Tim Eyman was, and is, a shill for regressive tax pimps. The same lawyers who bring you regressive-tax-to-the-max transit measures insert Easter Egg deficiencies into "Eyman" initiatives. Then those lawyers represent the governments (at $500 per hour) in the litigation that ends up overturning those initiatives (that they made sure were defective). Want to know why a fraternity watch salesman who dresses in gorilla suits for press conferences is the face of the opposition presented whenever a regressive tax measure is proposed? The tax pimps want a clown to denigrate in order to make their nasty measures look good. PR 101.

No mention of Grant personally going after a (female) Mosqueda canvasser?
https://thecisforcrank.com/2017/09/01/mo…

Or the alleged hostile work environment he created for POC at the Tenant's Union?
https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2017/07…

What happened to trusting women, victims, and listening to people of color? Why do we want another creepy dude who has questionable behavior in elected office?

Ditto @2. Mosqueda has a track record of advocacy leading to legislative accomplishment on minimum wages, safe/sick leave for women, etc. The Barrientos incident is not the first or only time he's lashed out against women and POC.

When Grant--the cis white male landlord--invokes social revolutionary slogans and value statements instead of plausible policy positions, and trashes the accomplished Latina renter who also maxed out her grassroots Democracy Vouchers, that's hypocrisy. I'll give the SECB the benefit of the doubt and assume in this case it's naiveté. You guys (S, H, S) form a terrific newsroom but this was a bad call. Please ease up a bit on the DSA Kool Aid.

Pfff...Moon didn't even have the chops to pull off her NIMBY crusade against the tunnel several years ago. She has no tangible progressive victories on her resume. Compare that to Durkan.

A mayor-appointed school board is a terrible fucking idea. Please get a refund for whatever cannabis inspired that sentence.

I can't recall the last time I saw a Stranger endorsement article that didn't include at least one apology for a prior endorsement (Urquhart in this case).

@5 "compare that to Durkan" who spent $90,000.00 paying a convicted pedophile to entrap mentally ill Muslim Americans into fabricated terror plots? Raided legal pot shops in WA while Obama told her not to? Lied on her taxes to hide half of her wealth?

Oh but she has that one photo of herself with Obama!

...

Pretty clear who is more qualified to be mayor.

Thank God for the voters who do not read this swill. Mayor Moon, that's hilarious.

Who are the current SECB voting members aside from Sydney, Heidi, Steven, Eli, and Dan? Was Ana involved in this process?

Thanks for the endorsements, I will be sure to NOT vote for any of these loony-bin candidates. Love it when The Stranger makes my life easier.

I keep saying that every argument for Durkan is a dodge. It's an attempt to change the subject. You see it every time. The purpose of this is to shift the debate.

Point: Durkan didn't prosecute a single WaMu profiteer. Response? Attack Charles Mudede. Attack the Stranger. Make ignorant claims about Edward R Murrow or the Fairness Doctrine.

Point: Moon was on the right side of history and against car-centric mega-projects. Shift the debate to whether Moon "failed". Rather than Durkan's error in judgement in supporting that $2 billion car tunnel.

This is the foundation of modern right-wing alt-right tactics. They don't care about truth or facts. They know they don't have sound arguments. But they know they can win support by looking strong and uncompromising, and by keeping attention on themselves. When they shift the conversation away from what's wrong with Durkan, and bait you into debating red herrings, and then they have won. If you get drawn into a debate over whether Moon failed to stop the tunnel, then you've accepted the premise that if the tunnel got built, then Durkan, a tunnel supporter, "succeeded." Winner vs loser. You've conceded that this isn't about who has the judgement to support good policy over bad policy if you take that bait.

Rather than retrograde reactionary policy vs facing reality. Durkan was a "success". The merits of her goals are not the subject any more.

Instead of prosecuting any Seattle police for violating the United States Constitution, Durkan cuts a deal with them where they agree on a years-long "process" which ends somewhere down the line with them not violating constitutional rights any more. Just like WaMu, established power elites don't get held accountable. But Durkan has shifted the debate away from the merits of her policy decision to her "success" in making a thing happen. They have taken control of the conversation, away from Durkan's reactionary, conservative reality, to the fantasy world of winners and losers, strong and weak.

