Comments

1

And yet Trump is simply firing all people he can required to provide oversight to the very inadequate federal response so he can rob us all blind (some more) before he goes. This country will in no way be able to evict everyone who can't pay, sue everyone who can't pay, or destroy the lives of everyone who can't pay.

We're going to have to do a lot of financial forgiveness and erasing of debt, movement of money from the top (who have stolen it from the bottom for decades and decades), and restructure our entire society, from who gets paid what to how things are done (including what is done as in what will jobs look like and who will be doing them and how much will they get paid now that it's been laid bare who the really important workers are) on every possible level, and most of all destroy the oligarchy and create a system of representation that actually represents.

If we do not do these things, this country is done. It will be a long, slow, horrific, painful death and the suffering and chaos will be obscene. It's time to do something or lay down and die. There really are no other choices.

2

Oh my, is failed millionaire candidate Cary Moon gonna tell us ā€˜densityā€™ is the future?

When history is written Seattleā€™s single family home owners will be among our unsung heroes.

4

@1 xina and @3 kristofarian: (sigh) Unfortunately, yes.
Small rural communities and especially those whose primary source of revenue is tourism will hurt the most. Sadly, the little channel town where I grew up is eerily just as deserted as it once was back in 1969 when my family and I moved up there permanently from Seattle after the Boeing layoffs. Only this is much worse because so many people are dying, have no income, and don't know what to do. This is unlike anything I have witnessed in all my life..There will have to be nationwide revolution if we are to have any change for the better.

5

@3: Ooops--I meant GermanSausage. Sorry for the mistake. Usually you and kris make similar comments.

7

M-O-O-N. That spells socialism.

8

We already have a capital gains tax Charles. I assume you want to increase it substantially.

10

The lack of specific, concrete proposals in this piece is a good example of why I did not support Moonā€™s mayoral campaign.

I mean, any idiot can list vague bullet points like ā€œinvest in transit,ā€ ā€œelectrify everything,ā€ and ā€œforgive student loan debt.ā€ Developing a effective strategy to realistically accomplish those things is something else entirely.

11

Whatever it will be, Seattle won't be a clone of the Seattle we've experienced for the past decade. Anyone who thinks it will be is in fantasyland. In fact, anyone who thinks the US is going to be a clone of what is was for the past decade is just as deeply mired in fantasy

Whether it appears so now, I suspect many Americans have had their expectations for the future, their complacency, and even their basic values shaken to the core. What we thought was so important before, might not seem important in the aftermath of COVID-19

The changes we see in the city and country post-coronavirus will reflect what this experience has wrought on individuals, which will be reflected in shifts in the culture. What those will be nobody, including the writers of this article, can foresee or prescribe. Trying to do that now is just blowing hot air to fill empty column space.

13

@10 demonstrates that the snide condescension of how-are-you-going-to-pay-for-that made it through the first phase of the plague unscathed.

14

Alden, what the hell are you talking about? You comment is unintelligible. Did you leave part of it in yoour head?

What's happening now is very likely not going to end May 4. Even if the curve flattens in Seattle we're still part of a country where we actually don't know for sure how many cycles of this we're going to have to endure. We might get a summer reprieve and be right back here in the fall Vaccines and treatments sound promising, but are as yet unproven.

Wake up. It might not be over this year. That's entirely possible. If you don't think that's not going to have an impact on how people view life and what that value most highly, you're either very young or ignorant of human nature.

15

@13 - But how ARE you proposing to pay for it? That is a fully legitimate question. The laundry list of things in this article add up to (in technical terms) a fuckload of money. Remember that any proposal to pay for it has to get through Congress, a Congress with a lot of members from states that in no way share the West Coast's liberal outlook.

16

"Because we live in the US, and our capitalism is founded on the exploitation of black labor..."
oh God could Chuck be any more clueless about how our economy works?
".... and the stolen land of Native Americans..:" LOL get over it.

17

"...so many people are dying..."
So Many doesn't mean what you think it does.
Grow a pair.

18

Fuck it. Let Coronavirus purge this country of its conservative voters. The mega churches want to be considered ā€œessentialā€? Great! Those same megachurches gave us Joe Biden and Donald Trump. If they want to bump themselves off that badly, I think thatā€™s awesome. Clear out the gerontocracy and free up some space at the top for the Left.

The General Election will be contested by two senile dudes who canā€™t keep their paws to themselves and insult or threaten the voters. Neither one can string a coherent sentence together. And why are we stuck with this shit? Because older voters are freaked out by the Reds.

Please, Miss Carona, wipe this planet clean. They fucked up the air, they fucked us the sea. They ran up the cost of tuition, and they made student loans undischargable. They bought up all the houses for their Air BnBs, drove the rents sky high and kept the wages low. We had one Bernie hope, and these greedy ass Boomer pigs had to kill that hope, just so they can glut their fat asses while we fucking starve. Oh, Holy COVID, youā€™re our hope now. They denied us the ballot, so itā€™s up to you. I pray at your altar, set us free.

Iā€™d never advocate violence or murder. But cheering on the coronavirus is neither. Iā€™m just cheering on a force of nature.

