San Juan County Democrats

40^th District Democrats Nominate for State House positions 1 and 2

Anacortes, WA, May 11, 2010: Tom Pasma of Bow won a decisive majority (75%) of votes cast at 40^th District Precinct Officers Nominating Convention on Saturday, May 8 becoming the official Democratic Party nominee for State House position 1.

The Democratic Precinct Officers (PCOs) met at the Anacortes Library to vote on the official party nominee for State House Position 1, and to officially nominate incumbent Jeff Morris for the State House position 2.

House position 1 candidates Tom Pasma, Thomas Boucher, and Kris Lytton each spoke, stating why he or she should be the State Party Nominee. Incumbent Jeff Morris also addressed the convention to formally request official party nominee status.

All pos. 1 candidates had previously met with the 40^th District’s Candidates’ Committee. Each had also participated in one or more Candidate Forums open to all Democrats in the 40^thDistrict.

Convention rules require that a nominee be chosen, of the selection will be chosen by the state committee chair.

Jeff Morris, current position 2 representative and current Speaker Pro-Tem in the legislature, nominated by unanimous acclimation.

A quorum of 10% of elected and appointed PCO’s is required to conduct business of the nominating convention. In this case, the event was attended by 50% of eligible PCOs, suggesting high interest in this race.

The 40^th District will conduct an endorsement meeting on Saturday, June 19 in Whatcom County to consider endorsing one or more candidates prior to the primary election. Democrats who reside in the 40^th LD and would like to vote at the endorsement meeting must join the 40^th District by June 12. Applications for membership are available at wa40dems.net.

For Immediate Release
March 21, 2010
Contact: Dwight Pelz, (206) 583-5880

State Democratic Party Lauds Health Care Reform

The most critical piece of domestic legislation since Medicare

SEATTLE – The Washington State Democratic Party today congratulated Congress for passing “the most critical piece of domestic legislation since Medicare.” 

“For Democrats, Health Care Reform is the Holy Grail of progressive change,” said Dwight Pelz, Chair of the Washington State Democratic Party. “Despite the unconscionable opposition of the Republican Party, the Democrats in Congress have prevailed and passed the most critical piece of domestic legislation since Medicare.”“History will judge Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid as courageous leaders,” said Pelz. “McConnell, Boehner, and Congressional Republicans will be seen as a herd of ostriches with their heads in the sand and their hands in the pockets of the insurance companies.”

With the vote of the House to concur with the Senate bill, the focus now turns to legislation before the Senate to fix the weaknesses in America’s newly adopted health care policy.“For weeks all we have heard about from Senate Republicans is the flaws in the Senate legislation. Now it is their chance to vote through reconciliation to repeal the Louisiana Purchase and Cornhusker Kickback and other obvious errors in the original bill,” said Pelz.

A very productive Congress, despite what the approval ratings say

By Norman Ornstein
Sunday, January 31, 2010; B02

When President Obama urged lawmakers during his State of the Union speech to work with him on “restoring the public trust,” he was hardly going out on a limb. The Congress he was addressing is one of the least popular in decades. Barely a quarter of Americans approve of the job it’s doing, according to the latest Gallup/USA Today poll, while 58 percent said it was below average or one of the worst ever, according to an NBC/Wall Street Journal survey last month.

It’s not hard to find reasons why Americans are down on Capitol Hill, and why President Obama’s approval rating has dropped below 50 percent in many polls. A year into the 111th Congress, unemployment remains at 10 percent, and many Americans are struggling to get by — even as they’ve watched Congress bail out banks and coddle the same bankers now salivating over massive new bonuses. At the same time, the public has had a front-row seat to the always messy legislative process on health care and other issues, and this past year that process has been messier, more rancorous and more partisan than at any point in modern memory.

There seems to be little to endear citizens to their legislature or to the president trying to influence it. It’s too bad, because even with the wrench thrown in by Republican Scott Brown’s election in Massachusetts, this Democratic Congress is on a path to become one of the most productive since the Great Society 89th Congress in 1965-66, and Obama already has the most legislative success of any modern president — and that includes Ronald Reagan and Lyndon Johnson. The deep dysfunction of our politics may have produced public disdain, but it has also delivered record accomplishment.

