By Hillary Clinton supporters who are mad as hell at the online abuse they say they are getting, and have decided not to take it anymore.

Music

The Presidents of the United States of America at Paramount Theatre

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The whole Obama/Wright story makes me like Obama more.

While Obama is obviously bullshitting when he acts as if he’s surprised by Rev. Wright’s statements, I actually like that Obama goes to a church with an incendiary, kinda trite black minister.

Ha! Wright’s “chickens home to roost” line about 9/11 is directly lifted from Malcolm X talking about JFK’s assassination, right? It doesn’t get any more amateur-hour than that from a firebrand wannabe. But The fact that Obama has a goof ball minister like that just makes Obama more normal. About time.

Meanwhile, Obama’s performance on Olbermann about the whole flap was particularly well played.

Although, before I get to that, I must say, the typically dogged Olbermann was a total pussy. Watch the first Q&A in particular. Obama doesn’t answer the question (did Wright resign or did Obama ask him to step down?), and Olbermann doesn’t persist.

Having said that, Obama’s explanation about Rev. Wright is perfect. Obama subtly tells mainstream America to fuck off (!) by paying respect to Wright’s ’60s POV, but at the exact same time, Obama uses Wright’s outdated and silly POV to bring this whole thing back to his central campaign theme: It’s time to move on from the old polarizing battles of the baby boom years and so, vote Obama.

Well done. Even genius. Obama uses a bad story coming out of his campaign corner as more evidence that you should vote for him.

Exelizabeth made some good points about obtuseness in gaming, though technically, that issue has been going for a long time. Most of the commenters with NES/SNES nostalgia are forgetting just how criminally hard a lot of games were in the 80s, when many were designed to frustrate folks in the arcade and keep the quarters rolling. (Even home exclusive hits like Mega Man were filled with ridiculous “jump on the tiniest ledge possible” levels.)

But then she went and disproved her own points by listing her own fave games. The Sims? Viva Pinata? These games might be pick-up-and-play at first, but they turn complex pretty quickly. Both require micro-managing a sandbox to the point where you’re almost better off having a strategy guide at your side while playing. But such a time investment isn’t a bad thing. The whole point of a winning video game is that it earns your desire to figure it out. Maybe you really like the idea of fake-fighting your friends, so you learn how to do an uppercut in Street Fighter. Or you’re a history addict who is so in love with military strategy, it’s almost second nature to make sense of Age of Empires. Or you see the absolutely bizarre production values of Katamari Damacy and take about two minutes to make sense of its ball-rolling tutorial—whammo, you’re now picking up loud, horny cats with a sticky ball. And on and on. Probably takes less time to learn Katamari Damacy and get into some wonderfully bizarre gameplay than it does to sift through enough humanities courses and books to “truly” appreciate art’s baroque era.

But the games industry would still be wise to listen to exactly what Exelizabeth is saying. Earning players’ desire is definitely different for those who have their noses stuck in the games world and for those who look at it from afar. I get that the world of art isn’t exactly fair to compare to, as it has thousands of years and scholars and everything else behind its existence. Games still need a few more decades to really find a comfortable spot in culture—not necessarily in art, but at least in something people are overwhelmingly choosing to include in their adult lives.

I can only hope Exelizabeth (and, duh, her bf) come out for the Slog Super Smash Bros. Brawl Slog tourney that I am gonna organize when I get back into town this week. Who’s in? What days/nights work best for everyone?

^{Walter Grio’s Waiting (2008), framed digital print on Kodak quality paper, 16 by 20 inches}

At McLeod Residence.

March is now Ideful and Friday has been Freaked and there are lots of readings to attend, so let’s get down to it. There are two open mics and a thriller and more.

Exelizabeth wrote about Amy Sutherland in a much more entertaining (and also forgiving) way than I ever could, and so follow the link if you’d like to read more about a self-help book that’s on the topics of marriage lessons from a killer whale. Sutherland is at Queen Anne Books today.

Exelizabeth also paid considerable homage to Lois Lowry, a young adult writer that I will always adore. Apparently, Lowry’s reading at Town Hall isn’t sold out yet, but you should probably get tickets before you go.

Warren Read is at Elliott Bay Book Company, reading from The Lyncher In Me, which is about coming to terms with the sins of a favorite great-grandfather. This is one of those “If I had all the time in the world…” books that gets ignored for other, more pressing books. But that’s one of the reasons we have readings, right? To see if the book’s worth the purchase?

Finally, there’s a reading going on that’s kind of a special case: local author Jefferson Elliott is reading from Suicide Diary, a novel that looks, frankly, pretty bad in the preview pages up at Lulu.com. But it’s also a grand opening for a new bookstore, called The Bottom Shelf. A new bookstore is always exciting, right? Here’s what the owner, Ben Corey, told me about it in an e-mail:

…what we are working towards is essentially an information shop. its a small place so we are going to specialize generally in non-fiction and more specifically in science, travel and social commentary. We will always have a selection of fiction as well, but I am trying to weed out all but the classics and the best of the contemporary. We also have art from a number of local artists and a small selection of music from local bands and musicians.

I might not make it there today, but I will make it there in the near future.

Full readings calendar, including more information about these readings, here.

posted by news intern Chris Kissel

Bear Stearns collapse: Stock market shakes, Federal Reserve fears the problems will spread.

Free Tibet: Violence overshadows Chinese elections, threatens to mar Beijing Olympics. Unconfirmed reports put death toll at 100.

Explosions in Albania: Two hours of blasts at army depot leave 150 injured in Tirana.

Storm hits Atlanta: City braves tornado that leaves destruction, 13,000 without electricity.

Delegate debate: Desperate Democrats continue to squabble over what to do with Michigan and Florida.

