Comments

1

That blurb about Seattle dying had a link to an article in Baltimore, written by Baltimore Business Journal, not Puget Sound Business Journal. Is that a bad link? Are you saying vacancy rates are similar to Baltimore?

3

There was nothing good or positive that came out of CHOP so why the city should feel compelled to "celebrate" it seems ludicrous on its face. Even the organizers of this event realized that which is why they pivoted and tried to relabel is as a Juneteenth celebration. That being said I have no doubt they'll do whatever they want any way. It's not like the city has any political will to enforce the lack of a permit.

4

1 - Indeed. I was trying to find Pratt street in Seattle.

6

@3 Switching the name from CHAZ to CHOP so they could reference the French revolution says it all. What started as a good idea ended in shameful behavior and random violence. I guess anarchy and death was probably the end goal of many CHOP participants, so in that light it was a success. But I cant imagine the city wants a repeat or even a reminder of it.

7

Why commemorate something as dumb and ugly as CHOP/CHAZ? Don't worry, foxnews and your aged 70 something relatives will always remember.

8

Fuck the "CHOP" and the parasites in the city council who enable this anarchy. The sooner they're run out of town the better.

10

Not sure about the city, but why would anyone in the defund movement want to highlight the orgy of rape and murder that was the police free CHOP? Pretty much was an experiment that turned into a disaster on all levels.

12

The irony is that the "Chop block party" event is run by someone that the protest community has lost all trust and respect for. The "CHOP Art" nonprofit does not have possession of any of the CHOP art. They are currently trying to take it by suing the artists and advocates who they think have it, after trying and failing to steal it from a west seattle storage unit months ago.

13

Happy they ousted Nearman. They're no heroes, though. They didn't do it until the video surfaced that made it impossible to refuse to do anything about it. Asking him to resign was a bullshit move because he was NEVER going to resign.

Now if only the members of Congress would oust the members who voted against Biden's win, in support of sedition, traitors every last one of them.

14

@6 I know you would never let facts get in the way of your bigoted opinions, but the switch from Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone to Capitol Hill Ongoing Protest came about because some of the adults involved in the protest, mostly folks from BLM, pointed out the difference between being protestors and insurrectionists. Organized, ongoing protest is Patriotic, while violent insurrections are treason. Which is yet another reason the Left is superior to the Fascist Right.

15

@14: To be fair, the comparison would need to be made between the fascist left and the fascist right.

17

if the Left were a little more Fascii
perhaps they might ram Universal
Healtcare down everyone's sore
throats. the so-called "right's"
got ramming shit down our
throats down to a Science
which they don't even
Believe In anymore.

corporate Rule
is Fascism

18

Speaking of well-Unbridled capitalism
nyt:

Lawmakers, Taking Aim at Big Tech, Push Sweeping Overhaul of Antitrust

A bipartisan group of House members introduced five bills targeting Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google.

WASHINGTON — House lawmakers on Friday introduced sweeping antitrust legislation aimed at restraining the power of Big Tech and staving off corporate consolidation. If passed, the bills would be the most ambitious update to monopoly laws in decades.

The bills — five in total — take direct aim at Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Google and their grip on online commerce, information and entertainment.

The proposals would make it easier to break up businesses that used their dominance in one area to get a stronghold in another, would create new hurdles for acquisitions of nascent rivals and would empower regulators with more funds to police companies.

by Cecilia Kang; June 11, 2021

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/11/technology/big-tech-antitrust-bills.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage

WILL the Fascists
in Congress side with
their Citizen Masters – US

or with their Corporate* Masters?

*Billionaires and MultiNational Corps

19

Obviously this was an attack by Big Beer on Big Cider.

Sigh.

21

@9 I like that you went right for the strawman argument. No screwing around, just went for it right off the bat. Very efficient.

24

"Seattle is doing everything it can to block the planned commemoration of CHOP at Cal Anderson Park. [...] It wants to un-remember whatever has to do with CHOP forever, to forget for good, to crumple and toss into a black hole from which no information is retrievable."

There's nothing preventing The Stranger from publishing biographical profiles on all of the victims of violence in the CHOP, starting with the three Black men who were brutally murdered there. Because #BLM, right? Right? (Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? BUELLER?!?)

(Don't worry -- you can still blame it on the SPD, due to the CHOP's origin in the illegal wildcat strike by SPOG members, which left the citizens of Pike-Pine without the police protection the City was legally obligated to provide.)

