Seattle Garbage Strike: The Teamsters said Friday afternoon they have chosen not to accept Waste Management’s “best, last, final offer.”
Erykah Ba-don’t! Erykah Badu stripped naked and strolled to the location where John F. Kennedy was assassinated for a clip in her new music video.
A Really Big Mistake: A contingent of Afghan reinforcements bringing aid to a German military base was mistakenly fired on by German troops, killing six Afgan soldiers.
Unpaid Interns: With job openings scarce for young people, the number of unpaid internships has climbed in recent years, leading federal and state regulators to worry that more employers are illegally using such internships for free labor and that internships violate minimum wage laws.
Oops: An 82-year-old woman who accidentally crashed her car through the front window of a Michigan salon, injuring two, stuck around afterward for an appointment to get her hair done. She’s a regular customer and says she was “so embarrassed.”
Bloody Friday: 25 members of an extended family in Bagdad were fatally shot or had their throats slit yesterday in a horrific sectarian slaughter.
Goodbye, Charlie: John Forsythe, the handsome, smooth-voiced actor who made his fortune in “Dynasty” and as the voice of the leader of “Charlie’s Angels,” has died after a yearlong battle with cancer. He was 92.
A Lack of Candidness: The government is lifting a 70-year-old ban on letting pilots fly while on antidepressants, citing improvements in the drugs and an unforeseen side effect of the restriction: Depressed pilots kept flying but just kept their conditions secret. “Our concern is that they haven’t necessarily been candid,” the Federal Aviation Administrator stated.
Creepy: Erin Andrews, the ESPN reporter who was secretly videotaped nude through a hotel room peephole in 2008, has been receiving death threats of an increasingly violent and sexual nature.
History Makers: Widely considered Seattle’s first rap group, Emerald Street Boys will temporarily re-form and play a set at the Crocodile tonight for a fundraiser for a documentary about Seattle hip hop history. The last time Sugar Bear, Captain Crunch, and Sweet J rocked the stage together was over 20 years ago at Judkins Park.
And Then There Were Two Blonde Terrorists: Another US woman charged in “Jihad Jane” case.
This is Why Guns Are Dangerous: Police say a man accidentally shot his neighbor in the head after pulling the trigger of his rifle in his upstairs apartment in the 4000 block of Northeast 50th Street in Seattle.
Good Job, Iowa: Iowa will celebrate the first anniversary of Varnum v. Brien, the groundbreaking legal case which legalized same-sex marriage in the Hawkeye State.
i wish i liked erykah badu’s music as much as i love her badassery.
tell the stranger you’re going to sue for damages and lost wages.
Max@1, you should see her live — she put on an amazing show at Marymoor last time she came through (opening act: The Roots)
Hey guys can you detail which neighborhoods are covered by this now looming strike?
@4, Joe perhaps this is what you seek?:
http://www.seattle.gov/util/Services/Gar…
where it is labeled “Waste Management” (as opposed to “CleanScapes”) there there be striking afoot.
There’s a big difference between being “arrested” and being issued a misdemeanor citation for disorderly conduct. Even an unpaid intern should know that.
I’m beginning to wonder if unpaid internships shouldn’t be illegal. I’ve done a couple unpaid internships, and they were definitely worthwhile experiences, but they’ve become such a regular part of college life that you gotta ask, is this getting a little out of control?
The truth is that unpaid interns have skills that other people do not and they deserve to be compensated for using them. And while they get something out of the position in that they might get school credit or career advancement from the internship, what’s quickly becoming common for Millenials is this idea that we’re supposed to work for free for like, a couple years until we’ve found salaried positions.
It just seems like a huge trick to circumvent the minimum wage laws at this point. Of course there are people who are willing to work for free “of their own choosing.” But that’s why we have minimum wage laws. To keep that from happening.
Yes but if you make people pay, they won’t in fact hire the former interns, they’ll just not have them around at all.
Millenials have this inflated view of their own value. I had a law school graduate working for me once, he didn’t know you’re supposed to keep a copy of any letter that goes out of the office! He didn’t know if he met with me and I told him 9 things to do, he should like, take notes, so he doesn’t forget. I’d ask him to write it down. He’d say “oh, do you have a pen? where is there any paper?” as if the concept of “writing” was a bit foreign.
If you’re really worth something, people will gladly pay. It’s hard to find people who can get stuff done on their own at all, without requiring all kinds of hand holding and training time.
