Comments

1

ā€œThe phrase ā€˜hotting upā€™ is yet another in-
excusable Britishism that must be stamped out.ā€

how Dare they (foreigners!)
pervert Our Sacred Languange?

it hots me up all over the
place to even Consider
gotta get my boots on
thereā€™s Stompin to do

2

"Pete Holmes thinks he might lose"

Mr. Holmes has spent his time in office using the criminal code to deport penniless immigrants and make women already living on the margins homeless because his inner Tipper Gore can't accept grown women having consensual sex in ways that violate his Victorian value system.

How many women are in the morgue because of his need to impose his 17th century poorly thought out values and personal feelers before the safety and welfare of the women trying to feed their children in a way he didn't approve of?

Pete Holmes will be remembered as an embarrassment to Seattle. He should move to rural Alabama and surround himself with kind of people who share his moral values on women's rights.

https://www.thestranger.com/blogs/slog/2015/08/11/22680666/op-ed-this-seattle-times-editorial-got-everything-wrong-about-sex-work

4

@3
There is no "far, far left" to speak of in the US.

Only by the standards of the radical far right (the so-called "conservatives"), who have moved the goalposts so far as to make Eisenhower, Nixon and Reagan seem "left wing", can anything to their left be considered "far left".

The aims of even the most progressive Democrats are nothing more than a truly conservative return to reasonable and responsible governance and taxation. The fact that they cannot compromise with the insane nihilism of the right, means that they would be overjoyed to push us as far to the "left" as the Nixon administration.

I suppose for a true leftist, that might seem pretty awful, I'll give you that.

5

Don Jr. is a better artist than Hunter will ever be.

6

Holy shit, Pete Holmes is 65?
Dude should retire to his multi-home compound on the lake (if I remember correctly), already.
Then we can give him shit about conspicuous consumption in a minority community.

7

@4 I would certainly call Sawant and her ilk the "far, far left". AOC, Bernie, that crowd. People with no sense of real-world economics.

@5 I looked at Hunter Biden's art and liked it a lot. I would buy a piece or two if I could.

Also, I have no doubt that Iran used drones to attack an Israeli-owned oil tanker, the Iranian state media has admitted as much and that it was in retaliation for an Israeli airstrike on a Syrian base. I imagine Israel will now do something else in this never-ending tit-for-tat struggle. It's all so tiresome.

8

I'm Shocked - SHOCKED - that Rich and The Stranger would so blatenly mischaracterize in a headline what someone actually said in an article.

I don't usually agree with anything Reuven Carlyle says, but I think he is correct in the linked The Hill article:

"We're at a moment when there is discomfort with the extremes of politics, represented by Trump on the right and represented by the left's approach to ideological rigidity. That far-left movement gives important voice, but they don't move a millimeter on issues. They're not interested in collaboration. They see words like negotiation and collaboration as euphemisms for compromise to corporate interests."

I've been in more than my share of far-left political coalition meetings in Seattle. In recent years, practical public policy solutions have been cast aside in favor of all-or-none, if-you're-not-with-us-your're-against-us idological purity, and where the one-upsmanship of virtue-signaling has become downright nausiating. It's gotten so bad that I actually paused writing the pervious sentence as I typed 'one-upsmanship' because someone might cry out at the use of such blatantly gendered language. Get over it, already, Seattle!

9

"Carlyle, who represents the Ballard area in Olympia..."

The 36th Legislative District covers Ballard, Magnolia, Queen Anne, and Belltown.

'...compared some vague "far-left movement" in town to Trump,'

The article is actually very specific about that:

"One City Council member, a self-described socialist, led a march last year to the home of Mayor Jenny Durkan (D), whose address is kept confidential because of ongoing death threats related to her past work as a federal prosecutor."

That same City Council member also engaged in the very, very Trumpian act of holding a public rally without any precautions against spreading COVID. As you may know, she may be subject to a recall election for both of these acts. So it would appear that Sen. Carlyle has a better claim to speaking for Seattle than any of his critics -- at least, of the ones quoted here.

Please do try to get your basic facts right next time, Rich.

10

@7 - I must admit, after looking at the linked bargesgallery pieces - he does have talent. When the story first broke his initial tries at it seemed pseudo.

11

@8/9 you both have been on here long enough to know that Rich gave up any pretense of journalistic integrity and unbiased reporting in favor of ideological propaganda long ago. Whether itā€™s perpetrating Sawants latest conspiracy theory, helping the SCC gaslight us over the debacle of public safety or deliberately taking quotes out of context like he did here itā€™s all about furthering the progressive agenda. The ends justify the means you know. Unfortunately the low information voters read it and take it to heart so heā€™s been an effective tool. Hopefully people wake up someday amd demand better but Iā€™m not holding my breath.

12

@11, of course I wasn't expecting better, just as @8 wasn't. He stated his point clearly at the top, I decided to hide mine as a needling aside ("As you may know, she may be subject to a recall election..."), but the intent was the same: go back to the alleged source material, and show how it was intentionally ignored/distorted/inverted to fit Rich's predetermined conclusion.

