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“Somalis, FBI in other U.S. cities on alert for terrorist recruiting” “While Minneapolis is the core of an investigation, leaders elsewhere want to keep youth from being drawn to violence.” COLUMBUS, OHIO - SNIPPET: “”No one has disappeared,” said Ahmed Hosh, who works with Somali youths in Columbus. “But if those who did the recruiting were individuals talking to someone alone, the scary thing is it could happen here.” The Twin Cities area has been at the center of the federal investigation ever since a 27-year-old from Minneapolis blew himself up in a suicide attack in Somalia last fall. But...

FEDERAL WAY, Wash. — Police are checking surveillance video as they try to identify people who beat a man at the Federal Way Transit Center. The 32-year-old Kent man was waiting for a bus Tuesday night when he asked another man to quiet down. The Kent man was knocked down and beaten. He was treated for a broken jaw and other facial bones at Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.

A group of young men severely beat a Kent man late Tuesday at the Federal Way Transit Center after he told one of them to lower his voice, police said Wednesday. The Kent man, 32, was waiting for a bus about 11 p.m. when he asked a loud youth to quiet down, police said. In response, several males in their teens or early 20s walked up to the man and one hit him in the face. The two began to fight and others in the group joined in. After the Kent man was knocked to the ground, the attackers ran...

Note: The following text is a quote: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE April 10, 2009 GANG MEMBER PLEADS GUILTY TO BEING A FELON IN POSSESSION OF A FIREARM Defendant Appears in Internet Video Holding Gun and Making Threats Against Rival Gang Members ERIC CHARLES SANFORD, 21, of Seattle, Washington, pleaded guilty today in U.S. District Court in Seattle to being a felon in possession of a firearm. SANFORD was arrested on November 15, 2008, following a traffic stop in central Seattle. SANFORD was a passenger in a car that was stopped for traffic violations. SANFORD was ordered out of the car for...

Donald Harmon's attempt to save a few bucks on his heating bill could cost him $850 — more than half his monthly Social Security — because he picked the wrong fuel. The 82-year-old retiree was hit with a hefty fine in January for burning wood to take away the chill in his kitchen and the living area in his North Seattle home. The Puget Sound Clean Air Agency had declared a burn ban that day. While Harmon was feeding broken-up pallets into his woodstove, an agency inspector was outside taking notes and photos as the smoke rose from the chimney....

Federal agents searched three money-transfer businesses in Minneapolis on Wednesday, carrying away boxes of documents and copying computer hard drives in a quest for details of financial transactions between the U.S. and several African nations. Agents searched Mustaqbal Express, also known as North American Money Transfer Inc.; Quran Express; and Aaran Financial. FBI spokesman E.K. Wilson confirmed the searches but wouldn't elaborate on the reason.

A gathering of residents in the Willow Lake Apartments of SeaTac, the south King County community where some citizens have evidently “had enough” of criminal activity is nothing to be alarmed about. They met for an informal gathering on March 28 to discuss crime problems in their neighborhood. Most of the people who attended this event were openly carrying sidearms. That’s legal, it is protected by the state constitution and a couple of state appeals court rulings, State v. Spencer and State v. Gregory Casad. Organized by James Beal, a member of the internet forum OpenCarry.org, the event attracted the...

Housing market decline hits Ichiro's mansion Ichiro's Issaquah mansion, yours for just $1.75 million. By KOMO Staff ISSAQUAH, Wash. -- The decline in the local housing market isn't just hitting the modest homes. The pool of high-end home buyers is shrinking as well. Former Mariners' pitcher Jamie Moyer just put his Magnolia mansion up for sale at $8.9 million. The seven-bedroom Tudor is one of the most expensive listings in Seattle, and about $6 million more than the Moyers paid. Ichiro Suzuki didn't field many offers for his original asking price of $3.2 million for his Issaquah mansion. The M's...

