I have every confidence that you and the other writers at the Stranger can help to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by pulling someone unelectable in the general election through the primary and following that up by crowing about the amazing slate of school board candidates you helped elect.

The Heathers at The Stranger have their marching orders.

"the corporate PACs bought all but one of the seven seats up for grabs."

It's not possible to buy a city council seat. All of the council members were elected by Seattle's liberal electorate.

lol at the notion the previous council represented the "people". Just a reminder that they routinely had the lowest satisfaction scores of any of the various political bodies in the state. I would also note we had 10 years of progressive rule during some of the best growth years of the city and the only thing they accomplished was increasing homelessness on a massive scale, increasing crime, increasing drug overdoses and passing policy after policy that continually failed to accomplish it's stated goal (ammunition tax - gun deaths are still an issue, soda tax - still a lot of fat people around, jump start tax - housing still an issue, rental protections - massive loss of rental units, minimum wage and worker protections - reductions in hours and loss of positions). Voters have short term memories and are more likely to blame those in office regardless of whether the issues stem from previous councils so I have no doubt that someone like Ron Davis has a better than average chance of defeating Sara Nelson however if anyone actually believe electing someone like Davis who will go back to the policy of demonizing business and landlords will do anything to improve quality of life in Seattle you are going to be disappointed (again).

To add onto @4, things were so bad that even Sawant didn’t run (and those that did only one survived).

What this election shows me is Woo was a weak candidate (due to similar circumstances like previous weak candidate Nikita Oliver). Candidate quality matters to Seattle voters - so only time will tell.

By the way, how’d Chaudhry do - last I checked Smith more than doubled her votes (that’s a true ass kicking, thus why TS has ignored that outcome).

@3: "It's not possible to buy a city council seat."

It's not possible for the Stranger to examine any of the real reasons their candidates lose.

@5: "By the way, how’d Chaudhry do - last I checked Smith more than doubled her votes (that’s a true ass kicking, thus why TS has ignored that outcome)."

The Stranger doesn't care. Eighteen months from now, they'll start pimping yet another no-hope candidate in the 9th Congressional District, and six months later, Rep. Smith will effortlessly trounce that person, too. (And, as always, the Stranger's 'explanation' for Smith's victory won't be that he's spent half a lifetime learning what 9th District voters want, but rather because he "... wins elections on the defense industry’s dime...")

The Stranger sacrifices hopeless 9th District candidates the way the International Solidarity Movement sacrifices idealistic young West Bank protestors.

@4 "There you go again" pushing your counterfactual argument. Homelessness massively increased almost everywhere in the US during that period whether or not progressives controlled local policy. Local policy that is otherwise mostly unable to deal with such a massive systemic issue especially when means of funding via local taxation is largely unavailable as it is in Washington state. You are trying to have the left hold the bag for decades of conservative policy that resulted into massive cuts to social programs when social housing was massively defunded, the mentally ill were pushed onto the street and jails, and economic inequalities reached robber baron era level.

@7 two things can be true simultaneously. Homelessness is largely a federal/state issue and is very difficult if not impossible to address at the city level. I disagree that conservatives are the sole cause of the spike in homelessness. As we debated yesterday there was ample opportunity for democratic administrations to put care in place and they chose not too.

What is also true is policies put in place by the previous council exacerbated the issue by creating an environment where being homeless became a one stop excuse to do whatever you wanted. Due to their laissez-faire attitude shoplifting skyrocketed, open air drug use and overdoses dramatically increased, public parks were overrun and destroyed and yes some people were even randomly assaulted by those suffering from mental health/addiction. Time and again we were promised from the previous council that this new policy or new tax was going to help turn the tide and time and again we saw the situation deteriorate further and the only ones who seemingly benefit were the care organizations who were feeding at the trough. You keep wanting to blame conservatives but the Dems have controlled WA state for the last 40 years and the progressives controlled the city council for the better part of the last 10. The only people who bear the blame for the issues in WA state are those who have the power to do something about it and have chosen not too.

@8 One can't logically both claim that homelessness is mostly a federal issue that is nearly impossible to solve at local level then blame local politicians for a rise in homelessness that occurs almost everywhere in the nation. If you want Washington to deal effectively with the homelessness crisis you could at least have the decency to support effort at passing progressive taxation on high incomes and capital gain in order to fund effective solutions to offset the lack of federal support. City level policy may alleviate homelessness except when people lose their housing faster due to systemic issues than they can find housing, which is said to have happened during that period and is likely still happening

I say 'conservatives policies cause homelessness' and you appear to believe that using a rhetorical switch to 'Republicans' is sufficient to fend off abundant facts supporting my claim. Almost all Republicans are conservatives but not all conservatives are Republicans, which explains that some Democrats also vote against social spending that would alleviate the consequences of massive inequalities. Using the vote of conservative Democrats to not blame conservatives (most of whom are Republicans) is really really poor form and not logical.

Finally, homelessness is still rising despite its criminalization by the current city council so your rhetoric about tolerance is not supported by the evidence even if it is hard to directly witness every day in the street the consequences of your favorite conservative policies

@6: The worst part of the Stranger endorsements for CD9 is that all the challengers to Adam Smith they support have no -- repeat, no -- experience in elected office, or in government at all. All they ever have is a one-issue platform. It's the height of insanity to promote challengers with such a lack of experience against a 13-term incumbent. None of them rise to the AOC level, nor has Smith ever ignored his district like Joe Crowley, the guy AOC beat.

As for Sara Nelson, the Stranger helped put her in office in the first place, and has never acknowledged their responsibility in that fiasco. It was the same dynamic as in their endorsement for hapless CD9 challengers -- endorsing an unqualified candidate with NO governmental experience, Nikkita Oliver, in the primary against the experienced and attractive candidate Brianna Thomas, who would have mopped the floor with the sourpuss Nelson. Until there is a real live viable announced challenger to Nelson, screeds like Hannah's are only so much bloviating bullshit.

In the August 2021 Primary election, Oliver and Nelson each received about three times as many votes as did Thomas:

Thomas 26,651
Oliver 79,799
Nelson 78,388

(https://aqua.kingcounty.gov/elections/2021/aug-primary/results.pdf)

I doubt very much the Stranger’s endorsement of Thomas instead of Oliver would have sent enough votes to Thomas to change those results.

Here we are. Let’s blame the candidates instead of you fools that backed Hezbollah. You won and we now have Trump. Could you be dumber? Could Kristofarian be dumber?

@11 -- "I doubt very much the Stranger’s endorsement of Thomas instead of Oliver would have sent enough votes to Thomas to change those results."

Then you don't understand local politics. The Stranger and The Seattle Times are extremely powerful when it comes to the primary. Very rarely does anyone else get nominated. Numerous times there have been strong moderate candidates that both papers ignore. Thomas was one.

Oh, and the same thing happened in the City Attorney race. The Stranger didn't endorse Holmes and he lost in the primary. We ended up with a right-wing City Attorney.

The good news is that The Stranger Editorial Board seems to be learning their lesson. Endorsing Rinck was huge. It is not that Rinck is a unicorn -- she was very similar to Thomas -- it is that The Stranger decided to endorse her.