Good morning. The weather forecast today comes from the National Weather Service, because I refuse to be a corporate shill like some. Expect a 40% chance of rain after 3 pm today, and some clouds in the morning that our comrades at the weather services believe will dissipate throughout the day. Calm winds in the afternoon, high near 54 degrees.
Speaking of corporate shills: In a dramatic speech, City Council Member Cathy Moore called out her “esteemed colleague” Council Member Tammy Morales for making Moore feel “evil” and like a “corporate shill” for not voting for Morales’s Connected Communities bill. I skimmed multiple articles for what Morales said after the Council’s land use committee voted down the bill and I still have no clue what Moore saw that caused her to need to stop talking “because I’m losing my temper.” Maybe Moore just has a guilty conscience.
Council Member Cathy Moore scolds her colleague Tammy Morales for “vilifying” opposition to her Connected Communities bill in the media. Pro tip: You don’t want to look like you oppose affordable housing, don’t vote against it! pic.twitter.com/qR2YKUtGD0
— Hannah Krieg (@hannahkrieg) April 29, 2024
Tariq Yusuf enters the race for Tanya Woo’s seat: Good guy tech bro Yusuf wants to see interconnected communities, taxes on corporations, and more renter protections. Coming from a refugee community in New Holly, Yusuf told Hannah he wants to stop the current shill Council from defunding “the social services that made his entire life journey possible.”
The Kraken fired head coach Dave Hakstol: The Kraken general manager fired Hakstol after the team missed the playoffs this year, according to the Seattle Times. Megan luckily already has a name for the Kraken to consider for their next coach: Shannon Miller. As a player for Team Canada she won gold in the 1997 IIHF World Women’s Championships and silver in the 1998 Winter Olympics. As a coach she has led the Minnesota-Duluth Bulldogs women’s hockey team to five NCAA championships. She also racked up her 250th and 300th career wins “faster than any other head coach in NCAA Division I history.” As Megan says, “The NHL just keeps recycling the same old white man coaches, it’s lazy and boring.” I agree. Miller for the Kraken.
Mayor Bruce Harrell formally proposes Seattle police union contract: Harrell announced yesterday that the Seattle Police Officer’s Guild (SPOG) has ratified the new proposed contract, which would raise police wages 23% with no additional accountability measures, while also effectively killing any possibility of true police alternatives. The Mayor’s Office couldn’t say yesterday what the total payout would be for the cops. The SPOG contract in 2018 raised cops wages 17% and the City spent $65 million in back pay. Harrell said he had submitted the contract to the City Council for consideration and possible approval. The contract covers three years, and negotiations for 2024 are ongoing, Harrell said. Meanwhile, the City Council has started a spending review due to the projected $250 million deficit.
Speaking of cops stuff: I wrote a little piece about the end of the Seattle Police Department’s Bola Wrap Pilot Project. Police used the gadget all of three times in 2023, and in one case, despite attempts to use the device, officers ended up shooting a suspect who carried just a small knife. We all want cops to use less lethal tools on suspects, but they don’t need Batman’s utility belt to do so. They just need to stop reaching for their guns, especially for suspects who carry knives, considering that stab wounds have a very low mortality rate.
The problem with police was never “not enough technology.”
Cops have more gadgets and doodads than ever before, and they’re still racking up 1100-1200 killings annually. https://t.co/33X2gj7KKH
— DivestSPD (@DivestSPD) April 29, 2024
Judge threatens Donald Trump with jail: After the former president once again violated a gag rule in his hush money trial, the judge said Trump needed to stop posting about the trial, according to CNBC. The judge fined Trump $1,000 for nine posts Trump made and told Trump he could face jail if he violated again. But like, OK, then do it. Put Trump in jail. He’s done it before. Our legal system is so unserious about rich people committing crimes.
WSDOT’s obsession with fighting graffiti… now involves drones.