Mayor Greg Nickels is going forward with a controversial executive order which would ban "dangerous weapons" - including firearms - on Seattle owned parks and properties. An exact date has not been set yet for when the ban will go into effect. However, a spokesman for the Mayor's office said the ban is currently expected to begin sometime in May. Coincidentally, this places the time somewhere around the one-year anniversary of the freak shooting incident at Folklife, last year, that left two people injured and was the casus belli for the order. The move also comes in spite of legal...

BELLEVUE, Wash., March 24 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Once again when faced with a controversy, Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels is reviving his plan to ban legally-carried firearms from city property, and the Second Amendment Foundation today promises once again to immediately take him to court. "This time around," said SAF founder Alan Gottlieb, "Mayor Nickels needs to raise this issue to distract public attention from the political smell arising from the snow-plowing investigation. We remind the mayor that his office has been warned by Attorney General Rob McKenna that neither he, nor the city, has the authority to enact such a ban...

When winter storms rolled over Seattle in December, bringing snow and freezing temperatures to the city, the manager in control of the city's snowplows had no experience directing a major snow response and had put in place as his No. 2 an employee who knew even less on the subject. Together, Paul Jackson Jr. and Robert Clarke, a former crew chief, orchestrated a disjointed response to the winter weather that left major streets unplowed while Jackson, the man calling the shots, worried aloud about clearing certain streets so the mayor could drive to work, according to interviews with plow drivers...

Easy Ways to Go GreenBy LESLIE BILLERA Last updated March 16, 2009 5:30 p.m. PT Save money in the bathroomBuy water-efficient showerheads. With low-flow models, a family of four can cut water usage by as much as 280 gallons a month — and yet not feel much difference in water pressure. Two we like: Kohler's Master Shower Eco (kohler.com) and Niagara Conservation's Earth Massage (niagaraconservation.com). Recycle rechargeablesCell phones, digital cameras, and camcorders have made these batteries more popular than ever, but in certain states — Florida, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, and Vermont — it's illegal to throw them...

Hearst's Seattle Post-Intelligencer Announces End to Print Edition By SHIRA OVIDE The Seattle Post-Intelligencer announced it will stop publishing its print edition on Tuesday and convert to an online-only news operation. The move had been anticipated since early January, when Hearst Corp., owner of the Seattle P-I and 15 other newspapers, announced it would shift the Seattle paper to a Web-news outlet or shutter the operation entirely, if a buyer wasn't found in 60 days. Hearst said it couldn't continue to absorb the P-I's losses, which the company says reached $14 million last year.

(Note - This is part 3 of the series, "A No Newspaper Town?") "Not everyone is online you know, so I don't know what Seattle is going to be like without a newspaper. We've never not had one." "Journalism is essential, especially in a city like this - a big city that has a lot of different opinions and a lot of different people's ideas." "I like touching and reading and actually physically reading news, not so much on a computer." These are some of the reactions Seattleites are having as they watch their oldest newspaper - the Seattle Post-Intelligencer...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama will nominate Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske to be U.S. drug czar and remove the job's Cabinet designation, The Washington Post reported on Wednesday. If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Kerlikowske would head the Office of National Drug Control Policy, which was elevated to Cabinet level under former President George W. Bush. The nomination of Kerlikowske would end a long search for a candidate to oversee U.S. efforts to fight illegal drugs. Kerlikowske was long speculated to be the front-runner, but revelations about his stepson's arrest on drug-related charged complicated the nomination process,...

Dori writes... In these brutal economic times, a lot of people are upside down in their mortgages and are losing their homes. But there's one group of people who don't have to worry about that - the residents of 1811 Eastlake. The housing project for chronic alcoholics in Downtown Seattle. While I support many shelters and job training programs for the homeless, this project has always struck me as misguided - public funds are spent on housing that allows alcoholics to drink in their publicly subsidized apartments. That's why I found these pictures so disturbing. A Downtown Emergency Service Center...

