It’s Only Half The Population Of The World: Looking at women’s rights worldwide to solve the world’s ills.
Fucking Up The Health care Debate: Democrats blaming the White House… And only the White House.
Co-ops? What the Hell Are They?: Group Health here in Seattle is one.
Why A Public Option Would Be Helpful: Little competition among providers today.
Democracy In Action!: Now with the unintended consequence of mutilation.
The Innovation We’ve Been Missing In This Recession: Now being forced by the economy.
The Biggest Seniors’ Community Ever: China quietly rethinks it’s one-child policy because of aging population.
The Saddest Story Of The Day If You Have A Heart: Old man in wheel chair rolls himself for four days to propose to woman. She declines and while rolling home he tips over.
How About Declaring Marshall Law Just to Make It Easier?: Pittsburgh asks for 4,000 police to aid for the Group of 20 meeting.
Not that All Cops are Bad, But There Are Way Too Many Bad Cops: Oklahoma City Police investigating their own for a drive-by shooting at a strip club.
Why Rail Isn’t Working In this Country: Research finds 88% view cars as a necessity, losing ability to drive a marker for old age.
So Seattle, Who’s Gonna One Up Atlanta?: Fake fliers promises free food and beer to homeless at mayoral candidate’s block party.
Radiohead’s Music Is Fast Becoming Jazz Standards: Just check out one interpretation from Brad Mehldau, who is 39 today.
aren’t radiohead covers by classically trained musicisians a little tired yet?
It’s “MARTIAL Law”, (as in Mars, god of War, military & Bruce Lee) not “Marshall”. I can understand the confusion if you grew up on “Gunsmoke”.
When it comes to legislation that presidents have repeatedly tried and failed for 60+ years (since FDR!) to address, such as health care, I blame the U.S. Senate. The very institution is fundamentally undemocratic and needs to go. When a conservative Democrat from Montana (Max Baucus) can decide to hold up the entire process until he gets approval from Republicans from Iowa (Grassley) and Wyoming (Enzi), we’re fucked. Time to protest Max Baucus, who actually is the single man standing in the way of health care reform.
Barrack Obama can’t sell because he’s not an executive. He’s an analyst who sold himself as an executive. And excutive does…Barrack Obama opines. Barrack sounded great in the debates because he had a firm intellectual grasp of the issues. But that is like saying the guys in the sports box see the game better than the players. It doesn’t mean you want those same guys playing Quarterback. Now we’ve got a Quarterback who wants to “discuss the game in all its aspects”.
@3, “needs to go”. Good luck with that.
The old man in the wheelchair wasn’t Arte Johnson by any chance? I’m pretty sure I saw that sketch on Laugh-In. Ruth Buzzi was so mean.
@2
by the snotnosed snark, more likely he grew up on Eminem.
Why Rail Isn’t Working In this Country: Research finds 88% view cars as a necessity, losing ability to drive a marker for old age.
Might have that backward. Less might view cars as a necessity if we had better rail and other means of transit. I know personally my choice is either to have a car or spend three or fours times as long to get where I need to go. When light rail reaches my house that might change somewhat for local trips, but for longer shit, not likely.
“Might have that backward. Less might view cars as a necessity if we had better rail and other means of transit.”
The recent high growth in automobile ownership in Europe, China and India would belie that.
Also the traffic last night from the Seahawks game in a city that is awash in transit options.
Obama’s not a quarterback. He’s the executive, Congress is the running/throwing/tackling team (or whatever the stupid football metaphor is). The House usually proposed good stuff; the Senate then dismantles it. This is traditional; it didn’t start with Obama and it won’t be ended by him. Let’s see, what else has he been dealing with in his 7 months: 2 wars, a collapsed economy, and several other similarly trivial matters. None of which Clinton had to deal with, and he definitely didn’t get healthcare reform through. Wait to see what Congress does in September and then rank on them.
He also can’t capitalize consistently.
On health care, why yes, many people with half a brain have noticed over the years that the Senate is a fundamenatlly undemocratic institution; in reaction, most people say “oh well, it’s in the constitution and anyway STATES RIGHTS means we should have STATES and that means we represent STATES not people and I kinda like that blah blah blah” not realizing that they are in favor of a profoundly undemocratic system of law making, one that empowers the few, in tiny rural states, at the expense of the many, in the states with bigger cities.
Duh!
So anyhoo we could probably expect that Obama dude was kinda aware of this before being elected?
The fault is his for not working with it. He had to mobilize VOTERS in the dogpatchy states like Arkansas and Loozianner, and the cowboy states like Montana and South Dakota, to be in favor of the public option and get all askeered of this socialism tag. So that their blue doggy senators would think “oh good, if I supoprt the public option then I will get reelected” isntead of “oh shit what do these coastal democrats want, if I vote for a public option I will lose my senate seat.”
THIS IS NOT ROCKET SCIENCE. You need 60 votes in Senate, duh, you gotta get ’em froim democratic senators in places like arkansas and louisiana and nebraska and until you go mobilize the folks who live there to be screaming for the public option
you ain’t gonna have unity
you ain’t gonna have change
you ain’t giving us hope.
(Btw, who would be a really good person to send to Arkansas and speak with Obama on a stage in the biggest stadium in the state? who, who who could stand there and say he LOVES the razorbacks and talk about his momma and her health care woes? who, who who, could that POSSIBLY be, who could help out in the state of Arkanasas……………..? There is absolutely no effort being made to sell this thing at all.)
