Ever watch a car wreck in progress, and get the sense that time slows to a crawl--that you can see the tragedy unfolding, in 1/100th of a second increments, and you're powerless to stop it?

Knowing how money would ensure the come-from-behind passage of the Seahawks stadium was a lot like that.

To state the obvious: money bought this election. The democratic process, from last November's opening contributions to state legislators to the victory party in the wee morning hours of June 18, was purchased by Paul Allen's limitless riches. $1.7 millio n to Olympia; several million to pay for the election itself, and over $5 million to actually win it. A shrewd investment that's already paid for itself--the market value of the Seahawks went up by tens of millions of dollars as soon as the measure passed .

Unfortunately, it leaves a raw and festering wound where the myth of democracy used to be. We'd already established, with this year's craven bills written by industry to give big bucks to industry, that our state legislature could be bought for pennies on the dollar. Now it's much, much worse: proposals even too outrageous for the legislature can be sent to the ballot box by Olympia with the "let the people decide" ruse, and the election then purchased separately.

As you read this, well-compensated strategists at Boeing, Weyerhaueser, Nordstrom's, Immunex, and countless others are calculating what business expenses or capitalization might be construed as essential to civic pride and/or Seattle's standing as a world-class city. Blood is in the water. All other things apparently have to be very unequal for a state-of-the-art, money-rich campaign to fail.

Sadly, in the stadium election, things were that unequal. The "No" side was underfunded, but it also crippled itself. The egos of Brian Livingston and Chris Van Dyk, alpha-male heads of (respectively) No Sports Taxes and CMIT, led to two groups wit h overlapping work and serious deficiencies. (Van Dyk is a horrible public speaker; Livingston is a good speaker and fundraiser but no organizer.) The massive volunteer support wasn't effectively used; the precious time of the campaigns' limited staff was frequently wasted on tasks volunteers should have been doing. In much of the state, "No" campaigns were virtually invisible. Where they were visible, they looked like buffoons next to Allen's slick crew.

Where does this leave us? With another critical election, having many of the same elements, in less than three months: the primaries to determine who will be Seattle's next Mayor, City Council, and School Board. The defining issue will be voter anger at b ig downtown money, business as usual, and corporate welfare priorities that ignore neighborhoods, social services, and basic infrastructure. Allen's win only sharpens that debate. Well-connected office-holders like Jane Noland and Jan Drago are already raising huge amounts of money. If alternative voices are to survive even the primary, they need to raise money now, in June and July, so that after Labor Day they have the organization in place to be competitive. Get out your checkbooks. Today.

It's easy to complain and tune out of the political process in the wake of a debacle like Paul's election. But remember: a majority of voters in each county in the Seattle area voted for this thing. That majority didn't exist a month ago. Reversing these kind of results can happen, and some clear advantages for the pro forces in this month's election suggest projects needed to make grass roots priorities more successful in the future:

Media. We need our own. Seattle had one radio station (KJR-AM, a sports talk outlet) that was a virtual full-time voice for Allen for weeks; another, more-listened to radio station, KIRO, had a direct financial stake in the measure's passage. KIRO' s owner runs eight other radio stations in town. Newspapers and TV also had lots to gain from the Seahawks' staying. Meantime, opponents scrounged for media coverage, since they couldn't afford ads. Forget ads--we need our own community radio station, our own news, talk shows, and forums for advocacy. For a few million, one could be purchased. A couple hundred people at $1000 each could swing the down payment on an AM audible around the city. It needs to happen.

Outreach. What campaigns crippled by poverty can't buy, they have to use foot power to replace. The "no" folks should have called every phone and knocked on every door in the county. Three times. Without apology. For any such campaign, we need not just to complain to our friends, but engage undecided voters and opponents.

Political Accountability. There need to be organized structures--to help campaigns, to paralyze the streets, and everything in between--to hold accountable officials who sell out our futures. People like Gary Locke and Norm Rice risked nothing for their support of Allen's boondoggle and prostitution of the electoral process. Instead, they're profiting from it.

Labor. The endorsement of Allen's deal by the King County Labor Council was particularly embarrassing. KCLC's head, Ron Judd, comes from the construction trades, which wanted the jobs. It's a measure of just how bad labor is on this issue that we'r e talking about at least $600 million in public funds, plus untold additional costs (like the gas tax hike now being called for to pay for fixing the traffic mess two stadiums and port access will create), for a few hundred temporary jobs--many of which will go to out-of-state contractors. A bigger betrayal of working class tax dollars, and union dues, is hard to imagine.

Local labor has an ugly record of backing the corporate welfare megaprojects that have epitomized Seattle politics in recent years. Such priorities and policies screw workers 90% of the time. Organized labor's constituents need to hold their leaders' feet to the fire: get out of bed with corporate-friendly Democrats and start demanding that tax dollars flow to things like (for example) livable wage legislation, or real enforcement of worker safety and environmental regulations. Or even, for chrissake, economic development that creates real jobs.

Money. Grass roots efforts are never going to have the money that a Paul Allen or a Boeing has; but they still need some reserves for those goods footpower simply can't buy. The "no" campaigns didn't get near the war chest they should have had for the popular support they held; the assumption, presumably, was that they couldn't compete with Paul, so why bother? As a result, at the end of the campaign they couldn't even blunt or distract from his message.

Until activists stop turning up our collective noses at fundraising, and supporters start getting real about reinvesting serious amounts of our income into reclaiming democracy (through whatever organizations, projects, or campaigns you prefer), we'll still be on the outside, complaining. Tithe yourself; think of it as a retirement fund, an IRA, an investment in your future job security and your ability to have a community.

Corporations invest in the democratic process because the laws and policies they buy generate far more money in return. We can, and probably will, see worse than Paul Allen; at least he lives here, and he's rich enough to occasionally be altruistic withou t missing it.

By contrast, any concession a company makes, in the policies it advocates, when public good does not coincide with maximum profits, is a betrayal of stockholders and corporate interests. Community advocates must tap that same kind of relentless determination just to help balance the pressure on our public institutions. Without it, every single citizen will, eventually, be sold up the river by a political process that has lost touch with humanity. We have a clear choice: shout ourselves hoarse at fancy new sports palaces, stay home and watch games on TV, or get busy and take our city back. It's up to us.