Free Republic

Yesterday, Ed Morrissey looked at the “controversial� (not really) figures coming out of Seattle showing the downward pressure on employment and wages experienced there since the minimum wage suddenly spiked upward. This is unwelcome news in the Fight For 15 community and they’re pushing back on it as hard as possible. But the figures don’t lie and this result was entirely predictable in a free market economy. Seattle, however, isn’t the only place this effect is being seen. The minimum wage has been jumping upward in New York City also and similar effects are being felt. Nowhere is this...

Seattle's first-in-the-nation $15 per hour minimum wage law is hurting the workers it aimed to help, a new study has found. The working poor are making more per hour but taking home less pay. The University of Washington paper asserts the new wages boosted worker pay by 3 percent, but also resulted in a 9-percent reduction in hours and a $125 cut to the monthly paychecks. The law also cost the city 5,000 jobs, the report said. Seattle's minimum wage ordinance, passed by the Seattle City Council and signed by Mayor Ed Murray in 2014, was sold as a way...

But since the tax took effect, those costs have only risen as gun violence in the city has surged. And the tax has apparently brought in much less than city leaders projected it would. “How much data do you need?” asked Dave Workman, senior editor of TheGunMag.com and member of the Second Amendment Foundation. “The data says the law has failed to prevent what they promised it would prevent.” [Snip] Seattle City Councilman Tim Burgess introduced the tax in 2015. It puts a $25 tax on every firearm sold in the city and up to 5 cents per round of...

Of 65 public comments over more than two hours, only a handful were against the income tax. At a public hearing on a proposed income tax on high earnings at Seattle City Council chambers Wednesday night, a near-unanimous consensus emerged from the sometimes soaring, sometimes stammering oratory: pass it. After a presentation from a council central staffer, the council’s Affordable Housing, Neighborhoods and Finance Committee heard from 65 commenters in total. Of these, only a handful spoke against the measure. I counted three. One identified himself as a Republican, another as a libertarian before saying that “taxation is theft,” and...

Can we just get along? This question is being asked more and more, what with the bitter polarization of the nation. The answer, right now, would appear to be a resounding no. It’s not because we can’t. We don’t want to. I had that thought the other day when I was listening to the Seattle City Council. Many council meetings of late involve left-wingers shouting at other left-wingers for not being left-wing enough. But on this day, a new purity test of left-wingedness was revealed. The council was debating the juvenile-justice issue. Not everyone agrees whether a new jail should...

Colin Kaepernick won't be catching on with the Seattle Seahawks following a recent free-agent visit, but Pete Carroll believes it's only a matter of time before the quarterback finds a new home. The veteran head coach told reporters Friday that, although Seattle won't be signing Kaepernick right now, the team is well aware of what he's capable of doing on the field.

An overwhelming number of people spoke in support of a citywide income tax in Seattle on Wednesday at City Hall. People in support of taxing the richest residents cited everything from “simple justice,” to the untapped pool of money that could be used to deal with pressing problems like homelessness and drug abuse. The proposed tax would be 1.5 percent on adjusted gross income over $250,000 per year. Councilmember Lisa Herbold says there are still many undecided details, chiefly how that income level would be calculated. The legal basis for such a selective tax is shaky and whatever the...

When Seattle police officers write use of force reports they no longer call a suspect a suspect. “Community member” is the new term. Several officers say the term is offensive, explaining their work with violent suspects. Sources point to the suspect who shot three officers last month after a downtown Seattle armed robbery. When officers involved in that incident were writing their use of force reports they were required to refer to the shooter, Damarius Butts, as a “community member,” not a suspect, police sources said. Police fatally shot Butts after they said he shot the officers. “I think this...

Some parents are frustrated by proposed schedule changes for Seattle Public School students. “I find this really heartbreaking,” Corinne Crabs said. The district wants to add 20 minutes to the school day by starting school 10 minutes earlier and ending 10 minutes later. On top of that, it’s proposing a change from a three tier to a two tier system, which means her kids, in high school and middle school, wouldn't get out until almost four in the afternoon.

When Seattle police officers write use of force reports they no longer call a suspect a suspect. “Community member” is the new term. Several officers say the term is offensive, explaining their work with violent suspects. Sources point to the suspect who shot three officers last month after a downtown Seattle armed robbery. When officers involved in that incident were writing their use of force reports they were required to refer to the shooter, Damarius Butts, as a “community member,” not a suspect, police sources said. Police fatally shot Butts after they said he shot the officers. “I think this...