@7, the New York Times has a relevant article today on the growth of unpaid internships and how they often cross the line into illegality: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/03/busine…
The six relevant criteria in current law (linked from the article) are:
*Training has to be similar to that of a vocational or academic school.
*The training benefits the trainees.
*The trainees do not displace regular employees.
*The employer receives no immediate advantage and may actually be impeded.
*Trainees are not necessarily entitled to a job at the conclusion of their training.
*Both employer and trainee realize at all times that the trainee is not entitled to wages.
It looks like the first four criteria are often violated. I wonder if the Stranger interns violated the third and fourth ones. Hard to say.
This strike will make it easier to pick out the trashier parts of town.
Follow the smell to West Seattle!
Let’s storm the Stranger office and demand our fellow liberals pay their help a living wage. I remember the ad they posted for an intern–stressing the drudgery. Or perhaps we should get the Teamster’s to organize Unpaid Intern so he can get a deal like the garbage haulers! I recall when the Madam of my hometown house of ill repute closed it down in the late 60’s. Her reason “too damn many girls are giving it away free these days”. Stop giving it away free, dear Unpaid Intern!
I wanted to read about the lady who ran into the salon, but I was linked to the horrific incident in Baghdad. Here is a link for anyone else who is interested: http://www.woodtv.com/dpp/news/local/gra…
The Erin Andrews story link is also wrong.
Yes, @12 and @13 — those were the two links I wanted to read! (Among others) Thanks!
And that’s why irresponsible journalism is dangerous.
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Please remember the obligatory scare quotes when using the term “journalism” in connection with The Stranger or the Slog….
The Mighty German Army is a proudly homophillic organization.
Seattle, and it’s greedy unions, are making their last few swirls around the bottom of the crapper.
(it’s what folks in the business refer to as a ‘third world shithole…’)
Too bad Seattle can’t hire South Carolina workers to provide municipal services.
The mighty Liberal Conscious of the World Stranger does not provide medical insurance for it’s interns.
Because its interns to not deserve the barest basic minimum accoutrements of human dignity.
from the OMAHA WORLD-HERALD
“In the end, the first year of licensing for same-sex couples turned out to be a little like March in like a lion, out like a lamb. After initial crowds at some recorders’ offices, as well as extraordinary media attention for the normally under-the-radar recorders, all is business as usual.
1,783 same-sex marriages were recorded with the state, according to the Iowa Department of Public Health.
That’s a far cry from the 57,640 in three years predicted by the Williams Institute of the University of California at Los Angeles School of Law.”
Maybe homosexuals just aren’t the marrying kinds?…..
@15, 16: Guns are dangerous, especially when combined with idiots who don’t follow the BASIC RULE of “always treat a gun as loaded”.
@17: Yes, and how about all the dead civilians and friendlies mistakenly shot by American forces? Friendly fire incidents happen from time to time, regrettably, and Teh Ghey has nothing to do with it.
@20: Not a lot of people want to eat anchovies either. Should we outlaw anchovies, then? Because if you try to take my anchovies, lox, smoked or pickled herring, or smoked trout away from me I WILL BASH YOUR FUCKING FACE IN YOU FASCIST FUCK.
The Stranger does not violate the rules for unpaid internships. As evidenced by the fact that the fucking links are typically broken. No way in hells anybody would be paid for this level of skill.
@8: I don’t know. There’s a lot of Baby Boomers out there getting paid to do sub-par work that Millenials could easily surpass in quality for free, on their off-time. Case in point: web design. I know a guy who was going to charge my mom $600 to basically implement a template from an online template-dealer as her website. One of my friends charged her $500 to do twice the work – building a content management system from scratch. So some Millenials maybe don’t write by hand much. That hardly means they’re skill-less, and sometimes means quite the opposite.
There’s also plenty of Millenials doing jack shit and getting paid for it while competent Baby Boomers are laid off – only because their employers can pay them half what is expected by someone with twice their experience. It’s all kinda relative.
I think Millenials in general don’t expect to get paid for anything. They volunteer far more than any previous generation, and their cynicism is so complete that they assume currency won’t really be a part of the equation.
It’s not unusual they trade favors for favors, in many cases living off that one friend in the single-family house-turned-multi-family rooming house that works at a restaurant who himself is basically running the place at minimum wage while his managers get laid off, and who is compensated by his roommates with whatever hookups they have, whether it be thifted clothes or black market drugs. Maybe this’ll all change when we get older, but so far, it’s only been getting worse.
