"blerglry"
Jesus. who here
hasn't done a little petty blerglry.

and they dropped all Charges
AND let you Out? so now you're
just our Justice Reporter. fine by Me.

so Welcome to the Schlog AM
Meatgrinder Ashley Nerbovig!

and Good LUCK!
you'll most like-
ly Need it.

Welcome from one of the more sane faceless (don't listen to the crazy aunt in the attic). Either your spell checker is broken or blerglry is a new crime to most of us. Happy to hear charges were dropped. Hope you have a long run in TS or some other place in Seattle that pays better.

omg - here's Obi Wan on tS:

"you'll likely never Find
a more wretched hive
of scum and villainy."

present Company
Excluded. OBV.

Ashley, recommend you do what many of us do on this site.....just ignore anyone with a fetish that includes weird sentence structure. I haven't read any of his tripe in months. It has nothing to say and it saves me lots of time.

Ashley, welcome!
If you listen to @4 and ignore anyone with a fetish that includes weird sentence structure, you would be ignoring Charles Mudede.

Daming?

I think you mean damming.

Sheesh, you non-engineers and your made up words

It's smart of Ashley to move from Montana to Washington. After all, there's a bill currently in the Legislature that would make our state the first to pay minimum wage to inmates.

There are few more welcoming places in the United States for criminals than your new home. Best wishes on your future burglaries.

“After a couple of his amendments failed, northeast Seattle Rep. Gerry Pollet, who is entertaining a bid for City Council in District 4, voted YES on final passage despite being a squeaky wheel the whole time. Incredible.”

What’s “[i]ncredible” about this? From his perspective (and I’m neither saying nor implying I agree with him on this) he tried to improve the bill, and when he could not get improvements added, he decided to settle for what he did get. I understand the Stranger has spent ten years supporting a local legislator who always vows to BURN IT ALL DOWN if it’s not absolutely every last thing she wants, but this is the real world, not some extremist’s fantasyland.

‘The medical director of the Washington Poison Center said exposure to smoke from fentanyl presents "no real risk." The drug gets filtered out by the primary user, the director said in an April blog post.’

Just like second-hand cigarette smoke used to do! (Until it killed lots of children.) Meanwhile, the Stranger’s deep support for the health, well-being, and safety of union-represented workers continues to amaze.

“…increase taxes on rich people (those making more than $400,000).”

Persons who make more than whatever are “high-income earners.” People who don’t have to work at all are rich. Please note this difference. (Hint: you’ll eventually find you are yourself subject to a ‘high-earner’ tax, but you’re highly unlikely ever to qualify as “rich”.)

"Rep. Jessica Bateman's "missing middle" housing bill, which will increase housing in single-family zones across the state . . . ."

This legislation does not create even a single unit of housing. It merely requires certain municipalities to incorporate new density objectives in land use planning.

Actually building more housing would be up to for-profit developers and existing property owners. Thus, this is a market-based solution to our housing crisis, and therefore unlikely to lead to a meaningful increase in affordable housing.

"[Cali] Gov. Gavin Newsom
said it's over between his
state and [Walgreens]."

whoa. Finally
a Final Solution.

Cali's Chambers of
Capitalism're gonna
Come Down HARD on
any Wokeness which likely
will Not be Including them and
their fascist Brethern. Showdown's

a Comin' Cali. USOFA. better buckle Up lads.

@4 -- sorry I didn't Include You
in @3. heck I just figured you
Never read my un-Readable
& Totally pointless tripe Tre-
asuring instead pulling the
Wool over your Own eyes.

consider
yourself
Included.

This is the third mention I have seen in the Stranger that Gerry Pollet is "entertaining a run for the D4 seat on Seattle City Council." As far as I can tell, no one from the Stranger has yet contacted Gerry to determine if this is true or not. Any real journalists would have done this already.

Proposing a tax increase once your party has lost the House, therefore ensuring it will fail, is the bold centrist leadership we need.

Cops will never catch me because I have been too clever for them.
And let's call it what it was alleged to be: pooch-napping.

@11 Pollet may not be able to say anything to the Stranger about it right now. There are a mess of campaign finance laws that come into play when you say that you're running for a position. And he may not want to go on the record as considering it if he's waiting to see how the field develops. He's got a leg up on competitors in that he already has a campaign infrastructure from previous runs for the legislature, so he doesn't need to declare as early.

