....what the fuck?

I know what a Republican is.

When I fill out my ballot, if I see a (R) by the candidate's name, I know how s/he will vote on every single issue. I could know absolutely nothing else about the candidate aside from the parenthetical letter, and I would know all I need to know.

I do not know what the (D) means.

It could mean a Tammy Baldwin, an Elizabeth Warren. Or it could mean a Joe Manchin. There's just no way to know how they will vote, what they will cave in on, how much they will compromise. Not from that parenthetical letter, anyway.

This is why we need a parenthetical S. I know exactly what a Socialist is. I know they will not vote to cut transit funding. I know they will vote to expand healthcare access. I know they will vote for higher wages and better hours.

Lets replace these (D)'s with (S)'s.

The President proposes, Congress disposes, so we'll have to see what happens with that.

As far as the state level, it's disappointing, but not the end of the world, and not unforeseeable. Car tabs are steep, and people need cars (not me, I live on the rail line)

@2 say that to all the people who are getting priced the fuck out of seattle and live in the northern wastes, dude.

Lynnwood Link is a must-have. The entirety of Snohomish County's bus network will rely on it, since eliminating service on I-5 to Seattle will save tons of operating funds that can be redistributed for local service.

Snohomish County has been happily paying into ST for years (and voting yes each time, with a slim majority but a majority nonetheless), and they need at least one Link line. It will carry 70,000 people, about the same as the current U Link+Central Link, by 2030.

Raindrop dear, you must try not to feel sorry for me.

#9,

It's very close to a "must-have". There is a plausible alternative, but it's not free and would cost probably close to half (IOW, the full amount of the currently budgeted local contribution) of what Lynnwood Link itself would. That is to build an elevated bus intercept next to the Northgate Link station, change the configuration of the HOV lanes north of Northgate to have a bus exit southbound and an entrance northbound and build an elevated busway to connect to the intercept.

Regarding the "federal sources" funding mentioned in the Seattle Times article, I have no idea where the 13% number comes from. Per financing documents presented by Sound Transit, the Washington Policy Center (and yes, I know who they are) did an analysis/review of the ST3 plan and published a fair paper back in Oct 2016:
ST3 Tax Revenues $27,710,000,000 51.5%
ST3 Grants $4,669,000,000 8.7%
ST1 & ST2 Extra Taxes $8,621,000,000 16.0%
Bond Proceeds $10,999,000,000 20.4%
Fares & Other $1,514,000,000 2.8%
Interest Earnings $333,000,000 0.6%
TOTAL SOURCES: $53,846,000,000 100%

I like Farrell, but if she wants to be Mayor of Seattle she needs a better story about her role in this clusterf*ck than the one she's currently peddling. She seems to want us to accept that it's perfectly reasonable to arbitrarily slash a crucial government agency's budget to pay for a tax cut on a tax that was overwhelmingly approved by the voters about 5 minutes ago.