.20 spent in Denver on the Spokane elections appears as Debt, not yet an actual expenditure. Who at the WA Realtors PAC directed the organization to incur that debt? Tom Hormel, the man who claims the $175K was spent to “address the housing crisis” in Spokane, has all the political and trade connections to direct this extraordinary election purchase. He is 1) the Chair of the WA Realtors PAC, 2) a member of the Spokane Association of Realtors’ government affairs committee, 3) 1st Vice President at Washington Realtors (state wide), and 4) a real estate broker with REMAX in Spokane. He has a foot in every camp. As a member of the Spokane Association of Realtors Government Affairs Committee, Mr. Hormel is involved in SAR’s interviewing of candidates for endorsements. In the context of the Government Affairs Committee, Mr. Hormel interacts with Michael Cathcart (a developer, not a realtor) who frequently sits in on committee meetings. (Cathcart is the recent second place finisher in the Spokane City Council Primary Election (to the far right Mike Fagan acolyte, Tim Benn) in NE Spokane (City of Spokane Election District 1). Cathcart’s campaign was the beneficiary of $9615.78 of “independent expenditures” (a 40% premium on Mr. Cathcart’s official campaign coffers) from the Tom Hormel-chaired WA Realtors PAC. I am not suggesting anyone could “prove” that WA Realtors PAC’s $9615.78 expenditure was not independent. I am sure no mention of PAC money expenditures is made in open meeting of the SAR Government Affairs Committee. I am only pointing out that intertwining personal relationships between candidates and the man most responsible for WA RPAC incurring 175K of debt make the word “independent” a bit of a joke.  Why so much money to support these particular four candidates? To be continued… Keep to the high ground, Jerry *Confusingly, both the WA Realtors PAC and the National Association of Realtors PAC are referred to by the members of WR and NAR as “RPAC,” even though technically they are different entities. WA RPAC reports to the Washington State Public Disclosure Commission. The National  RPAC reports to the Federal Election Commission. (Click the names to go to their Commission listings.)  P.S. It gets even better: Tom Hormel’s official city of residence for the purposes of the PDC is Spokane Valley. We have a man who is not even a resident of the City of Spokane while he is instrumental in trying to buy its elections using what is mostly other people’s money. P.P.S. Of that roughly $58,000 from residents of Spokane and Spokane Valley $36,995 came in donations of $35 each from 1057 of the roughly 2200 dues paying members of the Spokane Association of Realtors (SAR). Mostly these are local realtors who simply check-marked the “donate $35 to RPAC” button when they renewed their memberships. Many had no idea they would be supporting a tight slate of Republican candidates for these nominally “non-partisan” positions. I’ve asked them. When one is a member of an organization like SAR (or any other organization) and one checkmarks the PAC donation box, you run the risk of your money supporting candidates you wouldn’t vote for. People like Tom Hormel get to leverage their influence using your money. Message: get involved, pay attention.

I posted this first on Monday, August 26 after the weekend the stories appeared in the local media. Since the Fair opens today (and since I was supposedly on vacation when I wrote this), I am posting it again, as promised, preceded by a few notes on subsequent developments.

Preface: 

It looks like the State of Liberty people will have their booth at the Interstate Fair despite the uproar. Surely they hope to capitalize on extra publicity to convince new passersby that a 51st State is a grand idea. 

On September 2, an unnamed writer for Liberty State railed on the Liberty State Facebook page in response to Chad Sokol’s August 24th article in the Spokesman. Sokol’s article raised the issue of Liberty State’s Spokane Interstate Fair Booth. The “Response” is a curious read (click here). Its essence is to state that the facts of Sokol’s article  “were simply wrong. It was replete with factual errors, distortions, misquotes, and one-sided reporting.” That is quite a sense of umbrage which the writer backs up with…nothing. No rebuttal. No counteracts. Nothing. I have to take this writer’s “Response to Media Reporting” as a wordy version of yelling “Fake News!” It is an effort to whip up the faithful.

Ms. Holaday (the likely writer of the “Response”) took her case to a news conference the group held in Moses Lake Wednesday evening, Sept 4. Chad Sokol reported on it. I encourage you to click and read Sokol’s front page article from the Wednesday, Sept 5, Spokesman, “Liberty state proponents push plan to secede from Washington at Moses Lake press conference” Before reading it you might want to review my original post below detailing Rene Holaday’s writing and connections. Her Moses Lake presentation, I think you will agree, is a model for those wishing to downplay their origins and associations. 

My favorite quote from Sokol’s article on the Moses Lake news conference::

“When both [the west and east sides of the State of Washington] are a plague to each other because of natural cultural differences, and both would be much happier without the other, there’s only one solution that works very well for both sides,” she [Holaday] said. “And that is the amiable formation of the new state of Liberty that both sides agree would be the best win-win situation.”

For the purpose of the news conference, Holladay is framing the formation of her 51st State as a fancifully amicable divorce upon which we’ll all agree. Ridiculous. In a less public forum her passionate statement was, “It’s either going to be bloodshed or Liberty state!” This is a restatement of the Bundy family’s motto, “Whatever it takes…” Both statements skate at the margin of sedition. (Several of Bundy’s followers have certainly taken it that way and gone on to acts of rebellion; topic for another day.) I bring up the Bundy clan here since many 51st Staters, including Matt Shea, are intertwined with the family.

