JayB

Questioning their right to exist, and questioning their right to eliminate secret ballot in unionization drives because it hasn't delivered the results that they want (people are clearly choosing not to join) and replace it a public "card check" that leaves people who don't want to join the union vulnerable to intimidation and retribution are two different things. There's also the question of the rights of non union workers. Who should decided whether or not a mentally competent adult that decides he wants to work for a given employer who wants to provide him a job? Should the right to make that choice be retained by the individual or not? The reason that union membership is declining is that people aren't terribly keen to join them, and businesses that employ union workers tend to be uncompetitive and go out of business unless they can convince the government to transfer the costs of the union worker's above market compensation to the rest of the public via tarriffs, subsidies, or other legal measures that artifically inflate the price of whatever it is that the workers in that particular industry are engaged in producing.

She'd certainly be much better off if her family sold her to brothel to help fend-off starvation. But yeah - that's pretty much what's happened this century. Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, etc - all much worse off than they once were on account of trade.

Which part of "that" are you referring to? Surely not the stats concerning the percentage of workers in the private workforce that are unionized. The numbers would be even lower in the absence of the aptly-named "Davis-Bacon Act."

On the contrary - I am quite free to judge at my leisure, since you volunteered the information on a public forum. In my judgment - if your claims are true, which I doubt - you and your female (?) in laws show less virtue, decorum, and restraint than one finds in a typical ferret colony. But - I agree - consenting adults should be free to do whatever they wish to one another, regardless of what anyone else thinks, so have at it.

A member of the Teamsters Union will be glad to check the "yes" box for you, if you are unable to do so... In the private sector, the union/private-business follows roughly the same dynamics as the host/parasite model, and the passage of this legislation won't affect the final outcome, which invariably ends with a contract guaranteeing above-market wages far beyond what the skill-set in question would warrant - with a company that no longer exists. So the means may change, but the end will remain the same.

"The signed cards are then submitted to the National Labor Relations Board, known as the NLRB. Under current U.S. law, the employer need not recognize the union as its employees' collective bargaining representative if a majority of employees express their intent to join the union under through card check; instead, employers may require a secret-ballot vote overseen by the NLRB. The Employee Free Choice Act, introduced in the United States Congress in 2005 and again in 2007, would require that the NLRB recognize the union's role as the official bargaining representative if a majority of employees have authorized that representation via card check, without any secret ballot vote. [1] It was passed by the House on March 1, 2007. Organized labor groups argue that the card check process is preferable to traditional NLRB elections because it avoids the anti-union campaigns that can accompany elections and leads to healthier workplace relations by avoiding a direct confrontation between employer and its employees. Critics of card check organizing argue that the process takes away employees' right to vote for or against the union in a secret ballot and permits union intimidation of workers." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Card_check Just signed into law in MA recently. Should do wonders for the already stellar rates of private employment growth amongst the non-degreed population here.

That'd be roughly analogous to the "card-check" law that constitutes organized labor's foremost legislative priority these days.

"jayb to fw? as usual , you have nothing to say." Except for this, perhaps: It appears as though you are actually *less* discriminating when it comes to the deciding which ideas that you'll embrace than you are when it comes determining which of your female in-laws you'll commingle with - though the dignity of the former surely suffers more than the latter as a consequence of your affections.

With all due respect, I'm compelled to bluntly distance myself from your claim of agreement with Naomi Wolf, as your claim to her agreement is demonstrably not valid -- at no time has Wolf asserted that the events you cite are anything other than genuine acts of terrorism, and she did not assert that most acts of terrorism are fake. The relevance of the first item on the historical list of ten steps said to be consistently employed when open societies are incrementally closed down -- the invocation of a terrifying internal and external threat -- has nothing to do with supporting your conspiracy theories. The point made by Wolf is in how the threat (regardless of whether it is real or fake) is invoked as a rationale to ignore protections against abuse of power by the state. As you mentioned the tragic attack against the USS Cole, please note the presidency of that period did not invoke that event or any other terror attacks of the period as a rationale for subverting the American government, as has the current presidency continuously invoked numerous scary events and situations, both real and fake, to justify its criminal abuses of power extending back well before 9/11. What an amusing exhange. V7 is to Crux as: Id is to Ego. Golum is to Smeagol. Etc.

