On Thursday this week in the Cascade Room we are showing Ai Wei-Wei’s movie “Ai Wei-Wei: Never Sorry.” 7:30 pm. Spread the word. Thanks to Don C.
From 2008 to 2010, Beijing-based journalist and filmmaker Alison Klayman gained unprecedented access to internationally renowned Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei. Klayman documented Ai’s artistic process in preparation for major museum exhibitions, his intimate exchanges with family members and his increasingly public clashes with the Chinese government. Klayman’s detailed portrait of the artist provides a nuanced exploration of contemporary China and one of its most compelling public figures.
by Heather Cox Richardson (thanks to MaryLou P. and others)
This evening, lawyers for the Department of Justice told a federal court that the administration does not believe it has a legal obligation to return Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia to the United States, despite a court order to do so.
The 29-year-old Abrego Garcia came to the U.S. about 2011 when he was 16 to escape threats from a gang that was terrorizing his family. He settled in Maryland with his older brother, a U.S. citizen, and lived there until in 2019 he was picked up by police as he waited at a Home Depot to be picked up for work as a day laborer. Police transferred him to Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE). After a hearing, an immigration judge rejected his claim for asylum but said he could not be sent back to El Salvador, finding it credible that the Barrio 18 gang had been “targeting him and threatening him with death because of his family’s pupusa business.”
Ever since, Abrego Garcia has checked in annually with ICE as directed. He lives with his wife and their three children, and has never been charged with any crime. The Department of Homeland Security issued him a work permit, and he joined a union, working full time as a sheet metal apprentice.
On March 12, ICE agents pulled his car over, told his wife to come pick up their disabled son, and incarcerated Abrego Garcia, pressing him to say he was a member of MS-13. On March 15 the government rendered Abrego Garcia to the infamous CECOT prison for terrorists in El Salvador, alleged to be the site of human rights abuses, torture, extrajudicial killings. The U.S. government is paying El Salvador $6 million a year to incarcerate the individuals it sends there.
On March 24, Abrego Garcia’s family sued the administration over his removal. (please continue on Page 2 and note the last two paragraphs)
I’ve been asked if we could share our slides from the recent talk at Skyline that Lourdes and I gave. Unfortunately the talk wasn’t recorded, but here are the slides if interested.
In 2000, I published a book called “Rules for Aging,” a sort of how-to guide for navigating the later years of one’s life. I was 60 at the time and thought that I knew a thing or two about being old. Twenty-five years later, I just finished a sequel, which reflects my advice for growing very, very old. (I have been doing a lot of that lately.) It took me 85 years to learn these things, but I believe they’re applicable at any age.
1. Nobody’s thinking about you.
It was true 25 years ago, and it’s true today. Nobody is thinking about you. Nobody ever will. Not your teacher, not your minister, not your colleagues, not your shrink, not a soul. It can be a bummer of a thought. But it’s also liberating. That time you fell on your butt in public? That dumb comment you made at dinner last week? That brilliant book you wrote? No one is thinking about it. Others are thinking about themselves. Just like you.
2. Make young friends.
For older folks, there is nothing more energizing than the company of the young. They’re bright, enthusiastic, informative and brimming with life, and they do not know when you’re telling them lies.
3. Try to see fewer than five doctors.
I wish I could follow this rule myself, but once I grew old, my relationship with the practice of medicine changed significantly. I now have more doctors than I ever thought possible — each one specializing in an area of my body that I had been unaware existed. They compete with one another for attention. This week’s contest is between my kidneys and my spleen.
My father and my daughter were both doctors. Currently there are seven doctors in the family, with one grandchild in medical school. It’s not the doctors I dislike; rather, it’s the debilitating feeling of moving from one to another to another like an automobile on an assembly line. If the end product were a Lamborghini, I’d be fine. But I’m a Studebaker. (continued)
by Tim Snyder in Sojourners (thanks to Mary Jane F.)
