Durkan appeals to people who just want a normal mayor, not a riot-endorsing or car-outlawing nutcase. Who want incremental change, not wholesale slam-change-at-you-whether-you-want-it-or-not.

She'll have a lot of built-in support from all over town that's not the 2nd, 3rd or 4th districts. Long-term single family residents. People for whom Mike McGinn was too much, to say nothing of the riot-endorsing nutjobs like Oliver.

That's how they'll see it, and in a field where there's a bunch of self-described change-agents, Durkan would probably be the only choice that isn't one of those.

Speaking as someone that's argued various politics for 2 years with a lot of you, Durkan is probably no worse than my second choice. I'm not in agreement with her on the pot shop questions, but I also understand it was her job description to prosecute those then. I believe she'd follow the laws as we voted on them, so she should leave pot shops alone now.

As for things like Oliver's stated goals of rioting to make change happen, I think Oliver's going to find she's outnumbered significantly in Seattle.

As for things like more density, I would imagine Durkan will give downtown developers everything they want, just like Murray did. I suspect she'd take a bit shit on neighborhood single family home owners, just like Murray did. But she'll win those people over by promising more law and order against the homeless, just like Murray tried to do.