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Tax season is over, so now we have time to consider how our tax dollars are being spent. One glaring concern should be our funding of the Israeli military. Part of that money is used to incarcerate and torture Palestinian children as young as 10 years old — arresting them at night, harassing them, keeping them in frigid rooms, forcing them to sign confessions in a foreign language without defense lawyers or parents — in military not civilian courts. Convictions are 99 percent according to UNICEF. These terrible pro...
Frank Watson’s Guest Commentary “Religious Freedom Condemns Terrorism” is another in an unfortunately long history of predominantly conservative commentators criticizing Muslims for not condemning terrorism perpetrated by Islamic extremists. Watson is “still waiting for a Muslim spokesman to condemn 9/11.” He goes on to say that the terrorist attacks in Sri Lanka were, “absolutely denounced throughout the globe…except by Islamic political and religious leaders,” who he claims, “were conspicuously quiet.” Then tangentially,...
President Trump’s pro-energy policies are on a collision course with his protectionist policies. Let’s hope, for the sake of the economy and energy independence, energy policies prevail. At a time when U.S. oil production is at an all-time high, the president’s tariffs on metals are raising the cost of pipeline and drilling materials. In the last few years, breakthroughs in extracting oil and natural gas secured America’s spot as a top energy producer. Last year, U.S. production surpassed both Russia and Saudi Arabia....
Twenty years ago, Washington voters outlawed ethnic discrimination within our state. Initiative 200, passed by a decisive popular vote, specified that employers or those granting contracts, “shall not discriminate against nor grant preferable treatment … on the basis of race, sex, ethnicity or national origin.” This past Sunday during their last minute session, our Legislature struck down the people’s initiative. Ethnic background is now a required criteria for evaluating new employees and granting state contracts. Propone...
As president, Donald Trump has leaned heavily upon what he has called an “America First” policy. This nationalist approach involves walking away from cooperative agreements with other nations and relying, instead, upon a dominant role for the United States, under girded by military might, in world affairs. Nevertheless, as numerous recent opinion polls reveal, most Americans don’t support this policy. The reaction of the American public to Trump’s withdrawal of the United States from key international agreements has been host...
“One of the biggest challenges of the 21st Century is dealing with the progress of the 20th Century — especially old computers, monitors, cellular phones and televisions. These appliances depend on potentially hazardous materials, such as mercury, to operate. After a five-to-eight year useful life, many are tossed into dumpster and sent to landfills where they can leach into the soil and groundwater.” That was the opening paragraph of a column I wrote 20 years ago. Howev...
This week I had the privilege of eating lunch at a local middle school while working on a story. In the process, I talked to school officials and some students about what they were eating and the importance of a good meal during the school day. Over the course of my career I’ve talked to kids at sporting events, political rallies, domestic violence shelters and volunteer events. These conversations have led me to one conclusion, which I can look upon with absolute clarity. We don’t give kids enough credit. Children are con...
On March 15, a small group of white supremacists attacked a mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand, killing 50 worshipers. Political and religious leaders throughout the world condemned the act and the terrorists. The six gunmen were rounded up and will be punished to the limit of New Zealand law. As far as we know, the motivation of the attack was more racial than religious. In retaliation, a group of Islamic terrorists sent seven suicide bombers to Christian targets in Sri Lanka last week. They inflicted 800 casualties, 300...
Carbon dioxide is the thermostat of earth’s atmosphere. That was demonstrated by John Tyndall, a British physicist, in experiments done in his laboratory in the 1850s. Using a relatively simple apparatus he showed infrared radiation (heat) passes through oxygen and nitrogen gases unimpeded, whereas carbon dioxide, even in low concentrations, absorbs heat. Light energy from the sun (a spectrum of wavelengths) passes to the earth’s surface with little absorption, bringing the energy that is transformed into heat at the ear...
My moniker for this president is Desperate Donald. Now the Mueller report shows the moniker is a good one: It tells us that Trump went bonkers, fearing Mueller’s appointment spelled “the end of my presidency.” In June 2017 Trump told the White House counsel, Don McGahn, to fire Mueller. McGahn refused. Other attempts by Trump to get subordinates to undermine Mueller’s work also failed, the report shows. Publicly, Trump sought to debunk the Russia investigation on an almost daily basis; 1,100 times, to be exact (accord...
By ANDREW MEYERS and TOM VANDER ARK Contributors Lyft recently announced that it would be going public. Uber isn’t far behind. In little more than a decade, the two companies have upended the transportation sector -- and transformed how we think about both transportation and work. If only we could bring that sort of innovation to our nation’s education sector. American schools have scarcely evolved since the days of the horse and buggy. Our educational system incentivizes memorization and rote learning in the age of Goo...
Our state Legislature has accomplished all their goals. They have outlawed eyeball tattoos, enacted the biggest budget increase in history, raised the price of gasoline, and enabled the worst school funding debacle since statehood. Having done all this with time to spare, they recently voted to change the amount of available daylight. As I understand the logic, too many people get confused during the change from daylight savings to standard time, so we should quit changing. Making daylight savings time permanent would give us...
