Search Results for 'pR'

[WSMom]

JoB: Woo hoo!! You go girl!!

Like I’ve said before, give me Obama or Hillary! We could do much worse (like Romney or McCain)! We have to win this one. I can’t live through another 2004 election depression in 2008.

[Al]

Interesting links Ken & credmond. Let’s see if I can summarize…

The Transit Now tax that was passed does indeed single out RapidRide. However, the stress is on providing “unique…branding, frequency and quality of service to customers…will result in a significant improvement in the customer’s transit experience, and make the transit system easier to understand and use.” RR in the West Seattle corridor is described as “West Seattle/Downtown Seattle via West Seattle Bridge.” This does not limit RR to the route 54 only – it’s for the entire West Seattle corridor.

Now, as for the other links, it seems to me that Transit Now and RR are focused on REGIONAL transit, not city transite. Metro wants to get people from outlying areas in and out of the city quickly, “…keep pace with regional growth by expanding service.” So the focus on Vashon as a main service point is valid. They are looking to move that region, not the residents of West Seattle.

But they shouldn’t REPLACE an already existing route that functions very well (the regular 54). In fact, RR could very well use the resources to add an additional route through West Seattle or to “fix” the route 21 since Metro’s own site states the Transit Now initiative would “…increase sales tax to keep pace with growth and free up resources to address over crowding…” This is an exemplary problem on the 21 route (High Point, full buses, lack of express service, etc).

One last thing – in spite of Metro’s statements (to me directly) that this is not to be a solution to the viaduct problem, RR certainly seems to be a “solution”, “…when the…viaduct is closed for reconstruction, RapidRide service to West Seattle will maintain reliable access and provide other benefits as well.” Not without dedicated lanes not only in West Seattle, but over the bridge and down 1st, 2nd, 3rd or 4th, whatever they end up using, in both directions.

RR could be designed better and the funds used smarter.

[JoB]

LOL… now that is a texas sized joke!

not so respectful of the office…but one can question whether the president in question has been so respectful himself.

some days you just need a little comic relief!

[JoB]

i am really struck with the sensible analysis parents have given to this question. It depends on the kid, on how far, on how safe, on how well you have prepared them and most of all… on your own comfort level.

My grandkids walk to school… the younger are walked by the older and the older are in middle school and high school. The older have phones. someone is home to notice whether or not they get home. they have been well prepared. And … both families live in “safe” communities.

And every day a grandmother’s heart worries about the sickness that lurks even in safe places. But i also remember that they have to grow up and this is part of growing more independent.

We can’t raise our children in fear and expect them to become fearless adults… so we take calculated risks and pray for the best… for all our children.

[JoB]

corporate greed monkey? well i suppose that’s one way to characterize working on WalMart’s board years ago…while she was supporting a political husband and a daughter.

I like Billary better with the implication that she too will run after interns and lie.

Or, we could call her the screecher after what ken and others say is her voice.

or we could follow the press and label a misty eyed moment when she talked about her ideals as an emotional breakdown.

or we could talk about nepotism ignoring the fact that a politician’s wife certainly gets a political education and that she has used hers to work tirelessly for the Democratic party and has successfully (on her state’s terms) carried out her responsibilities as a senator.

or we could simply comment that she should have gotten bill a puppy sooner and should get him another to occupy him now.

Good grief!

How about we talk about policies and what we hope our candidate will or won’t do once elected?

Or let’s talk about the sex thing. Why is America more comfortable with it’s first viable black candidate than with a woman? (Probably for the same reasons that black men got the vote before women.)That would make a great conversation.

ok, so today i’m feeling a bit frustrated, but i have already stated that i am not in favor of combative politics (i think she should send bill home unless he can find something positive to say)…

and if the only way to support your candidate is to dig for the opponents weaknesses then i think that you have to re-examine why you support your candidate.

i could and have found good things to say about the other two democratic contenders… i just don’t think their good points trump hillary’s good points.

Ken disagrees with me.

That makes for discussion that actually uncovers some of the issues…

as for folding your tents and going home if your candidate isn’t our nominee… that’s one sure way to get a republican elected… and have you looked at their “corporate greed monkey” credentials lately?

Have you checked your house’s current market value? are you sure that you or your spouse are immune from the economic downturn that is headed our way? Do you like where your tax dollars are being spent? Are you in favor of corporate immunity and bailouts? I could go on and on.