There's a bit of a distinction between a particular house and the housing market, but I'll be willing to split the difference and stake 50% of the bet on whatever house you choose, and 50% on the housing market as defined by the CSW index for Seattle. I think that the point that you are making by insisting on a single-home is a fair one, since you buy a home, not the market - but I think that it's also fair to include the sum of all such transactions into the analysis when attempting to evaluate the condition of the market. I'd also be happy to stake $50 on the single home, and $50 on the market via CSW, and stipulate that in the event of a "tie," we both pay $50 and kick in for $100 worth of free beer at the first Pub Club after Nov 1 of '08. Loser (wrong on both counts) kicks in $100, the pain of which can be offset by drinking as much of the beer as possible oneself. I also don't think that Zillow is especially accurate: http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB117142055516708035-O6WPplch_duU0zq_zhjQaI19vIg_20080214.html?mod=rss_free but it may be the only tool available. Unfortunately, I don't think that there's a metric out there that doesn't include valuations derived from refis (which are especially rife with appraisal fraud - appraiser plays ball and hits the magic number, broker gets commission, homeowner gets cash-in-hand), which accounts for bundling closing costs into the sales price, builder incentives, etc. I also think it's reasonable to look at real vs nominal returns, so I'll compute the real return on the money market account (less taxes on dividends and inflation), and you include commissions and closing costs, interest, insurance, taxes, maintenance, net cost remodels/upgrades (what you pay for the new kitchen vs standard calcs that determine the effect of the said kitchen on resale value) and inflation in your calculations on the minus side of the ledger, and any tax savings that you derive from acquisition on the plus side of the ledger. If you accept the bet - we can make this post a sticky in the cc.com events forum, so folks will have plenty of advance notice of the free beer. In the event that I end up leaving the country for a few months before Nov 1 of '08, I'll hand over two fifties for someone to keep in escrow (I nominate Porter), and if I lose on both counts there's the beer money. If I win on both counts you fork over the $100 beer tab at the next Pub Club, and I get my money back upon my return.

I'll do you one better. How about if my "investment" is a US treasury money fund (VMPXX), and your investment is the Case-Shiller-Weiss Index for Seattle between today's date and the same date next year? $50 sounds fine with me.

"Citigroup CEO Plans to Resign As Losses Grow Board Plans Meeting With Prince on Sunday; SEC Queries Accounting By ROBIN SIDEL, MONICA LANGLEY and GREGORY ZUCKERMAN November 3, 2007 Citigroup Inc. Chief Executive Charles Prince is planning to resign at a board meeting Sunday, according to people familiar with the situation, as the bank faces big new losses from distressed mortgage assets." http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119403363814780742.html?mod=hpp_us_whats_news Thankfully the odds of he and Stan O' Neil facing foreclosure are rather low.

Yeah - but not permanently until the spring of '09, and won't be looking to buy any sooner than mid-to-late 2010, at the earliest. If the tax-adjusted rent-vs-mortgage differential is significant enough, the target date will be adjusted back accordingly. Housing is an expense that I hope to minimize within certain space/neighborhod parameters - that's it. If the tax-adjusted cost of owning reaches par with renting something the same size in the same neighborhood, and the rest of the cards are in order, then things may change. Profiting from the housing market? Who knows. I heard of people in some markets selling their homes from investors at current market prices, then signing multi-year contracts to lease the homes back from them at prevailing rates determined by a neutral third party, and granting the new lessors right of first refusal if the new owner decided that he/she/they wanted to sell. Doubt anyone would go for that kind of a deal anymore, but perhaps. Doesn't look like there's a futures market for residential real-estate in Seattle yet. IMO the primary impact of the subprime "issue" will be a significant reduction in investor's appetite for securities constructed from or containing non-traditional mortgages, which will translate into tighter lending standards on the retail side. This will probably have an effect on who can get a loan, and for how much, which will probably act to temper future price increases, at the very least. This may also have an effect on market psychology, which - in combination with incredibly lax lending standards - is what has driven the majority of the real appreciation since ~01-02 IMO. Foreclosures and REO sales by banks may have some impact on inventory/prices in some areas as well. It's entirely possible that home values in some areas will continue appreciating, or appreciate at increasing rates - but on balance I think that the distribution of probabilities is such that the number of places where this will occur will not be terribly numerous. None of this really matters if you are living in a home that you like, have a mortgage that you can afford, and don't need to sell. If a particular individual's prime motive for owning a home is near-term financial gain, then their situation is likely rather different. Ditto for folks who HELOC'd or cash-out-refied their way into the 100% LTV category or higher in 05-06.

