Good write-up - I’m hopeful Rinck can deliver on her campaign promises (she seemed a capable technocrat - I suspect voters just want to see results)

Another possible takeaway is that taking an unpopular candidate who could never win the office on her own strengths and simply anointing her as the candidate through an opaque process of intraparty backroom wheeling-and-dealing does not result in a candidate who can win a general election.

Concerns about public safety aren't flourishing in Seattle because it's a "populist moment." They are flourishing because downtown has become a lawless shithole experiment in anarchy, the city had record homicides last year, it's basically legal now to steal, and we have one of the lowest-staffed per capita police forces in the country. Even in 2019, the progressives running for office (Herbold, Lewis for example) ran on increasing policing. But they were lying and jumped on the glorious revolution bandwagon as soon as possible... and then got deservedly replaced. When people find out that AMR is lying about concern for public safety, they will replace her too.

If you want to use city government as a corrupt redistribution tool as Seattle progressives do, you need to bite the bullet and keep the streets safe and clean. Voters will then let you have your feeding trough for taxpayer dollars.

This is some revisionist analysis. Progressive Seattle had been anti-sweep, anti-police, share-our-public-spaces-with-unhoused-neighbors and anything-goes-antisocial-public-behavior for a very long time until it became untenable thus a wave of reform candidates rode that in to office in 2022. Of course any successful candidate will go where the vibe is and campaign on that. It didn’t help that Woo had very little energy and also did very little (or failed to demonstrate what she did) while in office.

Goodness, I hope the progressive liberal orthodoxy fever has broken with this last election. We’re not doing ourselves any favors by spinning our failures as compassion or righteousness anymore.

“ downtown has become a lawless shithole experiment in anarchy”

Were you looking for the comment section of The Seattle Times, or perhaps the Facebook page of KIRO, dear? Because your histrionics would be right at home there.

LOLZ, as the kids say.

@5 Nah. I live there. It's a lawless shithole experiment in anarchy. Even just this week, a triple shooting down the street on a corner that I walked past only 15 minutes prior. No property is safe. And I've encountered dead bodies multiple times this year. Witnessed multiple assaults (and have been assaulted) and police do not respond (kind of the definition of anarchy?) And the shit part is not only figurative either.

If you don't live there, please don't comment about things you have no knowledge. You beclown yourself. LOLZ at your ignorance.

Would be very curious what laws you believe are being enforced and by whom downtown to dispute the "experiment in anarchy" characterization. :)

and as for the "shithole" part, it's literal. walk past any alley and breathe deeply if you don't believe me.

@7, I work downtown. Yeah there are some shi**y blocks, but Enumclaw also has some unsavory elements outside the grocery store. Let’s get a little more sophisticated about changing our community than anonymously dropping expletives in the comment section.

@8 It's literally anarchy now, and has been since 2020. No laws are really being enforced. Some private businesses are taking steps to protect themselves (which is what happens in anarchy). But the city has essentially abandoned the field at this point.

Don't believe me? Next time you witness a crime downtown (easily be a dozen times a day), call 911. You will not get a response. It's the definition of anarchy. You are on your own.

Justme1, dear, you'd best stay home and hide under the bed. Maybe push the dresser in front of your bedroom door before you climb under the bed. Better safe than sorry.

And anyone who has just now discovered that people poop in the alleys downtown must be very very new to downtown, as that's been going on as long as we've had alleys. No wonder poor Justme1 thinks it's "anarchy" (that, or they were home-schooled, and that wasn't on the vocabulary list)