This morning, at 9 a.m., the Seattle Post-Intelligencer offered its employees a "Last Visit to the Globe"—a trip to the roof of the newspaper's headquarters on Elliott Avenue to see the giant, spinning, neon planet with "It's in the P-I" written around the equator. To pose for pictures with the icon of a 146-year-old Seattle institution. And to maybe circle it, as if it were the Kaaba—which, for P-I journalists who see their profession as a somewhat sacred calling, and their newspaper as an embodiment of a noble effort that makes for a better culture, the globe, in a way,...

There was a time, years ago, when William Randoph Hearst worked hard at expanding his newspaper empire, and after his death in 1951, his successors continued to acquire, building one of the world's great media empires. These days the successors of those successors are working hard at shedding what doesn't work in what's left of that newspaper empire, and it's a lot. A peek into how it might all play out may well be gathered from what's about to happen at the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Hearst's money-losing morning daily, which has a weekday circulation of 118,000. Unable to find a buyer,...

Newspaper giant McClatchy, which owns 49.5 percent of the voting stock in the Seattle Times Co., is now valuing that position as worthless. In the latest 10K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, McClatchy says the Seattle Times Co. in 2008 "recorded a comprehensive loss related to its retirement plan liabilities." As a result, says McClatchy, "the Company’s investment in STC at December 28, 2008 is zero, and no future income or losses from STC will be recorded until the Company’s carrying value is restored through future earnings by STC. Accordingly, no significant income or losses are expected to...

These pictures were taken Friday 09/27/2009 at the Seattle Tea Party protest. There were probably 200, or so, protesters present for the lunch time rally, which is a decent sized crowd for the very liberal Seattle area, especially with such short notice. In the future I hope more Seattle area Republicans will brave the mostly liberal mass of humanity, and the hunt for affordable parking to protest the communist takeover of our government. Conservatives have got to get better at organizing, and better at gathering big crowds. The media was present at the protest, but we will have to be...

Community members, newspaper employees, bloggers and academicians had a lively exchange Thursday evening at City Hall, where roughly 150 people gathered to discuss "Seattle As A No-Newspaper Town."

Kevin P. Casey Over the years, the P-I's iconic symbol has moved from the Regrade to the waterfront. Next stop: a history museum? By the look of things, Seattle is about to become, at best, a one-newspaper town. Unfortunately for Art Thiel, his isn't the one. "I think I could be a pretty good pool boy for a wealthy widow," says the wisecracking Seattle Post-Intelligencer sports columnist, starting to riff on his future if the P-I is shuttered by the Hearst Corporation in mid-March. "I was also thinking of a career teaching English for English Speakers. Spell-checker aside, I...

Holding signs reading "Stimulate Business, Not Government," "Families Against Porkulus" and "Say No To Generational Theft," protesters opposed to the $787 billion stimulus package have been mobilizing across the country. It started last Monday in Seattle, then moved Tuesday to Denver, where President Obama signed the stimulus bill into law. That was followed by another one in Mesa, Ariz., where Obama unveiled a mortgage rescue plan. Another protest was planned for Saturday outside the office of Rep. Dennis Moore in Overland Park, Kan. The Democrat voted for the stimulus. His office didn't return calls seeking comment. A New Populism? As...

Imagine you are the head of a company that loses a multi-million dollar lawsuit. Then imagine the public outcry if you announced that you were going to raise your prices to pay off the lawsuit. Would the public get incensed? Would you lose business? Likely both. It's even somewhat likely in this litigious climate in which we live that the decision to raise prices to payoff the lawsuit would spawn yet another lawsuit against you. Ah, but we are talking business, aren't we? Now imagine that you are a city government and a court finds out that you've ripped...

Fee will pay for court-ordered rebate checks. The Seattle City Council is expected Tuesday to approve a surcharge on city water customers to help cover the cost of a $22 million court-ordered rebate to water customers. The rebates are for fire hydrant costs that were wrongly charged to water customers. Fire hydrants are a basic city responsibility and have to be paid for from the general fund, the state Supreme Court has ruled. Arthur Lane, a former Seattle city attorney who, together with Rud Okeson, filed about a half-dozen lawsuits against the city in recent years to protect the rights...

