Tim Eyman's anti-tolling/anti-light-rail Initiative 1125 will fail—not by as wide a margin as a lot of us had expected, but its current two-point margin of defeat will only widen as ballot returns from lumbering King County gradually make up a larger percentage of the statewide totals.

Curiously, one of the areas of the state were I-1125 fared best was Southwest Washington, in a region stretching along the Columbia River from Wahkiakum County in the west, to Benton County in the east, and north to Lewis, Yakima, Franklin, and Kittitas, a swath of contiguous counties that supported I-1125 with decisive majorities ranging from 59 to 63 percent.

Wow. These voters really hate the notion of tolling.

And yet, without toll revenue to pay off its bonds and fund its ongoing maintenance, the proposed new $3.6 billion Columbia River Crossing bridge just wouldn't be possible. Which tells me that a strong majority of Southwest Washingtonians just don't want this bridge.

Which is fine by me. I mean, surely, they can't really expect us here in the Puget Sound region to toll and tax ourselves to pay for our new infrastructure, while giving our neighbors down south a free ride across a bridge they'll mostly use to cheat us out of their sales tax dollars by shopping across the river in Oregon, can they?