Columbia University enters its fascist era: Dozen of protestors took over Hamilton Hall at Columbia University early Tuesday morning, barricading the entrances and putting up a “Free Palestine” banner, according to the Associated Press. Protestors renamed the hall Hind’s Hall after a 5-year-old Palestinian girl reportedly killed by Israeli troops earlier this year. Columbia has canceled its main graduation event and locked down the campus. On Monday, law enforcement arrested dozens of other protestors at universities in Texas, Utah, Virginia, and New Jersey. Protestors for the most part demand their universities divest from companies funding the genocide in Gaza. Universities have responded by saying, “No thank you, we love our blood money, yum yum yum.”
New album from St. Vincent: St. Vincent’s newest album All Born Screaming is “very heavy, very groove focused—like Nine Inch Nails fronted by a dominatrix,” according to Slog music correspondent Kevin. One of his favorite artists, he said he thinks the album is some of her best work yet. I’m partial to “Broken Man” for its lyrics: “And what are you looking at? / Like you never seen a broken man.”
Holding Trump accountable for his actions doesn’t make him a martyr, it makes him subject to the rule of law, which no citizen, elected or otherwise, is above, regardless of political expediency and the threat of armed uprising. If some citizens are more equal than others due to their assets, fame, or holding of high office, then the rule of law is toothless and illegitimate.
“If one man can be allowed to determine for himself what is law, every man can. That means first chaos, then tyranny.”
Cathy Moore is a piece of shit,
@5 she’s conspicuously used to being a judge, where everyone answers to you and you are entitled to run your courtroom however you want. She’s having a tough time adjusting to answering to the public and needing to work with colleagues rather than dictate to them.
@3 Trump isn’t a victim of “lawfare” (god, I’m sick of that word). He’s just a crook. Even his most rabid supporters know this, they just choose to overlook it as long as he “owns the libs.” Sending him to the slammer absolutely would cost him support among the less-crazy right-leaning voters.
“Columbia University Students Barricade Themselves Inside Building.”
“…student protests appear out of step with broader public attitudes on Israel…”
(https://thehill.com/policy/international/4629597-americans-israel-hamas-gaza-student-protests-poll/)
@3 Does martyr status help when Trump’s base is 35%-40% of the country? There’s a lot of swing voters who could be persuaded by “He can’t even keep his mouth shut to stay out of jail.” Polling also shows a significant number of people who would reconsider voting for Trump if he goes to jail and/or is convicted of a felony. Even a couple of percent loss would doom him in the critical swing states.
Surely someone as smart and educated as you knows that January 6 is the date for counting electoral votes, and the inauguration is on January 20? And that the court where Trump is currently threatened with jail is a state court, so out of reach of federal pardons?
@3: Do you know for a fact the knife the police shooting victim carried was longer than three inches? And why is it every other LEA just about anywhere in the world is capable of subduing people wielding much large knives without resorting to lethal force?
Correction: meant for @2.
@2 You missed the rest of the post. Ashley fully acknowledges a knife is a weapon…
“They just need to stop reaching for their guns, especially for suspects who carry knives, considering that stab wounds have a very low mortality rate.”
My take away of her closing statement is that since knives are small, public safety officials should take one for the team and get stabbed a few times. They’ll probably survive after all.
Not sure what you do if they have a sword though like the guy in London: https://news.sky.com/story/hainault-latest-stabbings-reported-as-man-with-sword-attacks-people-near-tube-station-13126112. Maybe do the Black Knight sketch from Holy Grail and lose a few limbs before you shoot him? I don’t know.
“On Monday,
law enforcement
arrested dozens of
other protestors at universities
in Texas, Utah, Virginia, and New Jersey.”
it’s like a breaking Wave:
our funding a Genocide
is no longer acceptable
to those scheduled to
inherit this Planet:
nyt: More
Pro-Palestinian Protesters
Are Arrested in Campus Clashes Across U.S.
Columbia in New York and Portland State University closed campuses after demonstrators took over buildings. The police dislodged protesters in California.
https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/04/30/nyregion/columbia-protests-college
and:
US advocacy groups
back Palestine solidarity
campus protests amid Gaza war
Nearly 190 advocacy organisations
laud students’ ‘courage’ amid
ongoing crackdown on en-
campments across
US universities.
“We commend the students who are exercising their right to protest peacefully despite an overwhelming atmosphere of pressure, intimidation and retaliation, to raise awareness about Israel’s assault on Gaza – with US weapons and funding,” the organisations said.