Wright leaves campaign: Obama condemns sermons of pastor accused of being a “black separatist.”

Southern justice: New mothers in southern Alabama thrown behind bars.

Local economy suffers: Seattle well ahead of national inflation rates.

Seattle Center redesign: New $676 million proposal threatens Memorial Stadium.

No more bottled water: Nickles purges the city government of water bottles in an effort to save the environment.

Seen enough to eye you
But I’ve seen to much to try you
It’s always weirdness while you
Dig it much too much to fry you
The weirdness flows between us
Anyone can tell to see us
Freak scene just cant believe us
Why cant it just be cool and free us?

Seen enough to eye you
But I’ve seen to much to try you
Its always weirdness while you

What a mess
Dig it much too much to fry you
The weirdness flows between us
Anyone can tell to see us
Freak scene just cant believe us
Why cant it just be cool and leave us?

Its so fucked I can’t believe it
If theres a way I wish we’d see it
How could it work just can’t conceive it
Oh what a mess it’s just to leave it

Sometimes I don’t thrill you
Sometimes I think I’ll kill you
Just don’t let me fuck up will you
‘cause when I need a friend it’s still you

What a mess

Multiple viewings recommended.

After today’s financial meltdown “[y]ou have to go back to the banking crisis of the Great Depression to find a moment when the financial system as a whole seemed so close to the precipice.”

A bit of commentary from the Exile, an alt-weekly for American ex-pats in Russia:

Everything about Bear Stearns collapse and bailout is a deja vu of collapse of Yeltsin-era banking system …

In Russia under Yeltsin, when a bank was close to collapse they always assured the public that everything was fine and they blamed “rumors” for causing problems; this week, the CEO of Bear Stearns and all the American journalists on Bear Stearns payroll blamed “rumors” and “irrational psychology” for causing a run on Bear Stearns’ money during the week. The purpose of these lies is that it allows the insiders to cash out their money while the rest of the trusting American fools keep their money in, only to lose it later. Then after the insiders cash out, comes the supposed “panic” and “sudden” collapse, best to take place on a Friday of course. The “sudden collapse” and “panic” gives cover for the next even bigger transaction: the connected Bear Stearns banker calls the Central Bank Chief Bernanke, just as Khodorkovsky would call Dubinin or whoever was Central Bank chief then, and naturally Bernanke gives to Bear Stearns as many billions as the CEO asks for, and everyone thinks it’s okay because the billions were necessary in this atmosphere of alleged “sudden panic,” as if Bear Stearns and Bernanke had not been speaking to each other like phone sex addicts every day 24/7 the entire week.
…

It is sad to see Americans imitating the very worst Russians 10 years late, what incredible fucking losers you are! And meanwhile the American masses have no fucking idea, free press or no free press, they just stand around like retarded jackasses with a sign on their backs that reads “ASS-FUCK ME”, because they trust their leaders. Americans don’t know anything about Iraq anymore except that they’re winning, they don’t know hundreds of billions being stolen in front of their fat stupid faces, they don’t know anything except where to find a bargain on hamburger buns. I almost cannot blame Bush and the bankers for stealing from American fools, it’s just too easy! Let the bloodthirsty corrupt elite steal from the bloodthirsty retarded masses, it will hasten the final collapse of this cruel and shameful empire called “America.”

I.

The latest by the writer/director team of Craig Lucas and Bart Sher is scheduled to premiere at Playwrights Horizons in 2008.

(It was originally scheduled to premiere at the Roundabout, but Lucas and his agent pulled it because the theater wanted forty percent of the play’s subsidiary rights for the next ten years.)

Congratulations to Sher and Lucas, even if Prayer, at least in its Seattle iteration, wasn’t our favorite. Paul Constant’s review put it well:

The theater world would be a better, more populous place if nobody ever produced another play about an adult son with a tough-as-nails father, a frazzled mother, and an inferiority complex. That’s a lot of cliché, but at least it is well-acted cliché.

II.

Freehold, after being booted out of Odd Fellows Hall, is moving to the old Speakeasy space, on the second floor of 2222 Second Ave. (Freehold’s numerologists are happier than they’ve ever been.)

Our new location has a beloved history having been a former fringe-theatre space set in the heart of the vibrant Belltown neighborhood currently anchored by numerous coffee shops, restaurants and art galleries. Our new space will house two large studios (which includes a 49 seat performance space), a writing room, and administrative offices. Macha Monkey (www.machamonkey.org), also a former Odd Fellows’ Hall tenant, will be sharing space with Freehold at our new location.

Seattle-based Pioneer Organics, a home-delivery service operating in Seattle and Portland, will merge with the largest home-delivery service in Canada, Vancouver, B.C.-based Small Potatoes Urban Delivery, or SPUD. Pioneer president and co-owner Ronny Bell has his interest in the company he founded and will no longer play a role in the new company. Bell shared ownership of Pioneer Organics with a relative, Michael Knight, with whom he was reportedly battling over ownership of the company. Bell did not return a call for comment.

SPUD CEO David Van Seters says each company will continue to operate under its own name for the time being, and that all cities currently served by the two companies (which include Portland, Seattle, Victoria, Vancouver, and San Francisco, among others) will still be served by the new company. “We’re rapidly growing and expanding out to new markets,” Van Seters says, adding that the company does not plan any layoffs. “We’re actually planning to grow.”

Both SPUD and Pioneer Organics started in 1997. In its early years, SPUD grew rapidly, merging with other home delivery companies and expanding its own operations. The company claims on its web site that each SPUD van carrying 100 orders saves up to 200 private car trips to the grocery store and reduces fuel use by 40 percent. “With 100 orders, that’s literally an entire grocery store parking lot [replaced by] one little truck,” Van Seters says. The combined company will have a total of about 18,000 customers.

