Republican legislative candidate Marlyn Jensen wants to explain how some inflammatory anti-environmental remarks got attributed to her this week - wrongly, she says.

Democrats at a Pierce County environmental event Wednesday hooted at quotations from Jensen's answers on an online candidate questionnaire posted by the Kitsap Sun. (See today's post, 'Hanging with Pierce County greenies.')

A day later, Jensen's dismissive statements about global warming and cleaning up Puget Sound on the Kitsap Sun Web site were replaced by milder comments.

What happened, Jensen said Friday, was that friends posted facetious responses to the Sun's questionnaire, thinking the stunt "would make me laugh." Hence the changes that subsequently appeared in the online form, she said.

Well, if that's the case, Jensen's friends didn't do her any favors. Jensen has an uphill fight against state Rep. Larry Seaquist, D-Gig Harbor, a one-term incumbent who is the only member of the Legislature who has commanded a Navy battleship (the USS Iowa).

Semaj Booker's latest troubles didn't make our editorial lineup this week, but that doesn't mean we haven't been talking about the kid and his repeated run-ins with the law.

Here Pat gives his take:

The illegal antics of Semaj Booker – the kid who flew to Texas last year by bluffing his way into two jetliners – began to wear thin a long time ago.

Pierce County Superior Court Judge Frank Cuthbertson feels the same way: He refused to release Semaj from juvenile detention Thursday after the 11-year-old's repeated violations of his auto-theft conviction last year. Most recently, Semaj was arrested July 5 on suspicion of burglary. He missed 40 days of school last year.

I say it's tough love time. America's No. 1 boy-criminal needs to cool his heels in detention for a while to get a taste of the consequences of a career in crime.

To which I responded:

Tough love? It’s highly unlikely that Semaj or any 11-year-old boy can fully comprehend the gravity of his actions. Their brains simply don’t work that way. The last thing a kid like Semaj needs is to be bunking with fellow delinquents who can help him hone his craft.

I say how about some tough “love” for the adults who are clearly failing this little kid? When a mother lets her kid skip school for 40 days because she is “tired of the school system,” it’s a huge red flag that the child comes by his disregard for rules honestly. And where exactly is Semaj’s father?

There has to be a reason Semaj so desperately wants to skip town. Let’s find out what it is.

Saturday: Digest – what other publications are saying

Sunday: This is the year to take a stripped-down transit package back to the voters.

Monday: The public is well-served by the county’s campaign against illegal signs on public rights of way.

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I guess I'm not retired enough yet. I still like to hang out with politicians - enough to spend a lovely summer evening Tuesday at a gathering of pols and wanna-be pols courting the green vote at the leafy Fircrest home of local enviro godmother Helen Engle.

The occasion was a sort of pep rally for Pierce Conservation Voters, the local division of Washington Conservation Voters – the coalition of environmental groups that bestows the official "green" endorsement for candidates in Washington.

No surprise - they tend to endorse Democrats. Lots of liberal Democrats (is there any other kind in Pierce County?) showed up to pay their respects.

Surprise guest was Freight Mobility Farrell, the infant daughter of Tacoma Port Director Tim Farrell and Jessyn Farrell, executive director of Transportation Choices. F.M. Farrell (actual name, Emaline Muriel) said little but gurgled happily. I believe she favors stronger limits on polluting emissions from all those diesel-fueled ships docked at the port.

Note: This is a longer-than-usual post, but don't miss legislative candidate Marlyn Jensen's reported comments on global warming cited below.

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Since Sound Transit was created in 1996, we've been nervous that King County would lose interest in building light rail into Pierce and Snohomish counties once it got tracks built in and around Seattle.

We're still jittery. The Sound Transit board will decide next week whether to ask the voters to approve a $9.1 billion plan that would get rail service north to Lynnwood, east through Bellevue and south to South 272nd Street on the northern reachs of Federal Way.

I've been asking board members on this end of the sound whether they think the proposed second round of light rail construction would politically undercut hopes for a third round that would reach the Tacoma Dome.

King County Councilwoman Julia Patterson says no.

"Public demand will result in third vote," she said. "It's a natural extension to the Tacoma Dome. South King will want to bring it south.

"My constituents – there's a huge percentage of South King County folk who are going to Tacoma to work. It would be incumbent on me to provide them with that connection. I can't imagine that the next board of directors would think that connection shouldn't be made."

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