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flatdawgs

Certifiably Surly
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About flatdawgs

  • Birthday April 28

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  1. Sandpoint's a nice town, beautiful surroundings. Buddy grew up and has a lake house about 45 minutes away, on the WA side of the border (headed over there in a couple of weeks). Priest River and up towards Priest Lake is where you'll find a lot more of the white supremacist crowd (and Bonners Ferry, as you mentioned). Oddly enough, Pend Oreille county on the WA side is certainly very conservative but not quite the same vibe as across the river; I've enjoyed visits to the tiny county fair and other community events there. It's probably because it's close enough to Spokane to get the weekender lake house people. (If you’re ever in Usk, you owe it to yourself to stop by Mellany's for a shockingly good meal made by the kindest people you'll ever meet.)
  2. And Oregon (Bundy/Malheur), and California, and... well, pretty much everywhere in the country, particularly those places where there is actually wilderness left to hide in/around.
  3. Yes, very much so - although the people of CdA itself have fought back successfully against some of these groups via the courts.
  4. Check Spokane media (KREM TV, etc.) - they are the largest city near Coeur d'Alene and will have live coverage. Kootenai County sheriff live press conference right now. Two dead, "many" injured. I know this area a bit; my parents were married in CdA.
  5. Yeah, there's been a movement here (Seattle) to switch to even years; the state lege forced all municipalities into off-year elections in 1969, so both municipal and state law would need to change. Turnout in off years even in a vote by mail state like WA is about half of even-year elections. That said, terms would be shortened by a year at the bridge rather than adding an extra year as Miami is doing. Oh well, at least we're going to ranked-choice primaries in two years.
  6. 30-35% +/- is baseline in most countries; it's the fact that we have a two-party system that exacerbates it (Portugal's far-right Chega party, for example, took 35% in last month's elections but they did not take power as the other two major parties locked them out; similar percentages are found in recent elections from France to Brasil). Not great, but certainly not an outlier.
  7. Spokane is a purply-bluish city (fun fact: Democratic Speaker of the House Tom Foley represented Spokane's congressional district, albeit 40 years ago; much more recently the state House speaker was a Democrat from Spokane). That said, 5 miles out of town in any direction and you hear banjos; 10 to the east and you're in northern Idaho. Every year some Republican backbencher from the area floats secession from the state; this year they kind of gave up on that and now are onto "autonomous region", meaning "we don't want you to tell us what to do, but please keep sending us that sweet, sweet tax money to pay for all of our services." So - hell yeah, Spokane!
  8. Well, that was post-Balfour, which came from that imperial British genius of promising everything to everyone, all at once.
  9. David Fromkin's A Peace to End All Peace is a great read on the topic, although at 35 years old or so it's not fully up to date. That said it's a very good survey on the end of the Ottoman Empire from the Young Turk movement pre-WWI to Ataturk; the effect of the war on Türkiye, the Levant, and Palestine; and the creation of the modern Middle East.
  10. 51,600 in Seattle to see a result everyone knew would happen, 3pm on a Thursday. Kudos to Atlético Madrid for taking it seriously and trying to close their goal differential in the group. (I would have loved to have found those Miami $4 tickets, but the prices never dropped and the cheap seats went for $65.)
  11. The best thing about that is that Kalama/Longview are deep in the heart of the Alabama of Western Washington. It's as MAGA as a D+20 state gets. Love this thing.
  12. Ah, but I speak enough Portuguese to have fun with the Brazilian fans, and am enjoying drinking with them. The match was actually entertaining.
  13. Going to Sounders v Botafogo this evening in the Group o' Death - wouldn't likely be competitive even if the Sounders weren't banged up, but I'm still looking forward to seeing some of these teams I'd probably never see otherwise.
  14. Went to both rallies/marches in Seattle - most of the suburbs also had one, including the one Rick Steves was at above. The one at the UW had a couple thousand (it was commencement today as well, so a bit more challenging to get to). The main march had 70,000 estimated; it filled the entire 2 mile route from end to end. Many, many others lined the streets and rooftops and leaned out windows cheering and banging pots. No damage, no hassle, nothing at all went awry. No cops at all visible at the UW; downtown there were none along the route as they were a block to either side keeping the cross streets closed. Trains ran every couple of minutes all day to get people in and out. Great day, made greater by all the posts from fellow Surlyites from cities and towns far and near, big and small.
  15. Apropos of nothing, I think it would be great if Exxon honored its Standard Oil (SO) legacy by rebranding their US service stations as "Esso". You know, as a tip of the hat to history.
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