Dori: Dow files lawsuit against 976, but hints at unconstitutional income tax

Dow Constantine, as we told you on Wednesday, has announced that he is going to file a lawsuit against 976 over its “unconstitutionality.”

Apparently, I — a kid from Ballard — have to be the one to give career politicians like Dow Constantine and Jenny Durkan civics lessons as they throw their tantrums at the voters over 976.

Constantine wrote in a statement, “In the short term, we must clean up another mess that Tim Eyman has created for our state, our region, and our economy.”

Seattle is also preparing a lawsuit against 976. Durkan wrote in her own statement, ” I know Seattle overwhelmingly supported transit and voted strongly against Tim Eyman’s I-976.”

Eyman on lawsuit against 976: Constantine in ‘5 stages of grief’

Dow, Jenny, let me explain to you how voting works. It was not Tim Eyman’s initiative. It was 350,000 people — many of them your constituents — who put their signatures on petitions asking the secretary of state to certify putting a car tab cut on the ballot. There were enough signatures to qualify the measure for the ballot. We all got our ballots in the mail. And over 650,000 people — again, many of them your constituents — said, “Yes please, we would like a tax cut because we are illegally being charged for overvalued car tabs.” But I know that it’s a lot easier for you, with your revenge-minded and tax-focused attitudes, to demonize Tim Eyman instead of all 600,000 of us.

Here’s the reality. You’re going to have to deal with all 650,000 of us. There are probably a lot of people who voted no who recognize that the will of the people should be honored. Where were your challenges, where was your righteous defense of our Constitution, after the patently illegal gun law passed last year, I-1639? That initiative took away rights from citizens, so you had no interest in opposing that. But if something takes away your tax dollars, you’re all over it.

You can demonize Eyman all you want. But you cannot ignore that 650,000 Washingtonians — including 67 percent of Pierce County and 61 percent of Snohomish County, both within the Sound Transit taxing district — said they needed some help.

Dow’s plan for an income tax

But besides these ridiculous, temper-tantrum lawsuits, there is something even more nefarious going on.

Dow Constantine wrote in his statement, “The passage of I-976 underscores the ongoing need for comprehensive state tax reform … Our state’s tax system is inefficient, unfair, volatile, inadequate, and bad for business.”

He made a similar statement to our news partners, KIRO 7 TV — that the tax system must be redone to remove the dependence by government on car tabs.

What he means is, they will now use this car tab vote as an excuse to push for an unconstitutional state income tax, the all-time goal of Democrats in this state. They will probably call it a capital gains tax, but we know that the IRS considers a capital gains tax an income tax. An income tax is forbidden by the Washington State Constitution.

It’s ironic that as they are trying to convince people that 976 is unconstitutional, their remedy is something even more blatantly unconstitutional — a state income tax.

Jenny, Dow, if you think we fought hard against these car tabs, just wait for the people of Washington — the people who voted no on an income tax 10 times between 1934 and 2010 — to fight you on an illegal income tax. If you think you had a fight on your hands before, you just wait.

And if you somehow succeed with your lawsuits that you’re filing, there will be a mess. If you ignore the will of the people, we will rise up even stronger and louder and with more conviction than we did in Tuesday’s vote. You just watch and see. You have pushed us too far.

Listen to the Dori Monson Show weekday afternoons from 12-3 p.m. on KIRO Radio, 97.3 FM. Subscribe to the podcast here.

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