So Brancaccio... finally... wants a vote? What's changed? Madore.

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I'm seeing a resemblance here to the response of some middle eastern dictators to the, for lack of a better term, "Freedom Tsunami" currently cresting in Saudi Arabia.

The king of The Kingdom took a look around and thought he'd leave a, relatively speaking, lunch service-sized tip of a paltry $36 billion in hand-outs to attempt to cushion the blow of increasing unrest in his neck of the woods.

My experience there, admittedly for an extended stay in the late 70's in Riyadh and Taif at their Saudi Army Officers Ordinance School (30 odd years later, I still miss the Chai Guy, the character who looked exactly like Sam Jaffee in the old black and white Gunga Din movie and who brought us our tea twice a day.) was many years ago... but has that much changed?

It's kind of like Lou Brancaccio's "come to Jesus" decision to finally put the vote to the people.... the vote I've been demanding for years... out there as an issue and publicly, at least, FINALLY get behind it.

I say "finally," because, of course, their heavily endorsed commissioner candidate, Steve Stuart, has been in a position to push for such a vote for years, as have other Brancaccio-endorsed candidates... but none were asked... and certainly, none were pushed... and with equal certainty, certainly none have done so.... and will any of the candidates in the upcoming election be viewed through that filter as a part of their endorsement process? Or will we find this out to be mere lip service to an increasingly restive population who, having been told of the earthquake of exaggeration, costs, extortion and life-time tolls, are now feeling their ankles getting wet?

I again acknowledge that this is a good first move. But now what?

Will the paper start hounding elected officials in the area to get them to see that this must happen... and soon? And if this vote happens, and their position is crushed at the polls, will they demand an end of this nonsense?

Will they quiz every elected official, including the governor, our senators, Ridgefield Barbie and every candidate, every member of the downtown mafia and Identity Vancouver on their position on this issue... and publish the results so we can have a handy voting and business boycott guide, ready to go?

Will they extend as much vitriol against those officials (elected and unelected... like the bureaucrats appointed to further this project at our expense) as they extended towards me because of MY opposition to this steaming pile?

Because if Brancaccio does NOT take these and other steps, like muzzling that slime ball editorial page editor of his to make this vote happen... then his posturing about a vote will be as worthless as Tim "The Liar" Leavitt's campaign lies that he was opposed to tolls (and man, I'd LOVE to see the lie-detector test on THAT one.) and that is totally worthless.

And that brings me to the source of Brancaccio's democratic-vote ardor: likely his interaction with David Madore.

Brancaccio and his minions worked double-overtime to turn Madore into some sort of right wing whack job lunatic character because he was willing to get into a fiscal fist fight over the principles involved here.

Like me, the question becomes: how many times did they smack him and the candidates he supported because he was so steadfastly opposed to the rag's vision? (Does the reader believe for one second that either Madore or myself would have been subjected to Brancaccio's meat clever if we had SUPPORTED his view? Seriously?)

Unlike me, Madore responded with grace. He provided a level of transparency that simply astounded the cynics at Pravda on The Columbia.

Unlike the bridgers/looters, who want to use OUR money for THEIR vision, Madore is whipping out HIS money for HIS vision.

And where the bridger/looter vision excluded the people of this community while raping their wallets, Madore's vision does just the opposite: he uses his own money to do all he can to include the people of Clark County in the outcome.

Madore is serving as the focal point for the freedom wave here locally because he not only talks the talk, he's using his own money and resources to walk the walk.

At first, the bridgers/looters were driven insane by Madore. They were convinced, because it self-served them to BE convinced, that Madore had ulterior motives. That somehow he, personally, stood to gain from his opposition, either politically or financially (Thus Stuart's infamous "crackpot" insult.)

But he has not risen to the bait. He is much more patient than I am. And I believe that Madore's interaction with Brancaccio, et al, is the number one reason why the light that went off in Branccacio's head wasn't caused by getting whacked with the sudden realization of the well known by anyone except the downtown mafia of the massive, community-wide opposition to this economic black hole and massive waste of billions of our dollars which certainly could be used for far better purposes with a 3rd and 4th bridge.

Time will tell, but it fits for me.
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