There are quite a few other elements of the real estate business that need to be cleaned up so that market participants have accurate information. The buying/selling, and appraisal processes are especially flawed and rife with massive conflicts of interest, but thats another topic. Ka-ching! The New York attorney general accused an appraisal company yesterday of inflating the value of homes under pressure from Washington Mutual, one of the nation’s largest mortgage lenders. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/02/business/02appraise.html?_r=1&ref=business&oref=slogin http://bp3.blogger.com/_pMscxxELHEg/RxzD0s_7EYI/AAAAAAAABB4/ljDSXZhMG3o/s1600-h/IMFresets.jpg Worth clicking on the second link for an overview of what's ahead for ALT-A and Option-ARM loans. IMF Report

My neighbors want to know if they still have to wear the big scarlet "C" around their necks since they haven't turned their heat on yet, and they live in a way colder climate.

Yup. Our own Reverend Arthur Dimmesdale.

The reason that I asked is that while the depth/extent of the snowpack that you'll have is a bit of a wild-card in December, as are the temperatures you'll be dealing with - the one thing that you can count on for certain is spending a hell of a lot of time in the dark. At Seattle's lattitude at that time of the year, you're looking at something like 7.5 hours between sunrise and sunset at the Winter solstice, which will probably fall right in the middle of the trip. It'll be much easier to pass the time, and much more comfortable in a hut IMO. There are obviously no guarantees, but IMO you're more likely to encounter a deeper snowpack and warmer temps (though not necessarily better snow/weather) on a trip that falls somewhere between late February and early April, and you are certain to spend a hell of a lot less time in the dark. By the end of March, you're looking at ~13 hours between sunrise and sunset. Changing the timing of the trip might not be an option, but if you have a choice, it might be worth considering and/or looking into a hut. The odds of finding good snow in December at Roger's Pass in BC are probably as high as anywhere, and they have a couple of huts there (or so I hear). Not sure how the booking works, or if you have to reserve spots way in advance, but this area might be worth considering.

Thank God that everyone waited for Germany to complete its rearming process, and wait on the sideline while their massive conventional superiority relative to Germany diminished, or imagine the bloodshed that could have resulted.

There's a wealth of data out there that prove that home ownership and wealth vary in inverse proportions to one another. The poorest Americans are statistically the most likely to own rather than rent, and the value of the homes they own increases in direct proportion to their poverty, so the dollar value of the subsidy they get for their larger mortgages, capital gains, property-taxes, etc increase in significance as their average wealth diminishes. That's why it's so encouraging to see that those who are agitating for substantial reform to make the tax-code more progressive omit this aspect of the tax code from the discussion whenever the topic of tax-reform comes up.

There is a lack of plasticity in wealth movement in the very top tier, and there is ample evidence to prove this. Of course, Republicans want to do away with the inheritance tax, which would further solidify this situation. Here's an interesting link. If there's anything that helps the poor, its the mortgage interest deduction, the capital gains exemption, the deduction for property taxes, etc.

Are you planning to do a traverse, or day-trips from a lodge/hut?

If you want to round out the analysis, look at the effect of state and local sales/income taxes on the working poor.

Diamond face of Bear Mountain is another. Plug "John Scurlock" into Google, scroll through his galleries, and cross reference the faces that look interesting to you with Beckey's alpine guide or inquiries at cc.com. If you put this inquiry on the main forum, your post will probably get quite a bit more exposure, and you may get quite a few more suggestions than you will if you leave it in this forum.

Key Quote; "...the top 1% of US earners accounted for 39% of tax revenue - and the highest earning 25% of the population delivered 86% of the tax-take."

there's nothing that can be done about it. the secular societies of Europe have no prayer against the strong muslim religion/culture/language. be prepared for more "trouble" A head nods in Europe "Hooray - We're Capitulating!"