Good Morning! Could anyone sleep over the sound of that wind last night? Heavy gusts knocked out power for at least 135,000 customers in the area, took down utility poles, and threw a tree onto a car on Aurora, all while a Delta flight might have gotten struck by lightning over Lake Union (everyone’s okay). It’s supposed to stick around til 10 am, with gusts up to 60 miles per hour. If you have to go outside before they die down, maybe tie a sandbag or two to your ankles.
Alright, let’s get the Trump stuff out of the way.
Toes Are for Suckers: Someone apparently hacked into the monitors at the DC headquarters of the Department of Housing and Urban Development yesterday. And for a hot second, they showed an AI video of Trump making out with Elon Musk’s big toe. Overlaying the video is the text: “Long Live the Real King.” (Why do we think it’s AI? Elon has two left feet. The rest is pretty believable.) My favorite thing about this story is that someone at the New York Times had to write and edit the phrase: “President Trump sucking the toes of Elon Musk.”
Empty Threats: According to the government’s own data, nearly 40 percent of the contracts that Elon Musk’s DOGE cancelled won’t save the government any money. The agency published a list of 1,125 contracts that it terminated in recent weeks, and data on DOGE’s “Wall of Receipts” shows that 417 of those cancellations aren’t expected to save the government a dime. “It’s like confiscating used ammunition after it’s been shot when there’s nothing left in it. It doesn’t accomplish any policy objective,” one expert told the Associated Press.
Speaking of Musk: We’re off X (see above for a couple of the reasons). You can find us on BlueSky here. See you there!
Be Our Guest: The White House socials got weird about opening their tours to the public. It looks like a series of ads for the Hilton Guest Experience™. How do I know this? Because the White House Instagram account nonconsensually appears on my feed every day.
ICE Can Harass Fewer Churches, At Least: It feels like months ago, but remember at the very beginning of his term (36 days ago), when Trump threw out Department of Homeland Security policies that limited where ICE could make arrests—especially in churches? Several religious groups sued, including the Quakers, a Georgia-based Baptist network, and a Sikh temple in Florida. And yesterday, a US District judge blocked the order while the lawsuit plays out. Unfortunately, it only applies to the plaintiffs.
Another Possible Block: Today, US District Judge Jamal Whitehead in Seattle will hear a legal challenge to Trump’s order freezing refugee arrivals and funding. Individual plaintiffs and three nonprofits that work with refugees are asking the court to put the order on hold while the case proceeds.
The Company We Keep: At the UN General Assembly yesterday, the United States joined Russia to vote against a resolution condemning Russia’s war against Ukraine, ditching our traditional European allies, and instead aligning us with the likes of North Korea and Belarus. The vote marked the third anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. This is just the latest in this shift toward Russia: Since taking office, Trump has blamed Ukraine for starting the war, called Zelensky a “dictator,” started building a direct relationship with Putin, and implied that the US sanctions against Russia over the war could be lifted. Europe is starting to make clear that they’re over our shit, and I don’t blame them.
An Untrained Workforce Is an Obedient Workforce: At least two federal departments have stopped mandatory antidiscrimination and whistleblower training for their employees, according to Newsweek. Legal protections for whistleblowing are guaranteed under the No FEAR Act, and training has been mandatory for federal employees since 2006. But it appears the Trump Administration doesn’t know the difference between DEI and Whistleblowing—they’re all just “government waste” to them. Joe Spielberger, senior policy counsel at the Project on Government Oversight, told Newsweek: “This will certainly create more confusion, and even if people do know their rights, they will likely be more reluctant to come forward and exercise those rights if they feel agencies don’t take these issues seriously.”
Baby Bowie: Here’s your palette cleanser. Ever heard of a sloth bear? They’re very silly looking. Here at the Woodland Park Zoo, we have a mamma Sloth Bear who’s celebrating the arrival of Bowie, a female cub born on January 8—David Bowie’s birthday. The zoo is happy to report that Bowie is “nursing regularly, is very vocal and has a full, rounded tummy.” We can meet Bowie at the zoo in April.
