Seattle basked in the national limelight some years back. We were America’s “most livable city,” gorgeously located and with a booming, technology-fueled economy. We placed near the top as a place to be young and to find rewarding employment or even romance, in most of those magazine “best places” nationwide surveys.
People magazine depicted a young architect and family on a Saturday morning trip to the Pike Place Market. The cover of Newsweek was decorated with a picture of transplanted Washington, D.C., pundit Michael Kinsley wearing rain gear. He wore it when we went on a subsequent backpack trip to Twisp Pass.
We were the host city for an Asia-Pacific leaders’ summit. Arriving in America, Chinese leaders made us the first stop. With the demise of the Soviet Union, we were headquarters for three entities bent on world domination — Amazon.com, Microsoft, and Starbucks.
Nowadays, however, right-wing media and Trump are sullying our reputation and depicting the Emerald City as a crime-infested hellhole. They’re working to generate fear and are pretty damned artful at it. We are the target of the dark arts of disinformation.
The city has been in the crosshairs nationally, from Tucker Carlson to Bill O’Reilly to Sean Hannity, while home front denigration has grown. Jonathan Choe of the Discovery Institute fills “X” posts with images of squalid homeless camps and curses for “far left lunatics.”
Where is right-wing media going with this uptick in hyperbole? What does it propose to do to our diverse, environmentally conscious, progressive, and trade-dependent city and neighborhood? I detect three strategies:
Left Coast
Right wing media (and Trump) have set out to demonize West Coast cities, scaring the heartland for political gain. They’re targeting big cities (Los Angeles, Portland, Seattle), college towns (Missoula) and state capitals (Denver).
East Coast and New England are also in the gun sights, witness the attack on Harvard and threats that Boston is a National Guard target. Trump has squared off against Baltimore and deployed troops in D.C.
Boa Constrictor
A statewide strategy, surround with conservative rural and suburban voters and squeeze Seattle. The “boa constrictor strategy” worked for Sen. Slade Gorton, but that was 31 years ago. Eastside legislative districts have since flipped left. The Democrats now have a lock on the “Space Needle Washington,” defined by former secretary of state Ralph Munro as everyplace seen from the Seattle landmark.
The Shift Washington website bombards my email box with daily attacks on Democrats and in particular Gov. Bob Ferguson. Shift has its roots in the 2012 gubernatorial election, with some Rob McKenna boosters resisting acceptance of his narrow defeat. To bring about a shift, they are relentlessly targeting homelessness and crime. What’s offered is maximum blame and minimal remedies.
Looney Left
A traditional Republican pitch, arguing that, “(name of candidate) is too liberal for .. .” It worked against Jim McDermott in the 1980 gubernatorial election but has flopped since. One particular problem is the progressive social views of Washington’s electorate. We endorsed same-sex unions in 2009, same-sex marriage in 2012, and more recently sex education in our public schools.
Still, the campaign goes on. Rep. Marie Gluesenkamp-Perez, D-Wash, is co-chair of the centrist Blue Dog Democrats caucus, such as it is, in Congress. At home, however, she gets attacked as an ally of the Antifa (anti-fascist) militants featured in Portland street protests.
The right has discovered a new issue of national import, namely transgender athletes competing in women’s sporting events and using the ladies room. Having failed to roll back Jay Inslee’s climate agenda or the capital-gains tax, wealthy conservative initiative promoter Brian Heywood is now putting resources behind two ballot measures aimed at gender-affirming treatment.
The cause of “parental rights” was a key to flipping the Virginia governorship four years ago, and has shown resonance nationally. Here, however, it has failed to register although taken up by podcaster Brandi Kruse.
It may be that only excesses on the left can give the far right a foothold in Washington. But the freeway occupations and burning vehicles of the George Floyd murder protests did not register on the electorate in this state — not for lack of trying. Witness the barrage of Seattle-bashing TV spots promoting Republican U.S. Senate candidate Tiffany Smiley in her 2022 challenge to Sen. Patty Murray. Smiley took only 43 percent of the vote statewide and has taken her wares to Fox News.
The right-wing media have become a permanent presence here. Sinclair broadcasts a nightly dose of crimes and homeless camps on KOMO. The visage and high-volume mouth of Jason Rantz are featured on Facebook, as are Kruse’s warnings about transgender teens. Rantz and Smiley are the face of this Washington on Fox News.
We’re no longer subject of most-livable profiles, true. But neither has demonizing caught on, yet. Nationally, the picture is different. Mainstream media are hurting just as mainline religion. Conspiracy theories gain credence. Such mouthpieces as Bobby Kennedy, Jr., and Joe Kent now occupy high public office.
The result is a relentless party line, coupled with toadying to a dear leader. It is downright creepy, shades of North Korea. What manner of leadership will we put in place this November to counter it?
This article also appears in Cascadia Advocate.
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