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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The following editorial appears Monday in the print edition.
Justice Sanders’ outburst was hardly judicious
Yelling ‘Tyrant’ at the short-timer attorney general isn’t the best way to express a difference of opinion.
State Supreme Court Justice Richard Sanders may not have violated any judicial canons when he yelled “Tyrant! You are a tyrant!” at the U.S. attorney general during a speech last week in Washington D.C.
But he sure violated the rules of common sense and courtesy.
Sanders’ voice is clearly caught on tape, as is Attorney General Michael Mukasey’s startled expression. Mukasey later fainted – it’s not believed to be related to Sanders’ outburst – but he has since recovered.
Sanders, who played coy for a few days about whether he was the person who yelled at Mukasey, denies that his action could be described as heckling.
Sanders says he was just speaking his conscience, voicing his opposition to the Bush administration’s counterterrorism policies, which Mukasey was defending in his speech to the Federalist Society, an organization of conservative judges and lawyers to which Sanders belongs.
How long would a person be able to similarly speak his conscience at the state Supreme Court before being hauled away by security? We suspect Sanders would not long tolerate having someone in the gallery yelling “Tyrant!” at him.
Sanders has never shied away from voicing his opinion, but this outburst casts doubt on his judicial temperament. And it’s an embarrassment to the state of Washington that a member of its highest court acted so outrageously.
To his credit, Sanders says he regrets the incident and now says, “If I had it to do over again, I wouldn’t.” But then he immediately tempers that regret by suggesting he should have shouted “Tyranny!” instead of “Tyrant!”
Many Americans oppose the administration’s treatment of prisoners and its freewheeling interpretation of the Geneva Conventions. But yelling at the attorney general – who has less than two months left in office – isn’t the most judicious way to communicate that opposition.
And we have a sneaking suspicion that Sanders’ membership in the Federalist Society may be on shaky ground.
