by Trudy Springer

So you think Olympia has a moratorium against large retail stores? Think again. Oh, they passed a moratorium alright, stating that no retail space could exceed 125,000 square feet, but on Wednesday, May 18th the Olympia City Council granted an exemption from the moratorium to Westfield in a 5 to 1 vote.

This exemption states that Westfield cannot exceed 125,000 square feet per floor. The council has, by this ridiculous caving into the demands of Westfield, effectively voided the moratorium.

From the Olympia Community Association

I am writing to the council on behalf of the Olympia Community Association, a group of progressively minded citizens who have been meeting on a regular basis to better coordinate our work to make Olympia a livable city that supports and nurtures economic, social and environmental justice for all its citizens.

by Dave Lindorff

The cat's finally out of the bag.

Having failed to attract much interest in his plan for privatizing Social Security and killing it off more or less directly, President Bush, in a rare, but typically scripted press conference at the White House last week, declared his intention to convert the 70-year-old retirement security program into a welfare program, pure and simple.

Bush's latest scheme would see retirement checks slashed for those earning as little as $36,000 a year (by 13 percent according to one estimate).

by Drew Hendricks

The Olympia City Council's General Government Committee met on Monday, May 16th to review the city's police accountability system and consider changes to its structure and goals. No decisions were taken at the meeting, which began at 11:30 AM on a Monday. The next scheduled General Government Committee meeting is set for June 6th, 2005 at 11:30 AM, again on a Monday. The agenda for that meeting had not yet been posted to the City's web site as of press time.

That web site address is: http://www.ci.olympia.wa.us/council/minutes/default.asp

by Alexander Cockburn

Whatever sour emotions I entertained while reading accounts of the funeral of Marla Ruzicka had nothing really to do with the death on April 16 of a brave young woman in Baghdad. On many accounts, and I have had a detailed conversation with a close friend of Marla's whose judgment I respect, she was an idealistic person whose prime political flaw seems to have been the very forgivable one of naivety.

by Molly Gibbs

The articles and email regarding the persistent presence of military recruiters in schools hit an all time high this last week. In recent months several messages have come from high school students seeking assistance for protection of their civil rights. Many questions are surfacing around the country:

What is the role of the military in our schools?

If recruiters are given the same rights accorded other post secondary high recruiters, those same rules apply to individuals or groups expressing concerns about the misinformation given to students?

by Molly Gibbs

This is Mother's Day in Olympia. Today my heart and prayers are with the mother whose seventh grade son took his life. I awoke at 4 am thinking I could not sleep if I lost my son to repeated acts of bullying. This couldn't happen in one of Olympia's Middle Schools? My young Chinese American friend has experienced racially motivated bullying at school. She tells her mother that kids do not seek help when this happens because they fear retaliation. Wonderful children are suffering in our community and parents need to take action, beginning in our homes.

by Jeff Cohen

Looking for an easy way to protest Bush foreign policy week after week? And an easy way to help alleviate global poverty? Buy your gasoline at Citgo stations.

And tell your friends.

Of the top oil producing countries in the world, only one is a democracy with a president who was elected on a platform of using his nation's oil revenue to benefit the poor. The country is Venezuela. The President is Hugo Chavez. Call him "the Anti-Bush."

by Holly GG

One of the things I do that gets me out of town and into the middle of intelligent action is to sing for the GNAWNP. Don't try to say it. Just understand that it is a group working very hard internationally to keep the US from arming space in the interests of ruling the world.

Like me, you may applaud this, since the US is proving to be terribly bad at ruling its fledgling empire on the planet, let alone the one it wants to rule from space.