They’re calling it “the Red Cup Rebellion”: The Starbucks employee union voted to strike on November 13, aka Red Cup Day, when stores hand out reusable, free (with purchase) red cups to kick off the holiday season. The union said that after years of bargaining, Starbucks still hasn’t budged on their demands for better pay, more hours and resolutions of more than 700 unresolved unfair labor practice violations. The strike could hit about 25 cities, with potential to spread. Seattle baristas have participated in the strikes in the past. At one in March, police arrested 16 people.  

SPD Firings: Seattle Police Department Chief Shon Barnes fired two of the department’s top leaders yesterday, CEO Brian Maxey and general counsel Rebecca Boatright. According to the Seattle Times, they played key roles in federal oversight of the department, and were often referred to for internal policy inquiries—like protest response, use of body cameras and more—from City Hall officials. Barnes was hired by Harrell earlier this year. Look, I’m all for downsizing the police department, but is this the place to start? 

Wondering why the last two ballot drops showed so many progressive candidates leading their races, yet Katie Wilson is still behind Mayor Bruce Harrell? Vivian got answers yesterday. As of yesterday’s ballot drop, Harrell is leading by eight points. But ballots are still being counted, and because younger progressives tend to vote late, Wilson could come back. Keep every phalange you have crossed.

The “Sharia Law” They Warned Us About: New York City mayor elect Zohran Mamdani announced an all-women transition team to help “form an administration that is equal parts capable and compassionate,” he says. They include senior campaign advisor Elana Leopold, former first deputy mayor Maria Torres-Springer, former federal trade commission chair Lina Khan, United Way’s president and CEO Grace Bonilla, and Melanie Hartzog, former deputy mayor for health and human services. And then there’s Seattle, possibly about to be stuck with four more years of Bruce. 

Trump is Coping: A day after Dems swept elections across the country, the president posted more than 30 Truth Social posts in under two hours. Many were (seemingly) AI-generated videos of himself reading his past Truth Social posts: one of him warning the Nigerian government to “stop the killing of Christians,” another one declaring Obamacare “A TOTAL DISASTER!” and another alleging Walmart’s prices for Thanksgiving dinner dropped 25 percent since Biden was in office.

This one is by far the most cringe:

 

Weather: Rain between 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Breezy. The high will be 58 degrees. The low will be 48. 

Seattle police are investigating after a man arrived at Harborview Medical Center yesterday morning with a gunshot wound to the head. The police department said officers responded 2:20 a.m. after staff called 911 to report the victim. The man came to the hospital in a car with no license plates, driven by another unknown man, who walked the victim into the hospital and then left before police arrived, police say. The victim is reportedly in stable condition. Police said he told them he was injured in Seattle, but wouldn’t say where.

31 Years Later: New DNA evidence has led to an arrest for the 1994 murder of 14-year-old Tanya Marie Frazier, who disappeared after leaving Meany Middle School on Capitol Hill. Her body was found days later along E. Highland Drive. Police said 57-year-old Mark Anthony Russ was identified through DNA collected 31 years ago. Russ, recently released from prison, is now being held without bail. His record includes attempted rape, burglary and robbery.

More Air Trouble: Starting Friday, the FAA will cut US air traffic by 10% across 40 major markets due to safety concerns, a.k.a. the longest government shutdown in the history of this country. Air traffic controllers, who have been working unpaid since Oct. 1, have been logging six-day weeks and mandatory overtime. They’re fatigued and short staffed. This is not safe. The cutback could disrupt thousands of flights nationwide just before the holidays..

Deutschland: The shutdown’s wide reach expands overseas to American military bases in Bavaria, Germany. As part of its “Shutdown Guidance,” a US Army website briefly provided a list of food banks for people living at these bases, but the information was later deleted without explanation. Maybe because it’s embarrassing. 

Workplace Harrassment Charges at SFD: The Seattle Fire Department’s former head of human resources, Sarah Lee, has filed a $2.5 million claim against the city, alleging she was fired for trying to address workplace misconduct inside the department, including alleged  on-duty drinking, sexual harassment, and unsafe behavior. An attorney and former pro tem judge, Lee said she pushed the department to investigate multiple incidents—including a female firefighter’s uniform being slashed with a box cutter—but SFD retaliated against her. She was placed on leave in September and later fired, allegedly after seeking records that implicated a superior. 

