Rain, wind, and ... more rain: Today So Far

• Heavy rain and wind are about to surge through Western Washington. Be prepared.
• Election Day is less than a week away and political parties are pressing their messages harder than ever.
• Seattle is facing a tough financial outlook and city leaders are trying to think of ways to make up for shortfalls.

This post originally appeared in KUOW's Today So Far newsletter for November 4, 2022.

Get out your flashlights, candles, glow sticks, emergency foil blankets and whatever else you need to get through a power outage. Heavy wind and rain is slated to pummel Western Washington Friday and Saturday. The National Weather Service has issued a flood watch for our region.

The usual atmospheric river is dumping rain in the mountains. That means rivers are going to swell, and flooding is likely downstream. That also means there is a potential for flash floods around all the recently burned stretches in the Cascades, like the Bolt Creek fire area. With the heavy wind on top of that, I'm expecting quite a few power outages across Western Washington. I hope I'm wrong, but it's not a bad idea to download some reruns of "The Office" on your phone to watch in case electricity goes out, or organize whatever people do when they're not streaming "The Office." Like ... books?

Election Day is less than a week away and political parties are pressing their messages harder than ever. For Republicans, crime is the ultimate wedge issue they're betting on.

The GOP has its sights set on the 8th Congressional District. Republicans steadily represented the district until Democrat Kim Schrier flipped it blue in the 2018 election. If Republican Matt Larkin can flip it back to red via Tuesday's election, it could help the GOP gain control of the House in Washington D.C.

As KUOW's David Hyde reports, Republicans are using crime as a wedge issue in the 8th District, particularly to attract Asian American and Pacific Islander voters. According to one political expert Hyde spoke with, the GOP has seen the recent rise in hate crimes against Asian Americans as an opportunity to reframe concerns as “a broader law and order based authoritarian appeal to create more order, in this perceived era of disorder." Read more here.

In other election news, King County election officials say they haven't seen any signs of voter intimidation so far, as rumored nationally, but they're keeping an eye out for it.

"We haven't seen any reports from concerned voters about intimidation in this election, but we are asking voters to contact us if they do see anything out there at the drop boxes," King County Elections Director Julie Wise told KUOW.

Seattle is facing a tough financial outlook and city leaders are trying to think of ways to make up for shortfalls. According to a recent assessment that city staff gave to council members, Seattle is looking at a drop of about $80 million in revenue over the next two years. This breaks down to a loss of $64 million from real estate taxes, $9.4 million from the general fund, and $4.5 million from the sweetened beverage tax.

I suppose the silver lining here is that a lot fewer folks are drinking sodas these days if Seattle is slated to lose as much as $4.5 million from this tax.

Councilmember Mosqueda immediately released a statement calling for new "long-term, sustainable, progressive revenue for future budgets." Translation: new taxes. Mosqueda points to the JumpStart tax as an example. That tax is on the city's large companies paying hefty salaries. Read more here.

And a reminder: Daylight saving time ends on Sunday. Yep, we're still doing that (even though we apparently hit more deer on the road after the time switch).

Correction: A featured story from yesterday's newsletter mentioned that Seattle police and the King County Sheriff's Office had undercover officers around a protest in Seattle and referenced CHOP from 2020. Instead, this incident was on the anniversary of Breonna Taylor's death in 2021.

AS SEEN ON KUOW

King County Detective Cyrus Bowthorpe raises his hands after being stopped by Seattle police officers, who were unaware that he was working undercover on March 13, 2021 as he was tailgating a Seattle detective. (Seattle Police Department)

DID YOU KNOW?

"Weird: The Al Yankovic Story" comes out today, streaming on Roku. It's the second major film that Yankovic has penned and produced — 1989's "UHF" was his first. It tanked at the box office, leading to a considerable lull in Yankovic's parody career. Things could have ended there, but luckily, between "UHF" and "Weird" was Nirvana.

"UHF" brought Yankovic's humor to the big screen, but it wasn't a financial success (it has since become a cult classic among more refined — ahem — intelligent pop culture aficionados and cinephiles). The parody artist needed a hit to push through. Michael Jackson had a hit with "Black or White." Yankovic's previously successful singles were based on Jackson's songs (Michael Jackson was a Weird Al fan), so he wrote up the parody "Snack All Night." Despite the fact that Yankovic has never needed an artist's permission to parody their songs, he has always sought their blessing. In this case, Jackson didn't want his song to be parodied; he didn't want to distract from the social message of "Black or White." So "Snack All Night" was nixed, but another big hit was taking over the Billboard charts — Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" — and Yankovic had a connection.

That connection was Victoria Jackson. She starred in "UFH," and she was a cast member of Saturday Night Live in 1992 when Nirvana was scheduled to perform. Yankovic called Jackson at the SNL studio as Nirvana was rehearsing for the appearance. She pulled Kurt Cobain aside and put the two on the phone. Yankovic asked Cobain for permission to parody "Smells Like Teen Spirit." Cobain asked, "Is it gonna be about food?" since most of Yankovic's parodies involved food at that point. Yankovic responded, "No, it's actually going to be a song about how nobody can understand your lyrics." Cobain was cool with it and gave his blessing. Yankovic's "Smells Like Nirvana" put him back on the charts, and on MTV (because, kids, MTV used to play music videos).

His career was revitalized and Yankovic went on to produce more hits throughout the years, such as "Ebay," "The Saga Begins," and frankly the entire album "Mandatory Fun" is awesome.

ALSO ON OUR MINDS

Starbucks posts record-breaking sales even as U.S. inflation soars

Global coffee chain Starbucks reported record-breaking sales over the last fiscal quarter that ended in October. In North America, sales were up 11% compared to the same period last year. But profits were down, at $1.1 billion last quarter compared to $1.3 billion the prior year.

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