The productivity began with the stimulus package, which was far more than an injection of $787 billion in government spending to jump-start the ailing economy. More than one-third of it — $288 billion — came in the form of tax cuts, making it one of the largest tax cuts in history, with sizable credits for energy conservation and renewable-energy production as well as home-buying and college tuition. The stimulus also promised $19 billion for the critical policy arena of health-information technology, and more than $1 billion to advance research on the effectiveness of health-care treatments.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan has leveraged some of the stimulus money to encourage wide-ranging reform in school districts across the country. There were also massive investments in green technologies, clean water and a smart grid for electricity, while the $70 billion or more in energy and environmental programs was perhaps the most ambitious advancement in these areas in modern times. As a bonus, more than $7 billion was allotted to expand broadband and wireless Internet access, a step toward the goal of universal access.

Any Congress that passed all these items separately would be considered enormously productive. Instead, this Congress did it in one bill. Lawmakers then added to their record by expanding children’s health insurance and providing stiff oversight of the TARP funds allocated by the previous Congress. Other accomplishments included a law to allow the FDA to regulate tobacco, the largest land conservation law in nearly two decades, a credit card holders’ bill of rights and defense procurement reform.

The House, of course, did much more, including approving a historic cap-and-trade bill and sweeping financial regulatory changes. And both chambers passed their versions of a health-care overhaul. Financial regulation is working its way through the Senate, and even in this political environment it is on track for enactment in the first half of this year. It is likely that the package of job-creation programs the president showcased on Wednesday, most of which got through the House last year, will be signed into law early on as well.

Most of this has been accomplished without any support from Republicans in either the House or the Senate — an especially striking fact, since many of the initiatives of the New Deal and the Great Society, including Social Security and Medicare, attracted significant backing from the minority Republicans.

How did it happen? Democrats, perhaps recalling the disasters of 1994, when they failed to unite behind Bill Clinton’s agenda in the face of uniform GOP opposition, came together. Obama’s smoother beginning and stronger bonds with congressional leaders also helped.

But even with robust majorities, Democratic leaders deserve great credit for these achievements. Democratic ideologies stretch from the left-wing views of Bernie Sanders in the Senate and Maxine Waters in the House to the conservative approach of Ben Nelson in the Senate and Bobby Bright in the House, with every variation in between. Finding 219 votes for climate-change legislation in the House was nothing short of astonishing; getting all 60 Senate Democrats to support any version of major health-care reform, an equal feat. The White House strategy — applying pressure quietly while letting congressional leaders find ways to build coalitions — was critical.

Certainly, the quality of this legislative output is a matter of debate. In fact, some voters, including many independents, are down on Congress precisely because they don’t like the accomplishments, which to them smack of too much government intervention and excessive deficits. But I suspect the broader public regards this Congress as committing sins of omission more than commission. Before the State of the Union, the stimulus was never really sold in terms of its substantive measures; it just looked like money thrown at a problem in the usual pork-barrel way. And many Americans, hunkering down in bad times, may not accept the notion of “countercyclical” economic policies, in which the government spends more just when citizens are cutting back.

Most of the specific new policies — such as energy conservation and protection for public lands — enjoy solid and broad public support. But many voters discount them simply because they were passed or proposed by unpopular lawmakers. In Massachusetts, people who enthusiastically support their state’s health-care system were hostile to the very similar plan passed by Congress. Why? Because it was a product of Congress.

Well before Sen.-elect Brown’s Bay State upset, it was clear that a sterling legislative record in the first half of the 111th Congress did not guarantee continuing action in 2010 or beyond. And now, Democrats’ success at keeping 59 senators in line means little if they cannot find someone on the other side willing to become vote No. 60. With Republicans ebullient over the Massachusetts election, the likelihood is that they will feel vindicated in their “just say no” strategy, Obama’s leadership lectures notwithstanding.

