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Students from the University of Washington will rally for the rights of immigrants; we acknowledge that immigrants contribute to our economy and deserve equal rights as everyone one else. Please support us as we walk across campus and rally for the human rights immigrants deserve. House Bill HR4437 should not be tolerated!

Please make sure to wear a white tshirt as a sign of unity!

*When: Wednesday, April 5th 2006 at 12pm*

*Where: University of Washington Red Square*

sponsored by MEChA de University of Washington

We are all immigrants.

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Seattle Follies: Top Cop, Reggie Watts and Fisher Folk

The April installment of Seattle’s favorite political cabaret --- actually also its only political cabaret -- features former Seattle police chief and now author Norm Stamper as host. Norm’s guests for this topical and satirical evening include Seattle’s favorite soul singer and comic monologist Reggie Watts, and performers from the world-famous Fisher Poet’s Gathering; past and present fisherpeople from around the Northwest and Alaska who spin great poetic yarns about their sea-going experiences.

Downstairs at Town Hall (8th Ave. & Seneca St.), enter on Seneca Street.

Advance tickets are $16/$13 Town Hall members, students & seniors only at www.ticketweb.com. $18/$15 at the door.

Not an official BetterDonkey event, but when we hear "cabaret," we think "cabernet."

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Debating the Ban: The Call to Duty Tour
Uncovering the reality of the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy for today’s soldiers.

University of Washington Kane Hall, Room 120
7:00PM, Doors at 6.30
Sponsored by the Evans Student Organization of the Daniel J. Evans School of Public Affairs

Special Guest Speaker: Rear Admiral Alan M. Steinman, UW alumnus

Open to the public • Free of charge

The Call to Duty Tour is a platform for renewed debate on the merits of the DADT policy in the 21st century featuring the largely unheard voices of young service members who embody the reality of DADT in today’s armed forces and its impact on the nation’s security. The Call to Duty Tour is not anti-military or anti-war: It supports equal rights.

For more information, see www.calltodutytour.org or contact info@calltodutytour.org

Map to Kane Hall

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Don't you hate it when a bunch of stuff all happens at once? I can't go to any of the three events tonight! But maybe some of you can.

Tonight at Town Hall, KC Executive Ron Sims will debate Rev. Ken Hutcherson on gay rights and whether the gay-rights movement is like the civil-rights movement. According to a Times article, the debate is sponsored by the Stranger, since both have been prominent figures in this debate in our region. This ought to be something to see! Although, is it really pessimistic of me to think that this is just going to boil down to Hutcherson saying "being gay is an unnatural choice and it's bad" and Sims saying "being gay is a way people are born and there's nothing wrong with it"? Isn't that what's always at the bottom line of this issue?

Anyway, the details:

Sims vs. Hutcherson debate
Town Hall
7:30 pm
$5 at the door

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The High Cost of Free Parking

Featured Speaker:
Donald Shoup, Professor of Urban Planning, UCLA

Thursday, March 2, 2006
6:30-8:30 p.m.
UW Architecture Hall, Room 147
View Map

Free event; no registration required
View Event Flyer

About the Event
Guest speaker Donald Shoup will argue that the average parking space costs more than the average car. He asserts that when we shop, dine out, or see a movie, we pay indirectly for parking because its cost is included in the price of everything from hamburgers to housing. Shoup will demonstrate that free parking has other costs: it distorts transportation choices, warps urban form, and degrades the environment. Shoup estimates that (1) if all U.S. parking spaces were combined into one surface lot, it would be the size of Connecticut; and (2) every year we spend as much to subsidize off-street parking as we spend for Medicare or national defense.

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Alaskan Way Viaduct and Seawall Replacement Project - On the Road to Construction

What: Open House
When: Thursday, March 2, 5:00-7:00 p.m.
Where: The Seattle Aquarium, Pier 59, 1483 Alaskan Way, Seattle

Get the latest news on the replacement of the Alaskan Way Viaduct and Seawall. Learn how the city of Seattle is closing the funding gap. Find out what parts of the project may get built first. Provide feedback on the construction. Special introduction by WSDOT Secretary Doug MacDonald and Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels.

For more information call the hotline at (206) 269-4421, or e-mail viaduct@wsdot.wa.gov. Send your comments to:

Alaskan Way Viaduct and Seawall Replacement Project;
999 Third Ave., Suite 2424;
Seattle, WA 98104.

Visit www.wsdot.wa.gov/projects/viaduct for up-to-date project news.

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WHAT: Transportation Lobby Day
WHEN: Thursday, February 16, 9:00am - 6:00pm

Wanna stop bitching about the Puget Sound's transit problem and do something about it? Wanna tell your representative what you think in person? Wanna try being Abramoff-like-lobbyist for a day? (Scratch that last one)

Transportation Choices is heading down to Olympia on Thursday, February 16th to advocate for better transportation choices, healthier transportation, and real funding and governance solutions for the Puget Sound region.

