Over at my old blog, HA, Carl has a surprisingly appealing idea: The 43rd Legislative District Democrats should select a Republican to fill mayor-elect Ed Murray's vacated state senate seat!

First, and most importantly, it would give the GOP a clear majority in the Senate. Now, I know that as a lefty blogger, that’s the sort of thing I’m generally opposed to, but the GOP are going to control the state Senate anyway, and this way they would probably not give the Majority Leader post to Rodney Tom. I mean, why would they elevate this whiny asshole who has already betrayed them once if they didn’t have to?

With Republican Jan Angel's win in the special election to replace Congressman Derek Kilmer in his old state senate seat, Republicans are now one seat away from controlling the state senate outright. So let's give it to them, and with it, the power to tell Rodney Tom to go fuck himself. It's not like the senate would be any worse than it already is, and at least this way Republicans would lose the ability to hide behind that "bipartisan caucus" bullshit.

Of course the seat would revert back to Democratic control after the next election—even better, to a Democrat with the electoral muscle to win the seat at the polls without the crutch of appointed incumbency. So no long-term harm would be done. But in the meanwhile, fuck Rodney Tom and his self-serving seizure of the Majority Leader office.

Besides, now that Seattle has succeeded in electing a Socialist, it is time to rise to the challenge of elevating a true fringe candidate to office: A Republican!