HorsesAss.Org

No, this isn’t the first rant on this subject on HA. Unlike Will, I don’t think this is just a not getting it thing or a lack of basic politeness thing. And it’s not some inherent flaw among the escalator users of Settle. I think its signage.

Namely, most cities have signs on at least their public transit saying to stand on the right. They don’t trust it to chance, or whatever. They don’t think you should just know. Ideally it would go beyond just public transit. It could be for multiple story malls, or for the Convention Center. Basically, anywhere with escalators wide enough that you can pass someone.

Yes, you should know to clear a path for people who want to go. It’s common decency. On a busy time of day, it helps people who need (or want) to rush somewhere. Sometimes it just feels claustrophobic to not be able to get through. But I bet most of the people bunched up just don’t know that there can be a system.

I emailed the King County Metro customer service and asked if there is a rule even if it isn’t posted and if there might be signage at some point in the future since trains will be coming in from East Link and University Link. No response.

I feel like this is the sort of thing that’s about the right size for some HA activism. So I’m going to start bugging public officials. I assume King County is responsible for the Bus Tunnel, and ST for the rest of the off grade escalators along the system? [Late Update, KC responded, and said it was a Sound Transit issue. I’ve emailed them.]

But until then, please stand on the right.

Huh. I spotted this truck on the streets of Redmond late last week.

Please join us tonight for an evening of politics over a pint at the Seattle Chapter of Drinking Liberally.

We meet every Tuesday evening at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. Starting time is 8:00pm. Some people show up earlier than that for Dinner.

Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings over the next week.

Tonight the Tri-Cities chapter also meets. On Wednesday, the Bellingham chapter meets. On Thursday Drinking Liberally Bremerton meets.

With 204 chapters of Living Liberally, including sixteen in Washington state, four in Oregon, and two more in Idaho, chances are excellent there’s a chapter meeting near you.

– Speed Limit 20

– It’s nice that we have a mayor and at least one challenger who are at least willing to talk the talk on addressing the pay gap in Seattle. Not sure if that translates into actual progress.

– The gun is called “The Liberator,” obviously. Because all the privileged people who have access to 3-D printers are super fucking oppressed and shit.

– I’m not sure that a wishy washy factor would be meaningful in any way, and a couple debates is way too small of a sample size. Also, those yes/no lightning rounds are pretty much unhelpful.

– By not testing available DNA evidence using new scientific techniques that were not available at the time of his 1994 trial, Mississippi is choosing to ignore readily available scientific evidence in favor of flawed conclusions based on shaky racially charged testimony, as well as jailhouse informant testimony, which studies have found is particularly susceptible to manipulation.

– Oh hey, the Volunteer Park conservatory is having a plant sale next weekend.

The Seattle City Council yesterday approved the expansion of the Metropolitan Improvement District, the taxing district that funds extra clean-up service and security for a large portion of downtown Seattle, Pioneer Square, the Denny Triangle, and now, Belltown. If you work, live, or otherwise find yourself downtown, you’ve probably encountered folks in yellow jackets cleaning up or otherwise keeping an eye on things. That’s them. What’s new this time is that the taxing district now includes Belltown, the largest of downtown’s area neighborhoods.

Here’s a map:

A fun fact about the MID: they record each instance of “number two” they clean up in the downtown area. This means that someone in their office has a feces-themed map, speckled with dots.

Goldy points out that any push to dismantle Worker’s Comp as part of the budget will be disingenuous.

In other words, Republicans are attempting to impose hardship on workers in order to fix a problem that doesn’t exist. Kinda like Rodney Tom’s campaign to eliminate the GET program, or the Republicans’ broader efforts to end state pension programs that are among the best funded in the nation.

It will be tempting for Democrats to give in to the Republicans’ anti-worker demands in order to craft a compromise budget, but one hopes they have the smarts and the courage to call bullshit on this bullshit when bullshit it is.

Of course that’s true. But fixing the budget was never the GOP goal. Weakening our workers comp system is good enough for them. Putting the state further on the side of employers over employees has always been the goal. It’s the reason for the existence of the modern GOP.

– I’m hardly ever in Tacoma anymore, but when I go there, I always picked up a copy of the Weekly Volcano. Sadly, no more (h/t).

– It’s always a choice to be a bigot.

– There’s a rally opposed to Don Benton’s appointment to Director of Environmental Services: Tuesday May 07 at 6:00 PM at the Public Service Building, 1300 Franklin St. (I couldn’t find a permanent link, but right now it’s the post at the top).

– But the one about how Obama doesn’t have a mandate because he’s too good at politics is something special; it’s so self-refuting it’s almost a Zen riddle.

– Washington is number 1 for biking (h/t).

–Argument from Sociopathic Cost-Benefit Analysis is sociopathic

– Welcome home USS John C. Stennis

Last week’s contest was won by milwhcky. It was in Tupelo, MS (and I believe it’s the Taekwondo business that is now the center of the weird ricin case).

This week’s location is a random spot somewhere on earth, good luck!

Isaiah 34:7
And the unicorns shall come down with them, and the bullocks with the bulls; and their land shall be soaked with blood, and their dust made fat with fatness.

Discuss.

Note: I was travelling today. Time and bandwidth limitations kept this week’s collection of media clips a little thinner. Enjoy, and feel free to link to your favorite video (or audio) of the week in the comment thread.