Anger, bitterness and disappointment… along with a little graft and fraud… have put us where we are today. If we are stupid enough to fall for it again, we deserve what we get.

Regardless of who is the democratic nominee, it is out best interests to support them fully. And it might be a good idea to start remembering that now before we have blown bridges we can’t repair.

LOL… if we can be this divisive with the quality of candidates we have for nomination… imagine what we would be as republicans;-) no wonder they still feel confident that they can and will win.

[Ken]

Kayleigh:

I am firmly ABC, (anybody but Clinton) and have been from day one. But I base my opposition on disagreements I have with many of her stated goals and published policy papers. There are some places where she says the right words but I don’t believe she means them.

She is indeed the most likely candidate to sell out to the corporatist in my opinion. But I do not put any faith in hit pieces which cannot cite any sources in an era where news reports, SEC filings and the archives of the Arkansas Democrat Gazette (I pay for a subscription to get at the archives) are online.

The tactic is almost identical to the Clinton haters of the 90’s smear campaigns.

The left is not immune to the tactic. The nation magazine, counter punch and several authors who post at commondreams.org have created baseless smears attacking every candidate that is not Dennis Kucinich or Ralph Nader.

Matt Tabbi, now at The Rolling Stone, has written many good articles this year, but I still remember the vicious hit pieces he wrote in 03 against several Dems in the 04 primary race. I take his pieces with a grain of salt unless I have a second source.

[charlabob]

Miranda Taylor (www.taylorgoodhealth.com) She’s amazing (the first acupuncture I ever had, so she also overcome fear). Slightly out of WS, but also http://www.communichi.org for community, sliding scale acupuncture from folks who are extremely kind *and* professional. I’m dealing with chronic pain (see previous post on other forum about the wonderful purple cane) and these two saved me many times! I can’t say too much, so I’ll stop.

[charlabob]

I second the “oh no!” I actually expected Hill and Barack to destroy each other and John to prevail. I was right about the first two. Did anyone watch? Was Elizabeth with him? His ideas have had a definite influence on the campaign and the DemocratIC Party — and that will continue. I’ve always been disappointed that he, too, speaks of universal health INSURANCE rather than universal health CARE. (There’s a huge difference and inflated prices won’t stop as long as we support insurance. Johnny, we knew you too well! And we’ll miss you. I’m keeping the bumper sticker! :-)

[Ken]

The “endorse Obama” part seems to have been rumor. The TV pundits just vamp and make stuff up in the absence of news…

But Edwards drop will probably help Obama anyway unless HRC can turn him or keep him from endorsing before Tue.

It certainly buggers my plan to be uncommitted…

[cruiser]

There were three Texan surgeons playing a round of golf. As they’re walking down the fairway, they strike up a conversation and the first surgeon says, ” I reckon I’m the best surgeon in the world”. The other two enquire why and the first surgeon says, “I had a patient brought to me recently who had lost both his hands in an industrial accident. I sewed them back on and today that man has an audience to play the piano for Her Majesty, Queen Elizabeth”.

The second surgeon scoffs at this and says,”that’s nothing. Why I had a patient who lost both his arms in an automobile accident and I sewed them back on. At the last Olympic Games that man won a Gold Medal in the Field events”.

The third surgeon says, “that’s nothing. Several years ago a cowboy, high on alcohol and drugs, was riding his horse down a railroad track and collided with an oncoming express train. All I had to work with was the horse’s ass and a cowboy hat. Today that man is President of the USA.

[Sue]

My curse continues – whoever I support during the primaries never seems to make it to the end. I knew he’d never win, but it didn’t make me any less hopeful. :(

[Kayleigh]

The past matters to me, Ken, and I’m not going to change my mind about Hillary. Until she shows me real, progressive plans and ideas that make sense, I won’t vote for her at all, even if she gets the nomination.

I’m so disheartened by the type of thinking here in this thread (and elsewhere in the country in the Democratic party), I’m tempted to not attend the caucus at all. We have a real opportunity to turn the country around with John Edwards–to really make gains in things like health care and income equality. The poor, working,and middle classes have already lost so much in the last decade. It’s time get some of those things back, not to compromise.

The Democrats have given Bush way too much of what he wants and gotten little in return. When are they going to stand up and fight for the people they’re *supposed* to represent?

[Ken]

Jonathan Tasini (author of the above link) was defeated by Hillary Clinton in New York’s Democratic Primary in 06.

The piece seems a bit long on allegation and short on links to supporting documents.

