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What do you want your lawmakers to do?

We hear from Washington State Republican and Democratic leaders in the State House and Senate, labor, business and education leaders, and listeners.

Rico I would like to see the end of commercial crabbing in Puget Sound (not the Pacific but just the Sound).

Gary (Minton) Recent report says about 22% of state budget used for Medicaid. A large fraction of this is used by seniors in nursing homes. The report states there are many seniors who are hiding assets, and who need not be using state support given these assets (we are not talking about their homes but liquid assets such as stocks and bonds). Meanwhile, health care is being denied impoverished children. What will the legislature do about this.

Not enough HDTV for your fancy new tv?

Put art on it.

Don't trust the media! Part 1

Chicago Sun-Times publishes 2003 stock tables.

How do I help tsunami victims?

This site describes all the groups providing help and links to their web sites.

I'd rather not read this first thing in the morning.

The Cascadia fault, a 600-mile-long collision between two chunks of the earth's crust off the Pacific Northwest coast, has been quiet for a long time, and that is not a comforting fact.

Why speak a foreign language?

No one could think of a reason not to.

Foreign words with no English equivalent

Wesley From Taiwanese Mandarin. Ma Ma Hoo Hoo Literally means "Horse Horse, Tiger Tiger". It means your opinion of something is below average or "ok" in a less than ideal way.

Tara Seattle I was a Peace Corps volunteer in the Solomon Islands for two years and learned to speak Solomon Islands pidgin English. My favorite pidgin phrase that doesn't really translate is "mi les" (pronounced "me laze"). Its origin is roughly to be lazy, but to be lazy for a specific thing. For example, if someone asks if you like a certain food, "mi les" means you don't really like it, but not strongly enough to hate it. Or perhaps if someone asks if you'd like to go somewhere, "mi les" means you don't really feel like it.
Perhaps a good slang translation would be "I'm not into it".

Steve & Marla Wallingford, Seattle … a favorite word to share that's as handy for us here in Seattle as in the cold, dark rainy winters of the Netherlands where it comes from: gezellig (pronounced kind of similar to "challah" bread). It means something akin to cozy-togetherness....a state of being together with friends in a nice cozy spot. Wishing you and your listeners a gezellig New Year!

Matt Woodinville I think that understanding a foreign language allows insight into culture, but more importantly into the way that people form ideas and opinions. Mandarin (like other Chinese dialects) is mono-syllabic (each syllable is a discreet word or concept). They can be joined together to make more complex words, so “QiChi” (pronounced Chi – Chur) means car, but is literally “go-fast”. I think this sort of joining of new ideas is emblematic of asian culture (accepting new things, adopting new concepts, etc).
Anyway, here’s a joke that I enjoy telling to my friends in asia.
If you speak three languages, we say you are tri-lingual
If you speak two languages, we call you Bi-lingual,
But if you only speak one language, you must be an American!

Jeff BBC Article about 'Ilunga', judged the most untranslatable word... http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3830521.stm
Two other words that I've recently encountered along the same lines:
1. attaccabottoni - (Italy) a bore who buttonholes people and tells sad, pointless stories.
2. mamihlapinatapei - (Tierra Del Fuego) looking into each other's eyes, each hoping the other will initiate what both want to do but neither chooses to commence.

Howard Seattle The German word "Umstandskraemer" describes a person who is always looking for problems where there don't seem to be any. It is more descriptive than our "nitpicker", more like "noodge, which I think is originally Yiddish.

Gwendolyn In German, the word famously untranslatable word "Gemuetlichkeit" (ge-MOOT-lich-keit) is translated in dictionaries as "coziness", "snugness", or "sociability". This doesn't even come close to the meaning of the word as I, a native English speaker, understand it. I would also add to that "laid-back, carefree atmosphere", or "the indescribable feeling you get while sitting in a beer garden with a large mug of crisp beer and some good friends on a warm August afternoon under the shade of an enormous chestnut tree". Germans are proud to have this word, as well they should be.

Rats as big as raccoons!

Florida Keys fright. African Gambian Pouch rats.

Your 2004!

Why rely on what the pundits say about the past year? We've all got our own lives.

Mike 2004 Started with my car dying. An ex-girlfriend came to me from her abusive husband and then went back. My cousin's husband of 25 years died of Lukemia. I lost a bid on a great house because the company I worked for closed their doors for good and I was out of a job.
I received a pinched nerve in my neck that was very painful and debilitating. One of my mentors that I've known for 20 years died of cancer. I won first place in a national art contest for my sketchbook. I got a brand new Scion TC that is the best car I've owned. The worst presidential election result ever. I'm glad 2004 is over. I hope and pray that 2005 will be better.

