Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
Sorted by date Results 3432 - 3456 of 3749
I’ve read that an average dog possesses a vocabulary of 200-300 words, which is enough for him to have his own Twitter account. Most people won’t buy their dogs a smartphone, though, so you don’t see too many canines tweeting their friends unless they have access to a computer. Probably from the dogs’ point of view there are a lot of words they would just as soon not know, the “N” word being the most obnoxious. Here’s an excerpt from a dog’s wiki-dictionary of known words: Sit (vb): A word that means if you sit down your owner will give you a...
Finding a job is the best substitute for an unemployment check, but as more and more Americans exhaust their jobless benefits, employment opportunities remain sparse. In July, the state unemployment rate was 8.6 percent, down from 9.5 percent a year ago; however, in parts of Washington it is in double-digits. The Portland-Vancouver metro area reports 13.3 percent unemployment, about the same as last year. Economists worry that it may take years for our economy to return to its peak of a couple of years ago. Ironically, the longer we experience...
THEY FORGOT someone in the news stories that listed prominent persons who died in plane crashes in Alaska following the loss of former Sen. Ted Stevens Aug. 9. Remember Joe Murphy? Joe, state Democratic party chair from 1978 to 1981, was aboard a float plane that disappeared Sept. 20, 2004, in Alaska, with five people on board, including Joe, who was from Bremerton, and his twin brother, Jim, from Sequim. No sign of the plane was ever found and having flown over Alaska I am aware of the vast stretches of dense forest and many bodies of water in...
#!*! Simple math: Poor leadership plus poor management equals poor Colfax. Send your Pet Peeves and Okeydokes to the Gazette P.O. Box 770 211 N. Main St...
The Open Public Meetings Act has been in the news locally. Roger Whitten of Oakesdale used it as part of his recent recall effort against two county commissioners. He accused them of violating the law. That recall failed at the hearing level, and even though the open meetings act has been around since 1971, the judge misinterpreted elements of its requirements. As important and as established as it is, the act is often misunderstood. More often it still is considered an intrusion on the workings of government by officials subject to it....
My parents live in the part of the United States that is Canada. It is so far north that Minnesota lies in the same direction as Miami. They have four distinct seasons: Winter, More Winter, Still More Winter, and That One Day Of Summer. They’re not completely isolated: They can send and receive text messages, for example, provided they have pen and paper handy. And electricity is a lot more reliable now that it no longer comes from flying a kite in a thunderstorm. It still goes out pretty frequently, though. I’m visiting my parents right now...
With unemployment stubbornly stalled at 9.6 percent, the Obama administration is desperately looking for ways to get the economy moving again. Recently, in a meeting with my manufacturing counterparts from around the country, President Obama’s representative read a speech about all the administration is doing to spur manufacturing in America. Specifically, she tried to enlist our help in convincing companies to invest the $1.8 trillion they’re holding in reserve in added production capacity and new products and services. While we share the pre...
ITEM—The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has agreed to take another look at whether the rare giant Palouse earthworm deserves protection as an endangered species. A petition to do so was rejected in 2007 by a finding there wasn’t enough information to conclude the worm needs protection. Old reports described the worm as 3 feet long, smelling like a lily and a spitter. New specimens found this spring near Moscow, Idaho, were no more than 12 inches fully extended. COMMENT—Needs protection from what? A robin trying to down one would probably choke...
Open Public Meetings Act: As basic as speed limits. The Open Public Meetings Act came about because people were getting shut out of government and the public decision-making process. The act was intended to stop secret confabs and closed-door deal making. The law was enacted in 1971. One would think it was just recently slipped over on government. Resistance to it has been stiff, and many government officials still feel it is an unnecessary complication to governance. Fortunately, the electorate’s sensitivity to abuses of the OPMA has i...
Inaccuarate In response to the article in the Gazette (Aug 12) regarding water issues in Palouse: It must have been a most interesting meeting that your reporter attended. I did not hear nor say most of the comments reported to have been made at the meeting which I attended that evening at Palouse City Hall. I was on the agenda and asked when the City would have a comprehensive water plan in writing, including a water extension plan/guideline. That was my sole question. Yes, the Mayor did take my agenda item elsewhere. I returned to my point...
Good care The foresight of the people who created Hill Ray Plaza was a case of right time, right place, right people. They established a retirement community for independent living and it is owned by the residents. The community and businesses of Colfax take good care of us. Much joy is given to us by the various groups from Colfax that come to entertain us. The Council on Aging, not only provides transportation but finds programs that will benefit our residents. Whenever there is a problem in our building, who ever we call are prompt to...
The Internet has turned the world into one gigantic linked community, capable of instantly sharing vast amounts of incorrect information. Anyone can create a “fact,” such as, “If you do nothing but watch sports all weekend, the lack of physical activity will convince your body it is slipping into a coma, so to stave off unconsciousness it will start burning calories like crazy.” Post this new fact to a blog, and the search engines will dutifully pick it up so you can win an argument with your spouse. (Searching on “lack of physical activity...
I suppose we should give the state credit for trying to economize by consolidating its computer systems in one place, but the new Department of Information Services (DIS) building at the state Capitol is raising a lot of questions. When the contractor was selected in November 2007, the economy was flying high. True, the state’s unemployment rate was ticking up, but it was comfortably low at 4.7 percent. The plan called for a state-of-the-art $260 million, 456,000-square-foot office complex and data center to house most of the state’s com...
