http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/clash-of-the-middlemen/Content?oid=12925576 Comments On: Clash of the Middlemen by Brendan Kiley en-us Copyright 2013 The Stranger. All rights reserved. This RSS file is offered to individuals, The Stranger readers, and non-commercial organizations only. Any commercial websites wishing to use this RSS file, please contact The Stranger. webmaster@thestranger.com (The Stranger Webmaster) Wed, 22 May 2013 00:00:01 -0700 Wed, 22 May 2013 12:45:00 -0700 Foundation http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Posted by auntie grizelda]]> Thu, 15 Mar 2012 00:42:49 -0700 The Stranger Posted by lolololol]]> Wed, 14 Mar 2012 07:02:21 -0700 The Stranger Posted by auntie grizelda]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 23:22:00 -0700 The Stranger
Note to self: post no more blogs on Benadryl.
Posted by auntie grizelda]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 23:21:27 -0700 The Stranger
Okay, I'n done.
Posted by auntie grizelda]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 23:19:40 -0700 The Stranger
Unfortunately, with the passing of I-1183, a lot of state jobs got voted out. I don't foresee privatization of liquor sales actually restoring our high unemployment rate or skyrocketing college tuition fees any time soon.
Posted by auntie grizelda]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 23:12:55 -0700 The Stranger
And voters STILL yelled, Toga, Toga, Toga!

Welcome to the car wreck.
Posted by auntie grizelda]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 23:03:52 -0700 The Stranger
Newsflash.... WE KNEW ALL THAT!

1.We would have voted the same whether Costco spent 20-dollars or 20-million. Having the government compete in the same marketplace of a product the government also regulates is both unfair and ludicrous.

2. Costco is a business. Which is in business to make money. I hope they become a shining beacon of how the private sector can do it better then the public sector and they rake in bucketloads of money with this initiative. Creating more jobs and opportunity for everyone such as the new Costco being built across the street from Alderwood Mall.

3. And the state will actually make MORE money due to that 17% tax that going to get tacked on.

Then the state can focus on what the business of the state should have been in the first place. Regulation. And lets be honest folks, no state does regulation better than this Gregoire land nanny state.
Posted by thatsjarrod]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 23:02:29 -0700 The Stranger Posted by cattycat]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 21:48:07 -0700 The Stranger Posted by earwig]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 20:19:22 -0700 The Stranger Posted by Paddy Mac]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 16:53:36 -0700 The Stranger
Voters (that's you, citizen squid) decided long ago that taxing liquor, retail sales, business, building, and a confusing tangle of other things was good policy, so our state has used the system you built to pay for all the services we have demanded of government.

We have usurped the judgment of the very judges we elected to judge, demanded by initiative that the courts mandate unthoughtful, unproductive, and needlessly expensive sentencing practices, despite evidence this will only make impacts on communities worse and more expensive; spend a lot of money on "security", which will only make matters worse and more expensive; Buy a bunch of snowplows, garages to house them and mechanics to maintain them, despite evidence this will only make impacts on communities worse and more expensive; and the demands for service go on, and on, and on.

Taxes, after all, in the words of justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, "the price we pay for a civilized society", and we, voters, have weighed-in through our elected representatives about what services we require. Our challenge has been to build a system of taxation that can fund our demands in perpetuity. As has been apparent in headlines and committee rooms for decades, the voters of Washington continue to do this very poorly, demanding the legislature fulfill under-analyzed knee-jerk mandates that poll well (throw away the key, clear my street, build me a bridge, provide emergency services, hospitals, libraries, sewers, power, water, public health and safety systems...), and then pitching a fit when work costs money. Dude, get real, there is no tooth fairy.

Recent electoral history is rife with examples o this failure of analysis. We insisted on putting the monorail concept into play before we had completed even a rudimentary analysis, so it could not succeed. We may well have done the same thing to the liquor system.

We watched Costco spend millions over years to convince us to give it control over our broken system, and now are complaining that it is going to do exactly what the people in Costco's PR department convinced the voters to ask it to do, which is make more money for Costco. Remember, it was YOU who said the rich can do a better job of managing your money than you can. So now, when you have to pay for what you bought, you complain it isn't what you wanted. A personal problem, if ever I heard one.

"Business sense" is exactly what Costco spent so much money to lead voters to believe it was introducing into the system, and it did so, exactly as advertised. So now we have added profit-making to a system originally designed as a way to pay for voter demands through taxation (the things we pay to get what we want from our society). Government exists to address the desires of citizens.
Business exists to address the desires of owners. Why the surprise? Way to go.

The truth is beginning to dawn that the changes the "government is a waste of money" people are causing may only make impacts on communities worse and more expensive. Way to go.

Yes, reservation jokesters, anybody can break the law and avoid personal responsibility for the functions of society, but law is the only way voters can enforce the rules we want. If you are really tired of society and want the wild west, move to Afghanistan, where no tax collectors will bother you. Good luck with war-lords and no laws.