Do we sign consent decrees with gangs to phase out criminality? No, we catch them and prosecute them for as many law violations as we can. It deters others from doing the same and gets the criminals off the street. Durkan was a prosecutor. Did she prosecute law violations? No. She cut a deal with law breakers as a means to let them off. We should talk about that, but instead Durkan reframes it as a "success" in her work to create this great product, this decree.

Every time you want to talk about Durkan's record, they change the subject and attack The Stranger or Nikkita Oliver or whatever. Or the change the subject to some phantom "success" rather than the poor policy choices behind that. Control the conversation.

Here. Watch this. It's called "The Alt-Right Playbook: Control the Conversation" by Ian Danskin, aka Innuendo Studios. Watch it, and then go back and look at how Durkan has shifted the frame of the conversation in precisely the way Trump's twitter army and 4chan flying monkeys do.

Why is Jenny Durkan doing that? What does it represent? It represents that Durkan will use against Cary Moon her own rationality, her desire to be guided by facts and her willingness to seek truth rather than victory. Rationality and reasonableness is reframed as a weakness to be exploited. It's how a lawyer wins against an engineer. Durkan has become a creature of the new Trump age of anti-intellectualism and troglodyte anti-thought.

If you're impatient with introductions, skip it and go straight to Control the Conversation.

I gave all of my democracy vouchers to Pete Holmes and got my husband to do the same, solely because of his position on prostitution. Holmes was right to end the legal persecution of prostituted women, and he's right that johns are despicable and should go to jail. Amnesty International argues that the nastiest, grosses man on the planet is ENTITLED to a supply of women's bodies for hire. Why would anyone listen to Amnesty International on this topic?

*grossest (sigh, typo)

I love you guys, I really do, but think yer giving Enumclaw way more pub than it deserves. Clinton won the popular vote in Wash. and of course King Co., so yay, we went Blue (that's how it works unless ...). Of the four faithless electors, none went for Trump and it's hard to see them doing so if Clinton had won the election. We are powerful. We save Enumclaw, and Eastern Washington, from themselves. Enumclaw, and yer other retarded punching bags, didn't "help" get Trump elected. Voters in swing states that thought they could stay home since Clinton was gonna win anyway and glib assholes that never took what shape this country is in seriously ("Wouldn't it be funny if he runs?" "Isn't it funny that he is losing the entire government for the GOP?) got us into this mess.

What #6 said. You want mayoral control of the school board and then correctly state the issue is a lack of *state* funding.

Wait, what?

You state the School Board is a revolving shitshow, As compared to ... the City Council?

Wait, what?

I do concur with your School Board endorsements. So there's that.

I also find it amusing that the completion of the "Deep Bore Tunnel" is somehow a strike against Cary Moon, and a feather in the cap of Jenny Durkan. When we were having this debate 10 years ago, nobody was arguing *could* it be done (although given the technical obstacles, perhaps that should have been more of the conversation), but *should* it be done, and was it going to be worth all that money plus the inevitable cost overruns.

So the tunnel is basically complete now, and will be open in a couple years. Those are now the "facts on the ground". That does *not* change the fact that a Cut-and-Cover tunnel could have been done for a fraction of the cost. That does not change the argument that a Surface Street Solution *could* have worked, while better funding mass transit. Yes, those arguments are now moot, but it does not prove that the Deep Bore Tunnel was the best solution, or in any way progressive.

I still think the Deep Bore Tunnel was a boondoggle. And Cary Moon earns points on my score card for opposing it for as long as it was still an open question. That she lost that fight is less important than that she was on the right side. She was looking out for the actual interests of Seattle back then, and she will represent the values of Seattle better now. Want a better more progressive Seattle? Invest in mass transit systems... Not in multli billion dollar alters to Single Occupant automobiles.

@12, @18: More ignorant blather about the SR-99 tunnel.

Replacing the viaduct with a tunnel was never about moving cars. It was about providing a route for trucks to service Harbor Island to/from north of downtown. (That's why the tunnel will be a true bypass, having no entrances or exits downtown.) Any "surface+transit" option would have given those trucks the option of either (a) clogging downtown streets, (b) taking mass transit, or (c) I-5, or (d) not making the trip at all. Options (a) and (c) would have made downtown Seattle miserable, option (b) sounds just a little bit like it probably would not have worked, and option (d) would have caused great economic damage to our region.

