OCCUPY, ‘SEIZE,’ WHATEVER

► In today’s Seattle Times — University Bridge seized in rush-hour rally for jobs — Hundreds of demonstrators marched onto Seattle’s University Bridge on Thursday, snarling traffic during the evening rush hour in one of several rallies nationwide for “Jobs Not Cuts.” Among them were union workers, students, Occupy Seattle activists and clergy. Labor groups across the country chose old bridges for their National Day of Action protests to support proposals in Congress that would boost infrastructure spending.

► At SeattlePI.com — Occupy protest marches on bridge, blocks traffic — Rush hour was jammed in Seattle as hundreds of Occupy Seattle and union protesters occupied University Bridge.

► In the Slog — Police stand by as protesters Occupy University Bridge — It was raining so hard I was soaked to the bones, my fingers so numb with cold that I couldn’t feel the shutter button on my camera, and yet a thousand-plus protesters braved the weather and marched through the streets from opposite sides to occupy the University Bridge and claim it for the 99 Percent.

► At AFL-CIO Now — Senate hearing room erupts: ‘We are the 99%’ — Today’s National Day of Action took an unlikely turn on Capitol Hill, as working and retired Americans joined together to tell lawmakers not to balance the budget on the backs of the 99%, as a joint congressional committee has threatened to do through proposed cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

► In today’s NY Times — A day of protests as Occupy Movement marks two-month milestone — Protesters across the country demonstrated en masse Thursday, taking aim at banks as part of a national “day of action” to mark the two-month milestone of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

► In today’s LA Times — Hundreds held in Occupy protests across nation — More than 70 are arrested in downtown L.A., and several unions call on the city to let protesters stay at a bank plaza on Bunker Hill. At a march in Manhattan, 200 are taken into custody.

► In today’s NY Times — Out of Zuccotti Park and into the streets (Eugene Robinson column) — Occupy Wall Street may not occupy Zuccotti Park anymore, but it refuses to surrender its place in the national discourse. Up close, you get the sense that the movement may have only just begun.

BOEING

► In the Seattle Times — Lion Air deal adds to amazing week for Boeing — Lion Air said it plans to buy 201 of Boeing’s 737 Max planes, which are getting design tweaks and new engines to make them more fuel efficient. Lion Air also plans to buy 29 extended-range 737s. Boeing already employs some 80,000 people in Washington state. One analyst says that the biggest risk to Boeing’s planned production-rate increases appears to be its ability to hire the thousands of new workers it will need.

► In today’s (Everett) Herald — Boeing says huge 737 order is company’s biggest ever — Lion Air’s request is both Boeing’s largest in terms of the number of airplanes and its biggest by dollar value, Boeing said.

STATE GOVERNMENT

► In today’s Olympian — State jobless rate falls to 9% — The state’s jobless rate fell to 9%, its lowest level since March 2009, from a revised 9.2% in September; the state created 4,600 jobs in the September-to-October period.

► From AP — Budget forecast still looks grim — The state’s chief economist said Thursday that the state has taken in $12 million less than expected since September, and that revenues are projected to drop by $122 million over the next two years.

► In today’s Yakima H-R — Little change in revenue forecast, ‘brutal’ session up soon — “There are tax exemptions that have been granted for specific reasons at specific times that maybe have outlived their effectiveness,” says Rep. Bruce Chandler (R-Granger). “We should be looking at all of those. We should be looking at spending the same way.”

LOCAL

► In today’s News Tribune — Open forum over Tacoma mail center draws large crowd — A proposal to shift Tacoma’s mail-processing center to Seattle brought nearly 100 people out Thursday night to voice their concerns to the U.S. Postal Service.

► In the Wenatchee World — Postal officials to hold meeting on possible closure — The USPS mail processing center at Olds Station may be shut down and moved to Spokane. A public meeting on the proposed closure — its reasons and possible outcomes — will be held at 6 p.m. Dec. 1 at the Red Lion Hotel, 1225 N. Wenatchee Ave.

ALSO SEE — Attend USPS meetings on processing plant closures — Next up: TONIGHT (Friday, Nov. 18), a public meeting on the proposed Olympia plant closure is at 6 p.m. at the Phoenix Inn Suites, 415 Capitol Way North, Olympia.

► In the Columbian — Wind project in Pacific County killed — Four local public utility districts have pulled the plug on a proposal to build Washington’s first coastal wind farm in the heart of the state’s most valuable nesting habitat for the threatened marbled murrelet.

► In today’s Daily News — Rainier shipyard gets $9.6 million contract to build new state ferry — Foss Maritime’s new Keller Ferry will replace the 12-car Martha S., and will be able to carry 20 cars between the towns of Wilbur and Keller on Lake Roosevelt, the lake created by Grand Coulee Dam.

► In the Seattle Times — Reardon used county trips for affair, employee says — A woman who prompted a criminal investigation into Snohomish County Executive Aaron Reardon’s travel spending said she took multiple county-paid trips with the executive where he did little or no official business.

► In today’s (Everett) Herald — Reardon denies misconduct but otherwise stays silent

SUPERCOMMITTEE!™

► In today’s Washington Post — SuperCommittee!™ appears unlikely to reach agreement — If the congressional SuperCommittee!™ cannot agree on a plan to tame the federal debt by next week’s deadline, as now appears likely, here’s what will happen: nothing. The automatic spending cuts that were supposed to force the panel to deliver more palatable options would not take effect until January 2013. That leaves lawmakers a full year to devise alternatives.

► In today’s NY Times — Failure is good (Paul Krugman column) — Why was the SuperCommittee!™ doomed to fail? Mainly because the gulf between our two major political parties is so wide. Republicans and Democrats don’t just have different priorities; they live in different intellectual and moral universes.

► In the Seattle Times — How the deficits SuperCommittee!™’s failure would be a success (E.J. Dionne column) — A balanced deal would be nice but it’s now impossible — and not because of some vague congressional “dysfunction” the media like to talk about. Sane fiscal policies are blocked because one party refuses to accept the need to roll back the excesses of the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts. If Congress does nothing, those tax cuts go away. That’s why a “failure” by the supercommittee to endorse a deeply flawed deal is actually a victory for sensible deficit reduction.

NATIONAL

► In today’s Spokesman-Review — Workers focus on retirement income — One of the striking results of a new survey is that 25% say they’ll need to work until at least age 80 because they will not have enough money to retire comfortably. Even those who plan on retiring expect they may continue working in some capacity and for various reasons.

► In The Hill — Industry fights with health advocates over worker exposure to carcinogen — Business and labor interests are locked in a more than decade-long battle over how to limit worker exposure to a known carcinogen. The latest skirmish is over a OSHA proposal that has been stalled at the OMB for close to 300 days.

► At Politico — Big Labor shells out for GOP friends — Major unions are giving a heftier slice of campaign donations than usual to pro-labor Republicans this election cycle, even as overall union contributions to members of Congress lags.

► At Huffington Post — Workers rebel against early Black Friday openings, shortened holiday — There are more signs of worker frustration over a shortened Thanksgiving holiday.

► In today’s NY Times — Professor of profits (Tim Egan column) — This is not just another Newt Gingrich laugher, up there with his revolving Tiffany’s account or his multiple personal hypocrisies. This story encapsulates why Washington is broken and how the powerful protect and enrich themselves, unanchored to basic principles.

The Stand posts links to Washington state and national news of interest every weekday morning by 9 a.m. These links are functional at the date of posting, but sometimes expire.