The Washington Policy Center never saw a tax that couldn't be cut or a public service that couldn't be done better by the private sector. Sorry, but I'm not buying.

I only half pay attention when I visit the Slog, but didn't you endorse Prop 1 on your cheat sheet? How am I supposed to figure out how the Slog wants me to vote if you give balanced coverage to both sides?

The Washington Policy Center tries to sound like they care but really all they care about in making Washington an Ayn Rand Libertarian Shit Hole.

This is bullcrap.

Controlling weeds? Yes, the city owns how many gazillion acres of land, and those weeds can and do spread to your own property if they're not controlled. And many of them are not just "weeds" but invasive imports from god knows where whose control is possibly even mandatory, like Japanese Knotweed. You do NOT want this stuff in your yard, believe me.

His paragraph about having a cop around is just mindless. It has nothing to do with anything.

People LIKE the water taxi.

Metro salaries are established by negotiating with the union. The county exec doesn't just get to say "screw it, ten percent cut". This isn't how the real world works.

Hearing Paul Guppy and the WPC bleat about regressive taxation is interesting, to say the least. I'm sure they're doing everything they can to boost I-1098, then, right? Oh, wait, no: they're not. Because in reality they don't give a crap about regressive taxation.

Paul Guppy is a twat. Vote yes. And then work to fix the funding model that forces counties to resort to taxes like this. I'd suggest raising money by selling Paul Guppy into slave labor, but that would be mean.

You sloggers and election control boarders confuse me.
You love the income tax because the state sales tax is unfair, but you love the county sales tax?

The republican douches are right on this one. Yes on I-1098, No on Prop 1.

I'm currently unemployed and I already voted yes.

There is always some waste in spending, but some of your examples are pretty weak or irrelevant. There are necessary services that could be cut without Prop 1, so while I don't like regressive sales taxes, at the moment it is the lesser evil.

Purest lying drivel.

So I assume Paul Guppy is in favor of Initiative 1098, right? Because it IS progressive tax reform that doesn't raise the regressive sales tax. Hmm, nope.

Check their website (I refuse to link to it), where the WPC wrote a poorly-researched, highly-biased brief about the big scary tax that will chase away all of the business (just like our high minimum wage, right Paul?)

Pathetic, but worth a laugh. Thanks, Slog.

@6 is it really a necessary service to catch & keep all of those non-violent drug users in jail?

Cut police and court services until they have to focus on violent/property crimes.

Cutting budgets until they only thing they can only respond to people actively being stabbed to death isn't a very productive way of doing things. Law enforcement priorities are not necessarily budget dependent. Remember I-75? Not perfect and implementation has been uneven at best, but it gave some direction. Cutting budgets doesn't really do anything other than get more traffic tickets written.

The Washington Policy Center is a right-wing think tank which practically ran Susan Hutchison's afraid-to-admit-she's-a-Republican campaign for County Executive. You guys lost, Paul, so you don't get to write the budget.

By the way, the water taxi and Metro are both funded with dedicated revenue streams that can't be used for public safety services. Stop the lies, Guppy, and quit pretending to care about poor people, for pity's sake.

Paul Guppy and the Washington Policy Center are lying sacks of shit. And the Stranger should really have a disclaimer "the far-right anti-tax, anti-transit WPC"

The Water Taxi is funded by the Ferry District, not the county budget. Metro's funding is separate from the county. And on and on. This is a bunch of BS.

What is funded by Prop 1 is clearly laid out in your voter's pamphlet. Even the Seattle Times endorsed it.

Don't believe the Washington Policy Center, the group that Susan Hutchison said, "makes you smarter"

@5 is correct.

The only thing out-of-control Sheriffs like Rahr and former-Sheriff Reichert understand is saying No.

Just say No to overtime-increasing out-of-control cops that think it's fine to waste our scarce tax dollars doing pot busts in federal parks and state parks instead of actually arresting murderers, rapists, and arsonists like we PAY them to do.

I love how right-wingers always make statements like this try to sound pejorative: "A lot of it is going to nice salaries and benefits to some folks on the county payroll."

OH NOES! Some of the lumpen proletariat are making decent UNION salaries! The horror, the horror! Um, hello, supply-siders - if no one is making those decent middle-class salaries and benefits, no one can buy your shitty products. Henry Ford understood that; if you want your workers among those buying your products, you have to pay them enough to afford them.

It's sad to see all of you fall for this infantile ideological split: tax = liberal, anti-tax = conservative. Is that the best you can do, people? "Well the guy who is telling me not to jump off a bridge also likes Dick Cheney, so I guess gotta jump!"

The reason our regressive taxes got so regressive is because of all the other times we inched the tax rate up in an "emergency". This is just the latest in a long history of failures to lead by our wimpy local Democrats.

The fact that 1098 has a good chance of passing is all the proof you need that Dow Considine and these other local pols are lying when they say regressive taxes are the only choice. Progressive income taxes are now politically feasible and who knows how long that has been so. I suspect it could have happened four, five, six sales tax hikes ago.

Yes on 1098 and No on King County Prop 1 sends a message: replacing our regressive sales taxes with progressive income taxes is an idea whose time has come.

If you don't agree, then what about next budget cycle? Next election when they again hold vital programs hostage and ask to bump up sales taxes a little higher, is that when you're going to finally draw the line?

Good point, elenchos.

Speaking of Dick Cheney, did today's wikileaks mean his trial for International War Crimes is back on?

Ummmm... isn't the water taxi funded by a property tax and not the general fund? And didn't the County already reduce that tax in order to "paygo" (to use a federal term) increasing a tax to cover maintaining transit service?

And isn't Constantine successfully negotiating with labor unions to reduce or forego COLAs for next year?

See, this is one of the problems with conservative tax folks... Everything has to be paid for by targeted taxes and user fees, and then they use general budget examples of "what's wrong" with government spending.

The general fund only makes up a MINORITY of county budget spending now. And of that the vast majority of it goes to public safety services.

So, sure, conservatives can bitch all they want about foot ferries and buses, but if this proposal fails it's going to impact crime prevention and judicial prosecutions and the like.

ok, first thing when I googled King Co Prop 1 -- Paul Guppy was against it.... totally filled in the bubble for the tax ....