It Is Better to Barely Try and to Give Up Than to Never Run at All: Tim Burgess is out of the mayor's race, and Goldy isn't running for city council.

President Obama Did Something Awful: And Ansel Herz says that this is what you get, liberals.

In Need of a Bus Pass: Seattle came out strong for their bus service.

No Tall Men for You: Sonics fans showed their support for our sports team, but were disappointed yet again.

In Which the Seattle Times Pretends to Care About Poor People: The Seattle Times wants The Stranger to stop picking on The Seattle Times, so they Googled how many times The Stranger mentioned The Seattle Times this year. That turned out to be a genius plan. On multiple levels.

It's Spring: Which means it's time to talk about street harassment.

Where in the Bible Does God Talk About Cakes?: Dominic explains again why it's discrimination if you refuse to bake a cake for a couple just because they're gay. Plus, the bigot florist strikes back.

This Old House: In which an Occupy offshoot tries to save a man from eviction.

This Headline Would Mean Something Completely Different on a Tech Blog: "Michael Pollan Is the Steve Jobs of Food"

Once Every Five Years Or So, Slog Actually Teaches You Something: Here, use the afternoon to memorize the capitols of all fifty states:

Sometimes, I curse the fact that I am on the email list of 6 bazillion publicists who want to tell me about every comedian coming through Wenatchee, every phony "IT solution" for my "business," and every press conference about who farted at the county parks department meeting last week.

But then I'll get something like this, which helps me remember what a weird and many-splendored world we live in. From the US Attorney's office:

A 25 year-old Vancouver, Washington man pleaded guilty today in U.S. District Court in Tacoma to conspiracy to traffick in counterfeit goods, announced U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan. VY, was arrested April 2, 2013 after being indicted by a grand jury in Seattle. In his plea agreement Y admits that between June 2011 and June 2012, he sold more than 900 counterfeit vehicle airbags he had purchased from a source in China. Under the terms of the plea agreement both sides will recommend a sentence of ten months in prison, but U.S. District Ronald B. Leighton is free to impose any sentence up to the ten year maximum allowed by law. Sentencing is scheduled for August 23, 2013.

According to the statement of facts in the plea agreement, Y operated a business, Vital Auto Parts and Sales, out of his Vancouver home. He allegedly imported counterfeit Honda, Subaru and Toyota airbags from sources in China and elsewhere, and sold them over the internet representing them as the genuine product. Y sold at least 964 of the counterfeit airbags via eBay with a sales total of $137,243. Y sold individual Honda airbags for an asking price of $110. Investigators believe that many of the airbags are sold to independent garages who install them in vehicles believing they have purchased a genuine airbag. Y has agreed to pay restitution of $137,243 to Honda Motors Corporation and Toyota Motors Corporation.

Also, there's this sweet story about a Thai monk who is believed to have been reincarnated as a bird after a little yellow feathered friend flew into the room during his funeral:

After the service, Mr. Anusorn said, the bird flew into the chapel and flew around in circles 2-3 times, then rested on the wall and the top tiers of the Buddha statue, scanning the attendees of the funeral service with its black eyes.

What a wonderful world.

We're observing Slog silence from now until 11 a.m. while we have an editorial meeting, but look—we made an entire paper's worth of stuff for you! Here's what Harry Knowles has to say.

Ask any of my director friends... Guillermo, Brett, Quentin... and they'll tell you I love movies. I was born during a showing of Yojimbo, and my dad chewed through the umbilical cord, set me on his lap, and made me watch the rest of the film. Let me tell you, I was hooked... since then, I've celebrated all the greatest films of our time, nay, of all time... the Matthew Broderick Godzilla, Green Lantern, Tron Legacy... on my site, Ain't It Cool News. In case I haven't made myself clear, let me just say, I'm kind of a big deal.