19

@18 except that's not how a virus works. doctors and nurses are dying. grocery store clerks are dying. black people are dying (more than white people). newborn babies are dying. sick children are dying. college students are dying. healthy middle aged people are dying. and the wealthy will survive this since they are used to self-isolation, access to health care no one else has, and all of the assurances that they will have more than they had when it all started, because they've opened the government coffers to be used as their personal bank, are continuing to force their agenda by gutting legislation, appointing judges, and making sure anyone who is still around when the election rolls around can't vote. and thus you are advocating for violence and murder, you're just using semantics to pretend you aren't.

21

https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_5e8ebea0c5b6b371812bf71a

22

19,

Go lick a doorknob

23

@22: Yes, the xina cat got your tongue.

24

@19, nailed it

25

Of the 244 confirmed deaths in King County yesterday, 228 of them were 60 years are older. Only five deaths have occurred in people younger than 50 years of age. Some of us may go down too but I think I'm with Wandering Star on this one.

27

That's total deaths since we've started tracking them by the way. Over two million people reside in King County.

28

Too many humans on the planet, anyway. Idiotic straights wonā€™t use a fucking condom or a pill, so Mother Natureā€™s immune system kicked in and sent out Carona to bump us all off.

Iā€™ll be glad to see the boomers go first, though.

29

@28: I know you're feeling pretty awful about the state of things, and the fact that Sanders has dropped out and you need a little time to grieve that, but please don't despair.

30

@19: Thank you.

31

18
Wow, you're dumb.
And evil.
Haven't you noticed the virus focuses it death toll in Blue communities?
Karma always treats you to the evil you wish on others.....

32

@31: 1) YOU castigating people for being evil is comedy gold
2) Again, population density is the reason for that, not political persuasion.
Honestly you are so bad at this.....

33

31,

Come here and let me lick your eyeball

34

@33. Keep it together homes, lashing out at everyone indiscriminately isn't going to avenge your past or assuage your pain. Stay on target.

35

34,

My target is his eyeball.

36

In Economics History, it's theorized that Wester Civilization emerged from the Middle Ages into the modern era technological and geographic expansion because so many people at the bottom died from the Plague, leaving the survivors to demand higher wages. Other factors were in play, of course, since China and India went into decline as a result of the 13th C. pandemic. This pandemic will make no such dent in the status quo, but perhaps in some small way it can move the needle in the right direction. No overreaching predictions from me, although "getting more people out of their cars and onto mass transit" ain't gonna be one of them.

37

36,

The collapse of the Byzantine Empire played a greater role, as many archived texts (such as On the Nature of Things) that had been unavailable in the West for Centuries flooded into Western Europe. At the same time, the printing press allowed cheap reliable copies of these ancient science and philosophical texts to reach the eyes of the newly emergent merchant class, who, as a function of their job, were literate.

The plague, and the invasions of Genghis Khan, did sissy matters by forcing commoners to call into question the real power of the Papacy. Catholic doctrine had it that the Pope not only held temporal power over the Papal States, but also spoke for God. And yet, the awesome power of the Lordā€™s Representative on Earth couldnā€™t do shit about the Mongol Horde or stop the bubonic plague. That left the population open to new explanations as to how the world worked just in time for the books from Byzantium to offer them one.

That said, economic factors certainly also played a major role. Not only did many at the bottom die, many at the top did too, which freed up land that had previously been owned only by the nobility. It also significantly weakened the enforcement power of the state, so serfs who left the manor had nobody to arrest them.

38

32
Again, Red;
we agree, you seem not to realize it.
We have (repeatedly) pointed out that the virus disproportionally kills Blue folk.
You 'counter' that that is because of population density.
Which agrees with our assertion.
We have not commented on 'why';
only 'what'.
For Deranged Hatefilled Leftists to continue gloating that the virus is killing President Trumps base is factually wrong.
And evil.

39

@38: Honey. Covid doesn't care who you vote for. It cares how easily it can spread and thus replicate itself. So all those red state evangelicals who insist on sitting cheek by jowl in their churches are going to get it.
Not because they vote Red, but because there are a lot of them in close quarters.
So again. Pop-u-la-tion Dens-i-ty
Not Political Persuasion.
This isn't Karma. It's Epidemiology

40

@Lissa -- why (oh WHY?)
are so many Reptilians always
oh-so-easily mentally-challenged?
Could it be the Dummy-Kruger effect?

I'd say hit 'em with the business end of a shovel
but it appears it's already been tried
(and found Severely Wanting).
0h, what to do?

41

"The [dummy-kruger] concept is based on a 1999 paper by Cornell University psychologists David Dunning and Justin Kruger.

The pair tested participants on their logic, grammar, and sense of humor, and found that those who performed in the bottom quartile rated their skills far above average.

For example, those in the 12th percentile self-rated their expertise to be, on average, in the 62nd percentile.

The researchers attributed the trend to a problem of metacognitionā€”the ability to analyze oneā€™s own thoughts or performance.

'Those with limited knowledge in a domain suffer a dual burden: Not only do they reach mistaken conclusions and make regrettable errors, but their incompetence robs them of the ability to realize it,' they wrote."

