NOT SO FAST! ...... About that Socialist who was thought to have narrowly lost in Seattle......

[marmar]

Seattle City Council candidate Kshama Sawant, a “Socialist Alternative” insurgent, has unseated four-term incumbent Richard Conlin, with the latest batch of mail-in ballots nearly tripling Sawant’s lead to 1,148 votes.

A year ago, Sawant was running against the Legislature’s most powerful Democrat, House Speaker Frank Chopp, charging that the “Democratic Party-majority government” had slashed billions from education programs while bestowing tax exemptions on “rich corporations.”

On Thursday evening, however, the victorious “working class activist” Sawant was headed for a 36th District Democratic fundraiser sponsored by State Sen. Jeanne Kohn-Welles. Sawant’s tireless journalist booster, Stranger news editor Dominic Holden, is appearing on a post-election panel at the event.

The Sawant victory comes exactly 97 years after Seattle voters put their first outspoken radical into office, Seattle School Board member Anna Louise Strong. Strong would write about the Wobblies, oppose U.S. entry into World War I and eventually end her days in China, where she was on friendly terms with Mao Zedong. ...................(more)

The complete piece is at: http://blog.seattlepi.com/seattlepolitics/2013/11/14/sawant-wins-city-council-seat/

[BlueStreak]

1. Good. We really need to shake up the two-party stranglehold.

And that has to come from the bottom up because the only thing the big two parties hate more than the opposite party is the idea that others might get into the game.

We actually have some common cause with the Tea Party. Tea Partiers despise the PTT thing, mostly for the same reasons that liberals do. We shouldn't be afraid to reach out to others who don't share all of our views, but who have a basic understanding that our system has become extraordinarily corrupt and corrupted by the vast money flowing form narrow special interests.

In Indiana, we elected a Superintendent of Public Instruction. She ran as a Dem, but really didn't get much support for a mostly dysfunctional party. She won because she and fellow educators engaged their social network. Since that time she has been butting heads with the entrenched Republicans who are hell-bent on privatizing and profitzing public schools all over the state. We can win these battles one at a time.

[TBF]

2. If nothing else it puts fear in the boots of the capitalists -

The only reason FDR was willing to deal was that communists/socialists were making great strides in the 1920s.

They have nothing to fear right now and that's why they have shot into overdrive with their austerity measures. Time to push back a bit.

[Bennyboy]

3. The Obama plan is coming together...

YEAH SOCIALISM!

[socialist_n_TN]

4. The "Obama plan".......

Worker's Power gave critical support to Sawant as well as Ty Moore in Minneapolis. SA is Trotskyist, but it's a Grantite organization and very centrist (waffle between reform and revolution), but they do get into this election stuff. In most cases, elections are just to get the message out, so it's rare to win. The victory is unexpected, but good to hear about. Now let's see what Ms Sawant can do with the electoral power she has.

[Bennyboy]

6. Serious, you are

too much. The Obama plan is to turn everyone into socialistic Kenyans. And this is the first step in the domination theory....



(PLEASE TURN SARCASM METER TO STUN)

[socialist_n_TN]

8. Oh I caught the sarcasm Benny.......

However I have a problem with Obama's plan to turn everyone into socialistic Kenyan fascists (see I can do that thing too!).

DO THEY HAVE TO BE GRANTITES!?!?!!?!?!?

[gopiscrap]

5. YES!!!!! THat's about 35 miles from where I live.

[TBF]

7. We almost moved to Seattle a few years ago -

it was sort of bad timing and I just wasn't sure about the job itself or the climate (I have arthritis). So we stayed here in Texas. Still hoping we might find something in California at some point. Folks also seem to like Portland.