Slog tipper Josh detects a series of digs directed at George W. Bush in Paul Steinberg’s op-ed in today’s New York Times. The op-ed is about the long-term impact of binge drinking on rats and the possible implications for human binge-drinkers, current or long-since reformed. And Steinberg’s piece, writes Josh, uses several phrases that—well, let’s just go to the source. But first here’s the experiment…

When put into a tub of water and forced to continue swimming until they find a platform on which to stand, the sober former binge-drinking rats and the normal control rats (who had never been exposed to alcohol) learned how to find the platform equally well. But when the experimenters abruptly moved the platform, the two groups of rats had remarkably different performances. The rats without previous exposure to alcohol, after some brief circling, were able to find the new location. The former binge-drinking rats, however, were unable to find the new platform; they became confused and kept circling the site of the old platform.

Hm… so rats that were binge drinkers have difficultly adapting to new information or changing circumstances on the ground/in the tub. Hmm. Back to Steinberg’s op-ed:

The more we have binged—and the younger we have started to binge—the more we experience significant, though often subtle, effects on the brain and cognition.”… The binges activate an inflammatory response in rat brains rather than a pure regrowth of normal neuronal cells. Even after longstanding sobriety this inflammatory response translates into a tendency to stay the course , a diminished capacity for relearning and maladaptive decision-making…

The forebrain—specifically the orbitofrontal cortex, which uses associative information to envision future outcomes—can be significantly damaged by binge drinking… One can easily fail to recognize the ultimate consequences of one’s actions …

Does the research on rats have relevance for the more complex brains and behavior of humans? We have come to think so… we not only learn specific skills during these years, with our brains having developed more fully, we also learn in a more subtle way how to deal with ambiguity. Ambiguity comes into play when the goalposts are moved. Can we change course? Can we deal with this ambiguity and with nuances?

Our Dear Leader, of course, is a recovered—supposedly—boozer who, despite years of sobriety, has difficulties changing course, dealing with ambiguity, and the fruits of his seriously maladaptive decision-making processes are everywhere to be seen.

But this line is the real real kicker, says Josh:

The one piece of good news is that exercise has been shown to stimulate the regrowth and development of normal neural tissue in former alcohol-drinking mice.

Writes Josh:

Is this op-ed coded? Am I the only one reading it this way? “Stay the course” is a peculiarly evocative phrase right now. “Change course,” too. Lack of foresight? Check. Lack of nuance? Check. But what’s with the bizarre orthogonal pivot onto exercise? Could this explain why it is so frequently observed that Bush is an obsessive exercise freak?

Perhaps. But seeing as Steinberg’s point is that exercise repairs the damage done by binge drinking, and seeing as Bush, despite his avid exercise routine, retains a strong tendency to stay a failed course, shows no capacity for relearning, and continues to demonstrate his maladaptive decision-making skills, I’d say it’s a coincidence. Unless Steinberg intended to offer the president a subtle compliment, which seems unlikely.

But Josh makes a persuasive case…

Another one from Flickr pool contributor Karlheinz Arschbomber…

Tea anyone? Another Obama-Clinton tussle, this one over whether she only sipped tea with world leaders as first lady, and whether suggesting so is sexist.

Romney’s abortion conversion: Must have happened sometime after this.

Swinging hard: Chris Dodd.

Parsing the Pakistan positions: Not easy.

Huckabee’s foreign policy blunders: An overview.

More polarizing than…: A call for less hyperbole.

Obama vs. Edwards: Over who’s really about change.

Race matters: But it’s talked about differently by the Obama generation of black politicians.

The ground war: More ambitious and costly than ever in Iowa.

Going negative: The Republicans.

In the ongoing Blatant and Unapologetic Use of Racial Slurs, Specifically Aimed a Black People, in Standup Comedy Routines meme, it looks as though George Lopez was channeling Michael Richards Thursday night. Here’s the reader report [sic on the whole thing and the emphasis is mine]:

George was going on about text alerts - then he said we have to send each other texts saying Mayate Alert, Mayate Alert. Anyway, Mayate means [The N Word] in Spanish. Some of the Mexicans were making sounds like - Whoa I can’t believe he just said that. See some Black people think Negro or Nigerita means [The N Word] in Spanish. So, he thought the few black people there wouldn’t catch it.

He was also like f*ck ‘em, they ain’t here tonight - and if YOU are here - you’re Dominican tonight damn it.

Then he went on to promote the racial tensions (as if this needs instigating) in LA. He went on and ON about how Mexicans run L.A. and run the U.S. He also spoke about how young Mexican boys are dying on the front line in Iraq while the Whites are in the back partying (offensive to anyone of any race who has lost loved ones in Iraq).

I can take a joke, but I am no longer friend with this Vato. So disappointed - I have love for the LAtinos too.

I didn’t get a chance to record it, but he’s sold out at the Nokia Theater all this week performing up until New Years day.

