Before the August primary, the Seattle Times urged voters to reject the $123 million 7-year library levy exactly because the library is such an essential service:

Special property-tax levies should be requested mainly for big one-time expenses. An example on the Aug. 7 ballot is the King County levy for juvenile courtrooms and jail. An example on the Nov. 6 ballot in Seattle is a levy to rebuild a critical seawall holding up Seattle's waterfront. Another example was Seattle's libraries levy of a decade ago. It was for buildings.

I disagreed with the editors (as did 64 percent of Seattle voters), but at least they made a coherent argument.

Yet today the editors urge voters to renew the $120 million 6-year Automated Fingerprint Identification System levy—also not a big one-time expense—because... you know... it is such an essential service.

I'm so confused!