Counties pleased to be released from revote battle

With all of the atten- tion to constitutional provisions, historic precedents and dueling high-powered lawyers for the state’s two main political parties, one aspect of last week’s gubernatorial revote lawsuit may have been lost in the shuffle.

The counties are in the clear. They’ve been cut loose.

The Washington state Republican Party and their aggrieved voters had sued all 39 counties, and their respective elections officials, in their challenge to Christine Gregoire’s gubernatorial victory.

That meant at least 39 county prosecutors or their deputies being notified every time someone filed a brief, or a motion. Some of them helped fill out the front rows in the auditorium that is being used for the court proceedings and more than a dozen dialed in to attend the hearings by long-distance. After the attorneys in the auditorium had their say, the attorneys on the phone always got a chance to weigh in to repeat a point or draw attention to a slightly different view of a statute or a case – but there was usually a pause while men and women in offices across the state tried to figure out who should go first.

On Friday, Chelan County Superior Court John Bridges told any county that wanted out that it can be dismissed from the case. If Republicans have specific allegations, they can bring them, he said, but it was unnecessarily “burdensome” to keep the counties dangling, he said.

“I can’t see where the counties’ participation is helpful to the court,” Bridges said. “If they want to stay in, they can do that.”

There was silence on the phone lines for a minute. Then Asotin County Prosecutor Ben Nichols piped up with a sentiment that was probably shared by most of his colleagues:

“I don’t think I’ve ever been so happy to hear my comments were not needed or helpful.”

Standing watch

Threats against Christine Gregoire last week resurrected questions about the steps taken to protect Dino Rossi from similar circumstances. Rossi still has a state trooper assigned to him for security when he travels around the state, as he did last week on a visit to Spokane.

Asked about his WSP escort, Rossi offered two defenses, one of them stronger than the other.

First, he didn’t ask for the trooper; the state patrol chief recommended the protection “because of the calls we’re getting.” Good point, because emotions continue to run a bit high in the governor’s campaign that will not end.

Second, he said, the state patrol reports to the governor and if she didn’t think he deserved the security detail, “Gregoire could pull it away any time she wants,” Rossi said.

Sure, and wouldn’t the state GOP have a field day with that.

By any other name

One of the state’s top environmental action groups is changing its name. Goodbye 1,000 Friends of Washington. Hello … Futurewise.

The decision to drop the old name is pretty easy to understand. It’s a finite limit, and after a while, they had to get tired of new members saying “So, am I the 1,001st friend, or what?”

But Futurewise? Were they looking for something that would be relatively inoffensive, neutralwise? Did someone consider the public fallout, reactionwise? Is it really a good idea, wise-wise?

Maybe they can focus on policies that are Futurewise, instead of past-foolish.

Speaking of friends

Sens. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell and six members of Washington’s congressional delegation were named Friends of the National Parks, an award by a group that lobbies for – you guessed it – national parks.

The Washington honorables got their awards last week during a ceremony in D.C. (A far as we can tell, no one was named an enemy of the parks.)

Awards to members of Congress that a group likes are not particularly newsworthy, but the group making the announcement said the ceremony “demonstrates, on a national level, that it is the one issue that Democrats and Republicans can agree on!”

That statement would have been much more convincing if all the Washington folks getting the nice certificate and historic poster hadn’t been Democrats. Or if any Northwest Republican had been named at least “a passing acquaintance of the national parks.”

Checking the group’s list of honorees – who are “friendly” if they voted for at least three of five House bills or four of six Senate bills the group liked – reveals that of the 238 Friends only 23 have R’s in the parenthesis behind their names.

So it would seem, at least mathematically, that this is not something on which the two parties agree wholeheartedly.