Looking for a Book Rec? We’ve got one. Stranger contributor Katie Lee Ellison talked to Freda Epum, the author of The Gloomy Girl Variety Show, and this book has everything: Explorations of personal relationships with TV; immigrant cultures and assimilation in the U.S.; addiction; the film industry; fantasy and delusion as blockers for a sense of self. And it’s all framed through a fictional episode of HGTV’s House Hunters. The book is Epum’s debut, and you shouldn’t miss it.
The District 2 Race Is Underway: Adonis Ducksworth, Mayor Bruce Harrell’s transportation policy and operations manager, is running for Tammy Morales’s old city council seat. According to Stranger contributor Nathalie Graham, he may be the coolest person to ever run for the D2 seat: He’s a skateboarder, a high school golf champion, and he makes techno beats in his studio after his kids go to sleep. But is he ready for politics? Read about it here.
A Little Layoff Context: Yesterday morning, Starbucks laid off 1,100 of its corporate employees. Sales have slipped for four straight quarters, so the company is tightening where it can—cutting out the more complicated, less popular drinks on its menu (we didn’t really need olive oil drinks from Starbucks), and reducing staff. Meanwhile, in October, the company increased the cash dividends for shareholders and compensated their new CEO to the tune of $96 million in just four months. In case you were wondering where the corporation’s priorities are.
Our Own Cartoon Villain: SPD arrested the suspected leader of a four-person crew that they believe stole more than $1 million by tearing open ATMs with the Jaws of Life. Prosecutors say the crew also caused more than $500,000 in property damage, most recently destroying the entire face of a BECU branch in Fremont with a stolen forklift to access the two ATMs inside. When the suspect was spotted in a parked car, and he realized police were closing in, he climbed through the car’s sunroof, dropped a large bag of what cops think was cocaine, and tried to run away. He was stopped and bitten by a police dog. This reads like a Batman: The Animated Series episode.
Some Good News: We have a healthy baby girl in J-Pod. Scientists confirmed that J26 is female, which is very good news for a pod that’s been struggling to reproduce (no pressure, J-Dawg), and she’s thriving in her first month of life. Tahlequah, the orca mother who keeps breaking our hearts with her own broken heart, also seems to be recovering from her grief and caring for her two older sons. Do you think they know an entire city is rooting for them?
Fuck You, Make Me: Twenty-one civil service employees—including engineers, data scientists, and product managers—resigned from DOGE this morning, saying in a letter that they refused to use their technical expertise to “dismantle critical public services.” They warned that the remaining DOGE staff, who were recruited by Musk, were political ideologues who didn’t have any of the expertise to downsize the government in a responsible way.
A Song for your Tuesday: Two of my favorite weirdos, Perfume Genius and Aldous Harding, are finally working together. It’s a match made in heaven—or maybe the gender-neutral bathroom of a queer bar. Either way, we love it.
More in NEWS
Local (and not-so-local) news from your favorite writers.
I’m looking at what’s happening with DOGE and the dismantling of the military chain of command and the Department of Justice and the intelligence services and how Trump is now abandoning our allies and cozying up to the world’s worst menaces, and it occurs to me…
Vladimir Putin has expended the equivalent of billions of dollars and upwards of 700,000 or 800,000 casualties (killed and wounded) over his now-three-year invasion, and he has yet to conquer poor, weak, little Ukraine. And meanwhile the big, strong, wealthy United States of America?–Putin has managed to conquer us without firing a single shot. What a disgrace.
FUCK MUX
& Congrats on
going with Blusky!
that sloth bear baby
looks Nothing like
David Bowie.
oh and the sentient
DOGErs that quit?
“They warned that the remaining DOGE staff, who were recruited by Musk, were political ideologues who didn’t have any of the expertise to downsize the government in a responsible way.”
djt don’t Give a fuck
about any ‘responsibility.’
he’s gonna wreck US so bad he’ll
‘be Forced!” to declare Martial Law and
Then he can get to his Main Mission:
shutting down and then selling off
these here United States — the
Gold he’ll steal’ll make King
Midas look like a pauper.
feckless Dems’ve been
feckless for so Long
they don’t even
Know what hit
’em: ‘centrism’
has its Costs.
