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Eye On Olympia archive for Jan. 1, 2008

THURSDAY, SEPT. 18, 2008

And the state budget news is, yes, bad...

In minutes, the state Economic and Revenue Forecast Council will predict that general fund revenue will be down $529 million for the remainder of this biennium and the next one.Gov. Chris Gregoire will tell her budget office to find an additional $200 million in savings…

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Crystal ball for the coffers...

ER, FC.The state's Economic and Revenue Forecast Council will meet later this morning to peer into the crystal ball and forecast the state of the state's treasury over the next two years.Looking at the headlines over the past several days (Wamu? Hello?), it's hard to…

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TUESDAY, SEPT. 16, 2008


7th District: sharp elbows in GOP vs GOP race...

The northeastern Washington legislative faceoff between longtime legislative aide Shelly Short and architect Sue Lani Madsen is looking a lot like a grudge match.Short got slightly more votes in the primary than Madsen: 26.7 percent to 26.4 percent in a five-way, all-Republican primary. Both are…

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MONDAY, SEPT. 15, 2008

MONDAY, SEPT. 8, 2008


Apparently there's a Birdman of Walla Walla...

The Humane Society of the United States said this morning that its state director, Inga Gibson, filed a complaint with the state Department of Corrections and Department of Fish and Wildlife over reported mistreatment of pheasants being raised at the state penitentiary in Walla Walla.An…

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THURSDAY, SEPT. 4, 2008

WEDNESDAY, SEPT. 3, 2008

TUESDAY, SEPT. 2, 2008

THURSDAY, AUG. 28, 2008


Obama's speech: the preview...

Forty five minutes before Barack Obama takes the stage in Denver, his campaign has sent out excerpts from his prepared remarks.He talks about his background, about the nation's promise that hard work and sacrifice, each can pursue his or her dreams. But this is "one…

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WEDNESDAY, AUG. 27, 2008

Governor's race maps and Eastern Washington...

Catching up...My colleague Jim Camden has worked his political-mapping skills and come up with a couple of graphics in the governor's race.The upshot: the late-arriving ballots have been tilting slightly to Republicans."Dino Rossi has been gaining a bit of ground in the gubernatorial vote tally…

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TUESDAY, AUG. 26, 2008

Tax showdown in the Temple of Justice...

(and yes, the state Supreme Court's office building is really called the Temple of Justice.) Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown is doing something that would make many a politician squirm: going to court to make it easier to raise taxes. A 15-year-old law declaring that…

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WEDNESDAY, AUG. 20, 2008

Primary election postmortem: Everybody's happy...

After an afternoon of phone calls and emails with political consultants, campaign managers, etc., it's nothing but day-after sunshine and candies. Everyone I talked to claimed to be happy -- usually very happy -- with the results. Incumbents said challengers fell short of expectations, and…

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TUESDAY, AUG. 19, 2008





Goldmark/Sutherland: Very close

Democrat Peter Goldmark, who's led incumbent Commissioner of Public Lands Doug Sutherland in campaign fundraising for months, is neck and neck with Sutherland: 49 percent to Sutherland's 50 percent. (It's closer than it sounds, due to my rounding of these percentages.)As expected, urbanites seem to…

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Rossi's slightly ahead...

Now Rossi's up by a fraction of a percent: 47.49 percent to Gregoire's 46.5 percent.He's been helped by heavy leads in rural, sparsely populated counties, primarily east of the Cascades. But Gregoire's up by nearly five percentage points in Snohomish County -- a populous battleground…

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Short takes and breaking news from the Washington Legislature and the state capital.



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