It’s kind of strange that the State Senate GOP (er, Majority Coalition (er, GOP)) are talking about how awesome things have been under their leadership.

From an unprecedented boost in support for K-12 education and the first college-tuition freeze in nearly three decades to a sustainable new state budget that was balanced without general tax increases, the Senate Majority Coalition Caucus racked up a remarkable list of achievements in its first year.

Your Caucus was pushing for differential tuition and you totally would have spent the money we’re getting from having a somewhat improved economy on tax cuts instead of education. Also much of that “boost” to K-12 education comes from teacher pay, and that’s not really a boost so much as moving money around within education.

But it’s that “remarkable list of achievements” that caught my eye, since they didn’t even propose a transit package: They killed the Columbia River Crossing and didn’t replace it with anything. In the wake of the I-5 bridge collapse they decided low taxes was the priority. They heard King County ask to tax itself and they’ve pissed away any time to make it happen.

– Today in No. Just no.

– Oh look, the GOP are going to demand more frivolous lawsuits, but it’s OK because it’ll be against abortion providers (h/t).

– John Kitzhaber is running for reelection

– Viva! SeaTac

– If you’re up in Shoreline, they need volunteers for Holiday Baskets food and gift distribution

– Tongue Twisters

So we got a few flurries, but not much during work. It’s sort of sticking but not really. Since I’m safely on my way home, and since it probably won’t stick, I couldn’t be happier with the prospect of snow before it warms up.

With that said, moisture offshore will move inland and as that collides with our cold atmosphere, there’s a chance of snow for all of us later today. The coastal communities will see the snow first (a WINTER WEATHER ADVISORY is in effect for the Long Beach Peninsula through 11pm Tuesday) as 1-2″ of snow is likely. We won’t see that much in the way of accumulations across the lowlands, but the chance of light snow will greet us later today.

Did you have anything where you work? Are you dreading the prospect of shoveling your walkway, small as it may be? Do you have kids who you are are hoping won’t miss school tomorrow? Are you just making a nice lentil soup so what the hell, you can have a walk in the snow if it comes and warm up after?

– I try not to link to the same blog twice in one open thread, but there are two really good pieces at Seattle Transit Blog recently. So please, either read this about standing on the bus or this on the rail options to Ballard. But not both!!!

– 6 questions for the media about the Soho anti-prostitution raids

– In the larger context, note that when the Obama administration moves the U.S. Embassy to the Holy See closer to the Vatican, the right deems it “anti-religion.” When conservative slam the pope’s economic views, that’s fine.

– Things that aren’t gaffes if they’re fine in context aren’t gaffes.

– I knew most of the Mark Driscoll is terrible stuff here, but it’s helpful to see it in one place.

In the last post, I estimated the cost of legislating for all of the states that were competing to give Boeing all of the tax breaks was probably millions of dollars. Of course right after I hit send, I stumbled across this piece on how much legislators have claimed for the session (s/r link). Obviously, there are other costs like security, staff time, and keeping the lights on. But the cost is actually less than I would have guessed. So maybe it didn’t reach into the millions and I should probably be more careful about the numbers make up as examples, even when they’re obviously made up.

The tab for last month’s three-day special session to approve tax breaks for Boeing stands at $28,626 and counting, the most recent reports filed by legislators show.

Requests for the $90 per diem that legislators can claim have been processed, with some filling only for a day or two and some not requesting any. Some expense vouchers for travel to and from Olympia by senators might not come in until February

Because legislators can be reimbursed for driving expenses at 56.5 cents a mile, the biggest payments went to Eastern Washington representatives and senators who travel the farthest.

When reading about the other states having special sessions to try to lure Boeing production, it’s really disheartening. Not that Boeing is dumb enough to take those offers. They may well, and have to start from scratch or near from scratch again with a workforce who their goal is to have be shittier (if you get what you pay for).

No, what I’m concerned about is that there are a lot of states (including Washington, obvs) that will have a sunk cost of putting on a special session, and only one of them will have a gain. I know they won’t, but Boeing might consider compensating the states that it doesn’t pick as an irenic gesture: Sorry you wasted millions of dollars trying to give us billions of dollars.

Joel Connelly has a piece potential Metro cuts. He uses the Route 2 changes as a hook to show what the changes could mean. And he has links to when citizens can attend Metro Open Houses.

–Tonight (Thursday): North Seattle Community College, 6 to 8 p.m.

–Tuesday, Dec. 10, Union Station in downtown Seattle, noon to 2 p.m.

–Wednesday, Dec. 11, Bellevue City Hall, 6 to 8 p.m.