“These students have come forth with clear demands that their universities divest from corporations profiting from Israeli occupation, and demanding safe environments for Palestinians across their campuses.”
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/4/29/us-advocacy-groups-back-palestine-solidarity-campus-protests-amid-gaza-war
Dozens of Palestinian students and children staged a display of solidarity at a demonstration in southern Gaza on Sunday to express gratitude for the support seen on US college campuses in recent weeks.
Video from the Shaboura refugee camp in Rafah shows children holding banners with messages that read: “Students of Columbia University, continue to stand by us” and, “Violating our right to education and life is a war crime.”
The students gathered around makeshift tents near a school that now serves as a shelter for Palestinians displaced from northern Gaza. Footage shows people spray-painting messages of gratitude on the fabric of the tents. “Thank you, students in solidarity with Gaza. Your message has reached (us),” says one of the messages.
Takfeer Abu-Yousuf, a displaced student from Beit Hanoun in Northern Gaza, told CNN from the camp he felt it was necessary to thank the students in the US who “supported us with their humanity.”
“Those are thank you messages on our tents, those tents that don’t protect us from the heat or cold. The least we can do is thank them. We can’t write these thank you messages on the walls of our homes because we have no homes. They have been destroyed on top of our children, elders, and women,” he said.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/students-and-children-in-gaza-thank-pro-palestinian-protesters-at-us-college-campuses/ar-AA1nORxq
“Those are thank you messages on our tents, those tents that don’t protect us from the heat or cold.
The least we can do is thank them.
We can’t write these thank you messages on the walls of our homes because we have no homes. They have been destroyed on top of our children, elders, and women,” he said.
buried under the rubble
uncounted and uncountable
thanks to an Unaccountable tyrant
whose prolonging of this Ongoing geno-
cide is all there is that keeps him outta prison
How to execute a successful divestment campaign, and how to F one up, tales from a GenXer.
We had a campus presence that maintained; a light footprint (often a single shanty structure), and a civic fidelity (info tables, petitions, media events). Overall, we tried to enhance student life, not disrupt it.
We had disciplined messaging that was neither transgressive nor harmful to the student body. You have sloganing that resembles something from a 4chan fever swamp.
We had leaders of the aggrieved party who commanded international respect and offered inspiration – Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu. You have Sinwar…
We did not have to explain, excuse, or apologize for the ANCs civil disobedience campaigns. You have October 7.
We shared an aspirational bond in an imagined future with those activists in SA – dismatlement of apartheid and establishment of a peaceful democratic SA. You have discordance (I should hope) with Gaza’s resistance. Hamas seeks regional war, Israel’s destruction, and the spread of theocratic rule.
Time will tell if the student protests achieve anything. But looking back in a side by side, count me skeptical.
WELCOME TO THE USA OF ISRAHELL.
Will not vote for Biden or Trump period. Both of them are demented old men.
There are other options Stein and West for example. They are against genocide. the decimation of an entire population. This government finances and supports a terrorist zionist state that is committing genocide. Biden supports this. Will stand against this just like people stood against nazi Germany.
Shame on anyone that can justify genocide and side with Biden or Trump. Thank you.
Columbia’s students are using the archives of the Vietnam war protests (same building, they just “renamed it”) that occurred at Columbia. The students protesting the genocide in Palestine and demanding our institutions of higher learning divest from Israel and that working Americans’ taxpayer dollars tens of billions of dollars (that could house the homeless here, feed the hungry here, provide health care to the sick here, etc.) not be sent to Israel along with weapons to destroy GAZA and kill everyone in GAZA (which they are doing) – the students and every single person worldwide standing up and demanding that this slaughter and starvation stop is ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF HISTORY.
The fact that most Americans don’t care is irrelevant. Most Americans don’t care about most things, unless it directly affects them, because most Americans are stupid, self-absorbed, shallow, shit bags. Look at Trump (and the over 74 million people who voted for him in the last election). Look at members of Congress that are dumber than rocks like Boebert and MJT. Look at all of the MAGAts that continue to give Trump money when he cries about what a victim he is. Look at all of the people pretending to be journalists who write total shit and lies 24/7.
