State of the State

Yesterday evening was the State of the State speech, given by Washington (Barely) Governor, Christine Gregoire.

Before I get into the issue here, I just want to fill you in on little, fun tidbit of info: The speech was at primetime drivetime, 1700-1800 and the audio was fed live to anyone who wanted it.

Guess who ran it:

Was it Seattle’s Progressive Talk – AM 1090 (Seattle’s Air America affiliate)?

Nope.

Was it the biggest news station in town – AM 710 KIRO (winner of more Edward R Murrow awards than any other radio station in the country, according to their commercials)?

Nope.

It was the Fox affiliate – AM 570 KVI who ran it and the Republican rebuttal in living radio color. None of the other political talk radio stations, including the newest big right wing talk station that took Rush Limbaugh away from KVI, 770 KTTH bothered.

KVI was also the station that did everything they could to help organize protests against the King County re-re-re-counting of the ballots during the Governor election fiasco of 2004 and also helped get the gas tax repealing citizen’s initiative on the ballot for 2005 to help KVI win the utmost ire from the Seattle leftists, who branded them “KKKVI�.

I listened to part of it and then had to punch in for work. By the time things got settled down I could only catch the last 5 minutes of the Repub rebuttal.

But one of the funniest topics covered in both Gregiore’s speech and in the rebuttal: Child molester sentencing reform.

On Monday, the Republican minority members offered up House Bill 2476 which would make 1st degree child rape punishable with a 25 years to life sentence.

In a 55-42 (with one member excused) the bill was defeated in the House. The vote was along party lines with no Democrats voting for the bill.

Their excuse?

House Majority Leader Lynn Kessler, D-Hoquiam, protested the motion, saying it was too early to vote on the issue.

“Bringing this to the floor without public input … is not the way we want to go,” she said. Law enforcement officials and victims advocates should be consulted on the effectiveness of sex-offender legislation before it comes to a vote, Kessler said.

Not the way to go, Ms. Kessler? You had time to read through the bill, you know what it said. What is the hold up? I thought that everyone wanted tougher sentences for child molesters?

Oh, am I sounding insensitive to child molesters? Good.

More Dem reaction to their failing to put child molesters away for large portions of their sick lives….

House Criminal Justice and Corrections Committee Chairman Al O’Brien, D-Mountlake Terrace, chalked up the Republican proposal to partisan politics.

“What they did was they forced us to make a vote,” he said. “This is just a political maneuver … to try to show that we’re (Democrats) soft on sex offenders.”

That is because you are.

You talk about it and talk about it and talk about it, but you and the Dems never do anything about it year after year. Every time it is brought up, you defer it to a committee and that is where the increased sentencing idea dies.

Totally unlike the ‘You can’t descriminate against gay people’ bill, that must be so desperately needed in Washington, the third gayest state in the country, after only California and New York, that it gets brought up every year.

I guess that being the most highly educated and highest income earning groups in both the state and the country must really be getting to be a burden on them.

It will be brought up again this year and it will most likely pass as well, seeing as how the Dems hold the Governorship and majorities in both houses.

More when the vote gets closer.