The real Rob McKenna

(Sorry the weasel pictured has more socially redeeming qualities)

 You may have seen the latest TV ads about Rob McKenna. How he pushed to give himself a $148,000 raise while blocking an increase of 12 cents for minimum wage. Compassionate little bastard is he. But that's not the whole story behind the republicon candidate. He has a few more skeletons in his closet that need the light of day. You may have noticed his latest ads wanting to appeal to women and there's a reason or should I say several. The first was his law suit against the Affordable Health Care Act. If he had his way and it was repealed thousands of women would have been back to square one with their medical coverage meaning they would have been denied coverage. Side note many of the provisions went into effect even before the the act takes full effect in 2014. Mainly pre existing conditions. Insurance companies can no longer turn someone down with a pre existing condition. He stated only after much public outcry that he only wanted certain parts of the ACA repealed but that's not how he responded to his republican pals in Washington when a Florida judge ruled against it, the entire act. According to an article in the Stranger, McKenna had a bit of a go round with a young lady who wanted to know his opinion about a certain piece of legislation. I was going to post the exact confrontation but for some reason blogger won't let me so I'll paraphrase. A young lady at a Mckenna event asked him a question about the Reproductive Parity Act. She wanted his opinion. He rudely cut her off and told her to "get a job." Then there's Mckenna's ties to big oil. Stating that he was going to get to the bottom of the price gouging from the oil companies in the state, he came to the conclusion that the state was not refining enough. Interesting to note that some of his major backers are "the big oil companies". Also of interest is that we have several refineries here in the Puget sound area and yet pay prices far higher than the national average. Bellingham, Washington which has a refinery just outside the city pays the highest prices in the state. Figure that one out.

Plant safety an issue The Tesoro plant in Anacortes was the plant that exploded in April of 2010 that killed 7 workers. The piece of equipment that failed hadn't been inspected since 1998. The company was sighted for 44 workplace violations including a willful disregard for safety regulations. The state found the company failed to inspect and maintain decaying 40 year old equipment. BP, one of McKenna's other backers, received the state's largest fine $81,000 for willful violations after an investigation of a fire at the Cherry Point refinery. They too seem to ignore inspections and worker safety. This comes as no surprise as BP has been fined for similar accidents in Alaska, Texas, and of course the Deepwater spill and fire in the Gulf Coast. It's the job of Mckenna to see that the laws and regulations of the state are enforced but I guess there are other motivations going on here and definitely a conflict of interest.

More problems with the female vote 
 Mckenna says he's pro choice but that would go against his Catholic upbringing as well as the national republican platform which essentially would outlaw all forms of abortion even in cases of rape or incest and most types of birth control.

I would continue but Blogger keeps screwing up and gives error message after error message. Nothing like turing a silk purse into a sows' ear. Feel free to use that feedback tab to rip them a new one. I guess the nerd likes a Jolt cola bottle where the sun doesn't shine.