Thursday, October 26, 2017

THIS WASHINGTON

► In today’s Seattle Times — Ignore misleading attack ads in 45th District Senate race (editorial) — A TV ad paid for by Working Families, a group backed entirely by Senate Republicans’ soft money PAC, evokes outdated and offensive stereotypes about people of color. It likens Manka Dhingra, who emigrated from India at age 13, and her husband, who is Sikh and wears a turban, to a pair of gypsy fortunetellers, using images of smoke and red curtains to imply they’re playing magic tricks on the electorate. Voters should reject these smear tactics. Other Working Families’ ads make soft-on-crime claims against Dhingra that are untrue and easy to refute.

ALSO TODAY at The Stand — Shame on state’s corporations for funding false, racist attack ads — Washington state’s biggest companies and corporate lobbying groups — including Amazon, Microsoft and the Association of Washington Business — are paying for false, offensive and racist campaign ads attacking Democratic Senate candidate Manka Dhingra in the high-stakes 45th Legislative District election that will determine which party controls the state Senate. The corporate money is being channeled through a series of PACS run by Senate Republicans to obscure the source of the funds.

LOCAL

► In today’s Olympian — Aberdeen lumber mill fined $112,000 for safety violations related to worker’s death — Sierra Pacific Industries, which runs an Aberdeen lumber mill, has been fined $112,000 for seven safety violations following the death of an employee last spring, according to the state Department of Labor and Industries. Andrew Ward, a 41-year-old Elma man, died in April after falling from an elevated platform to a concrete surface below. Investigators found that a section of yellow guardrail had been removed from the platform, which was more than 17 feet high, and replaced with caution tape to make way for a crane.

► In today’s Seattle Times — Boeing churns out jets and profits, but Air Force tanker’s problems dent earnings — Boeing reported strong profits and cash flow Wednesday, though shares declined on news of a $329 million charge for the KC-46 Air Force tanker. On a conference call, management said Airbus’ surprise move to acquire the Bombardier CSeries jet doesn’t require a strategy shift.

THAT WASHINGTON

► From Politico — House narrowly passes budget — setting up mammoth tax fight — House Republicans cleared a crucial hurdle in their drive to overhaul the tax code Thursday after narrowly approving the Senate’s budget. By passing the measure, 216-212, Republicans unlocked procedural powers that allow the Senate to pass a tax bill with just 51 votes — and evade Democratic filibusters.

ALSO at The Stand — GOP supports slashing Medicaid, Medicare — All four Republicans from Washington state voted “yes” on this budget bill.

► In today’s NY Times — The real reason for Republicans’ silence on Donald Trump (editorial) — Most Republicans in Congress have silently accepted his daily outrages in exchange for policies they’ve always wanted. At his inauguration, Trump said his presidency was about “transferring power from Washington, D.C., and giving it back to you, the American people.” But he and his allies in Congress are transferring power to Wall Street, fossil fuel companies, the chemical industry and other special interests, and are stoking an anti-populist bonfire to incinerate protections for consumers and workers.

► Today’s daily outrage in the NY Times — 10-year-old immigrant detained after agents stop her on way to surgery — The girl, Rosamaria Hernandez, who was brought over the border illegally to live in Laredo, Tex., when she was three months old, was being transferred from a medical center in Laredo to a hospital in Corpus Christi around 2 a.m. on Tuesday when Border Patrol agents stopped the ambulance she was riding in, her family said. The agents allowed her to continue to the hospital, but followed the ambulance the rest of the way there, then waited outside her room until she was released from the hospital.

► In the Washington Post — The FCC just ended a decades-old rule designed to keep TV and radio under local control — Federal regulators have voted to eliminate a longstanding rule covering radio and television stations, in a move that could ultimately reshape the nation’s media landscape. The regulation, which was first adopted almost 80 years ago, requires broadcasters to have a physical studio in or near the areas where they have a license to transmit TV or radio signals. Known as the “main studio rule,” the regulation ensured that residents of a community could have a say in their local broadcast station’s operations.

ALSO at The Stand — Did Sinclair buy KOMO to shut it down? (by Dave Twedell)

► From The Hill — Female Dem lawmaker posts video of GOP chairman ‘mansplaining’ bill to her — Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) on Wednesday posted a video on Twitter of Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) discussing a bill during a House Judiciary Committee hearing, in which he refers to Jayapal as “the gentle lady from Washington” and refers to her “naiveté” as a new member.

NATIONAL

► From AFL-CIO Now — Workers’ Bill of Rights passed at the AFL-CIO 2017 Convention — Said AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka: “This will serve as a platform for our members to rally around. It will give prospective members a clear statement of our values. And it will provide political candidates and elected officials with a litmus test for our support.”

► From AFL-CIO Now — Highlights from Day Four of the AFL-CIO 2017 Convention

► In today’s Des Moines Register — In biggest vote since new law, Iowa public unions overwhelmingly choose to recertify — Thousands of Iowa teachers, snowplow drivers and corrections officers voted overwhelmingly to maintain their union affiliations in a round of high-stakes voting that concluded Tuesday. Results issued Wednesday by the Iowa Public Employment Relations Board showed 436 out of 468 public-sector bargaining units voted to recertify their organizations. Voter participation was 88 percent. The state’s new collective bargaining laws, which took effect in February, instituted a much steeper hurdle for unions to maintain authorization. Public-sector unions must now recertify every time they face a new contract negotiation — typically every two or three years.

► From The Onion’s archives — Woman assaulted by celebrity just needs to sit tight for 40 years until dozens more women corroborate story

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