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Cops

Durkan Reveals Police Union Contract, Community Group Warns It's a Step Back for Reform

by Lester Black • Monday at 2:01 pm

Mayor Jenny Durkan released the new police union contract with SPD Chief Carmen Best and Union President Kevin Stuckey at her side.
Mayor Jenny Durkan released the new police union contract with SPD Chief Carmen Best and Union President Kevin Stuckey at her side. Lester Black

Mayor Jenny Durkan released her new contract with Seattle’s largest police union on Monday morning, telling a press conference that she was “thrilled" about the deal. She was joined by SPD Chief Carmen Best and Kevin Stuckey, president of the Seattle Police Officer Guild (SPOG).

Notably absent from the stage were any members of the Community Police Commission (CPC). The CPC was created by federally-mandated reforms to give civilian input on police policies, like the contracts that dictate how the city’s police force is run. The CPC released a statement Monday saying the union contract “gives up many of the reforms” that the city passed in their landmark police accountability legislation

“The CPC was not consulted at any stage of the negotiation process regarding any of the substantive concessions we see in the tentative agreement,” the CPC statement said.

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Food & Drink

In Praise of the Toki Highball at Tamari Bar

by Rich Smith • Monday at 1:23 pm

Lemon swans cant get enough of this champagne bubble whiskey.
Lemon swans can't get enough of this champagne-bubble whiskey. Neither can I. (Nor can I get enough of portrait mode, apparently.) RS

PSA for whiskey drinkers: Late last month, Tamari Bar, a new-ish and very good Japanese pub on Capitol Hill, installed a Suntory Whisky Toki Highball machine.

Though it only makes one humble beverage, this machine rules. Whiskey sodas normally reduce the power and authority of the booze, but the highball machine produces superfine, champagne-like bubbles that enhance the whiskey's flavor. The bartender at Tamari Bar drops a long, rectangular ice cube in a frosty mug, keeping the drink cool to its core. She also sticks a lemon swan on the rim, which is fun to tip into the drink. Lemon swans a-swimming! (Kill me.)

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Sponsored

Ghosts, planets and cacti come into alignment at McCaw Hall with PNB’s dark and stormy November program.

The birth of a solar system, featuring a choir of 50+? Got it. Giant platforms used as drums? Got those too. Indie guitar and piano music that – when combined with Alejandro Cerrudo's choreography – is almost guaranteed to make you cry? Got it. Potted succulents as props? You bet. ALL PREMIERE features three new-to-Seattle works from choreographers the world is watching. November 2 – 11 at McCaw Hall.

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Arts • Things To Do

The 75 Best Things To Do in Seattle This Week: Oct 15-21, 2018

by Stranger Things To Do Staff • Monday at 1:13 pm

SAM’s Peacock in the Desert: The Royal Arts of Jodhpur, India exhibition, which opens this Thursday, welcomes visitors with an immersive recreation of a royal wedding procession, complete with life-size horse and elephant mannequins.
SAM’s Peacock in the Desert: The Royal Arts of Jodhpur, India exhibition, which opens this Thursday, welcomes visitors with an immersive recreation of a royal wedding procession, complete with life-size horse and elephant mannequins. Installation View: Peacock in the Desert: The Royal Arts of Jodhpur, India at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, photo: Will Michels

Our music critics have already chosen the 42 best music shows this week, but now it's our arts critics' turn. Here are their picks for the best events in every genre—from Seattle Restaurant Week to the opening of The Vikings Begin, and from an evening with living legend Carol Burnett to a play about a demon-obsessed artist, Night Parade. See them all below, and find even more events on our complete Things To Do calendar.

Stay in the know! Get all this and more on the free Stranger Things To Do mobile app (available for iOS and Android), or delivered to your inbox.

MONDAY

PERFORMANCE

Stuff You Missed In History Class
On their popular podcast, Holly Frey and Tracy V. Wilson unearth historical events that have been unjustly neglected in the books, like "the decades-long dispute between butter and margarine," "a pair of lions that terrorized a railroad crew in Kenya," and "the only successful coup d'état in American history."

