This blog is designed to give readers a glimpse of our editorial-page operation and how we make our decisions. We’ll let you know who we’re meeting with, what they’re telling us, what events and issues we’re looking at. We’ll also pass on information and observations that may not make our print editions. In addition to the editorial board members who post on this blog, the board includes Publisher David Zeeck, Executive Editor Karen Peterson and Managing Editor Dale Phelps.
Editorial board bloggers
Editorial page editor Patrick O’Callahan oversees the online and printed opinion sections of The News Tribune. He came to The News Tribune in 1987 and has worked at Washington newspapers since 1979. E-mail him at patrick.ocallahan@thenewstribune.com
Editorial writer Cheryl Tucker, in addition to writing commentary, manages the daily production of the editorial and op-ed pages and edits letters to the editor. She began her journalism career in 1974 at a Virginia newspaper and came to The News Tribune in 1978. E-mail her at cheryl.tucker@thenewstribune.com.
Editorial writer Kim Bradford manages the online opinion section of The News Tribune and writes commentary. She joined The News Tribune in 2005 after working 11 years at newspapers in Washington and Maryland. E-mail her at kim.bradford@thenewstribune.com.
Guest bloggers
Editor emeritus David Seago retired from The News Tribune in 2008 after 41 years at The News Tribune. E-mail him at sds99@harbornet.com.
Richard Davis’ column on state politics frequently runs in the print edition of The News Tribune. He was president of the Washington Research Council, a statewide think tank, from 1986 through 2006. Currently, as a principal with The Simeon Partnership, Inc. he coordinates the activities of the Washington Alliance for a Competitive Economy, a business coalition founded by the Research Council, the Association of Washington Business and the Washington Roundtable.
Karen Irwin of University Place, a mother of four, has been a frequent contributor to The News Tribune's print editions. She has also written for Seattle's Child, Puget Sound Parent, the Tacoma Weekly, the Fayetteville Observer Times and the political blog Right Meets Left. She graduated from California Lutheran University with a degree in English literature and is currently working toward a history degree.
Michael Allen, professor of history at the University of Washington Tacoma, was born and raised in Ellensburg. He served with the U.S. Marines in Vietnam from 1969-70. He has written five books, including the prize-winning "Patriot's History of the United States: From Columbus' Great Discovery to the War on Terror," "Rodeo Cowboys in the North American Imagination" and "Western Rivermen, 1763-1861: Ohio and Mississippi Boatmen and the Myth of the Alligator Horse." Allen lives in Tacoma and Ellensburg and has three children.
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It just occurred to me that I've gone for weeks without getting a whiff of tobacco smoke anywhere. Not outdoors, not indoors.
Something's working – some combination of steep cigarette taxes, peer pressure, indoor smoke bans and slow-on-the-uptake folks finally getting it. A new survey finds that the rate of adult smoking in Washington has fallen to 16.5 percent.
In other words, five out of six Washingtonians have quit smoking, or else they never got started. Sadly, most of the Washingtonians who still smoke are either poor or undereducated.
To see how Washington stacks up against other states in tobacco use, check this chart from the Kaiser Family Foundation. We're doing a heck of a lot better than West Virginia, where the rate is 26.8 percent, but still worse than Utah, where it's 11.7 percent.
As a country, we're at roughly 20 percent. That's less than half of the rate in 1965 – 42 percent. Progress!
In an editorial I wrote about the University Place City Council decision on domestic partner benefits, I mentioned the challenge employers will have in coming years finding replacements for the wave of retiring baby boomers.
This article that came across the wire looks at how some employers are trying to improve their ability to deal with those retirements.
Demographics, not destiny
By Grant Freeland, Anders Fahlander and Chuck Scullion
With as many as 15,000 air traffic controllers expected to retire by 2017, the Federal Aviation Administration is ramping up recruitment, hiring and training, even advertising on MySpace and Craigslist.
The FAA is not alone. A third of all employees on the federal government’s payroll in 2007 will be eligible to retire by 2012. Private companies and many professions face similar problems, with the percentage of workers 55 years and older in manufacturing, transportation, utilities, finance, education, medicine and state and local government ranging from 17 percent to 21 percent.
With a civilian workforce of approximately 145.5 million people, the retirement bulge creates a huge challenge for our country and economy.
The rolling disaster on Wall Street continues. The mysterious AIG – now being bailed out by the Treasury Department – is a perfect example of the hidden connections of the credit crisis.
The state’s new and as yet underfunded rainy day account should be a last resort, not a first.
About our editorials:
If you have comments or questions about these topics, please email them to patrick.ocallahan@thenewstribune.com. Editorials represent the consensus view of The News Tribune's editorial board.
Want to sit in on a daily ed board meeting? Email cheryl.tucker@thenewstribune.com to make an appointment.
