Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
Sorted by date Results 407 - 431 of 3750
OLYMPIA – This will sound funny anywhere outside Olympia, but there is a question that for years has stumped half the Legislature. If an income tax is so good for the people of the state of Washington, why do they say no every time they are asked? Advocates of higher taxes and spending have tried just about everything. Big income taxes, little income taxes, income taxes dedicated to noble purposes and income taxes that is only supposed to hurt millionaires. Yet the people keep voting no – ten times since 1934. The last time, in 2010, the mar...
Surprisingly, there is something U.S. Presidents agree upon — America’s economic and national security hinge upon maintaining our technology edge in semiconductors. Those tiny computer chips are the brains of modern electronics. They operate our laptops and smart phones and permeate every sector of our lives from farming and manufacturing to health care and public safety. They are embedded in our military’s most advanced equipment and give us a tactical edge. Semiconductors are among our natio...
Last week the Legislature got a terrific piece of news. State tax collections have rebounded despite one of the worst economic situations we've ever faced. The latest projection adds $3.3 billion, and we're right back where we were before the COVID shutdown. The strange thing about it was the reaction of our Democratic colleagues. They said they wouldn't let this good news stand in the way of their brave and noble effort to impose an income tax on the people of Washington. And never mind that the voters keep saying no to the idea, 10 times...
OLYMPIA - Everybody associates March 17 with St. Patrick's Day, that one holiday in which we are all encouraged to wear green. Around the Capitol last week, March 17 brought a different meaning of "green." That morning, the state Economic Revenue and Forecast Council announced the first state-revenue forecast for this year showed a surprisingly large increase of $3.3 billion through the 2021-23 budget cycle and $5.2 billion over the next four years. It is the largest positive quarterly forecast change on record. Since the state operating...
PULLMAN — For two weeks in February, members of the Whitman County Democrats worked on a letter to send to Governor Inslee requesting that Whitman County be separated from Region East if and when we met the metrics. We wrote the letter in a data-driven way, speaking logically to the uniqueness of our county. We shared that letter with experts in the county, asking for feedback and making sure our data was correct. We sent our letter to Gov. Inslee on March 1. You can see that letter on our website at whitman.wa-democrats.net/wp/. After a...
OLYMPIA — I have been advocating, since last spring, for a local approach to reopening our economy. I trust my local health departments and locally elected county officials to do the right thing for health and safety far more than I do Gov. Inslee or any other bureaucrat in Olympia. In addition, the governor’s Phase 1 and Phase 2 “regional” approach to reopening Washington ignores the unique needs, makeup and habits of rural areas. Despite numerous letters and pleas from legislators, Inslee has chosen a very top-down approach to dealing with ou...
America’s media is suffering from a truth deficit leaving many to wonder where to go for honest, reliable and accurate information. Unfortunately, it is not the mainstream or social media. Last month Forbes magazine found for the first time, fewer than half of all Americans acknowledge any kind of trust of major media. The information was captured in Edelman’s annual trust barometer. “Fifty-six percent of Americans, for example, said they agreed with the following statement: “Jour...
At 2 a.m. on Sunday, March 14, daylight saving time for 2021 will begin, clocks will spring forward an hour, and Washingtonians will once again ask themselves how this annual ritual is even still a thing we all must do. The supposed reason for daylight saving time is for us to make better use of natural daylight during the spring and summer. However, the practice of shifting back and forth between daylight saving time and standard time has proved to be a dangerous and altogether useless exercise that ultimately does more harm than good. It’s t...
With the clock ticking on our opportunity to limit global warming to the critical 2 degree increase by 2030, we need a bill in Congress that is both effective and bipartisan. A carbon fee and dividend policy, where a fee is assessed on carbon fuels and Americans receive dividend payments from the fees collected, is just that. First, it’s effective. In their February 2021 report, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine recommend a carbon fee for achieving net zero emissions by mid-century. The 2018 report by the UN’s Int...
I am writing in regard to the recent statement by Whitman County Commissioner Michael Largent in regard to the dam breaching proposal by Idaho Rep. Mike Simpson. The Nez Perce Tribe and its people have had a treaty of 1855 in place since before Whitman County existed. In this agreement between the US government and the tribe we are guaranteed the right to take salmon within the treaty area and usual and accustomed places. With the loss of salmon due to dams the US is not fulfilling their contractual agreement with us (Nez Perce tribal members)...
These days the mere mention of tax incentives for factories touches off a major firestorm in Seattle and you’d better be looking for an expeditious way out of town. Not so in Austin where major international corporations are receiving millions in property tax rebates when they build giant new factories creating thousands of jobs. Similar to Washington, Texas has no income tax. It has a sales tax and relies heavily on property taxes to support city and county governments. Property taxes are h...
