It’s easy for Washington state conservatives to tee off on King County Elections, but a good thing should be called out when a good thing is done.

Elections Director Julie Wise’s office did a good thing when they greenlit a new video intended to encourage more voter participation. In fact, their message is one that many conservatives should be able to get behind: universal suffrage is a reality because of the blood, sweat, and tears invested by many generations of Americans.

The video uses images and text to bring viewers forward from the time of the American Revolution through an expansion of voting rights that despite occurring far too slowly and in opposition to darker forces within the American public, were nevertheless fought for and should be acknowledged and used because they are valuable. Watch for yourself.

The video is surprising because the message is elegantly simple and undeniably patriotic. It implicitly reinforces the steps the country has taken on voting rights and affirms that history to voters in minority groups who are most likely the intended audience. The piece doesn’t lean into partisan sloganeering – scaremongering minority voters that we are just one election away from Jim Crow and systemic disenfranchisement – but affirms that achieving universal suffrage is a part of our common history.

Now, this isn’t to say that this one good deed lightens the great karmic burden on King County Elections. It was after all the machine that in 2004, under the management of Director Dean Logan, oversaw the magical transformation of a Dino Rossi victory on two vote counts into what was to be a two-term Christine Gregoire governorship. More recently, it was the agency in charge of a painful and predictably slow validation of more than 70,000 signatures on a petition to ban government-sponsored illegal heroin sites. There will undoubtedly be new outrages. Momentum is growing in Olympia on the proposal to make Sound Transit board members stand for election and be accountable for the tens of billions in taxes and fees they spend. The potential for professional wrestling-grade monkey business in such elections would be incredibly high.

For now, watch the video, judge for yourself, and please sound off in the comments below.