What if I just don't like fentanyl smoke and don't think I should have to be around it on the bus? Is that unreasonable? Is it possible not 100% of the smoke is fully inhaled by the user's magic filtration lungs every time they light it? Does this apply to meth too? Do you even ride the bus?

Fuck off. Hell of a start to your "journalism" career here at the stranger.

The Stranger sure loves the fentanyl users on public transit. You guys sure choose weird hills to die on but… whatevs.

Biden's budget should have cut the obscene funding of the military industrial complex. I mean even cut in half (and the Pentagon "loses" TRILLIONS annually - they can't account for it and are never made to) and it would still be obscene. Every single so-called crisis in this country is fabricated by those in power. When are people going to wake the fuck up and get rid of every last one of them?

With the last Stranger reporter to cover crime and justice I would often have to ask why he seemed to support criminals over their victims.

Now with stalkery Ashley on the beat there’s no need to ask. She favors criminals over their victims because she is a criminal.

@12 considering that the Republican voting demographic skews older and very much wants to keep their Medicare Biden’s budget might not be as DOA as you suggest.

If he gets it passed will you congratulate him or complain that it doesn’t come with enough unicorns?

@20.......Was.....past tense......charges were dropped so she gets a clean start. No hazing the newbie.

Well, you're off to a blunderous start already Ashley. As @17 notes, you apparently have never smelled fentanyl (get out much?) or have no empathy with transit workers much less your fellow Seattle citizens.

It's truly unmistakable. As strong as bleach but with a vile dirty chemically stench you never want to experience again for the rest of your life!

I suggest an apology.

@18 - Indeed, a very strange hill to die on. Nobody agrees with them. Must be lonely. Kinda like how the RNC feels these days.

Heading to the airport last week, a guy on the Link started smoking some drugs in a glass pipe. I changed cars since I didn't want to start my trip early. I guess I was just being a Nervous Nellie.

@20 @22 I wonder what the reaction would be if the stranger hired a male reporter with this person's criminal backstory. They'd demand he attend re-education class or some other public flogging.

This writer is a good writer, and I think activists are too hard on public people's personal lives in general. Charges were dropped, move on.

I hope all the activists remember it the next time it's a man in the spotlight. Not likely, but one can hope.

@27 Glad you said "allegedly". Crime of passion vs bank robbery. We were all young once. Who hasn't had a lovers spat.

If her world view is like Hannah and little Richie or even Chuckles we will have enough to criticize. Until then......move on. Welcome Ashley!

@28 even a 'crime of passion' is still a crime. which this probably wasn't. You're right - we have all have been on one side or the other of an 'intense' breakup. People's private lives shouldn't be held against them in their public art. see Michael Jackson, Louis CK, Ellen, etc. Brilliant artists with questionable pasts.

Lemme get this straight, if someone lights up a cigarette within a mile of most people, they gag and hack and go into epileptic fits over how the second-hand smoke is making them wanna puke and yank out their own eyes, but if someone who may or may not have an usual sensitivity to fentanyl smoke within mere feet of them complains, they don't know what they're talking about it and should embrace the fentanyl user in a bear hug.

Is that about right? At least from TS's perspective?

@31...Apparently you and your google machine missed the part where it said charges were dropped.....ergo....she will not be convicted of anything. Her record is clear....the only stain going forward is that she is a writer for TS.

Welcome, Ashley Nerbovig. One caveat: of all SLOG commenters to fully disregard, it's the willfully misinformed MAGA fool who goes by Bazinga. He's the one with the bats in his belfry currently leading the troll pack of incels.

@19 xina: The U.S. military industrial complex really does need to stop playing "global cops". Too much in macho spending (i.e., F-35C fighter jets currently at $110 million a pop) is just wasted tax dollars that could do better elsewhere.
34th U. S. President (1953-1961) and Five Star General Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower had warned about too much investment in the military industrial complex--particularly in dealing with foreign governments. We should have listened. Ike was the last Republican in the White House with a shred of common sense. Why he ever picked Richard Nixon as his Veep, however, I'll never know.
And, of course, we really need to do the obvious: reverse the Orange Turd's criminally insane tax cuts for the .00000000001% al-fucking-ready.

