With midterm elections two weeks away and pollsters predicting that Republicans — many with Tea Party backing — will gain control of the House and perhaps pick up as many as 12 seats in the Senate, the challengers’ campaigns seem to be coalescing around two principal themes: substantially reducing the size of the federal government, […]

In a debate on another blog (the Spokesman-Review’s “Matter of Opinion” blog), one commenter wrote, “No amount of Libertarian Ayn Randian rhetoric about the long defeated concept of “enumerated powers” as why this country can’t have universal health care is going to convince any intelligent citizens.” I asked how the doctrine of enumerated powers had […]

An interesting exchange here between Spokesman-Review reporter Jonathan Brunt and City Council candidate Jon Snyder regarding the “big box” development on the South Hill approved by the Council last year. Snyder had stated that he would not have approved the zoning change which will allow the development. (Exchange begins ~ 37 minutes). —— Brunt: How […]

Most of the considerable opposition which has emerged to date to Proposition 4, the so-called “Community Bill of Rights” which will appear on the November general election ballot, has focused on the measure’s fiscal implications for the City and its implications for the local economy. These are certainly serious concerns. Indeed, the measure is likely […]

. . . on the Spokesman-Review’s “Matter of Opinion” blog, here. Yours truly is a participant, of course.

Well, this being a political blog (although one which tries to focus on local issues), I suppose a post or two on the hot topic of the moment — health care — is de rigeur. And there is a local connection, after all, since access to “affordable preventive health care” is one of the fiat “rights” asserted […]

FreeSpokane today adds a new feature — the Encyclopedia of Political Nonsense. It will be a compilation of words, phrases, and statements frequently encountered in social/political discussions which are either empirically false or rest upon assumptions which are empirically false. The qualifier “empirically” is important here: the Encyclopedia will not include statements with which I […]

Gadfly attorney, intrepid blogger, former Spokane City Councilman and current Council Candidate (District 2) Steve Eugster today on his blog laments the decision of a South Hill neighborhood group to abandon their efforts to block a “big box” retail development on S. Regal St (S-R story here). Eugster calls the decision by the City Council […]

During a recent conversation over coffee an acquaintance posed the question, “What does Spokane have going for it?” My immediate and glib answer was, “Not much.” No, I’m not a reluctantly relocated Seattleite, nor an exemplar of Spokane’s alleged inferiority complex. Spokane does have a number of significant assets, which Greater Spokane, Inc. and the […]

At its Aug. 3 meeting the Spokane City Council considered a resolution to place a pair of advisory questions before the voters in the November elections. The two questions were, (1) Should the City seek “new funding sources” (e.g., new or increased taxes) to pay the costs expected to result should Envision Spokane’s “Community Bill […]