Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
Sorted by date Results 3267 - 3291 of 3750
Positive aspects I am a Rosalian — Yes me, the Clerk/Treasurer with the English accent. I am Irish and proud of that, but I am also proud that I have an American passport because my Dad was born in Brooklyn, N.Y. My Dad was in the American Army for 22 years and was awarded a Silver Star for his service in Vietnam fighting for the American dream. I am proud of who I am and where I came from. I am proud of the town I live in and, for the most part, of the people with whom I share this Town. Unfortunately, there are some people who claim to l...
I was recently stuck on an elevator — an event made no less dramatic by the fact that the doors were open. OK, maybe a little less dramatic. I was by myself on the elevator, having just been to the dentist to have my teeth and my wallet scraped clean. It was descending smoothly, when all of a sudden it stopped dead with a loud, slamming jolt similar to what it felt like when I saw the bill for the dentist. There was a grinding noise, and then the doors eased open between floors, though there was about 2 feet of space at the top where I could cr... Full story
The confrontation between Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and state employees has focused the nation’s attention on government unions. With the Badger State facing a $137 million budget deficit and a projected $3.6 billion shortfall over the next two years, Walker wants public employees to contribute more to their health-care and pension costs. He also wants to curb the power of public-sector unions, a move that has ignited massive protests across the nation, even in states like Washington where no such effort is being considered. Union leaders s... Full story
IT’S BAD ENOUGH that a new survey says the average price of regular gasoline in the United States has jumped 33 cents per gallon in the last two weeks. You’d think that alone would make people who sell it appreciate their customers who might otherwise be contemplating trying out an electric car. I’m sure some do. But let me give you two recent examples where that was not the case. I won’t name the stations. The ones I am speaking of may be singular in their attitudes and I don’t want to knock all of their brand. Many stations have gone to requi...
#!*! The person who gets to write off a quarter million dollars. Can you do my check book? #!*! The new election space. The money could have been better spent and now they are complaining about not having a kitchen. Come on. #!*! The parks are a waste station for most of the dogs in town. Send your Pet Peeves and Okeydokes to the Gazette P.O. Box 770 Colfax, Wa 99111 Pet Peeves and Okeydokes should be short. One sentence is often enough. They also cannot be personal. Please sign longer submissions so they can be run as letters to the...
There is something perverse about it. The biggest lobby group in Washington state is government itself. Nearly every segment of state government and state funded operations has a lobbying effort to argue and advocate for their own specific programs and needs. And, who do these government paid lobbyists lobby? They lobby themselves—the state of Washington. According to recent estimates, millions in tax generated money is spent by government to lobby for more tax generated money. In fact, last year, state-paid lobbyists spent the most money of a...
Some members of Congress complain that American corporations are “shipping jobs overseas.” But an analysis by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce reveals that U.S. regulators are doing virtually the same thing due to the high cost of excessive regulations. Federal rules alone in the past few years have exploded, and the Chamber finds it cost our economy $1.7 trillion. State labor and employment laws are costing the U.S. 700,000 jobs; paring back state regulations that exceed federal standards alone would spawn 50,000 new businesses each year. The Cha... Full story
THERE’S PROBABLY nobody happier that the snow is gone — well, it’s gone at my place — than my two flying squirrels. It has been their daily habit to show up next to the log on which I sit each morning while I eat an apple after picking up the daily papers. They await discard of the core, which I drop next to the log, then get up and walk up the driveway to the house. Me, that is, I walk up to the house, not the squirrels. I know they eat the core because every morning the previous morning’s core is gone. They also have gotten familiar... Full story
++++ Those who look for the good in all. You know who you are. ++++ Okeydokes! #!*! Community members who forget to take their Prosac?? #!*! Who runs the Grandma’s shop??? The hired man??? #!*! CHS cheerleaders performing their “foot tapping cheer” during the opponents free throws—no other school does that. #!*! First the commissioners, then the school, then the city, now the grandmothers. What next—babies? #!*! Reporters who fail to report the facts and look for the negative in all stories. #!*! Pet peeves! #!*! The Thrifty Grandmoth... Full story
Nationally, two high school students died last week in sports related incidents. Both had undiagnosed heart problems. These tragic deaths come on the heels of increased concern over head injuries and concussions in sports. Sports can be dangerous. Overexertion and heat-related problems have led to deaths, too. Just a few years ago, a student died on the field playing against LaCrosse/Washtucna. Injuries, of course, can cause serious problems, but so can a player’s undiagnosed medical condition. In response, some are recommending medical s...
Ripped from the headlines: Two superhero groups in Seattle are caught up in an epic struggle over whether they should fight crime or just deliver sandwiches. I’d explain the joke, but there isn’t one. According to The Wall Street Journal, a man named Phoenix Jones leads a group of superheroes called the Rain City Superhero Movement. Every night, Jones dons a costume of black and gold body armor with matching helmet and goes out to fight bad guys in the city, which has the members of the competing Real Life Superhero Movement up in arms bec... Full story
I hope you enjoyed arriving in Colfax 1.67 seconds faster than I did. Whatever you do with that precious time, that was worth risking my life and yours, I hope you use it well. It goes like this. I’ll be driving back to Pullman from Spokane on a Sunday evening, driving peacefully behind a line of cars ahead of me. We have all picked a speed that works for us, because we have all been driving at that same speed since Spangle. We’re okay with it. Then you appear in my rearview mirror, a dot on the horizon. Within seconds, you are less than 10...
