It's painful to listen to Governor Chris Gregoire and wanna-be-Governor Lisa Brown rail against Attorney General Rob McKenna's constitutional challenge to the health care mandate in ObamaCare because of their own hypocrisy: here's what they had to say about their constitutional challenge to Initiative 960 in 2008:

"A two-thirds requirement to pass certain types of bills, in my opinion, is antidemocratic and violates the Washington constitution," Brown said. "The constitution is difficult to change, and it should be. It should remain superior to the statutes we pass." (quotes taken from a March 5th, 2008 Centralia Chronicle editorial).

"I have no idea where we will be next year, whether we will have budget problems and the range of solutions to solve them. I imagine we would not start with taxes under any circumstances," Brown said of the GOP claims. "But the real reason for me is I believe in the Constitution, and it should be hard to amend the Constitution. And it should be done properly when we do it -- and that a statute, no matter how good of an idea or where it comes from, should not amend the Constitution." (quotes taken from a March 4th, 2008 Olympian news story)

"What I'm questioning here is a specific provision that I believe is unconstitutional. ... The ability we have here is to protect the constitution," Brown said. "We have this opportunity to clarify it, and I'm anxious for the courts to do so." (quotes taken from a March 3rd, 2008 Associated Press story).

But now Lisa Brown is upset with McKenna for doing the same thing she did (challenging the constitutionality of a law): Brown, D-Spokane, said she was "extremely disappointed" by McKenna's action. "I think this bill is good news for Washington state, so I'm not sure why he'd make a move like that." (quotes taken from a March 23rd, 2010 Seattle Times news story).

Gregoire, too, is being totally inconsistent. She's supposedly outraged that McKenna didn't "consult" with her about his constitutional challenge, but she was fine-and-dandy when Lisa Brown didn't consult with her on her I-960 lawsuit:

"Asked the same thing (prospect of raising taxes if I-960 is overturned) at a morning news conference, Gregoire said she, too, has no idea. There are three more state revenue forecasts between now and then, she said. "This is no time to talk about taxes," she said. "Why are we talking about taxes? I'm not going to scare the people of the state of Washington. No good comes of that. We are sitting on a surplus and I'm proud of that." Gregoire said Brown didn't consult her about the lawsuit, which she said she learned of when a staffer alerted her to a news story Monday. She's not participating in it, she said. (quotes taken from a March 4th, 2008 Spokesman Review news story).

It's clear that Chris Gregoire and Lisa Brown and others in the Democratic Party believe in the Constitution when it can be used to overturn government-limiting laws, but they believe the Constitution should not be used to overturn laws that expand governments' power. Lawsuits against voter-approved laws are OK, but lawsuits against legislatively-approved, voter-despised monstrosities like ObamaCare are not. Talk about blatant hypocrisy.

Not a single newspaper editorial or columnist has ever criticized anyone for bringing forth a constitutional challenge to any initiative we've ever done. What the Walla Walla Union-Bulletin wrote on March 4th, 2008 is typical:

In the end, however, all laws -- even those approved by voters -- have to be constitutional. Brown is taking a political risk in filing this lawsuit, but it's something that has to be done.

It'll be interesting to read newspaper editorials and columnists in the coming days concerning McKenna's constitutional challenge to see whether they remain consistent. If they do, then they will welcome the opportunity to learn whether the challenged portions of ObamaCare violate the Constitution. If they don't, then they're just like Gregoire, Brown, and the other Democrats who believe in the preeminence of the Constitution ... except when it conflicts with their agenda.

CORRECTION: Turns out that there was a newspaper -- the Spokesman Review -- that editorialized against Lisa Brown's lawsuit against I-960. Their editorials aren't made available to non-subscribers so I never saw it back then.