Wasn't Katie Herzog really concerned about Louis CK's career prospects going forward? She'll be glad to hear he's making a comeback.

I get a kick out of people with school age kids. Oh the entitlement. When the strikes happen, teacher strikes, bus driver strikes, the true nature of these parents comes out. They acknowledge the tacit belief that to them, the teachers and the schools are nothing but publicly subsidized day care centers. Do you hear complaints about the child not getting an education? No, you hear "I had to take off work today because these damn teachers are striking" or "I had to pay for a baby sitter today because these damn teachers are on strike".

@2, yeah the entitlement of wanting a stable schedule, not burning your bridges at work, and a government that isn’t dysfunctional. And there’s no shame in acknowledging the role public schools play in our state’s economy, developing a future workforce AND yes, subsidizing child care so parents can work and afford things like mortgage, groceries, savings.

@3 Case in point.

@3, 4: You all are talking past each other.

Now, I don't agree with this mindset myself, but put yourself into the shoes of a low income or blue collar worker for a moment. You work at a job with low pay, few benefits. You can be fired at anytime for no reason, and have no idea of you are ever getting a raise or promotion, and your schedule can be changed in a moment.

Then, a group of state employees with good pay, great benefits, regular schedules, annual raises, and with 100% job security strikes every year for more, and as a result, you have to forgo hourly income, risk getting fired, or take on another expense to ensure your kid is being watched.

I mean, you have to at least understand where some of these people are coming from when it comes to these annual teacher strikes.

Saying Louis C.K. was never funny is patently false.

Also...your school year doesn't start until well into the first week of September? Ummm...yea...your state is broken. Maybe shut Olympia down until they pass an income tax instead of circulating stories about how your city council (gasp) whipped votes...something there's literally a formal position for in the U.S. Congress.

@5: Well put Theordore.

Even Slog's resident Regressives don't LIKE Ted Cruz. No one does. Tejas pulls the lever for him because he's #notademocrat.

Basically, he's Senator just to spite the Libs.

Great news about Beto, but i hope someone teaches him proper mic technique.

I grew up in a unionized public school teacher's household. She went on strike once, @5, not "annually". I think we were out 2 weeks; it was awesome to visit her on the picket line.

@2: I've never heard anyone make those complaints. Who have you heard say that? Yourself? Some jackhole on KIRO FM?

@10) I hear Louis CK is available.

The 1% laugh at you people for engaging in petty dogfights with teachers unions - it keeps the 1% right where they are.

You butt-munchers should direct your anger at those 1% who pilfer and horde uhmuhrika's wealth at the tippy top. Force that wealth back down where it belongs.

Louis CK, from the linked article: "The audience welcomed the disgraced comedian". They could have booed him off the stage, but in this new era of White House approved pussy grabbing, he's A-OK with his audience. sigh

I don't know what Trump is complaining about - Google ranked it at the top of the list for my "Trump whiny rants" query.

@11: Right, not ever district strikes every year. That doesn't take away the fact that it happens with other districts nearly every year.

Actually, Louis CK was always, and probably still is, funny.

The fact that "Nanette" wasn't funny at all shows how having a sense of humor and being morally upstanding are two different things.

@11 Then you haven't been paying attention. Check story comment boards, look at next door dot com, listen in on conversations while riding the bus, talk to your neighbors. I don't have kids, but I pay for other people's kids to go to public school through my $6k/year property taxes. I support this because it is important to our future as a society. But you all complaining about the parents right to a normal schedule, etc., just made the point that you all know you're getting highly subsidized day care. You know that if you had to buy it on the open market you couldn't afford it, so you look to teachers, whose starting salaries are what, $40k/year, (that's highly paid @5?) to do it for you at pennies on the dollar. Stop the fucking hypocrisy and pay the teachers what they are worth to you.

Louis CK was one of the most successful - if not the most successful - comedian in America because was damn fu-- I just remembered Jeff Dunham, which obliterates my argument. Damn it. For his actions, he released a really good apology, and IIRC, the women involved accepted it. But you know, let's not let a good purity test get in the way of a person learning from their mistakes.