From Laser Butter

According to the Chicago Tribune:

Indicted Chicago businessman Antoin “Tony” Rezko was a more significant fundraiser for presidential candidate Barack Obama’s earlier political campaigns than previously known. Rezko raised as much as $250,000 for the first three offices Obama sought, the senator told the Tribune on Friday.

Obama also said for the first time that his private real estate transactions with Rezko involved repeated lapses of judgment. The mistake, Obama said, was not simply that Rezko was under grand jury investigation at the time of their 2005 and 2006 dealings. “The mistake was he had been a contributor and somebody involved in politics,” he said.

In an extensive interview that he hoped would quell the lingering controversy over his relationship with Rezko, Obama said that voters concerned about his judgment should view it as “a mistake in not seeing the potential conflicts of interest.”

It’s nice to know that the Muslim world has its priorities in order.

The Muslim world has created a battle plan to defend its religion from political cartoonists and bigots.

Concerned about what they see as a rise in the defamation of Islam, leaders of the world’s Muslim nations are considering taking legal action against those that slight their religion or its sacred symbols. It was a key issue during a two-day summit that ended Friday in this western Africa capital.

Enslaved women, honor killings, murderous extremists, sexual backwardness, fascist regimes, peak oil, global warming—yeah, yeah. Let’s focus on what’s really important, kids. Someone ink-stained cartoonist made fun of our prophet. Boo hoo. Maybe folks living in parts of the world where we can’t execute them for blasphemy will hold our religion in higher esteem if we threaten to sue ‘em. Yeah, that’ll work.

Thank you to our guest Sloggers and all the back-seat-driver commentary today. The blog was lively, weird, and wonderful, while the staff writers enjoyed a leisurely 18 holes. (If you’re looking for more critical feedback, Strangeways offers his review.) Bravo!

Stressful week? I have the ultimate relaxation tip for you. This guy:

You cannot be stressed out while watching Bob Ross paint. That soothing voice, the happy trees, the tranquil landscapes, the occasional clip of a baby squirrel. It’s so relaxing that while watching I have literally started to drool like my cats do when they’re really happy. It is that good.

The only way to see Bob is to catch reruns on PBS, or to buy DVDs from his website. It’s a bit pricey at $46 a series (13 shows), but trust me, knowing you have The Joy of Painting on demand is priceless.

And that’s everything for me! Thanks everyone, it’s been fun.

I’m squeaking in under the wire to show some love for a topic near and dear to my heart: Comic books.

You guys are going to the Emerald City ComiCon, right?

I’m not a superhero fan, I read a lot of Vertigo books, and a lot of, quite frankly, weird and dark books. But, even for a non-hero-lover like me, the ComicCon offers an opportunity to find new titles I wouldn’t otherwise see, meet authors and artists I like, and generally geek out. The ComiCon is making the move from the Qwest Field Events Center to the Convention Center downtown this year, and I’m excited to see their expansion. Please support them!

If you’re looking for a resource on comic books but don’t want to have to ask an actual person in real life, my friend Peter runs the P-I’s comic blog, and he knows more about comics than anyone else I’ve ever met.

Thanks Slog, it’s been fun. Or, humbling and stressful. That’s sort of like fun.

This weekend at the movies we have… a lot of movies I’ve never heard of. Seriously, the only one I’ve heard anything about is Horton Hears a Who! (which looks not-so-good to me, but Megan Seling says it’s funny).

Out of the movies covered in this week’s On Screen, the only one that looks watchable to me is Funny Games. The first sentence of Annie’s review:

In an interview included on the recently released DVD of the original Funny Games, from 1997, Austrian director Michael Haneke asserts that any viewer who chooses to sit through his entire movie is sick in the head.

So, there isn’t much in the way of movies this week. Perhaps you ought to stay home and read a book.

If you haven’t figured it out yet, I’ve really enjoyed the opportunity to give back a little of what I take away from here every day. But now there is serious drinking to be done, and I have a date with Kratos in Olympus. Thanks for all of the kind comments and post assists. You’re the best.

I state with metaphysical certitude that Friday nights are not the same without John McLaughlin. Once, Seattle’s proletariat could ring in the weekend with a cocktail or two and a half-hour of civil unrest with John, Eleanor, Pat and the others. But no longer. Seattle’s KCTS now broadcasts The McLaughlin Group only on Sundays at 11:00 am. The poetic shouting is not the same, stone-cold sober on a Sunday morning. Fortunately Andrew WK has captured the energy, wit and wisdom of The Group in this powerful little ditty, written exclusively for PRI’s Fair Game.

Bye bye!

Thank you to The Stranger and Ms. Horn for the opportunity to Slog for a day. Thank you to the commenters for making it fun. Thank you to the wife for all her help.

“But why shouldn’t I post a response?” she’s asked for the fifth time today. “What the heck is a troll?”

Have a good weekend everyone. Try to stay out of trouble.

In the wake of the Spitzer scandal, one rarely-discussed issue that’s being brought to the forefront is the legalization of prostitution. And, it would seem, most progressives are for it. They pronounce that Spitzer’s affair “wasn’t that bad” because “prostitution should be legal.” But I want to back the party wagon up, here and really consider—should prostitution be legal?

Even though I am an ardent feminist, prostitution was not something I thought about in great detail until, frankly, this week, when I’ve started doing research about it. I’ve always had an unarticulated unease about prostitution, and I’ve been shocked by the attitude that many people have it’s “just another line of work.”

