Jim

It IS a concern now - you don't seem to get the basic fact that the pension systems are paying out more than thy accure - it's basic math. WA is genreally better than most states and ours is around 75% funded - where do you think the money is coming from - fairy land? Reneging on pensions for public workers now will help almost none toward making states more solvent in the mid-term, little less in the short term, which is what we should be working on instead of playing disaster capitalism along with neoliberals to better bash on public employees who worked for these pensions (or most of them anyway). Shame on you for not distancing yourself from the partisans for the race to the bottom. Another straw dog. Read the post. No one said pulling existing pensions. But if you don't want to make changes in the current system - how are you going to close the $15B pension shortfall in WA - and that is if the fix could happen today - add about 10% a year and that is the definition of unsustainable. If you add more neoliberal, disaster capital, maybe jackboot to the string of adjectives it provides little substance to your argument - which seems to be - do nothing. Great- meanwhile the WA health care plan is going to be eliminated with the free drug care for the elderly poor. I'd rather see public employees go with a 401k plan then see contributions to a non-sustainable plan - for decades to come - by the taxpayers. What is your alternative - please be specific instead of "it can wait till later" or modest adjustments will do. How are you going to find an extra $15B right now, and then $15B say, every 10 years from now on. A tax? Good luck with that one. Any other plausible suggestions?

I'd say I lefty socially but fiscally - well - I call it common sense. In a dinner conversation or two that went from my commitment to a single payer health system - because it makes more sense fiscally and for social fairness - when applying similar logic to a pension reform plan - it's like I spit in their food or something. funding

And this is not something to worry about now? Friggin' A - it's sucking up capital from benefical programs. The social safety net is hacked to pieces and we don't need to fix this? Give me a break.

It IS a concern now - you don't seem to get the basic fact that the pension systems are paying out more than thy accure - it's basic math. WA is genreally better than most states and ours is around 75% funded - where do you think the money is coming from - fairy land? In CA 85% of tax revenue is being used to service two items - public pensions and current employee pay and benefits. What? You would want to wait untill it gets to 150% to change it? Every dollar put to an unsustainable program is one that cannot be put towards worthwhile social, environmental, health, and safety programs. The "ignore the problem" solution you offer is what has led to the current and growing issue.

We've been here before, but why not. I'll repeat. Yes the recent financial crisis is something seperate from state pension issues, yes the government did a bad job of monitoring the markets, yes the greedy bankers and wall street folks are getting of lightly. But - fiscal crisis or not - the majority of pension plans are unsustainable and the extra fiscal pressures now put on states is shining a brighter light on these unsustainable elements. In most, not all (about 85%) of states pensions have been promised that require an amazing amount of investment capital to be parked to get sufficient returns for payout. How the heck does a system manage to payout a 80% wages earned in the last few years of employement for life? Say that is $75k and a conservative 5% return - then that mean you need to have $1.5M parked!!!! Some retirement plans, notably CA, are even more generous in how they calculate your retirement. Given that the employee in this example would contribute, maybe, 25% of this - the tax payers should be on the hook for this? Honor the existing agreements, limit increases, and convert current holders to 401ks. Any arument about dealing with it later is an excuse to carry on an unsutainable practice - wait for what and why accrue more debt?

But that isn't what Dane was referring to (or at least that's what I'm reading). I understand that each tool is a backup but not clear on this statement that is referring to the umbilicals: Sorry to be dense - but is it meant to convey the idea that if you fall and the tools are stacked vertically the stretchy umbicals are ok for a minor fall? Or is it meant to just hold you in position for a bit if you need both hands for setting a belay anchor. Thanks!

So then "belay" is meant for say, keeping you on the wall while you use both hands to put in a real belay?

I think this is a good tool to harp on when discussing the issues with the smaller gv'ment crowd. But as policy it goes nowhere and then you start arguing about the greater good for any project, 520, viaduct, light rail, etc. The greater good is a difficult concept for knuckleheads to grasp, however.

Hey D - Getting back into ice after a decade away. Would you mind expanding on the "moving belay" comment. I used to use perlon as umbilicals back in the day, but the stretch factor would seem to make this difficult on the new gear. Clarification? Thanks.

Some planners I work with recently compled a large, regional study on the effect of military bases on the surrounding communities. Yea, the typical tatoo parlors and bar fights; but it was surprising to them the number of military families that make use of social services such as food stamps, food banks, mental health clinics, health clinics. Part of scaling back the military balooning budget should be knocking back the amount of expensive toys, ovresea bases and adventures, and taking care of their own.

Too late. They are likely on their way already.

Hey - I had a '69 that I rebuilt the engine to turn 1776 cc - up Snoqualmie Pass in 4th! balanced cam, lw flywheel, oversized pistons. So there.