25

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cjFoMU7idP8

27

One human life is so ephemeral, all pleasures transitory. Those who cannot see past the mind prison of the ego will never transcend themselves and inherit their own will en masse. The prison of limitless consumption without temperance and preservation is the essence on decay and squalor.

28

What a shame that the downtown Seattle McDonald's location permanently closing isn't the one on 3rd and Pine.

29

@2 Yeshua: Yep. Agreed and seconded. I know I won't fly in a commercial jet again anytime soon.

@13 xina +1 Agreed and seconded.

@17 kristofarian for the WIN!

30

Hello,

So, being how there is no shortage of hyperbole around CHOP/CHAZ, maybe we should look at actual statistics* in the East Precinct / Capitol Hill:

East Precinct / Capitol Hill (note: CH is part of the EP which is mostly hemmed-in by I-5, 520, I-90, and Lake Washington)

2020 listed 4 Homicides (Murder & Nonnegligent Manslaughter)
2019 (well before CHOP) listed 3

The average homicide rate/year (including years w/o homicide) in the same area from 2008-2020 is 1.2 …from 2008-2019 is 1

The average homicide rate/year (excluding years w/o homicide) in the same area from 2008-2020 is 1.6…from 2008-2019 is 1.3

If you measure for the entire East Precinct:

2020 listed 12 Homicides
2019 listed 5

The average homicide rate/year (no years w/o homicide) from 2008-2020 is 4.9
The average homicide rate/year (no years w/o homicide) from 2008-2019 is 4.2

To be sure, one homicide is one too many…and the jump from 5 in 2019 to 12 in 2020 for the entire E Precinct is horrible.

But can this be blamed on CHOP? The Pandemic?

For another comparison, we can look at the homicide rates for just 2008 and 2009 (the last really bad economic recession). Both years posted 7 homicides each, for a total of 14, across the entire E Precinct.

I am not trying to paint CHOP/CHAZ one-way-or-the-other, however, we need to put things in a more accurate context.

*https://www.seattle.gov/police/information-and-data/crime-dashboard

32

That McDonald's was my therapy spot when I worked at The Westin. Close enough so that my pager would go off, but outside the vortex of despair that was the hotel cafeteria.

My other refuge was the "hospitality suites" on the 32nd floor of the north tower: Six non-bedroom suites that were furnished in Joan Collins decor. No one ever booked them, so they were always available for a nap. Or a quickie (not that I would know anything about that.)

33

“The Black Lives Matter
uprisings were
remarkably
nonviolent.

When there was violence, very often
police or counterprotesters were
reportedly directing it
at the protesters.”

--@20
bingo

Fuck
FOX.

https://www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/news-and-ideas/black-lives-matter-protesters-were-overwhelmingly-peaceful-our-research-finds

34

@33 CHOP wasn't a BLM protest. It was a bunch of mostly white LARPers led by a rapist rapper and a demagogue on the city council. It's only permanent accomplishment was to tarnish BLM while killing actual black people.

It was a sick joke. You want to protest peacefully, and leave? Fine. Black Lives absolutely Matter. You want to occupy the place, drive out the locals, sell heroin and shoot innocent people? I think you'll find we'll be less tolerant of that shit the second time around.

35

nah
9mfSSw6NyHLs
I don't wanna Occupy the place

but it sounds like
you're Just the Guy to
Deal with them if they Do.

Manly you are!

shall I tell them
you're Coming?

36

say have you considered
working for the Po-po
rumour has it they're
looking for a few
good* men.

*say how are you at running
a fully-laden bicycle over
a protester's cranium?

37

"Can You Name
ONE Successful
Libertarian Country?

The poison of libertarian ideology in the GOP has been gutting America since the Reagan administration.

Libertarian ideology — that government should discard all regulation of polluting or otherwise dangerous (banks, etc.) industries, discard all consumer protections, and shred the “social safety net” of Medicaid, Social Security, Medicare and unemployment insurance, etc. — has completely seized the GOP.

It’s in the category of “failed ideas” like the USSR’s version of communism or Hitler’s fascism; let’s leave it and the GOP behind and fight together to make America a truly pluralistic, egalitarian democratic republic."

--Thom Hartmann

Oh the Humanity.

more at
https://hartmannreport.com/p/can-you-name-one-successful-libertarian

38

It’s Not Just Income Taxes. Billionaires
Don’t Pay Inheritance Taxes Either.

As a Trump adviser once said,
only “morons” would do that.

America’s ultrawealthy already get away with murder by structuring their finances to avoid income, and therefore income taxes. It’s not rocket science.

CEOs typically take the lion’s share of their earnings in stock and other nonwage compensation, for example.