Zoe The love of my life and I were able to be legally married, in the brief span of allowed time in Portland. We were validated by our family in a wonderful celebration, in which even my grandparents came to be with us. I felt my heart settle in my chest and my blood running more fluidly in my veins for after 10 years of loving my wife, our love was concecrated at last. For this we are so grateful.

John I'll remember 2004 ...for the five weeks I spent at UW Medical Center getting a blood stem cell transplant. The docs and nurses there and at SCCA (seattle cancer care affiliate) were all great, not just because they saved my life but they made a difficult time seem easy. Send them my love. I'm sitting here and I can say 'Happy New Year!' and my recent 6 month evaluation came back clear and cancer free. I can't complain. It changed my life and I'm getting into a whole new line of much more fulfilling work, and better for the community too.

2004 Poems and Haukus

incognito

This year began with a snow
That trapped me with no where to go.
Being stuck with a boy from my work,
I discovered he wasn’t a jerk
And finally decided to stop saying no.

Sandra I was single for over 25 years and got married this year.

Got married this year
Gone Twenty five years single
must communicate

Anonmyous

21 years done
Sedona becomes a home
I'm eddying out.

Michelle, Redmond

Baseball a plenty
First Passport, trip to England
Five Spot Proposal

Janet, North Ballard

The bad:
Parted from the love of my life
My dog died
Diagnosed with a benign tumor
The heartbreak of the election

The Good:
Studies are going well
Surgery to remove my tumor went well
I am getting my life back

Holding hope for 2005

Carsten

Explosions profound
Murky seasons abound-
O' Discordia!

Carl

sick and wondering
will new liver come
wife is there like spring

The best damn year in review column.

From Rick Anderson at the Seattle Weekly.

No blush!

You're Fired!

Property rights versus Growth Management

Two issues this week in the never ending dispute which afflicts every high growth area, like Western Washington, where grunge may be gone, but property values just keep going up and up and up....

Alex
http://www.ij.org/private_property/connecticut/12_9_04pr.html

more links

King County Council Adopts Updates to Critical Areas, Clearing & Grading, and Stormwater Ordinances, King County http://www.metrokc.gov/ddes/cao/
Locke sanctions Snohomish county for allowing car dealership to expand http://www.heraldnet.com/stories/04/12/29/100loc_sanctions.cfm
State Planning and Growth Management Database: Washington http://www.urbanfutures.org/state.cfm?state=Washington
http://www.researchcouncil.org/Briefs/2002/PB02-9/Reviewing_Growth_Management.htm
Reviewing Growth Management Washington Research Council http://www.researchcouncil.org/Briefs/2002/PB02-9/Reviewing_Growth_Management.htm

Lowlights of 2004

Memo to self - don't the leave the car unlocked while streaking through Denny's.

Ecstasy for terminal cancer patients?

It seems they're about to try it for despondent people who are having difficulty talking about it. Can club drugs be the answer?

Workplace bullying

We asked if anyone had been bullied in the workplace and got an earful. Washington State may join four others in laws requiring to businesses to have policies discouraging bullying.

Scott The invention of the concept of ‘Workplace Bullying’ seems like someone has way too much time on their hands.... Being a supervisor of a department of more than 40 employees, I am very conscious of any situation where either I or one of my staff may be perceived as being aggressive, threatening, intimidating or simply not showing others respect. I feel compelled to take swift and decisive action when any employee is uncomfortable with any interaction here at my store. Additionally I have modified my management style so as to minimize any exposure I would create when disciplining, counseling, or coaching an employee. I feel that the RCWs that exist right now may be tilted towards the employee a little too much, but that they are built that way (and necessarily so) to get employers’ attention and effect culture change. Adding new legislation and definitions to include ‘bullying’ would only feed the needs of lawyers and legislators and do little to improve conditions for anyone. If they are brought to fruition, it will be just one more reason businesses will downgrade Washington State when looking for places to set up shop. The current laws are more than adequate and will serve any employee that understands their rights very, very well. Rather than new legislation, and the bureaucracy that would surely sprout from it, we should dedicate any funding that would be required to an education campaign for both employers and employees on the current laws already on the books. I have to believe that would do much more than putting into action another law most people will never know about.