Uh Jim? Fuck you. Saw that one coming Jimbo. I actually think pretty highly of Evergreen, but if I didn't I'd be careful never to mention that unless I'd already mapped out an escape strategy to extricate myself from whatever enclosed space I happened to be in Seattle, Olympia, Bellingham, or Portland. "[Pointing]Look - over there! Someone's being judgmental and intolerant[rapid transition to fleeing...]! 10 to 1 says that you could defend female genital mutilation as a practice that the proper application of multi-culturalism (not to mentionthe West's sorry neocolonial legacy, etc) renders off limits to critiques by Westerners and elicit little more than a yawn, but make a single modestly unflattering aside about Evergreen and you'll ignite a pious rage that even a third glass of organic, biodynamically cultivated, fair-trade Pinot can't squelch.... Sigh. My east coast roots, humor included, requires the response It-was-a-joke all too often. Jeesh.

If only you knew how to visually assert your uniqueness through a tightly proscribed set of widely shared clothing, hair, and eye-glass frame options employed by millions and millions of other people to do the same thing. When "hipster" theme parties become the new 70's parties this jig is up. I hope. Does this mean I'm actually hipper than I think I am?

A cut from Portlandia I suppose. Heard a couple segment cuts on the radio; pretty funny but how many segments can you have. I give 'em points for effort. If everyone were like me life would be too boring.

Basically yes. NC were never full of griz. For the curious caribou seekers: http://wdfw.wa.gov/publications/pub.php?id=00448

Seen a number of Bulwinkles up near the border during field work, but have yet to see the elusive woodland caribou. Did see old tracks once.

If that is what you came out with from two statistics classes I'd venture: 1) the classes were taken at the philosphy department of Evergreen, or 2) you were asleep.

There's very credible evidence of the occasional giz in the N.C. but several hair snare projects, a rather extensive one from a M.S. thesis out of U.W. - have come up empty. The two that I know of personally are the male that came back to a elk carcass up a drainage along the Pend Oreille river, just south of the border when I was working up there a few years ago and spotted by the local USFS biologist; and the spotted owl crew who took pictures of good prints in the snow, back around 2002(?). Basically the habitat in the N.C. is not so good for mr. griz, the Selkirk part of the recovery plan suggests maybe 3 pair could be supported. Lots of sightings of blondies - light colored black bears that folks often mistake for the big guy. [video:youtube]

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a reasonable approach. although knowing if your kid is allergic to vaccine cultures is problematic until actually administering a vaccine. btw, have you had your booster for pertussis? I wish there were a "stupid" vaccine. Your responses, which is what we have to go by here, indicate a lack of comprehension of the science of the issue.

Yesterday, editors at The Lancet officially retracted the British medical journal's 12-year-old study that they say incorrectly linked the combination Measles-Mumps-Rubella (MMR) vaccine to autism. The retraction of the 1998 study comes less than a week after the General Medical Council of the United Kingdom chastised the Dr. Andrew Wakefield and his co-authors for acting "dishonestly and irresponsibly" in doing his research for the study, which claimed that eight out of 12 children who received the MMR vaccine began showing symptoms of autism within days of getting the shot.

Yea. No kidding hydro is the best backup to the fluctuations associated to wind and solar. Yet here in the PNW, where we have the most baseload in the country of hydro, it still creates massive issues with grid distribution, unpredictability, and scheduling. I notice that every renewable engery "base load" profile in the artile starts with -"..another promising technology". Non of which comes anywhere near providing a measurable contribution to base load. Yea - maybe some day but not in the foreseeable future. Know what grid managers see as the counterforece to deal with the ups and downs of solar and wind? Pump storage facilities are gaining a lot of traction. Of course this is great becuase these facilities actually use more energy than they produce, it's just the differential between when they use and when they sell the energy that make them "practical". And then there are the issues of drowning more land under new lakes. Yes, we need to invest more in solar and wind, particularly off-shore wind. Germany is doing a decent job on solar and the UK is doing investing heavily in tidal and wave energy, shooting for 25% of energy needs by 2050.

Did you even bother to read the article? I wasn't implying that was a chief reason - one of many. But yea - it is a factor because the French have folks in leadership positions who actually understand the technology and can discuss it with their people - and the people appaear to appreciate and respect folks with knowledge about the subject. Thus they understand the tradeoffs and are making fully informed decisions.

I've been working on the natural resource/ecological assessment end of energy for some time now, and what I see is a resurgence of consideration of nuclear power - primarily because of climate change issues. Other factors include energy independence and land use isues such as ripping up vast areas of Canada for oil sands. Solar and wind power are great supplements but they do little to assist with base load - dependable foundation energy requirements. If you know anything about energy mangement you know that large utilities, locally such as BPA, are having fits trying to figure out how to manage wind energy because it is so undependable and unpredicable. And often when you needed it most - winter and cold - is when it is not windy because a high pressure system is parked over you. Solar is not without land impacts either - you need to sacrafice quite a bit of desert land to get a cost-benefit scale. And wind turbines - many of the easy sites are already built out, the terrestrial issues mainly deal with chopping up bats and raptors. Off-shore wind has some potential as does marine energy - tidal and wave - but we are so behind the Europeans because of the byzantaine regulatory environment. The French took an early and conservative approach to nukes. The vetted designs and came up with two certified options. If you are a utility you have no choice but to use one of these designs. In the U.S. we do need to do something similar and yes, just move ahead with Yucca already.