And while employees do have to pay income and payroll taxes on the initial value of stock granted in lieu of wages, anyone who accumulates a large trove of assets can hold onto those growing investments and use them as collateral for low-interest loans to fund their lavish lifestyles.

Voila! No income. This is a lot cheaper than selling off chunks of stock and paying tax on the gains.

article by Mike Mechanic

Tonnes more at
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2021/06/propublica-billionaires-income-tax-wealthy-avoid-gift-estate-inheritance-taxes/

do we want More trumpf Crime Famblies -- or Bush or Dupont etc etc etc -- or a Country that works for Everyone in it?

we CAN Choose
not that they'd
let us Believe
it for even a
second.

39

okay one more -- nyt:

Private Inequity: How a Powerful Industry Conquered the Tax System

The I.R.S. almost never audits private equity firms, even as whistle-blowers have filed claims alleging illegal tax avoidance.

By Jesse Drucker and Danny Hakim
June 12, 2021, 5:00 a.m. ET

There were two weeks left in the Trump administration when the Treasury Department handed down a set of rules governing an obscure corner of the tax code.

Overseen by a senior Treasury official whose previous job involved helping the wealthy avoid taxes, the new regulations represented a major victory for private equity firms.

They ensured that executives in the $4.5 trillion industry, whose leaders often measure their yearly pay in eight or nine figures, could avoid paying hundreds of millions in taxes.

The rules were approved on Jan. 5, the day before the riot at the U.S. Capitol. Hardly anyone noticed.

The Trump administration’s farewell gift to the buyout industry was part of a pattern that has spanned Republican and Democratic presidencies and Congresses: Private equity has conquered the American tax system.

The industry has perfected sleight-of-hand tax-avoidance strategies so aggressive that at least three private equity officials have alerted the Internal Revenue Service to potentially illegal tactics, according to people with direct knowledge of the claims and documents reviewed by The New York Times.’

The previously unreported whistle-blower claims involved tax dodges at dozens of private equity firms.

But the I.R.S., its staff hollowed out after years of budget cuts, has thrown up its hands when it comes to policing the politically powerful industry.

More @:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/12/business/private-equity-taxes.html?action=click&module=Spotlight&pgtype=Homepage

41

say have you considered working for the Po-po rumour has it they're looking for a few good* men.

No but have you considered joining CHOP security. You can run around the street with an AR-15 and shoot black people all you want! Your political extremist buddies will even help you cover up the murders!

The only thing holding us back from glory is that hairy lesbian Mayor Durkan

Wow, such tolerant left. Gas yourself you fucking hippie.

42

"say have you considered working for the Po-po rumour has it they're looking for a few good* men."

No but have you considered joining CHOP security. You can run around the street with an AR-15 and shoot black people all you want! Your political extremist buddies will even help you cover up the murders!

"The only thing holding us back from glory is that hairy lesbian Mayor Durkan"

Wow, such tolerant left. Gas yourself you fucking hippie.

43

"The poison of libertarian ideology in the GOP has been gutting America since the Reagan administration."

I tend to agree. Why you want to implement the libertarian paradise in the streets with untrained teenagers in the AR-15s is beyond me, but hey, that rapist Raz seems to be OK with it.

You want to defund the police, and begin this fantastic libertarian experiment, OK! Wait till you see what we replace it with. Get used to private military contractors and absolutely zero accountability. Fuck around and find out, you racist, homophobic hippie scum.

45

GREETINGS TO YOU ALL, I'm JUDY from Colorado, USA. i want to testify about a herbal Dr called Dr OSE, who helped me to cure my Hepatitis C, totally with his natural roots and herbs for just two weeks of taking his natural herbal medicine. you can reach him for your own cure too, EMAIL; droseherbalhome@gmail.com. once again thank you Dr. OSE......

46

Well now that the chuds have decided we shouldn't commemorate movements that failed to achieve their goals and killed people in the process... they'll be getting right to work demolishing those Confederate monuments, won't they?

Time's a wasting boys, grab a sledgehammer and hop to it.

47

"You can run around the street
with an AR-15 and shoot black
people all you want!" way Ahead
of y'a there 9mfSSw6NyHLs -- I shoot
'Zactly how many I wanna. which is Zee-row

so, so how many do You wanna Shoot 9mfSSw6NyHLs?
or Gas? (so you guys are branching out and getting into gassing.
got any favorites?) (and then there's) all those lifelsss Bodies. such a Nuisance.

say have you seen
'the Death of Stalin'?
that's what Totalitarianism
looks like. Whole Lotta Boom-booms

... so -- if we don't buy the FOX narrative
that makes one a hippy? Rupert
'Uncle Snoopy' sure's had 'is
Way with America. lookit
where we're At today.