The only thing more revolting than what Trump and Musk are doing to our country is the thought of the two of them sexually touching anyone… much less each other.
The BECU branch on Stone Way is in Wallingford, not Fremont.
@1: First we were conquered by our screens; the rest just fell into place.
“[that four person crew who] most recently destroying the entire face of a BECU branch in Fremont with a stolen forklift to access the two ATMs inside”?
damn!
now that’s
Initiative! I can
see a Presidential
Par-don coming their
way soon. the djt’s gonna
need plenty More thinking-outta
-of-the-Box type energetic entrepreneurs
in his Raping of America campaign.
and to think ole MkMitch ‘the Statue’
KkKonnell couldda Avoided all this but
That’s whatchya Get when Big Money OWNS
america, llc, and babyback’s cumming in his genes
& loaded for Bear (tS’s commentariat, that is). headzup!
Here’s an update to the story yesterday about the 15 year old hit and run driver. Turns out he already has five other felony convictions for such fun things as burglary, grand theft auto, displaying a weapon and robbery. He had an arrest warrant issued for him on Feb 11 when he failed to report to his parole officer. Tell me again about how we should shut down the youth jail. Meanwhile the legislature just killed a bipartisan bill that was even supported by Leesa Manion that would have corrected a law that allows kids to brandish firearms without consequence.
@4: Hannah’s not to blame, the error is in the linked Seattle Times article.
@7 the no youth jail thing does not mean no youth detention or punishment but that’s beside the point because what you’ve just described is a failure of the police department to arrest a parolee with an active warrant
@9: My goodness! Look how many there are. If you’re wiling to magnanimous enough to be a bit charitable, this appears to be a resource problem.
https://doc.wa.gov/information/warrants/default.aspx
@10, I don’t care. All I’m saying is you can’t blame a program that hasn’t been implemented for a problem it didn’t create and isn’t designed to let violent criminals roam free anyway.
@9, @10: Yeah, it’s almost like the SPD suffers from a chronic staffing shortage…
Kids are too fat and out of shape to be cops. My friends kid said 70% of the trainees in his police cadet school dropped out because they couldn’t keep up with the physical requirements. Looks like we become a nation of mall cops in golf carts and hall monitors. They would be very intimidating and annoying.
Whether the failure to arrest him is due to a deficit of staffing or competence is not for any of us to know but you’re free to guess if you’re so inclined. I’m just stating what is known: he has had an active warrant for 2 weeks, “no youth jail” has not yet been implemented, and the plan does not call for allowing violent criminals to roam the streets anyway, though that does appear to be current spd policy.
@14 yeah
butwhattabout
d13r’s Narrative?
Responsible or irresponsible, let’s keep cutting. Eventually we’ll find a good place to stop… in about three or four years.
if Only! we Hadn’t
Defunded the Po-po
and Instead gave them
Massive hiring Bonuses
tho they’ll likely
Never get over their loss
of Impunity, so crucial in keeping their
Nightsticks employed & singing their Happy tunes.
‘Bout time this “progressive” outlet stopped platforming the same social media tool that Trump and Musk rode to power.
@16 — your MAGAts
cannot hold Out that long.
‘member that guillotine they built
for Theconolde’s Vice President? so do They.
I too pass along my thanks for finally dumping zombie twitter
The Stranger is still on X. Staff may not be “tweeting” there, but no harm in keeping both platforms so that X users can still conveniently enjoy reading TS content.
https://x.com/TheStranger
@14: “Whether the failure to arrest him is due to a deficit of staffing…”
Somehow I doubt that would help.
In any case, you’re missing the point. The sets of advocates for “no youth jail” and “defund the police,” intersect as a near-perfect circle. (And the “defund” crowd has pretty much the same attitude as @16, above, because Horseshoe Theory.)
@17: “if Only! we Hadn’t
Defunded the Po-po…”
The Seattle City Council had the same attitude then as Trump has now. They simply assumed whatever they wanted was right, good, and attainable, simply by virtue of their wanting it. So they did try to defund the SPD. All they really accomplished was to drive serving SPD officers out of Seattle, starting with the SPD’s first BIPOC Chief. (But that’s OK, because again thanks to Horseshoe Theory, they cared as much about diversity as does Trump.)
