A celebration of pork

I attended today's "groundbreaking celebration" for the multi-billion dollar Sound Transit light rail boondoggle.

They were giving away pork sandwiches, which is kind of a good metaphor for a useless pork barrel construction project.

The place was swarming with well-fed Sound Transit employees eating pork sandwiches.

The hardhat, of course, was just for show. There wasn't any real construction going on.

There were also a lot of extra policemen lounging around eating pork sandwiches while failing to protect the citizens from overzealous Sound Transit goons (keep reading).

Unfortunately, there were no pork sandwiches for me. The famously accurate Sound Transit planners somehow misestimated demand for the sandwiches. By the time I showed up at the food line, all the pork and chicken sandwiches were gone, all that was left was an enormous pile of vegetarian sandwiches that nobody wanted. But we all know that Sound Transit's crack staff has done a much better job of predicting ridership demand for the multi-billion dollar train system.

See the next part of the post for a tale of "The Suppression of Dissent in Ashcroft's America", and more photos!

Suppression of Dissent

I showed up at the "celebration" carrying some signs and initiative petitions. A Sound Transit official told me that I wasn't allowed to collect signatures inside the perimeter of the event. I told her that I wasn't actually collecting signatures inside the event area (nearly everybody there was either a Sound Transit employee or an elected official, so why bother?), I was merely holding the petition in my hands. She told me that I wasn't even allowed to carry a petition inside the event area. Hmm. Then this creepy-looking private security officer (see photo below) kept following me around and telling me that I couldn't even carry my sign inside the event area and I had to stand on the sidewalk. Hmm.

After all the speeches, the various ST Board Members did the customary "Five Well-Fed Guys in Business Suits Put On Hard-Hats, Pick Up Shovels and Pretend to Dig In The Sandbox for The Cameras" pantomime, I stood on the sidewalk behind the fence behind them and held up my sign for the news cameras. A beefy guy in turtleneck and blazer told me to get off the sidewalk. "But it's a public sidewalk," I said. I held my ground and asked "Who are you, anyway?". He refused to tell me who he was and then shoved me ever so gently, in a gesture meant to insult and intimidate. Just as the Five Well-Fed Guys stuck their shovels in the dirt, I yelled out to the policemen standing nearby "Officer, this man just assaulted me". The police not only ignored me, but they walked off in the other direction.

I blame Ashcroft.

L: Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels, a strong advocate of taxpayer-funded public transportation (for other people)	R: Mayor Nickels' taxpayer-funded chauffeur-driven limousine

There were dozens of Sound Transit "public relations", "communications" and other assorted lackeys standing around, shown here in front of an anti-Sound Transit petition. How many flacks does a public agency justifiably need on its payroll? All they actually did at this event (in addition to eating pork sandwiches) was to follow the protesters around to suppress First Amendment rights.

Sound Transit Executive Director Joni Earl. Some might think she's a sourpuss, but I'd bet she's a riot at office holiday parties.

State House of Representatives candidate and Sound Transit critic Mark Griswold (left), talking with one of the hundreds of thousands of area voters who are eager to put an end to the wasteful lunacy of Sound Transit.

This creepy-looking Wackenhut palooka kept following me around, telling me to move

King County Councilmember Dwight Pelz addresses the crowd, while the 3 Musketeers of public fraud look on. l-r King County Executive Ron Sims, Mayor Nickels, Sound Transit Board Chair / Pierce County Executive John Ladenburg.

John Ladenburg looking for another pork sandwich, or something.

Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at June 08, 2004 04:35 PM