Cary Moon wasn't just any other citizen; she identifies herself as an urban planner, and this was the most important piece of urban planning in downtown Seattle for fifty-plus years on either side. She got it completely wrong, and that fact should be considered by voters before giving her great influence over many other possible plans for Seattle. (Note that Mayor McGinn completely opposed the Deep Bore tunnel, and it went through anyway. His epic incompetence helped to save us there.)

What's so progressive about raising taxes on the working class?

Just once, I'd like to see the Stranger argue for responsible accounting as opposed to humping every tax increase tied to a social cause. We can help the less fortunate through smart government accountability, not empower careless management (over 50% of tax funded homeless shelters underperforming with no oversight) through gullible tax-raising measures.

Jon fucking Grant? Where the fuck is Tim Keck and his executive override?

@19 -- I'd add that in addition to being important to the PoS and truck access, the DBT was important to another leg of the the government leaders' base -- property owners proximate to the waterfront and developers.

@20 -- The Stranger is a loud mouthpiece for regressive tax measures because it gets paid to convince its readers to support them -- especially the shit sandwiches Metro and Sound Transit put on ballots.

Well let’s support a completely unqualified person to be mayor (Moon) and a city wide council candidate who may be under investigation for inappropriately taking democracy vouchers from homeless people (Grant). On the plus side, the only voters who think your editorial picks matter is the circle jerk that is your editors.

In your endorsement of Cary Moon you say she has "decades of city planning experience". She also regularly calls herself an urban planner. I am an urban planner, and have been for many years, and I can't honestly see where she has any urban planning experience. What plans has she worked on, or completed? She also has no management experience. Why isn't this a bigger issue?

Demexit.

Don't know why the Stranger thinks this is a "fucked up year" -- we are about to get a better mayor than Murray no matter who wins (though Moon is clearly preferable), and a new at-large council member who is MUCH better than Burgess no matter who wins that race. Seattle has done a lot worse in the past.

Thanks for throwing in an endorsement for Manka Dhingra, but I wish you would have said it is because she is an amazing candidate in her own right, now just that her election in the 45th district would turn our state senate blue. The Seattle Times recently endorsed her opponent, Jinyoung Englund for reasons that were hard to discern (gridlock in Olympia is good? Ms. Englund developed a phone app?) Meanwhile they (and you) ignored that Manka Dhingra is a visionary prosecutor who has helped developed diversion programs for the mentally ill and veterans and has trained police departments in de-escalation and crisis intervention, which is exactly HOW you reform a broken criminal justice system. She's spent decades working and volunteering to help victims of domestic violence, the mentally ill and veterans, some of the most vulnerable members of our society. Meanwhile, Jinyoung Englund has spent her time being mentored by right-wing Republicans (in the form of Cathy McMorris Rodgers and The Heritage Foundation.) And she's lobbied for Bitcoin (crypto-currency of choice of pedophiles, drug dealers and terrorists). Public servant or lobbyist? How is there any question?

I’m with @9. The reasons for endorsement are the reasons democrats are losing.

Ditto @27. The Seattle Times endorsement of Manka Dhingra's opponent is nonsensical. Manka is the clearly the superior candidate in this race by any objective measure. The only legitimate reason to vote for her opponent is if 1) you love legislative gridlock, and 2) you hate education.

Why the does everyone keep trotting out the "identifies herself as an urban planner" as a credential it means a fucking thing? Tell me about the long list of Moon's urban planning triumphs. There are none. She's a very rich white lady who spouts harder than everyone else, that's about it.

I fancy myself as Napoleon, so go ahead and endorse me for Secretary of Defense ...

"As if it means anything as a credential"...

Also I'm still mystified that we are cool with the security highrise, husband's super-elite firm with 2017 partner demographic looking like Mad Men 1963, etc. Moon flexes her faces and blows out air in tones that make people feel righteous, and literally has done nothing more, so she ought to be mayor? Do you people get banged by the slickest dude with herpes in the bar every Friday night too?

Thanks for the advice. I literally take what you suggest and do the opposite. Makes voting easy.

#19, 24, 30 : HEAR HEAR!!

I keep hearing how Cary is this great leader, but where is the evidence? I know she claims every single person who's ever worked for her told her she was the BEST BOSS EVER!" - but the one major initiative she headed was a complete failure AND her ideas were completely wrong.