Hillary is my last choice but lets stick to her very real policy problems and current DLC affiliations.

[JanS]

kayleigh…I guess we all have our opinions. Ovaries are only a part of the package…but those without haven’t exactly done a bang up job in recent years, now have they? And if that’s the deciding thing that can put a candidate in there to beat whoever the Repubs put out there, then idealism may just have to sit in the second seat on the bus.

They are ALL politicians…they ALL have something or other from their past that’s not exactly the best thing for some…Hillary has Wal-Mart…others have other things. Mr. McCain has a not too wonderful past, too, despite his Vietnam service and imprisonment. Do his body parts( or that imprisonment) give him a get-out-of-jail free card? I think not…just MHO…

[TammiWS]

I agree, Dr. Ferkel is great. I’ve been going to him for years – great demeanor, very knowlegable about mind/body/nutrition connection…Give him a call…

[Kayleigh]

I’m baffled as to why some of you are letting Hillary off the hook for Wal-Mart. It’s an assumption that she voted against the reeeealllly crappy stuff that Wal-Mart did–and even if she did, it’s a failure of leadership on her part, because they did the reeeeallly crappy stuff anyway.

Wal-Mart’s greedy suppressive acts didn’t begin with buying cheap sweatshop goods in China.

http://www.commondreams.org/views06/0207-34.htm

I guess it’s OK to be a corporate greedmonkey if you have ovaries? Ovaries are now a get-out-of-jail-free card?

[Ken]

I read it online and try to give a vendor the dollar to keep the paper and sell it again. But I don’t get downtown very often anymore.

This issue has a story relevant to this thread.

http://www.realchangenews.org/2008/2008_01_23/harasment_v15n05.html

The rich are coming. Hide the poor

Excerpt

---

After a shadow of public debate, the mayor will lay down a breathtakingly cruel policy of hounding human beings out of town.

By TIMOTHY HARRIS, Executive Director

How is one to respond when the most beautiful, affluent, and liberal city in America outlaws basic human survival? What are we to feel? What words could measure up to the sadness of this moment?

The Mayor’s staff has described their draft policy on homeless encampments as “consistent and compassionate.” Consistent, perhaps. But compassion requires action that is based upon understanding and empathy.

This is not that.

Seattle has joined the ranks of cities across America whose growing affluence will no longer tolerate the sight of extreme poverty. As urban living attracts those who can pay the price, the visible poor have come under attack in communities from LA to Boston.

Here in Seattle, in the few blocks that abut Pike Place Market, construction cranes mark four developments that will house 505 new condos with an average value of $2 million each. This represents about one-tenth of new downtown condo development.

The rich are coming. Hide the poor.

Until sometime last year, the City of Seattle mostly left homeless encampments alone until complaints forced action. This was as it should be. Last year’s one night homeless count — held in the dead of a cold January night — revealed about 1,600 people surviving on the streets. They slept in doorways and in cars. They rode the night buses. They walked to keep warm. They huddled underneath blankets and inside sleeping bags.

They made do without shelter because the shelters were full.

[swimcat]

Alright, this topic needs to be revisited since I just swam at Southwest and it amazes me that people won’t swim in the proper lane for their speed. I am usually the fastest person in the pool, and it is not fair or safe for me to have to continually pass people that are too clueless to get into a slower lane (I have been hit many times when passing people because they don’t know the proper way to be passed). So here is a hint- if you can not do a flip turn, or any stroke besides ‘freestyle’, you should NEVER EVER EVER go into the fast lane or very fast lane, even if no one is in there.

[Sue]

Ken, I really appreciate the time you spent explaining this further. Although I can’t be there at the caucus this year, I definitely want to be better informed so I can be more involved when and where I can. Thanks so much!

[Ken]

Just to clarify: The regulations on “free markets” were made after the crash of 29, to save capitalist and the corporations they invested in, from themselves. The boom and bust cycles throughout the 19th century and into the 20th, were the result of manipulation of most investors by the few insiders. Every cycle relied on a new crop of investors that could be roped into another “once in a lifetime opportunity”. Note they occurred at approximately generational intervals. Sometimes the unregulated businesses caused ecological disasters. The Dust Bowl of the 20’s could never have happened without wheat speculation during WWI driving investors to lease Midwestern grasslands sight unseen and pay crews to plow up the grass and plant wheat. After two years most of it reverted to it’s normal dry state, the wheat market crashed and the newly exposed dirt took to the winds in storms that brought darkness at mid day as far away as Washington DC.