Dirt slides In response to the pet peeve published in the Feb. 17 edition regarding the “tax payer” and state of the clean up of dirt slides by farmers working their fields too close to the edge. Would this person rather see miles of Russian Thistle, Canadian Thistle, Kochlo weed, Dog Fennel and many other unsightly weeds on their drive through the county and state? When fall comes, these weeds will break off and seed themselves through miles of countryside including family back yards and gardens. Also, these weeds will plug up state and cou...
My dad insists an occasional fried pastry never hurt anybody, using the word “occasional” to mean “daily.” “Everything I eat is good for me,” he insists, and I have to agree that his diet is certainly healthier than, say, gunfire. Otherwise, the high-fat food he consumes, rich in cholesterol and carbohydrates, is exactly what doctors tell us we should never eat if we want to live a long life. My father is 84 years old. Oh, and he’s also a doctor. True, his heart has more bypasses than the Los Angeles Freeway System. True, he has hearing aids...
Two years ago in a speech to U.S. House Democrats, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer predicted that America was headed for “a fundamental economic reset.” According to Ballmer, for 25 years our economy grew on unrealistically cheap debt. That is over. Since Ballmer’s remarks, our national debt has continued to grow and now surpasses $14 trillion, President Obama and Congress are struggling with massive federal budget deficits, state and local governments are drowning in red ink, and protesters are massing at state capitols demonstrating again...
ITEM–The Iraqi defector, whose claims that Saddam Hussein was hiding weapons of mass destruction was part of the Bush administration’s justification for the 2003 invasion of Iraq, has admitted for the first time that he fabricated the story. Rafid Ahmed Aiwan ai-Janabi, known as Curveball to the intelligence units of several nations, told the British newspaper The Guardian that he fabricated the story to topple the Hussein regime. It was okay to lie, he said, because that was the only way to get rid of Saddam. COMMENT–I’ve only seen this in...
+++ The positive thoughts shared by Hubers Freight. #!*! The doggie daycare in the county’s IT department is violating county code. +++ The Thrifty Grandmothers for all of the wonderful causes they support in our community. Send your Pet Peeves and Okeydokes to the Gazette P.O. Box 770 Colfax, Wa 99111 Pet Peeves and Okeydokes should be short. One sentence is often enough. They also cannot be personal. Please sign longer submissions so they can be run as letters to the editor.... Full story
Surveillance cameras are everywhere. They have become a symbol of this new world. Nearly any crime story shows some victim or suspect tracking through a store, an airport or a back alley. Videos of missing persons and convenience store robberies are daily fare. Even roads and highways are spotted with cameras. Cameras on traffic signals catch a motorists running a red light. And, of course, it is unlikely that any large retail store is without its own surveillance system scanning every aisle and every space in the parking lot. Those little...
A recent study determined that marriages are happiest when the wife is thinner and better looking than the husband, which is why I am doing my best to be as fat and ugly as possible. Wife: Why are you having a second chocolate sundae? Me: Because I want you to be happy. I guess what happens in relationships is that men look at their pretty wives and think to themselves, “Hey, I must still have it together, my wife is hot!” And then women look at their husbands and think, “What a slob!” And for some reason, this leads to marital bliss. But if th... Full story
In Olympia, some lawmakers want to speed up the closure of the TransAlta coal-fired electricity plant near Centralia. They want to toss out the negotiated settlement Gov. Gregoire put in place to gradually replace coal with natural gas over the next decade. It’s part of an anti-coal hysteria that ignores key facts that affect our economy, families, factories, hospitals and schools. First, activists ignore the fact that, even if we reach our energy conservation and renewable energy goals for 2035, we’ll still need to generate the same per... Full story
WELL, BACK to Olympia and what our lawmakers are up to. Gov. Christine Gregoire wants to be able to name a secretary of education operating out of her cabinet rather than let the voters elect the state superintendent of public instruction. She says people already think she’s responsible for the schools. Sen. Rodney Tom, D-Belfair, obliged her by introducing a bill to just do that. She certainly isn’t the first governor to want to take the reins on education. Everyone I knew which was from Rosellini onward had his or her own education adv...
#!*! Garbage burners in Thornton. #!*! Ignorant people who do not know the facts. The WIAA had NO decision in the tournament not being in Endicott. It was voted on by the schools in the league/district to move from there. ++++ To Mrs. D: All the hard work you put in at the Grandmothers Shop. #!*! My nice donations never show up in the Granny’s shop. #!*! Where does it go? So much in the alley, nothing in the store. #!*! Donation proof gate behind the Grandmothers Shop. +++ The ease of donating to Goodwill. Send your Pet Peeves and Okeydokes t...
Thousands of Wisconsin public employees descended on the state capital to rally against the governor’s various austerity proposals and to stop his effort to end collective bargaining for state workers. Many of the protesters were teachers. Reportedly, so many of them went to the rallies that some Wisconsin school districts had to close for a day or two. While there, some state employees openly obtained false notes from doctors claiming they missed work because they were sick. By getting these excuses, they were able to collect their pay w... Full story
Want to know my secret for having written this newspaper column for 612 weeks in a row? Well, so do I. I never thought of myself as having any particular method or system for writing (and neither has my editor). I decided this week to make a detailed record of my process, so that we’ll all know how I have done it, all these years. Step one: My column is due by noon Tuesday. Like any professional, I want to make sure I give myself plenty of time to write, so at 11:30 I send an e-mail to my editor telling her that due to unique and e...
Tipping point Public Education in Washington State is at the tipping point! Unprecedented retroactive state budget cuts coupled with additional unfunded mandates continue to damage our ability to maintain, let alone continue to improve, the quality of K-12 education. Like families across the state, school districts are being told to do more with less in this economy. So, like families, school districts have become more resourceful and responsible than ever before. All those involved in our schools have worked hard to insulate our classrooms...
