Eww...Somehow we haven't ever before considered the potentially toxic chemicals in such seemingly innocuous every-day items as baby bottles, but now we're eying all the plastic around us with new suspicion. The chemical in question today is bisphenol A, or BPA, which the state House just voted to ban from baby bottles, sippy cups and water bottles sold here. How timely--today, six of the largest manufacturers of baby bottles announced they're not even going to make BPA-contaminated products anymore, according to the Washington Post. more ›

A couple days ago, we received an email plea from the Washington Homebrewers Association to help get State Senate Bill 5060 (PDF), which eases some restrictions on homebrewing, passed. While homebrewing is perfectly legal, currently it is illegal under state law to transport or provide any homebrewed beer or wine outside the home of manufacture, except for competitions, in which no more than one gallon may be transported and provided free, and only to judges. Easing these restrictions helps pave the way for homebrewers to find a public and will help promote the local craft-brewing industry. Anyone interested in supporting (or opposing) said legislation can attend a public hearing before the the Commerce, Labor, and Consumer Protection Committee tomorrow in Olympia, currently scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Check here for details. more ›

It's opening day of the 2009 duck-hunting season state legislative session, and all signs point towards an interestingly contentious set of months in Olympia as the legislators deal with a deepening budget crisis. The Times notes that since Gregoire isn't campaigning anymore, state Democrats are now free to complain as loudly as their hearts desire without fear of giving an advantage to Dino Rossi's camp. For more information about the agendas of each committee meeting today, check Access Washington's calendar page. more ›

The most unfortunate victims of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor--which happened 66 years ago today--were surely the 2,333 military personnel who lost their lives. more ›

The Stranger has endorsed a No vote on the RTID Proposition 1 (along with the Seattle Times, but thankfully with more logic and, er, research). Their reasoning? "Rather than letting compromised politicians tell us what's possible, the people should tell the leaders what's needed: more light rail without massive roads expansion." more ›

Peter Steinbrueck, a soon-to-be--former City Council member, announced legislation today that would require all city departments that review the environmental impacts of projects to take greenhouse gas emissions into account. more ›

Seattlest's favorite crime (just edging Identity Theft) strikes again, this time in one of Seattlest's favorite places. A copper theft at Snoqualmie Pass temporarily disabled highway signs and safety lighting, which had to suck for people navigating the pass in the middle of the night. more ›

Seattlest watches as a S.L.U.T. is born and Seattle Flickr users go nuts over a local art installation. A restaurant critic demands a Diner's Bill of Rights over a gnat next to her drink, and, in lieu of a Portlandist, Seattlest debates with itself over the identity of the Northwest's crown jewel. Seattlest also joins the guys from Fantagraphics for an ill-fated gun party in the woods. more ›

With unseasonable weather descending upon much of North America, schools getting ready to reconvene, and sports seasons getting exciting, it's a busy time of year for us here in the Ist-A-Verse. Luckily, even with all the things we have to do, we still managed to get together to let you know what we've all been up to. more ›

Holy poop, Barack Obama raised a record $31 million dollars over the last three months. more ›

It's not exactly mind-blowingly awesome legislation, but our lady Maria Cantwell and her pals in the Senate have managed to negotiate a mileage standard for all U.S. cars and SUVs today. Currently, cars have to get at least 27.5 miles per gallon, while SUVs only have to get a measly 22 mpg. That's pretty pathetic from an environmentalist perspective, but it's also irresponsible from a business perspective. After all, just about every other country has been making cars that get far better gas mileage for years now. Who wants a gas-guzzling American car (Ford Focus gets 26 mpg!) when gas prices are hovering around $4/gallon and there's the option of getting a high-mpg car like Honda's Insight (61 mpg) or Volkswagen's Beetle (38 mpg)? more ›

Syd Abrams spent a quarter century as a lobbyist for the California Wine Institute, monitoring wine-related legislation in 12 western states until he was forced out two years ago, at age 78. All along, he's also been a partner in eastern Washington's pioneering, 800-acre Sagemoor Vineyards, the largest independent grape grower in the state. more ›

Slate.com put an article up yesterday suggesting GPS monitoring for abusive men who are under a restraining order. The batterer would wear a braclet or similar home arrest-type device and an alert would be sent to the police and/or the victim if he approached a home or office that was off limits to him. The example they use is Rebecca Griego who was killed by her ex Jonathan Rowan recently at the University of Washington's Gould Hall, arguing that Griego took all the standard evasive measures, but the situation still ended in tragedy. According to the article, Washington does have legislation in place that allows the use of electronic monitoring devices as a condition of a restraining order. Massachusetts recently passed a similar law that specifically mentions GPS. more ›

Hot issues don't really die, ever, they just retreat underground and cool for a while before popping up in new places. Increased regulation of strip clubs was put down by voters recently by a pretty strong majority, but according to this email we just received the City Council is reintroducing some of the restrictions of the placement of new clubs in the form of a zoning ordinance. Today at 5:30 at City Hall there's a meeting to discuss the ordinance, which, this email claims, will reduce the areas available to new strip clubs to those outlined on the map below. more ›

