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Category: other blogs (Page 7 of 7)

Washington State DOT does not use forced labor

May 2, 2008 / / 0 Comments

I wonder whyyyyyyy Washington State can’t get such a good deal on construction projects as the People’s Republic of China?? It is simply baffling.

At least to Michael Ennis at the Washington Policy Center:


 Can someone explain why China can build a 6-lane, 22 mile bridge for $1.7 billion, but Washington leaders can’t build a 6-lane 520 span between 405 and I-5 for less than $4 billion?

I’m just going to assume that a Chinese concrete guy doesn’t make nearly as much, or enjoy the same labor protections, as a union concrete guy from Burien.

From “One Year of My Blood” Exploitation of Migrant Construction Workers in Beijing:

Once hired, the lives of migrant construction workers, like those of most migrant workers in Beijing, become closely tied to their employer. Employers generally house construction workers in dormitory-style dwellings on the construction site or nearby and provide meals for the workers at food canteens in exchange for a daily wage deduction of seven to 10 Yuan (US$0.93 to US$1.33). The majority of the workers we interviewed complained that the quantity and quality of the food provided by their employers was inadequate to sustain them for their daily long hours of hard physical labor.

And a press release on the report:

“[We] workers ended up with less than 20 Yuan (US$2.67) per day, and on top of that we’d be deducted eight Yuan (US$1.07) per day for living costs; how are workers supposed to survive [on such low wages]?”

That’s the ticket to our state’s transportation problem!

Orting lost its newspaper, so they made their own

April 23, 2008 / / 0 Comments

After an out of town owner closed down Orting’s newspaper, the community came back with their own. Orting News is a new hyperlocal news website that is filling the space left open when the Orting Gazette folded.

In addition to just being a news website, it does the right thing by letting Orting community-members produce their own news. One of those community-members is a former Gazette editor:

Longtime Editor of The Gazette, Dannie Oliveaux will be contributing articles to Orting News, with a special emphasis on Orting High School Sports.

“We asked for Community assistance on Orting News and one of the first calls we received was from Dannie.” said Rich Carr. “With everything he provided at The Gazette, his contacts with the kids and with the coaches, and his knowledge of players, schedules and what it means to the community, he raised his hand almost immediately!”

If I lived in Orting

March 26, 2008 / / 0 Comments

Orting is losing its dead tree blog:

Today, the last edition of the 7,500-circulation tabloid will roll out. And while there have been whispers of hope that a new owner might come along, no one has stepped forward.

“We were hoping for a miracle,” said Dannie Oliveaux, the newspaper’s sole staff reporter and editor for the past two years said last week. “I’ll clear out my stuff … unless somebody buys the paper at the last minute or something.”

The real reason behind the closure is the flattening of Orting’s local economy. Local stores are closing, so there are fewer local advertisers to prop up the local paper. But, that’s doesn’t mean that Orting should go without a local news source.

Orting, get thee a hyperlocal blog.

Real Dupont and, of course, Olyblog are great examples. There are some Tacoma ones too.

Ideas on how we can improve, “not ditch,” the caucus system

February 19, 2008 / / 0 Comments

Andrew over at NPI blog writes a post about I guess improving the precinct caucus system, but spends the entire time defending them against folks that like the primary. Good for him, but I would really have liked to hear some ideas on improvement.

Seriously.

Because it’s been a demoralizing few months leading up to the precinct caucuses.

Anyway, I’ll start a list. Feel free to join in when you’re ready.

1. Hold caucuses more often. Why do we only force folks to attend a precinct caucus when we want them to choose a presidential nominee? If all that hooey about getting out of the house, meeting your neighbors and freedom of association was not a big lie, then we should hold caucuses to nominate every Democratic candidate, from governor down to state legislator and county commissioner. Not dog catcher, because we don’t elect dog catchers in this state.

Pros: Like I said, we would actually do what we mean when we defend the caucuses.

Cons: If you thought it was hard to pull off the presidential cycle caucuses, what makes you think we can do this all the time? Then again, fewer people will turn out for non-interesting caucuses.

This stuff costs money too, and the primaries the state pays for.

And, can’t we just have it both ways? Private political organization when it suits our needs and public, primary based party when we don’t have the money?

2. Hold them in separate rooms. One of the major complaints that I keep on running into following the caucuses was that people couldn’t hear what was going on because there were more than one being held in one room.

That was reality because a) we couldn’t book classrooms because of student privacy issues and b) we didn’t expect 10 percent of the voters to show up. More like 6 percent or something.

But, we as Dems should make a list of all the publically available small rooms in the entire state that are ADA accessible, just so people can have quiet civic conversations.

And, that’s it. I don’t have any more ideas.

Goldy gone (this is what our media ownership rules look like)

January 31, 2008 / / 0 Comments

In trying to show that he knows what the hell he’s talking about, Mark Gardner unwittingly uncovers the real story of Goldy being canned by KIRO:

…if he wants to stick with radio, he’ll find another job. It may be in another market. I’ll say it again: Eugene would be a perfect fit. Get some experience, temper the act, learn more about fairness. You can take strong positions, but you must be fair.