@23: Correction, “… the SPD’s first female BIPOC Chief.” I apologize for the error.
“no youth jail” has not yet been implemented”
How then do you explain someone who has been convicted of five felonies even being out on parole (which indicates he is awaiting trial for one of those crimes)? Shouldn’t he have maybe served some time in rehabilitation after the third felony? That’s me I guess.
I’m not missing anything. Who gives a fuck what advocates have said. If their policies have not been implemented you cannot blame them for events they didn’t cause.
25, What you are describing would be bond, not parole. He was in jail for prior convictions and they released him early. This is a thing that happens all the time for prisoners of all ages. None of this has anything to do with no youth jail.
@26: “Who gives a fuck what advocates have said.”
Reading this in the supportive comment of a Stranger post gave me a warm chuckle. Thank you for one of the best little bits of ironic humor I’ve seen in awhile.
It’s not a “supportive comment” of anything. Advocates say all kinds of things but that doesn’t make them happen.
You guys get so caught up in your hypothetical reality where every progressive policy has been implemented without any concessions then forget it’s just your imagination and blame things happening in the real world for the things you made up. I’m just describing what’s happening in reality and what policies/people who are actually responsible for it.
‘Reality’
can be so
Challenging
interfering with
reich-wing Narrative
that Sometimes ya
just gotta Make
Shite Up.
can you say
Inflation?
nyt:
Is Bird Flu
the Only Reason
Egg Prices Are Soaring?
The nation’s biggest egg producer has seen rising revenues and profits. Now some Democrats are calling for an investigation into pricing practices in the industry.
[hey babyback – I bet you’re Lovin’
the Deathgrip we’ve Allowed
Monopolies over the
Citizenry!] [eh?]
Cal-Maine Foods, which controls about a fifth of the egg market and sells to Walmart and other large retailers, reported that its revenues jumped to $954 million in the quarter that ended in late November from $523 million from the prior year — an increase of 82 percent.
The company’s net income surged more than 500 percent, to $218 million, from year-earlier levels, thanks to higher prices, the lower cost of feed and acquisitions of other operators.
And prices have shot up
even more since the company
released its quarterly financial statement.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/25/business/egg-prices-bird-flu-producers.html
how ‘bout
‘Price Gouging’?
can you say That?
Velkommen to
trumpftopia.
and Freedom!
I so look forward to the day when I look at The Stranger’s comments and there’s nothing from werebackbaby because he finally ODed.
@31 — his
overly-delayed
Demise’ll likely be
attributed to the Gutting
of the FDA or the next trumpf-
botched Measles outbreak or maybe
just a real Bad piece of meat, slipped past
the ‘inspectors’ at Big Meat – or perhaps it-
‘ll be from Laughing his arse off at atrocities.
hard to predict.
@27 you’re right I confused parole and bail. That doesn’t change the fact that a 15-year-old with five felony convictions is not behind bars though. What that tells me is, he’s barely gotten a slap on the wrist for each one of those convictions and he definitely isn’t getting any sort of treatment
You’re kidding yourself as well if you honestly believe our criminal justice system hasn’t been co-opted by progressive policy. In December, Judge Galvin, let a youth criminal stay home with electronic monitoring, and he promptly went out and disemboweled another kid. These aren’t isolated incidents.
33, That’s an individual judge exercising his discretion in sentencing, not a policy. Our system gives judges latitude in determining sentencing within the guidelines of the law.
@33
Q. will the Lawlessness
and Depravity be matched
by our Co-prezzes in their Efforts
to make America Give up her Riches?
A. undoubtedly.
see: Russia
see: N. Korea
see also: Hungary
see also also: Palestine.
our kids’ve
Likely learned
from The Best:
defund
the Citizenry.
@35 I’m not sure what point you are making but I’m glad to see you are associating Palestinians along with other brutal, authoritarian regimes that sponsor terrorism while brutalizing their own people.