So why hasn't SIFF brought me up to Seattle to celebrate their film festival? Especially when I've already seen the opening-night film, Joss Whedon's Much Ado About Nothing, and it's practically made for me? Guest of Honor Harry Knowles could put some butts in the seats, and I even headline my own film festival down here in Austin, so I know how it's done. But I'm not mad... like Uncle Ben told Peter Parker, people don't always appreciate your talents... that's why you've gotta wow them. Peter Parker's got sticky palms. I love movies. So here's a review, for free.

Much Ado About Nothing
USA (109 min)
Dir. Joss Whedon

Why should you give two shits about this film? Well, it is based on a series of books by William Shakespeare that has huge fans. Benedick is essentially the most badass Romantic Comedy Lead that there ever was. He found problems. That life is in the rearview, and now he wanders the earth like Kane from Kung Fu having sexy adventures. Now, there's no Eastern philosophy. Benedick is a bit more like John Rambo... except a whole lot more romantic. Shakespeare's dialogue for Benedick is so choice. In fact, if you watch Alexis Denisof's Benedick... hilarious & self-important describe his actions, dialogue, and line of thought. He keeps things explosive, even if they're barbs of the verbal side. Benedick is an old-school man with internally created way of life. He's a man like the Outlaw Josey Wales. Now I know, I've brought up The Outlaw Josey Wales, so I assume you have to want to know, what's better? Well, The Outlaw Josey Wales. Duh. By miles, because that's my favorite Eastwood western. Love it. But this film is called Much Ado About Nothing and after you see it, you'll know the name and what it stands for.

So I'm not in The Stranger's SIFF Guide, either. It's not very good, but at least it's got every SIFF movie in it, I guess... but I don't know, where's the enthusiasm? The way you should write about SIFF is like imagine SIFF is the tongue, mouth, fingers, and lips of a lover. The audience is the clit. SIFF goes down on the audience... watching the audience begin to squirm, then he takes the audience's clit in his mouth and just licks it like crazy. Damn, SIFF respects the clit!

See what you missed? This is what I could bring to SIFF. Oh, well... maybe next year, Seattle...

Thanks, Jeffrey!

It's Genius Season: Meet all the big brains who were shortlisted for Genius Awards this year. Now listen to a conversation about Genius.

Cashed: A local credit union cancels all the pot-related bank accounts it opened.

A Shitty Week for Seattle Media: Seattle Weekly eliminates a restaurant critic position, Seattle Times forces its reporters to pay for access to their own website, and Seattle Pulp is gone.

In Which Someone Other Than Goldy Pays Attention to the Seattle Times Editorial Board: Mayor McGinn rightfully attacked a stupid Seattle Times editorial by Bruce Ramsey about the gender wage gap. (But the Seattle Times exacted petty revenge on McGinn later in the week.)

We've Been Jinkxed: It's Monsoon season. For sure.

Why the Service at McDonald's Sucks: "If you treat your employees like garbage, they're going to treat your customers like garbage." Speaking of which, read this too.

The Only Cool Thing About Delaware: They approved gay marriage this week! (Minnesota's looking good, too.)

Troll School: Dan Savage on the proper spelling of "faggot."

Henry Louis Gates Jr, Through Bleary Eyes: Is this what it's like to be Charles Mudede?

Dan Vs. Dog: The smack heard 'round the world.

Fit for a King Street: Three cheers for our pretty new old train station!

And finally, because I don't think enough of you appreciated it yesterday, I demand that you watch the Gravity trailer. This is how you cut a goddamned suspenseful movie trailer:

We're observing Slog silence from now until 11 a.m. while we have an editorial meeting, but look—we made an entire paper's worth of stuff for you! Here's what Bruce Ramsey has to say.

A new study says that Seattle has the largest wage gap between women and men among 50 American cities, but I wouldn't be too worried about it. It's just that the kind of jobs we have are jobs that disproportionately benefit men.