As a theologian, I get nervous when reading Dietrich Bonhoeffer becomes all too relevant. I’m the kind of theologian who would rather not find myself in what some scholars refer to as a Bonhoeffer moment.
The irony of this distortion was that it was used to justify the use of violence if the Democrats were to win in November. In reality, Bonhoeffer played only a very minor role in the conspiracy, and that role didn’t involve guns or explosive devices. Most often, he was a chaplain to the co-conspirators. He prayed with them. He offered Holy Communion. And he helped reflect on the Christian ethical implications of their actions. Spoiler alert: He didn’t think guilt could be avoided, only accepted, writing that the idea that one could “keep himself pure from the contamination arising from responsible action” was a “self-deception.”
I was thinking of all this recently, when I was asked by a group of pastors to help lead a workshop for federal employees who are people of faith and who wanted to discern their ethical responsibilities in these early days of the second Trump administration.
Despite having spent the last decade interviewing people of faith about their working lives, and despite having written a book on the topic, I found myself at a loss for what to say. This was personal. Members of my immediate family are federal employees and contractors. My grandfather spent most of his career in the foreign service, including stints at USAID and Voice of America. My grandmother was a congressional staffer. The value of civil service is sacred to me. But this was different too. Whatever else we might say about the first few weeks of this Trump administration, it sure isn’t business as usual. It doesn’t seem like the typical scripts and strategies that fueled opposition to the first Trump administration will be enough this time around. (continued)
We are writing this save the date alert for an important upcoming event at Skyline. We have helped organize the appearance of Malou Chavez, Executive Director of the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, on 4/15 at 11 am. Malou will be speaking in the Mt. Baker room, and answering questions about current immigration issues and what NWIRP is doing
Attacking immigrants was one of Donald Trump’s signature campaign issues—and is now playing out in numerous ways. This has taken the form of slurs, illegal arrests, incarcerations, summary removals to a third country contract prison, and defiance of federal court orders.
We are lucky to have a strong immigrant rights organization in Seattle that for more than 40 years has been working hard to stand up for the rule of law and to defend the rights of immigrants.
We hope you’ll be able to take advantage of this opportunity to hear Malou. Linda and I helped found this organization in the mid-1980s, were both on the Board for many years, and remain strong supporters.
Posted inAdvocacy|Comments Off on Malou Chavez, Executive Director of the Northwest Immigrant Rights Project, on 4/15 at 11 am
Seattle Police were investigating a BMW peculiarly parked at the base of the steps of the Seattle Asian Art Museum in Volunteer Park earlier this week. Authority has a nose for dissidence, it seems.
The car, it turns out, is a local repository for a donation campaign to support artist Ai Weiwei after the Lego company refused to fulfill a bulk order of its toy bricks for the dissident Chinese artist. But the car isn’t in the middle of the park to collect cash — instead, supporters are being encouraged to drop in Lego bricks through the BMW’s sunroof for use in Wei’s works:
SAM’s Asian Art Museum has become an official LEGO collection point in support of noted Chinese contemporary artist Ai Weiwei. This site-specific project is inspired by the LEGO company’s refusal to sell Weiwei a bulk order of the tiny toy bricks because of concerns about the political nature of his work.
Ai Weiwei posted about the refusal on Instagram and his post triggered a flood of responses on social media criticizing LEGO for censorship. Thousands of supporters offered to donate LEGOs to the artist, so Weiwei organized formal collection points with major museums around the world: a series of parked cars where participants can drop LEGO donations through the sunroof.
The car will be open and accepting donations rain or shine through January 10, 2016 during Asian Art Museum open hours, which are:
Monday and Tuesday: Closed Wednesday: 10 am – 5 pm Thursday: 10 am – 9 pm Friday-Sunday: 10 am – 5 pm
Check out #legosforweiwei for updates on the collection project. You can also donate via mail: Asian Art Museum, 1400 East Prospect Street, Seattle, WA, 98112.