The word mayate, it doesn’t literally mean “ni**er.” It’s a Spanish word that basically means “black beetle.” It comes from the Nahuatl (Aztec) word mayatli— academically, the fig beetle Cotinus mutabilis, which isn’t even black, but possibly also meaning “dung beetle.” But anyway the word is never used in this context. It is an extremely derisive and offensive term that some racist Mexican-Americans use to refer to black people among their other racist friends and family and that has the same taboo and meaning as the English N-word. The fact that it was used in public—to an audience, no less—is deeply disturbing and upsetting to me as a Mexican and a human being, which of course doesn’t even touch how the black community must feel.

My experience with that awful word comes from hearing my uncle, who was often drunk when I was young, ramble on and punctuate his sentences with all kinds of foul language in English and Spanish. He used mayate on occasion. But then one day when he was working with a crew installing telephone poles alongside a road, someone accidentally unloosed a whole trailer load of the poles, which fell out and crushed my uncle like giant rolling pins.

Take a lesson, Lopez; that is comedy.

UPDATE: In doing a little more research on Aztequismos, I was reminded of another word that I heard in Mexico—camote, from the Nahuatl word camotl (meaning “yam”), used to refer to male partner in a sexual relationship; I heard it used in a gay context. But anyway, here’s a passage from Streets, Bedrooms, and Patios (2000), a book about diversity in Oaxaca, by Michael James Higgins and Tanya Leigh Coen. Apparently some gay male prostitutes there use mayate to refer to their clients!

Movie

‘Sweeney Todd’

• See what else is happening in Film on Saturday »
• More Stranger Suggests for this week »

The year in review and some predictions about 2008 on our weekly sit down with David Goldstein.

Tune in tonight at 7pm.

In Oregon one of those damn unelected judges thwarted the will of the people and their elected representatives by granting marriage-like “domestic partnership” rights to same-sex couples—oh, wait. The judge blocked domestic partnership benefits for same-sex couples.

A federal judge on Friday placed on hold a state domestic-partnership law that was set to take effect in Oregon on Tuesday, pending a February hearing.

The law would have given some spousal rights to gay couples.

Opponents asked U.S. District Judge Michael Mosman to intercede after the Oregon Secretary of State’s Office ruled in October that they had failed to collect enough valid signatures on a referendum to block the law.

Never mind.

posted by news intern Brian Slodysko

In Cold Blood: Grizzly Grisly account of Christmas Eve murders in Carnation.

Democracy-Spreading Allies: Musharraf blames Taliban for Bhutto’s assassination. Pakistanis not convinced.

Congressional Hand Wringing: Bush vetoes war spending bill after White House lawyers discover an overlooked provision allowing U.S. to coerce money out of terrorism sanctuary states.

One Out Of Eight: Bush attempting to leave green legacy during last year in White House.

Economies of Scale: Beijing’s push to cut pollution before the Olympics not going as planned.

Use Of Force: Questions raised about trooper shooting man to death on I-5.

Just Because It Burns Greenbacks Doesn’t Mean It’s Green: Military environmental spending a waste.

Education Parity: Harvard sets precedent of taking grants from the poor kids to help upper-middle class with tuition.

Every Saturday morning at 9 AM, without fail, we scramble over each other to get to the radio and turn the fucking thing off once those “Car Talk” guys start cackling.

My boyfriend’s one-eyed poodle was in our bed last night. And he just couldn’t stop licking himself—the poodle, not the boyfriend—and making these awful smacking sounds all night long, sounds that drove me out of my own bedroom at three in the morning. So I’d happily contribute to this woman’s legal defense fund:

A 25-year-old woman was arrested for investigation of second-degree assault for getting into an argument with her boyfriend over whether his dog should be in the bathroom while the couple were taking a shower together.

A police report said the 26-year-old man wanted his dog to join them in the bathroom, but the woman objected on Thursday night.

She told him if the dog wouldn’t stay out, she didn’t want to be his girlfriend anymore. He replied that maybe his next girlfriend would appreciate the dog more, and called her a name.

The couple—nude, in the bathroom, and unshowered—commenced to “grappling,” the woman then punched the man in the face repeatedly, and finally threw a framed picture at him, which broke and cut him. The woman’s in jail now, her boyfriend is back on the market, and the dog, unfortunately, is unharmed and remains at large.

Cancer Cells Are Like People: Less ambitious when stoned.

I’m Definitely Switching: They’re replacing regular coffee with genetically modified coffee. Let’s see if you can tell the difference.

Capitol Bill: Federal ban on D.C. needle exchange lifted.

Imported: More meth in 2007.

Highway Patrol: Officer charged with stealing $1 million in cocaine.

Europe: Where cocaine’s wind blows.

Vietnam: 43 traffickers sent to the firing squad.

Ecuador President: My father was a drug mule.

Australian Smokers: 6-in-10 are dolts.

OK, admittedly, I’m posting this in part to knock Josh’s Freedom Socialist press release off the bottom of Slog. BUT, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t guarantee yourself luck and riches with black-eyed peas and greens on New Year’s Day, believed to bring prosperity because they resemble coins and cash. (Why it’s called Hoppin’ John, meanwhile, has been the subject of lengthy speculation). Anyway, here’s a recipe I like from the Lee Brothers’ Southern Cookbook, which I own and love.

