The rain began. The wind whipped up a bit. The day fell into a stormy darkness, and I saw my first flash of lightning at 7:05 pm. But by 9 pm, much of the thunderstorm had departed and the night air was for the most part stable. Indeed, Seattle-Tacoma International Airport‘s “ground stop for arriving flights…was lifted at 9:30 pm.” Would something dramatic happen while I and the city slept? It didn’t, it seems. Upon returning from the land of dreams, we found a morning whose clouds were lowish and taking their own sweet time to cross the sky. Recall what that irritated rasta said to an excited hippie at a reggae concert: “Stand still and dance, mon.” The clouds at present, 6am, are exactly doing that: moving in their stillness. As far as Seattle’s Thursday is concerned, Wednesday’s panic about “large hail, severe wind gusts, and potentially a tornado” turned out to be “all cry and no wool.”
Today will see some clouds, some showers, some sun, more clouds and more showers. Expect a high of 57 and a low of 48.
King County Executive Dow Constantine will soon be sitting pretty at his new job, the CEO of Sound Transit. His annual salary of $450,000 comes with lots of perks: $10,000 to improve his home office, an “annual performance awards of $30,000,” a year’s worth of severance if he’s fired. But what are we to make of what happened at the Angle Lake light rail station last night? It was hit by the otherwise relatively mild storm so hard that it closed for the entire evening. Was this a sign? In Leviathan, the excellent Thomas Hobbes (a 17th century social philosopher), called a sign that involved “unusual accidents; as eclipses, comets, rare meteors, earthquakes, inundations… and the like” portenta as it portended or foreshowed “some great calamity to come.”
What can Canadians not stop seeing all around them since Donald Trump started his second term? The decline of the American empire. For example, Global News reports that a floating “McBarge” in Vancouver which was a McDonald’s during Expo 86 “but has sat empty ever since” is now sinking, “heading to the bottom of the Fraser River” where it will certainly “suffer a sea-change into something strange.” The story behind McDonald’s sinking ghost is riddled with signs of the rapid disintegration of what until very recently seemed like an iron bond between the “Children of a Common Mother” (as it’s written on the US side of the Peace Arch on the border that separates the biggest cities of the Pacific Northwest, Seattle and Vancouver BC), or “Brethren Dwelling Together in Unity” (as it’s written on the Canadian side).
And, yes, the market is crashing again because of tariffs. And I think the whole idea behind this kind of economic reasoning is less about profits/jobs and more about disciplining workers. The entire project of the present administration can only be understood in a way made clear in a 1943 essay, “Political Aspects of Full Employment,” by the greatest economist of the 20th century, Michal Kalecki. He wrote: “It is true that profits would be higher under a regime of full employment than they are on the average under laissez-faire… But ‘discipline in the factories’ and ‘political stability’ are more appreciated than profits by business leaders. Their class instinct tells them that lasting full employment is unsound from their point of view, and that unemployment is an integral part of the ‘normal’ capitalist system.” Please read that carefully. The answer to current events is found in them. Biden’s economy might have benefitted more Americans, but this kind of success is not all appreciated by those at the very top. They much prefer the power of “the sack.”
Shares in automakers around the world tumbled on Thursday after President Trump announced plans to impose a 25% tariff on imported cars and some parts beginning next week.
— The New York Times (@nytimes.com) March 27, 2025 at 4:00 AM
So, the GoSkagit story about a Big Lake murder trial has a detail that caught my attention immediately. It’s not that the jury failed to decide if the defendant, Angela Marie Conijn, 59, murdered or did not murder Kamran Cohee, 34. No, it’s this: “Cohee allegedly began beating on the Conijns’ front door with a wheelbarrow, documents state.” I’m gripped by the image of a wheelbarrow repeatedly ramming a home’s main door. I see it all too well—that door, that wheelbarrow, and that woman who is soon to be shot dead.
Wait? What? “Washington County sewer officials ran up a huge food tab on ratepayers’ dime.” That extraordinary headline is from The Oregonian, and concerns the CEO of Hillsboro, Oregon Clean Waters Services, Diane Taniguchi-Dennis, and the water utility’s Chief Business Operations Officer, Jack Liang. The two “dined out alone or with others, including various executives within the agency, at least 55 times in just under a two-year span at a cost of $5,100.” The Oregonian focuses on three meals that happened at Din Tai Fung, a hip joint “known for its xiao long bao soup dumplings.” These meals allegedly cost a whopping $600. And knowing very well that everything we eat ends up in the sewers, The Oregonian provides the details of what the CEO, CBOO, and their buddies digested and turned to shit: “Short ribs, wontons, pot stickers, fried rice, vegetables and four orders of pork and crab xiao long bao soup dumplings.” From order to disorder. That is the way of all things in our thermodynamical universe.
A movie that keeps returning to my mind is Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove. The Nazi advising the president; the chaotic war room; the batshit crazy, cigar-chomping general going on about the purification of water in much the same way Trump goes on about colonizing Greenland. And now there’s the puppy killer’s trip to the El Salvadoran prison that’s filled with Venezuelans “who the Trump administration alleges are gang members.” Indeed, Hollywood is empty. All the villains are here.
