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And now that Seattle is asking Amazon to give a tiny percentage back to help the community that fostered them, they threaten to leave.

This argument would be more compelling if Seattle didn't already collect taxes from Amazon. Amazon already pays quite a lot in taxes. The Seattle city government basically said "We've decided we need even more money, you have money, so hand it over."

When even the extremely liberal Starbucks is complaining, maybe Seattle has gone too far.

Amazon doesn't like this, but it's really going to hurt low-margin businesses like fast food hamburger restaurants. The iconic local hamburger chain, Dick's Drive-in, will never open another location in Seattle, according to the founder's grandson Saul Spady.

"This is a tax on high-volume, low-margin businesses, like restaurants, and that's where it's going to put the most pain. And it's making restaurants like Dick's Drive-ins think really strongly about do we make our workforce more efficient, do we give less money to charity, or maybe we just don't be a business in Seattle."

Spady cites Denver's head tax equivalent, the Occupational Privilege Tax, saying, "If the nearest, largest head tax in the country is $50 and [Seattle's is] six times the nearest head tax, how is that a compromise?"

But at least Seattle didn't already do something crazy like pass a $15 per hour minimum wage law! Oh wait... yes they did.

If a city council giving orders truly leads to prosperity and happiness, then Seattle will be prosperous and happy. I fear it doesn't work that way.

Cascade Mall Shooter? C'mon Dave, at least vet your links.

Arcan Cetin, immigrated to the United States from Turkey as a child when his mother married an American citizen. He's not even from Mexico, and there's no evidence he rode a bus to vote multiple times in ANY election. And he became a naturalized American Citizen so you can't even claim it was unlawful for him to vote.

It's marginal. Here's an article with a bit more detail

So yeah, Mr. $251k owes $22.50.

Another link: http://www.king5.com/news/local/seattle/man-in-womens-locker-room-cites-gender-rule/65533111

It was a busy time at Evans Pool around 5:30pm Monday February 8. The pool was open for lap swim. According to Seattle Parks and Recreation, a man wearing board shorts entered the women's locker room and took off his shirt. Women alerted staff, who told the man to leave, but he said "the law has changed and I have a right to be here."

the man returned a second time while young girls were changing for swim practice.

Really, you use an example of some douchebag trolling the new law to buttress your argument?

And what form does this "perving out" take? Please enlighten us.

Why should I have to justify to you what creeps women out?

In fact, here's the link: http://www.thegetrealmom.com/blog/womensrestroom.

Ok, an extremely rare incident occurred, as a result of which, some women were made temporarily uncomfortable.

Not a very good justification for discrimination.

Another link: http://www.king5.com/news/local/seattle/man-in-womens-locker-room-cites-gender-rule/65533111

It was a busy time at Evans Pool around 5:30pm Monday February 8. The pool was open for lap swim. According to Seattle Parks and Recreation, a man wearing board shorts entered the women's locker room and took off his shirt. Women alerted staff, who told the man to leave, but he said "the law has changed and I have a right to be here."

the man returned a second time while young girls were changing for swim practice.

Creepy but no one got harmed. And, almost certainly not a transgendered person. Hell, most likely he was a pervert who heard all the right wing pundits saying perverts were allowed in change rooms now so he decided to give it a try and failed!

And another: http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/10/06/u-of-t-bathrooms-voyeurism_n_8253970.html

The University of Toronto (U of T) is temporarily changing its policy on gender-neutral bathrooms after two reports of voyeurism in a student residence.

Gender-neutral is something quite different.

In fact, you should really be more careful with your citations as you seem to have an unfortunate habit of excluding a critical paragraph that undercuts your entire point.

Melinda Scott, dean of students at University College, told campus newspaper The Varsity that some washrooms in the college's residences will now be separated by gender for "those who identify as men and those who identify as women."

"At the same time, there remains at least one gender-neutral washroom per floor and per house,” Scott said.

“The purpose of this temporary measure is to provide a safe space for the women who have been directly impacted by these events and other students who may feel more comfortable in a single-gender washroom in the wake of these incidents."

ie, the remedy to this voyeur was the exact policy you're arguing against!!

