At the 41st LD Dems’ meeting, Goldy (David Goldstein) spoke about the REAL Rob McKenna and about how progressives can win.

State Attorney General Rob McKenna is a personable guy who presents himself as a moderate and who attends civic events everywhere. But his speeches and actions show that McKenna is deeply anti-union and anti-choice. McKenna’s first Supreme Court case was against the teacher’s union. In a speech obtained by FUSE, McKenna is heard telling Snohomish County Republicans that he wants to break the unions. He called public employee unions “dangerous.”

The biggest bogeymen for Republicans are unions and trial lawyers because they fund the Democratic Party.

The media are in love with McKenna — “big, sloppy wet kiss in love with him.” And though his likely opponent, Jay Inslee, is a good speaker and campaigner, McKenna will have advantages, including the probable endorsement of every major newspaper, including the Seattle Times, whose libertarian editorial board has moved increasingly to the right in recent years. They believe deeply in their hearts that we need Republicans in the governor’s mansion and legislature. But they sometimes will endorse Democrats (e.g., Suzan Del Bene) when the Republicans say and do things that make the press look bad.

Of course, McKenna opposed the Affordable Health Care for America Act, and was, in fact, one of the first state attorney generals to oppose it. In interviews he says he opposes only two provisions, but, in fact, the petition that he helped write (and that a US judge agreed with) declared the entire bill unconstitutional.

McKenna would end up being another Governor Walker (of Wisconsin).

Winning King County is key to winning state wide races, since it has 1/3 of the states population and since the 1/3 of the population east of the mountains is solidly Republican. Goldy thinks we have to hold McKenna to 42% of the vote in King County. That won’t be easy.

See Goldy’s article

Could Washington Be the Next Wisconsin?

A Sneak Peek into the Anti-Labor Administration of Governor Rob McKenna

Goldy said: no matter how disappointed Democrats may be with President Obama, it’s important to support him (or not oppose him) in 2012, so that down ticket Dems can win via his coattails. (This generated some commotion and finger-pointing in the crowd.) He acknowledged that in the state legislature there are some Democrats in name only — I won’t name names — but his emphasis is still on electing Democrats.

Goldy is working at the The Stranger/slog, where he’s given freedom. He spoke about Horse’s Ass in the past tense (I suggested it would have succeeded better if there had been more people controlling it). He said the Stranger could possibly be sold. Who knows?

During the question-and-answer period I asked about how to build a successful progressive media. His response was amazingly similar to my analysis in the proposal. He mentioned “competition” between advocacy groups. I asked him about the WA Liberals initiative to build a lefty online blog/website. He said that it’s hard to make a blog succeed — witness what happened to WashBlog. For a blog to succeed you need strong editorial leadership and a distinctive voice. You need writers with pizazz and chutzpah: snarkiness, like David Goldstein.  Still, I said that OpEdNews could be a model of a successful blog, one whose success is due less to a guiding voice than to cooperation from multiple individuals.

It takes only a few good, committed people to succeed.

Goldy wants to build not a blog but a REAL (online) newspaper, with hired professional staff. He figures it would cost a couple million dollars — not a lot of money, really, given the money available from, say, unions and lawyers and some rich benefactors. But getting various lefty advocacy groups and unions and constituents to cooperate and share power is tough.

Goldy says there’s not much left of a media anymore and people have pretty much given on pretending that a news source can be fair and balanced. That is, people expect partisan news and views. So, it’s OK to build a partisan lefty online newspaper. But most people want to read the sports page; only weirdos like us political activists read the editorial page first. So how can it work?

As I said, I just want the left to build, first, a blog and opinion site for its internal consumption.

With redistricting and with the addition of a 10th Congressional district, the boundaries of the 41st legislative district may change. Mercer Island may move to the 37th LD — which may affect local political races.

The topic came up of Bill Gates, Sr. and Jr. Though Bill Gates, Sr. is a good progressive, his son seems interested mostly in making money and  in giving it away (though not always with selfless motives).   Someone said that they once sat near Bill Gates, Jr. at a dinner, and Gates rocked forward and backward in his chair, like an autistic kid.   Does Gates have Asperger’s?  A lot of programmers do, I believe. (I’m a programmer myself, and it’s true: many programmers are lacking in social skills, and many are libertarians, as discussed here.)   Goldy asked: could Microsoft have succeeded without the foundation and help of government services and protections?   As discussed here, government is like the operating system of a computer: without it things don’t run.