It’s not too late to proclaim your holiday religion free with this printable topper for your secular tree.

Polls close tonight—this is your last chance to vote slog. And did you know you can vote once a day? You can.

And did you know that even I’m sick of this now? No more four-day polls, CHS, okay?

This is… um… something that came in the mail today.

Now that Santorum has only one disgusting meaning instead of two, it’s a good opportunity to take another devastating swipe at the dangers of homophobia.

The sad fact is that those intrepid climbers on Mt. Hood could’ve survived had all three simply huddled together and kept warm in a snow cave. That would have been their only hope, and it’s very unfortunate for them and for their families that their all-American values of homophobia probably hopelessly prevented them from ever even considering that option. But separated and clutching blocks of ice instead of each other, they were doomed to freeze and die.

The climber’s families and the nation have stoically embraced prayer and hope, while at the same time the climbers themselves were very likely frozen stiff all along because they had stoically refused to embrace each other. (Even heterosexual penguins are only able to survive the Antarctic winter by huddling together.)

As we thoughtlessly go about destroying the habitability of this planet and as we prepare to militarily impose our shallow, commercialized values upon the rest of the oil-producing world, a more accurate assessment of the needless Mt. Hood tragedy might help to bring more Americans to their senses and to make us a more human, a more practical, and a more tolerant people. The entire world will greatly benefit from that change.

Realistic And Luckily Practical Hetero

I’m not endorsing this letter by posting it. I’m actually a bit flabbergasted by it. But I don’t know anything about mountain climbing or snow caves or surviving extreme cold. I do, however, know something about huddling with men. I’m disinclined to think that RALPH here is correct, i.e. that the men could have saved themselves by huddling together—or that they refused to do so for fear of being perceived as gay by the… uh… snow? The cold? The mountain?

But, like I said, I don’t know. I also haven’t been following this story—which is tragic, and I ache for the families, and I think it’s silly to try and blame it on homophobia (and please note that the letter is from a straight guy, not a gay guy). But did I miss something? Was there are a news report that quoted someone saying that the men would have survived if they had only spooned? WTF?

‘A Child’s Christmas in Wales’

(DRINKING MAKES CHILDREN CUTER) There is no better way to prepare for a half hour of children in a tiny theater acting out the excellent Dylan Thomas poem (complete with flubbed lines, hot cider, scratchy violins, and irreproducible cuteness) than by softening your heart with a few glasses of tequila over at Beso Del Sol. (Beso Del Sol, 4468 Stone Way N, 547-8087; Stone Soup Theatre, 4035 Stone Way N, 633-1883, 3:30 and 7:30 pm, $14.) BRENDAN KILEY

(Fact: Thomas lived and died in an alcoholic vapor. He collapsed in a Manhattan bar while on a promotional speaking tour and expired soon after in St. Vincent’s Hospital. His last words were: “After 39 years, this is all I’ve done.” Merry Christmas.)

Helplessly entranced by the “beauty” of the Pottery Barn catalog, this Sex and the City writer decides materialism trumps Judaism. Eli, Josh, thoughts/feelings/bile?

I’d like to thank Jim Jones once more for contributing to the Christmas music canon.

Jones’ “Dipset Christmas Time” might beat out Donny Hathaway’s “This Christmas” and Run-DMC’s “Christmas In Hollis” for my favorite Xmas jumpoff. As an album though, i gotta admit Dipset Xmas is no Christmas on Death Row.

In particular, the title track’s 2nd verse (from newcomer Mel Matrix) gives an oft neglected holidays perspective- that of a Harlem Blood enjoying the finer things in life.

Brissmas time, everybody jolly (where da bottles at?)
feelin’ good, e’ybody wanna polly (what’s good, homie?)
get ya flag on, red rags out (soo-wooo!)
feelin’ good, pull the red Jags out (gettin’ money!)

hit the club, buy the bar out
where the dutches out?
get the jars out (let’s get high, blood!)

and we could one-two step
throw your gang up
what hood you rep (9-Tres!)
and everybody spaz out
get blowed homie til you fuckin’ pass out
it’s Brissmas

Don’t let his natural aversion to the letter ‘C’ perturb you- but I can’t help but have a hearty bowl-full-of-jelly belly laugh at his rechristening Jesus’ birthday ‘Brissmas’…considering the meaning of ‘briss’. Maybe Ol Mel was referring to this.

For the procrastinating penny-pinchers out there, a deal too good to pass up.

You can’t afford to let this one get away. It’s like making $500,000! Free Money!!

Conservative commentator, Jew-baiter, gay-basher, dark-skinned-immigrant-despiser, Nixon-administration-staffer, and two-time GOP presidential candidate Pat Buchanan had this to say in 1983 about the AIDS epidemic:

“The poor homosexuals—they have declared war upon nature, and now nature is extracting an awful retribution.”

That infamous quote—Buchanan gives good talking head—came to mind when I read this story in today’s L.A. Times.

Recent gay-sex scandals involving evangelical pastors have prompted much soul-searching among conservative Christian leaders.

No one has proposed rethinking the theology that homosexuality is a sin. Instead, there’s a growing consensus that the church must do a better job of helping pastors resist all immoral desires, such as a lust for pornography, an addiction to drugs or a lifelong same-sex attraction.

Seminary professors, Christian counselors and veteran clergy say the best way to help pastors fight temptation is to get them talking—even about their most shameful secrets. They don’t want a sordid tell-all from the pulpit each Sunday. But they would like pastors to bare their weaknesses and admit their lapses before a small group of “accountability partners”—friends committed to listen with empathy, then rebuke or advise as needed.