What previously was viewed as a severe form of sexual exploitation is now a woman’s right to do what she wants with her body and a way to sexual liberation and self-determination. This change is a contemporary and pertinent example of the revival of a stagnant repressive political agenda, which now permeates virtually all current political, academic, and popular discourses on prostitution and trafficking in human beings.

It is a logical enough train of thought in a capitalist system that prostitution would be an extension of “choice” as applied to reproductive rights. Unfortunately, “choice” has an economic rather than moral connotation, and these are not economic issues. They are moral ones. The Left shies away from talking about morality, because we (selectively) find imposing our morality on others distasteful. However, I don’t think being anti-prostitution is imposing morality; it’s being anti-exploitation. But more on that in a minute.

I’ve started investigating countries who take different approaches to prostitution than the US. In Australia, the state of Victoria has legalized prostitution (made it legal to buy and sell sexual services, as well as run a business that provides sexual services). Turns out, it’s not working so well. The women don’t have any more control over their situations, and trafficking, including that of children, has been increasing ever since legalization. They don’t have a means of transitioning out of prostitution (since no other legal job requires state-supported transition programs).

So far, the best approach that I’ve come across is that taken by Sweden, where it is not illegal to be a prostitute, but it is illegal to purchase sexual services.

In Sweden, it is understood that any society that claims to defend principles of legal, political, economic, and social equality for women and girls must reject the idea that women and children, mostly girls, are commodities that can be bought, sold, and sexually exploited by men*. To do otherwise is to allow that a separate class of female human beings, especially women and girls who are economically and racially marginalized, is excluded from these measures, as well as from the universal protection of human dignity enshrined in the body of international human rights instruments developed during the past 50 years.

One of the cornerstones of Swedish policies against prostitution and trafficking in human beings is the focus on the root cause, the recognition that without men’s demand for and use of women and girls for sexual exploitation, the global prostitution industry would not be able to flourish and expand.

Continue reading "Thinking Critically about Legalizing Prostitution" »

Thanks to The Stranger staff for giving me a chance to do this. I enjoyed it, but it was also rather difficult. I certainly am better at consuming information than providing it. I already had respect for the staff members who contribute to Slog, and it has nothing but increased as a result of the experience. I hope I did okay!

Thanks also to Casio, whose last minute decision to assist me with these posts proved invaluable.

In other old news, here are a few actual stories:

Maybe we can learn something from the conservative, Iranian, view regarding Sex Changes.

They are already talking about building BMWs here because the labor is cheaper than in Germany. If the dollar continues to fall I suppose we can look forward to the latest in Low Paying Jobs.

Here’s some good news, but don’t say you heard it from me.

And with that, I think I’m officially done as a guest slogger today. Here’s a crappy cell phone pic of me. Say hello if you see me around town. And check out my band, razrez.

Last Friday I stayed in with the intention of working on Slog posts, but instead I watched 20/20. I hate the news-magazine format for its cloying sensationalism, but their story on a young couple dealing with the husband’s sex-offender status, earned while he was a teenager having consensual sex with the woman who would later become his wife, was well-balanced and thought-provoking. They are running part two of the story tonight (on our local ABC affiliate, KOMO 4), so if you’re not doing anything else at 10 o’clock, it may help you forget how lame you feel for not doing anything else at 10 o’clock on a Friday night.

Laws like this frustrate me because, when applied in such a black-or-white way, they are not necessarily protective, and can unfairly ruin someone’s life. Sure, you can argue that it’s one’s personal responsibility to know the law and follow it, but teens with teens? I’ve said it before and I’ve said it again: I did not magically start making awesome decisions when I turned 18. How is it beneficial to society to make a man suffer for the rest of his life for a victimless mistake?

Any parents of teens out there, PLEASE talk to them about the age of consent laws in your state and how to avoid a very costly mistake. I feel strongly that this should also be covered in high school health classes, but in abstinence-only land that seems unlikely. This site collects the specific state laws, and many others provide a breakdown of ages of consent around the world.

Sherman Alexie convinced me to love the Sonics. His stories make me happy. If the Sonics make him happy, then I’m all for keeping them around. In my dream world, the Trailblazers have their bags packed and are waiting for a vacancy in KeyArena before they move here.

While Mr. Bennett pretends he’ll keep the team here, his fellow Oklahomers announced today they’ll pave the Sonics’ path from Seattle with tax-payer money.

At what point can we all stop pretending? Wouldn’t this Band-Aid hurt less if we just ripped it off quickly?

My beloved gay husband and I are taking the weekend off to travel in a big loop through the mountains to Leavenworth (short stop for a bratwurst?) then on to Yakima (antique stores, burgers at Dusty’s) for Saturday night. Sunday morning we move on to The Maryhill Museum in Oregon to see Marie of Romania’s stuff, the concrete Stonehenge, and the Theatre De La Mode. Finally, over to Portland for a night in a good hotel (thanks Orbitz!), a nice meal (at the Veritable Quandary, perhaps) and Portland things on Monday like Powell’s, Counter Media, etc.

Any suggestions for somewhere to stay in Yakima area that won’t cost an absurd amount and isn’t too scary? We are teh gay, and therefore can enjoy the kitsch, but we are also over 40 and like to be reasonably comfortable.

Is there anything not mentioned on our itinerary that we should stop for?

Thanks everyone for letting me SLOG today. I got little else done, but enjoyed myself thoroughly. Sorry I didn’t unearth any showtunes for Fnarf, sorry I wasn’t able to share my thoughts on Hillary VS Obama (short one-issue version: The Clintons have been known to toss the gays under the bus at the earliest opportunity. I’m hoping for better from Obama.) But thanks to Amy Kate and everyone from the Stranger for letting me spout off today.