Seattle has a lot of computer, engineering, and science jobs. I see tech people every day at lunch: Most are men. I do not see science people at lunch, but that's probably because I do not eat lunch where science people eat. Engineers, I understand, eat lunch at their desks. In any case, the fact that more men eat lunch in public where I eat lunch is not discrimination; it's that more men can afford good lunches because Seattle's employers are willing to pay good money for men to do their computer (and, I assume, science and engineering) work for them.

The Seattle area also has well-paid blue-collar jobs: aircraft assembly, shipyard work, machine shops, stevedoring, commercial construction, etc. There are women in all these fields, but more men. Women can work hard for long hours, but more men than women can handle a jackhammer or a big chain saw, or drive a big yellow bulldozer, or conduct a choo-choo train, or hoist a garbage can full of trash, or stevedore it up on a hot summer day. This has nothing to do with discrimination and everything to do with men's superiority over women.

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Friends of Slog gathered at Auto Battery last night... the unanswered question: Was the corgi there???

• mr. herriman

Jason Collins Came Out of the Closet: Dan Savage first told us about Collins and then defended him from the inevitable idiots and Christians. Anna Minard pointed out that Collins wasn't the first professional basketball player to come out of the closet and then explained why Collins' decision was still a huge deal.

The NBA Came Out Against Seattle: The Sacramento Kings are staying put, but Charles Mudede's anonymous source says there's still hope for the Sonics. We still might get a stadium anyway, and Key Arena is probably reaching the end of its lifespan. Also, this happened.

May Day: The Phantom Menace: SPD said that May Day would not be the apocalypse. Anarchists were reportedly targeting Goldman Sachs, but not really. Downtown was surprisingly calm all day. We maybe forgot the true meaning of May Day.

May Day II: The Smashening: Just when everyone thought everything was going to be calm: The drama! The flash bangs! The innocent bystanders! The operatic events! The pepper spray!

May Day III: The Hangover: Brendan Kiley wrapped-up the evening's events. The city filed "light misdemeanor" charges, which is probably better than light treason charges. Seattle's so-called "Real Life Superheroes" are a problem we should do something about. The SPD said the SPD did a really good job. The behatted man was set free. Anarchists announced that they will repay small businesses for the damage to their windows.

And More Importantly: The May Day immigration reform march was a huge, peaceful success.

The Mayor's Race Is Still Unexciting: Goldy went to the first Mayoral forum and told you all about the nothing that happened. Later, Cienna Madrid would point out that Tim Burgess said something stupid.

The W in WTF Stands for "Walla Walla": Mike Hewitt's got a gay farming problem, but he seems to think everyone else has the problem.

Suicide Watch: America's growing suicide epidemic is a side effect of America's love affair with guns.

Spoiler Alert: It's A Long List of Musicians: Look who's playing Bumbershoot!

Education Watch: Teachers ask parents to opt their kids out of tests. In happier news, Seattle Community College is fully funding tuition for 225 financially strapped students.

The Young Fnarfs of Rochefort: A very special special guest hosted the Viewing Club this week.

And finally, for no real reason at all, enjoy I Can't Believe It's Not Morgan Freeman reading that dumb, cuss-laden sorority letter:

Hello there and good morning! I won't take up much of your time.

Stranger Tickets, aka The Stranger, is hiring for a new position which we're calling "Ticketing Web Support".

This person will be responsible for becoming an expert in how our ticketing system works, and then handling client requests for new event setups, custom sites, configuration changes, and building and maintaining custom web sites, with a keen instinct for keeping these kinds of things out of our development team's hair.

We need someone who knows modern front-end coding techniques - HTML and CSS, and some Javascript (jQuery), has a good eye for design and UI, and is obsessed with getting the details right.

Here's the whole job description. If this is you, or someone you know, please email us! And spread the word! Slog readers are, and are friends with, the best people.

The yokels who run this shitty little rag think I'm going to write a nice, polite note in this space praising Jason Collins for coming out of the closet. And you know what? Good for Jason Collins. He's a stand-up guy. I think anyone who hates on gay people is either a bigot or just has too much time on their hands. But that's not why I'm writing this note. You know why I'm writing this note?