No one has proposed a re-think—that’s good. We’d hate to see the haters stop lumping homosexuality in with porn and drug addictions. Sheesh.

The evangelicals have been reeling since Ted Haggard, then head of the National Association of Evangelicals, was exposed as a meth-snorting, gay-hooker-banging hypocrite. Last week, yet another mega-church pastor—Rev. Paul Barnes, also of Colorado Springs—resigned when it was learned that he, too, is a great, big fag.

When he was exposed as a homo, Ted Haggard gave us this memorable quote:

“There is a part of my life that is so repulsive and dark that I’ve been warring against it all of my adult life.”

When he was exposed as a homo, Paul Barnes gave this equally memorable quote:

“I have struggled with homosexuality since I was a 5-year-old boy. I can’t tell you the number of nights I have cried myself to sleep, begging God to take this away.”

Reading Barnes’s quote, I recalled Haggard’s. Recalling Haggard’s, I remembered Buchanan’s. Because it should be clear to everyone just who has declared war on nature—and it’s not us homos, Pat, however pitiable some of us are.

Homosexuality is a naturally occurring phenomenon; it has existed in all human societies, through all of recorded human history. Homosexual activity and orientation have been documented in hundreds of other species. If it weren’t a desirable trait, natural selection would have eliminated it millions of years ago. Homosexual sex is every bit as “naturalâ€� as heterosexual sex.

I will give Pat this: Homosexuals did declare war in the 1970s and early 1980s, and we should be taken to task for it, and never allowed to forget. But it was common sense, not nature, that we waged war on. Gay men, being men, and being free for the first time in centuries, created a culture that celebrated promiscuity. (Straight men celebrate promiscuity too—it’s just harder for them to pull off.) The first out generation of gay men created an unsustainable, out-of-control sex culture. We ignored warning signs—concurrent epidemics of syphilis and gonorrhea, for starters—and fought to normalize a culture of rampant promiscuity. I came out of the closet in 1980-81 and caught the tail end of it. My first boyfriend and first gay friends thought I was a freak for not wanting to suck off strangers in bookstores, bathhouses, and parks. (Does it even need to be said? I’m no prude. But even at sixteen I was able to recognize the inherent risks of rampant promiscuity; as an adult and a sex columnist, I now recognize the inherent risks of stultifying monogamy.)

The end result? Well, AIDS—a health crisis that gay men in the West created the “disease settings” for. When those disease settings met up with cultural prejudice and sex phobia, it became a perfect storm. We’re still living with the consequences.

But even at the most extreme (Google “Mineshaftâ€� sometime), gay sex was and is “natural.â€� What isn’t natural is the war evangelicals are waging on human sexuality—it’s not natural and it’s every bit as unsustainable as the gay sex culture of the 1970s. Homosexuality—in a pastor or lay person—can’t be wished or prayed or cried away. Ask Paul Barnes. Providing evangelical ministers with a forum where they can “bare their weaknessesâ€� to “accountability partnersâ€� may delay the next Haggard, but it won’t stop him. (How much do you want to bet that “accountability partnersâ€� with similar “weaknessesâ€� will soon be getting it on?)

Gay men are going to have gay sex, just like people are going to look at pornography and have premarital sex. (A recent study finds that 95% of everybody has premarital sex—so much for the hundreds of millions of dollars we’ve spent on abstinence education.)

Gay sex, porn, premarital sex—these aren’t moral failings. These are natural expressions of human sexuality. Evangelicals can stomp around their mega churches trying to convince themselves and others that folks who “succumbâ€� to these “immoral desiresâ€� are weak or flawed or sinful. They’re not—they’re human. And there’s nothing sinful about homosexuality or pornography or premarital sex. There is something ridiculous about waging war on any one or all of these things—you might as well wage a war on blinking. Evangelicals who think they can prevent additional Haggards from tumbling out of the closet by redoubling their efforts, by going deeper into denial, are in for a series of rude shocks. There will be more Haggards—an endless stream of them.

So pity the poor evangelical ministers. They have declared war on nature—their own natures—and now nature is exacting an awful retribution.

From the New York Times’ #1 most emailed article right now:

Studies are piling up that show that messy desks are the vivid signatures of people with creative, limber minds (who reap higher salaries than those with neat “office landscapesâ€�).

Charles’s desk, to jog your memory:

I know slagging the Weekly on the Slog can get a little tiresome for readers—and certainly, bashing a corporate chain paper while it’s down doesn’t take much effort. But I can’t hold my tongue on this one.

The new editor of the Seattle Weekly, Mark Fefer, is a Jew. The Weekly is one of four main papers in Seattle. Seattle’s Jewish community got bitch slapped last week. Seattle’s Jews sat through a creepy, chilling, and ugly class on Anti-Semitism 101 (“Let’s stop exchanging gifts at Christmas and see if the Jewish-owned stores want gifting brought back”!!??)

But this week’s edition of SW doesn’t have a single word about it. Nothing—nothing in the news well, nothing in the feature section. There wasn’t a single word about it in last week’s paper either. (Not that I could find—did I miss it? Was it buried?)

Where’s your sense of responsibility, Mark? Where’s your pride in your identity? You command an entire paper. Speak up! The silence in your paper’s print edition about the outrageous avalanche of anti-Semitism on websites like KING 5’s is astonishing. (One post on your blog? A blog that no one reads except us? That’s not enough.)