And to finish up by being completely self-serving. Let me mention that I bar tend (most) Sunday afternoons at MOE Bar, starting at 3 PM. Come have some drinks and tip me lavishly.

As for the pagoda, we found it on Craigslist!

As the sun sets on Freaky Friday, I’d like to first take this opportunity to thank the Stranger staff, lovely, charming folks that they are. I will conclude with a slideshow of what are, as of 4:15 PM on March 14, 2008, the current best things on earth. They are, in order, sea otters…

pad thai…

and roller derby.

Slog would like to thank me for being here today. I would have posted more, but I’m busybusybusy and unoriginalunoriginalunoriginal, and I’m sorry. (Not for you, for me.) I am way too awesome for this… this “work” nonsense.

Anyway, thanks for shoving your tongue up my ass and/or making fun of me. It was fun, but this fun must end. If you ever see me around town, say hi. I’m not scary. I promise. I look like this:

Don’t be shy. And if you’re pictured anywhere in this post, you pretty much have a 100% chance of fucking me. Up the ass. Or in the face. Or just spray it all over. I’m GGG. Whatevz.

This is my last post of the day. I have to go off and prep for a big Saturday offsite.

I want to thank Dan and Amy and the whole Stranger family for giving me this opportunity. I had a blast. I especially want to say a deeply sincere “thank you” to the 90+% of Obama supporters who today argued articulately, passionately, and respectfully for him. I come out of today more confident that we as Democrats are going to kick McCain’s ass in the fall, regardless of who carries the flag. I hope the Stranger and the SLOG become a big part of that effort in Washington, which isn’t nearly blue enough for my tastes. Though the road to the nomination is uncertain, my second greatest wish in life would be that we leave the nomination united and optimistic.

There’s something that I’d like even more, though. I hope after reading this, you’ll understand why I asked the folks at the Slog to turn off comments for this particular post.

My Mom is the most stalwart Democrat, liberal and feminist that I know. When I was growing up, she was always positive and never didactic about her political beliefs, always letting her boundless optimism and confidence in the judgement of the people sustain her though the darkest of seasons (that would be Ronald Reagan and Shrub, natch.) Likewise, her feminism was such a positive, equality-for-all, organic part of our household that it always just seemed obvious and natural and not at all anti-guy (my Mom likes guys. Quite a bit. A troublemaker might almost argue a tad too much at times…)

She was diagnosed early last year with advanced metastatic pancreatic cancer. Though there have been some tough times, she is still fighting the good fight now, over a year later. We had a perfect summer and a wonderful Christmas last year. I just want to let her know- here in the strongest, most vibrant, most progressive forum I can find- how much who I am is built on the foundation that she gave me, and how grateful I am for the clear, exuberant, rational, hopeful, compassionate, fighting, forgiving, and strong political and ethical force that she will always be in my life.

Mom, I love you so much! Get better soon.

-Deeds

Greg

NapoleonXIV

Will In Seattle

Ecce Homo

Sally Kern’s son denies reports he is gay

by: Mick Hinton, World Capitol Bureau

OKLAHOMA CITY — The son of a state lawmaker who has condemned homosexuality as a worse threat to the U.S. than “terrorists or Islam” said Friday he wants it known that he is “straight and not gay.”

Jesse Kern, son of Rep. Sally Kern, R-Oklahoma City, said information purporting that he is gay, which has appeared on several blogs, is damaging to himself and his family.

Kern, 31, said he feels the media has a responsibility to seek out the truth, then report it.

Kern, who said he is affiliated with the Des Moines School of Metaphysics, said that he chooses to be celibate, but he is not homosexual.

Was his statement and consequent oversharing about his celibacy necessary? I would guess not, but according to the very snazzy website of the Des Moines School of Metaphysics, he is not just affiliated, he is the director of said school. He also looks possibly do-able, in a squirrely but earnest kind of way.

“First of all, no one’s sexuality is anyone’s business. It is not even my mother’s business,” he said. “I practice celibacy to give to my God,” he said.

He neglects to mention if he’s celibate like a Catholic priest, and only diddles children, or celibate like the Blessed Virgin and may one day give birth to a saviour. I’m too afraid to delve into Metaphysics to find out. It is possible too, I suppose, that he’s gay and is celibate because he is afraid of his Mommy, but that is too tedious and sad-making to consider.

It is hoped that Mr. Kern will return to keeping his big trap shut, and let us also hope that his bigoted, dangerous, and paranoid mother learns to do the same.

I have a 1968 Honda Scrambler (cl305) now, and have owned at least one motorcycle for the past ten years. When I bought this one, my friend Peter—who was studying prosthetics at the UW—told me that after his internship he will never ride a motorcycle. He seems to know a lot about losing body parts. And replacing them, too.

So i thought he’d be a great person to ask about pit bulls. I mean, why not get some expert opinions on the matter? Every time a pit bull story surfaces people always argue about the nature of pet-inflicted injuries, about good and bad owners, about identification of breeds, and on and on…. So I wanted to get some facts.

I emailed him a question: “Have you ever had to create a prosthesis for someone who was attacked by an animal, maybe a pit bull or something?”

His very revealing response was, “Negatory, but lawnmowers, yes.”

Maybe all these posts about the dangers of pit bulls should be directed to a more damaging problem: lawnmowers. Many of the same questions, unfortunately, would dog such a topic. Was the injury the result of a bad owner verses a good owner? Was the lawnmower cared for properly? Do lawnmowers attract a certain kind of owner? Could medical workers even properly differentiate a lawnmower from other similar tools, such as a gas-powered weed whacker?

Instead of getting sidetracked, I decided to remain focused on pit bulls. Maybe I’d just have to work a little harder to get the information I was seeking. Since I stopped working hours ago, this seemed possible.