While I agree with most of your comment, I do quibble with your misuse of "progressive," in "...itā€™s all about furthering the progressive agenda." You're just using it as a shorthand here, but I think we really should try to claw this term back from our local intolerant lefties. Attacking Amazon for problems Amazon did not create, taxing Amazon based on those lies, and then blithely squandering the appropriated money on a worse-than-worthless Homeless Industrial Complex was not progressive, and thus the (actually progressive) voters of Seattle teamed up with (actually progressive) Mayor Durkan to repeal the EHT. Reversing a decade-plus of City Council policy on the Showbox parcel wasn't progressive, either; it was actually despotic, vindictive, and reactionary.

The ideology for which Rich and The Stranger continue to shill is over 170 years old, and it hasn't aged well. Since it was first invented, it has been a murderously destructive force in every place it has ever been tried. Meanwhile, hard-working actual progressives have instituted the laws and reforms which have, via ever-expanding democracy, tempered capitalism, lifted the working classes from poverty into middle-class comfort, preserved our environment, and generally improved life across our country.

Instead of bringing Seattle's broadly progressive voters into cooperation to solve our problems and improve our city, CM Sawant uses purity tests and inflammatory rhetoric to divide us. She really is Seattle's very own Trump of the left, and why The Stranger didn't call her on it half a decade ago remains a mystery.

14

@13: I mean the ideology which defines Socialist Alternative "... has been a murderously destructive force in every place it has ever been tried." Go read their own internal documents, available at SCC Insight. Their scornful hatred of actual progressive Democrats is there for all to read. SA members clearly regard the progressives who brought "socialized healthcare and higher marginal tax rates" as nothing but craven, dishonest sellouts -- just as Sen. Carlyle said.

The reforms you mentioned, "socialized healthcare and higher marginal tax rates," and many more you didn't mention, were all the result of progressives working within democratic and capitalist systems, which I had clearly described as in opposition to SA's failed ideology. Had you actually bothered to do anything at all except to attack me with straw-man arguments (and with the modern version of red-baiting, no less!) you might've stood a chance at understanding that.

But understanding other commenters is just not what you do here, so I won't ask you to try it.

15

@12 youā€™re right. I use progressive as a cover for what they truly are which are Marxist authoritarians but if you say that outright you come across as a tin foil hat wearing conspirist. Just look at how the professor jumped all over it. I know he doesnā€™t matter but for the lurkers in this board who do Iā€™d rather use the labels Sawant and her ilk cloak themselves with so the point being made isnā€™t lost in rhetoric. Some day theyā€™ll pull off their scooby doo mask and show their true colors but until then Iā€™m willing to play in their game to call out their bullshit ans destructive lies.

16

ps the reason The Stranger never calls out Sawant is because half of them probably belong to SA and drink the kool aid and the rest love the clicks she generates that produce ad revenue. Sheā€™s their patron saint.

17

@16: The first half of your answer explains sycophantic apologetics such as this weakly critical justification for Sawant's purchases from Amazon, https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2020/01/13/42548876/kshama-sawant-and-her-election-campaign-shop-on-amazon-does-it-matter

The second half, though, I'm not convinced. Newspapers have been generating controversies to generate revenue since long before the real-life version of Charles Foster Kane demanded pictures from Cuba. Sawant would generate advertising money here no matter what stance(s) The Stranger adopted towards her, and if they offered a spectrum of responses to her antics, they might get even more money.

18

@8: Thanks for giving us the entire quote, "No Spin." Carlyle is absolutely correct.

20

@7:

Oh, please. Compared to established political parties elsewhere in the world, Sanders and Ocasio-Cortez would barely register as "centre left". It's only because the GOP has pushed the Overton Window so far to the right over the past half-century that they - and anyone more liberal than, say, Kevin McCarthy or Susan Collins - get saddled with this "radical leftist" canard.

@8:

Riiiiight. Because the GOP is a veritable bastion of bi-partisanship and willingness to compromise...

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/joe-biden/mcconnell-says-he-s-100-percent-focused-stopping-biden-s-n1266443

21

@20 Opinions vary.

22

Local Fascist Compares
SOME* Progressives to
fully-Fascist Former
'prez.'

there.
fixed
fin.

*some of
Seattle's DSA

24

@21:

These aren't opinions - this is literally where their policies lie on a spectrum of extant political philosophies. If one had to estimate, they fall somewhere in the immediate vicinity of Britain's Labour Party; somewhere between Canada's Liberal and New Democratic Party, albeit somewhat closer to the latter; and decidedly to the right of true far-left parties such as the Greens, Denmark's Socialist People's Party - oh hell, just about any lowland or Scandinavian left-center political party - and Spain's Citizen's Party.

https://theintercept.com/2019/02/26/democratic-party-centrism-aoc-sanders-warren/

https://www.economist.com/img/b/1280/1021/90/sites/default/files/20201031_WOC907.png

25

@23:

Tell you what - I'd be more than happy to pay taxes at exactly the same rate the wealthy and ultra-wealthy are willing to pay in this country. I'm currently paying 22%, so let's just make 20% the flat-rate. BUT, here's the kicker: there are no deductions, no exemptions, no waivers, and no parsing out this income versus that income. Everybody pays 20% of their earnings from: wages, inheritances, interest, capital gains, sales of property, business income - the whole lot. No offshoring, no tax havens, no accounting gimmicks or loopholes: one rate, everybody pays on whatever of value they accumulated during the previous calendar year.