Moon seems to have a lot of ideas, and seems be planning to take up the entire four years talking about them. 🙄

Fuck the Bourgeoisie to Hell!!! -- http://www.broadleft.org

The Times endorsed Englund because the Blethens don't want Democrats to raise their taxes. The Times editorial board has been moving leftward over the years, but the Blethens' fears of media consolidation and income taxes have been constant.

I suppose I'll use this soapbox to make a point about real estate speculation, which was brought up in the endorsement of Moon. Real-estate speculation by Chinese investors (not immigrants!) created a boom and bust in Vancouver, with the crippling effects that a boom and bust usually have. The same investors are looking to move elsewhere now, and Seattle looks to be a prime target. And the Chinese aren't the only cause. Ultrawealthy people from all over the world are buying up apartments they hardly use in cities all over the world. It's a major problem even in cities that are already huge, like New York and London, let alone boomtowns with growing pains like us.

Whatever happens in the mayoral race, fight real estate speculation. It will probably run wild in the next few years.

No mention of Murakami whatsoever?

While most of these at least mention the policies/records of the candidates that don't receive Stranger endorsements, your support of your candidate for City Council position 9 appears predicated solely on your feelings about her in/action regarding the mayor's scandal; while how she handled herself during the unfolding of that issue is certainly worthy of strong feelings, it seems antithetical for the SECB to suggest we base our decisions on that issue alone rather than helping us to understand why Gonzalez would do a better job than Murakami.

However the readers might feel about Stranger politics, at best that seems to represent editorial inconsistency, and at worst, abject knee-jerk favoritism and ammunition for your detractors.

SEATTLE+WAKE UP=SANITY

You think you are solving problems, when you create them. Homelessness. Not a crisis 5 years ago. Throw all the money in the world at homelessness and watch the problem grow. You're LITERALLY FEEDING the problem. Look at the underlying problem, which is ADDICTION + MENTAL ILLNESS. You have a mental illness if you think levying more taxes will solve this problem, unless it's SOLVING ADDICTION + MENTAL ILLNESS. I wish you luck.

STOP INCREASING TAXES
Seriously, just stop raising fucking taxes you dipshits. I don't make a ton of money, am a homeowner, but everyone just assumes I can handle more taxes. I CAN'T HANDLE MORE FUCKING TAXES. Stop increasing them. Why are there so many city workers out there making 6 figures ie $100k+? WHAT EVER HAPPENED TO CIVIL SERVICE? It ded. Killed by well paying jobs for friends. STOP. It's wrong to take money from the public to create bullshit high paying jobs for your friends and it's making Seattle shitty. Tax the uber rich if you want, but know that they create prosperity for everyone, so do it wisely. But do tax them, dipshits.

STOP MAKING SEATTLE COMMUNIST!! ASSHOLES.
Seattle, in fact, resides in the United States of America. OUR COUNTRY WAS FOUNDED ON FREEDOM, well, lower taxes, actually. There's a reason for that. Equality is important, but that's really just another way of saying Freedom. Everyone deserves freedom. Freedom from hate, freedom from misery. But you can't go around and just increase taxes in the name of a cause. Because, where have these tax increases gotten us? HERE. And I think we can all agree that HERE is NOT WHERE WE WANT TO BE.

If you do raise taxes, you BETTER FUCKING EARN THAT MONEY. Otherwise, IT'S JUST STEALING. If you want to give to a cause to help it, THEN FUCKING GIVE YOUR MONEY TO THE CAUSE AND STOP TAKING EVERYONE ELSE'S. Stop raising taxes on normal non-Amazon employees.

And this election is, in fact, bullshit. Our last mayor was a fucking piece of human trash. I voted for him because I was sick of McGinn's bike lanes that fucked with traffic. Wow, was I wrong.

Anyways, BALANCE is KEY. We have no balance, politically, here in Seattle, so shit is not going to get better. Go to the Eastside and look at the quality of those cities. I love Seattle for what it is, but when you drive down the street and have to SWERVE to avoid potholes to keep from fucking up your vehicle, YET TAXES ARE AT ALL TIME HIGHS, you know there's a problem... it's called CORRUPTION.

WAKE THE FUCK UP BRO

In the "sculptor's studio" illustration at the top, is it really necessary that the slab of clay that could become a bust of Durkan OR Moon, look like Drag Hitler?

Having worked for Obama gives on a progressive bona fide? Hardly. Obama is a Rockefeller Republican. He's never even claimed to be a progressive.