The editor at The Stranger is (was) a working-class Catholic. I don’t think I need to explain the ugly history of anti-Semitism—from Father Coughlin to Pat Buchanan to old-school Catholic schools—that has coursed through the Catholic community.

Yet, here’s Savage responding big. Check out this week’s great, great cover.

Read Eli Sanders’s story.

Read my column from last week. (Savage called me at home late at night and suggested I do my column on the Sea-Tac controversy as it was going down. I already was, I told him frantically. And I’m glad I did. I have never received so many thank you e-mails and people just stopping me during interviews on other matters to say how much the column meant to them or their spouse. I even got congrats e-mails from reporters at the Seattle Times and P-I for speaking out. I felt proud.)

Read our entire issue this week, which is sprinkled with Jewish-themed articles.

Merry Christmas Savage, you understand the spirit of the Season.

Happy Hanukkah, Fefer. Do us better next time.

Good news America: “Bush to mull Iraq strategy over holidays.” Will he mull over the holiday meal? Come up with ideas as the peas are being passed around the table? The president comes up with something as he opens a present. America, rest your worries, cool your horrors: the mind of the man is mulling.

Friday again. Students for a Democratic Society, man.

Read about it here. (Kidnapping and sexual assault charges are still moving forward.)

Leaving aside the question of whether the three Duke lacrosse players were guilty (the evidence on that is point, a good overview of which can be found here, is far from clear), a few things have struck me about how the reaction to the charges.

First, there’s the phrase “crying rape,” which came up a lot in the reaction to the woman’s accusations. (Typical is this Huffington post comment thread, which includes statements such as the following: “Typical BLACK liberal welfare whore who cannot keep her legs closed and tries to cash in on who she perceives as rich Duke students by crying rape. This is shameful and typical of blacks and liberals. Always looking for the handouts to fund their immoral behaviour.”) The phrase implies that all a woman has to do is yell “Rape!” and a man automatically gets falsely convicted. As if physical examination, cross-examination in front of a jury in court, name-calling of the type referenced above, having your character questioned in public and in the media, and being subjected to impossibly high standards of morality (“but she was drunk!” “but she had had sex just that week!”) and proof are all just part of the fun of “crying rape.” Moreover, studies show that just 1.6 percent of rape allegations are false reports.

The second thing that struck me is how many people have rushed to the players’ defense by insisting that they’re “good, upstanding young boys.” At the very least, these young men spent $800 to hire two escorts, got one of them drunk, called her a “nigger” (news reports say that the boys complained that the escort service hadn’t sent a white girl, using “a racial epithet,” yelled a racial slur at her and a friend as they left the party), and may have had gang sex with her. They’re not good guys. And yet virtually everyone in the Duke community who has spoken up about the case portrays them as “fine,” “upstanding,” “wonderful boys.” (Don’t take my word for it: Check out this support page for the lacrosse players to get a sense of this dirty-black-whore-upstanding-young-innocents dichotomy. Sample quote: “You are ‘stand up’ men and I would be proud to have any one of you as my own son.”) The fact that they’ve been cleared of rape charges doesn’t make them paragons of virtue. These lacrosse players, and everyone who’s defended them and their actions on the night the alleged rape took place, should be ashamed of themselves.

David Goldstein (Horse’s Ass) and Stefan Sharkansky (Sound Politics) actually agree on something: this week’s feature story by Eli Sanders on “Seattle’s Jewish Problem” is a must-read.

This idiot, however, begs to differ.

Kelly O has already chronicled the unique forlornness of abandoned hair extensions. I merely wish to add this, which I saw, to my lasting regret (and to the lasting regret of my lunch partner), this afternoon on Broadway:

ATTENTION LADIES! For a mere $50,000 (plus expenses) actor/writer/director Vincent Gallo can be all yours—for a night, at least. ($100,000 for a full weekend.)

Update: In the comments, Andrew Hitchcock—who managed to read farther down on Gallo’s page than I did—points out this bit of lunacy in a post where Gallo offers to sell his sperm for $1 million:

Mr. Gallo maintains the right to refuse sale of his sperm to those of extremely dark complexions. Though a fan of Franco Harris, Derek Jeter, Lenny Kravitz and Lena Horne, Mr. Gallo does not want to be part of that type of integration. In fact, for the next 30 days, he is offering a $50,000 discount to any potential female purchaser who can prove she has naturally blonde hair and blue eyes. Anyone who can prove a direct family link to any of the German soldiers of the mid-century will also receive this discount. Under the laws of the Jewish faith, a Jewish mother would qualify a baby to be deemed a member of the Jewish religion. This would be added incentive for Mr. Gallo to sell his sperm to a Jew mother, his reasoning being with the slim chance that his child moved into the profession of motion picture acting or became a musical performer, this connection to the Jewish faith would guarantee his offspring a better chance at good reviews and maybe even a prize at the Sundance Film Festival or an Oscar.

