Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
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I’m about to be very right or very wrong. I’m glad it doesn’t matter in newsbiz, because no one remembers what any of us writes or says; but for what it’s worth, I believe that Rand Paul has a decent shot at becoming not only the Republican nominee, but taking all the marbles in the general election next year. Speaking of marbles, did you see and hear Sarah Palin completely losing hers when she spoke at that hard-right Iowa political event? Her disjointed comments left her exposed to a lot of ridicule, including from people in her own party....
Daylight Savings Rep. Elizabeth Scott, R-Monroe, says that staying on standard time all year long would simplify our lives. I see it exactly the opposite. Here are my reasons for staying on the current saving time/standard time schedule. Reason one:. During summer, daylight begins at approximately 4:00 a.m. if we were on standard time. Most people do not get up until approximately 6:00 a.m. So two hours of daylight are not used except to sleep. In the evening the extra daylight is a welcome advantage so people can work in their gardens, golf, r... Full story
Not so long ago, measles was a fact of life. Then, because of effective vaccines and public health programs, measles was all but wiped out. The word itself dropped from common parlance. Now it is back, spreading to vulnerable populations. The number of people infected still is not great, but the disease is wildly contagious. The return and spread of measles is not because of some genetic evolution of the virus or lack of medicine. It is instead because many parents have decided not to get their children inoculated. In part, that is because of... Full story
Editor’s Note: The following column was originally published in 2010. You’d think I’d enjoy a baby shower — after all, I like to see babies (I even was a baby once), and I like to take showers. But I’ve always elected to avoid them because no one has ever invited me. That all changed when a former co-worker asked a bunch of us over to celebrate her former pregnancy. She now had a little 6-month-old girl she named Andie and wanted to throw a coed baby shower so all of the men would feel stupid. See, baby showers have their own rules and their... Full story
Can you imagine a nation’s president, a former guerilla fighter with socialist leanings, enacting policies that favor business and encourage foreign investment? How about a leader who prefers living in a farmhouse rather than the presidential mansion? That person is José Mujica, the 79-year old president of Uruguay who finishes his five-year term in March. Uruguay, a small South American country sandwiched between Argentina and Brazil, does not allow a president to stand for reelection, so later this spring, Mujica will take a seat in the se...
The White House has now become a stickler for protocol, especially when it comes to relations between the two political branches. The new persnicketiness arises from House Speaker John Boehner’s invitation to Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu to speak before a joint session of Congress in March. The invite is being denounced as a major breach and new low in Washington because he didn’t, as had been the traditional practice with such invitations, coordinate with the White House. As far as violations of the separation of powers in the Oba...
This column received this week was written before Mitt Romney announced he would not run for president. Do politicians flat-out lie, or do they merely backtrack? The answer is both, but in Mitt Romney’s case, the backtracking is so frequent, so practiced, that the guy rivals Michael Jackson with his moonwalking. A little traipse down memory lane to the 2012 campaign reveals how frantically Romney reversed himself whenever it was expedient. Pro-choice in an earlier political incarnation? No problem in 2012, when he needed to be pro-life. A leadi...
The Seattle Seahawks lost Super Bowl XLIX. With 26 seconds left in the game, the Seahawks were on the one-yard line. They had two downs and one time out to make a touchdown. What do they do? They pass. The ball is intercepted. The New England Patriots win. Seahawks coach Pete Carroll was immediately savaged by fans, the press and just about everyone else for the call. Still, it was a great, close game and a great show. That pass was not the only bad Super Bowl moment. The Nationwide commercial is another one. But, Kim Kardashian and husband Kan... Full story
With gas prices plummeting to less than $2 a gallon, some politicians think this is the ideal time to increase state and federal gas taxes. The theory is when gasoline is expensive, voters vehemently oppose higher gas taxes; but when the price drops, motorists don’t pay as much attention. They just fill up and drive off, thankful for the savings. The flaw in that theory is that gas prices will inevitably climb again. But a larger concern is that the debate over fuel taxes distracts us from the real question: what is the best way to pay for r...
Bravo Sunnyside As I arrived to work on Friday morning (January 16, 2015) I was greeted by the silence of being the first employee to enter into the cubicle maze of doom that consumed me five days a week. Just a few minutes later as I was coming out of the break room to begin my daily routine of turning computers on, in walked a co-worker with a great big smile on her face. I was in wonder as I had remembered her saying she was going to some kind of “event” at her granddaughters elementary school the evening before. Moments later after she had... Full story
Clint Eastwood’s new movie, “American Sniper,” marks the return of the American war hero. Heroism on the battlefield had never gone away, of course, far from it (witness the Medal of Honors awarded for acts of extraordinary valor in Iraq and Afghanistan). But the classic war hero is more than just brave or fierce. He is famous and almost universally acclaimed. On top of his battlefield exploits, he is a cultural phenomenon. That is what “American Sniper” unquestionably makes of Chris Kyle. The late Navy SEAL sniper had already written a...
Back at the beginning of my TV career, in Cleveland local news, on-camera minority reporters were few and far between. Our business was just discovering the imperative of diversity. We had just one on our staff, a guy named Peter. Pete taught me a lesson that I’ve remembered through the decades. The KKK was having a gathering in Cleveland, and, for some ridiculous reason, Pete was assigned to cover it. Pro that he was, he went to the event and ended up doing an interview with the grand dragon. Happily, the cameraman made sure to stay in a t...