“THANK YOU for saying, so succinctly, in your column ‘Afghanistan: Say we won and come home’ what many of us up here have been saying for years and having the courage to write this,” writes Peggy Burton of Coupeville. “I belong to a group here in Coupeville called Coupeville Peace and Reconciliation or CPR. Our local papers are very much aligned with military thinking. We have NAS Whidbey in Oak Harbor, and we find it hard to get much support for a different viewpoint. When we all have courage enough to stand up against this huge military-indus...
Conservation Reserve Program sign ups are taking place now. This year there is concern that the total number of acres in the program may go over 25 percent of the county’s total farmland acreage. Twenty-five percent is the cap for the program unless the county commissioners give special dispensation to exceed it. CRP was designed to pay farmers for not farming environmentally sensitive and highly erodible land in order to protect the land and waterways. The idea is a good one. It pays farmers to protect the environment and their land. Land i...
Of all the major-league sports that I follow, probably the one that asks the most of its elite athletes is competitive eating. That is why I was stunned and saddened to hear that one of the top face-stuffers in the world, Takeru Kobayashi, was arrested at this year’s international hot-dog-eating contest on Coney Island. Takeru reportedly “went berserk” during the contest, reminding all of us of the time that Mike Tyson became so worked up in a boxing match he bit both of Evander Holyfield’s ears — except, of course, in this case it’s hot...
The front saxophone line of the Miller Orchestra played behind music stands designed with the band’s logo. When they opened with their “Moonlight Serenade” theme people in the Grangeville audience didn’t need to read the logo to know they were listening to the real thing. Driving north of Grangeville as the daylight faded under a full moon, cars and trucks flicked on their signal lights before they turned off Idhao’s Highway 95 and headed for farms and small towns on Camas Prairie. Families were headed home after hearing the Glenn Miller Ochest...
Once again, dozens of wildfires are raging across California, reducing entire forests to cinders and displacing thousands of families. As they burn, these fires pump millions of tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) – declared by the federal Environmental Protection Agency as a dangerous pollutant – into the air. Ironically, this environmental and human devastation is due in part to federal environmental policies. For decades, federal forest management policy has been, in effect, not to manage forests. Because of pressure from environmental groups, man...
ONE OF THE TOUGHEST votes people will make as they plough through the candidates this year is when they reach the judges. The votes fall off here because people would rather withhold a vote than find out later that they voted wrong, that is, for someone on the wrong side of what the voter believes. Ask first? Doesn’t work. Most judicial candidates fend off questions about their beliefs by saying a case involving that issue might come before them. I ask everyone I interview where they stand on the death penalty since I will never vote for oppone...
Whitman County commissioners Pat O’Neill and Greg Partch have dodged the bullet. They faced a recall action, in part for alleged violations of the Open Public Meetings Act. At the recall hearing Monday Judge William Acey declared that there was not enough evidence to proceed with the recall. The next step would have been collecting enough signatures to get the recall on the ballot. This, of course, will not happen. The recall action is over. The commissioners are on the job, and the legal cloud which was hanging over their heads is gone. L...
Disagrees Gordon Forgey is incorrect when he states that my fifth recall charge against Partch and O’Neill concerns a policy decision. Partch, O’Neill and Largent have knowingly failed to perform a duty that is imposed by law, which is a violation of their oath of office. I have not charged the commissioners with making bad policy. I have charged Partch and O’Neill with conducting County business outside of the public view, which is against the law; and with violating their oath of office. It is difficult to explain a complex issue in a few w...
In order to write a book about teenage girls (“8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter,” Workman, 2001), I had to get inside their minds, which was a bit like Queen Latifah trying to squeeze into a size 4. My basic approach was to imagine what it would be like to be angry at everything, unwilling to listen to anybody, fascinated by boys my father didn’t approve of and wearing so much mascara my eyelids stuck together. My daughters loudly and vehemently hated the idea that I was writing about them, indicating they would bless the whole...
Just before my father died, I asked him why he kept repeating stories about his childhood and his life. He said, “So you will remember them when I am gone.” Suddenly, it sank in that there really is meaning to the phrase, “out of sight, out of mind.” For the last 50 years, business has been relatively invisible when it comes to telling its story. In the early days of television, the National Association of Manufacturing sponsored a weekly program called “Industry on Parade,” and I would watch it faithfully every week. We learned how cars we...
IT’S ONLY ANOTHER week or so before residents of Bremerton learn whether they’ll get to vote in November on being allowed to keep four hens as pets. Yes, I know people in Bremerton who already have chickens, some more than four. In fact, one of my doctors has chickens in his back yard where he has a continuing battle with raccoons over beating them to the eggs. But somehow the question was raised here whether chickens are legally pets, rather than just barnyard fowl who belong on a farm. Chicken lovers asked the Bremerton City Council to OK...
++++ Everyone who has put their individual touch of creativity on the downtown flower pots. Let’s do it every year. ++++ The lights on are at the fire station. The darkness has left. Send your Pet Peeves and Okeydokes to the Gazette P.O. Box 770 211 N. Main St...