Deregulation loosed these same actors on the public again and it is foolish to think any corporation will police itself. History can only teach us when it is not ignored.

[JoB]

Yesterday, i saw a man holding a sign on a street corner that said “homeless, need help”. had i encountered him in starbucks, i would not have been surprised because he was clean, well dressed in outdoor clothing and carrying a quality daypack. i nearly stopped just to ask him his story because i think there is probably a pretty interesting one there.

The assumption that the homeless are there by choice has driven a callousness about this problem that borders on cruelty.

There but for the grace of god… Any of us could suffer reversals of fortune that could bring us to that street corner. I know many women who are one step from that because of nothing more than chronic illness.

As a community, we need to address this problem whether it is an “artificial” problem landed on us by crackdowns in other parts of the city or a local problem. Once it is here, it is a local problem.

I am too new to be able to name the local agencies that take on this work. I encourage donations of money and goods… but the most important donation is time… both for those doing the work and those receiving help.

the greatest gift we can give another is to listen and acknowledge their story.

shame on me for only almost stopping to at least hear that young man’s story. i had the time.

[JoB]

ken, i would agree with your advice to the candidates… even to my favorite candidate.

As a woman with one of those voices that tends to go all high pitches i would bet that she has already had some coaching tho:)It’s a difficult thing to control. she should reflect on poor Dean whose one outburst and uncontrolled voice cost him any chance at the presidency… for good or bad, who knows.

However, she can control her stance on health care and she should come down on the side of universal health care. I think America is finally ready to talk about that option.

As for corporations, we need to roll back deregulation for sure, but i am not sure how to keep them out of campaigns.

I just read a totally unrelated book about Helga and Clara Estby’s walk across America (Bold Spirit) which mentioned the Bryan/McKinley campaign and that the campaign contributions of just two corporations for McKinley exceeded those of Bryan’s entire campaign($500,00 from JP Morgan and Standard oil.). McKinley won.

Corporate involvement in campaigns is not news and any attempt to keep them out of it has just resulted in the exploitation of loopholes.

As for our current concern with corporate greed, let me quote Wiliam Jennings Bryan’s campaign slogan, “Wall street owns the country. It is no longer a government of the people for the people, by the people but a government of Wall street, for Wall street, and by Wall street.”

This too is nothing new. In reading history it seems that there were only a couple of times when Wall Street seemed to get the need for investment in anything other than making money and that was during the industrial revolution and the period after World War II when it became apparent after our investment in Germany and Japan under the Marshall plan that we had better do some investment of our own here or American Corporations were going to be left in the dust. Both times, investment was crucial to their own self interest… better a little now and a lot later than none now and nothing later. And both times America and Americans prospered.

I feel that concentrating on the injustice of corporate greed (including their involvement in our elections) we are missing the boat that would lead to a realization of the importance of actual production for profit…

just as America missed the boat on health care when they worried about the govt rationing health care when the insurance companies were exceeding anything our government could have done. At least the govt had public opinion to contend with.

We need to find a way to focus on the real conversation which is about actual production… even in service industries which have forgotten they relied on service to create their business.

I believe that Hilary has a grasp of that concept… and that is why i am supporting her. It may be a vain hope, but there you go.

:) In closing, I can’t resist mentioning Bold Spirit again and that these two women walked across America during a time when only one state (Wyoming) actually granted women the right to vote… a little more than a hundred years ago. Something to ponder.

[sw]

Call Mitch Monetti at Monetti Landscaping – 938-5400. He did some work for us last year that was great, and priced comparably to other bids we had. He’s also done some work for others around the neighborhood that has turned out nicely.

[Ken]

If you want to see why the entire Rapid ride program will be mismanaged to benefit the fewest number of people, especially here in West Seattle, check out the young earth anti science creationist view of the project. (Note: this is the same morons at the Discovery Institute that think Dinosaures wore saddles.

http://www.cascadiaproject.org/surfaceandmarinetransportation/busrapidtransit.php

It appears to be a super expensive express bus for Vashon Island.

None of the links above disprove this theory except the King county link that is already riddled with inconsistancies.

[Anonymous]

Dr. Bailey Ferkel on 35th Ave SW. next to the old West Seattle Herald Building, he is fantastic!! He uses gentle pressure, diet and exercise as methods of healing. He is very gentle, and soft-spoken.