In traditional politics, successful governors moved up toward the presidency. Parties treated the governor job as a step in training, and governors performed well to satisfy their own ambition for the top office.
I just noticed two huge nonbarks that mark the end of traditional politics. I’ve thought about these politicians often. I didn’t notice what their fate says about the national parties. These nonevents help to bound the big inflection point of 2013.
Gary Locke and Christine Gregoire were top-notch governors of Wash. Locke was competent and made the right moves to serve the state’s best interests. Gregoire was HEROIC AND NOBLE. Absolutely the best politician in a generation. She knew exactly how to handle real emergencies.
Neither showed the slightest interest in national politics. I don’t know what signals they received from DNC leadership, but for sure they didn’t receive any boost from the media. Locke seemed crestfallen, Gregoire simply retired from public life.
She was replaced in 2012 by Superdemon Inslee, the perfect icon of the new politics. Inslee is a psychopathic universe-obliterating maniac like Bush and Trump, the precise diametric opposite of Gregoire. Instead of helping people in emergencies he CREATES emergencies and jacks off when the state dies. He spent his first term burning forests and blaming “climate”. In his second term Trump gave him the golden opportunity to strangle and torture the state for two years while blaming Trump for utterly normal political crap like rigging elections.
Polistra's Mill 