Hoppin’ John

1 cup dried black-eyed peas or field peas (You can also substitute fresh, often available this time of year; just omit the soaking step and cook until tender.)
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 smoked hog jowl, or 1/4 pound (3 strips) thick-cut smoked bacon
1 medium onion, coarsely chopped
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1 teaspoon salt
5 or 6 peeled whole tomatoes, or half a 28-ounce can, drained (optional)
1 1/2 cups uncooked rice.

1. Wash the peas in a strainer, and soak them for 4 hours in ample fresh water. When ready, heat olive oil over medium-high heat in a 4-quart pot, and brown the hog jowl on both sides. (If using bacon, omit the olive oil, and simply render the fat in the pot for 5 minutes.) Add onion, and cook until softened, about 5 minutes. Add 6 cups water, black pepper, red pepper and salt, and bring to a boil.
2. Let mixture boil 10 minutes, and then add peas. Maintain a low boil, uncovered, until peas are nearly tender (25 minutes for black-eyed peas, 30 minutes for field peas). In a bowl, lightly crush tomatoes, and add to pot. Add rice to pot, reduce heat to low and simmer, covered, 20 minutes.
3. Turn off flame, and allow hoppin’ John to steam in pot, lid on, for 5 minutes. If using hog jowl, remove from pot, and shred meat. Fluff hoppin’ John, and add shredded jowl. Serve.

125th and Densmore Ave N

Last month, I wrote about a Safeway redevelopment in North Seattle’s Pinehurst neighborhood that had a handful of community groups all riled up. Several neighborhood councils made noise about the potential loss of single-family zoned housing as a result of the project, which could require the demolition of three long-vacant homes.

Ironically, the Haller Lake Community Club (HLCC)—one of the groups who opposed the Safeway project—has now asked the City for permission to convert a single-family house into an office. The house, which is next door to the community club, was recently purchased by a dance group which uses the HLCC, and the group has outgrown their current facility.

Sure, the HLCC’s plan won’t require the demolition of the house, but there will be one less single family home in North Seattle once they’re done with the conversion.

Say goodbye to France’s famously smokey cafes…

French cafes set to ban smoking

France is poised to extend its smoking ban to bars, cafes, restaurants and discos, but the measure will not be enforced fully until 2 January.

The health ministry said smokers would be allowed a 24-hour “grace” period for the New Year festivities.

The fine for smoking in a French cafe, bar, restaurant or disco after January 2 will be 450 euros—or $662. And despite the impression Paris makes, the majority of the French are non-smokers. Out of 61 million French, just 13.5 million smoke.

This troubling item comes to us courtesy of News Channel 7—FIRST in South Carolina to broadcast in high definition.

A Spartanburg mother is accused of stabbing her son several times Christmas morning, but her son is the person facing charges. City police say it appears the mother, 45-year-old Tammy Jones, stabbed her son because he urinated on her while she slept in her bed. 21-year-old Michael Anthony Carson, nicknamed Pooh Bear, is charged with aggravated assault and battery. Police arrested him at his mother’s home on Wednesday.

City police say Jones stabbed her son six times with a butcher knife. He suffered wounds to his shoulder, calf, and chest. Witnesses in the house heard Jones say “why did you pee on me Pooh Bear?” A few moments later, the witness heard the son say “Mama you done stabbed me.”

Most everything in the print edition this week opened Tuesday, including The Savages (Bradley Steinbacher says it “deftly walks a tightrope between comedy and mush”), The Great Debaters (“The rhythms are so smooth and the beats so momentous that the story never seems remotely real,” I write. “Which is too bad, because Wiley College had some impressive debate teams”), and The Water Horse (Brendan Kiley: “It’s cute (but not nauseatingly so) and pretty, set in rural Scotland with its big peaks, cobblestoned streets, and a costume closet from the golden age of natty togs”). In a separate piece, Andrew Wright reviews Alien vs. Predator: Requiem (“a big ball of trademarked suck”), which also opened earlier.

But a few choice films are opening today. First up: Diva:

Diva
dir. Jean-Jacques Beineix Opening December 28 at SIFF Cinema.

I am told people retain nostalgic feelings for Diva, an insanely pretentious 1981 French film about smitten postmen, roller-skating shoplifters, freight elevators, spooky recording technology, and an electric blue everlasting wave machine. I hate to break it to you, but the only thing that’s still awesome about this movie is a five-second cameo by a cat named Ayatollah. Ayatollah is très chouette.

Jules (Frédéric Andréi) is a postal worker in his early 20s—ah, the fresh-faced French working class—with a raging crush on the African-American opera singer Cynthia Hawkins (played by one Wilhelmenia Wiggins Fernandez—can I get a holy shit?). He bootlegs one of her concerts, chats her up backstage, and then, in a fit of straight-as-a-board covetousness, snatches her silken robes from a rack and hightails it home. Jules also meets a Vietnamese shoplifter who enjoys roller skating and posing naked for artsy photographs. And her boyfriend, who sits soulfully on the floor of his massive Paris loft and works jigsaw puzzles. But then sometimes the boyfriend gets up and lectures on how to butter a baguette.

Meanwhile, there’s some other nonsense about a prostitution ring the chief of police is implicated in. And something about switching secret cassette tapes. None of this part of the plot makes any sense. All you have to know is the bad guys wear aviator sunglasses. Their favorite weapon is the awl. The awl.