There are good comments on her blog about how to get this kind of stuff going. Also, someone mentions www.resistnet.com organizing protests in DC.

NEVER-BEFORE-REVEALED TERRORIST TRAINING VIDEO EXPOSES 35 COMPOUNDS ON AMERICAN SOILBy Steve Foley - Posted on February 9th, 2009 Press Release from the Christian Action Network “Act like you are his friend. Then kill him.” – Sheik Muburak Gilani explaining how to kill American infidels Washington, DC—Christian Action Network will show Homegrown Jihad at the Landmark Theater in Washington, DC, on February 11, 2009, at 7:30 pm. There is no charge to attend the viewing. Copies can also be obtained at www.christianaction.org. The American public was never supposed to know. The 2006 Justice Department document that exposes 35 terrorist training compounds...

Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske has accepted a job in the Obama administration, most likely overseeing the nation's drug policies, according to sources familiar with the chief's plans... ...Sources said Kerlikowske established ties in Washington, D.C., and has a strong relationship with U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder, who served as deputy attorney general during the Clinton years... ...He has been an advocate of gun control and fought to pass the assault-weapons ban and has championed closing the background-check loophole at gun shows...

BELLEVUE, Wash., Feb. 11 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Reports that Seattle Police Chief Gil Kerlikowske has been tapped to become the nation's next "drug czar" offer more proof of the anti-gun intentions of the Obama administration, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms said today. "During his eight-year tenure as Seattle's police chief, Gil Kerlikowske has established himself as a devoted lobbyist for every restrictive gun law proposal," said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. "That's pretty hypocritical of a guy whose own gun was stolen out of his department car on a downtown Seattle street. He may pass an...

SEATTLE — A group devoted to keeping two daily newspapers in Seattle is pushing a community effort to buy the Seattle Post-Intelligencer from Hearst Corp. It might be the best hope for keeping the P-I alive, the Committee for a Two-Newspaper Town said Wednesday, adding that it would welcome the involvement of political, business, labor and community leaders. “The goal is to ensure that the P-I, which has been publishing local news daily since 1863, is not lost forever,” the group said in a news release. Hearst announced Jan. 9 that it was putting the P-I up for sale, and...

Washington, D.C. 09:28 AM PST on Monday, February 2, 2009 By KING5.com Staff SEATTLE – King County Executive Ron Sims is heading to Washington, D.C. to work for the Obama administration, Seattle Times columnist Joni Balter is reporting. Balter says Sims will take a job as deputy secretary, No. 2, at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Rumors about Sims have been circulating for months. Sims has called a 10 a.m. news conference. Sims was first elected to the King County Council in 1985. He was appointed King County Executive in 1996 after then-Executive Gary Locke was elected...

I dont know why my local news station in Oregon is calling a 4.6 earthquake in Seattle Washington Breaking News. Hardly breaking IMO must gonna be a slow news day.

On Wednesday, worries that the dominant Seattle daily may soon file for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection crept out into the open when an administrator for the union that represents Times employees mentioned the possibility in an e-mail to union members. "Within the Guild we have been preparing for a number of worst-case scenarios, including the possibility that the Times might enter the Chapter 11 bankruptcy process," wrote Liz Brown, administrator for the union, the Pacific Northwest Newspaper Guild. Brown's e-mail came in response to an earlier e-mail from Times managers suggesting that a union employee pension freeze might be sought...

On January 11, my family went to noon Mass at Blessed Sacrament parish in Seattle. It was being celebrated by our visiting priest, but after he processed up to the altar, we were astonished to see that Father Tom Kraft had taken a seat beside him. Father Tom is one of the sweetest and holiest men I have ever known: a thoroughly priestly man with a profound sense of his vocation, a deep love for the poor, a beautiful humility, and a sheer radiant goodness. He is also dying of esophageal cancer that has metastasized. We've been praying for him...