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Music

Get Into Weird Dream States with DJ Dronebeard, Host of Hollow Earth Radio's Edge of the Ape Oven Show

by Dave Segal • Monday at 12:55 pm

Dronebeard is available for your next mycological trivia night.
Dronebeard is available for your next mycological trivia night. Audrey Svenson

DJ DRONEBEARD (aka ADAM SVENSON; Hollow Earth Radio)

Current top 5 tracks:

"It's fall, so I'm feeling deliciously chill yet brooding."

Bongwater, "One So Black" (Shimmy Disc)

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Sponsored

A Celebration of Diversity: GeekGirlCon 2018

Join us October 27th & 28th at the Conference Center at the WSCC for GeekGirlCon 2018. Listen, learn, and grow during panels by our Featured Contributors and other spectacular guests from this diverse community.

Passes available now at geekgirlcon.com/passes.

Film/TV

The Biggest Question About First Man: How the Fuck Do You Pronounce "Gemini"?

by Erik Henriksen • Monday at 12:30 pm

1539211949-firstman.jpg

Damien Chazelle's follow-up to La La Land, First Man, opened last weekend, and stars Ryan Gosling as Neil Armstrong as he goes to the Mooooooon! There was a lot of stuff I liked about First Man, and some stuff I didn't like, BUT THE BIGGEST QUESTION ABOUT FIRST MAN REMAINS UNANSWERED.

Much of First Man involves the Gemini Program, which means First Man features a lot of people saying "Gemini" over and over and over. In a sane universe, they would pronounce "Gemini" like normal human beings:

Gem-in-eye

Yet in First Man, multiple characters repeatedly and bewilderingly pronounce "Gemini" as:

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Books

Hear Rebecca Brown Read Fairy Tales for Frightening Times Tonight at Elliott Bay

by Rich Smith • Monday at 12:11 pm

dq8a9232_mag__1_.jpg
Carlos Cruz

Rebecca Brown is past the point of apologizing for the clutter in her writing studio. All's treasure, after all.

Orderly and disorderly stacks of books make up much of the room's terrain. A cursory glance at some of the spines reveals a special affection for the romantic poets, Nathaniel Hawthorne, and the historical fiction of Danielle Dutton.

Atop and around the books, Brown displays artifacts of her personal and professional literary history, all of which come with their own fascinating story. She shows me a small trophy she earned for winning second place in a writing competition in high school in Texas. She had always wanted to be a writer, but the tiny silver cup gave her the ego boost she says she needed to think such a life was actually possible.

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2018 • Cops

In Wake of Tommy Le's Death, South Seattle Vietnamese Community Rallies Around Joe Nguyen

by Lester Black • Monday at 11:38 am

Tommy Les family, including His mother, Dieu Ho, his father, Hoai Le, Tommys aunts, Uyen Le and Xuyen Le.
Tommy Le's family, including His mother, Dieu Ho, his father, Hoai Le, Tommy's aunts, Uyen Le and Xuyen Le. Lester Black

Uyen Le was slow to respond when I asked her if she was satisfied with the King County’s Sheriff’s investigation of her nephew’s death.

“It’s not in our culture or our custom to really criticize or question authority,” Le said. “So, it is unnatural and it’s difficult because we don’t even know how to navigate through any of this process.”

But the Le family has slowly come to criticize the cops. Uyen’s 20-year-old nephew Tommy Le was shot and killed by a sheriff’s deputy last June and the King County Sheriff's Office has been caught in multiple misstatements surrounding the killing. First, the sheriff's office said Le was charging officers with a knife when they killed him. The county slowly changed their story as more details were revealed, including evidence showing Le was unarmed and shot in the back. But then Johanknecht’s office took to a different line of defense. The county argument is now that officers had to extra-judicially kill Le because even if he was armed only with an ink pen, he still posed a mortal threat to the cops.