Colored Vases, a 2010 work by Weiwei that “slyly plays on the question of authenticity,” is currently on view at the museum. You can learn more at seattleartmuseum.org.
He took a down-to-earth approach to sexually transmitted infections, a subject no one wanted to discuss, arriving at novel methods of treatment and prevention.
King K. Holmes in 2017.Credit…The Gairdner Foundation
By Michael S. Rosenwald – in the NYT (thanks to many residents who forwarded this article)
King K. Holmes, an infectious disease specialist at the University of Washington who almost single-handedly legitimized the study of sexually transmitted infections, turning a neglected, stigmatized subject into a major field of medical research, died on March 9 at his home in Seattle. He was 87.
The cause was kidney disease, his family said.
Once called “Mr. STD” by a colleague, Dr. Holmes founded some of the first clinics that specialized in treating sexually transmitted infections; pioneered the use of single-dose medicines to prevent illness after intimate encounters; and published the field’s definitive textbook, often referred to simply as “Holmes.”
“He brought sexually transmitted diseases out of the closet,” Judith Wasserheit, his colleague at the University of Washington, told The Seattle Times in 2013. “King did pivotal research on almost every aspect, every single STD, every diagnostic or treatment.”
Dr. Holmes began studying sexually transmitted diseases in the 1960s, the era of sex, drugs and rock ’n’ roll, which coincided with a surge of rashes and discharge in certain anatomical areas that patients and physicians were equally squeamish about discussing.
“This was not a well-developed specialty or an area of study in infectious disease,” Peter Piot, a global health expert who led an AIDS-prevention program for the United Nations, said in an interview. “There was no funding for it. Nobody liked talking about it.”
Dr. Holmes publicly challenged the medical community to do better. In interviews, he called the lack of interest in the study of sexually transmitted diseases a “conspiracy of silence” that was “ignorant,” “appalling” and “a disgrace.”
Writing about Dr. Holmes’s 1976 book, one reviewer noted, “Those who have picked it up off my desk have not put it down until they have completely read it and all smiled when they returned it.”Credit…Madrona
He also brought a frank, down-to-earth tone to an uncomfortable topic. His first book, written with Jennifer Wear, was titled “How to Have Intercourse Without Getting Screwed” (1976). A review in The Western Journal of Medicine quoted a passage from the book to illustrate its friendly tone: (continued)
David J. Lynch – Washington Post (thanks to Mary M.)
The tariff barrage that President Donald Trump unleashed this week on the world economy marks a decisive end to an era of freewheeling globalization that was shaped by American policymakers, business executives and consumers.
The United States is now abandoning the system that made it rich and powerful, gambling that it can become more prosperous by waging a global trade war on friend and foe alike.
Trump’s new protectionism breaks with international economic policies that were pursued by more than a dozen American presidents as the nation grew into a superpower that boasted a $30 trillion economy, the world’s largest and most innovative.
“This is a historical moment. Even if there is paddling back by the administration and even if negotiations start to soften the edges, this is the nail in the coffin of globalization,” said Carmen Reinhart, former chief economist of the World Bank and now a professor at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.
From the end of World War II until Trump’s 2016 election, U.S. leaders led a global effort to lower barriers to trade, investment and finance. Spreading prosperity to distant lands was seen as an antidote to the authoritarian movements that arose from the Great Depression to trigger a ruinous global conflict.
The strategy worked. But after the Cold War’s end in 1989, when global integration expanded to encompass low-wage countries like China, the costs for factory workers in advanced economies like the United States sparked a bipartisan backlash.
Trump’s announcement of the highest U.S. taxes on trade since 1909 capped a quarter-century of domestic disquiet over a global economic system that lavished disproportionate benefits on educated Americans while leaving less-skilled workers to the vagaries of the market.
The president insists that high tariffs and unilateral American action will deliver a new “Golden Age,” as companies flood the U.S. with trillions of dollars in investment. The stock market will soar and gleaming new factories — “the best anywhere in the world” — will replace the shuttered plants of an earlier age, the president promised in the Rose Garden on Wednesday.