I spent some time the other day in the giant, slanted roof building at Westlake and Denny—the sales office for three nascent Vulcan condoliths all either now or soon to be under construction. The building, in my opinion, looks like a giant toaster oven, ready for a big piece of French bread pizza. Maybe I was just hungry. Vulcan reps (could they have thought of a scarier company name?) say it’s a green building, constructed in easy to move segments. If you are ever at Whole Foods, kitty-corner, and need a little walkabout to digest your overpriced deli fare, I recommend wandering through this ultra fancy toaster oven/sales building/gallery. It contains such marvels as a doll house-like model of the floor plans in Enso, the fanciest of the three new buildings, which includes miniature sushi and copies of Seattle Metropolitan magazine. It’s kind of amazingly fastidious. I asked after the obsessive compulsive who built the thing and they told me it came from a company called Mice in the Southwest, but wouldn’t tell me how much it cost. There is also a large model of downtown Seattle featuring buttons you can press to light up various neighborhoods and transportation lines. Giant touch screen tv monitors can show you the rooms, views, specs, etc. ad nauseum, for all of the fancy condos you will never be able to afford. It would be interesting to see how you get treated based on what you wear into the place. I was wearing a long wool coat, and about eight people rushed to help me.

Anyway, the condos:

Enso: Situated at the southwest corner of Denny and Westlake, across from Whole Foods. Two towers are already under construction, set to finish in early 2009. The north building will hold 12 floors of office space. The south building will consist of 135 condos, starting in the $400,000s and climbing to $1 million-plus. Retail on the ground floors of both buildings.

Rollin Street: Construction is set to begin next week on this building, being marketed as an “urban sanctuary,” at the northeast corner of the same intersection. Like the Veer Lofts, below, the 208 “SoHo style flats” will have open floor plans. Prices start at $300,000 and go up to $1 million-plus. Expected to open mid-2009. Retail on the bottom floors.

Veer Lofts: Construction starts early next year. The Vulcan people think this will be the only building in Seattle with a bocce ball court on the roof. The 99 condos, on 9th Ave. North and Harrison, are geared “first time home-owners.” First time home owners with at least $200,000. The tower is expected to open mid-2008. Also with retail on the bottom.

The Big Question: Vulcan’s plans for South Lake Union were dreamed up with Portland’s Pearl District in mind. Will the new neighborhood live up to its inspiration? Though viewed as a commercial success, the Pearl has its lovers and haters. The typical complaint is that it attracted a bunch of people with lots of money and zero cultural capital and limited civic engagement. One funny illustration: the childless hipsters in the condos surrounding a popular park call in noise complaints during the summer when poorer families bring their screaming children to play in the park’s fountain.

There’s a new comedy club opening across the street from Key Arena. It’s going to be called Mainstage. It will open in February.

It will be owned and driven by women: Beka Barry (a comic) and Julie Mains (a singer-songwriter).

The People’s Republic of Komedy at CHAC just went from a monthly night to a weekly night, comedy nights at cafes and bars are springing up like mushrooms, now the Mainstage is opening—comedy in this town is popping.

A friend who works as a teller at a big local bank was aghast yesterday when a woman passed him one of these pro-life checks.

Put out by LifeChecks of Joppa, Maryland, these checks come in various designs—black child, white child, rainbow coalition of babies, mother nuzzling infant—with bold messages inscribed on the checks, such as: “Adoption, not abortion. Care enough to let them live!”; “It’s a life, not a choice. Stop Abortion!”; “Every baby is wanted by someone. Say no to abortion.”; “Choose life! Your mother did.”; and “Every 4th baby dies by choice. Say no to abortion.”

And then there is one that stands out. It’s a picture of feminine hands holding two tiny feet and proclaiming: “The PRECIOUS FEET of a 10-week unborn child.” I can’t grab an image of that check, but here’s a similar image from a pro-life address label:

If the religious right is going to campaign for the right of pharmacists to refuse to dispense the “morning after” pill, perhaps they should also, in fairness, promote giving bank tellers the right to refuse to cash these kinds of checks.

Look for Luke Esser, the deposed Republican State Senator from Bellevue/Kirkland/Redmond, (he lost to born again Democrat Rodney Tom last month), to declare his candidacy for GOP State Chair next week. He’ll be challenging Diane Tebelius, who’s had the gig for barely a year. (She took over from Chris Vance last January.)

Esser’s announcement will come with some power: Both Dino Rossi and AG Rob McKenna will amp Esser’s announcement with their glowing endorsements.

P.s. On the Democratic side, no one will bother challenging party chair Dwight Pelz—who took over from Paul Berendt last January.

Phill Kline, the rabidly anti-abortion attorney general in Kansas, brought charges today against one of that poor state’s only abortion providers. One of the charges? That Dr. George Tiller performed an abortion on a ten year-old girl. Yeah, it would be better for everyone if the 10 year-old rape victim had had been forced to go forward with that pregnancy, don’t you think?

And before you mutter “what’s the matter with Kansas” under your breath and scroll on, there’s a bright side to this story: Kansas voters turned Kline out of office in November. He has just three weeks left in office. It seems that Kline just wanted to see his name in the papers one last time.

Hello, citizens of the Slog. Please forgive my lazy Slog habits both this week and next as I’m on vacation, visiting my dude in NYC, Amtraking to Virginia to see my family for Xmas, and determined to bask in experiences I am not compelled to immediately summarize with hypertext.

Nevertheless, I’ll toss up virtual postcards when I see noteworthy shit—like the musical of Grey Gardens, based on the cult-classic Maysles brothers’ documentary, now running on Broadway. As anyone who’s seen the movie can tell you, the idea of a Grey Gardens musical is spooky but far from hopeless. When your source material is 90 minutes of film following a pair of delusional shut-ins with fascinating and tragic backstories as they babble at each other and the camera, your musical better damn well be weird, and Grey Gardens: The Musical isn’t weird enough.

