Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
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You’ve read that your hometown newspaper has been sold. You’ve been told that newspapers are failing. You may have even heard “print is dead.” Now, you are concerned local news and sports coverage will be disappear. You’re worried that that you’ll have to look to the Internet to see what’s happening in your neighborhood. B way of an introduction, let us assuage your concerns. We are Free Press Publishing, Eastern Washington’s largest community newspaper group. Our publications are found in mostl...
After 30 years at the helm, Gazette Publisher Gordon Forgey announced last week his paper was sold to journalist Roger Harnack, a partner of Free Press Publishing based in Cheney, Wash. This is great news for a retiring publisher and even better news for Whitman County, a stay from joining America’s vast desert of “No News Zones.” I met Harnack in 2012 when I joined the International Society of Weekly News Editors (ISWNE), a rowdy newspaper group that prides itself on upholding the tenets of community journalism and shining the spotlight on op...
Gordon, thanks for your unbiased service to the Gazette readers over the years and I do hope the new owners will not be biased as most newspapers are. To the typical Seattle reader of the Gazette who complained about depicting Bernie Sanders as an old man with a Soviet flag, nothing could have been more accurate. Bernie is 78, recently had a heart attack, went to Russia several times to study Marxism and his idol was none other than Fidel Castro. He has been a Senator for 25 years and had three bills of his own, two for naming post offices. He...
Washington and Oregon lawmakers want to end their legislative sessions; however, accounting for the costs of carbon emissions is a major road block. In Salem, rural Republican senators are boycotting session and thereby denying majority Democrats a quorum to vote on a “cap and trade” bill. The measure calls for an 80 percent state reduction in greenhouse gases (GHG) by 2050. The system would be similar to existing programs in California and some Canadian provinces. The state would set a cap on total GHG emissions. Oregon’s largest 100 indus...
I have sold the Gazette and Daily Bulletin. The new owners will take over on March 1. The papers will officially become part of the Free Press Publishing group in Cheney. It has been a big decision, but I am confident that the change will give the Gazette many more years of service to Whitman County. In the back room we have a variety of historic print items. One is a type drawer simply addressed to the Gazette, Colfax, WT. The WT stands for Washington Territory. The paper has had a long history, longer than Washington has been a state. The...
President Donald Trump is right that he does “have, as president, the legal right” to meddle in Department of Justice decisions. However, when he makes public comments, or when it can be shown that he has privately discussed any federal criminal case with his Justice subordinates, it should be considered undue interference, and a judge should order that all prosecutions of affected individuals or groups be halted. Furthermore, another count of obstruction of justice should be added to the list of criminal charges he will face when he leaves the...
Can the republic survive Attorney General William Barr? That's the question that has seized the media and center left, which have worked themselves into a full-blown panic over an attorney general who is, inarguably, a serious legal figure and one of the adults in the room late in President Donald Trump's first term. Some 2,000 former Justice department employees have signed a letter calling on Barr to resign. An anti-Barr piece in The Atlantic opined that "it is not too strong to say that Bill Barr is un-American," and warned that his America...
Okaydokes Local business owners who endure in a labor of love to serve their communities....
I have just read Carl M. Ogren’s letter where he hyperventilates over the coming climate warming catastrophe. I have also just read a 2020 report from NASA predicting a coming ice age. I worked for “The Mother Earth News” in the late 1970’s, and I recall very well all the predictions then of a coming ice age. I completely bought into Paul Ehrlich’s “End of Affluence” and “The Cold and the Dark.” I recall that Manhattan was predicted to be under an un-melting sheet of ice by the year 2000. Then the alarmist changed the meme to global warming…an...
Frank Watson’s article showing his skepticism about climate change issues brought to mind something that has become apparent to me over the last few years. People in general believe in the validity of science except when it comes to choosing science over cultural beliefs. I can ask anyone two questions concerning science and find out a tremendous amount about that person. I can’t tell their race, their income or their amount of education. But I can tell you if they are liberal or conservative leaning. The questions: 1) What are your views on...
With all the news about the coronavirus, many are wondering about the impact of a truly global-wide pandemic on world population. I got to thinking about the population implications of such pandemics and ran a few numbers. The Spanish flu is thought to have killed about 50 million globally when the estimates for global population was about 1.75 billion for lethality of 3 percent. If the true lethality for coronavirus is 3 percent, that would work out to about 231 million deaths for the current world population of 7.7 billion. For comparison,...