Would that make you happy? It would make me very happy, because I can only begin to imagine what we could do as a country with ALL THAT EXTRA FUCKING MONEY.

26

Hopefully socially-regressive loser Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes will get replaced by Nichole Thomas-Kennedy, if everyone remembers to vote. Did you vote?

Also, donā€™t forget to get vaccinated to stop this latest mutation, the Delta variant, which sounds as insidious as that green-orange howler-monkey Hitler-Queens variant, Trump the real estate steak salesperson gone bananas.

Let the Biden-Harris administration be a none-too-subtle reminder to vote the bastards out.

Thank you, Mr. Biden, for those stimmie checks.

Senator Reuven Carlyle is resorting to hyperbole with his ā€œvast right-wing conspiracyā€ ala' Mme. Hillary none-sequitur and should be taken behind the barn and cornholed.

Everyone punch it twice for State Senator Nguyen, who would be an enormous, progressive improvement over Dow Constantine, who represents the kooky white person old-guard, with his Elks Club secret handshake and Rotary Club affiliations.

We need more women in positions of leadership, so vote for outstanding women like Kim-Khanh Van for King County Council District 9 and Carmen Rivera for Renton City Council
Position 2.

Speaking of ā€œhotting upā€ it is nice to know that the crime rate is cooling down with police deemphasizing low-level arrests, pointing the way to fewer innocent deaths at the hands of the new, blue gestapo.

Speaking of whale habitat, which is a welcome improvement, lets put Trump in prison for sedition and treason, taking into consideration his creative tax filings and attempted Coup d'Ć©tat.

Hopefully heā€™ll get repeatedly molested in federal prison.

28

@5: DTJ only works in coke, though. That's a very limited market. I'll admit that "Untitled #2" actually shows he has some talent, but the rest are too "grandma's favorite quilting pattern." It doesn't surprise me that Swiftress has terrible taste in art, but as she(?) said, opinions vary.

@8: You should definitely pause in your writing more often. For the sake of proof-reading. God damn.

29

@24 Whatever. They still suck.

30

Summer, if youā€™re prepping a run for elected office (and it looks like you are), PLEASE back away from the rage machine, show some leadership, and center the data. Show me how your progressive policies are actually benefiting those most impacted and I might consider supporting those candidates or voting for you. Otherwise Iā€™ll just be stepping over campers in the park, and trying to figure out how to hold down a job and keep my kids from sliding into depression with the schools closed. Man where did Seattle go wrong??!!

31

Let's not forget that Reuven Carlyle, aka, The Senator from the State of Amazon, was also responsible for attempting to shove the ironically titled, "Washington Privacy Act," through the legislature for not one, not two, but the last three sessions. The WPA, of course, was authored by the tech industry lobbyists, without any input from consumer groups or the privacy rights community, and in the end was not even supported by the Attorney General's office, the only entity permitted to enforce the new regulations. And yet Carlyle is still insisting that he's going to push it through in the next session.

I'm no DSA member or Kshama fan-boi -- hell, I didn't even vote for Bernie, but Carlyle really has become Seattle's own Bob Rubin.

32

@27:

Simple, really. Cut the military budget by 50% - which would still leave the U.S. with a healthy $390 annual budget (2020), and keeping us at #1 in terms of military spending by about $137 B above China at #2, and hundreds of billions above any other major military power, including Russia, which spends a paltry $62 B per year (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_military_expenditures). Additionally, we cut out all kickbacks to the oil industry. Between those two items alone we could effectively double what we currently pay for social safety net programs, excluding health insurance and social security.

33

@5 Thank you for confirming that you are completely out of touch with reality. Most of us have known you were a complete moron and moral vacuum all along.

34

Trumpty Dumpty's Big Fall is a-comin'. folks, with or without his latest desperate right-hand stooge, Governor of Floridumb, Ron De Santis to keep him in hiding in the Mar-a-Lunatic Swamp. When Washington State Attorney General SuperBob Ferguson says, "Check mate!" it's OVER.

@26 pollysexual +1 Thank you for beating me to it. Agreed, seconded, bravo, and kudos! Keep on rocking the house..:)

@33 Greenwood Bob: That's Elmer (@5) for ya; SLOG's most notorious ultra maroon.

35

Hooray, finally(!!!) for our Southern resident orcas!! Now to help save our salmon populations--Chinook in particular---to continue the lifecycle.


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