“While we’re young” is a phrase the PGA has used to encourage faster play on golf courses. It has some applicability to Whitman County government. After years of problems, missteps and lack of progress, Whitman County has hired experts to help fix the financial accounting deficiencies in the courthouse. The consulting firm has analyzed the county’s accounting system and processes. The group will make recommendations on how to fix them in a formal report. This situation involves a bit of history. For years, the county has not been able to gene...
Wrestling Let’s set the record straight. My name is Jack McBride, and I have been a proud teacher and coach in the Colfax School District for 38 years. During that time I have had the privilege to work with some super colleagues and great young people. At present I am a substitute teacher on occasion and still coach jr. high football and jr. high wrestling. I must say this helped to keep me young in heart and sore and beat up in body but still going strong. Right now I am working with seventh and eighth grade boys in the great sport of c...
The New York Times ran a front-page article after the Charlie Hebdo massacre on Europe’s “dangerous moment.” As terrorists rampaged through Paris, ultimately killing 17, what was the cause of this particular alarm? That anti-immigration parties in Europe might gain. The Times article captured perfectly the reaction of polite opinion to the Paris attacks, which is driven almost as much by fear that someone might notice that Europe has an immigration problem as it is by fear of the terrorism itself. Europe’s anti-immigration parties run the gam... Full story
Surely you didn’t believe these guys, with their promises of bipartisanship and compromise? That’s what we got from President Barack Obama, but particularly from the Republican congressional leaders after an election where Capitol Hill — all the real estate under the dome and the outbuildings — became a GOP fiefdom, facing off against the Democrats’ shrinking territory down the Pennsylvania Avenue no-man’s-land that ends at the White House. New Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell even offered a rationale for cooperation, telling The Washing...
It won’t make a good movie. It is simply too unbelievable. It is, of course, the National Football Conference championship game between the Seattle Seahawks and the Green Bay Packers last Sunday. Through most of the game, the only strength the Seahawks showed was defense, forcing the Packers into four red zone field goals. But, Seattle could not put its offensive game together. At the half, vaunted quarterback Russell Wilson had thrown three interceptions and only gained eight yards. At one point, the Seahawks were down 16-0. By the fourth q...
Editor’s Note: The following column was originally published in 2010. I have a second cousin who, as a woman in her 20s, is considerably younger than I. Well, not “considerably.” She’s a bit younger. She’s my age. At any rate, she lives in my area, many miles from her parents, which she insists is due to no intent on her part, though when she graduated from college she submitted resumes everywhere but in her home state. She is planning her wedding, and her father asked me to sit in on his behalf and represent his point of view. I thought i...
Last month, the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Detroit approved $178 million in legal and consulting fees as the city exited bankruptcy protection. It is the most expensive municipal restructuring in our nation’s history and the money paid to lawyers and consultants alone is more than it cost to run the entire Seattle City Fire Department last year. To put its total debt in perspective, the amount Detroit owes its creditors is equivalent to the entire Washington state budget for this year. Once America’s fifth largest city, Detroit has seen its pop... Full story
Book record I read with great interest the article and picture concerning a book that was 60 years overdue at the Whitman County Library. In looking closer at the information card after the book was returned recently, I discovered I knew the names of two of the customers who had checked the book out of the library in 1952 and 1953. “C. Busby” was a well known and highly respected teacher of English for many years at Colfax High School. “E. Nelson” was also an outstanding teacher of Languages, Geography, and World History. The 1954 annual,...
Obamacare has come to Harvard, and the faculty is in a state of shock and dismay. In what has to be considered an early contender for the most hilarious and enjoyable news story of the year, The New York Times recounts the tumult over Obamacare in Cambridge. “For years,” the Times writes, “Harvard’s experts on health economics and policy have advised presidents and Congress on how to provide health benefits to the nation at a reasonable cost. But those remedies will now be applied to the Harvard faculty, and the professors are in an uproar.” In...
I am one of those who mourn the passing of Mario Cuomo, and celebrate his life. Among the more enjoyable experiences of my time as a younger reporter were various conversations I was privileged to have with him during the quiet that would precede the storm of news. He could argue without offending, unless he wanted to, be provocative without provoking. He was an unabashed progressive and will be remembered as one of his generation’s most exciting speakers, inspiring with his rhetorical style as well as his ideas. Unfortunately, when it comes t... Full story
When my parents graduated from high school in 1936, a college education was too expensive for the son of a copper miner and the daughter of a plumber. Eighty years ago, our country was in the middle of the Great Depression and teens took odd jobs to help put food on the table and pay the family bills. In those days, no bank would lend money to college students. Following World War II, there was new hope. The GI bill paid for veterans to complete their college or trade school education. My father, for example, graduated from trade schools in Sea... Full story
The fainting couch doesn’t have the same cachet it did in the 19th century, which is a shame, because it should be more in demand than at any time since the age of corsets and delicate sensibilities. To put it in Victorian terms, 2014 had a case of the vapors. It needed smelling salts and a fan, and a good rest on a fainting couch to restore its bearings. It was a year when the national pastime of taking offense and of fearing that someone might be offended reached such parodic levels that even North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong Un got in t... Full story
This is the time when we are supposed to discern meaning in the year we’ve survived and somehow find hope for the new one. Sorry, folks. The meaning of 2014 was that it largely was mean, another 12 months of national decline, and 2015 will get off to a horrible start. Even as the statistics show that the recovery from economic near-death is tentatively and finally extending beyond the obscenely wealthy, the country continues its downward trajectory, often a deadly and always dangerous spiral. Nowhere is that more apparent than in the bitter d...
