You can’t fault the King County Municipal League for lack of transparency. Below is a memo we got yesterday from state Sen. Pam Roach, a Republican running for re-election in the 31st District.

From the looks of it, this conservative Republican will be facing a panel of two conservatives, one centrist, three liberals, two “very liberal” liberals and two who describe themselves as “left of center.” Seven identify themselves as Democrats, none as Republicans.

 
I was contacted by the Muni League to set an interview date. In the past I have gone in with all the extraordinary things that I have done for constituents, district efforts led, my efforts in Honduras, local endorsements…etc. I spent hours gathering things up..driving to the interviews (sometimes as far north as Fircrest) and I was never the token Republican “superior than my opponent” candidate.

After they left several messages I decided to call them. I told the nice young-sounding lady that in the last interview there were two trial lawyers on the interview panel and my opponent was, in fact, a trial lawyer. That, I said, did not seem too fair to me. I asked if I could see this year’s panel members assigned to my race….. I can’t believe she actually sent it! 

Here’s the response from Brit Sojka of the Municipal League of King County:

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow’s print edition.

Veterans of Iraq – at Fort Lewis and elsewhere – can stand even taller after Sunday’s elections in that once-bloody country.

By any standard, the vote was a success. The turnout, 62 percent, far exceeded the turnout in U.S. congressional elections and equaled that of the 2008 presidential election. Iraqi candidates and political parties had campaigned fiercely – with rhetoric, not bullets and bombs. The voting by and large looked clean and honest.

Roughly 40 Iraqis were killed in election-related violence, as many as half the fatalities occurring in a single rocket attack that brought down an entire apartment building in Baghdad. But that’s a calm sunny day compared to the sectarian massacres Iraq was enduring several years ago.

The rocket attack and other explosions in Baghdad didn’t intimidate voters; they reportedly spurred more people to vote. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi security forces – not American troops – controlled the streets and appeared to thoroughly cow what remains of the once-powerful insurgent forces. Except for a few brief closures, polls remained open all day throughout the country.
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This editorial will appear in Wednesday’s print edition.

For the third year in a row, lawmakers from other parts of the state are trying to force Pierce County to conduct all-mail elections – like the other 38 counties already do.

Sadly, passing House Bill 1572 is probably the right thing to do. This newspaper has supported keeping an in-person option for voters, but that doesn’t look feasible anymore.

Given the cost involved with keeping polling places open – about $75,000 per election – it doesn’t make sense to spend that when the county is cutting money to law enforcement, laying off some employees and forcing others to take furloughs.

Most voters have already made the switch. Only about 10 percent of county voters cast their votes at polling places in last November’s general election, and only 3 percent in this month’s schools elections. It costs the auditor’s office about $1,500 per polling place (there were 58 in the November general election, 27 in this months’ school election).
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Here’s what we’re working on for the weekend:

So corporations and unions are short on opportunities to sway elections? Radio and television aren’t saturated enough with vicious hit jobs on the candidates they oppose? Such is the logic of the U.S. Supreme Court, which shook decades of seemingly settled law Thursday by striking down crucial limits on corporate “campaign speech” – i.e., campaign spending.

The Goldilocks strategy isn’t working for the American housing market. The Obama administration, in an attempt to provide neither too much nor too little help for homeowners faced with foreclosure, may have done more harm than …

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This editorial will appear in Monday’s print edition.

The end of the year is traditionally the time to bid farewell to elected officials as they leave seats that will soon be filled by newly elected leaders. Most cities are experiencing some churn, but few can compare to Tacoma, where five of nine City Council members are leaving – including Mayor Bill Baarsma – and three new ones are preparing to take office.

But what stands out in Pierce County cities is the sheer number of seats that will still be empty in the new year due to deaths of office holders and the departure of some elected officials to other positions. That presents challenges – and opportunities – for those charged with finding people to fill those empty seats.
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This editorial will appear in Wednesday’s print edition.

Think the 2012 elections seem about as distant as the return of economic prosperity?

Think again. New Hampshire expects to kick off its presidential campaign season next month with a visit from rumored GOP hopeful, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty.

Such early starts are encouraged by the free-for-all that encourages states to jockey for earlier and earlier primary dates in the hopes of getting noticed by the candidates – a system that is coming under deserved fire once again.

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This editorial will appear in Tuesday’s print edition.

Pierce County is facing a hard-knocks budget that would send more people to the unemployment line, give thieves a freer reign and stymie efforts to ensure timely justice.

But poll voting will be spared.

That’s at least the County Council’s plan. The council last week adopted a budget that slashed 300 jobs, pulled sheriff’s deputies from the roads, raised parks and sewer fees and eliminated a Superior Court judgeship.

It also put a twist on County Executive Pat McCarthy’s recommendation to cut the $150,000 set aside for poll voting. The council took the money out of the auditor’s budget – and then forbade the auditor from closing a single polling place.

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The governor’s right. We ought to have a rule requiring that mail-in ballots be in by election day, like other states require.

With the exception of military serving overseas, there’s no good reason Washingtonians shouldn’t be able to get their ballots to their local auditors by then. If we insist on voting on election day itself, we can stick our ballots into the provided drop-off boxes (of which there probably should be more).

This isn’t only about annoying delays in finding out who won or lost. When the counting drags on – and on, and on – some people …

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