Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
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I FIRST BEGAN writing about Tom Foley in 1975 when “Scoop” Jackson was running for president and U.S. Rep. Foley was urged to be his replacement in the Senate should Jackson win. It wasn’t Foley doing the promoting. He loved the House and he loved being chair of the Agriculture Committee which endeared him to his farm country constituents. He early betrayed a patrician streak by using taxpayer funds to buy $2,295.40 of Lenox China for use at coffee breaks because he balked at drinking from chipped Navy issue china. He also was so liked by th...
Tuesday, November 5, is election day. That is deadline day, the day that votes must be cast or ballots postmarked. This is primarily a local election. Some issues, such as initiatives 517 and 522, and advisory votes will be on the ballot for every voter in the county and the state for that matter. Some votes are regional in nature. However, most of the ballot choices are as local as they come. No ballot is particularly lengthy as local elections appear on the official ballot only in the areas eligible to vote on them. That means, local ballots...
Do the research I would like to urge all voters to do their research on genetically modified organisms, or GMOs, in our food supply. The multi-national corporations that are throwing millions of dollars into a campaign against I-522 hope that we will be lazy and only listen to the words crafted by their self-interested marketing departments. There is abundant information out there. Here are a few examples: Later this week there is a free “GMO Mini Summit” teleconference featuring leading experts from the international community of phy...
Nancy Pelosi infamously said that we had to pass Obamacare to find out what’s in it. The then-House speaker erroneously assumed, evidently, that people would be able to get onto the government-run exchanges created by the law. So far the law’s implementation has been as ugly as its passage. The rollout of Obamacare has been so disastrous that even “Daily Show” host Jon Stewart was plainly mystified and unconvinced when Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius came on his show the other day to offer reassurances. Judging by the hap... Full story
In 1992, a single male sockeye salmon managed to swim 900 miles from the mouth of the Columbia River to Redfish Lake in Idaho’s Sawtooth Mountains, the end of his migratory journey. Biologists dubbed the sole survivor, “Lonesome Larry.” By 2010, the Northwest Power and Conservation Council happily reported record-setting runs for sockeye —nearly 387,000 had climbed the fish ladders at Bonneville Dam. The numbers, which fluctuate annually, stand at 186,000 this year. The resurgence of the sockeye is not unique. As of Oct. 9, more than one mil...
Here we go again. The two parties in the two houses of Congress recently came to an agreement to reopen government and to tackle the debt limit ceiling. The agreement gives the country a respite for a few months. It didn’t really solve anything. It just put the decision off for a while longer. To use the now over-used expression, Congress kicked the can down the road once again. The promise is that Congress will come together and generate answers and solutions with a greater shelf life than just a few months. Over these past excruciating years,...
Editor’s Note: The following column was originally published in 2009. This past Christmas Eve, I was proud to see my 10-year-old niece and 4-year-old nephew participate in their church’s annual production of the story of Jesus, Mary, Joseph and Batman. My nephew, you see, has Batman body armor that he refuses to take off, even in the bathtub. I don’t blame him: It gives his little-boy body the rippled abs of a dancer at Chippendales. My niece has long coveted the role of Mary, but the appointment is strictly political. Her parents just haven...
Refusing to negotiate is the new reasonableness. After years of agonized media commentary about the failure of key players in Washington to sit down and work out their differences, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid plans to win the fight over the government shutdown by rejecting all compromise, calling his opponents names and escaping blame in the press. It is a gambit available only to Democrats, who are presumed, almost by definition, to be free of any responsibility for a shutdown. For his part, President Barack Obama says he won’t n...
Let’s give the tea partyers the credit they deserve, because they have pulled off a near-miracle: They have unified the Democrats. It’s hard to remember the last time President Barack Obama and the herd of cats in his own party were marching in such lock step. But then, the extremists are, to be honest, way over their heads. Unfortunately, they control the Republican agenda, dragging their up-till-now wimpy leaders into their “defund Obamacare” fool’s errand. Even after the government shutdown and the looming threat of a catastrophic national... Full story
The most controversial issue to be voted upon in November is Initiative 522. If passed, this initiative would require special labeling of some genetically modified foods. Opponents say that I-522 is clunky, incomplete and politically motivated. They claim that it will be expensive for the consumer as well. All these things seem true. Consumers deserve to know what is in their food and food products. It is a basic right-to-know issue. Nutritional labeling has been required on foods for years. It allows the consumer to make some educated choices... Full story
Whenever I make coffee, it winds up tasting like I filtered it through burned underwear. This makes me popular with exactly no one in the family, even though I’ve cut down on everyone’s caffeine intake and you’d think they’d be grateful for that. Besides, if you add enough milk and sugar to my coffee, it’s actually quite pleasant — sort of like a warm burnt-underwear milkshake. Since 66 percent of my three children have worked as coffee pushers, I get a lot of flack from them on my ineptitude. “I’m not a coffee pusher, I’m a coffee barista,... Full story
Colfax Achievements John Henry celebrated 50 years at Colfax Security in Colfax! He has been a solid business person. He has volunteered his time with the Planning Commission for the City for dozens of years. He has been a member of Rotary Club serving in many capacities with that group for more years than I can guess. He contributes to every kid that is trying to raise money for a school activity. He could be out collecting money for the lymphoma society... or doing other volunteer work for various organizations. I don’t know how many have b... Full story
How sad,” writes a reader, “that Congress has become a battlefield of hatred and derision in the constant quest for power. Same goes for the legislature.” I recall when there was a camaraderie in the legislature. Democrats went to dinner with Republicans. Insults were unheard of. How do we get that old camaraderie back? It depends on the people you send to Olympia and Washington, D.C. Back in those good old days lawmakers got something like $3,000 a year and shared offices and secretaries so you got candidates who truly wanted to serve the publ... Full story
In 1915, Franz Kafka wrote a novel about a man who was arrested by two unidentified agents from an undetermined agency and put on trial before unseen judges for an unspecified crime. He was compelled to defend himself without knowing what crime he’d allegedly committed. The proponents of new shipping terminals in Washington must know how that feels. For example, the Gateway Pacific Terminal at Cherry Point would ship a variety of bulk commodities to Asia, including grain and potash, a component of fertilizer. But the commodity that has garnered... Full story
The winds are intense, and giant waves crash over the ship. It is awash and being pushed towards jagged rocks. “Reef the mainsail,” the captain hollers against the wind. Half the crew jumps into action, but it is too much for them. They need help. The rest of the crew refuses. They think the captain is sending them to their deaths. “Add more sail,” they demand. If the captain adds more sail, they say, it will help save the ship. If he doesn’t, then so be it, the ship will go down. The captain cannot convince all the crew that reefing the sail...