Each time the pit bull discussion comes up, someone—often me—posts this crazy link to a list of dog attack deaths and maiming in the US and Canada between September 1982 and November 2006.

This would seem to provide the authoritative information people need to make good decisions about pit bulls. But still, people would reply that cat bites are more infectious, it’s the owner’s fault, or that animal control agents couldn’t correctly identify a pit bull in most cases. All of these arguments can be seen somewhere way down in this thread.

The report was compiled by Merritt Clifton, who happens to live in Washington state. I thought he might be an expert or something, and that maybe he could clear things up a bit. So I emailed him.

He responded instantly. And at great length.

I asked about breed identification first.

Do people really know what a pit bull is? Are there vast numbers of people who might not know that they don’t even have a pit bull? Do animal control agents make enough mistakes to invalidate your findings?

MC: This is also damned silly, because even if 50% of the identifications of breeds were erroneous, which would reduce the accuracy of breed identification to the level of random chance, you would still have one breed that amounts to 5% of the dog population committing 25% of the attacks that rise to the level of fatality or permanent injury—about one dog attack incident in 10,000.

But come on, people make mistakes. We’ve seen all the polling errors in the recent primaries. What margin of error do you think is present in your final document?

MC: None of significance. I’m not looking at hair-splitting cases.

Continue reading "Worst Post Ever About Pit Bulls" »

Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute are convinced they can, with the help of IBM’s new supercomputer, build true artificial intelligence.

Human common sense reasoning is extremely hard to model. Consider how much unconscious reasoning goes into your morning routine: hearing the radio, figuring out your alarm just woke you up, turning it off, getting up and walking to the kitchen (avoiding anything on the floor in the process), deciding you need a cup of coffee … you get the idea. In the 1980s, a researcher named Doug Lenat had an idea: Just get enough people filling in enough facts into a huuuuuuge database, apply some simple straightforward algorithms to them, and - poof! - you’ll have the software apparatus to build robots who can run around figuring out how not to burn your toast. Thus the CyC project was born. They went off and spent long hours compiling collections of simple information about everyday life, like “Toasters make toast”. And entered some more. And more. And more. It’s now eighteen years later, and CyC has done some cool things, but they’re still off filling gaps in the data, and we still don’t have toast-making robots.

Since then other researchers have come up with similar models for AI - trying to decompose intelligence into multiple simple layers which can be built upon, trying to automatically learn that same common sense information about the world from libraries of text, or from the World Wide Web, and so on. Projects based on these models have solved very specific problems well and brought us wonderful technology - the Roomba that cleans my floor, for example - but the task of building a robot that can interact with and think about the world as humans do remains largely unsolved. We still don’t really understand what intelligence is - how observation and memory are connected and built upon - let alone how to model it.

These researchers have gone about the task of modeling intelligence via a Second Life character that shows the cognitive skills of a child. From this, they expect to build a machine that will eventually solve the famed Turing test. History suggests they will instead solve a couple of tiny problems very well - say, building convincing personalities for video game characters - and then move on. This AI problem has turned out to be a lot harder than we thought forty or so years ago, when Marvin Minsky declared that within a generation the “AI problem” would be solved. But the most efficient process found for creating intelligent beings so far has taken about 3.7 billion years, so I guess we shouldn’t feel so bad.

I’d recommend Blue C in Fremont. Hurry.

I went to a public high school in Santa Barbara with Christian Love, son of Beach Boy Mike Love. He hung with the surfers and I didn’t really know him except as “that son of a Beach Boy”. I think we had a Spanish class together.

His first cousin, Kevin Love, currently plays basketball at UCLA, my alma mater. I went to just one UCLA basketball game during my four years of college, spending my Saturdays instead building grand pyramids from cans of Coors Light.

Today, America is on the cusp March Madness, a three-week college basketball extravaganza which will cost U.S. employers a SLOGesque $1.7 billion in worker productivity. The UCLA Bruins should be the West’s #1 seed when match-ups are announced this Sunday.

These are lofty times for the Bruins, but the shot clock winds down on UCLA’s legendary coach, John Wooden. The 97-year-old Wizard of Westwood recently spent two weeks in the hospital, recovering from a fall he took at his home. One wonders how much time the old coach has left. Can this year’s Bruin team, playing with a Woodenesque mixture of unity, toughness and poise, give the Wizard one last taste of March Madness glory?

Who chooses the Love Lab profiles and images displayed in the right hand column?

If you posted to Love Lab, would you want to be one of the featured profiles? Or is that too much exposure? Would you only want to be found when someone searches for you? They seem to find fairly interesting pictures to post, but why are they mainly women?

Has anyone here ever been the featured profile?

Ethan Stowell’s latest brainchild, How to Cook a Wolf, is located on top of Queen Anne and derives its name from an M.F.K. Fisher book. Not as casual as Tavolata and less formal than Union, the atmosphere is cozy and ebullient. There are a handful of tables along the south wall, but the space is primarily focused on a cork-lined bar where patrons can sit and eat and catch glimpses of the action in the tiny kitchen. The room is softly lit, with a warm glow from the copper that lines the elegant, curving plank walls. It feels like you’ve just walked into a secret.

But first, the waiting.

Continue reading "How to Cook a Wolf" »

1) Machine learning via watching COPS:

I like to watch / CopVision is a program that watches television. Specifically, it watches COPS on Fox. It is not a video, it is a software process that tries to make sense of a live video feed. COPS is all it has ever known, and it probably thinks it is COPS …

CopVision learns its language from closed captioning subtitles transmitted in the television signal. Everything that is said on COPS is tucked away in its memory to help it understand what it’s seeing.