The president-elect's Seattle residence in 1961. (Photo courtesy of the Washington State Archives, Puget Sound Branch, King County Assessor Property Record Card collection photograph (1937). Very little has been written about President-elect Barack Obama's mother Stanley Ann Dunham's time here in Seattle. Brief articles and even briefer accounts from schoolmates make the person who was the most influential person in Obama's life all the more intriguing. A single mother who enrolled in the University of Washington in 1961 and signed up for 1962 extension program, she likely came across many social prejudices in the predominantly all-white campus. Perhaps Ann Obama...

* Gene Johnson and Phuong Le, Associated Press Writers * Friday January 9, 2009, 8:08 pm EST SEATTLE (AP) -- Hearst Corp. put Seattle's oldest newspaper, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, up for sale on Friday and said that if it can't find a buyer in the next 60 days the paper would likely close or continue to exist only online. If it does become an Internet-only operation, the P-I, as the paper is known locally, would have a "greatly reduced staff," Hearst said in a statement. Hearst is a major media company that also owns TV stations, other newspapers and magazines...

The Seattle P-I is being put up for sale, and if after 60 days it has not sold, it will either be turned into a Web-only publication with a greatly reduced staff or discontinued entirely. "One thing is clear: at the end of the sale process, we do not see ourselves publishing in print," said Steven Swartz, president of the Hearst Corp.'s newspaper division. Swartz addressed the P-I's newsroom at about noon Friday, flanked by P-I editor and publisher Roger Oglesby and Lincoln Millstein, Hearst's senior vice president for digital media. Swartz said the reason for offering the paper for...

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, which first rolled off the presses in 1863 and has been the state's longest-publishing newspaper, is up for sale. The newspaper's staff was called into a closed meeting today by Publisher Roger Oglesby. Present at the meeting was Hearst Newspaper President Steve Swartz, who told the newsroom that Hearst Corp. is starting a 60-day process to find a buyer. If a buyer is not found, Swartz said, possible options include creating an all-digital operation with a greatly reduced staff, or closing its operations entirely. In no case will Hearst continue to publish the P-I in printed form,...

SEATTLE (AP) — Hearst Corp. put Seattle's oldest newspaper, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, up for sale Friday, saying that if it can't find a buyer in the next 60 days, the paper will close or continue to exist only on the Internet. "These options include a move to a digital only operation with a greatly reduced staff, or a complete shutdown of all operations," Hearst, the P-I's parent company, said in a statement. "In no case will Hearst continue to publish the P-I in printed form following the conclusion of this process."

In response to recent incidents of violence, including a shooting on May 24 that killed three people at Seattle's Folklife festival, Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels has recommended that all city departments consider a ban of all concealed weapons on city property. The ban would make it illegal for anyone to carry a firearm on properties including the Seattle Center and City Hall, even with a concealed weapons permit. State law already prohibits firearms in schools, courthouses and jails. It would not affect city streets and public sidewalks that are not being used for city events, parking garages and lots, city...

KING 5 news has learned that Seattle may soon become a one newspaper town. Like many newspapers across America the Seattle Post-Intelligencer has been struggling to survive. Now, a source close to the deal tells KING 5 that the paper's owner, Hearst Corporation, will announce as soon as tomorrow that it's putting the P-I up for sale. Under the joint operating agreement between the P-I and The Seattle Times, the P-I must be offered for sale for at least 30 days before it can cease operation. The joint operating agreement was formed in 1983 in an effort to keep both...

Eleven gay bars in Seattle were sent letters Tuesday threatening ricin attacks — in what some are describing as a hate crime. The anonymous letters say, "I have in my possession approximately 67 grams of ricin with which I will indiscriminately target at least five of your clients. ... I expect them to die painfully while in hospital." A 12th letter was sent to the alternative weekly The Stranger, according to its Web site. That letter says the paper should be "prepared to announce the deaths of approximately 55 individuals." The letter lists the bars as: The Elite, Neighbours, The...