And what form does this "perving out" take? Please enlighten us.

Why should I have to justify to you what creeps women out?

In fact, here's the link: http://www.thegetrealmom.com/blog/womensrestroom. Ask her yourself.

Another link: http://www.king5.com/news/local/seattle/man-in-womens-locker-room-cites-gender-rule/65533111

It was a busy time at Evans Pool around 5:30pm Monday February 8. The pool was open for lap swim. According to Seattle Parks and Recreation, a man wearing board shorts entered the women's locker room and took off his shirt. Women alerted staff, who told the man to leave, but he said "the law has changed and I have a right to be here."

the man returned a second time while young girls were changing for swim practice.

And another: http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2015/10/06/u-of-t-bathrooms-voyeurism_n_8253970.html

The University of Toronto (U of T) is temporarily changing its policy on gender-neutral bathrooms after two reports of voyeurism in a student residence.

Two women showering in Whitney Hall, a residence at U of T's University College, reported they saw a cellphone reach over the shower-stall dividers in an attempt to record them, in two different incidents, police Const. Victor Kwong told The Toronto Star.

"The purpose of this temporary measure is to provide a safe space for the women who have been directly impacted by these events and other students who may feel more comfortable in a single-gender washroom in the wake of these incidents."

First... get with the times, calling her 'Hillary' is sexist.... doubly so when you only used last names of two other people.

Are you still going on about this email thing

I wasn't, I was replying to a comment of someone who was... and also citing a quote from the FBI director who currently has an investigation into the matter.

when there are real scandals like the Pfizer donations after Hillary decided to drop penalties and all the stuff about Hillary that came out with the Manning leak?

There are also the whole Clinton Cash allegations... and thanks to the FBI having her email server and having allegedly been able to recover all of the deleted emails, we may soon hear more about that just as soon as they interview her and wrap up their investigation.

Funny how the email was not a big deal with Palin but it is with Hillary

Nice false equivalency you've got there... or are you suggesting Palin not only had access to classified information, but allowed it to traverse her unsecured private account as we know Clinton did?

The reason for Palin not being a scandal is probably for the same reason the Governor of Washington state admitting to using private email to conduct official business from time to time, and it's not just the matter of access to/misuse of classified information... but state vs federal law.

but it's still just being lazy instead of going after real scandals that are far worse.

Somehow, I imagine the FBI is able to walk & chew bubblegum at the same time, and given the # of agents that are on the case I am sure they have enough resource to investigate multiple directions related to Clinton's lawbreaking.

For too many used are dealers live up to the sterotypes.

Nukes are way too dangerous. There is a reason why Jimmy Carter put a presidential order with a permanent moratorium on any and all power reactor construction.

The nuclear reactor I operated was brought back into production mode (Plutonium) during the Regan years.

The reactor was dedicated by John F. Kennedy so built prior to 1963. A lot of modernization was under way during that time.

At the same time 5 new plants were being built of which one was completed, the rest a financial disaster. http://www.king5.com/story/tec...

There is a bomb shelter built under I-5 near Greenlake in Seattle, that was built in the early 60's (ok, fallout shelter). It was touted, I believe, during the 1962 world's fair in Seattle. Here's a King5 video about it: http://www.king5.com/story/new.... It is a circular room with bathrooms under the freeway, with a small entrance. Later, it was used to issue driver's licenses. I got one there myself in the early 70's. Now, it is a grown-over place used as a City of Seattle municipal records storage center for a few years, and then abandoned. A massive cement structure like a bomb shelter doesn't go away, nice they can be reused in peacetime. What could be more peaceful than marijuana :).

Um, yeah, no.

I'm sure the guys who made off with 20 tons of copper wire could be persuaded to write a positive piece about Carrasco.

You got a citation?