@2, @4, @22, @28, and @32:....said the most fetid of fecal stains currently spewing senseless word salad on SLOG. David in Shoreline, is that you? Isn't it tiresome changing screen names more frequently than most people change their undies?

@9 hbb for the WIN!!

@10 kristofarian: I KNEW I liked California Governor Gavin Newsom!

Ashley, I thought I had mentioned the crazy aunt in the attic that nobody sane pays any attention to. Bat shit crazy and self appointed know it all. Anyone right of Stalin is the enemy.

@39: ....said the reigning King of Batshit Crazy himself. Awwwww.... did I hit you right on the Bazinga? Suck it and choke. That's a good, obedient little MAGA-doggie! Now run along and get your treat.

@39: Is it loneliness or sheer boredom that makes you so overzealously chase your tail?

@35: “Why he [Ike] ever picked Richard Nixon as his Veep, however, I'll never know.”

The primary reason for choosing every running mate ever: electoral votes. Tricky Dicky was from California, which in the 1960 census passed New York as the most populous state. Secondarily, as a red-baiting demagogue, Nixon would preclude other red-baiting demagogues from attacking Ike. Hence Ike’s infamous quip, when asked about Trickster’s wise acts of governance: “Give me a week and I might think of one.” Ike was no fool.

@33,

@27 was too fucking stupid to embed a working link into his post and so it's impossible to discern what exactly he was asserting, especially given that he's got a long history of lying and posting in bad faith on this site, as evidenced by the dozens of now banned profiles he's maintained. He's a piece of human fucking shit.

@30 Morty,

If The Stranger was ever serious about it turning this dumpster fire around, they would hire you as a writer. You always make sense, you're well informed, you're level-headed, and you're an entertaining writer.

Bazinga: are you like 16? Jesus Christ you sound so bland and stupid and yet somehow think you bring something to the table. You don’t even add anything that the other rightie trolls add, you just sound stupid.

If it’s a personal smudge to write for The Stranger and you and so many other buffoons come here say in and day out to add your 2 cents for free then what does that say about you?

@43: I never said Ike was a fool, tensy. Eisenhower's 34th Presidency was before my time. My late parents and much older siblings would certainly remember Ike's years in the Oval Office, though, from the latter part of the Korean War to the Cuban Missile Crisis, and the rise of both the Cold War and NASA.
Whether or not Dwight David Eisenhower knew how to cleverly steer Tricky Dicky's acts of governance, I can only wonder. Ike, who died on March 28, 1969, shortly after Richard Milhous Nixon became 37th President, must now be rolling in his grave ever since Nixon's publicly announced resignation on August 9, 1974 after the Watergate scandal, ending the U.S. involvement in Vietnam (Tricky Dicky certainly wasn't listening to his former Chief about the U.S.'s military industrial complex in dealing with foreign governments, now, was he?). That last part about Nixon I do remember, vividly, 10 days after my 10th birthday.

@46 shoobop: Nailed it for the WIN!! Got him right in the Bazinga!
Personally I think he hangs out at raindrop's for the sugar, carbs, and free cable.
Nothing like a glut of FOX TeeVee to warp innocent young, easily misled minds.

@47: Oh, I get it, '70s. Are you Bazinga's Daddy? Did he come running to you in tears 'cuz his widdle ego got bwuised by the adult commenters in the room?

Youthful transgressions can be overlooked however gaslighting and shaming people who don’t want to be around someone lighting up a deadly drug can not. As others have noted I really hope the writer does better next time. Geez.

Pathetic; yet another misguided (criminal, no less!) “woke” (in the worst sense of the word) imbecile Stranger “writer” who would rather live in a dystopian crime and fentanyl laced shell of a city than wake the f**k up, become an actual responsible adult and support the hard work and decisions required to get Seattle back to functional status.

"tried to steal his dog"

I am curious what would have happened to the dog if it had been successfully stolen. What were the intentions?

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/mar/08/anti-woke-censorship-colleges-open-letter

@48: “I never said Ike was a fool,”

You questioned his judgement, so I explained why he’d made the choice he had. You still don’t seem convinced he hadn’t made a mistake, even though his presidency tends to be remembered fondly.