From the school of thought that brought us such blockbuster idiocies as "No DDT Means Malaria" and "Blood For Owl: Move It Lumber" comes a new thriller with all the intrigue that only moronic environmentalists can evoke.Ladies and Gentlemen, I give you the salty tale of "Pass The Salt - The Puget Sound Chronicles."Floyd and Mary Beth Brown at Townhall.com tell the story: Snow and ice cause an increase in car crashes. Car tires have little or no traction on these surfaces. We learn these basic facts in Driver's Ed 101. However, officials in Seattle, Wash. disregard these physics laws...

Tempted to leave that new GPS system in your car? Think you can get away with stashing your laptop behind the seat or your iPod in the glove box? ... You might as well just leave them on the hood of your car with a "For Free" sign attached. At least you'd save yourself the cost of replacing a shattered car-door window, according to police, insurance agents, glass-repair experts and the legions of folks who've found themselves victims of Seattle's most oft-reported crime — the car prowl. A two-week snapshot of criminal incidents reported to the Seattle Police Department shows...

A man was shot and killed and two others were injured at the Chop Suey nightclub on Seattle's Capitol Hill early this morning, a police spokesman said. One man, 25, has been booked into the King County Jail for investigation of assault. Another suspect, is still at large, police said. Seattle police arrived at the club in the 1300 block of East Madison Street about 12:30 a.m.

Somalis in U.S. draw FBI attention War at home seen as lure The FBI is expanding contacts with Somali immigrant communities in the U.S., especially in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, fearing that terrorists are recruiting young men for suicide missions in their homeland. FBI Special Agent E.K. Wilson, spokesman for the Twin Cities FBI field office, described the effort as community outreach. Many members of the Somali community are concerned over disappearances, he said.

BREMERTON, Wash. (AP) - Andrew Knight wishes it could snow 360 days a year. If that happened, he'd be able to put lot more money in the bank. During Christmas Week, Knight of DMK Tractor Services in Bremerton barely had a chance to let his Kubota tractor cool off. On Monday, he began plowing snow off driveways and parking lots for local businesses. "They'd just see me out there plowing and flag me down, and off to the next place I'd go," he told the Kitsap Sun. Knight spent Friday digging out car dealerships on Auto Center Way. He figures...

our days after telling its nonunion employees that they each must take one week of unpaid leave, The Seattle Times has confirmed that it will also freeze their pensions. The freeze takes effect Feb. 6 and stops benefit accruals for the current plan year. It does not affect the company's 401(k) plan. "The specific savings related to this action are not going to be released publicly," Times spokeswoman Jill Mackie said. "We regret the effect of these decisions on our employees. We have a remarkable work force, and we are doing what we can to respond to the financial challenges...

To hear the city's spin, Seattle's road crews are making "great progress" in clearing the ice-caked streets. But it turns out "plowed streets" in Seattle actually means "snow-packed," as in there's snow and ice left on major arterials by design. "We're trying to create a hard-packed surface," said Alex Wiggins, chief of staff for the Seattle Department of Transportation. "It doesn't look like anything you'd find in Chicago or New York." The city's approach means crews clear the roads enough for all-wheel and four-wheel-drive vehicles, or those with front-wheel drive cars as long as they are using chains, Wiggins said....

Back in April of 2007 the FBI raided a Somalian grocery store in Seattle looking for Shumpert. Too late, Shumpert was gone. Already on his way to Somalia to fight for al Qaeda's local branch, the al Shabaab Youth Mujahideen Movement. Later Shumpert pulled a Hannibal Lecter and called the FBI from Somalia. He saw too many movies, I guess. In real life the fighters for Allah end up dying, get no virgins, and their deaths do absolutely nothing to further any cause worth dying for.