@36
yeah
except
Palestinians
haven’t fucking
VOTED for fucking
Hamas since two thousand
fucking SEVEN — MOST Palestinians
hadn’t even been fucking BORN Before Then.
is Hamas a terrorist org?
yep. they’re also TERRORIZING
Gazans and for That Gazans fucking
DESERVE TO FUCKING LOSE THEIR FUCKING LAND?
and you wanna know
why so many peeps didn’t fuck-
ing Bother to Vote for sponsoring
a fucking GENOCIDE? gosh, let’s Think
about for — okay asshole your time’s Up.
there’s like like
300,000 DEAD Palestinians
MOST OF WHOM ARE WOMEN*
and children.
where’s your
ai compatriot🛴🔨?
he with all his little
Happy Smiley Faces?
like babyback you
got some pretty
Sick Puppies
under your
tent –like
tentsores
for xmp.
*all to keep bibi
outta jail
oh, and to give
the djt & his fraudulent
fambily ocean front Property
formerly
occupied
by human
beings confined
to the Planet’s LARGEST
OPEN AIR PRISON, under Attack
for what
SIXTY FUCKING
YEARS? yeah, I’m more than
fucking Happy to acknowledge that fact.
@29: Ok, so you’re not doing the humor today (obviously, solely due to your own toxic something), so I’ll focus more on trying to make my point, and less on trying to make a funny you clearly don’t want.
For the past decade, the Stranger has listened only to tightly overlapping sets of advocates, with tightly overlapping agendas; among them no youth jail, defund, abolition. It has relentlessly pushed these advocates’ policies, and endorsed their candidates. With these chosen policies and candidates, no failure — or slew of repeated failures — has caused the Stranger even the slightest hesitation in demanding far more of the same. After a decade of this, readers expect the Stranger will respond to failure of one such policy by immediately advocating a related policy, one which appears to have a very high likelihood of exacerbating the effects of the previous policy’s failure. Hence the suggestion @7, that the Stranger would respond to a minor’s multiple violent felonies with a demand to end jailing of youth.
@37: “why so many peeps didn’t fuck-
ing Bother to Vote for sponsoring
a fucking GENOCIDE?”
I know your beliefs have been utterly impervious to all external reality on this point, but still, not everyone agrees with you on the Hamas-IDF war being a “genocide,” nor does the mere existence of such disagreement automatically provide you with unimpeachable evidence any person who dares disagree is nothing more than a morally-repugnant “pro-genocider.” What turned voters off was exactly the blistering intolerance you’ve incessantly expressed, coupled with your tiresomely obsessive focus on a piece of land barely twice the size of Seattle, one seemingly inhabited solely by persons always very, very eager to cheer religious fanatics’ slaughter of children and hostage-taking of old women. Meanwhile, innocent persons died from Russia’s bald imperialism in Ukraine, with nary a word of protest from the All Gaza All the Time crowd. You were told repeatedly that only Trump would benefit from your actions, and you ignored or belittled that obvious reality, each and every time you could no longer avoid hearing it. Your attempted victim-blaming now, of everyone who fruitlessly tried to engage you in honest dialog then, won’t change any of the above in the slightest. Own it.
too many words
wormmy too
little time.
@37 they may not have voted for them but its untrue to say they don’t support them
https://www.pcpsr.org/
Not to mention the spectacle they put on every week where the hoot and holler while releasing hostages. It also seems most hostages have been held in residential houses. So spare me the innocent Palestinians. They support the continued bloodshed.
@38 Pretzel logic alert.
Almost all humanitarian organizations says it is some form of genocide, the overwhelming majority of historians say it is a genocide (Brookings poll that we have seen here), etc . Constantly justifying mass murder like you do is morally repugnant. Arguing indefinitely about whether it is genocide is just a deflection from your sociopathic behavior. Opposing wanton murder is the exact opposite of intolerance, being supportive of it like you on the other hand ..