I happen to have normal work on career track that I get paid for, but I know a lot of Millenials for whom that’s not the case. I’d say a majority, but I really have no data to support that. I just know it’s pretty common.
@9, 11, 22: I’m not targeting the Stranger specifically with my critique. But yes, it might be part of the problem. My issue is less specific.
It’s mainly that I think minimum wage laws are probably being broken all over the place merely because we’re a generation that’s fine with wearing used clothes and volunteering for jobs they like or that they think will advance them toward an actual “career” that, “in this economy,” may never actually come.
Missed opportunity indeed. If Erykah Badu strips down the headline isn’t “Erykah Ba-don’t” it’s “Erykah Ba-donka-donk!” I mean, have you *seen* the video? Ka-POW!
Here’s the biggest problem with unpaid internships: Only people that can afford to work for free can take advantage of them. It impedes upward mobility. I was offered quite a few awesome internships as a college student/recent grad but I had to support myself, so I missed out. Life’s not fair, I get it, but without an internship, I was basically put on a much more difficult career track and I’ve stalled out.
Irony: In my line of work, I often hire/place interns, and they are always kids who come from money while the most qualified and smartest kids can’t take the internships because they need to support themselves. And I have zero power to change that.
This whole Millennial v. Boomer argument is total bullshit, imho. Both groups are full of entitlement and impossible to collaborate with, Gen X is resentful of both, and those of us who aren’t in any of the above just want everyone to shut the fuck up and do their fucking jobs.
@18 It’s true. Seattle is famous, due to the incompetence of its garbage collectors, for the filth in its streets. Whereas South Carolina is known for its municipal efficiency. Wait. You mean Seattle is known for its successful recycling and composting programs, living municipal wages, and educational achievement, whereas South Carolina is recognized for its shit wages, failing schools and lack of social advancement? Oh, sorry. I guess you’re right. Unions suck. We should all strive to be like South Carolina, Alabama and Mississippi, where life is SO good for the middle class.
@ 25: Word.
26
Actually, of late, S Carolina is famous for being the place Boeing selected, out of the whole gol darn US of A, (and specifically over you-know-where) to make its planes….try to keep up
26
(and, actually, Seattle is famous for those things only in its own mind- rest of the world just thinks of grunge.
maybe over-priced coffee consumed by pretensious hipsters.
and, oh yeah, the shittiest software ever to curse mankind…)
26
of course, the MILLIONs and MILLIONs of Americans voting with there feet disagree with you there, kk-
they are flocking to the South.
oh, and you know that extra Congressional seat Washington and Oregon are tussling over?;
save yourself the hassle-
it’s actually coming to a Sourthern State
26
In fairness, it must be said that Seattle is acquiring a youtube reputation for its horrific urban violence….
@28-31: Tell us more, oh wise swami of conservatism. Your adoring faithful await you.
32
now now child,
we don’t want to overload
your peanut sized brain-
study, ponder and absorb;
there will be more in due time…..
@33: No, we demand more of your shining wisdom. Tell us! Tell us all about it…
@25: Yeah, I’m liable to change my mind and agree. I think there’s a number of problems with unpaid internships, to be sure, but I’m persuaded by your argument that the generational lens is not particularly useful in understanding them.
I think the purpose in even engaging that frame was to explore unpaid internships as a rising phenomenon, but to be fair, this could just as easily be attributed to modern economic conditions as it could to generational characteristics.
In the meantime, yeah, it’s pretty much only rich kids who can take advantage of these opportunities.
@34: Haha, you’re a badass mothafucka, sir. 🙂
Something is very off about the whole Erin Andrews deal. For anyone who has seen the video : does it not seem slightly odd that she just happened to be walking around for 3 minutes, naked, in just the right spot to be seen through the peephole? Looks like a pretty big room to me – but she just happened to linger in that area. Interesting.
Then the fact that it apparently sits around on the web for several months before anyone decides to make a stink about it. Which would appear to indcate that if there had been no stink about it, nobody would have ever much cared. Interesting.
Then she gets a good shot of publicity when the guy gets caught. Interesting.
Now she’s on a TV show, and out come reports of death threats – which, like the original video, appear to not be a new thing – but we need to be aware of it now for some reason. Interesting.
Isn’t it?
We know that Boeing chose South Carolina. That is primarily because the SC gentry are so dog-stupid that they are happy to let Boeing shit on them and they will lap it up like it was soft serve.
I love how whenever sad crank is pressed to back-up his horse-shit with fact he smarmily skulks away.