2) Mild discomfort via watching Full House:

You’re Not My Father, by Paul Slocum, is composed of a sequence of recreations of a 10 second scene from the television show Full House, overlaid with sound loops from the scene’s original music.

And now, just because I can, an image of Vanilla Ice being attacked by a swarm of bees.

She looks like a corpse.

Posted by Greg | March 14, 2008 1:02 PM

I agree with Greg. I also believe that looking like a corpse while wearing Haute Couture is part of the fucking deal.

This girl looks a little steadier on her feet, and is slightly more animated than a corpse. She is a glamor zombie. I think she has great forward thrust in the upper body, which shows some capacity for locomotion. The photograph reveals nothing about her capacity for eating human brains.

Le costume is again Galliano for Dior, from the Spring couture, ‘07. The workmanship in this particular collection is especially beautiful, with silk origami decorating many of the clothes. These ensembles are made by hand by teams of people with rare and specialized skills. It is the ultimate in the dressmaker’s art. It is magnificent, and vain, and we deserve a world where it thrives for its own sake.

Now, how to eat a puppy like a zombie. For Jake and David.

I know this is old news to some, maybe many of you. However, I am posting these in case there are people unfamiliar with these houses as we all once were.

I was amazed and intrigued when I found out there was a residence in the top pyramid of the Smith Tower.

Notwithstanding the decorations inside, I can think of no other place I’d rather live in Seattle.

Okay, maybe either of these places would suffice…

I am obsessed with houseboats. Unfortunately, I cannot even afford this one. Or the mud beneath it.

The houseboats moored within 150 feet of the 1907 Lake Union shoreline are actually on owned real estate. Local legislators snuck a bill through the Legislature that required anyone owning property on Lake Union to buy the adjacent underwater property. The subsequent one million dollars funded the 1909 Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition on the University of Washington campus.

Photo by Steven MacDonald.

We seem to have a lot of dog lovers here on Slog, some to the detriment of human compassion. While we’re busy getting up in arms over dogs being mistreated thousands of miles away, there are dogs here in Washington State that are going to be put to death simply because they aren’t wanted any longer. This sad fact inspired local woman (and Rickshaw Restaurant owner) Ginger Luke to found and operate Ginger’s Pet Rescue.

Dawn-Marie and Ice-T. Photo by Steven MacDonald.

Dawn-Marie Crowe has been a dog owner and enthusiast for years, and decided that she had the time, compassion, and resources to help. She applied to take part in Ginger’s Foster Program, a process that involved filling out an application, providing pictures of her home, and submitting references. She received her first placement within a week, which consisted of three dogs rescued from a puppy mill. One dog found a permanent home within six days, while the other two are still in her care.

Dawn-Marie says that it’s easy to get attached and want to keep the dogs herself, but she realizes that she can do more by letting the dogs find other homes: “The more dogs I have, the less I can save. If I keep adopting them, the less I can foster.”

If you’re willing to complain online about the mistreatment of animals, are you willing to go one step further? The Pet Rescue site lists 102 things people who can’t foster or adopt a dog can do to help. Here are the first fifteen:

Transport a dog?

Donate a dog bed or towels or other bedding type items?

Donate MONEY (collect your change for a week or a month and donate that!)?

Donate a Kong? A nylabone? A hercules?

Donate a crate?

Donate an x-pen or baby gates?

Donate a food dish or a stainless bucket for a crate?

Donate a leash?

Donate a collar?

Donate some treats or a bag of food?

Donate a halti or promise collar or a gentle leader?

Walk a dog?

Groom a dog?

Donate some grooming supplies (shampoos, combs, brushes, etc.)?

Go to the local shelter and see if that dog is the breed the shelter says it is or go
with rescue to be a second opinion on the dog?

Green is everywhere. Now you can get your Walk Score.

Free tickets. Presidents of the United States. Free.

Video games are omnipresent in my life. My boyfriend, Nick, is a dedicated gamer with an encyclopedic knowledge of the industry, so I hear about new releases, reviews, controversies, and analysis of video games. We got a two bedroom apartment so the entertainment system, which centers on video games, can have its own enclosed space. I often fall asleep to the muffled sound of electronic gunshots.

But I don’t play video games. Or at least, I hardly play them, because I am really bad at any of them that require any fine motor skills. They make me feel incompetent, which is not an entertaining use of my time. I am unwilling work to be even mediocre at them, because I know the entertainment value in the end wouldn’t be worth the effort.

Knowing this, Nick sent me this article, in which a gamer talks about why he doesn’t think video games will ever become a significant form of cultural discourse like books and film are. Part of this has to do with exactly what I complain about: inaccessibility to the average non-gaming person.

Over time, the technical and systemic complexity of video games have increased… controllers have sprouted more buttons, gyroscopes, and analogue sticks than ever; and it’s still extremely common for games of high quality to be too difficult for a non-game to play effectively.

I want to like video games, it’s just that I want them to be on my level, instead of having to work up to their level. And I would like to play games with Nick. Since it’s such a big part of his life, it necessarily affects mine: if you live with a gamer, you hear it in the background, wires and controllers are everywhere, and it intensely consumes their time . So it seems a shame that it’s so difficult to join them in their hobby on occasion, and to participate in what, throughout human history, has been a shared experience—playing games.

The game I’ve found that is best able to bridge the gap between gamers and non-gamers is Rock Band (we play on the Xbox 360, though it’s out for the Playstation 2 and 3). It’s designed to be multi-player, and the bar to entry is low (even the most tone deaf can sing on “Easy”), but different players can play on different difficulty levels, so it can also be challenging for skilled gamers. Essentially, it’s a whole freakin’ lot of fun to play with your friends: we’ve got some buddies who live out in Issaquah and have no neighbors, so we’ve had several cheap-beer and coffee fueled Rock Band sessions that last until the wee hours of the morning. I just wish there were more games like Rock Band that appealed to group-play and accommodated a variety of gaming skills. Added bonus if, unlike RB, is doesn’t cost nearly $200.