Everyone in the world who shrugs their shoulders and doesn’t give a shit that Israel is slaughtering and starving over two million people and has bombed GAZA into a pile of rubble that will require HUNDREDS OF BILLIONS TO REBUILD (and Israel expects the United States to hand over the money to them to do it, so they can build their seaside settlements) IS ON THE WRONG SIDE OF HISTORY.
The corrupt and war mongering two party system needs to go. The majority of people have had enough. Stop funding genocide now!!!
https://youtu.be/0hZqOdsRoKU?feature=shared
https://youtu.be/0sajngb0W6I?feature=shared
Before Palestine was occupied by the brutal zionist state people lived peacefully together.
There were Jews, Christians, Muslims, Atheists etc. It was a beautiful country before 1948.
The Palestinians welcomed everyone. Than came NAKBA.
From then on the unrelenting mass murder began. There are ten thousand Palestinians in brutal Israeli prisons many children without ever knowing if they will ever be released or see the light of day again. Israel shot hostages waving white flags so Fuck Israel.
https://youtu.be/JcFFEjq5Ap8?feature=shared
Sorry, this is the correct version of @21.
@13: “it’s like a breaking Wave…”
@18: “The fact that most Americans don’t care…”
‘An overwhelming majority of Americans support Israel in its war against Hamas over the militant group running the Gaza Strip, according to a new poll.
‘The Harvard CAPS-Harris survey shared with The Hill showed 80 percent of registered voters said they support Israel more in the war, while 20 percent said they support Hamas more. That is about in line with the poll’s findings from last month, when 79 percent indicated they support Israel more.’
‘Mark Penn, the co-director of the poll, said support for Israel “has not budged” despite the “campus unrest.” He said the student protests appear out of step with broader public attitudes on Israel and noted that the poll showed Americans largely want a cease-fire in the war but only after Hamas is removed from power and the hostages they seized during its Oct. 7 attack on Israel are returned.’
(https://thehill.com/policy/international/4629597-americans-israel-hamas-gaza-student-protests-poll/#:~:text=The%20Harvard%20CAPS%2DHarris%20survey,indicated%20they%20support%20Israel%20more.)
@19- the bad situation in Gaza was created by a country run under a parliamentary (= looney fringe parties have outsize influence) system. I’m not sure that the two-party system is not better than that.
But you will have Donald Trump’s gratitude if you and the People’s Front of Palestine/Palestinian People’s Front succeed in making Biden lose. And I suppose being on the Fuhrer’s good side would ease some of the pain when Trump greenlights an ACTUAL Palestinian genocide.
@14 What, like this poll, where independent voters in most of the swing states said that a Trump conviction would make it less likely that they would support him? Where 15% of /Republican/ voters in PA said that they’d be less likely to support Trump if he were convicted?
https://ktla.com/news/nationworld/new-poll-shows-trump-ahead-of-biden-in-seven-key-swing-states/
After that, you go off into your second-favorite territory–the straw man. Presumably you couldn’t work mens rea into this one. Nobody said trump was going to be wrestled away from the Secret Service. There are any number of solutions here, from detention in a special facility (probably not a hotel, but that’s a decent analogy) to actually a hotel where Trump could be under Secret Service protection, out of the general prison population, and still be in detention.
Nobody said anything about preventing Trump from executing his Constitutional duties from prison should he be re-elected. Also note that the enumerated duties of the president do not require travel. He can sign bills, issue the State of the Union by letter like Washington did, and receive foreign dignitaries all from a suitable detention facility.
Awesome and totally unsurprising that you consider the president a king unaccountable to criminal charges even after their departure from office. Whose view on this are you closer to, Kavanaugh (No law applies to the president unless the text specifically says it does) or Alito (Making a president subject to criminal liability would make a coup more likely because of course every president will prosecute their successors)? For someone who purportedly believes in rule of law and the Constitution, you certainly seem to be eager to discard it at the drop of a hat. No man above the law? Pffft, as long as they’re running for president, we can’t touch him! For someone who purports to hate Trump, you certainly adopt plenty of his arguments.
We actually agree that the courts aren’t going to save us from a Trump presidency. That needs to be done at the ballot box. But exposing Trump’s corruption for all to see will have an impact on that political process.