If hell exists, Kristi Noem is a shoo-in.
— John Pavlovitz (@johnpavlovitz.bsky.social) March 26, 2025 at 8:43 PM
The great classical pianist András Schiff has cancelled his upcoming US concerts because he’s had enough of Donald Trump’s bullying on the world stage and support of neo-Nazis in Germany. (Schiff, who presently lives in the UK, “was born to a Jewish family in Budapest that witnessed the horrors of the Holocaust.”) Let’s end Slog AM with Schiff’s gorgeously lyrical interpretation of Bach’s “Prelude and Fugue No. 1 in C major.”
Given that music is a universal language, rather pouty for a concert pianist to deprive American audiences of his talents over politics.
Charles, Charles, Charles; It’s not just the U.S., but the entire world that’s circling the drain.
…says the poutiest commenter in the entire history of the world wide web.
my BIL in CA suggested we strap plywood to our new SUV;s roof rack to protect it from the impending golf-ball sized hail last night. ITS NOT GOING TO HAIL, said I.
@1: classic PIW.
my BIL in CA suggested we strap plywood to our new SUV’s roof rack to protect it from the impending golf-ball sized hail last night. ITS NOT GOING TO HAIL, said I.
@1: classic PIW.
@1
precisely
what they
said when
Simone Biles
said, sorry, but
I Gotta sit this one Out
your
self-loathing
will likely Never win
you quite enough Con-
demnations but Kudos for Effort
“the batshit crazy, cigar-chomping general”
that’d be
General Jack D, Ripper
aka Strerling Haywood – always
Hated the guy, regardless of the Role
till I read his autobio
‘Wanderer.’
“Stand still and dance, mon.”
Excellent advice.
thnx Chas!
lol noem can foad but i can count at least 4 ms13 tattoos
If I didn’t live in this shithole country I wouldn’t travel here either. Our government is actively alienating our closest allies and disappearing visitors off the streets without due process, even people with all their documentation in order. It’s not worth the risk, however minor, and the act of resistance is a form of peaceful protest that will hit the people who need to feel it the most, the electorate who brought this on by re-electing this fucking clown show.
A s*hole president doesn’t make s*hole country. That’s resistance 101.
Not to mention we’re in the midst of a measles epidemic and our hhs secretary wants to manage it with vitamin A and cod liver oil. You would be safer visiting north korea.
It was already a shithole country. Trump is only a symptom, though he is accelerating our decline. The first trump administration could be chalked up to an honest mistake but a non-shithole country would not re-elect a con artist/gameshow host who tried to overturn an election because he lost. In a non-shithole America, Trump would be in prison for treason right now, assuming he hadn’t been strung up by his toes on the national mall. We brought this on ourselves.
@9 and @11 FTW!
Going forward can we just refer to PIW as “Boot-licker In Wallingford”? I mean, for the sake of accuracy?
@12: “We brought this on ourselves.”
Yes, that line will get your always drink refreshened in Seattle cocktail parties.
I’ve never had the pleasure of hearing András Schiff play in person, but he’s been a regular on my iPhone’s classical playlists ever since he stopped being a regular in my CD player.
@1, etc.: We don’t deserve to hear him play for us, and I’m glad he’s making that point. He can stay in decent, cultured countries, unless we make an effort worthy of him. (Electing ignorant, bullying, déclassé frauds won’t get us there.)
@15, Do you honestly think a properly functioning democracy would re-elect a guy who is openly hostile to our democratic institutions, sexually assaults women, and was probably selling state secrets to foreign adversaries? And that’s not even touching on the racism and xenophobia in a country populated almost entirely by immigrants and their descendants.
This country is not well but you don’t have to take it personally. We have some lovely people here and we make some of the best art and entertainment the world has to offer but as a nation we are an embarrassment and as a democracy we are complete failure.
@16: “Electing ignorant, bullying, déclassé frauds won’t get us there.”
True, but neither will depriving and punishing ourselves. Life and music continue.
Dweeeebeee have you ever experienced firsthand a gross act of blunt force racial violence upon another human being? I am assuming that you haven’t. Because for those of us that live the nightmare every day from their firsthand experience(s) of someone being tortured, abused or otherwise physically-mentally-spritually harmed due to their race or ethnic quality then I would stay away from this country if I had the choice. I don’t know if you ever read Malcolm X’s Autobiography as told to Alex Haley, but I found solace in his observations from his pilgrimage to Mecca. He observed Muslims from all races worshipping in peace and harmony. He felt America was toxic to the rest of the world because of our society that is dominated by the white racial overlord and our inability to correct and atone for our sordid history. The best thing has happened for the world with Drumpf alienating us from the other countries. It has given them a firm jumping off place to leave us behind, wall us in and possibly save themselves from our misplaced role in the world as beneficial leaders. And I know you want to say that they are no better than us, but they are better than us. I expect that they will watch our mistakes over the next four years and do something better still.
