Wednesday, October 26, 2016

LOCAL

► From AP — Boeing has a banner 3Q and sees more of the same ahead — Boeing’s third-quarter profit rose 34 percent on lower taxes, and the company raised its forecast for 2016 earnings, revenue and airplane deliveries… Boeing’s effective tax rate in the third quarter was a negative 3.4 percent and compared with a rate of 31.5 percent in the same period a year ago. For all of 2016, the company expects an effective tax rate of 14 percent, down from 23 percent last year.

► In today’s (Longview) Daily News — Hundreds support, condemn coal at Millennium hearing in Longview — Hundreds of people showed up Monday afternoon to have their say on the latest federal environmental review of a proposed coal terminal in Longview.

STATE GOVERNMENT

► In the PSBJ — Marijuana tax brings in $45M for Washington as nine more states consider legalization — Since July 2014, Washington’s marijuana retail sales have totaled almost $180 million. That means $44.9 million in excise taxes for the state.

► And this proof that Republicans are right when they claim state regulations can kill jobs — Charlotte loses 730-job operations center over House Bill 2 — North Carolina’s House Bill 2, which limits protections for LGBT individuals, played a deciding role in a Washington-based real estate company choosing Richmond, Va., over Charlotte for a 730-job expansion.

STATE ELECTIONS

► In today’s Spokesman-Review — Big money fuels contentious Washington Supreme Court races — In the Legislature, the McCleary decision has become a strongly partisan issue, with some Republicans criticizing the court for overstepping the separation of powers and introducing bills to cut the number of Supreme Court justices or divide the state in districts to force more geographic diversity. Although the judicial races in the state are nominally nonpartisan, the Washington Republican Party is spending about $36,500 for independent campaigns to support each of the three challengers.

ALSO at The Stand — Support three incumbent state Supreme Court justices — By voting and supporting three labor-endorsed incumbent Justices Mary Yu, Barbara Madsen and Charles Wiggins, voters can turn away this brazen political attack against the Supreme Court and re-elect justices with a proven record of making sure our constitution and laws are applied fairly for all Washington citizens.

► From KNKX — Vulcan, Gates, Ballmers join list of wealthy Washingtonians trying to alter Supreme Court — Paul Allen’s Vulcan, Bill Gates, and Steve and Connie Ballmer are among a growing list of wealthy Washingtonians who want to change the makeup of Washington’s Supreme Court. All three were also major donors to a 2012 charter school initiative that the Supreme Court later found unconstitutional.

► From KUOW — I-1433 would close the gap between the state’s and Seattle’s minimum wage — partially — “The hope is that with the passage of 1433, there’ll start to be stronger wages all over the state,” said Nicole Grant, executive secretary of the Martin Luther King Labor Council.

► From PubliCola — Poll: Inslee tops 50 for first time, minimum wage edging toward magical 60 percent — The minimum wage measure, which iteratively raises the state minimum wage to $13.50 by 2020 is closing in on 60, leading 58 to 31, up from 57 to 31 in August.

► In the Seattle P-I — Electing a Governor: The case to re-elect Jay Inslee (by Joel Connelly) — Washington is an optimistic place as Democrat Jay Inslee seeks a second term… Inslee, 65, has bridged an historic division in the Evergreen State, one that used to pit resource industries such as timber extraction against an environmental movement seeking protection of its waters and wildlands… The old high school quarterback has a playbook. He is bold, within limits.  Washington is going great guns.  Why change horses in mid-stream?

► In the PSBJ — Gov. Jay Inslee’s top donors include Mariners, Michael Bloomberg and Amazon execs

► In the PSBJ — Bill Bryant’s top donors include Paccar CEO, Weyerhaeuser heir and Martin Selig

► From KUOW — No, you don’t need a stamp for your ballot — A call to the U.S. Postal Service confirmed this: They will deliver any ballots dropped in the mail, even those sans stamps. The postal service keeps track and bills the county. It turns out that few envelopes show up without stamps. (Although that may change after this story.)

REPUBLICAN RIGGING

► From Huffington Post — This is what voter suppression actually looks like, and it’s appalling — With early voting now underway in several states, the real-world effects of actual (and very consequential) voter suppression have begun to bubble up. Exhibit A is North Carolina, where in recent months reporters discovered that state Republican leaders had sent emails directing GOP appointees on local elections boards to “make party line changes” to limit early voting. In one NC county, a reduction in polling places has helped cut early voting by 85%.