I used this search:
craigslist tv warrant stolen goods

I found this story, police got warrant:
http://www.krem.com/news/regional/spokane-county/Local-man-tracks-down-stolen-goods-using-Craigslist--228170651.html

warrant issued: http://www.wsaw.com/home/headlines/Plover-Man-Accuse-of-Selling-Stolen-Property-on-Craigslist-234155941.html

warrant issued: http://www.king5.com/news/crime/Guns-and-robbery-kits-Craigslist-stolen-items-bust-192359201.html

warrant issued: http://www.abcnews4.com/story/22806385/craigslist-posting-leads-to-recovery-of-stolen-property

warrant issued:
http://www.ksat.com/news/craigslist-post-leads-to-thousands-of-dollars-of-stolen-property/-/478452/20969968/-/8tktj8z/-/index.html

There are tons of instances where people selling stolen goods have been the subject of search warrants. It would be interesting to see what specific set of details made your anecdote unique enough to avoid a warrant -- but I can't find it.

ou've got to wonder why the folks on the right who care so deeply about individual freedom of choice and despise government intrusion in personal affairs are such big fans of the war on drugs.

Because drug use has such detrimental effects on society. Witness the issues with meth, squatters taking over people's homes, general neglect of both property and person. Perhaps the judge in this case summed it up best:

âoeYou liked drugs. For that, your children suffered. They suffered terribly.â

Considering how much noise the right makes about a woman having an abortion (which is odd considering it is about individual freedom of choice), it would stand to reason they wouldn't want drugs because of the suffering they incur.

They've known for almost a year. It was even covered on the local "news".

All I can say is, HOLY PLUTONIUM Batman! Not residue from tests, but hundreds of pounds of plutonium metal in useable form. Enough for dozens of nuclear bombs. And they capped it and left it there! And now they are telling the world where it is. I'm speechless. (Other than the preceding text of course.)

With the collapse of the soviet union, packing up that much plutonium and trucking it back to Russia would have been a fools errand. I suspect those involved didn't expect the disruption to be permanent, and didn't think the local population had any capability utilize it, or to even understand what they had under their feet.

But still, there are horror stories almost as bad right here in the US. The Hanford site is again leaking and DOE was perfectly happy to ignore it for years.

Do you suppose the Russians would reciprocate and sent people to help with Hanford?

The Government can ignore this just like they ignore a sovereign States authority (See DIA raids in CA on marijuana shops and farms). In fairness, the town must abide by State law which may invalidate the City law.

Until more people wake up and shake off the cobwebs, the police state will continue to grow. I hope like hell we catch it in time, but looking at media and education I have strong doubts.

Well, they may not be able to prevent Federal Drones, but State and County drones may be banned, especially if this City has a home-rule charter (giving them local law enforcement authority).

In Seattle, there is currently an uproar over drone use by Seattle PD. The Police have them, but haven't used them yet. They want to put them into use, but the public is pretty much opposed, and SPD hasn't made a convincing use case, or even cited any recent incident where these might have been useful. (They carry small cameras, and by the looks of them do not provide any telemetry.)

The idea is to prevent your own law enforcement units from wasting their time peeping into back yards and windows. By the time State Authorities and the Feds arrive, the situation is totally out of hand anyway. The demand on state and fed resources is probably such that their arrival with drones in hand is less likely.

So just keeping your local PD/Sheriff from acquiring invasive tools goes a long way.

We might be stoners here in Seattle, but we aren't stupid. The Police is likely to abuse the usage of Drones, and we know it.

The Government can ignore this just like they ignore a sovereign States authority (See DIA raids in CA on marijuana shops and farms). In fairness, the town must abide by State law which may invalidate the City law.

Until more people wake up and shake off the cobwebs, the police state will continue to grow. I hope like hell we catch it in time, but looking at media and education I have strong doubts.

Well, they may not be able to prevent Federal Drones, but State and County drones may be banned, especially if this City has a home-rule charter (giving them local law enforcement authority).

In Seattle, there is currently an uproar over drone use by Seattle PD. The Police have them, but haven't used them yet. They want to put them into use, but the public is pretty much opposed, and SPD hasn't made a convincing use case, or even cited any recent incident where these might have been useful. (They carry small cameras, and by the looks of them do not provide any telemetry.)

The idea is to prevent your own law enforcement units from wasting their time peeping into back yards and windows. By the time State Authorities and the Feds arrive, the situation is totally out of hand anyway. The demand on state and fed resources is probably such that their arrival with drones in hand is less likely.