Young Turks: FAUX News says “no” to reason and science.

Sam Seder: How to own your Congresscritter.

Ann Telnaes: The morning after the White House Correspondent’s Dinner.

Maddow Show: The lies about Hurricane Katrina in the Bush Library.

Liberal Viewer: Right wing “austerity economics” based on spreadsheet error?.

Young Turks: Why May Day should outrage the bottom 90%.

Memphis Soul at the White House:

Kimmel: Unnecessary censorship.

Thom: “Mission Accomplished”, ten years later.

Pap: Why deficits don’t matter.

Sharpton: From prisoner to President.

Stephen: Bomber roommates.

SlateTV: Happy Birthday Open Web.

Ann Telnaes: More than one way to support a free press.

White House: West Wing Week.

Mark Fiore: Sequesterless Airlines.

Young Turks: Woman prosecuted for filming slaughter house from public street.

Stephen with some background check truthiness.

Pap: The G.O.P.’s New America.

Lawrence O’Donnell: Elizabeth Colbert Busch headed to Congress.

Sam Seder: PA Gov, “There’s no jobs because you’re all on drugs”.

Maddow show: Truth decay and the NRA.

John Fugelsang asks God to explain John Boehner.

Gitmo:

• Jon: Gitmo failure.
• Adam Serwer: Transferring prisoners out of Guantanamo.
• Ann Telnaes: “We have to close Gitmo”.
• Thom: Gitmo by the numbers.

The caterpillar that becomes the pussy moth looks like Donald Trump.

Susie Sampson’s Tea Party Report: gay and Bush.

Matt Binder: No guns left behind in AZ.

Young Turks: Stephen Colbert’s sister puts a beatdown on Mark Sanford:

Jon on freedom magic.

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

Not much happened in the last legislative session. There isn’t a budget yet. The state DREAM Act and Reproductive Parity Act didn’t even get a vote, for God’s sake. But at least it’s now always a crime to rape a married partner.

Gov. Jay Inslee signed a bill Wednesday to change state law, calling it a “very important advance.” The measure removes the spousal exemption from both rape in the third degree – in which no physical force is used – and from taking indecent liberties.

Congrats to us for doing something most other states did decades ago.

Also, those comments are probably not the worst I’ve ever read (hello, I write for HA) but the incongruity between the good news in the article and the paranoid awfulness of the comments is pretty incredible.

It’s tough to hold out much hope for the special session when the Republicans put out press releases like this.

It is the last day of the 105-day legislative session and we have just adjourned. Unfortunately, a special session is on the horizon — an outcome that is disappointing for everyone.

We are headed to overtime primarily because of one issue: the operating budget. The governor and House Democrats want to spend roughly $1 billion more than the state plans to take in for regular tax collections in the next budget cycle that begins July 1. To do so, they would increase taxes on Main Street sectors of our fragile economy.

…

Some things are worth fighting for — no matter how long it takes. We don’t want a special session, but the alternative is accepting an approach that has led to many of the problems our state faces today.

Honestly, if you don’t want any loophole closing no matter how ridiculous they’ve become over the years, it’s tough to imagine any amount of cooling off time being enough. But maybe being a few weeks closer to a deadline will help? Sure.

That may be the strangest headline I’ve ever written. Makes me feel like Lex Luthor or something. Still, reading this Paul Constant piece I’m nodding in agreement.

I’m ordinarily the first person to come to Seattle’s defense when a journalist pokes fun at Seattle’s provincialism. But the answer to your question, Tim, is that there is no defense for this shit. Our city deserves every ounce of ridicule that it gets for tolerating—and even, on the media’s behalf, encouraging—these sad little children LARPing their little-kid fantasies all over the city. This is one case where a little street harassment could do some good; I’d love to see an entire block of Seattleites shouting “GROW UP” at these preening fuckwits as they mosey around feeling good about themselves.

I mean if you want to pretend, go pretend. That’s what your back yard is for, I guess. Or a park, maybe. But when it’s the public, when it’s people who have rights, maybe superheroing around is not helpful.

– I had been wondering where the buses (and cars, but that’s another post) that wanted to get from Downtown to West Seattle would go when the Viaduct closed. Columbia.

– Renew and include Belltown in the MID.

– My job at the abortion hot line

– Right now our state has the deepest concentration of aerospace intelligence anywhere in the world. We have the facilities, the runways, the production capacity to build airplanes. So rather than the state being a promoter for Boeing, we have to be a promoter for aircraft manufacturing.

– Bike season is starting as the Fremont Bridge recorded it’s most bike crossings yet.

– About a quarter of the people in your country think an armed revolution might be necessary in the next few years.

– Rick Perry knows who to be upset at after the West disaster. A cartoonist.

Sorry people in Clark County, you just got a new Director of Environmental Services (Columbian link).

State Sen. Don Benton was tapped to become Clark County’s director of environmental services Wednesday in a surprise and controversial move by commissioners David Madore and Tom Mielke.

Yeah, he’s pretty terrible as a senator, he’ll probably be just as bad as an anything. At least he’s out of the state’s hair. Wait, really? You’re joking? No.

The sudden move to hire followed an email Madore received from Benton. Madore said Benton told him he will remain a state senator and split his time between the jobs.

Fuck the fuck? In case you’re wondering, I hate that our legislature is part time.