–Monday, December 16, Kent City Commons in Kent, 6 to 8 p.m.

–Thursday, January 16, Peter Kirk Community Center in Kirkland, 6 to 8 p.m.

–Thursday, January 23, South Shore K-8 School in Southeast Seattle, 6 to 8 p.m.

You should definately go and let people know how the cuts will hit you if you’re interested. But I’m more interested in this hook that he starts it:

The key to whether cuts are prevented likely rests with a quartet of Eastside legislators who are members of the Senate Majority Coalition — Republican State Sens. Andy Hill, Joe Fain and Steve Litzow as well as renegade Democrat and titular Senate Majority Leader Rodney Tom.

Well, it could, still I suppose rest on them. Or it could rest on if King County can bypass those people and pass something. It could rest more on if the King County Council (that has some of the same problem) has enough members willing to put something on the ballot, or just pass something outright.

– Yay for Bill Clinton saying states should decide for themselves if they’re going to legalize marijuana and all. Still, he was president, and he didn’t really move in that direction. Obviously states have forced the issue since he left office, but he was president.

– Instead, the racial battlegrounds of the Obama era have settled on a series of more ambiguous controversies. Conservatives have made endless jokes based on the strange premise that Obama is unable to express coherent thoughts unless reading from a teleprompter, defined health-care reform as “reparations,” imagined a Reagan-era program to subsidize telephone use for the indigent is actually “Obamaphones,” or complained when black entertainers or athletes socialize with the First Family. The accusations of racism that follow merely confirm to conservatives that black-on-white racism is a canard, that the balance of oppression has turned against them.

– I’m not sure how assholes decided that happy holidays was the worst thing imaginable. It seems nice to me.

– White, wealthy people who are members of the dominant religion are not “the real victims” of anything. They’re actually not even in a position to know what experiencing structural oppression feels like. So why do they still have an audience every time they want to complain that, notwithstanding everything, they’re still not privileged enough?

– I never get invited on the panel of important seeming people

A few months ago when I wrote about Linda Thomas using driving as a hook that, I felt was unnecessary, the first comment noted that as a radio commentator, her audience is disproportionately people driving. It’s a good point, and partly that explains the tone of this piece on My Northwest.

It’s far from a done deal and the public would be consulted before a protected bike lane would be added to one of those streets. But what is a protected bike lane, and how is it different from the bike lanes currently on 2nd and 4th?

Cycle tracks are full traffic lanes that are set aside from vehicle traffic and protected from cars by barriers.

“There might be a lane of parked cars that separate the travel lane and the bicycle facility,” Chang said. “It could be curbing, or it could be striping with some posts.”

Seattle has three of these protected bike lanes right now. Drivers and parkers had trouble with one on Broadway in the Capitol Hill neighborhood, because parking was pushed away from the curb into an old traffic lane. Those parked cars now protect the bike riders.

[…]

The money to pay for these extra bicycle amenities comes from your property taxes.

Still, what I think the piece is missing is that not providing bicycle infrastructure doesn’t mean there’s more parking or more room on the road. It would mean that more people would drive to everywhere. And when they do, they’ll take up room with their cars. If you can get several people out of their cars onto bikes, you won’t have to compete with them for parking space, and you won’t have them in the lanes of traffic that you’re trying to merge into. And as someone who bikes and drives, I’m just going to say that drivers are worse stewards of the roads than bicyclists; Seriously, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone text and bike.

I don’t really have very many feels one way or the other about college football. But Andrew at NPI has a nice piece on Steve Sarkisian going to USC.

Washington’s highest-paid employee is headed south for a more lucrative job.

Steve Sarkisian, who was hired to turn around a winless University of Washington football program five years ago, acknowledged earlier today that he has accepted the head coaching position at the University of Southern California, which is one of the most elite schools in the country and a traditional powerhouse in the Pacific 12 Conference (formerly the Pac-10). Sarkisian was an assistant coach for seven years at USC prior to being hired by UW, so his desire to return his understandable.

But the timing and circumstances of his departure are not becoming of a man who claimed for half a decade to bleed purple and gold.

It’s tough, perhaps, for a city and a state to put much civic pride in an institution with a mercenary at the top. Perhaps that why we cling the game with a spirit of amateurism in the rest of the game.

– Where fighting this might have at least resulted in an awareness of what was happening, years of Democrats chasing votes that were never going to come their way resulted in zealots quietly passing laws at the state level making abortion more and more difficult to obtain. I guess that’s what the anti-choice minority in the Democratic Party calls “winning.” They must be so pleased.

