Many thanks to our volunteer webheads who, after countless hours of work, are bringing our geek-ancient web site kicking and screaming into the 21st century.

While ETS! has always been edited as a print publication, from its first issue in 1996 we've had volunteers who would HTML code the text from the issue and slap it up on the web. Over the years, though we remain committed to our local audience and the expense of print, the bulk of our audience has come to ETS! through the web, and not just locally but from all over the work. Our best estimate is that at least ten times as many people read ETS! on the web as in print--and from over 100 countries around the world, judging from the suffixes on the Net addresses of readers. (Lots of .gov and .mil in there, too. Hmm.)

For all that, our web site has remained a haphazard affair. We do our best to keep up, and the ever-expanding backlog of old issues and articles has made the site increasingly difficult to manage--especially since users can come to ETS!, via search engines, at any point in our eight-year history. Finally, that's changing. Look for a vastly easier and better web site--some improvements already visible, many more on the way. And, again, thanks to the tech folks (Becky and the long-suffering Peter especially!) who have made it all possible. --Geov Parrish

I recently received a heartfelt e-mail from an activist friend urging me to reconsider my inclination to vote against the Espresso Tax, Initiative 77. This was a tough decision for me, because it pits my conscience against my pragmatism. My friend made very good points about the need for more funding for childcare and early childhood education--things that have been drastically cut from our state budget and which receive short shrift when the federal budget is hammered out. I agree with him that we need more quality daycare providers and that preschool programs need more funding; however, the way the tax will be levied and collected is still unfair. Businesses that make under $50,000 will be exempt from the tax, but that will exclude only the smallest of street-side coffee carts.

All of the independent coffee shops in Seattle have been recently hit by a huge increase in restaurant license fees from King County; this tax will only add to that burden. And sales taxes are a bad idea, given the inefficiency involved in collecting them at the cash register and then remitting them to the state--a waste of employee time that coffee shop owners will have to pay for. In addition, the city will have to enforce the tax and audit coffee shops that don't comply. What we need is a fair tax system--a state income tax--and some state representatives with the guts to push for one. In the meantime, if we start down the road of specialized sales taxes, it'll become an inefficient, wasteful nightmare. Having said that, let's ask the State Legislature why fuel tax exemptions for Boeing are more important than funding preschool programs. Now that's something I can really get behind.--Maria Tomchick

A few more footnotes to our election endorsements: We printed our picks an issue early for the primary this year (Sep. 16, vote early, vote often), with one of the bonuses being the chance to correct our inevitable errors and omissions and give room for dissenting views.

This issue certainly features that--hope you're interested in I-77--and hopefully we only mangled one friendly pol's name. Beyond that, a couple of other notes: based on the Voter's Pamphlet, which came out after our endorsement article was written, you might consider Jim Baker for Port of Seattle position #2 against the incumbent Bob Edwards. Baker hasn't had much of a public profile, but he seems to stand for all the right things and Edwards hasn't attracted any other decent challengers. (For the other Port Commission spot, Christopher Cain is your choice, now and forever.) (Well, maybe not forever...)

Also, in response to inquiries, Peter Steinbrueck's race (note spelling) isn't on the primary ballot because he has only one primary challenger; that city council race forwards directly to the November general election. And none of us at ETS! have gotten ballots with contested judicial positions, nor did I see any going through the editorial board at Seattle Weekly (which I'm on). In general, we don't endorse uncontested opponents; and if we missed such a race, well, what can I say? We missed it. --G.P.

The final looting of Iraq as a nation was official signed off on in a August 28 executive order, a.k.a. Executive Order 13315 (See: http://a257.g.akamaitech.net/7/257/2422/03sep20030800/edocket.access.gpo.gov /2003/03-22543.htm) This order is a follow up to a May 23 executive order that officially authorized the looting of Iraq's oil resources and created a defacto slush fund for these assets known as the "Development Fund for Iraq," which is being overseen by the US Treasury Department (See: http://www.useu.be/Categories/GlobalAffairs/Iraq/May2303IraqDevelopmentFund. html.

Executive Order 13315 calls for the seizure of all the assets of the former Iraqi government the Bush administration just overthrew with the recent illegal invasion. Section1 of the order states that "All property and interests in property of the former Iraqi regime or its state bodies, corporations, or agencies, or of the following persons, that are in the United States, that hereafter come within the United States, or that are or hereafter come within the possession or control of United States persons, are blocked and may not be transferred, paid, exported, withdrawn..." and that "All right, title, and interest in any property so confiscated shall vest in the Department of the Treasury. Such vested property shall promptly be transferred to the Development Fund for Iraq."

Like the May 23 order, 13315 has a section proclaiming immunity from any legal claims to the property being stolen by the Bush gang. Section 11 reads: "This order is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, instrumentalities, or entities, officers or employees, or any other person." This section of the order is kind of like a bank robber claming the bank he's robbed has no claim to the property he just stole at gunpoint. We can be certain that, contrary to all the flowery proclamations by the Bush gang about its commitment to "rebuilding Iraq," none of the money being funneled into this Development Fund for Iraq will be used to turn the lights back on in Baghdad anytime soon, or rebuild the country's shattered health system. --Rick Giombetti