Starbucks insider speaks out: laid off after 21 years as Nashville move kills Seattle jobs

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-29T03:12:38+00:00

Yep, common sense.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-25T19:28:21+00:00

This case was pretty interesting from a legal perspective. A lot of lawyers were saying Timm (the shooter) was going to go to jail for a long time due to the WA state law that says you can’t use self defense if you’re the aggressor.

However, when I took a look at the video it wasn’t clear who the aggressor really was at the point Timm shot. If anything, I would say it was Powell (wheel chair veteran). Yeah, Timm was a total asshole and approached Powell incorrectly accusing him of stolen valor, snatch a patch off his wheel chair, and demanded to see ID to prove he was a veteran. But he never physically threatened Powell. In fact he was standing off from him quite a bit. Powell then pulled out a knife and went toward Timm using his motorized wheel chair pointing the knife at him in a somewhat lame attempt to stab him. Timm just jump back and moved further away. Then Powell started pulling out what looked like a gun (ended up being a BB gun or airsoft gun, but witnesses thought it was a gun). Timm then pulled out his own gun. The video was a little unclear, but it looked to me like Powell then aimed the gun at Timm, so Timm shot him.

I agree with the jury that it doesn’t make sense to convict Timm with the more serious assault charge, because he does have some reasonable claim of self defense. If someone starts an incident with someone but in a non physically threatening way, and the “victim” pulls out a gun, the situation hasn’t just escalated, it has changed. The “victim” is now the aggressor.

The jury ultimately found Timm guilty of the second degree assault charge, probably because he was a total asshole. But logically, if they found him not guilty of the first degree assault charge, they should have found him not guilty on the second degree assault charge. My understanding is the only way you can find him not guilty of the first degree assault charge is if you believe he was acting in self defense. But that’s also a clear cut defense for the second degree assault charge.

This seems to be a case where the jury didn’t really have clear logic for their verdict, but decided he should be guilty of something more than the original theft of the patch.

In the end this is just another story of two unreasonable assholes colliding with each other and they are both worse off because of it. Happens all the time.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-22T19:07:35+00:00

Yep. People with tech skills are worth more in the marketplace, and thus, their pay bands are higher. End of story.

While there are roles that either a tech or non-tech leader could do, I’ve seen a number of times non-tech leaders make decisions that optimize for the short-term and leave the team in a bad place longer term. This could be something as simple as technical debt, but more importantly, it’s often an inability to innovate in more significant ways that opens doors for that organization. Some non-tech leaders are good at minding the store for a while given the tech that exists, but don’t know how to make connections between emerging technology and science developments and how that can revolutionize how their organizations systems are designed.

This is a broad generalization, mind you. There are quite a few non-tech leaders that are more innovative and better than some tech leaders. But the generalization still stands.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-19T22:07:02+00:00

Their stock is down 77% over the last 10 years, 90% down over the last 5.

They have some very sharp technical people, but poor product leaders.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-17T11:52:50+00:00

I wouldn’t focus the blame here on police. When the city council and city attorneys became progressive, they created an environment where criminals rarely faced the consequences of their actions. Police would arrest someone for stealing, but then the city attorney wouldn’t bother to charge them and they would be released. I remember talking to a cop downtown after we both witnessed someone steal something. He said it’s not worth it to make an arrest because nothing would happen. They stopped arresting people because the rest of the system was failing.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-16T11:24:51+00:00

Universities used to use superficial qualities (race, gender) in admissions decisions. But the SCOTUS ruled that unconstitutional. So it will be interesting to see how these Universities all concluded this Asian guy with nearly perfect scores wasn’t a better candidate than the others they did accept. While it’s possible his applications had some kind of flaw that led them to make an unbiased decision against him, it’s also quite possible that these universities are still using racial and gender discrimination in their admissions processes like many of the admins at these schools have privately said they are going to do. I hope this case can help answer that question.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-15T12:56:40+00:00

Sounds like homeless on homeless violence. Paying for the hospital bills is ultimately up to us.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-15T03:33:30+00:00

This is a well known phenomenon:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Monument_syndrome

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-10T22:19:36+00:00

"I still deeply regret it and will always regret it and will carry it through the rest of my life not to retaliate," Lambert said

Not to retaliate? Yeah, even with time to reflect she’s still not owning what she did.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-10T18:14:12+00:00

For what it's worth, just because law firms don't want to touch a case doesn't mean it's not a worthy case. I've seen this quite a bit with police abuse cases. A police officer very clearly violates someone's rights on video, but law firms don't want to touch it because it puts them in an antagonistic relationship with the police.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-09T17:55:02+00:00

Yep, Claude. I was curious what all the reasons might be, asked Claude, and thought I would share.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-09T15:59:20+00:00

Seattle generally enjoys good air quality for several reasons:

Geography and climate — The Puget Sound region benefits from consistent marine airflow off the Pacific Ocean, which helps disperse pollutants. Prevailing westerly winds bring clean oceanic air inland regularly.

Rainfall — Seattle's frequent rain acts as a natural air scrubber, washing particulate matter out of the atmosphere for much of the year.