Because I want Seattle to know it can go fuck itself.

Yeah, you heard me. You bumble around with your cocks in your hands, and you lose your basketball team to a bunch of inbred Okies, and then you turn around and try to poach Sacramento's team instead? Fuck you. Sacramento is a beautiful little city, full of good-natured, proud Americans. I visited Seattle once, back in the '80s sometime. All I remember is that it was wet, gray, full of whiners, and the coke was some seriously low-grade shit. I was walking around, being assaulted by hoboes on every street corner, and I was like, "The fuck is this?"

Truth is, I just don't like you, Seattle. I didn't like you in the '80s, I didn't like you in the '90s, with your greasy-haired, whiny musicians, and I don't like you now, with your goddamned speak-songs about how you like to buy dirty shit at junk shops and pretend you look good doing it. And as long as I draw breath, you're not going to get a goddamned ball team. Not on my watch. You can be sure of that.

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Do you miss Slog Happy? Well don't be sad! Some of your fellow commenters have put together an unofficial Slog Happy for this Saturday at Auto Battery on Capitol Hill. It starts at 5:30 pm and the main photo on the Facebook event page is a very adorable leaping corgi.

Will that corgi be there? If that cori is there then I will definitely be attending.

Policing the Police Yields Mixed Results: Interim Police Chief Jim Pugel offered an unsolicited apology for a homeless-mocking video he made in the 1980s, and the federally appointed monitor of the Seattle Police Department says the SPD is resisting reform.

Transit Catfight! Ed Murray opposes sub-area equity for Sound Transit. Mike McGinn thinks that's—and I'm heavily paraphrasing, here—bullshit.

No Contract (Minor Contractual Obligations May Apply): Goldy breaks down the Washington AG's gutsy smackdown of T-Mobile's new ad strategy.

Cool Story, "Pastor" Mark: God's tool from Mars Hill "Church" shoots off his idiot mouth again about how much he hates women.

Thus Began the Gay Farming Movement: For a good time, call 360-786-7630. Ask them how they feel about this sentence: "Well, gay people can just grow their own food."

A Bookshelf Built for Two: Two Slog writers have upcoming books. Here's one. And here's another.

"Besides being a radionic psychotronic expert with Asberger's and an undying love of Tiffany...": This has to be the best qualifying clause beginning a sentence on Slog this week. This weeks' Slog Netflix Streaming Club is kind of mind-blowing.

I Will Miss the Erotic Han-Solo-in-Carbonite Sculptures: The Broadway Grill is closing.

Best Slog Headline of the Week: "Not With A Bang But A Side Order Of Cheese Sticks."

Lastly, our Patriotic Corporate Overlords have ensured that this song is going to be played a whole lot around Seattle in July:

We heard today from the Washington Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (WACDL) that Brendan Kiley is going to become one of only two journalists in the organization's 25-year history to receive their annual Champion of Justice Award. "Past recipients include a Supreme Court Justice, a Senator, a Representative, the Innocence Project Northwest, and other esteemed individuals," WACDL writes. The award is for "an individual who may not be a lawyer, and may not be a member of WACDL, but who—through legislative, judicial, journalistic, or humanitarian pursuits—has staunchly preserved or defended the constitutional rights of Washington residents and endeavored to ensure justice and due process for those accused of crime."

WACDL singled out not only Kiley's reporting about the grand jury refusers who were jailed for failing to testify about other people's political beliefs, but also his extensive reporting about drug distribution and sentencing disparities and related issues (see here, here, here).

In their internal nomination materials, WACDL wrote, regarding Kiley's reporting about grand jury refusers:

Few mainstream journalists are willing to confront the ethical issues associated with these proceedings. Brendan Kiley is the only one who has been willing to move beyond "is it legal?" to "is it moral?" And although his interest was initially piqued by the iniquitousness of the grand jury, he has written several feature-length articles since, humanizing the individuals caught in the dragnet, decrying the cruel and arbitrary conditions at the Federal Detention Center, and updating the public about the status of the case. Throughout, Kiley's approach has been replete with humanity, eloquence, and—despite the grimness of the issue—even humor.