I rather doubt Ike was “rolling over in his grave” when Nixon resigned; Ike had known all along exactly what Nixon was, and therefore kept him close. It was a version of “friends close, enemies closer,” which also helped Ike win California twice. Ike knew what he was doing, and was no fool.

@article Ashley Nerbovig Looking forward to hearing from a new voice!

@12 Brent Gumbo I generally adore your comments, that one in particular.

@29 2CV I think it's a little more complicated than you're implying, because public work funds private action, and sometimes people's pasts aren't in their past. That said sometimes their pasts are in their past and our society can't be healthy if people can't be allowed to grow, but our society also can't be healthy if we just assume that everything is fine... like I said, more complicated.

Reality check: The medical director of the Washington Poison Center said exposure to smoke from fentanyl presents "no real risk."

Real reality check: The CDC and NIOSH beg to differ.
https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/fentanyl/risk.html
Now I don't know what they say about fentanyl smoke. But a necessary part of smoking it is an addict being in contact with the drug. And I'll be damned if I have to wear a hazmat bunny suit to ride a bus sitting next to one.

California to "cuts ties" with Walgreens.

How DARE they block the sale of some product in states that have outlawed it. BTW, does anyone know if Walgreens sells 5.56 NATO 100 round drum magazines?

@53: Did you even bother to read my comment @48, tensy dear? Obviously you didn't go past the first sentence. You'd argue with your own mother, wouldn't you? Even when you're wrong you're "supposed" to be right? Anything to put other commenters on the defensive just because you said so? Was the dinner table in your childhood home a nightly war zone for you growing up? Did you, your parents, siblings, extended family, etc. throw things in addition to screaming at each other? Holiday gatherings at your house must be a hoot.

@53: One dead giveaway, tensy, that you're here merely to argue, and nothing more: I noticed you had nothing to add about Watergate or Vietnam.

@56: “Did you even bother to read my comment @48, tensy dear? Obviously you didn't go past the first sentence.”

Then how did I quote from the sixth
sentence of your comment @48? Did you actually read all of what I wrote? (Or perhaps your reading comprehension is so poor, you didn’t even recognize your own words?)

@57: Your ‘proof’ of my being “merely here to argue” is that I did NOT go off-topic? Seriously? (One dead giveaway that you’re stating your groundless opinion as fact…)

@8 I was going to say there’s been multiple journals out saying secondhand fentanyl exposure leads to multiple health risks(addiction as well), so props to the bus driver for making a statement and going to the hospital. The drivers health is more important than allowing stupid ideologies that these crazies have.

@49, @55, @59: We voters enacted Washington State’s Indoor Clean Air Act (RCW 70.160) in 2005. It forbids ALL smoking, of anything, in ALL indoor public spaces. Public transports, such as busses and trains, are definitely included in the definition of indoor public spaces. So, every instance of fentanyl smoking on a bus or train has been a violation of state law, one which we voters enacted specifically to protect our public health and safety.

But hey, someone wrote a blog post, making the exact same statement which once was proven disastrously wrong about tobacco smoke, so the Stranger says just screw the voters, and enjoy your second-hand fentanyl smoke.

The Stranger’s dedication to arbitrary lawlessness seems to have no bounds. Who this benefits has never been established, but it’s certainly not ordinary citizens.

@58: That's right, tensy. Keep on chasing your tail. It's more entertaining than actually reading comments made by anyone disagreeing with you. Now we know where Bazinga gets his MAGAspertise.
Do you guys get a doggy treat every time you post? Maybe if you're extra good, raindrop will throw you a squeaky toy. Run, boy, fetch the stick!

@61: So, you’ve decided bluster and personal attacks will somehow prevent anyone reading this from simply comparing our comments, and noting how you were the one who failed to read beyond my first sentence? Yeah, that’ll work out great for you, no doubt. All of this over some off-topic comments you made.

You sure do pick some odd hills to die upon.

@44: The guy you’re ranting about is Some Rando On The Internet who might annoy you for a few minutes each week. There’s no need to get all worked up about him. You might want to take a few deep breaths, go for a walk, read something else.