If the midterm elections in November turn out to be more like 1994, when Democrats got hammered, than 1982, when Republicans suffered a less costly blow, the GOP will probably be emboldened to double down on its opposition to everything, trying to bring the Obama presidency to its knees on the way to 2012. That would mean real gridlock in the face of a serious crisis. Given the precarious coalitions in our otherwise dysfunctional politics, we could go quickly from one of the most productive Congresses in our lifetimes to the most obstructionist.

And voters would probably like that even less.

Norman Ornstein is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute and the co-author of “The Broken Branch: How Congress is Failing America and How to Get It Back on Track.”

Citizens to Elect Rick Larsen
Washington, 2nd District

For Immediate Release: January 30, 2010
Contact: Brooke Davis, Political Director
Cell: 425-830-2031
E-mail brooke@ricklarsen.org

Larsen Wins Key Test Vote Over Rival Democrats

Seattle, WA – U.S. Representative Rick Larsen (D-Everett) won a decisive vote today at the Washington State Democratic Party Central Committee. The vote to recommend Larsen’s nomination was a resounding 18 to 2 with two additional abstaining voters.

“This strong signal of support reflects the hard work and persistence I have shown to create the economic environment that creates jobs, to hold Wall Street firms accountable and to restore fiscal discipline to the federal budget,” Larsen said.

“I am happy that Democratic party leaders chose to send a strong signal that Democrats should avoid a divisive primary and instead focus on electing the Democrat best positioned to push against the Republican and Tea Party alliance,” Added Brooke Davis Rick Larsen’s Political Director.

The Central Committee members from the Second Congressional District forwarded Larsen’s nomination to the full Central Committee where the nomination was confirmed.

“I can’t say that I have been everything to every Democrat in my district, but I am a Democrat able to reach out to independent and moderate Republican voters while upholding Democratic values,” Larsen said.

Larsen has won re-election the last three elections by an average of 27.8 percent and has nearly $540,000 on hand for the fall election.

###

A New Direction
Progress For the American People

“…a Democratic Caucus that is enjoying its greatest political and legislative success since at least the beginning of the Clinton administration and arguably since its legislative heyday in the mid-1960s.”
Politico, November 8, 2009
The 111th Congress is working with President Obama to take America in a New Direction, with key bills passed on economic recovery, affordable health care, and clean energy. More must and will be done — to put Americans back to work, grow our economy, and set our nation on the path to prosperity.
HIGHLIGHTS INCLUDE:
ECONOMIC RECOVERY AND CREATING JOBS
AMERICAN RECOVERY AND REINVESTMENT ACT, enacted in the first month of President Obama’s term, to jumpstart our economy, create and save 3.5 million jobs, give 95% of American workers a tax cut, and begin to rebuild America’s road, rail, and water infrastructure, with unprecedented accountability. (Signed into Law)

CASH FOR CLUNKERS, jump-starting the U.S. auto industry, providing consumers with up to $4,500 to trade in an old vehicle for one with higher fuel efficiency – spurring the sale of 700,000 vehicles. (Signed into Law)

WORKER, HOMEOWNERSHIP & BUSINESS ASSISTANCE ACT, boosting the economy and creating jobs with unemployment benefits for Americans hit by the recession, an expanded 1st-time homebuyer tax credit, and tax relief for struggling small businesses—expanded to all struggling U.S. businesses. (Signed into Law)

STUDENT AID & FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY ACT, making largest investment in college aid in history – increasing Pell Grants and keeping student loan interest rates low– while reducing the federal deficit. (Passed by House)

HELPING FAMILIES SAVE THEIR HOMES ACT, building on the President’s initiative to stem the foreclosure crisis, with significant incentives to lenders, servicers, and homeowners to modify loans. (Signed into Law)
AFFORDABLE QUALITY HEALTH CARE
HEALTH INSURANCE REFORM, landmark legislation to lower costs to consumers, preserve and provide choice of doctors and health plans including a public option, ensure peace of mind that coverage can’t be delayed or denied, and expand access to affordable health coverage for millions of Americans. (Passed by House)
HEALTH CARE FOR 11 MILLION CHILDREN, providing cost-effective health coverage for 4 million more children and preserve coverage for 7 million children already enrolled. (Signed into Law)