“We’re going to be an entirely different country, and it’s going to be fantastic for the workers. It’s going to be fantastic for everyone,” Trump said.
Mainstream economists call that outcome unlikely, and the early reviews from Wall Street were brutal. On Thursday, the S&P 500 index dropped nearly 5%, its worst day since the first months of the pandemic, and the carnage continued Friday, with all three major indices down more than 5% in afternoon trading. Economists at JPMorgan said that Trump’s tariffs, and foreign retaliation, meant a 60% chance of a global recession this year. (continued)
By Thomas L. Friedman Opinion Columnist in the NYT (thanks to Marilyn W.)
Donald Trump is not known for doing his homework — he’s more of a go-with-my-gut kind of guy. What I find most terrifying about what Trump is doing today is that he seems to be largely relying on his gut to bet that he can radically overturn how America’s institutions have operated and the way the nation relates to both its allies and enemies — and get it all right. As in, America will become stronger and more prosperous, while the rest of the world will just adjust. Next question.
Well, what are the odds that Trump can get all of these complex issues right — based on trusting his gut — when on the same day that he was announcing his huge tariff increases on imports from the world over, he invited into the Oval Office Laura Loomer, a conspiracy theorist who believes that Sept. 11 was an “inside” job. She was there, my Times colleagues reported, to lecture Trump about how disloyal key members of the National Security Council staff were. Trump subsequently fired at least six of them. (No wonder so many Chinese asked me in Beijing last week if we were having a Mao-like “cultural revolution.” More on that later.)
Yes, what are the odds that such a president, seemingly ready to act on foreign policy on the advice of a conspiracy theorist, got all this trade theory right? I’d say they’re long.
What is it that Trump, with his grievance-filled gut, doesn’t understand? The time we live in today, though far from perfect or equal, is nevertheless widely viewed by historians as one of the most relatively peaceful and prosperous in history. We are benefiting from this pacific era in large part because of a tightening web of globalization and trade, and also because of the world’s domination by a uniquely benign and generous hegemon called the United States of America that is at peace and economically interwoven with its biggest rival, China. (continued)
Ed note: The approval of Skyline’s skybridge is finally up for vote by the City Council this coming Tuesday–after making it through multiple sub-committees. It expected to pass (hopefully). If interested you can tune in to watch the proceedings live on the Seattle Channel 321 (HD). On the agenda, the skybridge vote is the 4th item (view the complete agenda here)
City Council Agenda April 8, 2025 – 2 PM A RESOLUTION granting conceptual approval to install, maintain, and operate a pedestrian skybridge over and across 8th Avenue, north of Cherry Street; as proposed by FH, LLC d/b/a Skyline, in the First Hill neighborhood.
Res 32166 (from the Transportation Committee) The Committee recommends that City Council adopt the Resolution (Res). In Favor: 3 – Saka, Hollingsworth, Kettle Opposed: None
by Heather Cox Richardson – posted yesterday April 2nd as the anticipated fallout began
Just five months ago, on October 19, 2024, The Economist ran a special report on America’s economy. That economy was, the magazine said, “the envy of the world.” Today, stock market futures plummeted after President Donald J. Trump announced that he will impose a 10% tariff on all imports to the United States, with higher rates on about 60 countries he claims engage in unfair trade practices, including China, Japan, Vietnam, and South Korea, as well as the European Union.
Dow Jones Industrial Average futures lost more than 1,000 points upon the news, falling by 2.5%; the S&P 500 dropped 3.6%.
Trump’s erratic approach to the economy had already rattled markets, which dropped significantly in the first quarter of this year, and consumer confidence, which recently hit a twelve-year low. Trump waited until the stock market had closed today before he announced the new tariffs. Then, in a speech in the White House Rose Garden, he said: “For decades, our country has been looted, pillaged, raped and plundered by nations near and far, both friend and foe alike. But it is not going to happen anymore.” Instead, he said, tariffs would create “the golden age of America.”