Diva is, unfortunately, two hours long, so pretty soon the crushing weight of its ridiculousness begins to suffocate the modern viewer. Do we really have to listen to Wilhelmenia bleat about how anyone with the audacity to record her precious voice might as well go ahead and rape her? It’s 1981, darling. This behavior has no place. The Vietnamese Frenchie is absolutely intolerable. And there are one too many shots of that goofy wave machine. But if you want to kneel at the altar of the coolest cat name ever recorded, Diva is your flick. C’mere, Ayatollah, you fuzzy thing. ANNIE WAGNER

Competing for the cool vote at Northwest Film Forum: Five Easy Pieces.

The question of whether Five Easy Pieces is sexist or about sexism has been troubling movie nerds for thirty years now, and this screening will open the worm can once again. This unresolvable dialectic is one of the many good things this great film trails in its wake. Because yes, frankly, it is sexist (and not pre-feminist, either). Even the title is a sexist double entendre—those pieces aren’t piano music, dude. Jack Nicholson’s Bobby Dupea bounces from one weak woman to another (including Sally Struthers, most acrobatically), tearing them apart in the process, and Bob Rafelson’s camera makes him a hero for it. Only when Bobby meets a substantive woman (who terrifies him) does the movie take pains to register the hero’s maybe-tragic, maybe-just-psych-101 flaw. Bobby’s suffering excuses nothing and explains everything. His victims (Karen Black as the not-as-ditzy-as-she-acts sex kitten waitress, Struthers as the easy mark with the dimple in her chin) are not without dignity; they are, however, without hope, because they can’t help loving the king of all cruel bastards. And that’s why the movie is about sexism even as it pretends it’s not also looking through Karen Black’s see-through nightie. Throw in the chicken salad sandwich scene and you’ve got yourself an imperishable emotional weather report from the heart of the American ’70s. SEAN NELSON

And Grand Illusion is screening Oswald’s Ghost, a documentary about the JFK assassination.

Movie times are available at Get Out. If you’re going to Pacific Place this weekend, bring an extra sweater. I almost froze to death last night watching Charlie Wilson’s War, which is, otherwise, highly recommended.

Netscape is no more.

Netscape, the Web browser once used in 80 percent of all Internet sessions, will be shut down by AOL after failing to regain market share from Microsoft Corp.’s Internet Explorer.

Netscape users should switch to Mozilla Foundation’s Firefox browser, Netscape director Tom Drapeau wrote on his blog. America Online Inc. paid $9.8 billion in 1999 for Netscape, which by then had been crippled by Microsoft.

You gotta love this quote…

“AOL’s focus on transitioning to an ad-supported Web business leaves little room for the size of investment needed to get the Netscape browser to a point many of its fans expect it to be,” Drapeau said.

Netscape had fans? And who’s gonna shut down AOL after its transition to an “ad-supported Web business” ultimately fails?

We’re down to the semifinals at the Capitol Hill Seattle Tourney 2007—it’s Hillku vs. Aloha non-crosswalk and the #10 Bus vs. Coyotes. The Stranger endorses Hillku and Coyotes. Vote here.

Apologies for the long block quote, but this is quite a remarkable series of statements (and misstatements) from the man who is currently leading all other Republicans in Iowa:

DES MOINES — Mike Huckabee used the volatile situation in Pakistan Friday to make an argument for building a fence on the American border with Mexico and found himself trying to explain a series of remarks about Pakistanis and their nation.

On Thursday night he told reporters in Orlando, Fla.: “We ought to have an immediate, very clear monitoring of our borders and particularly to make sure if there’s any unusual activity of Pakistanis coming into the country.”

On Friday, in Pella, Iowa, he expanded on those remarks.

“When I say single them out I am making the observation that we have more Pakistani illegals coming across our border than all other nationalities except those immediately south of the border,” he told reporters in Pella. “And in light of what is happening in Pakistan it ought to give us pause as to why are so many illegals coming across these borders.”

In fact, far more illegal immigrants come from the Philippines, Korea, China and Vietnam, according to recent estimates from the Department of Homeland Security.

Asked how a border fence would help keep out Pakistani immigrants, Mr. Huckabee argued that airplane security was already strong, but that security at the southern United States border was dangerously weak.

“The fact is that the immigration issue is not so much about people coming to pick lettuce or make beds, it’s about someone coming with a shoulder-fired missile,” he said.

The sudden emergency in Pakistan and Mr. Huckabee’s response come at a time when he has come under increasing scrutiny from opponents for his lack of fluency in foreign policy issues, and the situation in Pakistan appeared to have challenged him.

“We have seen what happens in the Musharraf government,” Mr. Huckabee said on MSNBC. “He has told us he does not have enough control of those eastern borders near Afghanistan to be able go after the terrorists. But on the other hand, did he not want us going in, so what do we do?” Those borders are actually on the west, not the east.

Further, he offered an Orlando crowd his “apologies for what has happened in Pakistan.” His aides said later that he meant to say “sympathies.” He also said he was worried about martial law “continuing” in Pakistan, although Mr. Musharraf lifted the state of emergency on Dec. 15. His campaign told CBS News that his statement was not a blunder.

