Recycled

My dad bought a shitload of USGS maps back in the 50's and 60' and them promptly stored them in the back of a closet. They cover a lot of the interesting bits of Washington and are mostly 7-1/2 and 15 scale. I don't need them so I'm willing to pass them on (in one lot) to anyone willing to pick them up in the Bellingham area. No individual map requests please - I don't have time to unroll and sort through them. PM me if interested.

Taxing consumption is about more than redistributing the tax load. A middle class (or any) family that has priorities other than consumption would likely come out ahead. A middle class familty that lives for credit cards and the mall may come out worse. Wealthy consumers will pay more - if the equivalent VAT tax on the Hummer is 15-20%, they will pay quite a chunk of change. A poorer family that buys used goods (no VAT!) pays less. It all depends on the relative proportion of VAT tax, flat income tax rate and property tax rates. The savings issue is very important. I'm constantly amazed at how many people (at all income levels) believe that they should spend everything they earn and have essentially no savings. It seems to me that our taxation system could use a tweaking to encourage more saving.

Howard Roark: phone home, John Galt is looking for you - Ayn On a more serious note, how about this for a tax system: (A) a national value added tax (VAT) applied to all services and goods as in Europe. This would increase the price of goods and is thus a tax on consumption, as in a more sophisticated sales tax. Wealthy CONSUMERS would bear most of this cost while SAVERS would not. (2) A flat tax at a nominal rate with the first $25k per household exempted. Combine the two and you have a system that reduces taxes on INCOME while increasing taxes on CONSUMPTION. It also encourages savings to counter our dismal national savings rate and impending retirement funding crash. I'm also surprised that fellow "environmentalists" are not all over this, since excess mindless consumption is the root of most environmental problems. Discuss.

I went up the Depot Creek road a couple times in June (recon trips). The final stretch to the T junction where a spur on the right crosses the river is quite brushy. It's not worth going past the junction - very brushy and doesn't get you much further. I have a Trooper and had no problems in 4-low. Not so sure how a suburu would do on the creek crossings - clearance is nice. BTW, when I was up there the gate on the bridge crossing Depot Creek on the main Chilliwack road was open and loggers were punching in a steep road up the shoulder of the ridge between Depot creek and Sapper's Park. I drove up the road to the end of both spurs - doesn't go far yet, but something's afoot. If the road does go up high on the ridge it might open up some access to some interesting ridge running toward Nodoubt/Redoubt. Perhaps Dru knows what this new road is about?