@22. I wouldn’t say fuck Israel for the actions of the IDF that committed those war crimes, but I will say fuck Netanyahu, his batshit cabinet, and fuck Hamas and all the warmongering fuckheads who are killing innocent people in cold blood.
Stop giving them arms with no strings attached to commit genocide redubbed self defense.
Neither Israel nor Gaza should be collectively scapegoated for the actions of their extremist criminals who have disenfranchised them and wag the dog to stay in power. It is a disservice to their own people and the hostages to keep that power mad warmongering menace to the world from accountability to his own people and his psychotic bastard cabinet of maniacs making insane decisions for the rest of us.
“especially for suspects who carry knives, considering that stab wounds have a very low mortality rate.”
WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS HORSE SHIT. I’ve been stabbed by a mugger. I almost died! It happened over 33 years ago, and I’m still in terrible pain from it, every single day since then.
EAT SHIT ASHLEY
@14, The Secret Service has already been making arrangements for Trump’s detention for being held in contempt. Their job is to make it work wherever the protectee has to go, but they aren’t a personal army. Think Martha Stewart’s Camp Cupcake stay with dedicated areas. You’re also way overblowing the “martyr” argument, only his most rabid acolytes will really believe that, polling already shows that the majority of Americans believe that Trump has committed crimes and would hardly be shocked if he ends up in jail.
Ah yes, there’s no better way to garner the support of America and for your cause than to dress up in balaclavas like Hamas and yell pro-Hamas slogans while taking over buildings in the middle of the most Jewish city in America.
@31 “Young minds full of mush…” is almost precisely what people said about anti-Vietnam War and civil rights protesters. Funny how the old folks always seem to think the younguns’ minds are full of mush. All the way back to Plato.
@31 whatever is in their minds, it isn’t emulating a successful precedent, as I mentioned in 15. If you are attempting a divestment campaign inspired by the anti apartheid student campaign of the late 70s to 80s, then almost purposely ignore every element, then 1) something is off in idea space 2) it probably will fail.
@18 xina and @19 Ivy R. Nightscales: +2 Thank you.
@17 – If you are old enough, I would bet just about anything that you voted for Nader. How did that go for you?
If you are not old enough to have, look it up, or even better, find some of the well meaning cuckoos who very, very much regret that vote. Probably don’t need to look very far.
Absolutely +1000 @ 25.
@22
“Before Palestine was occupied by the brutal zionist state people lived peacefully together.
There were Jews, Christians, Muslims, Atheists etc. It was a beautiful country before 1948.
The Palestinians welcomed everyone. Than came NAKBA.”
That is not remotely true and is outlandish even for you. Pre 1948 the area was part of the British Empire who took it over after defeating the Turks who ruled it from 1517-1917. Before that it was ruled over by various empires who came and went. The fundamentalist version of Islam practiced by Hamas and many of the neighboring Arab countries completely rules out the possibility of Jews or Christians from living “peacefully” among them.
@22, @36: And even the most cursory check — Wikipedia — details the utter falsehood of Ivy’s claim:
“The British controlled Palestine for almost three decades, overseeing a succession of protests, riots and revolts between the Jewish and Palestinian Arab communities. During the Mandate, the area saw the rise of two nationalist movements: the Jews and the Palestinian Arabs. Intercommunal conflict in Mandatory Palestine ultimately produced the 1936–1939 Arab revolt in Palestine and the 1944–1948 Jewish insurgency in Mandatory Palestine. The United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine was passed on 29 November 1947; this envisaged the creation of separate Jewish and Arab states operating under economic union, and with Jerusalem transferred to UN trusteeship. Two weeks later, Colonial Secretary Arthur Creech Jones announced that the British Mandate would end on 15 May 1948. On the last day of the Mandate, the Jewish community there issued the Israeli Declaration of Independence. After the failure of the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine, the 1947–1949 Palestine war ended with Mandatory Palestine divided among Israel, the Jordanian annexation of the West Bank and the Egyptian All-Palestine Protectorate in the Gaza Strip.”
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mandate_for_Palestine#:~:text=During%20the%20Mandate%2C%20the%20area,Jewish%20insurgency%20in%20Mandatory%20Palestine.)