Must everyone be Enemies?

so why you wanna
Break America 9-
fSSw6NyHLs?

48

@30: Thanks for bringing the data, which those who pretend the fist people ever to die in Seattle occurred at the CHOP studiously avoid. Odd they never include unjustified police killings in their narrow focus on the violence that matters to them.

Here's more useful data on the topic:

In 1990, 1,271 SPD officers handled 65,053 serious (FBI Part 1) crimes and cleared (a proxy measure for “solved”) 13,425, equal to 51.1 crimes handled per officer and 10.6 cleared.

In 2019, 1,371 SPD officers handled 39,055 serious crimes and cleared 3,447, equal to 28.5 crimes handled per officer and 3.2 cleared.

During the same time period that clearance rates for violent crime cratered despite more officers dealing with half the level of violent crime, the SPD budget exploded by more than 100%.

But sure, CHOP is the problem.

It's almost as if the less violent crime the SPD deals with and the more we pay them to deal with it, the more officers it takes to arrive at a worse the SPD does at actually addressing the kind of crime they imagine only ever occurred at CHOP. Perhaps they're upset that clearance rates have not yet reached 0 and they believe another pay bump for the SPD will get us there?
Now we know what consent decree driven reform has given us. Better paid officers resolving far less crime despite their being far less of it.

@43: "Hippie?" Thanks for the 1960's time warp, to include Mr. Roper from "The Graduate" shaking his frail aging hand at the camera while complaining about "outside agitators, not in my building!"

Thanks for the trip down memory lane.

49

Where da pm slog tho?

50

it's all about their Feelies, Casino.

Facts can be persuasive but we got
the FOX who chooses to Feel
'the News' at you. as anyone
can see it's Working quite
well for the Billionaire
Class. Doubtful that
9mfSSw6NyHLs Is
a Billionaire but
one never
Knows...

51

@38 -- "do we want More trumpf
Crime Famblies -- or Bush or Dupont
etc etc etc -- or a Country that works for
Everyone in it?" hmmmm. Tough question.

deepest apologies to the Walton Fambly
who earned the Masssive Fortune the Hard Way:
putting their Employees on the Gv'mnt Teat by paying
Shite Wages and learning them how to get Food Stamps.

is THAT the right wing utopia you're looking for, Fascis?

52

damn. whattabout them Sacklers?

Billionaires, all of 'em
most of their good Fortune
they Earned by Addicting America
to their "SAFE!"* new Opiods [no matter
they're Hugely-Addictive] thru a grossly successful
Marketing Scheme involving both Doctors and 'doktors'
and an Army of Drug Pushers. did we Execute them? right.

*"safe" for making a Fortune
on the backs of desperate Americans
suffering thru an Economy built on Profiteering.

gawd
what's
Become
of America

53

@47 I want to shoot zero, hippie and want to make sure nobody else shoots any either, where that be police or, political extremists with guns, or some racist white assholes with guns who might be police.

You want to reform the police, fire bad officers, hire new ones, introduce bias training and actually prevent black people from getting shot, I am right there with you. Remove their immunity and civil forfeiture? YES! You want to tear down confederate monuments? Ditto. I will rent something that can help.

You want to come into take over my block, replace the police with vigilantes carrying rifles and fill the place with heroin, we're gonna have a big fucking problem, you idiot hippie.

And yes, "the death of Stalin" is exactly where idiot hippies like you lead countries. You follow some pied Piper like Donald Trump or Sawant right to the same end. So yes, gas yourself. Do something productive for the planet. Put a bag over your head.

54

@52 what makes you think I like the Sacklers. Those assholes should be in jail. A guillotine would work too but that always goes too far.

55

“You want to come into take over my block… “
no

“… replace the police with vigilantes carrying rifles… “
no

“and fill the place with heroin… “
no

“…we're gonna have a big fucking problem… “
looks like you got The Strawman Syndrome
real Bad 9mfSSw6NyHLs. but there's
Good news! it’s totes Curable.

“… you idiot hippie.”
Otay.

“So yes, gas yourself. Do something
productive for the planet. Put a
bag over your head.”
--9mfSSw6NyHLs

oh so it’s Carbon Monoxide.
I had you wrong I figured
Mustard Gas or maybe
Zyklon B. say that
reminds me: to
check my CO
detector’s
Batts.

Thnx!

have a Nice Day.