“Never before has an hour of Presidential rhetoric cost so many people so much,” former treasury secretary Lawrence Summers posted. “The best estimate of the loss from tariff policy is now [close] to $30 trillion or $300,000 per family of four.” (continued)
Posted inFinance, Government|Comments Off on “The Trump Tariff Tax is the largest peacetime tax hike in U.S. history,” former Vice President Mike Pence
This message is being sent to all staff, faculty and academic personnel across the University of Washington.
Dear colleagues,
Over the past two months, we have been tracking and responding to a range of policy changes and directives from the federal government while also facing major state budget cuts. Combined they create a perfect storm that we must continue to actively address.
As we navigate these and future challenges, we will be guided by our mission of expanding access to an excellent education and to serving the public good, as well as our University’s values. And we will continue to prioritize the well-being of our students, patients, faculty and other academic personnel, and staff as we make decisions.
Budgetary impacts
Federal impacts: As a major research university with a large health-care mission, the cancellation of grants and continued delays in annual award notices and renewals threaten our ability to fund and educate our graduate students, provide our undergraduates with important research experiences, and innovate. They also threaten our ability to provide our patients with leading-edge care in the present and develop and test new life-saving treatments and cures for the future.
On each of these issues, UW leaders, the Office of Federal Relations and the Washington Attorney General’s Office have been working with a range of partners, including higher education associations, UW supporters, and policymakers from Washington and other states to protect our ability to fulfill the UW’s mission. We have been successful in several areas, as court orders have blocked some of the most damaging proposals, at least for the time being. Additionally, this week a presidential message was sent to UW alumni living in other states to alert them to these challenges and urge them to join in our efforts to let others know the high societal cost of such draconian cuts to federal research.
As we navigate the ever-changing federal landscape, we are also working with principal investigators and other research leaders to mitigate the effects to the extent we can. That includes taking the risk of allowing advanced spending for 30 days on grants that are pending renewal. However, no source of money available to the University — public or private — can possibly replace more than a small fraction of the more than $1.2 billion in federally funded research we conducted last fiscal year alone. We must prepare for the long-term impacts of these federal policy changes.
State impacts: At the state level, the Washington House and Senate majorities’ proposed budgets disproportionately affect the state’s four-year universities and would impose especially damaging cuts on the UW. We recognize the state government is facing budget challenges that Governor Ferguson described as a “five-alarm fire,” and we are committed to doing our part. But the effects of these proposals on our ability to educate students and serve our state are profound.
In short, both chambers are considering measures that would cut the UW’s funding across the board, as well as reduce the amount and share of money provided for compensation increases. In addition, they raise the costs the UW pays for health insurance and other benefits.
Combined, these and other proposals would have major negative impacts on our students. Not only would they and their families be expected to pay more, but with cuts of this magnitude, we simply would not be able to provide students with the same level of educational excellence. These effects would ripple across the state and beyond for years and decades to come, as we still have not fully recovered from the state funding cuts of the Great Recession, and these proposed reductions would set us back again.
President Cauce will continue to travel to Olympia to meet with legislators, and Office of State Relations representatives are there daily. She has also written to UW alumni living in Washington to inform them of the situation and how they can get updates via UW Impact, a program of the UW Alumni Association.
With your help, and that of our alumni and supporters, we will continue to make the case for the importance of research funding at the federal level and push back against inequitable cuts by the state. Still, there is no question that our budget will be challenged in the upcoming biennium, with the University’s expenses already stretched thin before the current crisis.
Your continued efforts to reduce expenses are vital. Every dollar that goes to expenses that are non-essential now worsens the financial situation and will require deeper cuts later, putting not only new, but existing programs at risk. We must spend less to sustain the University’s mission through these uncertain times and ensure a healthier future for generations to come.