Mayor Murray of Seattle has just dropped out of the Seattle mayors race.

Via The Seattle Times: Mayor Ed Murray’s soda-tax legislation led to criticism it was unfair because white and affluent people tend to drink more diet drinks. The mayor’s revised proposal lowers the tax rate slightly and adds diet soda. The changes were recommendations that emerged when staff from the mayor’s office and the office of Councilmember Tim Burgess studied disparate impacts the tax could have on people with low incomes and on people of color, according to Murray. That work involved conversations with community advocates, public-health professionals and business owners, according to the mayor. After Murray’s initial announcement, some suggested...

The mayor of Seattle has altered the rules of his proposed soda tax — which would fund education for minorities–to include diet drinks because affluent white people tend to consume them more. Mayor Ed Murray of the staunchly liberal Seattle city originally proposed the soda tax during his state of the city address in February. Under his initial plan, distributors of sugary drinks would have to pay 2 cents per ounce. It would cover sodas such as Coke and Pepsi, energy drinks like Red Bull, fruit drinks, sweetened teas and bottled coffees such as those sold by Starbucks. The Mayor claimed the tax would bring $16 million in...

SEATTLE, WA - A group of conservative, pro-Donald Trump activists will gather in Seattle on May Day as a counterpoint to planned leftist demonstrations, and the group is preparing for possible confrontations. As Seattle gears up for May Day - which typically brings large, sometimes violent, protests to the city - police say there is a potential this year for "crowd on crowd" conflict. The organizer of the pro-Trump rally says that some members of his group will be armed with guns, but he is asking everyone to remain nonviolent. About 50 members of the Vancouver, Wash., group Patriot Prayer...

The Seattle City Council passed a unanimous resolution this week which declares May 1 a "day of action" on which city employees are encouraged to attend planned anti-Trump protests instead of going to work. The resolution—drafted by Councilmember Kshama Sawant, a member of the Socialist Alternative party—instructs supervisors of city government departments to remind their workers that they are entitled to take two days of unpaid leave for "days of faith and conscience," and that attending Monday's protests is a legitimate use of this leave. Sawant's resolution goes on to stress to Seattleites that through strikes and civil disobedience they...

After a year away from football, running back Marshawn Lynch is coming out of retirement to play for the Oakland Raiders. Because there were years remaining on the contract extension Lynch signed with Seattle two years ago, the Seahawks still controlled Lynch’s rights, so to facilitate Lynch returning to play with his hometown team, the Raiders and Seahawks will swap picks in the 2018 draft, the Raiders announced. The Raiders will receive Lynch and a sixth-round draft choice in 2018 in exchange for Oakland’s fifth-round selection in the 2018 NFL Draft. Lynch, who the Seahawks acquired in a trade with...

A spectre is haunting Seattle—the spectre of Kshama Sawant. Consider the April 12 Seattle Times editorial. In it, the editorial board called on Mayor Ed Murray to forgo a re-election bid. The reason: The child sexual-abuse allegations recently leveled against him make him vulnerable. “If he runs under that cloud,” the paper reasoned, “it increases the possibility of a Mayor Kshama Sawant, or some other extreme left-wing ideologue, steering this booming city wildly off course.” This was an odd argument to make, especially since Councilmember Sawant is almost certainly not running for mayor this year. In the swell of resistance...

Continuing from our previous story below about the shooting in Fresno and about anti-white bias in the media. I want to bring this up some more about the actions of Antifa/ARA especially their recent antics in Seattle Washington. Its an incident that should be making headlines, a racist attack on white people. A gang of marxist terrorist hoodlums putting up flyers warning white people not to propagate their race. The language of the posters clearly threatening, telling whites not to date white not to propagate, had this been any other group the media would be doing headstands. Unfortunately the...

Three Seattle police officers were shot and wounded while trying to arrest robbery suspects in downtown Seattle on Thursday afternoon before one of the suspects barricaded himself in a nearby building where he was later found dead. A male officer, who was shot in the face, was initially listed in critical condition but was upgraded to serious condition. He remains in serious condition Friday morning. A female officer, whose Kevlar vest saved her from a life-threatening gunshot wound to the chest, was treated at a hospital and released. A third officer suffered a hand wound and was treated and released...

Seattle Mayor Ed Murray on Wednesday denied knowing or having sex with a 46-year-old man who has accused the mayor of sexually abusing him when he was a teenager. In new court filings Wednesday, the man suing Murray over alleged sex abuse in the 1980s publicly identified himself as Delvonn Heckard, from the Seattle suburb of Kent.