As noted in yesterday’s Slog AM thread, there’s very good reason for Israelis not to trust the motives of the current protesters.
What was it
bibi call the
Protesters?
‘Worse than Nazis’?
or something like that
the guy’ll do
ANYthing
to keep
outta
Jail
see:
Gaza and
the West Bank
and 150,000
Dead, Injured
and Buried Alive
now THAT’s
“Justice”!
remember
Oct. 7th!
so how can one be a veritable Slave
to The Letter of the Law and yet
totally Immune to its Spirit?
might’n a Magic 8-Ball
be the better & more
Enlightened Guide?
c. where’s ole Tommy
Jefferson when you
Really need him?
@10 — “ And why is it every other LEA just about anywhere in the world is capable of subduing people wielding much large knives without resorting to lethal force?”
They’re not.
Here’s police in London shooting someone with a knife:
https://youtu.be/gAgijjUUQQA?feature=shared
And here’s police in London again shooting someone with a knife:
https://youtu.be/c4_GCOWuaEM?feature=shared
And here’s police in London shooting two people with knives:
https://youtu.be/HsEWgKttC9A?feature=shared
And here’s police in Australia shooting someone with a knife:
https://youtu.be/cnk4su6HSHk?feature=shared
I could go on and on. I’m not sure if you were just uninformed or lying, but hopefully you now understand that LEA everywhere in the world shoots people with knives, just like police in the US shoot people with knives.
@15, @33: In addition to all of the excellent points you have made, the current situation has two key contextual differences from the anti-apartheid student protests of 35-40 years ago.
First, there was already nationwide consensus against apartheid. Congress had passed the Comprehensive Anti-Apartheid Act of 1986, which laid out a framework of what South Africa had to do to return to full American investment. After that, the main issue was getting senile old Reagan to enforce it fully. By the time of Shanty Town on my school’s campus, the students were pushing at an open door.
Second, South Africa sits at the end of the world, and hold no strategic interest to the United States. Students today are demanding the U.S. abandon a pluralistic democracy and staunch ally in a crisis-ridden region, an ally which was just attacked by the women-beating fundamentalist regime in Iran. As I’ve noted above, registered voters are 4:1 in favor of Israel in the current conflict, so the student demands would be unreasonable, even if student leaders did not engage in flat-out eliminationist rhetoric against persons who dare disagree with them.
It’s now May, and the campuses will empty soon anyway. With the NYPD clearing out Columbia’s demonstrators, I expect all of this to fade as Summer approaches.
speaking of ‘bloodbaths’
looks like the Pro-Genociders’re
taking the matter into their own hands
and showing the Pro-Palestinians what a little
Ultra-Violence feels like. where have you Gone smokin’ Joe?
the nation turns its
bloody noses and
black eyes to you
arrest bibi
and END this
fucking GENOCIDE
before fucking Armageddon!
tho it seems a few here’d
look Forward to a little
bit o’ Armageddon
and yeah
smokin Joe
cannot arrest
that nutnyahoo
but Joe IS the Leader
of the Free Fucking World
and as such
has some
Pull.
@46
it’s turning
Wormtongue
nearly inside out
but yeah
apparently!
@43 Right. Thank you for adding that. I had actually forgotten that Congress was able override the Gipper with a 2/3 majority. There was general support by the public.
@44 I’m still of the mind this movement will fail for the reasons I’ve already shared, but if the protesters are rocking it like 68, then we will have 68 outcomes- that is to say, periodic violent disruptions, a public that grows to hate the protesters more than the (fill in the blank), a shit show of a convention in Chicago (how fitting), now nudging the electorate rightward , finally sputtering out with dead end violent radicals like Panthers and Weathermen.
Of all the annoyances of the boomers, it was their mythological narrative that their street shenanigans helped end the war. That’s been debunked years ago(I believe Michael Lind led the charge there). But university culture nevertheless romances that period, the kids absorb it, so we’re off to the races. Didn’t Huey Newton pen a book called “revolutionary suicide”?
@48: Did Hamas commit “genocide” (your definition) in Israel on 10/7? Yes or no? One word.
Let’s see who gets turned inside-out. Over one word.