Stop by their booth. Ask questions. See what they’ll reveal. 

Read on for more detail on Rene Holladay and the booth at the Fair. 

AUGUST 26th POST: REDUX COPIED (UNCHANGED): 

Dear Group,

The Spokane County Interstate Fair runs from today, Friday, September 6, to Sunday, September 15. Matt Shea and his theocratic 51st Staters (State of Liberty) have reserved a booth at the Fair. That has become the subject of controversy. At the booth they will soft peddle the theocratic, revolutionary side of their idea. Surely, if you stop at the booth, you will hear talk of the “conservatism” of eastern Washington and how “we” in eastern Washington are always voted down by those terrible liberals on the west side of the state. You will hear how a 51st State (to be composed of what is now Washingotn east of the Cascades and, maybe, just maybe, parts of Idaho, Oregon, and Montana) will give “us” conservatives a greater voice. Everything presented will sound oh so reasonable to the average moderate conservative unfamiliar with the theocratic, militant background of this movement. 

Please click and read the Spokesman article by Chad Sokol “51st state supporters reserve booth at Spokane County Interstate Fair, draw scrutiny” from Saturday, August 24th. I want to provide a little background. René Holaday, aka Lady Liberty, hosts a “Liberty State Radio” podcast. Take a moment and listen to her introductory broadcast at the RedoubtNews.com website, “Liberty State Radio – Episode 19-01 – Intro” (If you’ve never heard of the “American Redoubt,” it is time. It is the descendant of the Aryan Nations. It has grown fat on electronic media in the Inland Northwest while we slept.)

Ms. Holaday in her podcast is far clearer than the folks who man the booth at the county fair will likely be. She is indeed the author of a book. The synopsis of the book at Amazon is a mandatory read: “The Perils of Sustainable Development.” The book taps right in to themes you can hear on youtube and from many pulpits in Evangelical churches: the evils of the United Nations, the “New World Order,” the threat to our “liberty.” Implied, but not quite stated, is the underlying sense of a grand, evil conspiracy against “us,” the chosen people. Be afraid, get ready to fight, the forces of evil are gathering against the Chosen, the End Times are nigh!

Ms. Holaday was recently fired from her position as legislative aide to Matt Shea. A less than careful reader of Sokol’s Spokesman article might suspect a rift between Shea and Holaday. Not so. As Daniel Walters explains in lengthy detail in an Inlander article referenced in the Spokesman, Holiday was not fired by Shea, but by Chief Clerk’s Office of the Washington State House of Representatives. She was fired for her involvement in Liberty State rallies. (Read the Inlander article. It provides a lot of detail.)

Holaday’s statement at the Liberty State rally last May, “It’s either going to be bloodshed or Liberty State.” was published in the Spokesman. Walters, of the Inlander, pressed Holaday for an explanation:

“What we’re doing with Liberty state, we’re offering a peaceful option of dividing the state rather than having to defend your rights in whatever way you decide you might need to,” Holaday says. “How much illegal stuff can be done before people can start feeling like they’re cornered? That’s why this Liberty state [proposal] is so awesome. It gives people the peaceful option and a legal way out where they’re not forced into that corner.”

Read that again: “..peaceful option…rather than having to defend your rights in whatever way you decide you might need to.” Holaday is just restating her “bloodshed” comment in different words. Wow. It’s Liberty State or armed revolution for her! This is scary stuff, well beyond just participating in a rally (the ostensible reason for the Chief Clerk to fire her). Notice that Shea, who routinely refuses to talk to the “godless” media, is mum.

Some might argue to “simply ignore them and they’ll go away.” It is way beyond that. In this era of organizing and propagandizing electronically, Holaday, Shea, Fagan, Benn, the Redoubters in North Idaho and all their fellow travelers have stolen the march while most us have slept. The Aryan Nations did not go away because they were ignored. Neither will their descendants. It is time to educate ourselves on the ideology of this movement, expose the candidates and elected officials who endorse it, shun them, and vote them out of office. People who tote assault weapons, train youth in “biblical warfare,” and threaten bloodshed if they don’t get their 51st State have no business with a booth at the County Fair.

Go to http://chng.it/pGgbbXddx7 and sign the petition. 

Please share widely. 

Keep to the high ground,

Jerry

This is quite a story, but it’s long. The plea is to help out a great progressive candidate settle campaign debt. Think of this as an email version of GoFundMe .(Except this isn’t “Me”) Click here to donate.

Dear Group,

I supported Naghmana Sherazi‘s candidacy for Spokane City Council, Position 1 of District 1 (NE Spokane, N of I-90, E of Division, i.e. Hillyard plus). This seat was just vacated by the hard right Mike Fagan. Fagan term limited out of the seat after two 4 year terms. However, do not conclude District 1 is all Matt Shea-style hard-right Republican. Consider that the other City Council seat from District 1 is occupied by Kate Burke, one of the most progressive voices on the City Council. (Kate was elected to her seat in 2917 over Tim Benn, an acolyte of Fagan, 4799 to 3430 votes.) 