So just keeping your local PD/Sheriff from acquiring invasive tools goes a long way.

The problem isn't even conclusively in the batteries themselves. It may be the chargers used, the thermal cutoff, or simply overloading.

Some reports in the press suggest that the batteries are being recharged way too fast:

An inspection of the All Nippon Airways 787 that made an emergency landing in western Japan found that electrolytes, a flammable battery fluid, had leaked from the plane's main lithium-ion battery. Investigators found burn marks around the damage. ... The two incidents resulted in the release of flammable electrolytes, heat damage and smoke, the FAA confirmed. The release of battery fluid is especially concerning, safety experts said.

Once the electrolyte (which includes the lithium) catches fire it is very hard to put out. Boeing, knowing this provided special containment for these batteries, which has kept the fires from doing much besides destroying the battery (so far). However the risks are very real that this will be insufficient.

Large size Lithium batteries (over 8 to 25 grams of lithium) are not even allowed on aircraft as baggage or carry on, due to the propensity to burn when shorted or punctured, but some how Boeing talked the FAA into certifying this plane with these batteries to save a weight. Bad enough that these batteries are prone to catch fire when shorted, but Lithium fires are almost impossible to put out with the fire suppression systems found on planes (page 9). How Boeing talked the FAA into allowing this on the plane (in multiple locations) is beyond me.

According to a news report of the only similar incident I could find, the man with the knife was walking, and approached the officer with the knife in hand. Though the shooting was eventually determined to be "unjustified", under Washington law, the officer was free to kill if he believed the man to be a threat.

I'm sure in your case you'd think you were saving someone being brutally stabbed to death, but you're just as likely as the officer to have no idea what's really going on.

It's worse than that. They want to strip you of your rights to due process and freedom of speech as a preventive measure to protect their IP. That's not OK. A big Seattle TV station, KING 5 supports SOPA. They have comments, so you can let them know how you feel about this here.

If during a bust they accidentally kill your family, the offending officer will be punished with a few weeks of paid vacation. They can do anything they want to you for any reason without recourse.

While I don't doubt this may occur it doesn't seem to be the case involving a shooting of a homeless man by Police in Seattle. King5. I'm not championing the Seattle Police, this is just something that stands out.

And states are passing laws to encourage it.

Is Washington State one of these states?

There is no such thing as nuclear waste, everything that comes out of a used fuel rod is extremely useful, rare and precious and very expensive.

If it is really so useful in practice, why is so much in "temporary" storage after years and years with the amounts stored growing ever larger? Why have the U.S., Japan and many other countries "re-racked" their fuel ponds to make room for more at spacing closer than what the original designs required for safety?

As of November 2010, Fukushima Daiichi had 1760 TONS of spent fuel in storage, using 84% of capacity. (That's taking re-racking into account)

The linked .pdf report gives some idea what a big deal it is to deal with the fuel stored in Japan.

http://www.nirs.org/reactorwatch/accidents/6-1_powerpoint.pdf

Yes, they're done some recycling too. It wasn't many years ago that they had a criticality accident at such a facility. Even after bone marrow transplantation and experiment stem cell therapy, they still had workers die. And a number of non-employees living nearby got above normal exposure.

https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Tokaimura_nuclear_accident

And when I said waste, I didn't just mean spent fuel. There are other contaminated materials to deal with. Flying insects that got into things left behind from the old Hanford Washington facility were so radioactive that 210 TONS of material later contaminated by the bugs at a regular landfill had to be hauled off as radioactive waste.

http://chronicle.augusta.com/stories/1998/10/22/tec_242588.shtml

Radiation is still turning up from things that happened 40 years ago. Beware if cooking rabbit stew....

http://www.king5.com/news/environment/Radioactive-rabbit-trapped-at-Hanford-106761238.html

If there's technology to make ALL of that waste safe and useful, I haven't heard about it. Breeder reactors do turn some into more fuel (or weapons). While that may be a significant source for fuel, I haven't seen any citations showing a percentage and/or tonnage of total radioactive waste that actually gets recycled in that way. Citations please.