Commitment to our mission and values
In addition to the budgetary perfect storm, with state shortfalls magnifying federal cutbacks, many of us are deeply concerned about a range of other federal policies that impact our ability to provide an open, welcoming and supportive environment for ALL of our students, faculty and staff.
We do not view diversity and access as being in opposition to merit and excellence, and we remain committed to providing access to excellence for all. We are not mandating any preemptive changes in our policies as we already follow all state and federal anti-discrimination laws. Part of that compliance is ensuring that the members of our University are aware of their responsibilities. For example, in conjunction with state and federal requirements, we’ve expanded trainings on shared ancestry, race and sex discrimination for students, faculty and staff. Also, our five-year Campus Climate Survey will launch this spring to help guide further leadership actions. We hope everyone will participate to ensure the University remains a welcoming place for all. Our programs and services are open to all, and we engage in periodic reviews of our programs and activities using guidance from UW Compliance and Risk Services.
The UW is committed to welcoming students and employees with a diversity of experiences and viewpoints. Freedom of expression is core to the university experience and to American ideals, and we support the right to free speech across the spectrum of political and ideological positions. At the same time, as we have made very clear, we will enforce laws and policies against harassment, creating a hostile environment and disrupting University activities and operations. We also fully support our faculty and instructors’ right to academic freedom, including in their research and in the classroom, while reminding all that in the classroom this freedom applies to their areas of expertise, and not to introducing ideology or content unrelated to the subject matter of their classes.
We are also seeing more aggressive immigration policies and enforcement. International students at other universities have had their visas revoked and, in some instances, been detained. We are communicating directly with F-1 and J-1 visa holders about this situation and providing general advising on standard visa processes and information for international students and scholars about the resources available to them. We are also working directly with the representatives of a UW Medicine employee who was detained by immigration officials in late February when returning from a personal trip overseas. You can also review guidance on what to do if immigration officials come to a University facility.
These are difficult times for universities around the nation, and the UW is no exception. We will continue to work with our partners here in Washington and at the national level, guided by our mission and values.
In addition to the actions listed above, it is incumbent upon each of us to demonstrate the importance of the UW’s mission to the people of Washington and the United States. It is their investments that have created a system of universities that advance the nation’s health, prosperity and security and, as a result, is the envy of the world. And it is their investments — and our shared future — that are now at risk.
Sincerely,
Ana Mari Cauce President Professor of Psychology Tricia R. Serio Provost and Executive Vice President for Academic Affairs Professor of Biochemistry
Lindsay Church left the Navy in 2012, having served under the United States’ “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, which prohibited military servicemembers from being open about their sexual orientation.
“I really struggled with, am I a veteran, or am I queer?” Church told Next City. “And if I’m a veteran, I can’t be queer because they hate me here.”
Since then, Church co-founded Minority Veterans of America, a nonprofit that helps veterans that identify as gender, racial, or religious minorities.
A community of supporters at the opening of Q’mmunity House. Photo courtesy of Minority Veterans of America
In October, Minority Veterans reached an exciting milestone: The opening of the nation’s first-ever transitional housing facility for homeless LGBTQ+ veterans.
With a $1.8 million levy from King County, the organization opened Q’mmunity House, a renovated 1915 five-bedroom, two-story home in West Seattle.
Signing a 50-year contract with the county, Minority Veterans will operate the home, which gives residents a place to stay for six to 18 months as they find permanent housing.
The home is now open to eligible residents. Photo courtesy of Minority Veterans of America
“Today, we are filled with immense pride as we celebrate the realization of a long-held dream — Q’mmunity House,” Church said at a ribbon-cutting ceremony for the home.
“This milestone represents years of dedication and hard work to create a refuge for LGBTQ+ veterans who have too often been left behind and experienced discrimination and stigma when accessing essential services.” (continued)
Posted inAdvocacy, Gay rights/essays, Social justice|Comments Off on Seattle home transformed into first-ever shelter for homeless LGBTQ+ veterans: ‘Healing to be part of something again’
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Ana Mari Cauce
Tricia R. Serio