Continue reading "Grey Gardens: The Good, the Bad, and the Courtney" »

When I was editing Erica’s excellent feature on the changes coming to Pike/Pine I asked her to give some context to one particular quote she had included. Someone was bitching about the building going up at Broadway & Pine. It was called out as an example of how developers are ruining our beloved ‘hood. My God, a Walgreens was going in. And, uh, dozens of units of affordable housing—including three-bedroom units, designed to be big enough for low-income families. How awful, so much worse than what was there before… which was what again?

A gas station.

There used to be a Texaco sitting on that corner—one the same block with a Chevron. I’ll be accused of being in the pocket of developers for saying this but, you know, I’ll take a drugstore—even a chain—and dozens of units of affordable housing over a gas station any day. The development at Broadway & Pine is a net gain for the neighborhood, unlike the development planned for current site of the Bus Stop, Cha-Cha, Manray, etc. That development represents a net loss—of affordable retail spaces and character. And as Erica pointed wrote, it’s a highly stupid move on the part of the developers. They can’t simultaneously sell condos by promoting their proximity to lively independent businesses while also tearing down the buildings that house their businesses (and refusing to build new retail spaces small enough to host small, indy businesses). Or they can—just not for long.

Anyway, on my way to work today I passed the building shown above—it’s at Harvard & John, behind the new U.S. Bank building. I’ve heard folks bitching about it too. Oh, look at those awful little balconies! (Erica, for one, really hates little balconies.) And look at that out-of-scale, out-of-place trellis! And the brick veneer slapped on the first two floors! Shit, there goes the neighborhood!

Yeah, it could be better designed. So could a lot of the housing around here—including buildings like this ugly piece of shit, which predate the condo boom by decades. But what was on this spot at Harvard & John before this building—apartments, not condos—came along and ruined the neighborhood?

A parking lot.

Surely this building—despite its manifest flaws—is preferable to a parking lot. I remember a time when city dwellers regarded parking lots as an affront to urban values, not something worth preserving or mourning. “Save the parking lots!”—or the Texacos—isn’t a rallying cry that will bring me to the barricades.

The Cody Rivers Show

(DRINKING WHILE LAUGHING) The Cody Rivers Show is a high-concept, loopy comedy duo that’s funny ha ha and funny weird. Augment your experience by showing up early and tipping back something you don’t normally drink. Tip back a lot. There’s no waitperson during the show. (Rendezvous Jewelbox Theater, 2320 Second Ave, 800-838-3006, 8 pm, $10.) BRENDAN KILEY

But oh, how I wish.

In November, right-wing blowhard Dennis Prager wrote in a column for Townhall that

Keith Ellison, D-Minn., the first Muslim elected to the United States Congress, has announced that he will not take his oath of office on the Bible, but on the bible of Islam, the Koran.

He should not be allowed to do so — not because of any American hostility to the Koran, but because the act undermines American civilization.

Prager went on to write that

Devotees of multiculturalism and political correctness who do not see how damaging to the fabric of American civilization it is to allow Ellison to choose his own book need only imagine a racist elected to Congress. Would they allow him to choose Hitler’s “Mein Kampf,” the Nazis’ bible, for his oath? And if not, why not? On what grounds will those defending Ellison’s right to choose his favorite book deny that same right to a racist who is elected to public office?

Today on Think Progress, there’s this:

In September, [Prager] was appointed by President Bush to a five-year term on the taxpayer-funded United States Holocaust Memorial Council.

Yesterday, the Executive Committee of the Holocaust Memorial Council adopted a resolution condemning Prager’s views as “antithetical to the mission of the Museum as an institution promoting tolerance.â€�

The resolution can be found here.

Slog’s lead over Victrola is shrinking fast. While Slog was once leading by forty percentage points, our lead is now just 30 percentage points. With 458 votes counted, it’s Slog 65% to Victrola’s 35%. Polls will be open until tomorrow night and you can vote once a day. So even if you’ve already voted click here to vote again.

Why should you vote for Slog? Because we want it. We’re actively campaigning, we’re taking this race seriously. We’ve got the fire in the belly. And Victrola? Seattle’s best coffee shop—sorry, Vivace—has a blog. They’ve posted once during this election. About the vote? No, about their holiday party. Victrola clearly doesn’t care. Since we now know that, if nominated, Victrola will not run, can we risk electing Victrola? If elected, will Victrola serve? Unlikely. A Victrola victory is a risk we simply can’t afford. The stakes are too high.

Vote SLOG!!!

DOC: Most folks busted in Snohomish testing positive.

YTD: Fewer kids puffing pot but more popping pills.

R&R: Malibu is hot spot for rich in rehab.

VIP: Peru’s president pushes coca leaf recipes.

DUI: Cops net Phish head.

MADD: Miss Teen USA gets cut off.

GMO: Colombia develops immortal super-pot.

OMG: Pot declared top US cash crop.

Toronto’s major theater has scrapped plans to make My Name Is Rachel Corrie the centerpiece of its 2007 season.

Bragg’s version: When he read the script (based on Corrie’s journals) he had an emotional reaction and was “absolutely reduced to tears” as he told the Star’s Richard Ouzounian five weeks ago. But later when he went to see it on stage at the Minetta Lane Theatre in New York’s Greenwich Village (where it recently closed) it fell flat. The theatre was half-empty, and there was no standing ovation at the end. “The truth is it just didn’t seem as powerful on stage as it did on the page — and the audience wasn’t buying it.”