The same police who shoot people and routinely lie about it and almost never get punished can be trusted not to use these new toys to spy on people salaciously ? What BS. What will happen if they are caught ? Nothing. So, it will go on.

And, in fact, a county has already done the same thing to collect fines for sheds, garages, etc: http://www.king5.com/news/local/Eye-in-sky-finds-illegal-Pierce-County-buildings-92779144.html

Also, FTA, "A representative for Google said she did not know of any other community using Google Earth as it has been used in Riverhead." Pierce county must have used Bing?

This is just so ridiculous it has to be a frame or a setup.

Read a news article earlier about a guy in the Midwest that went to the post office to pick up a package and got arrested because it was 7lbs. of pot. So now we can mail illegal stuff to people we hate and get them arrested and ruined for life? Also, there's an article on Fark today that links to a newpaper report about a guy who had his wallet stolen, years later is seems a registered sex offender was using his identity. Now the guy is F'ed because the police cannot remove the alias from the real offender because "the concern is that if authorities delete the alias, the criminal could go back to using it again." The guy is now getting arrested for not registering as a sex offender.

Is law enforcement and people in general really this stupid?

http://www.king5.com/home/Innocent-man-may-be-linked-to-sex-offender-for-rest-of-his-life-98943394.html

You have only the "totally unbiased" word of the account holder for your assertion. Who knows what he was ACTUALLY told? Who knows what Citibank is legally ABLE to tell him?

Those who whine the loudest do not always have clean hands.

Righteous Indignation is best served for desert, rather than as an appetizer.

I guess you better not apply for a job at the King County Medical Examiners Office. The head of that office paid his employees for sperm samples,

http://www.king5.com/video/featured-videos/Reports-says-laws-were-broken-in-ME-Office-83308672.html

Washington state already has a very successful program called Running Start that is very similar to this proposal. Starting their junior year, high schoolers are allowed to attend a community college instead of (or in addition to) their local high school, all paid for by public school funding. I had the great opportunity to participate in a program at my local CC called Ocean Research College Academy. ORCA gave me the opportunity to earn my Associates Degree while I finished high school (with college courses standing in as equivalents for high school requirements), all while having actual scientific research experience. Heck, recently they started maintaining an underwater monitoring station for the State Department of Ecology.

(Commentor medeii gives a better explanation of Running Start above.)

Of course, there's the concern that students doing this may be brain-smart, but might lack the emotional and social skills gained in a high school environment. Some of my own family made that concern clear to me when I applied for this program. However, because of the nature of ORCA (where students have to make an effort to apply and be accepted), the students there were predominantly highly-motivated and socially capable.

Anyway, I got a terrific education, earned an AA degree while I was still in high school, and got 2 years of tuition paid for by the public school system. Also I made some awesome friends.

So, ome of our local stations is planning to switch early. On February 6th to be exact. So I'm guessing that the Feb 17th date was a "must switch by" date but earlier was OK. Unless the new legislation has been written to prohibit switching early, what's to stop stations from sticking to the Feb 17th date?

"You've got the wrong name and _maybe_ the wrong date of birth, and you're not flying."

Oh, come on! We all know to be terrified of letting 5-year-olds onto the plane (video). If they share a name, they're bound to share ideologies. And what better place to hide explosives than in a shitty diaper?

And that kid was only wanted by the INS! I can just imagine the hillarity ensuing when they clear an airport because another kid "made a stink bomb" in his diaper - we all know how much the TSA loves words like those.

although I don't have exact numbers

http://www.king5.com/localnews/stories/NW_021008WAB_scientology_protest_SW.accc9b6e.html

http://www.king5.com/video/featured-index.html?nvid=205525
very cool! The quality is surprisingly good.. and the infinite focus is pretty neat. I see that it is connected directly to an IPOD... I wonder what kind of cable is necessary for this....
For $200-$300 later this year.. I can't wait to try it out!

The sibling rivalry is one of the reasons Tacoma Police are not looking at this as a criminal case.

A huge population (Tacoma,) would have to be uncommonly decent, some might even say unnaturally decent, in order for there not to be a few vultures present.