Laura I own a small company with 9 employees. One (female) 20-year-old new hire started bullying a co-worker (also female) about three months after she was hired. The co-worker came to me with complaints about this new hire, with some specific examples of the problem behaviors. We spoke to the new hire about her behavior, and she started being more sneaky but did not change, so we fired her. I still have not figured out her motive, but we did not and will not tollerate that behavior at our company.
We did not need a law, or even a written policy; we just saw something wrong and delt with it. I don't know if a law will be a good idea or not; as an employer we have all kinds of red tape all ready. I am rather hesitant to accept this as a law. As a fair and reasonable employer, from my point of view a law is not necessary. It is too bad that our world is such that laws are needed to regulate behavior that should just be common sense, courtesy, and consideration.

Vince work place bullying? please. this is the political correctness agenda run off to its silly extremes. we all experience bullying. usually in about 3rd grade, on the playground. and we all (need to) learn to deal with it. it's called growing up. will you also do a show on wimps in the workplace?

anonymous: The caller who said that people just need to speak up for themselves are not considering the people who desperately need the job that they have. It’s not easy to speak out if you’re afraid that you’ll lose your job for doing so and he’s living in a fantasy land if he thinks just bringing it up will take care of the problem. It’s much more complicated than that.

Steve I prefer the word "Mobbing" to describe bullying in the work place. The bully boss is very rarely alone in any form of attack on workers. In the academic, governmental, or not-for-profit sector bullying and/or emotional intimidation is rampant. The book "Mobbing: emotional abuse in the workplace" may be one of the best resources available on this issue.

Dave in Lynnwood "Carrot and the stick"; "good cop / bad cop", are well-known motivational axioms. As an IT project manager of 25 years, I learned to make a point of maximizing the carrot and minimizing the stick. My team knew the stick was always there, and the few times I felt the need to wield it, it had a lot more impact. My experience is that those in a supervisory capacity that use the stick too much get a good short-term response, but its effectiveness burns out quickly, leaving rancor, divisiveness, and low morale in its wake.

Melissa in Beacon Hill Your definition of a bully boss fits my old boss perfectly. As a new
employee at a local biotech company, things seemed fine for the first few months. While firm, my new boss seemed fair. Once I got engaged, things changed drastically. This person found every mistake I made an opportunity to humiliate and belittle me. Examples include: yelling at me in front of co-workers, refusing requests for vacation time, and putting me through probation periods. As time wore on, I started having physical symptoms, including disrupted sleep and an ulcer. What's worse, no matter what I said to the human resources dept., nothing was done. I finally started interviewing for other jobs, and now am working for a wonderful person who
is actually capable of communication and respectful management. Thanks for addressing this important topic!

Should Dino throw in the towl?

Our interminable governor's election race continues. Today we asked if Republican Dino Rossi (won the election and the first recount) should concede to Democrat Christine Gregoire (won the second recount) or fight on in the courts. Aside from those alternatives listeners suggested flipping a coin or splitting the term, each serving two years.

Dan We can do it like the we did the witches back in the day. We light them both on fire, and the one that comes out alive is the TRUE governor of Washington.

Bob, Seattle I voted for Gregoire. But as I see it, Rossi has the legal right to pursue the election as far as the law allows. Given the closeness of the election he has the incentive to do so. Once the legal questions have been taken as far as they can go, one candidate or the other should concede.

Michael I believe that both candidates should use every legal means they can. All this legal action of the close election means that the system is working and will work itself out. However, I believe that without a runoff we will never truly know who got the most votes.

Syl, Central Area What are the reasons that the Republicans allege that some votes were unfairly rejected? When the Dems were alleging the same we knew many specific details. We don't know the details upon which the Repubs. allege that votes were illegally or unfairly rejected. Can you tell us this?

George What I'm surprised about is the lack of interest in WHY we have an election this close. I've heard that this is the closest election in American history, certainly Wa. history. What are the political forces that lead to a state so closely divided?

Virgil Regardless of who our next governor is, let us not forget that Ron Sims is responsible for the mess. Had he urged his primary (democratic) voters to switch their support to Chris G. after she beat the pants off him, the present situation would not exist.

Mia Seattle I'm a high school senior watching this election closely. I couldn't vote, but I supported Rossi. The first count was not good enough, and neither is the second count. The margins are to small to declare a winner. I know it takes more time and money, but I believe we owe it to ourselves to make sure all the votes are counted. Why settle?

jeff seattle I don't think, as a recent caller suggested that you stop counting votes simply because there's a clock that runs out -- that only build in an incentive for people who would twist the outcome to stall. If the Republicans can find votes parallel to the King County votes -- votes that were proper in every legal requirement but overlooked or misfiled -- in King or other counties, we should *mandate* they, and all such votes (not cherry-picked or on an uneven county-by-county standard) be counted.