Hear, hear! Congratulations, Brendan.

you don't know how it felt to be in the womb but it must have been at least a little warmer than this.

you don't know how it feels to write a poem in nine minutes and then have the whole internet misread it.

you don't know how to stop. you just really don't know how to stop.

you don't know how little you've been paying attention until you look at your eyebrows in the mirror and they look like brown mcdonald's arches sprawled across your forehead.

you don't know how many vietnamese soft rolls to order, but that's okay, because the wonder coffee & sports bar, reviewed by CHARLES MUDEDE in this issue, doesn't carry them anyway.

you don't know how precious your iphone battery time was until you're reading REBECCA BROWN's essay about sleeping in a homeless shelter in a cafe in boston and there are no free outlets available to recharge.

you don't know how to convince these fuckers to let you use a fucking outlet.

you don't know if these people don't know who you are.

you don't know how it's possible to feel total compassion in one moment and total disconnection in the next moment.

you don't know how CATE MCGEHEE's story about diy culture in the university district somehow makes you feel total compassion, but you feel it anyway.

you don't know how to exploit the diy scene into playing music for free at one of your concerts, but you'll figure it out somehow.

you don't know how to again reiterate the fact that you are in boston, where the terror happened, without making it seem like you're just looking for attention.

you don't know how to tell the girl in the chair next to you that you've been peeking at her dissertation draft and there's a grammatical typo in the actual file name.

you don't realize that the fact that you're writing hundreds of words without a single proper capitalization makes you not the best unsolicited copy editor a dissertation-writer could ask for.

you don't want two percent but it's all they have.

you don't want to read all of DOMINIC HOLDEN's story about surveillance post-boston-bombing, but you want to mention it anyway, just so people remember that you're in boston right now and wonder if you're okay.

you don't know where your friends went.

you don't know where the bathroom is.

you don't know where the bathroom is.

you don't know where the bathroom is.

you don't know... never mind.

Hi there. I'm the ninth-century Chinese guy who discovered gunpowder, and I've come back from the mists of history to ask you all a simple question: WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE?

Seriously. I cannot fucking believe what you all have done with my dumb little discovery. You know who I was when I discovered gunpowder? Just a simple Taoist alchemist, searching for the elixir of life. That's right—I discovered gunpowder while looking for a cure for death. Talk about irony. On the advice of an old lady who lived next door, I mixed up a bunch of saltpeter with a little charcoal and a little sulfur, and BOOM! (Literally. It wasn't pretty.) Turns out, saltpeter plus charcoal plus sulfur wasn't the elixir of life. But some of my neighbors thought it was "cool" and invented fireworks. You know, to make the kids happy on special occasions. Fine by me. I love special occasions as much as the next ancient Taoist alchemist. I didn't even mind when a couple of jackasses from the next town over thought it'd be funny to fire up some of my discovery in an outhouse while the town bully was taking a dump.

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We miss you, bro.

It's almost time for a new issue of The Stranger's Cocktail Compass! Which means today would be a really good day to ensure we have the most up-to-date happy hour information for your bar or restaurant.

If you own or manage a bar, just go to our online bar listings, search for your business, and take a look at the happy hour info we have listed. If it's correct, then you don't need to do a thing! If it needs updating, though, you can either go here, click "Update Your Info" and fill out the online form or you can e-mail updates to cocktailcompass@thestranger.com.

And! If you have a happy hour that isn't yet listed at all, e-mail us all the information (days, hours, specials) and we'll get you included before the new issue hits the streets.

For all the rest of you who like cheap food and drinks, do you have the FREE Cocktail Compass app on your phone yet? Hundreds of nearby happy hours, updated regularly! For free! Get it here.

A Bouquet of Lawsuits: The state sues a florist for discriminating against a gay couple's wedding. The couple sued, too. Dominic, brilliantly, explains why this is important.