It's not about the vultures themselves, it's about the lack of sufficiently negative consequences for being a vulture. The cops aren't going to bother going after either the looters or the ad poster.

No it doesn't beg the question, but it does indeed raise it. ;)

A known disgruntled previous tenant, her sister who was evicted, is apparently the prime suspect.

KING-TV

Compare Bush's secret police state tactics with the conviction and sentencing of the "Millennium Bomber" in a Seattle criminal court. (Especially read the "Judge's Statement" at the end.) On the other hand, we have Bush botching 2 investigations into terrorists that could have stopped last month's London bombings. And then consider that the Millennium Bomber was already caught, and spilling details about his training in Afghanistan, before 9/11/2001. Which Bush, and his Ashcroft Justice Department, ignored.

Edmund Burke's statement, that all that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing, also applies when bad men like Bush do nothing, or do their own triumphant evil.

They have and and will continue to abstain until they are married ...

Even if your children abstain studies have shown that some children who receive only abstinence education and/or take the pledge to abstain in fact don't. Here's an article on one such study, Abstinence-only data released . This one is about a documentary made on comprehensive sex ed vs abstainance only, Documentary features sex ed debate . Google news has four links from different media sources on the document on the first page of results. Then there's this, Pediatricians Group Approves Policy Opposing Abstinence Education . Some children go so far as to pull a Bill Clinton saying they didn't know what they did was sex. Many instead of having intercourse, ie vaginal penetration with a penis, they have oral sex or anal penetration, which isn't "sex" to them.

It can happen. Consider the below. The top plurality winner of each party went onto the general election. Let's say we used those results as if we had the Louisiana top two primary. Two Democrats would go on. Ignore the fact the below results are skewed due to forced partisan voting. Ironically Senn lost in the general election (negative ads I think hurt her).

http://www.king5.com/election/results.html?attorne ygeneral

Deborah Senn (D) 332,705 50.7%
Mark Sidran (D) 323,189 49.3%
Rob McKenna (R) 305,258 78%

Link where Tommy Heath mentions it in passing. Unfortunately, the Buffalo Snooze article from way back then isn't available online, but I've seen it nonetheless. I guess you could hit the microfilm if you like ;)

Or one can avoid the problem. A whole new industry is developing on data recovery because IBM (and others) can't make a decent quality Hard Drive. Granted, I couldn't make one either, but I don't have a billion+ in the bank!

I hope you folks would at least take the time to read about the crime that took place. It is loose commentary on threads like this that make me wonder if the U.S. needs to do anything special at all to be "hated".
The FBI did its job and then some pursuing these criminals. I am not equating the U.N. Security Council to criminals like you seem to have done. As a founding member nation of the U.N., the United States is entitled, I would say obligated, to pursue its own interests. All other sovereign member nations are supposed to as well. That is the reason for being a U.N. member in the first place.
The only arrogance displayed here is the substitution of political views for facts.

"...maybe we could convince the 1.2 billion Chinese, that you can dump your junk on their soil, if they can dump their junk on your soil.
Come to think of it, the US might still be better off: It is still the world's largest poluter per capita and *not willing to do anything about it*."

China is polluting the USA soil. Actually, a lot of the pollution is their soil. Fortunately, they have a large population to reduce the pollution per capita.

I've been getting a flood of hits and email since yesterday when that PI article turned into a piece on KING 5 TV here in Seattle and, obviously, this Slashdot piece. When it rains, it pours. :)

I've won $7150 in small claims court. I've collected $2650, of which $1800 was from pre-trial settlements.

I've been doing this for about a year and I'd estimate I spend about twelve hours a month doing it. That works out to ~$18 per hour, which isn't too shabby in this economy. If you actually enjoy doing this sort of thing, it's that much better.

This hobby keeps getting more interesting every day. Two weeks ago I was contacted by an assistant attorney general in Arizona about one of my cases. They wanted to "compare notes." That same week, a police detective from Oregon contacted me, wanting to "share" information. It seems that these people might not have jurisdiction over the spammers (who violate more than Washington law when they hijack mail servers), so they're really rooting for me. The Oregon detective said he was hoping to come to my court case!