When I was in sixth grade, I noticed something wonderful, something I’d never seen before: girls. Well, OK, I’d seen them, but I felt about them the same way I felt about housecats: They did only what they wanted to do, and they weren’t any fun to wrestle. And, like cats, they could be cute sometimes, but they always left me feeling mildly allergic. And then one day the girl in front of me in class smiled at me, and chemicals flooded my brain, turning it into the Love Canal. My immediate reaction was to try to get the girl to perform that...
Amendment I would like to make an insert to show what I believe the definition of the Affordable Care Act should really be. They need to add Catastrophic before Affordable Care Act. This way the acronym would be CACA. I’m quite sure anyone familiar with Spanish would agree it more accurately describes what it entails. It would also clear up any misunderstanding “we the people” and Congress might have, even though Congress gets an exemption. I hope we all remember this come voting time. Mel Mundell, Elberton Samaritan Monday the 23rd, my wife an...
It contradicts the very concept of our nation: One in six Americans goes hungry some of the time — that’s one in six who is “food insecure,” the term used by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Forty-nine million in this land of plenty don’t get enough to eat. It’s even more shameful for children: One in five is deprived of adequate meals. But even that is not the worst. That would be the hateful vote by Republicans in the House of Representatives to severely cut the federal program that allows those millions to get the nutrition they need....
After spending a couple of days last week in Washington, D.C., I wonder how Congress and President Obama will settle their differences without hurting the taxpayers or crippling our struggling economy. There is a high-stakes duel going on inside the Beltway. House Republicans have approved a continuing resolution that provides stopgap funding for the federal government after Sept. 30 — except for Obamacare, the president’s costly health care law. Their position is that Senate Democrats and the president can avoid a government shutdown if they a...
As of this writing, the government of the United States is shutdown. Congress failed to fund it and, consequently, certain services are suspended. Some Republicans in the House of Representatives have refused to fund government operations. They want funding approval tied to the dismantling of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). Recent polls indicate that 71 percent of Americans disapprove of holding the entire government hostage over one law. Other polls show that Congress has an approval rating of a mere 10 percent. Despite these numbers,...
Tattoos are how my children’s generation expresses its individuality, which is why they all have one. I’ve got nothing against tattoos: They’ve been used for centuries to identify which sailors on a particular ship got drunk the night before. But at least those sailors, upon awakening and seeing the name Sheila inked into their shoulders, have the satisfaction of being able to say, “Who the heck is Sheila?” My children are not sailors, but they are all of the generation that is determined to do to their own flesh what the Exxon Valdez di...
WHAT ARE YOU going to do about health insurance when Obamacare kicks in Oct. 1, I asked a friend I regard as one of the smarter cookies around. “Keep Medicare,” he replied. I don’t think you can do that, I said. I keep hearing over and over again on television and the radio and reading in the newspapers politicians reminding me of the president’s promise “If you like your present health care plan, under Obamacare you’ll be able to keep it,” and telling me that’s not true. “Well, that’s what I’m going to do,” he said. He happens to be a Democra...
A small critter is causing big problems in the South Puget Sound. It’s called the Mazama pocket gopher. Some 100,000 pocket gophers inhabit prairie lands throughout northern California, Oregon and Washington. Our state is the northernmost part of its range, where separate populations are scattered in pockets throughout the area, including Thurston and Pierce counties. Last December, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) proposed to list several subspecies of the Mazama pocket gopher in Washington as a threatened species under the E...
The clamoring to go to war in Syria has subsided. American leaders from both parties who wanted to punish Syria and its leader Bashar Assad for using chemical weapons have quieted down. That is because a plan now exists for controlling Assad’s chemical weapons without resorting to military strikes. Russian President Vladimir Putin has put forward the plan to which the U.S. is subscribing. Putin is promoting the containment and removal of Assad’s chemical weapons. His real aim is to eliminate interference in Syria from other nations. Reg...
Times were tough when I was a kid: We didn’t have the Internet, so when it came to finding information on life’s most challenging questions, we were forced to watch television reruns. From “The Three Stooges,” as an example, I learned lessons such as: Whenever possible, avoid walking into boards. Don’t make friends with people who look like a clean-shaven Adolf Hitler. Never, under any circumstances, allow a monkey to run loose on a train. “Gilligan’s Island” was a trove of life-changing information. For example, I learned that within a three-...