The alternate version being told among CanStage insiders: Members of Bragg’s board were alarmed by negative response from influential supporters of the theatre, especially in Toronto’s Jewish community, who were canvassed for their opinion. Many were dismayed and openly critical when confronted with the prospect of the city’s flagship not-for-profit theatre producing a play that could be construed as anti-Semitic propaganda, especially during a frightening period when Israel’s existence is threatened by Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas.

Calling the play “anti-Semitic propaganda” is a bit much, but Corrie, scheduled to open at the Rep in March, is certainly stirring up the hornets but the controversy isn’t helping to sell tickets—The New York production closed ahead of schedule.

Anyone who says the Rep doesn’t know how to take a risk is now officially wrong.

Zero more shopping days for this little masterstroke.

(Perhaps you remember learning of the Global Orgasm Project in this Slog chestnut.)

It is what to get the person who has everything. It is not, however, a gift that keeps on giving (or, one imagines, the stuff of good pickup lines). However, as holiday hippie bullshit goes, it seems like a better use of time than, I don’t know, prayer?

The Science

The Global Consciousness Project (http://noosphere.princeton.edu), runs a network of Random Event Generators (REGs) around the world, which record changes in randomness during global events. The results show that human consciousness can be measured to have a global effect on matter and energy during widely-watched events such as 9/11 and the Indian Ocean tsunami. There have also been measurable results during mass meditations and prayers.

The Zero Point Field or Quantum Field surrounds and is part of everything in the universe. It can be affected by human consciousness, as can be seen when simple observation of a subatomic particle changes the particle’s state.

We hope that a huge influx of physical, mental and spiritual energy with conscious peaceful intent will not only show up on Princeton’s REGs, but will have profound positive effects that will change the violent state of the human world.

Isn’t it pretty to think so.

This year, Tacoma Art Museum bought or acquired more than 100 works of art. Fifty-two of them are 19th-century Japanese woodblock prints, including this one,

adding to the museum’s already fabulous collection of ukiyo-e prints. These were donated by Al Buck, a descendant of the US ambassador to Japan from 1898 to 1902, and his wife, Betsy. Because the family kept the prints stored for more than a century, they’re in mint condition (as you can see). Their imagery ranges from scenes from the Tales of the 47 Ronin to depictions of Japanese westernization. I can’t wait to see these up.

Also cool and new to the collection: three sculptures from Patrick Holderfield’s recent Pilgrim show at James Harris Gallery, purchased with funds from trustee Rebecca Stewart and her husband, Alexander; works by Brian Murphy,

and Blake Haygood;

and two videos, by Ron Lambert

and Jared Pappas-Kelley.

Once you get into the business of remarking on the death of the American skyline, why, somebody will go and prove you wrong. Chicago’s had its share of discussions about tall buildings lately, but that city is always on the architectural move. Now, San Francisco developers announce (thank you, as always, ArtsJournal) their plan to throw up towers taller than anything outside New York and Chicago, where the Sears Tower and the Empire State hold the No. 1 and 2 slots for highest American building:

The plan presented Thursday to the city’s Planning Department envisions a cluster of thin towers rising from 2 acres at the northwest corner of First and Mission streets. The cluster would include two 1,200-foot towers, two 900-foot structures and a 600-foot companion.

Originally posted yesterday

I’ll be on KUOW’s Weekday tomorrow later this morning, beginning at 10 a.m., to talk about the news of the week and my feature in this week’s Stranger, “Seattle’s Jewish Problem.”

Charged with Murder in Iraq: Marines Charged in Haditha Rampage.

Charged with Murder in England: 48-year-old Charged in UK Prostitute Murders.

Former NSA Official: Writes OP-ED in Today’s NYT.

Former Drug Agent: Makes How-To Video.

Edwards and Obama: Dems Tied Atop Iowa Poll. McCain Leads Republicans.

Fatah and Hamas: Truce Holds, Kinda.

In Local News:

WA. Supreme Court: Forbids Referendum on Critical Areas Ordinance.

WA. DOT: Announces Higher Roads Project Costs.

Since Mike Seely is getting pissy over at the Seattle Weekly’s blog about this kind acknowledgment from an editor at the P-I, I thought I’d mock the Weekly in turn.

Where to begin? The glaring omission of movie times for such centrally located theaters as Cinerama, Pacific Place, and Uptown (all included in the print edition of this week’s Stranger)? [Forgivable: Seattle Weekly readers probably never leave their cozy homes in the suburbs, n’est-ce pas?] The lack of information about bargain matinees? [Forgivable: Seattle Weekly readers have oodles of money to spend on movies that—oh, yes—they never bother seeing in theaters anyway.]

But really, I have to hand it to the Seattle Weekly for this extraordinarily helpful write-up in this week’s derogatorily titled “Oddballs and Events” listing of limited engagement films:

We Found It in the Basement The GI unleashes its secret trove of celluloid oddities. Expect a 100-minute mash-up of various cartoons, previews, industry shorts, and God knows what else. (NR) Grand Illusion, 1403 N.E. 50th St., 206-523-3935. $2.50-$5. 11 p.m. Fri. Dec. 1-Sat. Dec. 2.

Come again? December 1st and 2nd? What kind of randomly burping database are you using over there, Rachel Shimp? Oh, and you missed The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. If Mos Def as Ford Prefect isn’t oddball, I don’t know what qualifies.

From the booth next to ours: “I’m Rick James, bitch!”

The person sitting with his back to Rick James: “He’s white, right?”

The person facing Rick James: “Yes.”

The person sitting with his back to Rick James: “And bald?”

The person facing Rick James: “Yes.”