And, for any non-gamers out there who are looking for some games that might appeal to them, here are some of the console games I have enjoyed:

Animal Crossing (GameCube). A Sim type game played in real time. Soothing like Bob Ross is soothing, but still manages to gently sate the capitalist drive to acquire useless crap.
Legend of Zelda: Windwaker (GameCube). A quest type game with manageable game play that doesn’t require a lot of precision.
X-Men Legends (Xbox): Okay, I have a total boner for all things X-Men, so my dedication to this game was kind of a one-off thing. However, the four-character game play is repetitive and doesn’t require much precision so it’s pretty easy to control, but it does require some knowledge of role-playing game conventions (or access to someone with said knowledge). Online cheats are also helpful.
The Sims (Xbox). Duh, the classic non-gamer game where you live a fake life that doesn’t involve shooting much of anything. I originally played Sims games (City, Tower, Ant) on our old Mac IIci.
Viva Piñata (Xbox 360). Another Sim type game, you basically breed piñatas. It’s kind of weird, but so pretty!
Dance Dance Revolution Universe (Xbox 360). Great for exercise, but even I can tell the “Quest Mode” is utter and complete crap.
Carcassonne (Xbox 360). This is an Xbox Live Arcade title that’s based on a board game. It’s essentially a strategy game.

The AP reports today that Republican Representatives Dave Reichert and Cathy McMorris Rodgers are “taking a one-year break from pet projects known as earmarks.”

The two Washington state members of Congress say they will voluntarily adopt a one-year moratorium as a way to protest a system they say has been abused for personal and political gain.

Like heck they will! I don’t live in either Congresspersons’ district, but if I did, I wouldn’t have not voted against them just so they can turn their backs on the barrels of pork our State so richly deserves.

If Maggie Magnuson, Scoop Jackson, and even Slade Gorton can bring home the bacon, why can’t Reichert or McMorris Rodgers?

Could everybody who thinks that this Clinton/Obama contest is somehow the deathknell of the Democratic Party please take a very large chill pill? After all, let me remind people that this ad that ran in Iowa in 2004…

…is far worse than anything we’ve seen this year. Some think it tanked Dean in Iowa. And who created it? Why Robert Gibbs, Obama’s current Communications Director.

I say this not to “score points” against Obama—I like him, and if he’s the nominee I will enthusiastically support him—but to point out that every campaign fights tooth and nail to win, and this year’s no different. In either camp.

Warner Home Video released on DVD this week a second volume of the “Forbidden Hollywood Collection”. These are all films made in the early 1930’s before the Production Code of 1934 was foisted on Hollywood by censorious religious pigs.

I recommend “Night Nurse”, starring Barbara Stanwcyk and directed by William Wellman (“The Public Enemy”). It’s a weird and grimy little film with a somewhat bizarre plot, but with great performances by Stanwyck, Joan Blondell, and Clark Gable (who’s tricked out in a very fetishey, very hot Chauffeur’s uniform). Stanwyck gets clocked in the jaw at one point and hits the floor! Ka-bang! Worth seeing!

In “Divorcee” from 1930, it’s all urban ennui and upper middle-class fucking. After divorcing a very studly, square-jawed Chester Morris, Norma Shearer swanks around Manhattan in a variety of freakishly gorgeous Art Deco costumes, sleeping with everything that moves, drinking too much, and trying not to look cross-eyed.

I feel her pain.

I caught “Divorcee” on TCM not long ago, and it truly blew my mind (the weed helped). High contrast, jazzy black and white settings, and splendid, sophisticated costumes make this a design fag’s dream. I always find Norma Shearer a bit too uppish and self-satisfied, but when she gazes off midrange looking troubled and brave you can always study her jewelry.

Three other films are included in the set— “Three on a Match” 1932 directed by Mervyn Leroy, Clarence Brown’s”Free Soul” from 1931, and Michael Curtiz’ “Female” from 1933.

Daily Camera—whatever the fuck that site is— is filling us in on some interesting High School shit that happens to be boring. Check it:

Boulder police spokeswoman Sarah Huntley said Thursday that 10 Fairview students, all boys, have been ticketed on suspicion of public brawling. Police think they were part of a club of friends that regularly met near the South Boulder Recreation Center for public “street fighting.”

“Apparently, they were gathering in the field after school hours … where they were engaging in fights,” Huntley said. “They see this as sort of a recreational, spectator-type sport where they just wanted to go out and fight.”

Huntley said police started receiving calls about the fights in February but were never able to catch anyone in the act—until a female Fairview teacher broke up one of the fights March 6, which resulted in two teens being ticketed.

Obviously, the pigs didn’t care enough to deal with this “problem” until the female strolled by.

Fuckin’ bitch.

Speaking of water…

Okay, I can admit it: this is a pretty stylish water fountain. Bronze, fully immersive, ELKAY! However, it is still only slightly cooler than the Fresh Flow Pet Fountain my cat drinks out of at home. Let’s face it: public water fountains are fucking gross. How much of the water actually goes into your mouth, and how much of it dribbles down your disgusting face back onto the spigot? I’m guessing A LOT. Rinse, repeat, gross. Coupled with the fact that god knows what else is happening with the pipes and the filters and the transients and I’m sorry but I haven’t drunk out of a public water fountain since the third grade.

Stranger Offices: Please invest in one of these!! SAVE JOSH FEIT!!