Durkan just wants to ride the wave of the recent spate of pity donations that billionaires have been putting toward homelessness. They'll ingratiate themselves with Durkan, then she has less leverage over them the next time something like a tax is proposed. Small investment now, big payoff down the road.

And as for the planters, why not just put a little ribbon of metal bumps along it to make it uncomfortable to sit on? They do that to keep skateboarders off stuff all the time. But I appreciate your comment about more sitting spaces downtown and everywhere really. The butts demand it!

@1 I agree with you on the clear demand for butt spaces, but adding hostile architecture to our landscape seems like an eff you way to solve this. Maybe just putting the planters up one foot higher (and adding some benches to 2nd Ave) would do the trick.

Also, tech bros + pickup artists = 🤮

Then you get into the problem of discriminating against low-butts. High-butts will still be able to sit on planters, but low-butts will be tossed to the curb (where their butts fit, but uncomfortably. That is a can 'o' worms you don't want to open.

)

Maybe I’m the only one who didn’t know this, but apparently “just deserts” is an archaic phrase (in the HOV lane blurb). Glad I didn’t put my foot in my mouth criticizing that one...
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/just_deserts

I mean, it's not JUST deserts that taste sweet. There's other things, too; like ice cream. Or, cake. Pies, too. Any dessert, really.

Rivers and forests taste sweet, too.

And I wager that unjust deserts taste just as sweet as just deserts.

The nose, God, the nose.

@5 Yep! And I've seen the "desserts" eggcorn so often that it actually throws me when I see "deserts". It's from "deserve".

"Just deserts taste so sweet."
Much like clam chowder, just deserts are just too sandy for me.

What cunning plan will the Mayor and her wealthy donors come up with to solve the homeless crisis? If I were a betting man, I would guess "Build more Luxury housing for the wealthy," with stipulations that developers have to give minimal amounts of money towards the homeless. It won't solve the issue. They can at least pretend they're doing something.

Seattle should take London's advice:
* Tax vehicles for entering the city.
* Cordon off busy areas for non-motorized use only.
* Physically barrier off non-motorized transit lanes.
* Put all you entitled car drivers onto treadmills to burn off that misplaced energy, fat, and cut down on utility rates.

"Speaking of Republican depravity: We can’t make this up people -- Roy Moore, Former Alabama Senate candidate has endorsed Supreme Court nominee Brett Brett Kavanaugh."

Perfect. On any semi-sane Planet, an Endorsement from 'Judge' Moron would be the Kiss of Death. Let's see how Earth fares in this long-drawn-out Morality Play.

(Did judge Kavanaughtiest -- Brett Brett -- come with two first names, or is this merely more Slander from the far far, far far far Left?)

@9 You’ve made some giant leaps of assumption with your last statement, especially considering the blurb is to create discussion on the topic, not make a decree, and even if that was the case, it doesn’t really.

That being said, your first statement is definitely adding something to the discourse.

The important point is, if the city is going to remove something for which the initial purpose is to protect bikes, because it allegedly/apparently does not actually protect people more so than it creates additional issues, then there should, at the very least, be a proposed solution if not a distinct plan to remedy the initial problem, protecting bikers, because removal puts the situation back to square one (debatable), right?

As the situation is developing, it looks like within that Twitter thread there is some contact being made between concerned citizens and SDOT. We shall see what unfolds.

When I drive my RV in the HOV lane, I never get stopped. I guess they just figure that I've got somebody with me and usually I do. But from time to time, I do think to myself,

Well I fooled you
I fooled you
I got pigiron
I got pigiron
I got all pigiron

@6,7,8,10,11,

See @5.

I also didn't know it, but the correct usage really is "just deserts" not "just desserts"

@19 the use of the term "entitlement" in regard to cars,I think, is usually used in reference to the way that the the city spends time, energy and money to grow and expand transit options in such a way that is preferential to car drivers. We are constantly expanding highways, building new tunnels, putting millions into stupid traffic-responsive digital speed limit signs that are not policed. Meanwhile, efforts to improve the city for walkers and bikers are meager and incomplete (bike lanes that only last a couple blocks, safety barriers that they decide to take down rather than find another solution.) The more you build a city to serve cars, the more people will commute by car, and live further away from their places of work. The "entitlement" is comes in the form of the backlash every time government tries to spend more money to make the city more pedestrian friendly. Meanwhile, against the people's expressed will, the city spends billions to build a tunnel. If you are interpreting "entitlement" to literally mean the belief that everybody should have car, then you are being a little concrete (pun!)

@20 daaayyyyummmm, noice

UGH, have you guys seen the article on WaPo re one of Kavanaugh's friend (and ADVISOR!!) floating the theory that it was another guy who tried to rape Ford that night, and actually naming this random innocent guy (Ford says she knew both and it was def. Kavanaugh)! God, I hope this poor guy sues him for every cent he has. What a horrible monster. And then there are those idiots claiming it's totes likely that Ford was attacked by a Kavanaugh doppelgänger!!!

This is why we can't have nice things in GOP's America!

"There is no evidence whatsoever that Ford was assaulted."

You mean, other than what she herslf said? That kind of evidence? Kavanaughtius Maximus's denial does not make it so.

That blurb on homelessness tells you everything anyone could ever need to know about the mayor. Just another shill for the wealthy & powerful.

If we were serious about HOV enforcement, HOV violations would be considered moving violations. They aren't. That change would make a bigger impact on behavior than any "emphasis patrol" ever could.

@22 and Whelan has distinctly not denied coordinating with Republican Senators, and Kavanaugh apparently talked over the "some other dude" theory with Senator Hatch.
https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/policy-and-politics/2018/9/21/17886430/brett-kavanaugh-news-ed-whelan-trump

@25 Who's to say there would have been evidence of her assault had she reported it at the time? People report assaults of varying kinds everyday in which there is no evidence...understanding that the Complainant's statement in and of itself does not constitute "evidence"...and yet the appropriate assault charge is typically filed regardless. It's up to the Complainant to then convince a jury that assault took place.

Are you saying that anyone who reports any sort of an assault without any evidence beyond their reporting statement be dismissed? The easiest example of this is family violence. Such assaults often have no corroborating evidence beyond the Complainant's statement. The husband pushed the wife to the floor, but left no visible sign of injury, for example. Ignore it?

I would be filled with reasonable doubt and unable to vote to convict.

OK, but if he was being sued, then you would only have to determine whether it was more likely that he did the crime than didn't. Based on everything I've heard, I would definitely rule for the plaintiff (her) in that case.

Of course neither of those things are happening. What is happening now is that Senators are supposed to decide whether this man should serve on the Supreme Court. Since it is likely he committed the crime, I would reject him. He won't serve time, he won't lose a bunch of money, he will simply go back to his previous job.

(The first line in #36 was supposed to be in italics -- I forgot that SLOG no longer accepts markup. I was referencing comment #34)