Andy MacDonald links to this recent editorial about Seattle's anti-Republican political monoculture. Andy adds:
How did Seattle get this way? It's a matter of feedback: Seattle today is welcoming to Democrats, so more move here and the city becomes even more welcoming. Meanwhile Republican ideas get less credence and now Republicans tend not to settle here.There's a lot of work to do, but Seattle Republicans are on the way back. We even have a logo:But this can be reversed and balance restored. If the Republican party wants to keep from becoming extinct in the city, it needs a higher profile -- not just on national issues, but on local ones. People who want lower taxes, more parental control in schools, and cooperation with national authorities on anti-terrorism measures must know they have compatriots in Seattle, that if they settle in Seattle they will have an organization to work on their concerns. Local Republican organizations should band together to advertise their existence so no one thinks the term "Seattle Republican" is an oxymoron.
A good place to meet other Seattle Republicans is the picnic with Dino Rossi, Wednesday, July 28th at 6:30pm Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at July 09, 2004 05:40 PM
Great logo.
There is another problem confronting Republicans in Seattle: career risk. When I was temping at Microsoft, I saw many leftist posters on office doors, but never any conservative/libertarian ones. There are undoubtedly conservates at Microsoft, but they may feel like they cannot 'come out of the closet' without risking their job. Bill Gates and his father, after all, donated to Jim McDermott.
Posted by: John Doe on July 9, 2004 07:59 PMThat logo need to be made into a bumbersticker now!
Posted by: Andy MacDonald on July 9, 2004 10:00 PMWashington State represents a rural/urban split that exists in other parts of the country as well. If you look at an election breakdown, I believe you'll see three "blue" counties, and all the rest are "red."
I suppose the influx of out of staters to the Seattle-Everett corridor has a lot to do with the extreme leftward tilt of that area. Other metropolitan areas, such as Tacoma and Spokane, still maintain their somewhat right of center mix.
When I worked in the District Court in Seattle I was practially a pariah for my unapologetic service in the military. Fortunately, as an IT tech, I was expected to be a little bit "out there," so my status as a brutal baby killing racist fascist was not much more exotic than, say, a predilection for Dungeons and Dragon or membership in the SCA. People would have been much more comfortable around me had I expressed angst at my complicity in war crimes. But the inside of my mouth got lots of chewing in a mostly successful policy of keeping it shut whenever my co-workers embarked on their regular tirades over why their part of the state was so progressive while outside Seattle teemed with "rednecks."
"Rednecks" in this context meant, so far as I could tell, people who owned working pickups (no F-150 Lightnings or S-10 Stepsides) which routinely carried loads of lumber, topsoil, or gravel, and had Bush/Cheney bumperstickers. A simpleton such as myself might have erroneously characterized those folks as, oh, heck, hardworking taxpaying citizens? But that's the kind of simplistic, nonnuanced attitudes you risk picking up int he service, where prejudice very quickly runs up against the wall of reality. You soon find that you don't have to agree with people, or even like them, to rely on and truct them. Sad to say, that has pretty much ruined me for civilian life.
Posted by: Steve Skubinna on July 10, 2004 12:51 PM