Spoiler Alert: There’s gonna be a new Barnes & Noble downtown. To that, I say: 

@a_twink_and_a_redhead We could’ve easily written Romeo and Juliet, but Shakespeare could’ve never written Barnes & Noble by Grant & Ash 🤣🔥🤭💕✨ #shakespeare #singersongwriter #plottwist #reading #songofthesummer ♬ original sound – Grant & Ash

74 replies on “Slog AM: The Red Cup Rebellion, FAA Cuts Flights, Mamdani’s All Woman Transition Team”

  3. @40: All over the world, legislators constantly receive harsh criticism for just trying to do good jobs. Watching a terrorist gang get handed one pass after another after another for literal murders should indeed upset any responsible elected official.

    For the Knesset’s members, they at least have the satisfaction of knowing the peace deal pretty much satisfies all of Israel’s war aims. They also now know the many criticisms hurled at their country worldwide for the last two years amount to nothing more than the emptiest, most performative posturing imaginable, from the most vapid of spoiled children. No adult, including all of the adults elected to the Knesset, need ever again pay any attention to such risibly meaningless noise.

  5. “… the

    many criticisms

    hurled at {Israel] worldwide

    for the last two years amount to nothing

    more than the emptiest, most performative posturing imaginable,”

    –official AIPAC propaganda

    showing the World Israel’s complete

    lack of Humanity under the bibi nutnyahoo

    administration and Highlighting how Israel is rapidly

    losing its once-Universal support on this Planet’s massive stage

    how Far they’ve Come;

    how Far they’ve

    Fallen since

    1939

    I heard, probably for the First time, today, a

    disturbing report on NPR, about a couple

    boys who’d picked up some Unexploded

    Ordnance, maybe with ‘proudly made

    in the usa’ written on it, that blew up

    leaving the boys badly injured but

    the point is, NPR is allowing us

    a look behind israel’s misty

    pink ‘fog of war’ & when

    this starts, should Israel

    fail to quell it quickly

    it’ll snowball into a

    massive outroar

    from Earth’s

    inhabitants

    about fucking Time.

    the additional childish slurs were

    likely All Wormtongue, scatting

    for his masturbatory needs

    😝😎😎😎😎😝😎😎😎😎😝

  6. @51: So, kristo still feels like he’s got some boysplanin’ to do about his chronic use of bigoted, anti-gay, sex-shaming slurs? Biped’s barb must’ve bit real deep. Nice shot!

  9. @57: Why? It wouldn’t tell them anything they didn’t already know. The thunderous silence of the “Pro-Palestinian” protestors in the face of Hamas’ public executions of Palestinians says more than two years of their hypocritical whines ever did.

  12. and

    wormmy’s

    TWO Long YEARS

    of Supporting Genocide

    says Oodles More about wormmy

    whilst his attempts at shaming

    anti-genociders not calling

    out terrorists terrorizing

    Gazans falls onto ears

    Deafened by OUR

    Bombs which

    we GAVE to

    SUPPORT

    Israel’s

    fucking

    GENOCIDE

    with wormmy’s

    Gleefully CHEERING

    IT ON, costing us the world’s

    Worst president, ‘president’ Cadet Bonespurs.

    you can

    fucking bugger

    the fuck off Too, wormmy

    along with

    your favorite fellow

    fiend, our very own bippy buggers.

  13. wormmy wants to

    Start a Genocide Support

    Group and Call it — Wait for it:

    “Give War Another Chance, Please?”

    so

    how’s

    your Cult

    coming along,

    so far, Wormtongue?

    had

    many

    Bites?

  14. and, speaking of Democratic Socialists’ capturing the

    Mayorship of these United States’ BIGGEST City,

    and Genocide (& wormmy thumpfnsorna’s

    UNWAVERing Support thereof),

    I give you, this:

    Michael Blake . . . has officially announced

    he will challenge Rep. Ritchie Torres in New York’s

    15th Congressional district. In his announcement, Blake wrote

    “the people of The Bronx deserve better than Ritchie Torres,” and criti-

    cized Torres for his borderline-obsessive pro-Israel rhetoric, writing

    “I am ready to fight for you and lower your cost of living

    while Ritchie fights for a Genocide. I will focus on

    Affordable Housing and Books as Ritchie will

    only focus on AIPAC and Bibi. I will invest in

    the community. Ritchie invests in Bombs.”

