Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
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Recently, the EPA proposed new air quality regulations for power plants that activists say will finally kill King Coal. The rule would require all new power plants to cut emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) by almost 44 percent. While natural gas plants can meet the standard, coal-fired plants cannot without expensive carbon-capture and storage technology that is not commercially available. While EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson stresses the standards will apply only to new power plants, some experts say the Clean Air Act explicitly requires the go...
ITEM—Just as the Democrats were stoking up a hit on Mitt Romney as being unacceptable by women voters, prominent Demo Hilary Rosen threw gasoline on the fire by stating that Ann Romney “never worked a day in her life.” Even Democrats joined in condemning the remark about a woman who was a stay at home mom, rearing five sons. Rosen apologized to her and “anyone else who was offended.” COMMENT—USA Today says Hillary Rosen has two children with her ex-partner Elizabeth Birch, although there is no explanation for how that came about. ITEM—Congre...
Mitt Romney says he likes to fire people. If elected, can the General Services Administration be his first target? A few (but not enough) heads have already rolled at the agency that threw itself an infamous Las Vegas conference that could have been planned by former Tyco CEO Dennis Kozlowski before he went to jail. The GSA couldn’t outdo Kozlowski, who threw his wife a birthday party on an Italian island with an ice sculpture of Michelangelo’s “David” that urinated vodka and billed his company for half the cost, but it undertook its confere...
When environmental organizations pushed Washington voters to approve their renewable energy Initiative 937, they touted biomass energy — incinerated wood waste — as one of their preferred alternatives to fossil fuel. They reasoned that biomass energy plants would help clear forests of flammable wood debris from dead and diseased timber, put idled loggers and millworkers back to work and produce cleaner, more affordable energy. But since voters narrowly approved the initiative in 2006, many of those same activists are battling against bio...
REMEMBER the 9-year-old kid who took a gun in his backpack to school in Bremerton and when he dropped the backpack on his desk the gun went off and almost killed another student? That was Feb. 22, and the victim just got out of the hospital the other day. The bullet did so much internal damage, however, that Amina Koceer-Bowman will be undergoing repairs for years to come, if not the rest of her life, She and the accidental shooter made the news again recently over a letter he wrote her apologizing for bringing the gun to school. That...
Irony was thick this week. The GSA, General Services Administration, is under fire. One manager may face criminal charges, and the administrator has resigned. It all stems from a GSA conference and team building exercise in Las Vegas in 2010. Nearly $830,000 of public money was spent on the affair. The conference turned out to be a raucous and very expensive party. What is more, the GSA regional commissioner who put on the show made several trips with taxpayer money to Las Vegas prior to the party just to scout things out. Ironically, according...
On April 21, 1962, the Seattle World’s Fair opened. The “Century 21 Exhibition” ran for six months, drew 11 million visitors, turned a profit and left the Northwest with a wonderful Seattle Center. A half century later, many of the fair’s landmarks remain, and the Center’s 73-acres is a gathering place for people from all walks of life. It is Seattle’s Central Park. The Space Needle has become Seattle’s landmark. Conceived in an architect’s notebook, it was constructed in eight months at a cost of roughly $3 million in private funds. You have...
A short time ago, LaCrosse was declared all but dead. The loss of its grocery store, declining population, a downtown fire, the negative impact of CRP and, more recently, the loss of its bank threatened the town’s future. Despite even all this, the report of the town’s demise was exaggerated. LaCrosse is seeing a resurgence. This renewal is not the result of some grand project but is instead the result of many smaller ones and many individuals working together with a common goal. Even though the town’s obituary had already been written, LaCross...
“IN YOUR COLUNM which ran in the Wilbur Register issue of March 8, in response to a younger member of your family who asked why doesn’t somebody do something about Barack Obama,” writes Gordon Green of Seattle, “you responded in part by saying ‘he keeps doing things that are unconstitutional like making recess appointments.’ “A check with the Congressional Research Service, which works closely with Congress providing policy and legal services, shows Obama has made only 28 such appointments to date. By contrast, George W. Bush made 171 and Ronal...
Crosswalk concerns With the work proposed on State Route 195 this summer, I wish to inform the Gazette’s Colfax readers about my concerns for pedestrian safety. I am particularly worried that there will be more fatalities in our crosswalks. Of particular anxiety are two intersections, one between Greg’s Electric and Columbia Bank and the other between Palouse Empire Pest Control and the Siesta Motel. At this time, the possibility for improvement in safety would seem to be better for the crossing intersection of Thorn Street and Main Street sin...
Last year, Fotis I. Antonopoulos, a successful Web designer in Athens, decided to set up his own e-business to sell olive oil products. It took him 10 months, winding his way through the city collecting dozens of forms and stamps of approval, including proof that he was up- to-date on his pension contributions, before he could get started. But, according to The New York Times, even that was not enough. In perhaps the strangest twist of all, his board members were required by the Health Department to submit lung X-rays and stool samples, since...
WELL, AFTER TWO years, the tennis ball known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, aka Obamacare, has finally landed in the U.S. Supreme Court. We may know in June, we may not know until the end of the year or we may have to wait until 2015 to learn whether it will remain the law of the land in whole or in part. Obamacare, the linchpin of President Barack Obama’s legacy, was passed on March 23, 2010, as a plan to provide health care and insurance for the 50 million Americans who are uninsured. Without it, we were told, Medicare a...