The person sitting with his back to Rick James: “I knew it.”

From Scientific American:

Nut-obsessed squirrels scurry around collecting and secreting away food for the future. The amount of acorns they find, though, is not what determines how many baby squirrels there will be in the spring. Instead, squirrels predict how abundant their food supply will be the following year and coordinate a second litter to be born during times of bountiful harvests, says a new study.

Mark my words: One day squirrels will become our enemies. Last September’s attack in Mountain View, CA was just the beginning.

“The techno-rebels are, whether they recognize it or not, agents of the Third Wave. They will not vanish but multiply in the years ahead. For they are as much a part of the advance to a new stage of the Third Wave. They will not vanish but multiply in the years ahead.”

Alvin Toffler

Overheard outside our offices:

Two twentysomething hipsters were walking by to the Value Village next door. The woman saw our news box and said: “The new Stranger? Shit. it’s Wednesday already? I was supposed to call Jason today.”

WSDOT presented the RTID board with inflation cost updates for all the projects on RTID’s list this afternoon. (In September WSDOT updated the numbers for two RTID projects—the Viaduct replacement options and 520.)

I’ll give a full report after I go through the whole memo (there are 14 projects), but it’s a pricey update.
I-405, for example, went up $300 million—from $1.7 billion to $2 billion. WSDOT’s memo to the RTID board recommended deferring specific aspects of all the projects—like deferring westbound SR 520 to southbound I-405, so that RTID could stay within its $7.4 billion budget.

The trick, obviously, is not deferring popular items (like HOV lanes) that may kill support for RTID … and in turn, kill light rail expansion—which is (stupidly) coupled with RTID on the ballot.

UPDATE The new cost of the 14 projects combined is about $20.8 billion. The previous cost was about $16 billion. This isn’t including the Viaduct replacement and 520.

Obviously, the $7.4 billion RTID budget was never supposed to cover the original $16 billion total costs. (RTID is reasonably banking on an assortment of other funding sources depending on the specific project. The Viaduct replacement, for example, had $2.2 billion coming from the state.) And so, RTID isn’t expected to cover the new $20.8 billion either. But the percentage that the $7.4 billion can cover is far less.

Given that the bottom line difference between the original cost ($16 billion) and the new cost ($20.8 billion) is $4.8 billion—the projects will have to be scaled back considerably.

Okay, the sun is out—and that’s weird. But can you spot the “fashion don’t” in this picture?

This Capitol Hill hipster is wearing a brown hankie in his right back pocket. Which in Great Gay Hanky Code means… um… that… you want someone to take a dump on you. Is this hipster being ironic? Is he oblivious to GGHC? Hard to say. And while GGHC has fallen into disuse among the gays—the modern homo itemizes his sexual interests on the internet—walking around a gay neighborhood with a brown hankie hanging out of your back right pocket can’t be a good idea. It could land you—literally in this case, literally fans—in some deep shit.

For those who have been following what could shake out as the greatest battle of the year (DONALD TRUMP vs. ROSIE O’DONNELL), last night the Donald struck back at Rosie’s claims that he has horrific hair and is a “snake-oil salesman” by spending two minutes telling her how fat and ugly she is. Want to hear Rosie’s response to this slight? LET’S GO TO THE VIDEO! (Thanks BWE!)

Now who’s side are you on?

Tragically, Kate Fleming drowned in her basement last week, when the room was suddenly filled with a rush of water during the storm.

In an effort to help her family with the costs of the funeral service, her friend Burke Thomas (of Pris and Vendetta Red fame) has put together a benefit show at El Corazon tomorrow night with Speaker Speaker, Patience Please, Megaspien, and In the Empty City.

It’s an all-ages show, it costs $7 at the door, and it starts early at 5 pm.

“Kate was an incredibly talented girl in town—voice talent, actress, producer,” says Thomas. “She had a huge heart.”

… but the first paragraph is sadder:

Iraqi Comedian Shot to Death in Baghdad

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - Gunmen killed a veteran Iraqi actor and comedian known for his stage portrayal of the lighter side of life in Baghdad during Ottoman rule in the early 1900s, police said Wednesday.

He was 60 years old.

Trivia heads: Who’s the cartoon dog with long ears, a bandana around his neck, and a cowboy-ish hat?
It’s not

Deputy Dog (too early, too short in the nose)

Huckleberry Hound (too blue)

Scooby

Astro

or

Smedley (though his hat takes the cake).

This week, Dale Chihuly stopped suing people over copyright issues. He dropped the remaining suit he hadn’t already dropped. This prompted Regina Hackett of the P-I to write an account of the suits and the press coverage of Chihuly in the past year on her blog.

Naturally, she reported that her writings in the P-I about Chihuly—the ones that set him as a brother to Jeff Koons and Andy Warhol—are the only ones that made any sense. What I’ve written has been “mean-spirited” and “eccentric.” (I guess it’s eccentric even to consider the questions of ownership and creation raised by a copyright lawsuit — an explicit assertion of ownership and creation — especially in light of the art world’s current unquestioning approval of artist studios as thoroughly corporate structures, replete with romantic-celebrity CEOs, regardless of whether these structures are in philosophical keeping with what the art they produce purports to represent. Not to mention the class issues Chihuly’s work raises … but I digress, and I sure as hell am not going to digress into Daleworld any more this year.)

Clearly, Hackett and I are of very different minds about the conceptual underpinnings—or lack thereof—of Chihuly’s work. Hey, that’s what critics are for.