Wack Addict: Jane’s Addiction Bassist’s Awful New Record

Setlist: We Love the Terrordactyls

Tonight in Music: BlöödHag, Ian Moore, Snowman Plan, and Terrordactyls at the Anne Bonney

Good God Oh No: Eddy Grant’s “Electric Avenue”

Minneapolis: Megan Seling on Janet Jackson’s Twin City Shout-Out

The Year in Disco: TJ Gorton’s Favorite Releases of 2007

Photo of the Day: Strong Killings at the Comet

Meet the Real Dave Mustaine: Worms and All

Not a Real Doctor: Maybe Dave Should See This Guy

Today in Music News: Madonna, Tupac, Warner Brothers & Amazon, Beards, and More

Show Us Your Pics: Share Your New Year’s Eve Pics in the Stranger Flickr Pool

In a recent interview David Beckham said:

“I’m very honored to have the tag of gay icon.”

Well. I’m confident that I speak for all The Gays when I say that we’re just thrilled to be tagging you, David dear. Now please show us your penis. Please.

And just because we haven’t heard anything from her in a spell, I give you Old Widow Cobain (if I may dust off that old chestnut) and her massive delusions:

“Courtney Love is “devastated” after a pair of $100,000 pink diamond earrings was stolen from her New York hotel room on Wednesday. According to a source: “She had brought the earrings for Frances as her Christmas present. Frances hadn’t even tried them on yet.”

The tragic teen didn’t even get to try on her $100,000 pair of earrings? Oh, the horror! But wait!

But hours after New York police launched an investigation into the incident on Thursday morning, the diamond earrings mysteriously reappeared.”

Turns out they were under the winged pink elephant the entire time.

On Christmas Day, the state patrol received over one hundred 911 calls about a man running across I-5, near Federal Way, whipping passing cars with his belt. Police arrived and, according to reports, tasered Aaron Larson, 28, to no effect before he was shot and killed by an officer.

According to a report in the PI, Larson was upset over the death of his mother. Indeed, Larson was the son of Phyllis Buchert, who was found dead in a Lake City apartment earlier this year.

This summer, I wrote about Buchert and within days of my story going to print, I received a call from her son—and Aaron Larson’s younger brother—Danny, 26. In June, Danny told me about a series of tragic events that had led to his mother’s death. He said that his mother had been in and out of the hospital, in jail, and eventually thrown out of her home by her husband, before she was found dead in a Lake City man’s bathtub.

Earlier this month I remembered my conversation with Danny, and one of the first regrets I wrote for this year was about my flippant coverage of Buchert’s death. Now, it appears that Danny was at the scene when his brother Aaron was killed by police last Tuesday.

Aaron Larson is survived by five siblings, age 26, 25, 16,15 and 11. Again, I’d like to offer my sincerest condolences to his family.

Jonah and Josh (the male cabal that forms two-thirds of the Stranger’s news staff) took advantage of my absence to write this totally offensive look back at 2007 “with” (they wish!) Venus Velazquez, the foxy onetime City Council candidate last seen losing to Bruce Harrell thanks to a DUI. Those two really know how to kick a lady when she’s down! Anyway, here’s an excerpt.

Best Decision of the Year: No. And Hell No.

The voters get credit for making the best decision of 2007. When it came to Seattle’s waterfront, voters wisely said no to Mayor Nickels’s expensive (and unfunded) tunnel option and no to Olympia’s retrograde elevated rebuild. Both options were bad news for the environment and downtown. Invaluable bonus: The “No” and “Hell No” votes put the “surface/transit” option in play, which is good for the environment and will be killer for the neighborhood. Double bonus: Surface/transit guru Cary Moon is foxy.

Venus Velázquez says: First of all, I’m way foxier than a hippie like Cary Moon. Second of all, the best decision of the year was mine, when I refused to take that fascist sobriety test. Did anyone check to see if Bruce Harrell was fucking drunk? You know, I know where that guy drinks and I know for a fact he’s wasted after two beers.

1) Seattle cabs get 12 miles per gallon, the Sightline Institute points out—not news, exactly (it’s been out there for a while) but a depressing reminder that even those of us who think we’re doing good by taking cabs instead of owning cars (because so much of the environmental impact of cars is in their manufacture) aren’t doing nearly as much as we could. Prius taxis, now, please!

2) Portland is having trouble expanding its beloved streetcar line around the city, thanks to federal rules that favor buses over rail. The new rules deemphasize increased density, reductions in vehicle miles traveled, and improved land use and focus instead on per-rider cost-effectiveness, a measure that strongly favors buses (because, duh, putting buses on the street is cheaper per rider than building rail lines, even though rail lines have other benefits). According to the Oregonian,

The transit administration has published rules that would make cost-effectiveness the key test of whether a project should be funded. Zoning for high density and saving miles driven in cars would be combined with congestion relief under an effectiveness test. Together those would count for half the benefits allowed [a reduction in their impact on benefits].

The result?

“If you build 5,000 units of housing along that line and people walked from those units of housing and get on the streetcar, they would not count under their criteria,” [US Rep. Peter] DeFazio said.

The only riders that count are the ones that transfer from a bus or other transit to get to the streetcar line, he said.

