Kung fu, STDs, sin and other deep post-election musings

Elective democracy can be a grueling civic duty, and this week we felt as unfit to exercise it as a wheezy fat man running on a treadmill in scuba gear.

We intended to spend hours plowing through the fine print in the voters pamphlets before marking our ballot. Alas, we were repeatedly distracted by the puzzles on the kids’ pages – and by the puzzling use of decimal points in the county’s Proposition 1.

In the end, we paid just enough attention to the election to form some random observations:

• Washington voters placed their full trust in Costco, which is ironic because Costco doesn’t trust us. What other store stops you at the entrance to make you show an ID card and at the exit to make sure you’re not stealing stuff? Throw in a few patdowns and a cavity search, and they’d be running a bulk-discount prison.
• There’s at least one political truth to be found in kung fu movies: The student does become the teacher. Just ask Karen Smitherman and her former Tacoma School of the Arts grasshopper, Anders Ibsen.
• The sin industry missed some opportunities. Voters made it known they’re in the mood for debauchery by saying “yes” to hard liquor and marijuana. The gambling and prostitution lobbies must be kicking themselves for not putting measures on the ballot.
• Partisan politics breeds sore winners. State Dem Chairman Dwight Pelz cracked at a campaign event Tuesday night that Tim Eyman is like herpes: “Just when you think it’s gone, it comes back.” Memo to Pelz: Dunno how to get rid of Eyman, but modern medicine has effective treatments if you can’t shake that other problem.

One pleasant outcome from the election is that University Place showed it’s ready for a black City Council member. Two African-Americans – Kent Keel and Steve Smith – contended for the Position 2 seat. Keel won it.

All it took was 16 years of cityhood. Not bad compared with the 219 years it took America to elect a black president.

What’s up lately with honchos and pols trying to join the burgeoning protest scene? It’s a little awkward, like an absentee grandpa suddenly deciding to put on some checkered Vans and hang at the skate park.

Last weekend, Tacoma city councilmen Ryan “Harsh My” Mello and Jake “Not Related to Tina” Fey hoisted signs at a Walmart protest.

And in an op-ed commentary in this paper last week, Tacoma schools bossman Art Jarvis sounded all activist-like in railing against state budget cuts to education: “That proposal is so wrong it makes one want to join the Occupy movement and take to the streets!”

Before you put on your hoody, Art, recall what it looked like the last time you took to the streets.

What’s the Latin word for “dumb idea”? The Cascade Land Conservancy, which has offices in four cities, including Tacoma, was given a free coupon for a rebranding campaign. Now it has announced a new name: Forterra, or “for the earth.” (Proterra would be more accurate, we Latin nerds know.)

Forterra, by the way, is also a closet-organization system, an all-season tire by Goodyear and a defunct 3D graphics software company.

So good luck with your new identity, Forterrans. Maybe one day you’ll consistently crack the first page on a Google search. Til then, we’ll call you Forterra Incognito.

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