WTF with traffic last night? It was midnight and I-5 was PACKED. The express lanes should’ve been opened for northbound cars.
Marshall Law? Who the hell is he? Jude’s dad?
Cars are a necessity in Seattle. Cars are not a necessity in NYC, or Berlin, or London. If I could commute to a show in capital hill or ballard by rail, I would do it. If I could commute to my job in snohomish county by rail I could would do it. I’d end up with 3 hour commutes if I had to rely on public transportation to those places
#13 Cars are not a necessity in NYC, or Berlin, or London.
I have numerous friends who live in Manhattan, Brooklyn Heights. They all have cars. My parents live in Queens. They’ve always had a car. I’ve lived in New Jersey-New York Metro. Always had a car.
There are many examples of places with rich public transit where people, given rising incomes, eschew those and use cars. Public transport is only there for populations that don’t have rich incomes. However, as incomes rise people choose private transport — it’s that simple. The only way Seattle and Obama can force people onto public transport is by taxing them so much that they become poor and can’t afford their cars.
#9 Obama’s not a quarterback.
My point exactly.
Bush was a quarterback.
Clinton was a quarterback.
Obama is a sports commentator.
one that empowers the few, in tiny rural states, at the expense of the many, in the states with bigger cities.
People who live in big cities are top feeders who exploit the rural people who grow food and create energy.
Cities are energy sinks. The last two years of leveraged investments and Madoff made it plain for all to see.
Big city people write blogs about how we should eat organic food. But they don’t want to grow or harvest that food. They want to stay up late on their computer and go to see “Inglourious Bastards” while farmers go to bed at 9 and wake up at 3:30 am to make their snacks and beverages.
Well at least Radiohead isn’t making any bones about it. It is indeed film music: the Umbrellas of Cherbourg soundtrack by Michel Legrand, 1964, jazzed up for the new millenium.
Brad Mehldau is a fuckin’ piano whiz. Love his music.
“Fake fliers promises free food and beer to homeless at mayoral candidate’s block party.”
That’s a really common (and ooooooollld) ratfuck tactic.
Maybe we could try the fake beer flyer around here and trick the hobos into moving to Tacoma.
@14: That’s fine. Owning a car is an enormous convenience even if it’s not a necessity. I find it odd, however, that you have lived in NYC and truly think that everyone on public transportation is there because they have absolutely no choice.
On the contrary, in many cases (given good transit and high traffic volumes) public transit is more convenient for everyday commuting. Those who do own cars in such situations would not necessarily use them to get to work. And where a couple in Boise might need to own two cars, a couple in Brooklyn merely prefers to have a car to make some things a bit simpler.
So no, it’s not “that simple.”
It’s really a bitch to convince people who have no business driving to give it up.
My mother works at an emission-testing site, they had a woman come in who nearly hit one of her coworkers. They stopped, and someone who my mom presumes is the grandson had switch seats so he could steer the car in. The woman could not see the worker that tried to talk to her that was three feet away from her. Said woman also accidentally let slipped that she relied on the guy with her to tell her where to go.
#21. No it’s not. But you forget to add in another type of car — the taxi. Here in Seattle taxis cost an arm and a leg. In NYC, much more reasonable. Taxis are a good compromise between highly regimented rail and anarchal one-man-one-car. They are more convenient than FlexCars because you can call a cab from anywhere.
I think most if not all of Seattle’s transit problems could be fixed if we got rid of the current restrictive taxi licensing system to allow more taxis and cheaper fares.
Oh so now we can say:
“After reading the misspelled word, ‘marshall,’ several Slog readers aided for the writer, but as of 6 pm, their efforts at aiding for, were yet to be heeded.”
(Or, “heeded for”?)
@23: What the fuck are you talking about? Taxi fares in New York are virtually identical to fares in Seattle. A quick internet search confirms this recollection on my part, and shows that while NYC cabs have slightly lower idling charges, the initial fare and per-mile charges are EXACTLY THE SAME.
Please. You do no one any favors by lying and insulting everyone.
It takes a man to be a quarterback.
George W. Bush is a man, and was a great leader.
Barack Hussein Obama is a girlie guy who’s a kicker, at best. An idiot kicker in the vein of Mike Vander Jack who thinks he knows more than the real leader.
But at least Vander Jagt has a birth certificate.
@ORCA Control Station #1-1-3
You’ve never been to China, have you? If you knew what transit there was really like, you’d understand that they’re not a good example.
Excuse me, but I think women make up 51% of the world’s population. We’re not actually a minority, we’re just treated like one.
I went to school with Marshall Law. He was a friend of mine. This, sir, is no time for Marshall Law.
@2: to kick a dead horse, Gunsmoke fans would be familiar with “marshal law” — as 12 said, “Marshall Law” would presumably be Jude’s dad…
Many working class city individuals can generally get along without a car. It’s working parents, busy professionals and suburbanites (and many fit one or more of these categories) who see a strict need for a car due to the non-existent margin of error in their schedules and the lack of timely transit along their commuting routes.
Someone like me doesn’t need a car because I don’t need to care for any kids, I live near the center of town and work close to where I live. I’m in the minority among Puget Sounders and so are many of you.