“It’s totally misanthropic,” DeFazio said. “It’s set up to make streetcar never pencil out.”

Immediately at stake is $200 million in federal money for streetcar projects around the country. In the long term, though, the feds’ philosophical shift toward buses could jeopardize funding for rail projects around the country, including Sound Transit’s light rail and streetcar expansion in Seattle.

Hey y’all—those of you celebrating on Monday night—upload your party photos to our Flickr pool with the tag NYE07. I’ll post a bunch of them to Slog on Tuesday (since we’ll likely be too bleary to read or write much).

Whether you’re going to a fancy dress-up party…
^{Kelly O}

Or just a karaoke bash in your friends’ moms’ basement…
^{Kelly O}

We want to see your pictures!

(New Year’s Eve party listings are here.)

So… if you ever get caught smoking pot, you’re permanently banned from installing snowchains at Snoqualmie Pass. Who are they going to go after next? Pizza delivery drivers?

Ron Paul supporters have already used Halo 3 to drum up support. And now they’re taking to World of Warcraft:

On New Years Day, Paul-backing devotees of the online multiplayer game are planning a march through WoW’s sprawling virtual universe to show support their candidate. Participants will be represented by one of an array of mythical avatars that populate the fantasy-themed game, in which players take on adventures and duel against rival characters.

The anti-Paul brigade shouldn’t get their hopes up for a sword-clashing conflict with the marchers, however, since

The event will take place on a server that forbids player vs. player combat.

Cowards.

The crime:

AN ELDERLY circus worker was crushed by an elephant on the North Coast yesterday.

The scene:

Police said a Stardust Circus worker found his colleague lying on the ground soon after entering the elephant’s enclosure in a Yamba park about 5.15 pm.

The motive:

It is believed it was a 50-year-old female Asian elephant named Arna, which was at the centre of an animal-cruelty case dismissed in 2004.

McCain’s secret attack ad: A Slate scoop.

Who has time for these sites? Other than… well, who exactly?

Much easier to digest: Is this.

Like buttah: Obama endorsed by key Iowa figure, the “Butter Cow Lady.”

Closing with a sermon: Mike Huckabee.

These are greedy institutions: And there are prices to pay.

Edwards and the 527s: More stories like this every day.

Almost out of air: Television ad time now hard to come by in Iowa.

Tune in to Robert Mak’s year-in-review round up this Sunday. I’ll be on with a panel talking about the year’s top local stories. There’ll also be predictions for ‘08.

Mak’s show airs: 9:30am on KING, 11am on KONG, 8pm on NWCN, 11:30pm on KING.

Progress! From Flickr pool contibuter kurt schlosser.

The homepage for The Seattle Times:

Death, death, death, and more death. Enough is enough! Let’s have some life!

Both in the comments and in my apartment around midnight last night, the question arose: Does it matter what a presidential candidate thinks of evolution? (Notice I didn’t ask about “whether a presidential candidate believes in evolution,” which is a flawed question.)

My answer: Absolutely.

Ron Paul said:

At first I thought it was a very inappropriate question, you know, for the presidency to be decided on a scientific matter. And, uh, I think it’s a theory, a theory of evolution, and I don’t accept it, you know, as a theory. It probably doesn’t bother me—it’s not the most important issue for me to make the difference in my [life?] to understand the exact origin. I think the Creator that I know, you know, created us, every one of us, and created the universe—and the precise time and manner, and all, I don’t think we’re at the point where anybody has absolute proof on either side. If that were the only issue, quite frankly—I would think it’s an interesting discussion, I think it’s a theological discussion, and I think it’s fine—but if that were the issue of the day, I wouldn’t be running for public office.

That first sentence isn’t awful. Presidential candidates should not be taking sides on current scientific debates—it’s a waste of time to inject politics into a process that universities, conferences, journals, grants, and other mechanisms are perfectly capable of working out independently. But the basic theory of evolution by means of natural selection is simply not a matter of current scientific debate. Current science adds to the theory of evolution, tweaks it, finesses its more complicated implications. But absolutely no one is saying: Uh oh, you guys, this theory is not up to the task of explaining this new trove of evidence, it’s no longer making useful predictions, it’s not as comprehensive or predictive as this other unifying theory. It just isn’t happening.

What the evolution-vs.-creationism debate is about is, instead, a culture war—and it’s a culture war with policy implications. Republican primary voters are clamoring for a candidate who professes disbelief in evolution. (I honestly have trouble believing that a medical doctor who graduated from Duke refuses to “accept” the theory of evolution, but whatever.) This has resulted in a president who publicly disavows evolution, throws massive amounts of publicity at think-tank pseudoscience, and in doing so erodes respect for the United States in much of the rest of the developed world and damages sorely needed scientific literacy here at home.

In the above quotation, Paul disparages evolution as “a theory” (“a theory of evolution,” even, not the theory, which it is), when we should all know by now that a theory is a robust set of statements or principles that explains a wide variety of observations, has stood up to repeated tests, is widely accepted, and successfully predicts natural phenomena. A presidential candidate should never confuse the American public by mixing popular and scientific definitions of the word “theory.”

