"His decision came after the police-accountability office recommended that the commander be disciplined given that the crowd was peaceful at the time."

For those that think we can root out the "bad apples" the phrase is "one bad apple spoils the bunch." It is past time to toss out the bunch. There is no "reforming" Seattle PD, it is time to dissolve and reform our public safety infrastructure. Their priorities haven't aligned with ours for years.

I wonder if any of those lazy whining kids described in the 30s grew up to complain about how entitled kids are today? Maybe if Seattle can hobble on for another century they and their children can grow up to talk about how dirty and crime ridden the place has become compared to the good old days. I won't get my hopes up though. Haven't you heard? Seattle is dying. Any day now.

My grandma gave me a few details about The Depression in the 1930s. She and her sister worked in Seattle during that period. It sounded horrible to me. Also, I always cleaned my plate at her house because, "You never know. That might be the last time you eat for a while."

You know, the deadly SARS epidemic back in 2003 could have become a global catastrophe too, but smart and knowledgeable people in the Bush(!) administration (and in the CDC and in Canada) nailed that bitch into a tomb - and it didn't take too terribly long either. Then, I reflected on and compared how COVID was dealt with when a distant alarm bell rang: a president glued to Fox News while styling his combover and applying bronzer, assigning this new, bothersome hassle to Ivanka and her trainer (or whatever). It's only a flu. It'll be gone by summer.

For those of you who believe it doesn't matter who becomes President - that one candidate is pretty much like the other, please remember this pandemic and the anemic response of an uncaring, spoiled narcissist who doesn't have skin, apparently, in any game.

What's the point of an accountability office if the police chief can override their decisions?

More "we've investigated ourselves and found no wrongdoing" bullshit.

Police, this is why people hate you. It's not just the wanton murdering, it's everything. Any time you are given a chance to do something good or build trust with your community, instead you opt for the most deplorable action possible. Its almost like a competition to see who can be the biggest state-sanctioned piece of shit.

Fuck the police.

"His decision came after the police-accountability office recommended that the commander be disciplined given that the crowd was peaceful at the time, reports the Seattle Times."

Your regular reminder that when only the police are responsible for the oversight and discipline of the police, you live in a police state.

The police will accept microaggression training, implicit bias training and every other performative training you ask for in exchange for endless pay bumps, but they will never submit to the civilian control that would require them to be judged equally before the law.

According the National Umbrella Association: 'Only Thing That Stops A Bad Guy With An Umbrella Is A Good Guy With A Umbrella'.

I forgot to mention, the NUA did not comment or have any recommendations as to the color of the umbrella or whether it was collapsible or fox frame.

@8: It's all perspective.

I think if you were to ask Mr. Diaz or anyone else in the police department about this, they would inform you it's the public that needs to be reformed, not them.

If you disagree with that perspective on moral grounds, their rejoinder would be that their version of morality is backed by guns, prison cells, a union and an entire team of prosecutors and judges ready to turn a blind eye to and forgive whatever unethical or illegal act they carry out.

Other than ethics and virtue, what do you have to enforce the position that they are the people in need of reform?

@1 - We seldom used that particular phrase in Dallas. Down there, "P-O-P" was more commonly used to describe the phenomenon of action taken due to Pissed Off Police.

@6 Good comment. Thanks.

Speaking of pink umbrellas, cops are such bullies, wagging their you-know-whats all over the place and verbally and physically abusing the citizenry, who pay their salaries and have to put up with all their egomaniacal crap. Let's defund the police and reallocate these financial resources to help homeless and indigent people.

Speaking of which, there's nothing wrong with a little poop on your shoes or public masturbation, so people should stop saying "Seattle is dying--will the last person to leave please turn out he lights--hang your dick out the window and screw the world" and so forth. Seattle is one of the more attractive and livable cities in the nation, and all these NIMBY crybabies should move to Atlanta and get attacked by cockroaches or shot in the backside by hoodlums.

Everyone should get vaxxed, financial incentive or not. Pollysexual cannot wait for the booster follow-up, one shot in each cheek, please.

In reference to Covid being "a totally preventable disease;" I mean, hell, you could say the same thing about the AIDS crisis. Humans are frustrating sometimes but our social nature is hard to overcome even at our own peril. Based on our understanding of human nature, lets roll out more programs like Ohio and their lottery for getting vaxxed. Im not really concerned how altruistic your motives are for getting vaxxed as long as you do it. Any incentive programs will no doubt be less costly than dealing with the alternative.

Yes, that nasty pink umbrella might have pepper-sprayed - oh wait, that was the cops.

Younger people don't know this usually, but every generation bemoans the loss of the city they knew. Listen to Fran Lebowitz talk about New York City now compared to New York in the 70s and 80s. She hates what has happened to Times Square. She misses Studio 54 and Max's Kansas City. It happens to all of us if we live long enough...and if we love the city in which we live.

I moved to Seattle in the mid-80s after a long, long (don't want to think about it) two-year stint in Galveston, Texas. Believe me, when I got off that plane at Sea-Tac, I thought I'd died and gone to heaven. The air was so clean and sweet like vanilla ice cream. The rain (which I love) and the 4 PM darkness come November (which I also love) freaks out many newcomers, but not this kid. That is when the city glistens most.

Seattle then had a population under 500K and was more provincial than city - although it was definitely a city. God, how I remember the crab feed on Saturday nights at My Susie's Oriental Lounge (it was nearing its forty or fifty year run) and stiff drinks at Jimmy Woo's Jade Pagoda, The Hurricane. The Crocodile, all the other places that defined my Seattle. They move into history, and everyone hates when that happens to them. Older folk, when I moved to Seattle, reminisced both gleefully and sadly about their day, about The 411, about The Gardens of Allah , about baseball in the Rainer Valley.

So I watch as my places are torn down, and pricey condos, yoga studios, and fancy restaurants take their place for another generation. It's just the way of the world to lament the loss of one's heyday. There's nothing to do about it except to stand out of the way, hope the younger folk have as much honest fun as you have had and treasure the times that will live forever in rivers of one's memory.

@20: "It was the same incompetent callous Rightwing republican leadership that allowed AIDS to explode out of control"

As you recall from history, unlike covid, AIDS is spread through sex. Just image if a President Gary Bauer had implemented his AIDS solution. Thankfully we got the annoying indifference of Ronald Reagan on the matter.

@21 You can practically put your finger anywhere on the globe and find a country that did a better job than the US.

New Zealand is the prime example at 5 deaths/million. Australia and S Korea did pretty well at 35 and 37 deaths/million. Whole swaths of Africa are under 100 deaths/million. The world average is 430 deaths/million. Germany, Greece, and the Netherlands are around 1000 deaths/million. The US is about 4 times the world average at 1800 deaths/million. We're #18 from the bottom of standings.

@17

Vax dat ass up!

"And yeah, the "kids these days" mentality of The Boomers is nothing more than a subterfuge for the fact that not only did they take the biggest piece of the pie (that was going to last forever!), but put barbed wire around the rest of the pie... "

kids these days are gonna
Inherit a republican Utopia
that gives ZERO Fucks re
their Lives their chirren's
or the "bottom" 99.9%.

speaking of
Subterfuges.

oh and wenwohoo
where are all those
Filthy Rich Black Boomers?

did they all jet off to St. Elsewhere
of did you disremember 20% of our
Citizenry? o and whattabout all them
Oldes I see gainfully employed at the
home Depot and Walmart struggling to
afford even 'good' cat food for their Dinners?

are they all Faking it?