| Portlanders may have another tax day: Nov. 4
Now that city Commissioner Sam Adams' $464 million street fee proposal appears to be headed for the November ballot, it joins a crowd of other potential initiatives that will compete for voters' tax dollars. Local pollster Tim Hibbitts, of Davis, Hibbitts & Midghall, said that, especially in tough economic times like the country appears to be facing, voters sometimes suffer from "ballot fatigue" when faced with a swarm of tax increases — fatigue that might come into play this fall. "The city is pretty liberal, but when times get tight even liberal voters look at their pocketbooks and say, 'How much can I afford?' " he said. "They might say, 'Gosh, this one I can vote for, but I just can't see three or four tax increases.' " So far, the measures appear to be a Portland Public Schools facilities levy that would cost at least $900 million, a Multnomah County public safety levy that could cost $25 million to $30 million year, and a five-year renewal of the Portland Children's Investment Fund that would cost $14 million per year.
Doug Clarke: C.C. failed as ‘The Man,’ so Carmona can’t
Well, isn't this a fine kettle of chowdah? As the actor John C. McGinley says to Sgt. Barnes (Tom Berenger) in "Platoon" when he's asked to lead a small band into the jungle one more time, "I got a bad feeling about this one, Skip." The Cleveland Indians are, for the third time in these American League playoffs, going to have to send a boy out to do The Man's job. No usual boy, this Fausto Carmona kid, but still a boy when it comes to this grown man's game of major league baseball. On Thursday night, C. C. Sabathia — ostensibly The Man and in the hunt for the Cy Young Award along with his mound opponent, the estimable Josh Beckett — took the hill in a situation that called out, nay, begged for a strong stomach, if not utter brilliance, from two men. One came running, the other didn't even bother to answer the bell.
NFL Combine | Seahawks sit in good shape entering draft
With Holmgren saying that Chris Gray should be available for another season in 2008, the line is now a position of strength and depth. Seahawks personnel here are also extremely pleased with the personnel on the defensive side of the ball. Cornerback Marcus Trufant, who went to the Pro Bowl, was tabbed as the franchise player at about $9.5 million. With defense and offensive-line play seen as strengths, will the Seahawks try to supplement the sexier positions, such as running back, quarterback and wide receiver? The answer seems to be: They're looking at it. At running back, Holmgren has said the offensive line was the greater issue in the slowed running game, and said improvement up front should improve Shaun Alexander's standing. Yet Holmgren admits the position might merit a look.
Consumer Reports Names Best Used Cars for Every Budget
For consumers on a budget, CR found 30 cars that can be purchased for under $4,000 including the 1998 Acura CL and the 1999 Buick LeSabre. Consumer Reports' "Best of the Best" vehicles list, which is derived from "Good Choices", includes vehicles that have performed well in CR's road tests and have had several years of better-than-average reliability according to survey respondents. Models from Acura, BMW, Buick, Honda, Infiniti, Lexus, Lincoln, Mazda, Nissan, Pontiac, Porsche, Scion, Subaru, Toyota, and Volvo appear on the "Best of the Best" list. Vehicles that have had multiple years of much worse than average reliability earned a spot on the "Worst of the Worst" list. Models from Buick, Chevrolet, Chrysler, Dodge, GMC, Jeep, Kia, Land Rover, Lincoln, Mercedes-Benz, Nissan, Oldsmobile, Pontiac, Saturn, and Volkswagen consistently had more problems than other models overall.
Slay That Green Dragon
Here on OpEdNEws, I haven't seen one single article supporting Hillary. It's not because we haven't accepted them. Matter of fact we welcome cogent, well written articles supporting ANY candidate, since we trust our readers to respond and balance out the perspective in the comments section. It appears that the concensus of the readers and writers on this site, most of whom were Kucinich, Edwards or Paul supporters, are, except for the Paul supporters, now leaning towards Obama. .
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