All in all, this is good fun and you get a warm fuzzy feeling knowing what slimebags most of these people are. Junk faxes and recorded calls are illegal under federal law as well as many state laws, so anyone can go after those folks and, if you enjoy playing detective at all, you really should.

I've been getting a flood of hits and email since yesterday when that PI article turned into a piece on KING 5 TV here in Seattle and, obviously, this Slashdot piece. When it rains, it pours. :)

I've won $7150 in small claims court. I've collected $2650, of which $1800 was from pre-trial settlements.

I've been doing this for about a year and I'd estimate I spend about twelve hours a month doing it. That works out to ~$18 per hour, which isn't too shabby in this economy. If you actually enjoy doing this sort of thing, it's that much better.

This hobby keeps getting more interesting every day. Two weeks ago I was contacted by an assistant attorney general in Arizona about one of my cases. They wanted to "compare notes." That same week, a police detective from Oregon contacted me, wanting to "share" information. It seems that these people might not have jurisdiction over the spammers (who violate more than Washington law when they hijack mail servers), so they're really rooting for me. The Oregon detective said he was hoping to come to my court case!

All in all, this is good fun and you get a warm fuzzy feeling knowing what slimebags most of these people are. Junk faxes and recorded calls are illegal under federal law as well as many state laws, so anyone can go after those folks and, if you enjoy playing detective at all, you really should.

I saw a news bit recently (last night?) about the crash... looked like one of those 'impending doom' situations, where you know things are going badly, and there's nothing you can do to stop it. Unwieldy looking landing gear, but necessary for the size of the prop the fellow is turning. I'm amazed there was as little damage -- it looked worse.

Here are some links from local news:

• Human-powered plane crashes on first flight
• Test flight for the human-powered Raven
• (includes post-crash picture)
• 'Raven' debuts at Museum of Flight (includes pre-crash picture)

Incidentally, the Boeing hangar (the 747 assembly building) is where some of the human-powered helicopter (!!!) tests have been conducted. It's the only indoor place large enough, and the tests have to be indoors because they need absolutely calm air.

I saw a news bit recently (last night?) about the crash... looked like one of those 'impending doom' situations, where you know things are going badly, and there's nothing you can do to stop it. Unwieldy looking landing gear, but necessary for the size of the prop the fellow is turning. I'm amazed there was as little damage -- it looked worse.

Here are some links from local news:

• Human-powered plane crashes on first flight
• Test flight for the human-powered Raven
• (includes post-crash picture)
• 'Raven' debuts at Museum of Flight (includes pre-crash picture)

Incidentally, the Boeing hangar (the 747 assembly building) is where some of the human-powered helicopter (!!!) tests have been conducted. It's the only indoor place large enough, and the tests have to be indoors because they need absolutely calm air.

I saw a news bit recently (last night?) about the crash... looked like one of those 'impending doom' situations, where you know things are going badly, and there's nothing you can do to stop it. Unwieldy looking landing gear, but necessary for the size of the prop the fellow is turning. I'm amazed there was as little damage -- it looked worse.

Here are some links from local news:

• Human-powered plane crashes on first flight
• Test flight for the human-powered Raven
• (includes post-crash picture)
• 'Raven' debuts at Museum of Flight (includes pre-crash picture)

Incidentally, the Boeing hangar (the 747 assembly building) is where some of the human-powered helicopter (!!!) tests have been conducted. It's the only indoor place large enough, and the tests have to be indoors because they need absolutely calm air.

Sure, you may not like their software/business practices/leader or whatever, but for training people up to be able to use a computer for running charities or getting a job you'd be far better off teaching them how to use Windows/Word/Excel than some open source solution which is more difficult and less well supported.

It's sad to see that despite all the talk of using the right tool for the job when /bots talk about programming languages when it comes to operating systems they want to use open source wishware despite the fact that there are plenty of cases where using a Microsoft solution would be a better choice. Don't let your prejudice make these people's lives more difficult. And since Microsoft already do stuff like this, your case looks even more like open source ego stroking.