But there are two things you’re still doing, Regina, that are really pissing me off. One, you’re labeling me a hater, maybe because it’s easier to dismiss me that way. If I was a hater, I’d never write about Dale. Witness my predecessors here at The Stranger. So stop it. I’m having a more interesting conversation than that. Or at least I’m damn well trying.

And two, you called Christopher Frizzelle a “creepy” man on your blog because Christopher asked whether Dale was creepy. Doesn’t that make you creepy for calling Christopher creepy? Don’t be such an easy target, will ya?

Now happy Xmas, damnit, one and all.

In October, New Jersey’s supreme court ruled that gays and lesbians should be able to marry. Today, New Jersey’s governor signed a law that will allow same-sex couples to get civil unionized starting in February.

In response, Lambda Legal launches “Civil Union Watch” to help same-sex couples “navigate the pitfalls of a government-sanctioned second-class status.”

…about The People’s Act of Love. Constant calls it the best book he read in 2006. It’s on King’s top 10 list.

A friend who manages an apartment building on Queen Anne Hill sent this made-for-Slog rant. (By the way: Got a rant you think the people need to hear? Send it my way and maybe I’ll post it.)

Every year, multiple publishers of yellow pages (there isn’t just one phone company anymore, so there isn’t just one yellow pages) decide that everyone must have their books. The problem is, who needs a phone book anymore? Okay, there are lots of people out there who aren’t tethered to the internet. But a growing number of people just don’t need these enormous, old-school tree killers. The publishers don’t mail them out (too expensive), so they just drop them at the door. At my apartment building, 90 percent of the books go unclaimed. I call this trash.

There’s a movement out there to encourage people to recycle their old yellow pages when a new one arrives. But what about the new books that no one wants? Why are these being printed and distributed in a blanket manner when their relevance is sharply declining? My guess is that the publishers charge advertising rates based on the fact that everyone gets one, whether they want it or not.

I’ve never found a contact number in the books that I can call to ask that they stop delivering them. And I’m skeptical that type of request would get anywhere because of the incentive to deliver to everyone. Last year, I took about two dozen Qwest yellow books and dumped them at Qwest’s doorstep downtown. But as far as I can tell, the Verizon office responsible for their books is up near Everett mall (Verizon just delivered the batch seen in the photo). That’s a bit too far out of my way for direct action.

Any other ideas out there on how to kill yellow pages rather than letting them continue killing more trees?

As these scandalous (scandalous!) photos reveal.

Dirty, dirty Miss Nevada. Who would have thought that someone who paraded around in a bikini and bowed and scraped at the feet of Donald Trump to win her Miss All-American Virgin crown would have engaged in such disappointingly unwholesome behavior?

(Speaking of the Don: When Rosie pointed out that the twice-divorced cheater isn’t exactly a moral paragon, he did what all playground bullies do: called her fat and threatened to beat up her girlfriend.)

Oh, and by the way: 95 percent of Americans fuck before marriage.

Well, it did for me anyway: Jeb Bush tells reporters he has no political future—thanks to his idiot brother.

The shadow of President Bush seemed to loom large over his younger brother on Wednesday, as the outgoing Florida governor ruled out any plans to return to elected office.

“No tengo futuro (I have no future),” Jeb Bush told Spanish-language reporters in Miami, when asked about any possible political ambitions after he steps down next month. The popular, two-term governor has often been touted as a savvy politician with a good chance of following both his brother and father, George H.W. Bush, into the White House.

But the unpopularity and dismal job-approval ratings of his brother may have scuttled any plans Jeb Bush may have had for a future in politics after running one of America’s most crucial swing states for the past eight years.

I just got back from KING 5—taping a year-in-review segment for Up Front with Robert Mak. It airs on Dec 31. Lively panel—got to spar with radio jock Dori Monson and political consultant Cathy Allen among others. So, tune in next week.

But I will share the 2007 prediction I made: Former Mayor Norm Rice gets the superintendent of public schools job and flops.

Here’s why: Seattle parents have too much micromanagement power and, like spoiled children, need to be told NO! Rice is the archetypical Seattleite, and so, is incapable of playing that role. He wants everybody to be happy. He wants consensus. For this reason, he will come in as a savoir, but fail fail fail as superintendent.

Lorenzo Romar’s boys beat up #12 LSU last night. Spencer Hawes had 23 points, Jon Brockman 19. Even better: LSU stud Glen “Big Babyâ€� Davis was held to just eight points—the first time he’s scored less than double-digits in almost 50 games.

Bob Hill’s boys horked it against the Dallas Mavericks, losing 103-95. Even worse: Rashard Lewis left just after the first minute with damaged tendons in his right hand.

The Mariners say they really want Barry Zito, and might even consider breaking their budget to get him.

Rosie said…

Donald said…

I’m worth billions of dollars, and I have to listen to this fat slob? When I saw the tape, I said, “You’d better be careful or I’ll send one of my friends over to take your girlfriend!” I imagine it would be pretty easy to take her girlfriend away, considering how Rosie looks.

Gawker says…

Donald Trump Succeeds in Making Rosie O’Donnell Loads More Likeable

From yesterday’s Washington Post:

Bush has now adopted the formula advanced by his top military adviser to describe the situation. “We’re not winning, we’re not losing,” Bush said in an interview with The Washington Post. The assessment was a striking reversal for a president who, days before the November elections, declared, “Absolutely, we’re winning.”

So not winning… not losing… then it’s a tie, right? So why can’t we just declare it a tie and get out already?