Spokane District 1, while containing nearly the same population, consistently lags the other two City of Spokane Districts in civic engagement in voting. For example, in this August’s Primary election only slightly more than 9000 votes were cast in District 1 in contrast to roughly 16,000 and 18,000 in the other two districts. In District 1, even more so than the rest of Spokane, elections are determined by the level of voter motivation to actually cast a ballot.

I met Naghmana Sherazi at several local functions and fundraisers. She is bright, energetic, personable, and embedded in local community service organizations. (Click on her name above to read her bio.) I expected her story would resonate at the doorstep with registered voters who had been too discouraged or pre-occupied with making ends meet to participate in previous local primary elections. I knew she was committed to meeting as many of these voters as possible. Indeed, over the Primary campaign she knocked on over 6,000 doors. Kate Burke’s success against Tim Benn for the other District 1 seat in 2017 offered a lot of hope.

So what happened?

Running for office is complicated, even on a local level. It requires attention to accounting detail, website development and management, fundraising, and hours and hours knocking on doors and talking with potential voters. Even local candidacy is not for the naive, disorganized, or faint of heart. With help and encouragement from Emerge Washington, a group dedicated to helping progressive women run for office, Naghmana filed with the Public Disclosure Commission (PDC) on March 14th. 

Jerrall Haynes, a sitting member of the Spokane School District 81 School Board, filed with the PDC nine days later on March 23. Another progressive-leaning candidate with diversity credentials, Jerrall trailed Naghmana in fundraising (12K to Naghmana’s 21K) but persisted in his candidacy. The local Democratic Party, faced with limited funds and two appealing candidates, stood back and waited for the results of the Primary. 

Meanwhile, the two main Republican candidates for the District 1 seat, Michael Cathcart and Tim Benn, filed with the PDC on May 20 and May 29. two months after Naghmana and Jerrall. Benn is Mike Fagan’s protege. Cathcart is a builder who, among other things, sits in on the Governmental Affairs Committee meetings of the Spokane Association of Realtors, the group whose “independent” PAC spent $9,615.78 in “independent” support of his candidacy. 

The primary results?

Tim Benn     2,370

Michael Cathcart     2,121

Naghmana Sherazi     1,612

Jerrall Haynes     1,166

Benn activated Mike Fagan’s far right base. Cathcart benefited by his connections with the Realtors (all perfectly legal and “independent”, of course.). Naghmana and Jerrall awakened a bunch of disaffected voters by knocking on doors, turning out a lot of folks who ordinarily don’t pay attention to the primaries. BUT: they split the progressive vote. Now District 1 has a choice between two Republican political insiders, one with the support of builders and the Realtors’ PAC, the other with the support of the Matt Shea-allied far right. It is a sad choice delivered to the General Election ballot. 

I saw Naghmana again at a PJALS function last week. She remains enthusiastic about her efforts and sounds wants to remain engaged, but her campaign is $6000 in debt (not yet reflected on the PDC website).  A single wealthy donor cannot swoop in and pay off this debt, even if one were available. By law, the maximum any one individual can contribute to a candidate for the Primary is $500. Unlike a Michael Cathcart or an Andrew Rathbun (see P.S. below), Naghmana cannot afford to self-fund the campaign debt. She is a single mother of a teenager, living in an apartment. Her full time position as the Office Manager and Community Coordinator for the Office of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at Gonzaga yields gross pay of $36,000 a year. She holds a Masters Degree and is working on a Ph.D. 

I want this Naghmana’s political enthusiasm to live on to run another day. I want her creditors to be made whole in a timely fashion without her paying the debt out of her wages. I encourage you to donate what you can here or send a check made out to People for Naghmana and send it to People for Naghmana, 8711 N. Colton St., Apt C, Spokane, WA 99218. (Donations to political campaigns are not deductible.)

 

I personally lack the temperament and fortitude to run for office. That makes it more important for me to support good people who have those qualities and share my values, people like Naghmana, with the skills to be effective and the enthusiasm and faith in our governmental processes to step forward and run.

Keep to the high ground,

Jerry

P.S. Read of the Rathbun shenanigans here. He has contributed 29K to his own campaign. He already used his personal wealth to break open the campaign cash box for Nadine Woodward’s mayoral campaign–before he shifted and settled in to oppose Karen Stratton in District 3 (NW Spokane). Rathbun is a Spokane landlord who (like Cathcart, Woodward, and Wendle) is supported by the mega-expenditures of the WA Realtors PAC. (“independent” expenditures…of course)

P.P.S. Naghmana was born in Pakistan and grew up in Karachi. She has six brothers and sisters. Her dad was a commercial airline pilot whose position afforded Naghmana and her siblings the chance to see some of the world. She moved permanently to the United States in 2008. She embarked on her City Council campaign less than a year after she became a naturalized citizen of the U.S., exhibiting a level of civic enthusiasm few U.S. natives possess.