@17: “…was probably selling state secrets to foreign adversaries?”
Please. Putin has Trump’s “piss tape.” That paranoid old spook now gets any of our secrets he wants, for free, every time he cracks that whip.
@17: “But as a nation we are an embarrassment and as a democracy we are complete failure.”
So then what do you suggest? Sounds like you have no defiance left. I suggest you attend an indivisible meeting.
@19: If Islam beckons you to go off and worship in peace and harmony, then go! Don’t put off your solace any longer.
Malcolm X’s Autobiography as told to Alex Haley
Surprise surprise, another Muslim who can’t read or write.
@11 the WHO also recommends 200,000 IU Vitamin A for children fighting measles. Cod liver oil is high in Vitamin A (and Vitamin D). Sounds like RFKJ knows what he’s talking about.
@21 & 22
I’m laughing so hard right now. Come on now… give us more of your racist, transphobic, whitey-is-alrighty bull shit.
@23 they recommend vitamin A supplements for measles infections in severely malnourished children, not as a first-line treatment and definitely not for prevention, because they’re not fucking idiots and they know how vaccines work.
Do you always seek medical advice from trial attorneys? You should definitely keep doing that.
@24: Glad you’re so easily amused, at least laughter gets you hard.
@22. You bear the mark of Yakub most prominently.
@25 – Vitamin A and other “supportive treatment” (fluids, rest) are indeed the first line treatment for measles. At least according to every reference I could find on Google.
And the answer to your question is, “it depends on the trial lawyer.”
@23 @ 25 Or people could take a fucking vaccine to PREVENT measles in the first place. Dumbass.
@28, If you’re in an underserved county where chronic malnutrition is commonplace and vaccination rates are low vitamin A will help keep kids alive. Until now these were the only kinds of places where measles outbreaks occurred. Supplementing american kids with vitamins their bodies are already saturated with isn’t going to help anyone and it does nothing to contain the epidemic. The best guidance in the US is to vaccinate your kids so they don’t get infected in the first place.
I encourage you to continue seeking medical advice from google and people with no medical training who make their living from class action lawsuits. You’re doing great.
The “We” in “WereBack” is Measles; the Measles virus has made its own account and is using it to spread its message of “don’t bother with vaccines, use good ol-fashioned cod-liver oil just like grandpappy used to do (right before half his children died from measles.)”
Viral content: it drives engagement!
@21 “Sounds like you have no defiance left. I suggest you attend an indivisible meeting.”
Ruthless!
That said barth seems like they know that DAGTG, you must have thought you were talking to Bax or one of the other milquetoast libs here.
@31 if That
ain’t The
Truth
@29 – I personally have no argument against the measles vaccine but other people do. If someone has contracted measles, it’s rather pointless to argue with them about not being vaccinated, just give them the best available treatment. Think of it as harm reduction.
@30 – a few hundred cases, typical of every year, is not an epidemic. Also, I always research any medical advice I receive using Google. If you don’t, you might be an idiot.
@31 – when has measles ever had a 50% fatality rate? In reality it’s 0.1 percent. Grandpappy’s children are going to be just fine.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_wrestling_with_the_angel
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob
At least four and possibly as many as seven B-2 stealth bombers have deployed to Diego Garcia in the last two days, the most I think I’ve ever heard of that particular airframe on the island at once, even during the early stages of OEF/OIF.
USS Harry Truman and its strike group are already in the Red Sea, and USS Carl Vinson and its strike group are steaming into the Indian Ocean from Guam.
2x CSGs plus 4-7x B-2s is a big force, enough to hit Iran even harder than the Israelis did last October, when they wiped out Iran’s integrated air defense system. However. It’s not enough of a force to eliminate the entire Iranian military. You’d need hundreds more airframes for that, which would mean flying fighters out of the Gulf States, Jordan, and Turkey … a military and diplomatic build-up we’ve seen no sign of yet. So if Iran is the target, it is more likely to be a raid or series of raids on select critical targets, not a sustained campaign aimed at crippling the regime.
It’s tempting to think this force build-up could be intended to land a few punches on Iran’s nose, but I think a more likely target is the Houthis. The Iranians haven’t shot at the US in months, while the Houthis have been shooting every day. 2x CSGs and 4-7x B-2s is exactly the size force you’d want to put a serious hurt on the Houthis.
It’s possible the carrier and bomber deployments are a mere show of force but I doubt it. Deployments of this size are both rare and extremely expensive. This is way more firepower than you’d need (or want to pay for) if you intended a mere show of force. To me, it looks like the real thing. There’s some heavy fireworks coming to Yemen within the next 72 hours, or my name’s not thumpus! 💥💥💥
Looks like thumpus was on the group chat too
@34, there is nothing typical about the number of measles cases this year. I don’t know where you’re getting your medical advice but I encourage you to continue using the internet to verify it because that’s been working out so well for you. Most people just talk to their doctor.
the
Reich
Wing trolls
here tS suck ass