– I don’t mind Amazon’s drone program as much as some people, but there is something disquieting about it.

– It is pretty amazing that a smear against Obama can be dumb enough for the GOP to drop.

– This story of recovering a stolen bike off a rack is the greatest thing I’ve ever read.

– Willie fucking Bloomquist?

– No, you decided to buy Mirah Playing Cards even though you still have most of your Christmas shopping ahead of you.

Goldy has a map of the Seattle City Council District where Kshama Sawant will probably run for reelection.* It went pretty overwhelmingly for her. And it pretty much breaks down by neighborhood with Capitol Hill and First Hill overwhelmingly supporting Sawant and the rest of the district pretty overwhelmingly supporting Conlin.

While the district that Sawant lives in and would most likely run in is the most obvious to look at, that race might be a decent proxy for the other races on the ballot. For while it wasn’t the highest profile race, it was one with a fairly high profile and a real ideological divide. The mayor’s race was, of course, the highest profile, but it was at least as much about personality as it was about issues. O’Brien-Shen was probably more of an ideological divide for a council seat, but it turned out to be a bit less high profile after Shen not doing well in the primary. It was also so far apart, it probably doesn’t tell us much except don’t run a pro-bidness campaign anywhere in Seattle.

So there’s the Sawant-Conlin race. It pitted the only member to vote against paid sick leave/paid safe leave against the biggest proponent of a $15 minimum wage on the ballot. And of course one side pushed the socialism label pretty hard while the other didn’t. I’d think that someone running in a district where Sawant won might have a bit more leverage to push social and economic justice issues, and someone running in a district where Conlin won would have to be a bit more traditional lefty.

Or maybe I’m reading too much into one race with two unique people.

[Read more…]

– Mark Deiscoll is the worst and he steals from the worst.

– Oh look people are actually getting health care coverage.

– I’m rather excited for the campaign for a $15 minimum wage coming to Seattle

– Jameis Winston, and the Overlapping of Football Culture and Rape Culture

– This is maybe the least thought out heist of all time (Seattle Times link).

– Are you ready for some traffic between Monday Night Football and maybe some snow?

A few months ago when Oregon said they would recognize same sex partnerships that happened in states where that’s legal, I wrote that it would probably be a boon to Vancouver. Looks like that has happened (there were some ads that may be NSFW, depending on where you work; h/t).

So, you know, congrats to the couples who got married, and I’m sorry that your state has yet to get on board. It must be strange to have to travel, for some a short distance, for others quite a long way, to have to get legally married. It’s better than your home state not recognizing it at all, but it’s so far from the ideal.

I’d add that as long as you’re coming to Washington, the train ride up to Seattle is pleasant (driving is not so much). As long as you can’t get hitched in your own state, you might as well enjoy Seattle if you can.

While writing about Boeing threatening to leave the Puget Sound, I’ve had some thoughts batting around my mind about corporations more generally. I think all major (and most minor) corporations have 4 obligations. 3 that I think are necessary to their survival, as well as just decency and one that’s important but not really in the same way. Corporations have obligations to their shareholders and their investors. They have an obligation to their workers. They have an obligation to their customers. They also have an obligation, although probably not at the same level, to the community where they’re based.

I know this sounds naive, and it probably is. Still, I think those obligations, even though they’re sometimes in competition with each other, make corporations worth having as instruments in society. Obviously, we put a lot of emphasis on shareholders and investors. Probably too much, but they do play a role. And if they’re getting paid a reasonable amount for bringing a return on investment, then fine.

Still, businesses must have an obligation to their employees. When companies like Boeing threaten to leave, we keep hearing about the jobs they provide. But we rarely ever hear about an obligation to provide good jobs. When companies are lagging in this, unions, or government regulation like workplace safety and a minimum wage can force a minimum standard. But I think corporations have an obligation to the people working for them to treat them as something more than just cogs.

They also have an obligation to their customers. Ultimately, they’re making a product or service for someone or some group. When I use a good product, it reflects well on the company that made it, and when I have a bad product it feels like a bit of a betrayal. I think that’s part of the reason that people are sensitive to bad customer service.

Finally, and more generally, businesses have a duty to the communities where they’re located and where they do business. When companies give to charity, we call it “corporate citizenship.” As long as we understand that’s a metaphor, and corporations can’t actually be citizens, that’s fine as far as it goes. Still, there ought to also be an obligation not to pollute and to pay their taxes. Basically, it ought to be better for the community that a corporation locates there. Otherwise, why have them?

I don’t really know what my point is here, but I think the discussion is too much on shareholder value or return on investment, and not on the other things that companies ought to do.