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Seattle City Council will (finally!) regulate towing fees

By on December 7, 2011 in Local, Local Politics, Police, Scumbag System

This is way overdue. Now can we also do something about the tow trucks that line up, waiting to tow vehicles at 3PM downtown without being notified by the police? They’re like vultures.

Seattle City Councilmember Nick Licata says he plans to introduce legislation that would cap towing rates after a Seattle Times columnist wrote about a resident who was charged $800 to get his truck from a towing yard.

via City Council to take on predatory towing fees | Strange Bedfellows — Politics News – seattlepi.com.

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Whatcha gonna do when they come for you?

By on November 26, 2011 in Culture, Local Politics, Police, Politics, Scumbag System

And I’m proud to be an American
where at least I know I’m free,
And I won’t forget the ones who died
who gave that right to me

 

The picture darkened still further when Wonkette and Washingtonsblog.com reported that the Mayor of Oakland acknowledged that the Department of Homeland Security had participated in an 18-city mayor conference call advising mayors on “how to suppress” Occupy protests.

via The shocking truth about the crackdown on Occupy | Naomi Wolf | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk.

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NEWSFLASH! Pepper spray doesn’t hurt!

By on November 20, 2011 in Banks, Business As Usual, Crime and Punishment, Culture, Economy, Impotent Modern Media, Military, Police, Politics, Scumbag System, Television

Pepper spray does not hurt, it “creates compliance”. The U.S.A. does not torture, it “intensely interrogates”. Pizza is not bread, cheese and tomato sauce, it’s a “vegetable”. Bank credit cards aren’t traps designed to suck as much cash out of your pocket as possible ion the form of interest and fees, they’re “smart money”. Freedom is slavery. War is peace. Ignorance is strength.

Orwell was right.

 

Charles J. Kelly, a former Baltimore Police Department lieutenant who wrote the department’s use of force guidelines, said pepper spray is a “compliance tool” that can be used on subjects who do not resist, and is preferable to simply lifting protesters.
“When you start picking up human bodies, you risk hurting them,” Kelly said.

via Nation & World | UC Davis officers in pepper spray incident placed on leave | Seattle Times Newspaper.

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Hallelujah! Thine the glory. Revive us again!

By on November 19, 2011 in Art, Business As Usual, Culture, Impotent Modern Media, Music, Police, Politics, Scumbag System

It’s time to return to those days of old when gods of freedom walked the earth and sarcasm was a fearsome tool in their quiver.

 

(Slightly Altered) Piggies

By the Beatles

Have you seen the right wing piggies
Crawling in the dirt
And for all the right wing piggies
Life is getting worse
Always having dirt to play around in.

Have you seen the newsmen piggies
In their starched white shirts
You will find the newsmen piggies
Stirring up the dirt
Always have clean shirts to play around in.

In their sties with all their backing
They don’t care what goes on around
In their eyes there’s something lacking
What they need’s a damn good whacking.

Everywhere there’s lots of piggies
Living piggy lives
You can see them out for dinner
With their piggy wives
Clutching forks and knives to eat their bacon.

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Seattle police pepper spray granny for fun and profit

By on November 15, 2011 in Culture, Police, Scumbag System

Hey, SPD cops have to justify the overtime pay somehow, right? Might as well pepper spray an elderly woman for sport. I wonder how hard they laughed at her?



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How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the OWS Protests

By on November 12, 2011 in Banks, Culture, Economy, Politics, Scumbag System

From the moment Matt steps to the plate, this one is going over the wall.

We’re all born wanting the freedom to imagine a better and more beautiful future. But modern America has become a place so drearily confining and predictable that it chokes the life out of that built-in desire. Everything from our pop culture to our economy to our politics feels oppressive and unresponsive. We see 10 million commercials a day, and every day is the same life-killing chase for money, money and more money; the only thing that changes from minute to minute is that every tick of the clock brings with it another space-age vendor dreaming up some new way to try to sell you something or reach into your pocket. The relentless sameness of the two-party political system is beginning to feel like a Jacob’s Ladder nightmare with no end; we’re entering another turn on the four-year merry-go-round, and the thought of having to try to get excited about yet another minor quadrennial shift in the direction of one or the other pole of alienating corporate full-of-shitness is enough to make anyone want to smash his own hand flat with a hammer.

via How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the OWS Protests | Politics News | Rolling Stone.

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Washington State making $22 per hour on slave prison labor while unemployed told “no way”

By on November 5, 2011 in Business As Usual, Culture, Economy, Scumbag System

This is how capitalism works in America.

The State of Washington is getting paid good money — $22 per hour per worker — to provide prison labor in Washington’s apple orchards. But experienced farm workers, willing and eager to pick apples for decent pay, are being told they must work for minimum wage… or else take a hike.

via Pickers seeking ‘prison pay’ turned away | The Stand.


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Most unemployed cut off from benefits

By on November 5, 2011 in Banks, Business As Usual, Culture, Economy, Politics, Republican, Scumbag System, Tea Party Loons

So the long-term unemployed are being completely screwed by not only big business but the Republican majority in Congress that won’t do a thing to help them.

But who will Republicans help? Well, their rich banker friends, that’s who! As seen in this CNN story from 2010, the bankers backing Republicans in Congress are doing juuuuuust fine: Big banks mint money again: $18.7 billion

Occupy Wall Street chant: Banks got bailed out, we got sold out.

Why can’t Conservatives see this? They can’t all be that stupid, can they? Is it wanton ignorance, then? Conveniently ignoring the problem while they drive their 2.5 children to mall to buy more superfluous stuff? Do they just hate the poor and unemployed?

 

The jobs crisis has left so many people out of work for so long that most of America’s unemployed are no longer receiving unemployment benefits.

Early last year, 75 percent were receiving checks. The figure is now 48 percent — a shift that points to a growing crisis of long-term unemployment. Nearly one-third of America’s 14 million unemployed have had no job for a year or more.

via Most of the unemployed no longer receive benefits.


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Grower on Washingtons State’s red side sells moldy applesauce to schools and food banks

By on November 5, 2011 in Business As Usual, Food, Scumbag System

You might imagine that a company from Washington State’s traditionally Conservative (Red) side would put profit ahead of food safety laws but even I have a hard time with this one.

I don’t know which is more frightening, that a company would be so hell-bent on profit that it would take a chance on compromising  the health of children or that moldy applesauce and fruit puree is allowed to be “reprocessed” for human consumption.

This is a culture that has a “five-second rule” for things dropped on the floor. How many people realize that we may be eating “reconditioned” food?

 

“Your firm reprocesses moldy applesauce product … using a method that is not effective against all toxic metabolites,” read the FDA letter sent to Jimmie L. Davis, Snokist’s president. “Several foodborne molds may be hazardous to human health.”

via FDA says Yakima company that supplies schools repackaged moldy applesauce | KING5.com Seattle.


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Dear Banks, As I stuff this letter: P.S. I love you

By on October 29, 2011 in Banks, Economy, Lyrics Spoof, Music, Politics, Scumbag System, Social, Twitter

As I stuff this letter
send my love to you
remember that I’ll always
dislike most of what you do
Treasure these few words ’till you surrender
and change your ways forever
P.S. I love you
You, you, you

This kind of creative non-violence is just the kind of thing that generates lots of negative branding, and makes companies crazy.

via Keep Wall Street Occupied. Send Them Your Love Letters « Shoq Value.

 

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