Ding dong NASCAR's dead. The ISC came a'knocking with promises of garbage bags full of tourist's cash if only the state legislators would agree to a tax-payer-funded track on the Peninsula. It seemed like kind of a longshot from the beginning, and NASCAR's local guys failed spectacularly at judging the state of things in the Puget Sound region. "Hey, guys, they just voted down a tax-funded basketball venue and it looks like they're gathering in front of Key Arena right now with torches and pitchforks. Get Petty over here today!" Yeah, Richard Petty came and instead of having politicians falling over themselves to kiss his belt buckle they insulted him and NASCAR fans in general and sent him on his way. We're kind of neutral on the prospect of a NASCAR track in the region. We'd go, sure. But tax-payer funded? C'mon. more ›

Someone wrote in via our tip widget today: more ›

We saw the news articles on the internet sales tax stuff that the Governor signed recently. We also saw a few blurbs about it on the TV news, but we still feel like a caveman when we attempt to wrap our mind around what is actually happening here. more ›

You're at an intersection staring down traffic, trying to get someone to stop so you can get across. Suburu Honda, Honda, Suburu, that new Mustang, Prius, then someone with those damn studs on their tires that scrape the asphalt so loudly you can hear the road repair coin getting sucked out of DOT's wallet: Krkrkrkrkrkrkrkrkrkr. Of course this is the guy that stops. Mountain man, down at sea level to pick up a few tanks of propane and tear the roads of Seattle a new asshole with his little metal knobbies. The car that finally stops always has to pay for all the cars in front of him who didn't, but little metal knobbies guy gets an extra long pedestrian meander. When he takes off again: Krkrkrkrkrkrkrkrkrkrkr. more ›

The legislation would not require the track to be built near Bremerton, though [state senator] Hatfield said he believes track promoters are serious when they say they have no other site selected. The location would allow NASCAR to connect with latte drinking Seattle urbanites, he said. more ›

McMenamins, a Portland-based chain of hotels, restaurants and brew pubs, submitted a 2005 letter of intent to lease the seminary building and turn it into a hotel with a restaurant and a conference center. more ›

Whoa, whoa, whoa there, Spencer Kim. We just caught up with Salon's reaction to James Kim's father's finger point-a-thon in the Washington Post. James Kim is, of course, the San Francisco technology journalist who died in the mountains of Oregon after getting stranded there with his family, and Spencer Kim's article blames the credit card and cell phone companies who put a lot of red tape in front of the transaction and call records of the lost family and he blames the search and rescue people who tried and failed to find his son in time to save him. It's tragic. James Kim's trek through the mountainous terrain in an attempt to save his family after they had been stranded for over a week was heroic. But blame put on Oregon forestry and search and rescue is misplaced. more ›

Speak now before McCain's new bill makes us turn comments off forever. more ›

Celebrity Cruises is getting hit with a $100,000 fine for dumping graywater into the Sound. Maybe $100,000 sounds kind of steep for flushing some shower and sink water into the Sound? It happened ten times in nine days. Whoops. The hundred grand is out of the goodness of Celebrity's hearts, though, since there is no legislation that prevents cruise ships from dumping sewage into our water. What we have in the state of Washington is a "Memorandum of Understanding," which we've talked about at greater length in the past. The short version is that cruise companies agree to pay fines if they dump waste water in the Sound, but they can't be inspected and there's no potential for legal enforcement of the fines. more ›

We swooned and applauded along with the crowd during Barack Obama's half-hour speech last night. Even though we couldn't name one piece of legislation he has proposed or any of his accomplishments, it really didn't matter. more ›

We sat down to write something about congress's attack on internet gambling and the parallels to Washington state's recent anti-online poker legislation, but a few quick Google searches that started out as "research" morphed into an hour of Texas Hold 'Em. An hour, it turns out, is exactly as long as it takes a complete idiot to lose $1000 of play money at a poker table. more ›

The recent law that makes internet gambling a Class C Felony in the state of Washington in fact isn't a recent law, the P-I tells us today. more ›

As both the Seattle Times and P-I are reporting the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's latest national ad campaign in support of Republican lawmakers has had to be tweaked a tiny bit. more ›

Eyman called a press conference in Olympia to show and turn in the signatures he gathered for two of his initiatives-- one that would repeal the civil rights legislation passed by the state legislature last winter and one concerning his obsession over 30 dollar car tabs. more ›

A new biodiesel refinery in Western Washington was announced Tuesday that would dwarf the 5 million gallons a year that local guys Seattle Biodiesel (actually it's the same guys: Imperium Renewables) can currently come up with. Supposedly the new Gray's Harbor plant will be able to produce 100 million gallons of biodiesel fuel a year which there may actually be a market for due to The Energy Freedom legislation passed in the state earlier this year which says that 2% of all diesel used in Washington will need to be biodiesel by 2008. more ›

You can don your black sweater and black jeans and join the march today, or you can get your ass out of downtown early. We suggest you do one of those, though. People are supposed to congregate at Judkins Park at 4:30pm and we've marked out the route from there out above. Over on Jackson, up on 4th, over on Pike or Union and down on 2nd to the Federal Building. more ›