The Bellingham Herald has unwittingly made voters' choice dead simple.
If you want your life here to be governed more, vote for Browne, Buchanan, Mann and Weimer.
If you want this area's government to have tangible limits, vote for Kershner, Elenbaas, Knutzen and Luke.
The rhetorical goal was, as always, the mobilization of partisan bias: to identify restraint as outside the mainstream.
Allow us to share one basic principle about government: Up to a certain point, government services actually do provide more freedom and self-determination when they're carefully contained. Government work that serves essential needs more efficiently than we could meet them alone allows us to attend to our own endeavors without being unduly or unjustly burdened. But beyond that point, government crosses the line to burdensome and oppressive governance. Instead of leaving us free to mind our own business, government starts sticking its nose into our business. WE believe government crossed into the realm of oppressive governance a long time ago.
There have always been loopy blue laws, but WE thought the nation got past most some time ago. Alas, the lust to rule seems like a hiccup in human nature. Take a trip to the Nanny State and explore how easily good intentions slip to petty tyranny, and "nudge" becomes "shove." The appetites of some to govern is a wonder to behold.
If personal and civil liberty mean little to you, and the thought of a ballooning local bureaucratic state seems safe - well, you know who to vote for. The Herald told you so.
Could this problem be solved with more freedom, instead of less? ~ Penn Jillette