[Superman]

Another interesting issue. It would be hard to find anyone in the know including legislators on both sides of the aisle, who is not insisting that Western Washington MUST invest in transportation infrastructure upgrade. The virtually unanimous consensus among insiders (here, you have the opportunity to avoid the transportation question altogether my declaring those "insiders" to be gubmint trash) is that the passage of Initiative 912, which would roll back the legislature's 9-cent gas tax increase scheduled to be phased in over time, would be economically devastating to the State. And yet, voter anger is probably great enough, and greed powerful enough, and selfishness rampant enough (we don't need no stinking taxes) that it could pass.

You know where I stand on this. I think our economic outlook is being throttled by this problem, and we're at a point where it is going to be quite painful, in both traffic disruptions and also taxpayer costs, to do what absolutely, positively, undeniably (I guess you'll be the judge of that) needs to be done. But as always, I'm interested in the silly, ignorant and misguided opinions you guys have that disagree with mine.

Another thing. They say there are few good comprisons between public and private efficiencies (you listening, Len?), but that we probably have one here. The embattled Monorail project. It's one of those public/private partnerships. The public pays the bill, and the private firms do all the rest. Well, the voters approved $2 billion because that's what the private interests said it would cost. The private companies now sheepishly admit they want something like $11 billion to build it. Hmmmm. First $2 billion. Then $11 billion. I've never seen a public agency mess up that badly with math.

And finally. Will we have to see the collapse of the Alaskan Way Viaduct or some other similarly unstable public transportation structure fail and kill some motorists before we accept that maybe public works are necessary for the public good, and that their cost is lower than the cost of not addressing the problems?