Gary Varvel’s political cartoon on the opinion page of the Gazette on Feb. 20, 2020, depicting presidential candidate Bernie Sanders in a wheelchair with a Soviet Union flag draped over his lap, being pushed off a cliff by a donkey, is offensive to many Americans and a gross distortion of reality. This sort of political opinion is not at all helpful in furthering reasonable political discourse in our nation. Mark Olson, Seattle...
Last week, we visited the Grand Canyon National Park in northern Arizona. It is part of our National Parks “bucket list.” The trip was a real eye-opener. The Canyon is spectacular. It is hard to believe over a billion years ago it was flat ground and covered by ocean waters. In ancient times, there was too much water. Today, it is a deep gorge with a ribbon of water running through it. The Grand Canyon is 277 miles long, over a mile deep and 10 to 18 miles across. The famed Colorado River runs t...
I've ranted about the expression "Breaking News!" before. But like any issue I confront, it only gets worse. So it is with this one. Nowadays, all the networks, without exception, open each and every newscast with that worn-out expression. Obviously, the anchormen and -women have been ordered to start with their robust "BREAKING NEWS" declaration as a way of contriving drama and immediacy, even if the top story happened hours ago. It's the handiwork of the marketing consultants who rule TV reporting, hucksters whose job it is to improve ratings...
The rich are different from you and me -- they can buy themselves instant presidential campaigns. Former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg has elbowed himself into the Democratic nomination race solely on the basis of his fortune. His campaign is high-handed as only a billionaire many times over could even contemplate. He entered late, is skipping the early contests and hasn't participated in any of the debates to date (although that will change soon, thanks to the Democratic National Committee retrofitting its rules for Bloomberg). It's a free...
Okeydokes Big, billowy clouds, little snowbally things... my favorite. Love this weather. Matt Swan, local representative for Avista. For all you do in our community!...
Climate change Most of us are aware that rising sea levels due to climate change are threatening coastal cities in the United States, dramatically exemplified by Miami, Fla. Although I am aware that climate change is a grave threat and seems to be accelerating all the time, I must admit to a tiny bit of smugness at living on the Palouse, at our seemingly un-encroach-able elevation of circa 2,500 feet above sea level. However, my sense of security was shaken recently by the piece “Paradise Creek flirts with flood stage in Moscow” (Mo...
About the only non-fiction I read is the local newspaper. I try to avoid the New York Times and Washington Post so I am confident I am reading real news. Other than that, I usually read light fiction; shoot-em-up detective stories, super human heroes, etc. My son, however, has not given up on improving my intellect and frequently urges me to read something he considers worthwhile. He sent me a copy of The Silk Road several months ago, and I finally got around to looking at it last week. It is a historical examination of the trade route between...
The 2020 race for the White House is heating. It’s shaping up to be a referendum on America’s market-based economic system. The central question is government or the private sector going to provide our basic products and services? Last May, a Monmouth University Poll found most Americans say socialism is not compatible with American values, but only 4-in-10 hold a decidedly negative opinion of it. Americans are divided into two dominant camps – 29 percent have a positive view of capit...
When Donald Trump was looking into Ukraine last year, how concerned was he about presidential candidate Joe Biden? Enough that he wanted foreign help to beat him? If so, wouldn't that be about the most overestimated Joe Biden has been in his life? Biden is not a good candidate. Four years ago, it was more likely, but a month from now he'll be out of the 2020 race. Show a reel of his highlights, good and bad, from the last eight months and any honest observer would say; some president was worried...
It's not just that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo chewed out NPR reporter Mary Louise Kelly after she dared to ask him questions he didn't like. Nor is it so objectionable that his tirade was saturated with F-bombs. And it certainly is not because she's a woman. When it comes to reporters, Pompeo is not just a misogynist but a mistersogynist. He's an equal opportunity jerk, as evidenced by his decision to block NPR from his plane for his trip to Kyiv. No wonder President Trump likes him so much. He's not your stereotypical diplomat, but he...
And so 2016 finally draws to a close. It's been the longest election year in American history. It ran from Feb. 1, 2016, the date of the Iowa caucuses, to the Senate vote to acquit President Donald Trump in early February 2020. It's true that Nov. 6, 2016, was a signal event in this long election year, but it didn't really conclude anything, even though the result wasn't in doubt. Usually, contested elections are ties or near-ties. This is the first time an election has gone into overtime, with repeated attempts at what were in effect...