I’d like to offer a contrast of ideals and character for your consideration. I recently had the pleasure of interviewing several Medical Lake High School students, members of the Circuit Breakers robotics team. I went into the interview not knowing what to expect, having never spoken with a teenager involved with robotics. I guess I expected some serious nerdiness. What a pleasant surprise it was. The kids I spoke with were polite, intelligent, engaging, enthusiastic and d...
Big headlines announce one in 12 Spokane teachers may lose their jobs. Those who follow my column may remember last fall when the Legislature poured money into K-12 education statewide, I said it would do little, if anything, to improve classroom education. As predicted, the first in line to grab the money was the teachers’ union. I blamed the State Supreme Court for mucking around in areas beyond their expertise. I blamed the Legislature, recently unconstrained by a conservative majority in either house, for pouring money w...
Before the ever turning news cycle moves on spotlight-fashion to the next attention-consuming item, some thoughts on the April 15 fire at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. First, despite early fears, a lot of the 850-year-old Gothic masterpiece of architectural, cultural and religious importance is intact and capable of being salvaged. The organ and most associated pipes are safe, along with much of the stained glass in the building, including the Rose Windows from the 13th century. In fact, video posted on CNN Tuesday from...
If you have been reading the Cheney Free Press with any kind of regularity, you will have noticed something troubling. At least it’s troubling to me. In the last year, especially the last six months, Cheney has had to say goodbye to some people that have really made a difference in our community. There are people that reside in Cheney, and then again, there are people that “live” in Cheney. We have lost so many that have made this community what it is today, and I worry that there won’t be anyone to step up and take their p...
I would like to thank Paul and Martha Harris, for helping us in a dire time of need. Very recently my father passed away and a few days later our pump broke. It was very overwhelming, for my family and I. We didn’t think we could make it through everything, but when Martha started to help us, it helped us see that it was possible to make it through it. She and her husband Paul both helped organize something to help us a lot. One of Paul’s good friends, Dick and Kyle Swegle, helped us to get our pump back up and working. Our...
By SHANNEN TALBOT Staff Reporter March was fraught with conflict for educators and parents across the county when the U.S Office of Management and Budget proposed the elimination of nearly $18 million in Special Olympics funding. Lights. Smile. Curtain up. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos defended the budged on Capitol Hill, even though the billionaire personally donated to the organization. A massive public outcry ensued despite the slim chance that Congress would approve such a move, and following the potential public...
My heart goes out to the children who are caught up in our adult problems: migrant children separated from families and abused at the southern border; Palestinian children in Israeli jails and in the March of Return, Nigerian girls kidnapped from their schools; Yemeni and Syrian children starving and dying from blockades and airstrikes and American children at Sandyhook and Parkland schools, to name a few recent massacres in our country. Of course, with the present administration, more American children may go without food...
Yippeee! I finished my taxes. I was concerned after the media horror stories of taxpayers who expected considerable refunds only to discover they owed thousands to the IRS. I didn’t know what to expect. I was happy to discover my small refund was approximately the same as I have received for the last 10 years or so. I guess those horror stories were rare exceptions broadcast for shock effect. After I electronically submitted my return, I did some quick calculations and was a bit surprised that I paid just under 10 percent o...
Recently I learned that the Washington State Patrol has added additional officers, and resources to Gov. Inslee’s protection detail because of his presidential campaign. This begs the question of why we the citizens of Washington should subsidize the cost of our governor running for another office. The people of Washington elected him to serve as our governor and to conduct the business of our state. Even if no state resources are being used for his campaign, he cannot devote his entire attention to the needs of our state, as...
Trustworthy is the PACE character trait for April. As a former school counselor and now teacher, I’ve learned a lot about trustworthiness working with students and families. To be trustworthy means to be someone that others can trust and count on to be reliable. Trustworthiness is essential for healthy relationships including your relationships at school, work, at home and in the community. Being able to place trust in a person means that you have faith that they will follow through on a responsibility or keep something safe....
Our democracy has become dysfunctional, and it’s all part of the sideshow of distraction. Meanwhile, special interests — read moneyed interests — have taken over the legislative decision-making processes that are intended for all, not just for the wealthy few. I was privileged to serve as a legislative intern during the financially desperate 2010 Washington state legislative session. Revenue forecasts at the time were in the red in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisi...
Before our country, in haste, dives totally into renewable energy, we must carefully evaluate its impacts. By just focusing on eliminating natural gas, liquid fuels (gasoline and diesel) and coal to combat climate change, we ignore the effects of other forms of pollution generated by processes in which renewable energy components are made. Under the Green New Deal, the United States would become 100 percent reliant on renewable energy in a decade and eliminate CO2 producing...
I was tired of shoveling snow the other day and needed some comic relief, so I decided to read the most recent newsletters sent out by my state representative. Finding out what is happening at our state capitol is challenging. I usually start with the newsletters, then Google for more details. If you don’t get these newsletters, you should. Your representative’s office will gladly add you to their email list. Then you, too, will have something to break up the monotony of late winter. As our governor has been reborn as the...