I will not even attempt to address any positions beginning with "all you gotta do is", "it's government's fault", "it's the union's fault this won't work", or "why don't they just". These vacuous voices help us get into these errors of failed analysis to begin with.

We did, indeed, trade an arcane but cost-effective and well-regulated taxation system for an expensive unregulated one. Way to go.

Cheap liquor, by the way, has never been the priority of Washington voters. Arizona gets cheap vodka, we get schools, roads, bridges, trauma centers, police, curb-cuts, and other things we want.

If we keep privatizing government functions, we will keep wondering why the CEOs have yachts, but our children have no schools. Way to go.

We will keep on getting into these dilemmas until we figure out how to put analysis into the initiative system and make our taxation system rational. Rational, by the way, does not mean free. Carry your weight.


Posted by Songbird]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 16:38:12 -0700 The Stranger
Back at ya, twerp.
Posted by Rujax!]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 14:35:37 -0700 The Stranger
Of course there are excise taxes that are part of the shelf price of booze (just like there are sales taxes on top of the shelf prices I was quoting). Where did I imply or state otherwise?

Retail competition CAN be a good thing for those who buy liquor. Nowhere did I assert that that outcome is inevitable, or that it will be the case in Washington state.

So go fuck yourself, you dumbass fucking fuck.
Posted by Functional Atheist]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 14:20:06 -0700 The Stranger Posted by rp]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 14:03:39 -0700 The Stranger
Goddamn fucking Teahadist revolt...
Posted by Banned on The Seattle Times]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 11:06:56 -0700 The Stranger Posted by Steve not registered]]> Tue, 13 Mar 2012 00:35:18 -0700 The Stranger Posted by Rujax!]]> Mon, 12 Mar 2012 16:46:59 -0700 The Stranger
Arizona has a three-tiered distribution system...

...just like Washington is going to have. Distributor/Wholesaler (NOT Costco, BTW)/Retailer.

PS-The State taxes you pay on your favorite brain cell killer?...you'll stll pay 'em. Sucker.


Posted by Rujax!]]> Mon, 12 Mar 2012 16:30:13 -0700 The Stranger
Ha, ha, ha, ha, HA!
Posted by Rujax!]]> Mon, 12 Mar 2012 16:22:12 -0700 The Stranger
Yes, there is indeed a lot of political tea bag / Tim Eyesore-related bullshit destroying what's good here in Washington State. As a native, I have traveled across the United States and frankly wouldn't want to live anywhere else. Despite ample problems in Olympia, including the ridiculous inability to balance the state budget, home is where my heart is.

I guess it's a good thing I don't consume hard liquor.
Posted by auntie grizelda]]> Mon, 12 Mar 2012 12:06:19 -0700 The Stranger
As with everything in WA State we the people are waiting for someone to take charge and hold a steady course so influx and price and demand and the skin flint tin horns are left behind?

We (supposedly) have no control over the price of anything and as well the economic forcasters cant predict anything so your going to loose your shirt and your home and your school?

Toll road,gas price gas,tax that tax this and the little guy gets pushed out.

get on your knees for the banks as they are the ones who own everything?

next year it will be a new ball of wax 7-11 will have its own brand of gin. and the market will be competitive and not haveing growing pains? untill then you snooze you loose and you should have stocked your wine cellar before the state had its panty tantrum.
Posted by slade]]> Mon, 12 Mar 2012 11:20:19 -0700 The Stranger
Arizona sucks in many ways--the summer weather is terrible and the political climate is even worse--but one thing this state does well is retail competition in the sale of liquor. Prices here are very cheap. Grocery stores have liquor sales in their weekly ads. A 1.5 liter bottle of Wolfschmidt or Fleischmann's vodka is $12.99-13.99 normally, but some major chain is sure to have it on sale for $10.99 any given week--and a couple times a year, you'll see it at $9.99. Or how about a 750 milliliter bottle of Captain Morgan or Jose Cuervo on sale for $12-13 (and a couple times a year at $10-11)?

Rewrite your law to mirror Arizona's, specifically encouraging grocery stores to enter the retail liquor trade, and I bet Washington state citizens would see the kind of price reductions that true retail competition can provide.
Posted by Functional Atheist]]> Mon, 12 Mar 2012 10:22:22 -0700 The Stranger The Stranger editorialized against 1183, endorsed a "no" vote, and wrote extensively about the unfavorable terms of the initiative as written.

(Funny how, with massive price spikes all but confirmed, the odious and self-righteous asshole from this thread is nowhere to be found.)


Posted by d.p.]]> Sun, 11 Mar 2012 23:25:13 -0700 The Stranger
@18: You could always move.
Posted by auntie grizelda]]> Sun, 11 Mar 2012 23:08:06 -0700 The Stranger