My kid used the paper pass from Sound Transit. I guess the fuckups need yet another break before they learn. Or not.

I love Nancy Pelosi.
Always precise with her language.
This is both very tough and a completely accurate characterization of what is happening with the Trump properties.

Public transit systems and their fare collection/enforcement systems are fundamentally flawed. They're exactly like healthcare in this respect and, like healthcare, the simplest and most egalitarian model would be to simply overhaul it completely, make it all free to the consumer and obtain public funding to maintain it's function and upkeep.

How is the following not a racist statement?

"The fact is nothing is going to be done about climate change until it kills lots of white people."

@3 People value what they pay for. It’s why you’d rather take a shit at the Four Seasons than a public restroom.

@3: When you say "make it all free to the consumer" and "obtain public funding" then it's not at all free because the consumer is taxed to provide your beloved public funding.

@7,

Right, figured that was implied. Certainly doesn't dispute my assertion that a public funding model is far more egalitarian than what currently exists. And assuming you'd agree with my assertion that the current model is flawed, how do you propose fixing it?

@9: Well, raising taxes on everyone to cover transit makes as much sense as raising taxes on everyone to pay for tunnel and bridge tolls.

When the service and the consumer are transactional, such as using transit, fees make the most sense. When the service, such as police and fire, is needed by anyone at anytime - taxation makes the most sense. I think that's a more egalitarian model.

Hurricane Dorian is the strongest hurricane to hit the Bahamas SINCE ANYBODY'S BEEN KEEPING RECORDS.

How many of the candidates flew to the CNN event on private jets?

By now, two years into the trump administration, it is clear that inherited wealth tends to create sociopathic idiots. Therefore, it's in both society's and the individual's best interest to have an onerous estate tax, and extremely high tax rate on both capitol and earnings above $500,000.

The proceeds could be used to fully fund things like transit, Social Security, and healthcare for all.

@13: Why do you hate the middle class? Many middle income families have a portfolios of let's say $400K for their children's college and let's say a dual income totaling $150K. Even with that, they still have to budget wisely.

Raindrop dear, why do you hate math? 500k is greater than both 400k and 150k.

$500K in assets is nothing. $10mil and I may agree with you.

@10, everyone benefits from transit whether they personally ride it or not. Drivers maybe even benefit the most since they're the ones enjoying the reduction in congestion. That's why tax dollars already pay the vast majority of transit operating expenses. We want as many people as possible to use transit so it's over the years become artificially cheap, to the point that now the fare collection is mostly just a formality. We'd get a better return on our tax dollars if we just ditched fares altogether, which increases service speed and ridership.

@14 Perhaps Catalina believes higher education is one of the public goods that estate tax revenues should fund?

Three of the fifteen richest Americans are Walton heirs who have never done an honest day's work in their lives. You're not standing up for the middle class, you're defending aristocracy.

@18: I'm not talking about our friends in the Hamptons. I picked a middle class portfolio and a middle class salary.

Until higher education starts accepting students based solely on their merit, instead of who their parents are, their public funding should require extensive and exhaustive reviews and revamping including congressional oversight committees.

@15: Yes, I picked that combo because you're talking combined.

The opening photo is from the Eagle Creek fire, which was started by a 15-year-old playing with fireworks on a hot, dry, windy day. There is no climate policy that would have prevented that fire.

Metro/ST fare enforcement was already an embarrassment. Why dress meter maids like paramilitary commandoes? Is fare skipping such a problem that we need to scare people into thinking they will be issued a ticket by seal Team 6? The martial style feels out of keeping with the spirit of “public” transit. Kindly, compassionate people in cardigans issuing warnings and providing pointers to assistance programs first, calling the cops on repeat violators second, would be a MUCH better look for the system.

@22
Judging by the number of items i see for sale advertised as (film trailer voice) "tactical", it seems that EVerybody needs to like like a paramilitary commando.

It's actually not hard to go carbon negative if you're well off.

Just buy 6-12 solar panels (either installed on public faciliites or when you replace your roof), buy new modern appliances (fridge, stove, washer, dryer, furnace), and use your $2000 escooter or eskateboard to get to work, while wearing your hi tech waterproof backpack and camera-equipped helmet with $2000 crash bubble jacket.

No, seriously.

Will dear, you're already carbon neutral electrically if you live in Seattle, but what will you do when the house next door to yours builds up and blocks your solar panel's access to sunlight? What "public facilities" have solar panels that you can buy into? City Light sponsored six of them, but they are all sold out (I have a share in the Holiday Apartments array!)

Stoves and dryers haven't changed much in the last 75 years, so there's no need to buy a new one of those (although the induction/convention ranges are a dream!) and an electric furnace will set you back several hundred dollars a month in the winter. (An electric heat pump, on the other hand, is a dandy technology - but unless you have gas as your back up, even it will get pricey on the cold days where the heat pump technology doesn't work.