Does anyone have “absolute proof on either side”? No. Paul is correct there. But we as a society don’t usually ask for “absolute proof.” We put people to death for lesser degrees of certainty. The real question is, is there evidence of equal weight supporting evolution and creationism? And the answer is no. The evidence that is better explained by and further confirms the theory of evolution is overwhelming.

So when Paul deems the analysis of the credibility of evolution “a theological discussion,” he is fundamentally perverting the question. Evolution is not susceptible to theological arguments. It seeks to explain only natural phenomena. The notion that you would start from a theological truth and work backward bespeaks an irrational, antiscientific worldview. And that, in my opinion, is anathema in a president.

Most importantly, federal funding makes science happen in this country. The idea that a cursory understanding of science fundamentals is not desirable in a president is, quite frankly, laughable. The evolution question is relevant. We should expect a more thoughtful answer from our next president.

(See also the libertarian blogger Eugene Volokh on this question when it applied only to Sen. Brownback; and DeWayne Wickham at USA Today.)

Hello Kitty, the cute, cuddly white feline adored by Japanese girls and young women, is going macho. The cat, made by Japan’s Sanrio, will soon adorn T-shirts, bags, watches and other products targeting young men.

“Young men these days grew up with character goods,” said a spokesman. “That generation feels no embarrassment about wearing Hello Kitty.”

Thanks to Slog tipper Jubilation T. Cornball.

It looks like Local SEIU chief David Rolf may have screwed up by attempting to coordinate his union’s support of presidential candidate John Edwards with the Edwards campaign.

Independent political groups like Union PACs and 527s are not allowed to coordinate their campaign efforts with candidates.

Courtesy of David Postman who is on the story.

This is sort of inside-baseball, but it’s telling for anyone who’s interested in the media world and where it’s going, especially when it comes to political journalism. Mark Halperin today offered a long list of things that reporters shouldn’t hold their breath for as the Iowa caucuses approach. On the list: “Al Gore’s endorsement,” “Huckabee to lose that new 12 pounds,” and this:

An editor to say, “Don’t bother filing for the web – take the time to make your print story that much better.”

Which brings up something I’ve been wondering: Where do you all get your political news? Is it just from blogs and online news sites, or do you actually wait for a well-crafted story on printed paper to tell you what’s going on?

I know asking this of Slog readers on a day when a lot of people aren’t at work is going to make for a strange sample, but hey, maybe strange times call for strange samples. And anyway, I’m just curious.

Central Connecticut State University has released their annual list of the top ten most literate cities in the U.S. and Seattle’s number two.

But…but…we were number one last year. And we were number one in 2005. But we were number two in 2004.

I had no idea that literacy was so damn mercurial. Apparently, the information is compiled from (emphasis mine)

U.S. Census data, newspaper circulation rates, magazine publishing, educational attainment levels, library resources and booksellers.

I think our public schools were probably responsible for the dip in literacy in 2004, but I’m placing 2007’s second-place finish directly in the hands of Seattle Metropolitan Magazine (this month: “Linda Derschang brought the fun and the funky to the Pike/Pine Corridor,” a story about cellist Joshua Roman titled “String Theory,” and a story about potatoes titled…wait for it…”This Spud’s For You.” )

Please stop, Seattle Metropolitan. The statistics are showing that you’re making us dumber with every new issue you publish.

(Thanks to Slog tipper Gregory for the literacy news.)

The land of France could learn a thing or two from Bellevue Community College:
Hardcore!

Mouth eyes photos, qúúl. Toothèd vagina movie, get the hell away from me. Wait, is it “toothéd”? Will the zeroeth tone please stand up?

Whatever! This is clearly the best part of this post.

Don’t you think headlines like “Largest diamond in galaxy predicts future of solar system” are unnecessarily titillating? Meanwhile, Pravda still has one of the best logos I can think of. At this time.

Similary, OOF! Lasers, crystals, servomotors, fashion, modern sun worship. Hussein Chalayan, Spring/Summer 2008. The “Making of”:

The collection video, in collaboration with Nick Knight’s SHOWstudio, and you will hear dissonant Antony beat interference upp-in. The Good Shit starts around 8:03. YOU. BETTA. VENERATE.:

Dagggg. Chalayan is turning it out and proving that we need more brains in fashion, please. Stop this “cute” bullshit. “Cute top!” “Fabulous skirt.” “Nice touch.” Shut up, with your tired, Barbie-playin’, fishtail-makin’, Old Hollywood Glamour-invokin’ ass.

The elusive ʻokina, which is having “transitional problems.”

Speaking of transitional problems, has anyone else noticed the onslaught of in-depth special reports on transsexuals on MSNBC lately? It’s kind of refreshing because none of the reports carry that “They are freaks, but you be the judge” tone that so many transgender docs on other channels have. They totally just follow some transgirls getting ready for and competing in the Latex Ball in New York. Anyway.

Recursive warning sign!

A Bob Mackie-encrusted Diahann Caroll as a singing, psychedelic, holographic fantasy, pleasuring Chewbacca’s Wookiee Pa:

I know you’re searching for me.
Searching, searching…
I’m here. My voice is for you alone.
I am found in your eyes only.
I exist for you. I am in your mind
as you create me.
Ohhh, yes.
I can feel my creation! [Mmhm!]
…
I find you adorable.
I don’t need to ask how you find me.
You see, I am your fantasy;
I am your experience,
So experience me.
I am your pleasure,
You enjoy me.
This is our moment together in time,
that we might turn this moment into an eternity.