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Stranger Election Control Board • 2018

Mona Das for Legislative District No. 47

by Stranger Election Control Board • Monday at 10:55 am

monadas_mag.jpg
In late September, Candace Faber, a civic technology advocate for the City of Seattle, accused two-term Republican Joe Fain of raping her the night she graduated from Georgetown in 2007. Fain denies the allegations and has called for an investigation. Even if he hadn't been credibly accused of rape (!), Fain would still be a "moderate" Republican who helped block the Reproductive Parity Act from coming to a vote.

Meanwhile, Mona Das, a former congressional candidate with a mortgage business, says she'll support a capital gains tax, fight for climate change mitigation, work on expanding funding for early education and vocational programs, and secure more affordable housing in the burbs. In response to allegations against Fain, she said she "believes survivors of sexual assault" and added that "it's obvious we need more women in positions of power."

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2018

The Seattle Times Doubles Down on Their Endorsement of Joe Fain Following Rape Accusation

by Rich Smith • Monday at 10:16 am

The editorial board isnt just re-endorsing Fain. Theyre chastising his accuser. And its gross.
The editorial board isn't just re-endorsing Fain. They're chastising his accuser in the process. And it's gross. SEATTLE MUNICIPAL ARCHIVES

On Wednesday the Seattle Times Editorial Board reaffirmed the paper's support for Joe Fain, an incumbent Republican state senator who was accused of rape late last month. Yes, the situation is complicated. But that's no excuse for making an argument this bad. Let's pick through this scattered mess together, like one big Slog FAMILY.

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Things To Do

The 42 Best Music Shows in Seattle This Week: Oct 15-21, 2018

by Stranger Things To Do Staff • Monday at 10:05 am

The Grammy-winning Soweto Gospel Choir will come to the Paramount on Friday.
The Grammy-winning Soweto Gospel Choir will come to the Paramount on Friday.

This week, our music critics have picked everything from an evening with whip-smart performer Curren$y (and BLKSKNN, Carter Wilson, and D. Mikey) to a piercingly pensive post-punk show with Casual Hex, So Pitted, Bad Luck, and Travis Coster to the multi-genre NadaFest. Follow the links below for ticket links and music clips for all of their picks, and find even more shows on our complete music calendar.

Stay in the know! Get all this and more on the free Stranger Things To Do mobile app (available for iOS and Android), or delivered to your inbox.

MONDAY

METAL/PUNK
Gwar, Hatebreed, Miss May I, Ringworm
Damn it, I love GWAR! I mean, they lose their frontman and original founding member, Dave Brockie, aka “Oderus Urungus” (he died in 2015 of a heroin overdose), and what do they do after 14 albums and 30-some years as a band? They fucking carry on! They go on tour in honor of their fallen comrade! Brockie would undoubtedly be proud that his blood-and-guts-spewing thrash metal freak show from Richmond, Virginia, refused to lie down and die with Oderus. KELLY O

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News • Politics

Proud Boys Spent the Weekend Street Fighting in Portland and New York City

by Lester Black • Monday at 9:24 am

Joey Gibson at a rally he organized in Seattle this summer.
Joey Gibson at a rally he organized in Seattle this summer. Lester Black

The Proud Boys made national news this weekend as members of the far-right nationalist group were caught on video engaging in street violence in both New York and Portland, Oregon. Both fights looked brutal and similar, with young men running at each other, fighting, punching, and occasionally circling and kicking people already on the ground.

The brawls eventually ended when police swarmed in, but leaders in both cities are asking if cops could have done more to stop the violence and arrest the fighters. While officials call for investigations into the fights, the organizer of Portland’s rally is already using the violence to promote himself. Joey Gibson, the founder of Patriot Prayer, released a video on his Facebook page showing him encouraging his followers to engage in violence if they felt attacked, telling the crowd that sometimes citizens need to “clean up the streets…”

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Sports • Seahawks

Seahawks Get Fun Win, Vengeance Against Tom Cable

by Spike Friedman • Monday at 8:45 am

Russell Wilson, looking good in London.
Russell Wilson, looking good in London. Naomi Baker/Getty Images