“coupled with your tiresomely obsessive focus”
only sociopaths supportive of mass murder think that not letting go silently on-going mass murder is “tirelessly obsessive”
“on a piece of land barely twice the size of Seattle”
As if the small size of the territory where mass genocide is committed made it more bearable (twerp)
“one seemingly inhabited solely by persons always very, very eager to cheer religious fanatics’ slaughter of children and hostage-taking of old women”
where did I hear that in the name of their god given right to the land, Israel’s army murdered 10,000’s of women and children? How many children purposefully maimed by the IDF during the intifadas? How many weak and old have lived in refugee camps for the better part of a century?
” innocent persons died from Russia’s bald imperialism in Ukraine”
several fold as many innocents died in Gaza thanks to the weaponry supplied by our government and it went unsanctioned thanks to the diplomatic cover provided by …. our government
“nary a word of protest from the All Gaza All the Time crowd”
from the person who wrote more words and more comments (justifying mass murder) than anybody else here
“You were told repeatedly that only Trump would benefit from your actions”
so the overwhelming majority of Democrats and independents should just have remained silent while their leadership were complicit in the crime of all crime. They were told of the effect it would have on voter turnout and they chose to continue supporting genocide
“Your attempted victim-blaming now”
are you for real?
@40 because Israelis don’t support the continued bloodshed every day the violent occupation goes on?
@41: Genocide is a crime. Courts decide guilt or innocence in crimes. Not public opinion polls, not humanitarian organizations, not polls of historians — courts. We’ll find out what the ICJ has to say.
Futhermore, the reticence of the same parties you mentioned to describe 10/7 as a genocide suggests they’re not familiar with the term, and so they speak with no authority on it.
thank you, ab.
let us not
buckle under
to sociopathy and
fascists here @tS. Thank
You OODLES for your Service.
@theWormtongue: “Your attempted victim-blaming now, of everyone who fruitlessly tried to engage you in honest dialog then… “
“Honest” dialog, wormmy?
your lofty tales of “victimhood”?
your insidious and continuous justifications
of Israeli Terrorism, Genocide, and War Crimes
on OUR Tax Dollar$
is fucking
Sickening.
bugger
Off wormmy.
I hear they’e missing
a few jackboots over to the
Daily Stormer or whateverthefuck
you should
Go There
you’ll be
@Home &
Welcomed w/
Open arms. Lots of ’em.
@43: Well, you managed to read your part of @38 after all. It just took you longer, of course. All you have in response is name-calling and other forms of verbal abuse, but again, that’s nothing out of the ordinary for you.
Thanks for validating perfectly my mentions of your “blistering intolerance,” and “tiresomely obsessive focus on a piece of land barely twice the size of Seattle, one seemingly inhabited solely by persons always very, very eager to cheer religious fanatics’ slaughter of children and hostage-taking of old women.”
@32 — where’d babyback go to?
he Needs to hear this from nyt:
Mass Federal Firings
May Imperil Crops,
Cattle and Pets
The terminations, which hit agencies involved in protecting the nation’s food supply and agricultural products, could have long-lasting consequences, experts said.
Shortly after taking office for the second time, President Trump began making deep cuts to agencies and programs that play critical roles in human health, slashing funding for medical research, halting global health aid and firing scores of workers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
But the campaign to downsize government, which has been led by Mr. Trump and Elon Musk, has also hollowed out agencies and programs devoted to protecting plant and animal health.
The recent wave of mass firings hit federal workers responding to the nation’s growing bird flu outbreak, protecting crops from damaging pests and ensuring the safety of pet food and medicine, among other critical duties.
The shrinking work force could also have far-reaching consequences for trade and food security and leave the nation unequipped to tackle future threats to plant and animal health, experts said.
–by Emily Anthes and Apoorva Mandavilli
Feb. 26, 2025
oodles, frighteningly:
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/26/science/trump-plant-animal-health.html
let’s hope bb didn’t
catch himself a Nasty dose of
Bovine Spongiform Encephalopathy
speaking of which
@44 — such a tedious lying
facts-distorting Distraction
“All you have
in response is name-
calling and other forms of
verbal abuse, but again, that’s
nothing out of the ordinary for you”
sayeth
tS’s Master
of verbal abuse
obfuscation & mendacity
ooh — did I not
mention Pro-
jection? a-
pologies.