Democrats in Washington’s Legislature traditionally haven’t been shy about raising taxes. This legislative session is no different. In fact, there are several Democrat-sponsored proposals that would increase existing taxes or create new ones. State income tax: The Senate Ways and Means Committee recently passed Senate Bill 5096, a proposal requested by Gov. Jay Inslee creating a state income tax on capital gains. Voters have rejected a state income tax proposal 10 times over the past 85 years. A recent statewide Elway Poll revealed that onl...
In the coming decade, European Union leaders are investing heavily in hydrogen fuel research, believing it is a key to eliminating CO2 discharges from vehicles. One new technology is called pyrolysis. It is hoped the technology will allow Europeans to pipe hydrogen much like natural gas now travels long distances across country and under water. Hydrogen created by pyrolysis is an adaptation of an industrial process developed over the years. It was designed to remove CO2 from the process creating charred wood and organic matter. Currently, 95...
OLYMPIA – Imagine paying off the mortgage to your home in full and on time. Then, a month later, receiving a letter from the bank outlining an additional three years of payments owed because the bank decided your interest rate changed after you’d paid your mortgage off. That is the discussion playing out in agriculture during this legislative session. Instead of mortgage it is farmworker wages, and instead of interest rates, it is the seeking of additional wages related to a court case. Substitute Senate Bill 5172 would require all agr...
OLYMPIA – In the past 22 years, by working together with our thousands of heroic supporters, we've qualified 17 statewide initiatives for a public vote. They all limited the governments' power over us and have saved taxpayers $46.9 billion. And our four 2/3-vote-to-raise-taxes initiatives have saved taxpayers billions more by stopping and deterring tax increases. While other initiatives spend $1.2 million to qualify, we averaged $672,000 because we run a tight ship and I often risked my own money. After two decades of effort, vehicle tabs a...
Idaho Congressman Mike Simpson’s $33 billion plan to remove the lower Snake River dams is unwise. However, if he pushes it, he needs include the impact of breaching dams in his home state which completely shutoff salmon and steelhead migration. Simpson, a Republican representing eastern Idaho, announced he wants to rupture the four lower Snake River dams— Ice Harbor, Little Goose, Lower Monumental and Lower Granite—-all in southeast Washington. Those impoundments have fish passage systems to allow adult anadromous fish to continue upstr...
As children, we hear many insightful stories that are simple, but often full of meaning. The one mentioned above seems to resonate with what is happening in our country today. Right before our eyes, we are seeing over and over the truth. Even though videos and pictures can be altered, it would have been an almost impossible undertaking to make fake videos of what happened that led up to and included the infamous events that took place on Jan. 6. Can we assume that most of the Republicans in the Senate and House are seeing what you and I have...
We are fast approaching the halfway point of the 2021 legislative session. There have been some challenges conducting business as usual for the Legislature during this unusual time in our lives. The governor's decision to close off a large portion of the Capitol grounds to the public is concerning, as are his ever-changing metrics and policies when it comes to reopening our state. I'm very pleased that all parts of our state have been able to move to Phase 2 of the latest reopening plan. I and my 13th District seatmates had been critical of...
I recently read your opinion piece, “History Under Fire,” in the Feb. 4 edition of the paper and wholeheartedly disagree with your premise. House Bill 1372 is a bill to replace Marcus Whitman’s statue in the National Statuary Hall collection in Washington D. C. with a statue of another distinguished Washington state citizen, Billy Frank Jr. Marcus Whitman’s statue would be returned to the state of Washington to be displayed at a future location. It is not uncommon for states to replace statues in the hall with other statues; after all, our his...
People are manipulated through fear. •Fear of terrorism •Fear of climate change •Fear of the corona virus The politicians and media, with the help of academia and other recipients of money from the government, fan the flames of fear. People react to fear by doing what so-called “experts” tell them to: •Destroy Iraq, bombing them and killing hundreds of thousands of people •Hang humanity on a “Cross of Iron” by spending trillions of dollars on the military-industrial complex •Support alternative energy production that harms the environment wit...
Why would any company spend $5.5 million for a 30-second Super Bowl ad that leaves viewers perplexed as some glitzy and abstract commercials did? After production costs are tacked on, you’d think advertisers would want their messages clearly understood especially in difficult times. Some prominent advertisers, such as Coca Cola, Budweiser and Pepsi, traditional large buyers, skipped Super Bowl LV; however, WeatherTech did not. After game, the list of best and worst ads was released. It did n...