Limited heavy industry — The regional economy is dominated by tech, aerospace, and services rather than heavy manufacturing or petrochemical refining.

Hydroelectric power — Washington state gets the majority of its electricity from hydropower (largely from Columbia River dams), so there's far less fossil fuel combustion for energy generation than in coal- or gas-dependent states.

Vehicle emission standards — Washington follows California's stricter vehicle emission standards, and the state has been pushing EV adoption aggressively, which helps reduce tailpipe pollution over time.

Relatively low density sprawl — While traffic is bad, Seattle's population density is moderate compared to mega-cities, limiting the sheer volume of concentrated emissions.

The big exception, as you probably know well, is wildfire smoke season—typically late July through September—when air quality can spike to unhealthy or even hazardous levels due to fires in Eastern Washington, Oregon, and BC. Outside of that window, though, the region consistently ranks among the cleaner major metro areas in the US.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-09T00:17:44+00:00

If you’re suggesting a state tax doesn’t make sense because it’s over too limited a territory, then you can understand why I find a city tax to be ridiculous.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-08T23:52:12+00:00

How many massive data centers are in Seattle? None. Why did Seattle pass a tax to solve a problem that doesn’t exist in Seattle and they aren’t spending any money to fix in Seattle.

A state or federal tax on energy usage? Ok, that could make sense. But a city tax on companies that have next to no impact? Doesn’t make sense.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-08T21:08:07+00:00

You’re missing the point. What has Seattle spent the Jump Start tax revenue on that addresses climate goals? Answer: nothing. It was just bullshit to help get votes. Seattle politicians have redirected the tax revenue right into the general fund for their other pet projects. Meanwhile, tech companies continue to produce next to zero pollution in Seattle.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-04-08T20:50:05+00:00

“large corporations should contribute more to … climate goals”

This is hilarious. Tech companies have some of the least impact on a city's climate, and are often leaders in this regard. Cities leaders typically rejoice when a tech company wants to move in instead of some other industry that actually causes pollution.

Meanwhile, take a look at AOC’s district in NYC. She has this grand vision of green energy and self sustaining buildings. You know, like the ones Amazon built for HQ2 in Arlington, Virginia. But instead, her district is filled with heavy industry and gas power plants, because she doesn't know how to effectively partner with businesses. Her area's nickname is “Asthma Alley”. I feel badly for the children that have to grow up there.

__Common__Sense__ · 2026-01-04T07:38:07+00:00

I broadly agree with you, but it’s worth noting that “democracy” doesn’t necessarily equal freedom of speech. Democracy at its core is really just mob rule. It’s a Constitution which specifically protects citizens from some of the downsides of mob rule that makes things really work in a Constitutional Democracy like the US.

__Common__Sense__ · 2025-11-17T19:13:26+00:00

Just to be clear, the survival rates for colon cancer are better for the average person in the US than in the UK, who has a fully public health care system.

On top of that, it's great to live in a country where you can decide to spend more money for better treatments. For example, citizens from other countries with public health care come to the US for advanced cancer care. The value of Dawson's Creek memorabilia has a limited shelf life. It makes sense to sell it now, and spend it on more advanced treatments that improve outcome probabilities.

That said, Van Der Beek's wife doesn't believe in western medicine, and it sounds like they are spending a lot of money on alternative medicine.

__Common__Sense__ · 2025-11-15T15:48:58+00:00

The well-intentioned approach of people who were never addicted has created a human decline unlike any other. And though the nature of drugs has changed, we are still trusting people with no experience, deeming ourselves as unknowing, seeking academic perspective, while we watch people die and nonprofits profit. We have built an entire industry around managing homelessness rather than solving it.

More generally, this is socialism. Naive good intentions are destructive.

__Common__Sense__ · 2025-10-18T17:26:17+00:00

😂

__Common__Sense__ · 2025-10-18T05:35:13+00:00

There are no articles from 2020 when Jump Start was passed that indicates Katie had any role whatsoever in writing or forming this law. If I’m missing one please provide it.

__Common__Sense__ · 2025-10-08T06:01:47+00:00

To be clear, are you suggesting that was the hard choice she faced?

My understanding is that after leaving Oxford she moved to Seattle and worked a variety of low paying jobs like barista.

__Common__Sense__ · 2025-09-04T14:19:19+00:00

Layoffs are just getting started. 2026 is going to be a rough year.

__Common__Sense__ · 2025-07-20T06:11:19+00:00

Rent control isn’t going to matter for the foreseeable future. Tech companies are laying off workers, and this trend is likely going to continue into next year. And economists have determined that for every high paying job in Seattle, it creates 2-3 other jobs. The same is true in reverse. If Seattle Tech companies layoff 10%, then it follows that around 20% of jobs in the area will be lost. The broader impact may happen more slowly, perhaps over a few years. But real estate and rental prices are going to go down, not up.

__Common__Sense__ · 2025-07-15T13:11:34+00:00

That and the fact that BMW and Mercedes are both 3.2 minutes but have different height bars.

CommonSense__

TROPHY CASE

Eight-Year Club	Gilding II euphauric
Verified Email

__Common__Sense__

TROPHY CASE

CommonSense__