FOOD SAFETY, to fundamentally change the way we protect our food supply; close gaps exposed by recent food-borne illness outbreaks; give the FDA new authorities. (Passed by House)

FDA REGULATION OF TOBACCO, granting the Food and Drug Administration authority to regulate advertising, marketing, and manufacturing of tobacco products, the #1 cause of preventable U.S. death. (Signed into Law)

CLEAN ENERGY JOBS AND CONSERVATION
AMERICAN CLEAN ENERGY & SECURITY ACT, historic legislation to create millions of jobs; reduce dependence on foreign oil; reduce climate change pollution; keep costs low for Americans. (Passed by House)
OMNIBUS PUBLIC LAND MANAGEMENT ACT, the most significant conservation bill in 15 years, strengthening tourism and rural economies with more than 2 million new acres of wilderness and parks. (Signed into Law)

FISCAL RESPONSIBILITY
BUDGET BLUEPRINT, creating jobs with investments in health care, clean energy and education; cutting taxes for most Americans by $1.5 trillion; cutting Bush deficit by more than half by 2013. (Action Completed)

STATUTORY PAY-AS-YOU-GO, restoring 1990s law that turned record deficits into surpluses, by forcing tough choices; Congress must offset new policies that reduce revenues or expand entitlements. (Passed by House)

PROTECTING CONSUMERS AND TAXPAYERS
WALL STREET REFORM & CONSUMER PROTECTION ACT, the most comprehensive financial reforms since the Great Depression, to end taxpayer-funded bailouts and ‘too big to fail’ financial institutions, protect consumers from predatory lending, and give shareholders a say on executive pay. (Passed by House)

CREDIT CARDHOLDERS’ BILL OF RIGHTS, providing tough new protections for consumers—including banning unfair rate increases, abusive fees, and penalties—and strengthening enforcement. (Signed into Law)

FRAUD ENFORCEMENT & RECOVERY ACT, providing tools to prosecute mortgage scams and corporate fraud that contributed to financial crisis; creating an outside commission to examine its causes. (Signed into Law)

Senate to hear landmark ocean-management legislation; Ruckelshaus to open the testimony

Tuesday, January 19 2010 - Kevin Ranker | Permalink

OLYMPIA – It’s only appropriate that Washington – with its 3,000 miles of shoreline, its 2.6 million acres of state-owned aquatic lands, and the millions of dollars that both contribute to our state economy – be in the vanguard of states in the management of its aquatic resources.

Sen. Kevin Ranker, D-San Juan Island, wants to build one comprehensive marine planning approach so that everyone who depends upon Washington’s aquatic resources – fishing, energy, industry, government, conservationists and recreationists – can all make informed and coordinated decisions on the use of marine resources.

Last year, President Barack Obama convened a task force to pursue a similar planning approach for federal waters, and is expected to move forward to implement the effort soon. Ranker, who testified before the task force at the White House Conference Center, says action this year on a state marine plan would put Washington in excellent position to coordinate with an eventual federal plan.

“Our Puget Sound and coast face an era of unprecedented activity,” Ranker said. “Important existing uses – such as fishing, aquaculture, shipping, recreation and proposed wave, tidal and other energy facilities – are competing for what once seemed like limitless space. In order to maximize the benefits our Sound and ocean provide – both ecologically and economically – we urgently need a process to rationally guide the multiple management objectives. This bill gets us there.”

Senate Bill 6350 would establish and implement a comprehensive marine planning (MSP) blueprint for a state. The bill would strengthen the MSP elements of the existing state, federal and local collaborative marine management planning activities. It would also charge the governor with forming a marine interagency team composed of all of the state agencies with marine management or regulatory responsibilities to mandate coordination.

SB 6350 will receive a public hearing in the Senate Natural Resources, Ocean & Recreation Committee on Thursday, Jan. 21 at 10 a.m. in Senate Hearing Room 2 of the John A. Cherberg Building. Sen. Ranker will chair the committee hearing. Bill Ruckelshaus, the first head of the federal Environmental Protection Agency, will open the testimony at the hearing.

# # #