Great! Happy Life Day!

Shhh.

On KUOW this morning I was asked how the Democratic presidential candidates are talking about the housing market, the sub-prime mortgage problem, and possible solutions. You can listen to my answer here, or you can watch this brand new Clinton ad, which happened to be in my in-box when I got back from the show:

Are you scared yet?

Music

Xmas at the
Anne Bonny at The Anne Bonny

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America’s favorite post-Cheech&Chong stoners-orf-color are back—and they’re in Guantanamo. Watch the trailer here. Is it a hilarious slap at racism, racists, and the injustices committed in our lil’ War on Terror? Or is it tasteless and too soon, seeing as people—some doubtless innocent of any crime—are still rotting away at Guantanamo?

And can someone tell me what’s in the age-restricted trailer? I can’t get in to see it because I don’t have a driver’s license and they’re discriminating against me.

Via Towleroad.

According to Seattle Art Museum spokeswoman Erika Lindsay, this summer you’ll be able to roam the meadows at the Olympic Sculpture Park. No more fences keeping you from coming anywhere near—let alone standing under, as by design the artist seems to invite you to do—Bunyon’s Chess. This means, essentially, that the people of Seattle will experience this early Mark Di Suvero sculpture for the first time this summer. (The “experience” right now is nothing more than an image held visually—imagine if you weren’t able to walk into Richard Serra’s Wake and you have the idea.)

^{Mark Di Suvero’s Bunyon’s Chess (1965)}

In other OSP news, Glenn Rudolph’s photographs of the way the site used to look and Pedro Reyes’s wall sculpture and swinging structures will be removed from the pavilion in March to make way for an installation by Geoff McFetridge. The installation hasn’t been finalized, but from preparatory drawings, Lindsay described it as a billboard that extends from the wall with parts that reach the floor. I love that the pavilion is a place in the park to consider the relationship between the wall and the floor, and to consider the history of relief.

^{Battle of the Gods and Giants, from the north frieze of the Treasury of the Siphnians, Delphi (ca. 530 B.C.)}

^{Untitled by Robert Morris (1967)}

Originally posted yesterday.

Puget Sound Business Journal has the scoop on financial woes at the Seattle Times.

Blethen said the Times’ print revenue losses for 2007 and 2008 will total about $33 million, and senior leadership has “amazingly” found $21 million in cost reductions, but “we still need another $6 million to ensure stability next year.”

Scientists have developed a new drug that “reverses the effects of sleep deprivation”—and it comes in a snortable form. Man, what will they think of next?

Thanks to Slog tipper Mr. Poe.

This one made it into the print edition…

Dan Savage, editorial director of The Stranger, is certain he WOULD regret inviting a group of Stranger staffers over to his house to bake matzo using human blood in place of water IF Mr. Savage had done any such thing. But IF Mr. Savage did invite several coworkers over to his house—including Jewish coworkers—to prepare blood matzo, Mr. Savage’s intentions were pure. If blood matzo was prepared in Mr. Savage’s kitchen on or near Passover in 2007, it was a misguided effort to disprove the “blood libel,” e.g. the claim that Jews prepare matzo, the unleavened bread consumed by Jews during Passover, with the blood of innocent Christians. If Mr. Savage and Brendan Kiley, performance editor of The Stranger, had their innocent Christian blood drawn in Mr. Savage’s kitchen by a licensed phlebotomist, and if their blood was mixed with kosher flour in a food processor, and if this mixture was then rolled out on sheets of wax paper, and then baked in Mr. Savage’s oven, and it was discovered that a fine, deep-purple matzo could be prepared with human blood, that would be very regrettable indeed. Successfully baking matzo with human blood wouldn’t prove, of course, that any Jews anywhere at any time in history had ever actually made matzo with human blood—save, of course, one hypothetical Jewish phlebotomist and one hypothetical Jewish cook—only that it was possible to make matzo using human blood. Which is very different. If any of this had happened, and if a videotape was made of it, and if blood matzo was still sitting on a shelf in Mr. Savage’s kitchen, and if a food processor and a cookie sheet and a rolling pin all had to be discarded after this happened, that would all be very, very regrettable. Luckily, however, none of this happened.

This picture did not…

This one got cut from the print edition:

Jen Graves does not regret her June 13 story exposing the strange process behind the rejection of a proposed sculpture by Felix Gonzalez-Torres proposal for Western Washington University in 1992. But she does regret describing the sculpture, which was finally built for this year’s Venice Biennale, as “The One That Got Away,” because that implies that the sculpture is good, and when she arrived at the Venice Biennale, she discovered that—at least in this posthumous version—it is not.

It must be kind of hard to meditate in your living room while a photographer from the New York Times snaps pictures of you.

I’ll be on KUOW’s Weekday this morning talking about the news of the week, the biggest news from the year gone by, and the probable big stories in the year ahead. Show starts at 10 a.m.

Got something you think we should discuss? As always, put it in the comments.