The Seahawks cruised to victory in London with a 27-3 rout of the hapless Oakland Raiders. It was a throwback win for the Seahawks, in that it was fun and easy, and was largely a reminder of why we fell in love with this version of the team. Russell Wilson was cooking, running backs weren’t getting hit in the backfield, and young dudes on defense were balling out. Sunday morning saw a cool group of football guys break the will of another team. Again: fun. Let’s break down what happened:

• The Seahawks pass rush, which had looked dismal for first few weeks of the season, is rounding into shape. Frank Clark and Jarran Reed both look really good right now. Clark had 2.5 sacks, two forced fumbles, and another big sack called back for a weird penalty. Reed, along with Shamar Stephen and Poona Ford, did a great job of bottling up Marshawn Lynch, which, as we all know, is no easy task. Now there’s a pretty big caveat with all of this which is…

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Resist Trump

New Randy Rainbow: "Just Be Best!"

by Dan Savage • Monday at 8:29 am


It may be his best yet.

News • Slog AM/PM

Slog AM Don't Bring Pot to Canada, Senator Elizabeth Warren Takes DNA Test, Is Putting Googly Eyes on Statues a Crime?

by Michael Bell • Monday at 8:11 am

Maybe life is just one long, drawn out 23andme ad
Maybe life is just one long, drawn out 23andme ad ASTRID RIECKEN / GETTY IMAGES

Don’t bring pot over the border: Former Stranger writer Heidi Groover answers a question a lot of people in Seattle were inevitably asking—if weed is legal in Washington and legal in Canada, can we bring cannabis back and forth? Long story short, no. Go read her piece on it in the fancy Seattle Times.

Senator Elizabeth Warren’s DNA shows evidence of Native American ancestry: Trump is always wrong. However, even though he produces baseless accusations out of his ass, the important people in his crosshairs follow through with disproving all of his bullshit accusations. First, Obama released his birth certificate, and now Elizabeth Warren took a DNA test. After several years of Democrats asking to see Trump’s tax returns, and an unprecedented New York Times investigation into his tax schemes, there’s still little chance he will ever release them to to disprove any highly credible claim against him. Oh yeah, and apparently he pledged $1 million if Warren’s DNA showed Native American ancestry, and Warren now wants him to cough up the dough.


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News • Slog AM/PM

Slog PM: Washington Has the Most Women in Construction, Tacoma Gets More Scooters, Grocery Tax Struggling in the Polls

by Nathalie Graham • Friday at 6:24 pm

9.9 percent, baby!
9.9 percent, baby! xavierarnau/Getty Images

Slog PM is brought to you by this mystery crowler from Ravenna Brewing Company: This little brewery is my favorite. Heads-up, I'm biased because my roommate works there. But there's no place that rivals Ravenna when it comes to charm. Also, they have an impressive tap list.
This picture is dark and I dont care. What do I look like, a photographer?
This picture is dark and I don't care. What do I look like, a photographer? NG

I forgot what this crowler (can+growler) is full of because I swiped it from home. It's definitely an IPA. But what isn't an IPA these days? Anyway, this beer goes down smooth. It tastes like sun-kissed shoulders and its got a sort-of tang to it, like when a wave crests over your head while you're mid-conversation. It's got me thinking these sunny skies will stick around and is definitely getting me through the last dregs of Friday.

Washington state has the highest number of women in construction: In Washington, 9.9 percent of construction workers are women. That’s the highest number in the country. This column points out that as baby boomers are retiring there will be more room for women. But, it also disturbingly details the culture women face in the construction industry. It talks about one drywall apprentice in Woodinville who was called out to a worksite at 3 a.m. by her foreman. According to charging papers, he raped her and then made her work five hours. Then, the article goes on to say that she was raped by two other workers a few weeks later. Jesus.

Tacoma is getting Bird scooters, too? Goddamn, Tacoma is Scotter Town USA now. The Santa Monica-based scooter is making a name for itself in Tacoma, along with Lime’s e-scooters. Seattle, meanwhile, is scooter-less. Though, some people were able to test drive the Lime scooters in Westlake center today. In a quartered off square of Westlake Center, mind you.

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