Join 'em and you'll have the chance to learn more about transportation issues, meet with your legislators, attend hearings, and be a lobbyist for a day. Face-to-face meetings are always the most effective way to influence your legislators!

So Sexy, So Wonky!

You just need to RSVP by contacting their Field Director, Rachel Smith (rachel@transportationchoices.org) or by calling 206-329-2336. Want to carpool you nerdy transit folk? Include your address in your RSVP and we'll arrange carpools from different neighborhoods and cities.

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The New Echo Chamber: The State of the American News Media and Why it Matters

Epiphany Church
38th & E. Denny Way
Seattle

Join author & University of Washington professor David Domke for this partisan-free public discussion.

A series of cultural, structural, and technological developments over the past two decades have been instrumental in the creation of a press that functions less as an independent institution and more as an echo chamber to be manipulated by sophisticated politicians. The implications for today's politics, as well as potential future developments, will be discussed.

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Have you noticed that your health insurance is really expensive, and yet it doesn't cover all the stuff you think is important? Or, maybe you've noticed that you don't actually have health insurance? Or maybe-- maybe you don't understand anything about the Medicare Prescription Drug Benefit, except that Grandma is getting totally effed.

Want to do something about it? CodeBlueNow! wants to help you do just that. Come to Town Hall (8th & Seneca St., Seattle) on Monday, Dec. 5 at 7:30 pm for their forum, "Health Care: Build a Road Map for Change." Local and national health care heavy-hitters will be there to share their views, and you, the ones who actually have to deal with this mess, will have the opportunity to share what YOU want from the American health care system.

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ACTION Northwest Presents
THE OIL FACTOR

November 9th, 7:30 pm
Seattle University’s Pigott Auditorium

Fresh from the Vancouver International Film Festival, THE OIL FACTOR explores the crisis of dwindling oil reserves and sky-rocketing consumption amid increasingly tense U.S.-China relations over military positioning in Central Asia. This 93 min. documentary also questions the "coincidence" of focusing the so-called U.S. "War on terror" in the Middle East and Central Asia where almost 3/4 of the world’s remaining oil and natural gas is located.

Director Gerard Ungerman (co-creator of HIDDEN WARS of DESERT STORM & PLAN COLOMBIA) will introduce the film and entertain questions after the feature.

Students $5; General Admission suggested donation $10. No one will be turned away due to lack of funds.

www.actionnw.net

It's a little last minute, but our friends at ACTION Northwest tell us that when they heard they could get the film's director to come this week and only this week, they couldn't help but schedule it right away. Who could blame them?

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I stole this from Democracy for Washington.

*Applications open for Institute for a Democratic Future*

ANNOUNCING an upcoming, 7-month long political training for young
people ages 21-35. The Institute for a Democratic Future (IDF) is
now accepting applications for the Class of 2006, its 9th class.

IDF was founded in 1997 by young people seeking to educate, motivate and inspire future Democratic and civic leaders in Washington State.

Since graduating its first class in 1998, IDF has emerged as a
forward thinking institute dedicated to assisting 25 emerging
leaders each year to expand their skill and knowledge of critical
issues and the political process.

Graduates of the program include State Representative Derek
Kilmer '02, WashTech Founder Marcus Courtney '98, former Seattle
City Councilmember Judy Nicastro '99, current Brier City
Councilmember Sasha Doolittle '01, State Representative Aaron
Peterson '00 (MN), and numerous legislative assistants, party
activists, young professionals, non-profit organization executives and political campaigners.

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POST-INTELLIGENCER COLUMNISTS WALK YOU THROUGH ELECTION ISSUES

So, you don't know your Initiative 910 from your Senate Joint Resolution 8207? Or maybe you have a question or two about the mayoral race, or the monorail.

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer presents "Election Issues 101" with Chi-Dooh Li, Ted Van Dyk, Julia Youngs, Thomas Shapley and Joe Copeland who come together at The Mirabeau Room for an after-work event designed to demystify upcoming city, county and state election issues.

Bring your questions, take notes.

Saturday Spin columnist Cathy Sorbo moderates.

"Election Issues 101"
Thursday October 20, 2005
The Mirabeau Room
529 Queen Anne Ave. N.
21+
doors at 5pm, show from 6-8pm
FREE

www.themirabeauroom.com
www.cathysorbo.com
www.seattlepi.com

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The Social Action Committee of Temple Beth Am presents a forum on the Drug War: An Alternative Approach.