56

"... what makes you think I like the Sacklers."

oh. okay. it's the Comprehension you lack.

when I bitch and moan about the Rich
having too much Power over the Planet
I'm not suggesting that You endorse them.

that's Curable too.

57

53.

were I to Follow* ANY-one
I'd be chasing Bernie
to a (DEMOCRATIC)
Socialist Agenda

you know -- like
the Civilized World?
where peeps are Actual People
and soulless Corps aren't

you On Board?

*not a Disciple, I'll be totes
FREE to Criticize &
Not follow off
some Cliff

58

Chop was destroyed by cops and cop friends attacking protestors. The Trumpers and other right wingers freaked out and blatant lies were told about this experiment to scare the hell out of people. Of course the status quo with the mayor couldn't allow this to continue and to progress.

Cops often cause more problems in neighborhoods than solve them.

Maybe those that criticize Anarchists should research their philosophy and history instead of potty mouthing. Chop was offering services and helping the homeless.

59

And class warfare. Can't have the peasants thinking they have rights and acting on it. Yeah, what about the cheap labor that this economy relies on?

60

No. Raindrop. There you go again. The left and right are not the same. They are opposites.

The right are authoritarian and worse. The left, generally speaking, tend to be egalitarian and humanitarian. Positive and negative. Or the right tends to be selfish, greedy assholes and the left tends to be a vast improvement for those who are not very wealthy or poor.

61

@48: "...those who pretend the fist people ever to die in Seattle occurred at the CHOP..."

Who are these people? When did they pretend this? (Who did they fist?) Quotes?

The data cited @30 showed that there were some recent YEARS without a single murder reported in the entire East Precinct. The average number of homicides reported for the East Precinct in the dozen years before 2020 was ONE per year. At least three persons were murdered in the tiny physical area of the CHOP, which lasted about a month. Scale that up to the entire East Precinct for a full year and you'd be looking at hundreds, if not thousands, of murders. The CHOP was a needless murder patch which ended Black lives, and when we recall the summer of #BLM in Seattle, we must always recall the CHOP has earned its place in infamy.

"Perhaps they're upset that clearance rates have not yet reached 0 ..."

Care to place any bets on clearance rates for CHOP crimes ever exceeding zero?

The CHOP existed because of the illegal wildcat strike by SPOG members. They and everyone in their chain of command, police, and union officers should have been under investigation for their wanton dereliction of duty. Instead, the head of our City Council's Public Safety Committee wrote irredeemably stupid garbage like this (https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2020/06/30/44008034/we-must-end-the-conditions-in-chop-that-are-leading-to-violence-and-death) for The Stranger:

"I asked SPD and SFD to change their tactics and engage with protesters to remove the barriers, and offered my help in negotiating to these goals. My offer of assistance wasn’t accepted, and I regret that I didn’t spend the necessary hours and days in the CHOP to develop the relationships to be useful in that endeavor."

I regret the Public Safety Committee has yet to issue subpoenas to everyone in city government who was responsible for the CHOP.

62

@60: Of course they're opposites. But the extreme left and the extreme right both embrace tyranny but the left slips even further into authoritarianism.

63

yeah dewey the Left embraces tyranny like
Healthcare for all
Free education
a strong Social Safety Net
Equality

while the so-called right
embraces Oligarchs like
trumpf
Putin
Kim in N Korea
Duarte
whomever suppress their Citizenry
they're pretty easy to spot
they do Not beleive in
an Egalitarian
Society.

64

In Congress, Republicans Shrug at Warnings of Democracy in Peril

As G.O.P. legislatures move to curtail voting rules, Democrats say authoritarianism looms, but Republicans dismiss the concerns as politics as usual.

[one comment on the Article]

Let’s not kid ourselves here. In a democracy, the goal needs to be that ALL citizens have the right to vote.

Limiting mail-in voting, purging voter registration lists, limiting the hours at voter precincts, allowing state legislatures to overturn elections in a partisan way are not staples of democracy: they are strategies of the GOP to keep power without needing to have the majority.

There was no proof of wide scale election fraud.

These laws were created and implemented based on trump’s election lie.

This is a dangerous road that easily leads authoritarianism, a road the last administration had no qualms pursuing. That is what many of us are so concerned about.

--Emma; Minnesota

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/14/us/politics/democracy-in-peril.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage

65

@64 -- well not ALL of us.

see: dewdroppings
@15
@62
et al

ad Tyranny

66

@15 Listen, we know you are a fucking moron that seriously needs some mental health care and remedial education. You don't have to remind us that by claiming the Left is no different than the Right.


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.