Don't Let the Door Etc.: SPD Chief Diaz is retiring. Here's why that's great news, kinda.

Woofus and Gallant: News intern Ben Steiner saves a mean dog and does the right thing.

What's That Droning Sound? It's probably a drone! A drone spied on me. Obama lied about drones. Republicans suddenly don't like drones. Drones matter. Drones can't be surgical.

The Most Efficient Way to Kill People: What did we learn on Tuesday evening? Guns are so simple, even a two-year-old can shoot somebody with one. It's much harder to kill people with knives.

Taxi Rides: Better or Worse Than Being Forced to Watch DC Cab? We've been talking about taxis this week, because the internet is fucking with yet another industry. Are taxis going to go the way of the music industry, bookstores, video rental stores, and shame? Find out here!

Our Boring Mayor's Race: Nobody's raising any money. McGinn had an okay couple of days. Ed Murray didn't have a good month.

If You Love Your Gun So Much, Why Don't You Marry It? Megan Seling investigates.

Cheap Housing in South Lake Union: Nick Licata talks about it.

Hell Is Other People: In which I complain about people complaining about movie theaters, and everyone complains about movie theaters in response.

Where Were These People When Serenity Was in Theaters? Joss Whedon breaks all SIFF records for opening night ticket sales.

OP Doesn't Get The Joke: Oh, Reddit.

This weekend, you need a therapy llama:

I am going to make this statement short because you know how much I love doing these. I'm resigning as police chief. Look, I don't leave from a fight, but this is clearly the time to go. In my time in office, we saw some of the worst crimes in our city, but luckily statistics don't capture the moral abhorrence of crimes, just the frequency of them, so it currently looks like Seattle is as crime-free as it was when President Kennedy was in office. Say what you will about SPD's race problems, the out-of-control fascistic behavior of individual officers, and the department's poor management—the fact is that there are fewer marijuana-based arrests now than at any point in the last 50 years, and I will take credit for that success. So I'm clearly going out on top.

With those unpleasantries out of the way, I'm happy to announce what I'm going to be doing next. Ever since I was a young boy, my life's passion has been theater criticism. There's nothing like the thrill of a house quieting down as the lights dim; the untapped possibilities of an actor taking her first tentative step onto the stage, into the lights, being momentarily struck—you can physically see this, if you watch closely enough—with the expectations and goodwill of the audience; and the fragile first utterances of words escaping the lips of an actor for the first time.

I have spent too long on the sidelines; it's time for me to finally throw my voice into the mix. As anyone who has followed my tenure as SPD chief can probably tell, theater critic is the role of my lifetime, the part I was born to play. It's time for me to stop reading theatrical criticism and instead set my pen to the task. And perhaps The Stranger is the ideal home for my writing.

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It Takes a Village to Get the Seahawks to Condemn a Player's Homophobic Remarks: Dominic Holden's fight against the Seahawks wins the week. Bless his heart.

Two Wheels, No Engine, Many Opinions: Some Reasonably Polite Seattleites built their own short-lived bike lane. Also, somebody with access to a computer has his own, very non-specific plan for bikes in Seattle.

Arizona Continues to Suck: Dan Savage on a new anti-transgender law.

Bobby Kennedy: Hot or Not? President Obama calls Kamala Harris "the best looking attorney general." Fox News defends President Obama. President Obama apologizes.

The School of Cyber Hard Knocks: Goldy says online classes are not college.

Wait, This Is All Going On the Internet? Dan Savage directs us to a shitty opinion piece by a dumb kid that will now stick around forever, thanks to Google.

Our Hero: Goldy saved us all from nuclear annihilation by surrendering to North Korea on Wednesday.

Slog Headline of the Week: Is from Brendan Kiley: "Oh, the Austerity!"

Two Thumbs Down to Cancer: Everybody loves and misses Roger Ebert.

You've Gotta Love Yelp: No, wait. No, you don't.