Speakers include:

Why Drugs Should Be Legalized
Norm Stamper, former Police Chief, City of Seattle

The Disparate Impact of Drug Prosecutions Upon the Minority Communities
Lisa Daugaard, Public Defender

Different Legislative Approaches to the Drug Problems
Adam Kline, Chair, Judiciary Committee, Washington State Senate

The Economic Impact of the Drug Wars
Roger Goodman, Director, Drug Policy Project, King County Bar Association

Temple Beth Am is located at 2632 NE 80th St, Seattle

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The Capitol Hill Community Council and the Miller Park Neighborhood Association will host a Candidate Forum at Miller Community Center (330 - 19th Ave E; Center phone 684-4753).

All the City Council candidates, the Mayoral candidates and the School Board candidates for our area (Position V: Mary Bass & Jane Fellner) will attend and will answer your questions.

This is a fantastic way to meet the candidates and see if they're the kind of people you want running your city.

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AIDS IS KNOCKING:
a multimedia project by Amanda Koster to raise funds and awareness for the Rabuor Village Project.

On exhibit: Saturday, October 1, 2005 5 pm to 10 pm
VIVEZA Art Gallery, 2604 Western Ave. Seattle 98121

Through video, art installations, sound and photographs, the viewer will be transported to Rabuor Village, Western Kenya. You will come to know Caxton, age 15, head of household, one of 14 million orphans in Africa who have lost their parents to HIV/AIDS. You will be uplifted by the courage and determination of the people of Rabuor as they struggle to survive and overcome poverty and the devastation of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Africa. You will learn that you can make a difference in the life of one orphan, one mother, and one village.

This isn't an official BetterDonkey event, but the intersection between art and AIDS is undeniably political, don't you think?

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Operation Democracy is launching its big push to get a Democrat in office in the 8th District-- and you can totally be there!!

WHEN: Saturday, September 17, at 3:00pm
WHERE: Bellevue Regional Library
1111 110th Ave NE
Bellevue, WA 98004
CONTACT: Gwyn Lewis
(206) 985-2048
gwyn.lewis@operationdemocracy.org

This is not an official BetterDonkey.org event, but we do enjoy a trip to Bellevue every now and then.

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Join progressive King County Councilmember & City Council
Candidate DWIGHT PELZ for a couple of hours of music, cocktails and KARAOKE.

A low-cost, "give what you can" fundraiser to help with the high costs of
Dwight's Seattle City Council campaign.

Wednesday Aug 31
7:00-9:00 pm
The Mirabeau Room
529 Queen Anne Ave N
Seattle

This is not an official BetterDonkey event, but if Dwight promises to sing "Baby Got Back" again we are so there.

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Not long ago Greg Nickels (Seattle's Mayor) unveiled his plan to increase density in Seattle. Not long after, the City Council hired Vancouver's planners to review the Mayor's plan

The Vancouver B.C. planning consultants completed their review, presented their findings, and found a number of flaws in the Mayor’s plan, finding that the plan doesn’t support the potential for a viable residential community downtown.

A Public Forum will be held to Review Mayor’s Downtown Height and Density Proposal on Monday, August 15, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. in the Bertha Knight Landes Room, located on Seattle City Hall’s first floor (600 Fourth Avenue, between James and Cherry) to address these findings.

Community feedback on the Vancouver BC consultants' recommendations is invited.

Plenty of background info on the politics behind these plans can be found in this Weekly article - Time To Grow Up.

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Congressman Jim McDermott and other invited guests are coming together at the Seattle Labor Temple (2800 1st Ave.) to increase public awareness of the Downing Street Memo and urge Congress to pass a Resolution of Inquiry.

AfterDowningStreet.org is a rapidly growing coalition of veterans' groups, peace groups, and political activist groups, which launched on May 26, 2005, a campaign to urge the U.S. Congress to begin a formal investigation into whether President Bush has committed impeachable offenses in connection with the Iraq war. Together with Congressman John Conyers, AfterDowningStreet.org organized hearings in the U.S. Capitol and a rally in front of the White House on June 16.

Don't know what the Downing Street Memo is all about? Go here for an explanation from the Times of London.

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Want George W. out of your and/or your girlfriend's vagina? Here's one way to make it happen.

NARAL Pro-Choice Washington
invites you to our

SCREW ABSTINENCE PARTY

Watertown
106 1st Ave N
Seattle, WA 98109
Let them know you keep it real when it comes to your sexual health and decision making.
Come laugh, learn, socialize and buck the system at NARAL Pro-Choice Washington’s Screw Abstinence Party.

Featuring:
Pork Filled Players – Seattle theatre’s hottest sketch comedy group performs a sex ed class for adults
Toys in Babeland – Seattle’s sleaze-free, sex-positive purveyors of adult toys offer tips on “Sexy Safer Sex”
Lady Jane DJ – Seattle’s First Lady of the turn tables spins the latest in Hip-Hop and R&B
Hors d’oeuvres – Scrumptious Appetizers generously donated by Watertown.