Republicans are getting closer to deciding on their nominee to run against President Barack Obama in the upcoming election. Tuesday night Mitt Romney won three more victories in the race for the party’s nomination, handily winning the primaries in Wisconsin, Maryland and Washington, D.C. The roster of possible Republican nominees has shrunk over the months. Only Rick Santorum appears to have a viable chance to oust Romney, but even in Wisconsin, where Santorum put in a significant effort, Romney won 45 percent to Santorum’s 38 percent. Rom...
Precious legacy Last week’s Gazette quotes Kirby Wilbur, state Republican Party chair, as exhorting local constituents to turn out in big numbers to “stop those wild-eyed drug-crazed Seattle liberal hippies.” Could he have been joking? He looks like a jolly man. I am tempted to point out that Seattle is also populated by a lot of fat, narrow-minded, mean-spirited hicks, but my Grandma tried to teach me good manners, and I don’t think she would have liked that. Maybe my grandma could have taught Mr. Wilbur something about good manners. Can you i...
Oregonians loathe a sales tax about as much as Washingtonians detest an income tax. Knowing that, why would Curry County commissioners put a 3 percent sales tax on the ballot later this year? The answer: Money. Curry, Oregon’s southwesternmost county, is one of a network of economically distressed rural counties throughout the West with double-digit unemployment and facing the potential loss of federal subsidies. Congress passed the Secure Rural Schools and Community Self-Determination Act in 2000 to provide transition payments to counties a...
I WAS INVITED to a luncheon meeting the other day of the WGAS group, which stands for Who Gives a (Darn.). Figure it out for yourself. It was a small crowd of old timers, retired legislators, judges, lobbyists, staffers. I knew most of them, having covered the legislature since the 1960s, although I didn’t recognize some at first. They were all friendly to me, despite the fact I didn’t shake hands with any of them, following my rule of not shaking hands during the flu season which apparently is still with us, according to the newspapers. And...
Last week’s editorial about requiring the new Colfax police chief to live in or near town needs to be revisited. The editorial stated that the new police chief should be required to live in the city or at least be within a certain distance of the city to be able to respond quickly to unforeseen circumstances. It is a good idea, but it is not an idea ahead of its time. The city had considered the idea way before the editorial came out. According to Connie Ellis, secretary of the Civil Service board, the issue of residency requirements for new c...
All about sales tax In the Gazette dated March 15th, there was a letter from a resident of Moscow who argued against the proposed Hawkins development. As has been noted in the editorial of that same date, the decision by the Board of County Commissioners to have county government bear a heavier burden to finance the infrastructure has stirred controversy. As the previous Whitman County Planning Director, now retired, my opinion of the matter has been solicited by a couple of county residents. I desired originally to keep my opinion to myself,...
When you talk about state health insurance exchanges, people’s eyes glaze over. (See, it’s happening right now.) The subject seems far too complicated and confusing. But we need to talk about them because, as you read this, state bureaucrats in Olympia are making decisions that will affect the cost and availability of your health care benefits. Your insurance company isn’t taking part in the state exchange? It doesn’t matter. The rules will still affect your choices and your costs. State exchanges are a creature of the federal health care la...
Colfax’s police chief will be retiring soon. The city has been advertising for candidates. In fact, the application deadline is Monday. All the professional requirements of the candidates will be scrutinized. Naturally, too, the personality, philosophy and demeanor of the applicants will be taken into account as will their perceived suitability for rural police work. Unfortunately, there is one factor that will not be considered. That is whether or not the new chief will live in Colfax. Local residency is not a city requirement. It cannot be a...
WELL, THIS TIME I guess he really means it. When Democrat Congressman Jay Inslee announced last year that he was going to run for governor again this year (he ran in 1996 and lost in the primary and was hinting at another try in 2004 but got cold feet) my response was I’ll believe it when I see it. But resigning his 1st district seat effective March 20 to devote fulltime to his guber (I really hate the word gubernatorial) campaign proves this is where he hopes to go. Personally, I don’t think he can beat Republican Rob McKenna who is giv...
It started in 1935 with a $3.8 million loan to Cuba for the purchase of U.S. silver ingots. That loan, backed by the U.S. government, was the beginning of the Export-Import Bank. Today, the bank helps finance export sales by thousands of U.S. manufacturers. While it is little-known outside our nation’s capital, the Export-Import Bank is a lynchpin of our economy. It provides direct loans, loan guarantees and insurance to help finance sales of American goods and services overseas. In 2011, the Export-Import Bank provided $32 billion in f...
If anyone does a year-end wrap-up of the worst ideas of 2012, losing the presidential election deserves to be high on the list. A note of gloomy wishfulness has entered Republican thinking of late. Maybe a loss in November (if Mitt Romney wins the nomination) won’t be so bad because a cleansing fire will rid the party of moderates once and for all. Or, from the opposite point of view (if Rick Santorum or Newt Gingrich were somehow to get nominated), a devastating defeat will teach the party’s purists a lesson. In any event, a Republican Con...
The county commissioners have taken a lot of heat over their support of the Hawkins retail mall project at the state line. In fact, they are being sued over it. Now, strangely enough, the debate over the project is changing. What started as claims of improper actions by elected officials has evolved into criticism of the project itself and the very idea of growth in the county. Critics are saying the Hawkins mall would hurt local businesses and would only provide low-paying retail jobs. Some have gone so far as to claim it would have an...
Adversity often brings out the best in people. We find ways to pitch in and solve problems that government can’t. Since the recession began, non-profit organizations have seen a big increase in volunteerism, and as state and local governments are forced to slash public services, volunteers are coming forward to pick up the slack. For example, after the City of Las Vegas laid off half of its park maintenance staff, neighbors put together volunteer work crews to pick up trash, wash picnic benches, trim shrubs and paint the curbs. The City of O...