• Back to the Garden, Flower Power Comes Full Circle

This week's Stranger deals with damn hippies in not just one, but two places. Coincidence? From Charles Mudede's review of the local documentary Back to the Garden, Flower Power Comes Full Circle:

...In Back to the Garden, however, we see that some hippies did not give up the fight, did not surrender their dreams, but continued dancing to African drums, worshipping Mother Earth, and growing their own food.

But here is where the documentary becomes very interesting: In 1988, the rural hippies looked just plain crazy (the director even says as much), talking endlessly about nature this, sustainability that, and the like. But today, they sound totally sane and even urban. The director reinterviewed some of the hippies in 2008, and it's clear that they now live in a world that's realizing more and more of their dreams—using cloth diapers, recycling waste, turning to solar energy, breaking with Judeo-Christian morality, and seeing humans as just one life form among many. The hippies have moved from the cultural fringe to the center of rational discourse. We need more arts, more communal cooperation in the care of our children, more free time to enjoy life, more trees, more food grown without chemicals, more sources of renewable energy—the list goes on and on. We are all hippies now.

And in my review of new Pioneer Square restaurant Bar Sajor:

...Bar Sajor's food is not merely delicious, it is also healthy, for Matt Dillon (appearances to the contrary) is a damn hippie. Evidence: He is cooking everything by fire, all natural-like. He worries, arguably excessively, about the happiness of chickens. He lives on a farm (the Old Chaser Farm) on an island (Vashon). He is making his own vinegar (with which he makes hale drinks) and bread (three kinds, including a sourdough that is as stellar as bread can be) and pickles (which he says make people burpy, but then they feel so good the next day). Bar Sajor's menu has lots of things that are sprouted, and seeds, and even kombucha on draft. The establishment is stylish and upscale, and Dillon himself is close-cropped and jovial, but the case rests itself...

There have been a lot of rumors lately. People have been whispering about sexuality and closets and all sorts of things I can't quite wrap my entire brain around, because my brain gets knocked around my skull a whole lot, on account of my day job. Who on God's earth is this person working for The Stranger saying they are coming out of the closet as a straight person? I'm not against anyone, but I think it's a selfish act. They are just trying to make themselves bigger than the paper. Whoever this person is, it doesn't matter how good they are. That will immediately separate a newsroom and divide a paper.

Everyone knows The Stranger is gay. That's just how it is. The news section is gay, the reviews are gay, the advice column is way too gay—they even have a column called The Homosexual Agenda, written by a person named ADRIAN RYAN, who I assume is super-gay. I just read the column, and it's full of gay words like "crème" and "OMG" and "hardwood" and "Red Vines." It doesn't get much gayer than that. Why would someone come in here and straight this place up? It makes no damn sense.

Continue reading »

Meet the Free Seattle Times: It's like the Seattle Times, but it's free! Also, it never endorsed George W. Bush!

Inside Man: Slog correspondent Joseph Landau was inside the Supreme Court while the Prop 8 and DOMA arguments were being made. Here's his first report, and here's his second report.

Too Terrible To Even Think About: This headline: "Driver Who Hit Four Pedestrians Blew Nearly Three Times Over Legal Alcohol Limit, Say Prosecutors."

Who Could Have Predicted That a Football Player Would Say Something Dumb? Meet Christopher Clemons, the Seahawk who thinks that gay football players should stay in the closet.

What's Your Drone Refund Policy? Homeland Security apparently doesn't want the SPD's lightly used drones anymore.

Wait, He Makes How Much? What's it like to be a paid signature-gatherer?

Best Slog Headline of the Week: Is from Jen Graves: "I Went to A Big Spectacle and All I Got Was This Big Spectacle."

He's for Liberty and Shit Like That: Sam Bellomio, never change.

Well, You Can't Give It to Homeland Security, Apparently: Eli Sanders wants to know: What does Slog think he should do with his drone?

And Finally: Here, via Slog tipper Rich, was the best cheap laugh of the week.