It’s hard to keep track of the many stories that the Democrats are telling about their new cap and trade/carbon tax – though Shift has documented some of them – other than knowing that the truth that it has raised gas prices by 50 cents per gallon in our state is not one Governor Jay Inslee’s minions are sharing. Instead, the Spokesman-Review catches one Ecology flak telling this whopper that after nine months, “the impacts are a little bit higher than what we estimated. We still think that, over time, the cost will still go down.”

That’s right – the Inslee administration is hoping you are joining them in being so far out of touch with reality that you will think the carbon tax is going to reduce fuel costs because of “the growing number of electric vehicles and more people working from home or taking public transportation.” However, if you have noticed how much more it costs to fill your tank, you can read how one state senator thinks this policy is so “mean-spirited and punitive” that it needs to go away here… Shift, Spokesman-Review.

Last week’s interview was with Dr. Raul Garcia, a Republican U.S. Senate candidate who escaped the communist Cuban regime at the age of 11, built a successful medical career, and now resides in Yakima with his family. In the interview, Dr. Garcia discussed his political influences, concerns about Senator Maria Cantwell’s absenteeism in much of the state, and his views on issues such as the Israel-Hamas war, rising crime rates, healthcare, and college debt, while also sharing his favorite novel and admiration for President Abraham Lincoln. Read more.

We are closing in on the last week before election day, so inboxes and mailboxes are filling with the latest news about your favorite local candidate. According to the folks keeping track at Crosscut, you can expect around a million dollars’ worth of independent fun in Seattle’s city council races, as “committees have spent nearly $1.1 million to influence voters, according to data available from the Washington Public Disclosure Commission. More than $883,000 of that outside money has come primarily from business and real estate interests.”

Now, Crosscut thinks that spending is going for such a thing as “conservative and centrist candidates in the seven district Council races,” despite no such animal having been spotted in the city this century. However, you can see for yourself that “unions and other progressive groups have marshaled nearly $192,000 in spending so far,” so lefties will have something to cheer about here… Crosscut.

The Democrats populating the legislature in Olympia seem to come from a wide variety of non-legislative jobs, ranging from union employee to government employee to unemployed. That’s why they might be confused by Republican Representative Chris Corry having a private-sector position, leaving the Washington State Standard to report he appeared “to satisfy concerns of an ethics panel so he can continue working for the Washington Policy Center without violating any conflict-of-interest laws.”

Some Democrats were concerned that working at a think tank would present a conflict for someone working on state laws since “Corry’s predecessor, for example, wrote and spoke often against the capital gains tax.” You can read more to see how having Democrats who work for labor unions doesn’t seemingly qualify as a conflict, but thinking does, here… Washington State Standard.

Who would have thought that having police officers walking a regular beat on downtown streets would impact the actions of criminals? Evidently, that had not really dawned on the liberals running the city of Bellingham, with Cascadia Daily reporting that “foot patrols, which previously operated as regular assignments, stopped prior to COVID-19 due to police department staffing issues,” and even now “the patrols are only being done on a voluntary, overtime basis because of continued staffing limitations.”

Despite making the patrols a low priority, the Bellingham mayor claims to “want the public to know they’ve heard the complaints about downtown safety.” You can read on to see how much these patrols are adding up to here… Cascadia Daily.

You can’t really blame Sound Transit bureaucrats for trying to avoid releasing any news about the region’s expensive train network since almost all of it recently has been bad (as Shift has highlighted). However, even one of their own board members is mad at being jammed by staff, asking the Seattle Times, “(I)s there not a cheaper operational solution than $100 million in new cars?” and suggesting that “we cannot make these big decisions based on PowerPoint presentations.”

Since even the board member who is supposed to know what she is doing isn’t sure whether this is a good idea, how can the public know whether those last-minute PowerPoint shows that “this was a planning failure, or changing assumptions, or changing conditions”? Read on to see how the head of Sound Transit is “very pleased with the opportunity” to waste hundreds of millions more of your money here… Shift, Seattle Times.

Shift was surprised that “fentanyl residue” was a trending topic last month after a “University of Washington study revealed that bus and train riders were regularly being exposed to traces of fentanyl and methamphetamine.” The latest from Crosscut is that this is fast becoming a labor issue, as “bus drivers and train operators would also be considered a vulnerable population because they are working in an environment where they do not have control over the air they breathe.”

You can read about how “obviously, individuals who use drugs are a vulnerable population,” but they are extending their impact here… Shift, Crosscut.

The reporter deleted his original tweet, but we had a screenshot…

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