That wasn't "speechifying", that was making a valid point. Until they are accountable to the community it is supposed to serve, most of these department reforms are merely cosmetic and still entirely decided top-down. We're so used to that, that some liberals think a female spouting the status quo is enough. It is not enough. And yes, I am una feminista. I am from the communities that get profiled, criminalized and shot by police. Sawant speaks for me.

Who will speak for the Drones?

She sure wasn't standing up for the poor in the SE when she voted for an upzone in Mt. Baker, was she? SOCIALIST FAIL.

She suffers from some of the same syndrome as did Mike McGinn, transitioning from activist to part of the (eeeevil) system. maybe she'll never be able to do it. so there she is perpetually railing against the dais on which she's a member. particularly if you need a majority vote to get anything accomplished it will eventually make you a feckless and established irritant.

Sawant doesn't appear to put a whole lot of strategic energy into her grandstanding. She just does it for the sake of doing it.

She sure wasn't standing up for the poor in the SE when she voted for an upzone in Mt. Baker, was she?

I actually find that vote an encouraging sign for her, given how she indulged in some of the moronic "stop the greedy developers" demogoguery last year. As San Francisco amply demonstrates, restricting new housing supply at a time when thousands of people with money doesn't work out very well for the poor, because they'll eventually start getting outbid for even the crappiest apartments. Pretending that restricting development helps the poor is just a way of pandering to neighborhood NIMBY types who flatter themselves by irrationally believing their selfish, reactionary policy preferences are consistent with their left-wing self image. I was worried Sawant may not fully understand that; now I am less so.

It's almost as if the Democratic Party of Seattle has one agenda, and Kshama Sawant has a whole separate agenda.

Sawant is flying wa-a-ay over the cuckoo's nest. O'Toole wants SPD to apply "best business practices" (that's just management talk for "doing shit that works"), and Sawant reads it as making SPD "accountable to the profits of a few".

She further describes her vote as "not a comment on her [O'Toole], because this [Sawant's ideal model] is not something that can be accomplished by one person".

Sorry, Kshama, but in this world we're voting on a Chief of SPD to do what that one person can, and if a NO vote is not a comment on O'Toole, it's not a comment on anything - it's just open mike amateur night at the City Hall Comedy Club.

She lost me when she suggested Boeing workers could take possession of its factories and start building transportation vehicles instead of "weapons of war" - without management of course; let the workers manage themselves... or something. She's a total con artist, and not a very good one.

This is not a comment on her, because this is not something that can be accomplished by one person. We know we have a Community Police Commission, but it is neither elected nor has any binding authority over the SPD. What we need is a democratically elected civilian review board, with real powers over the SPD to hold them really accountable. If Ms. O’Toole is willing to take steps towards that, I will be happy to do everything in my power to help her.

Sawant votes NO because she thinks the idea of a police chief being in charge is a poor one. She would prefer, if not a leaderless-collective like occupy, at least a citizen council that does the job of the police chief.

It all reminds me of the metro parks district, or rather, the complaints by those opposed to one where the city council serves as the controlling board and individuals have no real ability to control the spend of it directly (like we do with levy votes).
http://www.seattlemet.com/news-and-profi…

If the voters who picked Sawant had wanted to see 9-0 rubber stamp decisions, they'd have voted for Richard Conlin and gotten 9-0 Council votes.

Sawant's grandstanding is boring. And, as noted above, with speeches like this, increasingly irrelevant.

I don't understand Anna's assertion that CM Sawan't "[isn't] wrong, just speechifying." This seems to be a contradictory assessment. Or is this a Linda Brillesque comment about the little Indian girl talking funny?

Hear hear! @ 14

attention whore