No surprise that Trump failed to make a deal with 1/3 of the involved parties of NAFTA, the one with the largest geographical share of North America no less, and wants to take a victory lap for said failure. The thing he was ostensibly good at - the BEST at - is making deals, and we've all seen just how true that claim was.

And for the record, I consider myself a math whore, not a math slut. If I'm going to crunch numbers, I want to be paid for it.

@20: I said "good pay," and the average educator in Washington State makes over $53,000 a year, about 3,000-4,000 over the national average for teachers, and roughly the average salary for the state, and also roughly the total median household income for the state.

How is that not "good pay?"

@22 It may be good relative to other teachers, but $53k (health benefits/pension notwithstanding) just isn't a lot of money. After taxes, lets say it totals up to 15% of gross pay, you're only taking home $1,700 per paycheck or about $3,400 per month. If housing eats up half that, you're living on $1,700 per month for all the things the parents of the kids everyone was defending above need and want. So why shouldn't the teachers, the ones shaping the minds of your children, the ones that raise your kids when you're out living, get a larger share of the value they bring to the community.

Between jobs I seriously thought about teaching. Something very different that I'd ever done. When I researched and found out what teachers make, even with a Master's, I quickly dissuaded myself of that notion.

@24 The high-end salary range is for teachers with PhD's. It's a graduated pay-scale (this is all from memory) based on your level of education.

And inevitably it's not for you and I to decide if they are paid fair. They obviously do not (I agree) and that's why they are always striking. Pay them what they're worth to you.

Would you want to live in King County taking home between $3,400 and $5,000 per month? It doesn't go a long way, and again, these are the people raising your kids for you when you're not around.

Call me when there's Elon Musk slash-fiction. Gay slash fiction. Of the super-kinky variety. ahem.

@13 - "You butt-munchers should direct your anger at those 1% who pilfer and horde uhmuhrika's wealth at the tippy top."

Well, please consider & be aware that the 'trickle-up' tendency of money is in fact structural, as much as it is because the 1% pilfers & hordes. As long as we have money "as we currently know it", money will continue to trickle upwards and enrich those who start out having more to play with.

"Force that wealth back down where it belongs."

Got any ideas on how to do that? Because we haven't been successful in doing so since the late 70s.

Pay Teachers More. Duh.

Jesus Christ Beto. That’s a microphone, not your boyfriend’s cock.

What I find amazing is how parents will pay $$$$ for "enrichment" and tutoring and music lessons and club sports so their kids look good on college applications, yet aren't willing to pay teachers a living wage! Think about it folks, good and excellent teachers with their masters and PhDs have many other choices, especially the math and science teachers. If you won't pay them enough to actually able to live in the cities that they work, they will do something else, and your kids will be taught by people who can't get any other job! What happens to your kids' college prospects then?

In the last 2 years I have heard of 15 teachers leaving the profession because they can do other things for better pay and fewer hours! And that's from only the TWO schools I get news from!

Oy, *and that's from just tge

Oy, *and that's just from the TWO schools I know.

Grammar is hard!

Y'all have heard the saying 'You get what you pay for', yes? Don't your kids deserve good teachers?

Good lord and butter---La Conner's on the strike list, too? That was my K-12. Mount Vernon, too, in Skagit County alone. I've got friends teaching in both districts who could be seriously hurt financially by negative outcome from the pending teachers' strike. The sad irony is that the communities that tend to vote down school levies for better wages are usually rural-Republican-conservative based. Pay our college educated, well qualified teachers and musicians what we're worth, people!

@23: I am not saying they don't deserve more, simply outlining why the old chestnut that "teachers get paid slave wages" is obviously and demonstrably false. They get paid average wages to above average wages.

One can debate if they deserve well above average to high paying wages, but you don't just get to make up your own facts that these are poverty wages.

@22 & @33 Theodore Gorath: $53K a year doesn't go very far if you're teaching at a Seattle school district. However, I have some friends in Skagit and Whatcom counties who I'm pretty sure would give their eye teeth for such an annual salary.