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Wednesday, September 19, 2007

This Week’s Paper

posted by on September 19 at 17:01 PM

I’m glad the new issue is on-line because I’ve been waiting all day to throw a bouquet Jonah Spangenthal-Lee’s way.

Jonah has an important must-read story in this week’s news section.

Jonah found a list of johns and their phone numbers in the case file of an underage prostitute. It followed that these johns could be guilty of sexual exploitation of a minor and child rape.

Jonah discovered that the SPD hadn’t pursued these guys. Meanwhile, the County sought serious time for the 15-year-old. Jonah reports that the SPD’s excuse for not going after potential child rapists is that they didn’t have the time or resources.

It took Jonah two seconds to pick up the phone and call “Blue Van Man” and the other 10 names on the list (Jonah reached one guy at work) to determine that some of them had, in fact, had sex with the 15-year-old.

Jonah also has a hot story this week on a woman who was fired from Nintendo for her personal blog.

Also: Be sure to check out Erica Barnett’s thoughtful and excellent news feature this week about fixed-gear bikes (fixies) and the fatal bike crash at Eastlake and Fuhrman.

RSS icon Comments

1

When you're done licking Jonah's butthole, click here.

Posted by Mr. Poe | September 19, 2007 5:04 PM
2

Nintendo needs to be sued! This bullshit will only get worse unless we stop it...my favourite was the quote from the Nintendo executive: "...I've seen everything that she's written and it's really not work appropriate." Um, except she wasn't doing it at work. Once more example of the increasing encroachment of our jobs on our lives outside of our jobs (drug testing, anyone?)

Posted by Dianna | September 19, 2007 6:07 PM
3

Sounds like John #1 made a good faith effort to make sure the girl was of age. Still though, unless they caught the girl with a fake ID, all those guys should be sweating fucking bullets right about now.

Posted by Big Sven | September 19, 2007 6:16 PM
4

I gather from the print version of Erica's bike story that the crux of it is that you can't stop very well without brakes. At first on the Slog she said Bryce Lewis had a front brake and that he couldn't stop because he would have flipped over. It turned out that reasoning didn't fly.

So in the print version, she doesn't really say clearly whether Bryce had brakes on his bike. I think we're supposed to infer that riders like him usually remove their brakes, if their bikes ever had them.

So if you see Erica, can you ask her, did he have a brake or didn't he? It's the key fact at the center of her whole story, and a few days ago she seemed to know.

Posted by elenchos | September 19, 2007 7:05 PM
5

No 4: You're right (even a stopped clock...)--that fact got left out during the editing of the final story, which was an error on our part. He did have a single front brake. Still not easy to stop, as I said in my original post. Anyway, I'll make sure to make that clear in the online version.

Posted by ECB | September 19, 2007 8:14 PM
6

Hey Erica, do you ride a fixed gear bike? Does it have a front brake? How hard do you find it to stop? I know you won't respond to these questions but it's also obvious that you don't ride a fixed gear bike and have zero first hand experience. Do you admit that anywhere?

That statement, "still not easy to stop" is pretty hilarious. It's funny how even after many many people tell you you don't know what you're talking about, you just plow ahead. Once you've made up your mind, that's it. Your ignorance is only equaled by your stubborness.

You write in your story that fixed gear bikes are "notoriously dangerous" or something like that. Oh really? Care to provide some statistics/data/facts? That is such sloppy journalism, it's pretty shocking. It sounds like something Joel Connolly would write.

Conclusion: the Stranger is anti-fixed gear bikes.

Posted by tree | September 20, 2007 12:06 AM
7

Wow, there was an article in the Seattle Times a while back that was way more positive about fixed-gear bikes than Erica's ignorant drivel.
"Notoriously danger"? "Not easy to stop"? Um, ok grandma...

Posted by tree | September 20, 2007 12:19 AM
8

Re: Erica's article.
A fixed gear with a good front brake is significantly easier to stop than a freewheel bike for rider with some experience. By far the most significant danger that led to this tragedy is a bike lane that runs to the right of motor traffic through an intersection like this. Cars and trucks will drive right through the bike lane. The only safe place for a bike moving at a reasonable pace through an intersection like this is the center of a traffic lane.

Posted by Wes B | September 20, 2007 1:57 AM
9

I was surprised to see that the cyclists' lack of helmets was mentioned only once in the entire article.

Posted by vitamin-e | September 20, 2007 5:24 AM
10

When I got to this line I pretty much stopped reading. "...while others have simply attached fake brake levers and cables to their handlebars in hopes of eluding unobservant police"

Fawking idiots.

Posted by Dr_Awesome | September 20, 2007 5:41 AM
11

Fixies is a cute name for track bikes. They're made for a bike racing track. They're just as safe as it would be to take an indy car and drive it in traffic.

Did you read ECBs article? It says she has ridden one, the people who sell them acknowledge that they're harder to stop.

This particular accident almost certainly happened because of the inherent foolishness of bike lanes. You simply can't ride on the right side of cars which can turn right at any time and think you have the right away - even though in a bike lane you do. The track bike apologist is right, on this at least, the only safe place is in the traffic lane.

Posted by Mike | September 20, 2007 6:16 AM
12

Re: Fired from Nintendo for blogging

Don't get me wrong... I'm all for bitching about work. With your significant other, your friends and relatives. On the phone, by email or in person.

When you blog about it, its kind of like bitching about a teacher while you're still at school... the teacher may be coming up behind you as you rant. And we all know how that scenario ends.

I also think that if you want to say something about someone and don't want to say it to their face (maybe because it's not work appropriate?) then you should only say it behind their back if you do it in a venue where it is fairly unlikely that the person will find out. Obviously in this case, using a pseudonym (but still your real picture!) and refraining from naming names (but giving recognizable physical descriptions!) was not good enough to conceal her identity.

Boo. Hoo.

Posted by Toby | September 20, 2007 7:29 AM
13

Front brakes on any bike don't cause you to flip unless your a moron. The front brake is the most efficient way to stop. I've ridden a track bike in traffic for 5+ years (with and without a front brake) and the only time things get really dicey (and this goes for all bikes on the street) is when you stop paying attention to heavy moving objects that can kill you.

I think that a bike lane to the right of traffic through an intersection like that problematic. Unfortunately all the things that could have gone wrong in that situation did.

Posted by Tony D. | September 20, 2007 9:07 AM
14

I would just like to comment on the bit about the girl getting fired from Nintendo.

Trust me. This is absolutely not under any circumstances the only reason she was fired.

It was more for the hate-mongering, atrociously discriminatory and racist/homophobic comments and she would make to co-workers on a daily basis.

Posted by someone who actually knows what happened | September 20, 2007 11:55 AM
15

Erica is the only writer in Seattle with the balls to attack fixies for being death machines. These bikes should be illegal and The Stranger is right for calling to ban them and pass laws against them.

No one should be allowed to ride a bike without brakes no matter how fun it is.

Posted by Issur | September 20, 2007 12:38 PM
16

But Issur, aren't fixies one of the ways God culls the goyim?

Posted by Greg | September 20, 2007 2:23 PM
17

Re: Underage prostitute

Did anyone else pay attention to Nick Licata's quote? Here is part of it again.

"How are we going to stop prostitution if we're not going after the johns?"

Does he really think that we can stop prostitution? Or, worse, that we should?

Posted by Greg | September 20, 2007 2:26 PM

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