It was only a matter of time, after the Democrats-only Washington State Supreme Court illogically and unfortunately legally defined a state income tax as an excise tax back in March, for another shoe to drop in the long fight by liberals to impose an income tax on the people of our state. That drop has come, with Crosscut reporting that a “conservative advocacy group has filed an appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court to challenge Washington’s capital gains tax.”

While we wait to hear whether this case will be one of those rare ones picked up for review, you can read more about how supporters of the Democrats’ unconstitutional tax respond with a legal analysis consisting of citing racism, poll numbers, and (of course) attacking rich people here… Crosscut.

Seattle liberals have destroyed rural communities in the past in the name of extreme environmentalism – think the spotted owl controversy in the 1980’s – and it appears they are looking for a new way to impose their will on our rural neighbors. That’s apparent in this major Crosscut piece on how “environmentalists are pushing policymakers to figure out how to lease and manage public lands to industries looking to buy carbon credits”, as opposed to providing jobs through “a sustainable supply of trees for wood and paper production.”

This sounds like a replay of the 1980’s timber wars from which parts of Washington have never recovered. You can read how the extremists know that “mill jobs could be most at stake in the transition from harvesting to carbon storage, and there’s no clear plan to support these workers and businesses as the demand for natural resources changes” here… Crosscut.

It appears that Washington’s competition with California for the highest gas prices in the country is here to stay, thanks to Jay Inslee’s cap and tax law . But at least we’re not number one this week, as Center Square reports that “Washington state fuel prices are rising again, but slower than in previous weeks. Despite the increase, California is still king when it comes to price at the pump, beating out the Evergreen State by 21 cents  this week.”

Of course our limited relief may be only temporary, as the “third quarterly carbon auction is set to take place on Aug. 30.” You can read how “prices in the second auction were deemed too high (and ) this triggered the Allowance Price Containment Reserve clause of the cap-and-trade law, adding an emergency price containment auction” earlier this month here… Center Square.

In what would be funny if it weren’t for the negative impact on people’s lives, another Washington State Ferry has run aground, on the very day that (as covered by Shift) the media started reporting on how broken the state ferry system is after 10 years of Governor Jay Inslee’s special brand of “leadership”. The Seattle Times was left to unironically report that the “ferry Chelan will be sidelined for an undetermined amount of time after it ran aground Sunday night while heading from Orcas Island to Friday Harbor.”

You may recall that hard landings are not new for the troubled ferry system, as “Sunday’s crash is the second grounding this year; the ferry Walla Walla lost power in April due to a fuel contamination issue and ran ashore on Bainbridge Island. Last summer, the ferry Cathlamet crashed into a cluster of pilings known as a dolphin near Fauntleroy in Seattle.” Sadly, since the “state considers just nine of the boats in good shape, and the backlog of needed maintenance grew 30% between 2018 and 2022”, you can see no relief is in sight here… Shift, Seattle Times.

Sure is nice to see one government agency going after another government agency for breaking the rules, as reported by the (Everett) Herald, that the “Department of Ecology fined Community Transit and its contractor, CA Carey, $10,000 each this week for stormwater permit violations at McCollum Park, the site of the former Emander Landfill.”

You can read about how “Ecology’s press release quoted Community Transit CEO Ric Ilgenfritz, who said the agency ‘responded rapidly’ to the permit violations” so more taxpayer money can be moved around to special interests here… Everett Herald.

Shift’s Newsmaker Interview is with Spokane Mayor Nadine Woodward, who is up for re-election after her first term in office. She will be facing Lisa Brown, a liberal career politician and former member of Governor Jay Inslee’s appointed cabinet. In her first race in 2019, Mayor Woodward won by just 848 votes over another liberal career politician, Spokane Council President Ben Stuckart, despite his supporters breaking multiple campaign funding and reporting laws. Lisa Brown had been Gov. Inslee’s Commerce Department Director from early 2019, until she resigned earlier this year the day before she made her official announcement of her campaign for mayor. In 2022, then-Commerce Director Brown had the Washington State taxpayers fund the moving of her government office from Olympia (where the majority of her employees were working) to Spokane seemingly in preparation for this campaign. Read more on Shift.

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