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Here is your open thread for the mid-week on February 27th, 2013. You may post random links and off-topic discussions here. Also, if you have an idea or a topic you’d like to see covered in an article, please make it known.
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The Local News Made It Clear
That the highly likely furloughing 27,000 DOD civilians in Wash St is horrifying with Sequestration coming Friday. Nationally, the 800K DOD civilian force 20% reduction in 2013 FY workweeks will save $4-5B off the DOD budget. Irrespective, nationally, we need to save another $43-44B to go by Friday, even with the DOD civilian furloughs in place.
Sounds like Boeing Defense and the other private sector DOD contractors need to go on 20% less pay per week too; fair is fair….otherwise the Sequestration numbers needed CLEARLY don’t add up.
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RE: softwarengineer @ 1 – Good reporting SWE. Hope you are not one of them. I was going to post that my personal impression based upon pretty extensive travel around the USA is that the economy seems to be improving. Hmmmm….
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RE: Blurtman @ 2 –
I May Be Immune
But when I read MSM hogwash and political only reporting on across the board Sequestration I speak up.
The other major part of Sequestration no one is talking about is Health Care Spending….they need about a $.5T whack too, although similar in size to DOD this area is already doomed before the cuts….the uninsured can’t afford $20k/yr family plans and putting like 100M more on butcher axed Medicaid by the end of the year is the straw that will break its back.
How about those interest rates deductions on real estate purchases?
Let’s put it this way, do we butcher ax disabled poor programs even more or eliminate this type of middle income welfare?
And I haven’t even touched on automatic school spending cuts.
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I’m thrilled, just tickled, that there will be a Costco and mixed-use retail coming to Lynnwood:
http://www.heraldnet.com/article/20130226/NEWS01/702269869#Lynnwood-OKs-zoning-for-Costco-residential-project
Unfortunately, it will be just to the north of the mall. No word yet on how much worse traffic can possibly get in that area. What a treat it will be to sit in bumper-to-bumper trafffic, all the way from the freeway offramp, to the pump at the Costco gas station (not mentioned in the above-linked article, but it was discussed in an earlier Hearldnet article that there will also be a Costco gas station as part of the development).
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RE: redmondjp @ 4 – Yeah adding a Costco + other stores that will take up as much space as the mall just sounds like a nightmare:
Yikes. Not that I go to the Alderwood Mall that often, but after this project goes in I’ll be avoiding it as much as possible.
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Here’s one way to fight foreclosure & property taxes:
http://www.columbian.com/news/2013/feb/28/man-challenges-validity-of-state-constitution/
Darby claimed historical records show that the state’s 1889 constitution was passed illegally. A state constitution was already put in place in 1878, and proper steps have never been taken to invalidate it, he said. The 1878 constitution prohibits taxation of patented land.
He hasn’t paid county taxes on his property since 2008, according to property records. He paid in full in 2006 and 2007 and paid about half of his bill in 2008. In 2009, he stopped paying altogether.
His intention, he said, was the lay the groundwork to challenge the county’s right to collect taxes on patented land.
He tried to challenge the county’s authority to tax patented land in federal court in 2010, but a judge dismissed the case.
“The only way I can get into court is for the county to foreclose on me,” Darby said.
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Happy Days, equity investors. We have now crossed into positive territory from where we were right before the crash.
Waiting on the return of the padded shoulder suits and big hair.
We already have the guy on the take from Enron equivalent in the White House.
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