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reverend_tel's comments:
on Live from Salem
I'm wondering how the region's dams would fare in a large subduction quake. the populations below downriver of reservoirs aren't huge, but they're substantial.
posted 2 years, 2 months ago
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on Strategic Default
seems to me that the heart of the problem is treating everything in our lives as an investment. why should a house be an investment and not simply a place to live? if folks bought houses to live in instead of to unload for a profit somewhere down the line, changes in price up or down wouldn't be such a big deal. quality of design and construction would improve. neighborhoods would be more stable. housing bubbles wouldn't be such a problem. the pop-up suburbs that have proliferated in times of economic growth would be replaced by more thoughtful solutions.
I believe that this simple change in attitudes would have many benefits for the strength of our communities, for our economy, and for our environment. the idea of strategic default would cease to be an issue.
which isn't to say that the bankers, mortgage lenders, developers, and derivative pushers should be let off the hook for their part in all this. they absolutely should not. but the folks who took the loans also share some responsibility for trying to cash in on the American Dream© without considering the damage it has done and continues to do.
posted 2 years, 2 months ago
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on Food Access
I can certainly get behind clandestine local food trade as described by Katz. but if getting involved means a real or perceived risk of legal troubles, such activity will be rather more limited than if regulations explicitly allow and encourage it.
it's a lot to ask of an inherently conservative (small 'c') institution like government, but well within the realm of possibility.
the recent urban livestock phenomenon is encouraging, though there are plenty of ways to do that wrong. but suppose those back yard chicken eggs or quail could be legally sold as prepared meals to neighbors, or maybe sold to the restaurant next door or down the street. I believe the positive impact would be much greater. such activity does go on currently, but on a very limited scale and in a secretive manner that limits its significance to the vast majority of folks who might otherwise benefit.
and many "food deserts" are well-populated by folks with plenty of knowledge about food production and preparation. given access to dirt and regulations that encourage them, these folks could easily solve many of the problems created by grocery stores and the lack thereof.
posted 2 years, 2 months ago
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on Food Access
I live in rural Cowlitz County, Washingon. I'm half a mile from a gas station with a small selection of junk food, beer, and fishing bait. seven miles from a Safeway and a monthly drop point for Azure Standard. eight miles from a Walmart. twenty miles from a Whole Foods. more than thirty miles from several lovely food co-ops in Portland. I can and do get to all of these places on bicycle and bus (except Walmart and Whole Foods), though it takes a considerable amount of time and effort. a large garden this year should make such trips less frequent in the future.
for rural areas as well as urban areas, small-scale food enterprises make an awful lot of sense. back yard (and front yard) market gardens, home bakeries, home breweries, home restaurants, &c could all be economically viable while knitting neighborhoods and small communities together and keeping resources circulating locally. with the exception of the gardens, though, they're all illegal without expensive inspected commercial kitchens that must be kept separate from personal uses. regulations like that make sense for larger producers who might be tempted by geographic insulation from consumers to conduct business less than scrupulously. they don't make sense for folks who could otherwise produce for their immediate neighborhood. I wouldn't suggest a complete lack of regulations, though, just extensive revision to fit this different scale.
to me, promoting small local production for local consumption would make a lot more sense than trying to promote building more capital- and transport-intensive groceries and farmers markets in areas where they don't already exist for one reason or another. it would be a better use of limited resources and have a larger positive impact on quality of life.
it may be going on other places as well, but the small town of Sedgwick, Maine recently adopted an ordinance to exempt such small enterprises from onerous regulations and inspections. similar local political action concerning food could spread, and I hope it does.
posted 2 years, 2 months ago
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on The Role of Unions
the arrangement I believe teachers have a vested interest in maintaining is institutional education. I wasn't at all clear about that.
I believe that arguments over the content of that institutional education are a distraction from the real issue: priveleging formal education over all other kinds of learning is detrimental to our society.
posted 2 years, 2 months ago
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on The Role of Unions
I would have liked to hear about some of the Northwest's labor history, from violence against unions in Centralia, Tacoma, and Everett, to the Seattle general strike and more.
as far as teachers, I have to agree that they have tremendous power to shape future economic actors. with that power, they perpetuate the current state of affairs wherein humans are thought of primarily as producers and consumers, employees and employers. until that changes, I can't imagine how disputes between labor and management will ever end, or even become less acrimonious. teachers are not responsible for the commodification of education and I'm not trying to blame them, but they certainly have a vested interest in maintaining that arrangement.
basically, as I see it, the problem is an extreme lack of imagination.
posted 2 years, 2 months ago
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on Philosophy of Taxes & Spending
if economic growth is considered desireable (and it isn't to everyone), then it doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me to tax economic activity. it makes more sense to me to heavily tax things that we would like to do away with. things like pollution and waste and ecological damage and consumption of limited resources and employee injuries.
of course, I understand that such a radical change in tax policy is unlikely to take place with so much government inertia. under the current tax model, I believe the best we could do would be a steeply graduated income tax.
I'm also not really part of the growth booster club.
posted 2 years, 7 months ago
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on What's Working (and not) in Education
I would like to hold out Michael Becker at Hood River Middle School as an example of what, or rather who, is working in education. I won't try to confine his approach to a short comment, but the centerpiece is an outdoor classroom paired with respect for each student's unique capabilities.
posted 2 years, 7 months ago
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on Global Trade in the Northwest
your guest just said something along the lines of "If it's making money, it isn't nonsensical." that, to me, is indicative of everything that is wrong with the current global economy.
posted 2 years, 7 months ago
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on Global Trade in the Northwest
exporting seems like shooting ourselves in the foot. why not reduce imports instead and produce what we need closer to home? focusing on actual quality of life instead of economic indicators could do a world of good around here. if economic growth comes at the expense of global and local environmental health - and globalization has done just that - it might not be such a great idea.
posted 2 years, 7 months ago
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