Who
First, some background. The South Park Bridge, which carries about 20,000 vehicles a day, is scheduled to close at the end of this month.
According to Seattle Times columnist Danny Westneat, this will be a serious hardship for the South Park community. (Which is not especially wealthy. Or powerful.)
To this point, Westneat and I are in agreement. If what he is saying is correct, then it is wrong not to replace the bridge. And I would agree with the two people he talked to for the column, one living in the neighborhood, and the other visiting, who also think that closing the bridge will blight the neighborhood.
After reading the column and sharing a little of Westneat's outrage, I began wondering who, if anyone, was responsible for the failure to replace the bridge. I began to wonder who is to blame.
But Westneat, perhaps responding to cost controls at the Seattle Times, never goes beyond "King County", never names a single elected official who we might blame for this failure. That first "W" never made it into his column.
I understand, of course, that times are tough in the news business, and that news organizations have had to make all kinds of painful cutbacks. But I hope that Westneat and the Seattle Times will reconsider and restore the first "W" to their stories, columns, and editorials. They may not realize this, but many readers are more interested in the "Who" than in anything else.
Is it possible for those of us not in the news business to fill in for Westneat, and supply that first "W"? Perhaps, if we work together on the problem.
We can start with the one clue that Westneat provides. King County is officially responsible for the bridge. The current King County executive is Dow Constantine (D), who served on the county council beginning in 2002, until he became the executive in 2009. His predecessor was Ron Sims (D), who was a terrible manager, as even Westneat's newspaper has admitted occasionally. (Those not familiar with the politics in this area may want to know that Sims has taken his managerial skills to the Obama administration.) Although the county council is now formally nonpartisan, the members still vote along partisan lines. The Democratic party has controlled the council for many years.
Our state's senior senator is Patty "not-a-rocket-scientist" Murray (D). She is famous — some would say infamous — for her pursuit of pork projects, but this one never seems to have gotten much attention from her. (On the other hand, South Park probably hasn't contributed much to her campaigns, either.)
Our governor is Christine Gregoire (D). Since her disputed election in 2004, state spending has soared, but she has never found the money to replace this bridge.
In 2009, the Congress, led by Speaker Pelosi (D) and Majority Leader Harry Reid (D), passed an immense "stimulus" bill. In principle, the bill could have provided for infrastructure projects such as a replacement bridge, but it was reshaped in Congress, after a campaign by feminists, to provide fewer jobs for men, and more for women. That meant, among other things, that there were fewer construction projects, since most construction workers are men. (In the latest unemployment report, the unemployment rate for adult men was substantially higher than for adult women.) Despite this, President Obama (D) signed the bill.
Those are the names that occur, offhand, to me. Perhaps, if you are familiar with this area, you can add to that little list. Together, perhaps we can supply the "W" that Westneat, and the Seattle Times, are too impoverished to give their readers.
Cross posted at Sound Politics.
(I can't help wondering whether Westneat's elimination of the first "W" is related to another cutback. As most readers know, many news organizations have decided to economize by eliminating the "(D)" after politicians of a certain party, who have gotten into trouble. Oddly enough, the same news organizations have not gotten around to eliminating the "(R)" after similar miscreants in another party, but I am sure they will do that soon.)
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