EDITOR’S NOTE — These Republicans are essentially admitting they can’t get elected unless they cheat. Whether it’s gerrymandering, making it harder to vote, or racist targeting of efforts to block voter registration, there’s only one party trying to “rig” this election.

► From Think Progress — Indiana officials are trying to block almost 45,000 black citizens from voting — Roughly 45,000 newly registered voters in Indiana — almost all of whom are black — may not be allowed to vote next month after state police targeted the state’s largest voter registration drive, forcing it to shut down its operation… In 2014, Indiana had the worst voter turnout rate in the country. But its Republican secretary of state decided not to address her state’s abysmal participation levels (as a legislator, she cosponsored the state’s strict voter ID law). Instead, she went after voter registration groups.

► From Huffington Post — Trump loyalists planned voter intimidation using fake ID badges, fake exit polling — until HuffPost asked them about it — Vote Protectors, the anti-voter-fraud group hosted by Donald Trump ally and political dirty trickster Roger Stone, plans to send volunteers to monitor polling places in nine cities with high minority populations on Election Day, Stone said last week. Untrained poll-watchers have intimidated voters in previous elections. But Vote Protectors is going further than its predecessors.

► From TPM — Texas polling places still advertising false info about Voter ID law — Some poll places in Texas are disseminating inaccurate information about the state’s voter ID law, which was softened by court order after an appeals court ruled it discriminatory.

FEDERAL GOVERNMENT

► From The Hill — Warren’s power on the rise — Elizabeth Warren’s near-constant presence on the campaign trail is solidifying her status as one of the Democratic Party’s most influential figures — and a force to be reckoned with in the Senate. Having never held elected office before 2012, Warren’s ascent to party leader has come at breakneck speed. She is rapidly building a network of allies, giving her increased leverage as she seeks to pull the Democratic Party to the left on everything from Social Security to policing Wall Street.

► From Huffington Post — Here’s how to tell if Hillary Clinton will keep her promises on trade — Lael Brainard is one of a handful of candidates being circulated as a potential Clinton administration treasury secretary, and the implications her appointment may have for trade policy are roiling progressives in Washington. Brainard has been involved with just about everything progressives have complained about on trade since the 1990s.

► From The Hill — Obama takes aim at workers’ non-compete agreements — The White House announced Tuesday support for federal legislation and various state initiatives that would roll back controversial non-compete agreements, which companies use to prevent their employees from switching teams.

► In today’s NY Times — Affordable Care Act premium increases are a fixable problem (editorial) — With rates rising, especially where there is little competition, more middle-class families will need subsidies.

► In the Washington Post — Want to save the Republican Party? Drain the right-wing media swamp. (by Catherine Rampell) — The sickness in today’s Republican Party is not confined to its current standard-bearer. It is therefore not curable by merely disavowing, however belatedly, the soon-to-be-defeated nominee. The sickness has taken over the Republican base, and there’s only one antidote. If Republicans truly want to save the Republican Party, they need to go to war with right-wing media. That is, they need to dismantle the media machine persuading their base to believe completely bonkers, bigoted garbage.

NATIONAL

► In today’s Washington Post — Why employees feel so pinched by health-care costs — The growth in employees’ share of health-care premiums and deductibles has slowed over the past decade, but their incomes have lagged behind, according to a new study. The slower increase in premiums reflects a nationwide trend in health expenses. But the shift hasn’t felt like a reprieve to many people because the growth of deductibles hasn’t abated as much and their incomes haven’t kept up.

► From AFL-CIO Now — U.N. special report: U.S. workers restricted in exercising basic union rights — A new report finds that the United States fails to uphold the most basic rights of workers, particularly in the South, where some states “support or collude with employers to infringe upon workers’ rights to peaceful assembly and association.”

► From Bloomberg — Kansas ends bad economic news — by not reporting it — Republican Governor Sam Brownback, despite promising to measure the results of a “real life experiment” in cutting taxes, has decided to cancel a quarterly report on the status of the state’s economy. The problem was that the reports didn’t match the governor’s predictions for the state’s soon-to-be-booming economy. Local news media flagged the abandonment of the reports as evidence not only of policy failure, but as an attempt to hide that fact from the public.

The Stand posts links to Washington state and national news of interest every weekday morning by 10 a.m.