Actually, Eugene would be a shitty place for Goldy to find a new job in radio. Want to know why? Same reason he can’t find work in Seattle. Locally-owned radio stations are old hat and chained owned stations don’t hire local talkers.

The two stations in Eugene that have some similarity to KIRO, KUGN 590 and KPNW 1120, have exactly two locally-produced shows between them. That Eugene’s talk local radio scene is exactly two morning shows doesn’t exactly paint a pretty picture for Goldy someday landing a gig down there.

Of course, Mark wasn’t talking about the actual Eugene that exists in today’s media market reality, but rather the fantasy Eugene radio market that would exist with local ownership who cared about the communities they served.

Anyone remember the FCC hearings in Seattle a little while back? Back then, Goldy said this:

Meanwhile, over 251 audience members have already signed up for a two minute speaking slot — if everybody gets their turn we’ll be here for another eight hours! And of the dozens of concerned citizens who have already spoken, only one has argued in support of loosening ownership rules… my colleague and KTTH morning host, David Boze. (Talk about a brown nose. I sure hope that’s not what it takes to get ahead in today’s corporate-owned media, because if it is, I’m screwed.)

It wasn’t his stand on the FCC rules that got him fired, but if the rules had been different, he wouldn’t have been fired. Make sense?

Anyway, I wonder if this means a return of Podcasting Liberally. To be honest, I listened to that a lot more than I listened to his show on KIRO.

And, to make a suggestion like what Mark made above (but hopefully better informed): If Goldy likes to hear the sound of his own voice, then maybe get together with the barons of online media in Seattle, and do some sort of non-Podcasting Liberally podcast thing.

Why is Fred Finn running for the state legislature in the 35th LD?

October 1, 2007 / / 0 Comments

Oh, so glad you asked:

It is now time to bring to bear the experience I have gained in government, nonprofit, military and business, for the benefit of all the citizens of the 35th District. I hope to ensure for the next generation the educational and health care opportunities I have had, to safeguard the precious environment that brought us here and to promote a business climate that provides family wage jobs so that all our children and grandchildren may enjoy this wonderful place.

Read the entire thing, its pretty good. Also at the blog of the 35th LD, read about the man he hopes to replace, Bill Eickmeyer.

Re: Private libraries: a novel idea (“Let’s fix our own problems”)

September 30, 2007 / / 0 Comments

John over at the Washington Policy Center posts up about the Jackson (OR) county library system joining forces with a for-profit firm to get the libraries back open.

Good for Jackson to get their libraries going again, but I’m afraid I can’t swallow what John is pushing (an embrace private libraries). It seems that there are some nuances he’s overlooking.

LSSI (the private firm) will operate the libraries on about half of what the county had been spending. But, the county hasn’t found a permanent source for those funds and most of those savings seem to be coming from lopping off hours of operation and cutting retirement.

I can’t also but look at other places LSSI has either come into or been rejected from. In New Jersey, one person carries the heart of the matter for me:

“Let us fix our own problems,” said Leticia Acosta, president of the newly formed Friends of the Library group. “Don’t send our tax dollars to Maryland.”

Jackson county brining in a company to run their libraries is essentially a “we can’t do this.” The original closure of the libraries came when federal funds dried up and the community couldn’t come together to locally fund the system. Now that LSSI is in the picture, if local communities want full service libraries, they’re going to have to pass higher taxes anyway.

And, how libraries are run is also outsourced under LSSI. In a Texas example, the details of LSSI’s response to a public request for proposal is secret.

I agree with the Daily Tidings here, that its great to get the libraries back open. But, it would be even better if it was the communities themselves who did it. Rescuing libraries may be profitable, but running libraries in the long term isn’t something you should be able to make a profit on:

Public libraries, by their very nature, are classic ‘market failures’ — as are highways, schools, police, firefighters, and national defense and security. They are not profitable activities that a free market place will support. Privatization is not a mere management tool; it is a grave public policy shift. Privatization advocates must be challenged. If the core democratic values of libraries are glossed over in the name of efficiency, economy, and creative management, how will the public interest be served?

When LSSI Comes to Town
Fargo Public Library Drops LSSI Contract

Smells like blackmail lives on

August 26, 2007 / / 0 Comments

Stephan Sharkansky got into a little blog post war with a waitress and a anonymous blogger up in Seattle this week.

Blatherwatch and Metroblogging Seattle both have pretty long posts on the… (oh God, I hesitate to call it this) debate. Sharkasnky attempts to cap the blogging about with this post: End of Story.

Well, not really, because even though the actual posts (the one that pissed him off and the one from Stephan that inspired the name of my post) were pulled from their respective blogs, they both live on in google cache (here and here).

So, while you can’t comment on this entire debacle either at soundpolitics.com or “Meet the Stress,” (the Shark’s “end of story” post has comments disabled), I’m sure the story is far from over. Hell, I mean, its Sunday, so lets see what we think about this on Wednesday.

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