Tis Sad, indeed.
And, not just
for them.

42

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykK0uEjSsqY

43

I thankDr Abaka Ā  today because I was badly hurt when my lover of three years left me to be with another man . I cried and sobbed every day, and wish the world will just come to an end , until it got so bad that I reached out to the Internet for help. And i saw a testimony of a spell caster that has been helping people with similar problem that very day i read a lot of testimony and post of this powerful spell caster , and i said let me give it a trial so i contact him for help and he cast a love spell for me which i use in getting my love back and now i am a happy man. For what you have done for me,i will not stop to share your goodness to people as well I hope God blesses you as much as you have help me to get my Love back,visit him on WhatsApp +2349051159571 or email him greatabakaspelltemple@gmail.com

44

After the Pandemic, the Big Reset" --Tim Egan in today's NYT

"Every crisis opens a course to the unknown. In an eye-blink, the impossible becomes possible. History in a sprint can mean a dark, lasting turn for the worse, or a new day of enlightened public policy.

Be still, my heart, but I see the latter. Some of the greatest advances in American history ā€” liberation of slaves, Social Security, robust clean air and water mandates ā€” were birthed by disaster.

For now, the coronavirus pandemic is an epic of sorrow, and has many mortal months still to run. But in the midst of our suffering, our grief for loved ones lost, our loneliness in social isolation, we have a chance to re-engineer our world.

Hereā€™s a look at what may follow as the pandemic starts to settle:"

More at:
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/10/opinion/coronavirus-political-reform.html?action=click&module=Opinion&pgtype=Homepage

45

@19 xina For the WIN! Bravo, agreed, and seconded.
@44 kristofarian: We can only hope.

Everyone stay healthy, safe, and sane.

46

Thereā€™s no talk about stopping international predatory debt practices, specifically Chinaā€™s owning USAs debt as well as many other countriesā€™ - and China has no plans to slow down. The change you seek in America is a change necessary globally. Too many foreign interests are invested in our broken systems and therefore benefit from our fractured and unfair distributions of wealth, health and other resources. Policy changes you want internally necessitate policy changes externally.

To have jobs on our soil again means stop having China making our everyday basic needs.

And also: Stop selling America to the highest bidder. Most new building development is owned by foreign investors who give zero Fā€™s about American citizens. Zero. This is why Seattle has become the unaffordable city it currently is. any long term, resilient change needs to plan out how to divest from interests that have no interest in the American citizen. To think this is just a fight between rich white people and poor brown people is a very limited view. I implore you not to have tunnel vision about the US and its future.

Some of the articleā€™s arguments about Americans pulling together, I agree with and love, but this has to be extended to what we allow on our shores. If the values of other nations arenā€™t aligned with a vision of a unified and fair and just America, then they should not be allowed in- not even under the guise of ā€œhelpingā€ or giving a loan. Often foreign companies install factories in poor areas that pollute and sicken the citizens. And for what? The wealth of that company. Zero Fs about the wellbeing of citizens.

I love America. I love who we are and the variety of us. The cracks in Americaā€™s system are cracks in a global system. Letā€™s strengthen ourselves. No matter what political party you stand with, I know most of us have enough in common to build the self sufficient, autonomous future we want. We donā€™t have to be ugly and hateful to achieve what we want. We can be strong, morally clear, measured and wise. I remember when we were more like that. Less ready to use the ugliest, hateful words we can throw at one another.

47

Assuming we really want change and not just to preach to the converted we need to follow a few simple principles.
1. Recognize that people of all colors, even whites, in certain demographics are being unfairly impacted. Polarization does not help the cause.
2. Let's avoid notions that would require government to suspend constitutional rights. Defining identifying, tracking, and seizing "offshore" assets would require an autocracy and would likely destroy the world economy.
3. Avoid polarizing names like "Green New Deal" for something that should make a lot of sense to economic conservatives as well.
4. Be open to grand bargains and compromises. Unless we suspend democracy most of these ideas will require accomodating a wide range of interests that go beyond the Seattle city limits.
5. Be on top of waste, fraud and abuse. America is not known for its greatness in churning out technocrats/bureaucrats.
6. If you want to drastically cut Military spending come out with a plan and not a tagline. I'd start with Paul Kennedy's Rise and Fall of the Great Empires that attributes much of the decline of great nations to military overspending. If you want to geek out there are thousands of incredibly well researched papers and books on the topic.

48

A good contrast and a higher level view of the possible outcomes (and they are limited), from this is:
https://theconversation.com/what-will-the-world-be-like-after-coronavirus-four-possible-futures-134085
What will the world be like after coronavirus? Four possible futures

I agree the money was always there. The will to direct it towards Barbarism changed greatly since Reagan. Can State Socialism win out after the belly of the beast is exposed like never before, or do most die out to Barbarism?

50

@RicketyRick, I agree with a lot of what you say. Particularly about not preaching to the converted. Itā€™s essential.


Please wait...

Comments are closed.

Commenting on this item is available only to members of the site. You can sign in here or create an account here.


Add a comment
Preview

By posting this comment, you are agreeing to our Terms of Use.