    Oodlesses, right fucking Here:

    https://www.ralphnaderradiohour.com/p/the-ai-prompt-that-could-end-the

    whoa.

    speaking of 

    “Gaza-Driving-VOTES,”

    and Support, there’s THAT, oh my!

    and,

    wormmy,

    as we’ve Told

    You, for. two. fucking. Years,

    “You be on de Wrong side of de History, mon!”

    and how

    fucking ‘Bout

    them ‘damn’ Progressives!?

    You DEF be on de

    Wrong Side,

    wormmy!

    Time

    to Change

    de Subject!

  18. “No apartheid state has the right to exist as an apartheid state. It must either change (as it did in South Africa) or face the reality in the 21st century, it will be condemned and eventually sanctioned. Israel refuses to admit its atrocities have consequences and no matter how much evidence is erased from media it’s been downloaded all over the world and it’s never going away.

    Listening to clips of enraged, expletive-laced rants by people like Mark Levin may make true Zionist believers feel validated it doesn’t change the fact that they’ve lost the young voters, including many of their own.

    How proud can they expect them to be of a country (hiding behind an ancient religion) that justifies raping a defenseless prisoner, shooting a six year old child alone in a car begging for help, destroying >80% of all structures (homes, hospitals, schools) and planning seaside condos to take their place?”

    –@SW; 11/8/25

    fucking Oodles:

    https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/the-us-empire-keeps-getting-creepier/comments

  19. South Africa went from having an average of 2,000 (two thousand) murders annually under Apartheid (mostly black-on-black) to having over 23,000 (twenty-three thousand) murders annually now (still mostly black-on-black). Wow what amazing “progressive” progress!

    Always remember, “progressive” = “stupid and naive”.

  20. @68: The International Court of Justice ruled Israel was not running an apartheid state:

    ‘The Court concludes that the “separation” implemented by Israel in the West Bank between the Palestinian population and settlers constitutes a breach of Article 3 of CERD, without qualifying it as apartheid.’ (https://www.icj-cij.org/node/204176)

    However, our local All Gaza All the Time Crowd simply ignored that last clause, and declared Israel guilty of apartheid, just as they constantly declare it guilty of “genocide,” just as they always refuse to consider whether Hamas’ 10/7 murder of Jews, for being Jews, on land the killers had vowed to cleanse of Jews, constitutes “genocide,” or not. Words mean whatever they want them to mean, and the same word can have diametrically opposite meanings at the same time. (Calling something “Orwellian,” sounds like a compliment to them, I guess.)

    As for actual apartheid, South Africa now suffers the same sorry outcomes as every other one-party state ever has suffered. If the 20th Century taught us anything, it was the reliably tragic results of a one-party state. It does not matter how good that party’s intentions may have been at the start (indeed, outcomes may be worse, the better the party’s initial intentions). It does not matter what the party’s initial philosophy was. It does not matter who forms or runs that party, it does not matter how much or how few supporters the party has outside of itself within the country, or outside the country. It does not matter how many resources the party or state had at the beginning. The simple reality is that power corrupts, and the longer the one party retains monopoly power, the worse that corruption and resulting ill effects become.

    The Soviet Union had an educated population, advanced heavy industry, vast natural resources, and no credible internal or external threats. When it finally suffered total collapse, first economically and then politically, that regime had no defenders remaining. None. Nobody wanted it anymore.

    I hope South Africa can and does transition to a true democracy, shake off / reform its failed one party, and return to a path of peace and prosperity. I hope we in the United States can and do help. Because the current situation in South Africa isn’t doing last century’s anti-apartheid activists in the United States any favors.

  21. For more context to my comment at #68, the South African police/security forces killed about 3,500 people during the entire 1948 -1994 Apartheid era.

  22. @69: “without qualifying it as apartheid.”

    ha ha ha, right in the court’s own summary of its decision, no less! Where’s that Average Bob guy, I feel like we spent a solid week trying to get him to understand this point! 😂

  23. @71: Yeah, averagebob REALLY wanted a ruling of apartheid against Israel, and when he didn’t get it, he simply declared that he had. He gets my vote for the most intransigent of even the All Gaza All the Time crowd back then, which is really saying something.

  24. @72: wow I wish we had just pointed him to the summary. The summary is hard to refute because it’s in the court’s own words. I was so busy reading the actual decision that I never read the unofficial summary! 😂

    Showing him the summary might have saved a lot of patient explaining, because reading him the actual decision only ever seemed to confuse him! 😄 He just had this fanatical commitment to misreading a text, over and over, I’ve never seen anything like it! 🤣

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