Open Left

Add Murray, Cantwell, and Wyden (4.00 / 9)

to your list.

Focusing on Murray for a moment, she voted against the Sanders amendment to cap usury at 15% (so did Cantwell). They did however vote for the milquetoast bill that requires banks to wait for sixth months before bumping usury rates.

Neither Murray nor Cantwell have signed the Sentate petition calling for a public option. Any public option.

Murray is up for re-election next year, and on Friday the WA State Democratic Party called me from Renton to ask me to donate money for her campaign. The title of your post is right on, because the first thing I was told was "Democrats won solid majorities last year, but Senator Murray is up for re-election, and you know the Republicans will do any thing to stop her".

What exactly would they be stopping? Except for finally passing the Wild Sky Wilderness Protection Act last year, her 17-year record as a Senator, with half that time as a member of the Senate's leadership team, reads more like the record of a city councilwoman in a midsize town. I once visited her Seattle office to urge her to bring in more funds for mass transit, and her staffer told me that Murray's record in that area was equivalent to Warren Magnuson. And I'm thinking "Really? You mean when he was alive, or since he's been dead? Because if you're talking about since he's been dead, well then she may have outspent him, but it's going to be damn close." Murray, who first ran for Senate in 1992 as a "mom in tennis shoes" whose grit and determination would ply the halls of Congress for education money, has done little more than act as a seat warmer.

Anyway, I told the woman on the phone that I appreciated her getting involved and volunteering, but not only will I not donate for Murray, I won't donate to the party, and I won't vote for Murray unless & until the party gets her in line. I recounted Murray's record, mentioned that I had donated to the state party and the DNC last year, but again, wasn't going to do so until there was a change of behavior...and her voice got real low and she said, "You know I kind of agree with you, I think there's a lot of Democrats who never do anything". She was very sweet, and we ended the phone call.

I'm sure she and I aren't the only ones; WA has a very progressive party base, with an impatient streak. But there's no one pushing the issue by running in the primary, etc....we need a vehicle for our grievance.

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by: glacierpeaks @ Mon Jun 08, 2009 at 19:37:12 PM CDT

thank you thank you !! do you have a list of (4.00 / 1)

their crappy votes anywhere ??

I meant to start a Patty diary series on www.washblog.com

http://www.washblog.com/story/... - but apparantly haven't done anythign since xmas.

she and cantwell are pathetic. they're not LEADERS, they are people who are in charge, and that seems to be the raison d'etre of our washington democratic party 'leaders' - stay in charge of telling us why we have to keep accepting ronnie raygun grover norquist tim eyeman budgets.

just think - for 3 decades the mantra has been

the rich need more money to invest in more prosperity,
and they know where to invest cuz they're rich!

well, the rich took their extra money and did what the drunken fishermen of the alaskan king crab hey deys did - some of them invested it wisely, some invested it unluckily, but most of them BLEW it on gambling and on vices.

we cut community investment for a bunch of drunken sailors to get drunker.

oh, and on 'our' side are a bunch of people in charge who learned from 1984 and 88 and 94 etc etc how to NOT rock the boat, cower, snivel and whine.

ugh.

rmm
ballard

It is too full o' the milk of human kindness To catch the nearest way

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by: seabos84 @ Tue Jun 09, 2009 at 07:25:06 AM CDT

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