September 14, 2007
It's in the P-I

Contumelious liberal columnist Joel Connelly is shocked, shocked! that political parties are engaged in partisan campaigning over the officially partisan office of King County Prosecutor, with the Democrat Party accusing the Republican nominee of being "partisan", and vice-versa:

It's time to send a message to would-be Karl Roves about our prosecutor's race: Butt out!
Connelly's foot-stamping about political parties behaving like, uh, political parties strikes me as sophomoric, but at least he's above name-calling!

I don't claim to know an exact definition of "partisan", nor do I know exactly how well that predicts how a candidate for Prosecutor will perform in office. But I will observe that Republican Dan Satterberg has lined up the support of many prominent Democrats, including Mrs. Gregoire's close confidante Jenny Durkan, and Ron Sims' top deputy Sheryl Whitney. On the other hand, Democrat Bill Sherman has yet to announce an endorsement from a single prominent Republican.

Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at September 14, 2007 03:24 PM | Email This
Comments
1. Seems like Satterburg is THE MOST BI-partisan candidate up for election. Vote Satterburg.

Posted by: Michele on September 14, 2007 03:40 PM
2. Joel seems to be trying, in his clumsy way, to tone down the venom on the Democrat side. The last couple op-eds seemed to show that.

I didn't think the ad against Sherman to be a smear. I think politicians are overly sensitive regarding what is a negative ad or not.

Posted by: swatter on September 14, 2007 03:48 PM
3. The PAO should probably be a non-partisan office. In some instances party gives voters a good gauge of where a candidate stands. e.g. Democrats tend to favor government based solutions were republicans tend not to. I don't think that translates to a race like the prosecuting attorneys office.

The funny thing is that such a move would have likely helped Satterburg and hurt Sherman. My hunch is that most people are just going to vote D as this is King County and Satterburg does not have the standing of Maleng yet.

Posted by: Giffy on September 14, 2007 04:25 PM
4. The Durkans do have clout. That was a good pick-up by Satterberg.

The Durkans definitely don't do party lines. I remember back in the 70s, either 74, 76 or 78, Martin ran for US REP and was defeated in the primary by a young, bright, sincere D named Durning, a patent attorney who worked with the WEC (todays equivalent to the 1000 Enemies of Washington group). Boy, was Martin ever ticked off. He gave his campaign contributor lists to the Republican, not Durning, his opponent. This might even have been before PDCs.

The Republican won.

Posted by: swatter on September 14, 2007 04:34 PM
5. I thought Joel was up on the tundra doing some kind of mosquito mantra; when did his focus change? (And how many Alaskan mosquitos now have AIDS?)

Posted by: Doc-T on September 14, 2007 04:42 PM
6. It's good that Joel is standing against a would-be Karl Rove like Dwight Pelz who is trying to smear Satterberg by trying to dredge up what he knew and when about a certain drunk driving incident committed by a county councilmember.

Posted by: Don Ward on September 14, 2007 05:25 PM
7. #6: Hmmm, sounds like more mean-spirited dirty politics by democrats who know their candidate is weak. They do it every time.

Posted by: Michele on September 14, 2007 05:32 PM
8. Yawn.
This fixation you display on anything Connelly writes is interesting.

Posted by: Union Machinist on September 14, 2007 06:47 PM
9. Union Machinist #8, Connelly is the comical actor used to balance the dramatic play, that is local politics. The dead tree media used to have Jean Godden to play this part, but now she plays the part of the wacky politician. Unfortunately the Seattle City Council is more like a bad Saturday Night Live sketch, with no one to play the staight man.

Everyone needs a hobby, so if Stefan's hobby is trying to figure out how Joel's brain works, then so be it.

Posted by: Moondoggie on September 14, 2007 07:39 PM
10. But in their minds it is perfectly OK to appoint an elections director. Oh I see the light now.....NOT

Posted by: gs on September 14, 2007 08:00 PM
11. What unpatriotic, Rovian behavior!

The Republican letter was filthy piece of work. These are two wlel qualified guys. Whatever Schwanztragger in the Reptican party wrote this letter should be sacrificed at the Karl Rove monument.

I have met both of the guys. I was likely to vote for Satterburg mainly on experience but also as a way of keeping at least one Reprican in office.

What Shark and the GOP have done has cost you my vote. I apologize to Mr, Satterburg but Rovism is disgisting.

Posted by: SeattleJew on September 15, 2007 02:45 AM
12. SeattleJew,

I'm assuming that you must have misread something to become so irate that you couldn't spell.

Or you are trying to coin new terms, which you shouldn't.

So, take a breath, get some sleep because I question what you were doing at 2:45am to post crap like that, and look again.

See ya later!

Posted by: Chris on September 15, 2007 06:53 AM
13. Chris, From the looks of SJ's spelling and grammar, it appears he's just a displaced Florida voter.

Posted by: Walters on September 15, 2007 07:10 AM
14. The next time the U of W sends out a mailer looking for donations, please send back a copy of a couple of SeattleJews comments from this blog. Maybe a note saying something like "I'm not supporting this ". See if anyone responds.

Posted by: Smokie on September 15, 2007 07:43 AM
15. I know an exact definition of partisan.

It is of, or relating to, parties.

Which is what the prosecutor's race is, by definition. Whether it should be such is up to the voters.

Posted by: pudge on September 15, 2007 10:48 AM
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