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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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.
There’s one thing to like – and lots to dislike – about the leading plan to bail out two U.S. automakers.
The positive: The money’s coming from a fund already set aside for the automakers. Its original purpose was to help them retool to build more energy efficient vehicles. The shift makes sense – these companies won’t be doing much retooling if they’ve gone out of business.
Here’s what’s not to like about the bailout:
No one is pretending that the run on public money is going to stop at $14 billion. Some industry analysts believe it would ultimately take $125 billion to keep GM and Chrysler in business.
This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.
To understand how the cleanup of Hanford depends on a nuclear waste repository in Nevada, work backward.
Without the repository, there will be no permanent disposal of any of the nation's intensely radioactive reactor wastes.
Opponents of the Yucca Mountain project talk vaguely of other possibilities, but there are no other possibilities in the real world. Yucca Mountain is more dry and isolated than any realistic alternative, and it's been studied to death for more than 20 years.
Without permanent burial of reactor wastes, Hanford will be saddled with the radioactivity of 53 million gallons of waste now held in 177 steel tanks on the Eastern Washington reservation.
But that's just the beginning. The likely alternative to a repository – an alternative now favored by President-elect Barack Obama – is "interim" storage of all commercial nuclear power plant waste at secure federal sites.
Over at the Political Buzz, Joe Turner has blogged about the seemingly secret list of 60 projects that state officials want to fund with federal stimulus money. (To be fair, a state spokesman told Joe that the list is not secret, it's just that there is no one list and won't be until the state knows more about the feds' criteria.)
Anyone who fears that the infrastructure stimulus will be laden with pork has good reason to worry, according to the founder of Reason Foundation. Robert Poole, writing in the Wall Street Journal, offered some specifics:
What vital infrastructure projects would cash-strapped taxpayers get for their $73 billion? Here's a sampling:
-Hercules, Calif., wants $2.5 million in hard-earned taxpayer money for a 'Waterfront Duck Pond Park,' and another $200,000 for a dog park.
-Euless, Texas, wants $15 million for the Midway Park Family Life Center, which, you'll be glad to note, includes both a senior center and aquatic facility.
-Natchez, Miss., 'needs' a new $9.5 million sports complex 'which would allow our city to host major regional and national sports tournaments.'
-Henderson, Nev., is asking for $20 million to help 'develop a 60 acre multi-use sports field complex.'
-Brigham City, Utah, wants $15 million for a sports park.
-Arlington, Texas, needs $4 million to expand its tennis center.
-Miami, Fla., needs $15 million for a 'Moore Park Community Center, Tennis Center and Day Care' facility. The city is also desperate for $3.6 million to build a covered basketball court and a new tennis court at Robert King High Park. Then there's the $94 million Orange Bowl parking garage you are being asked to pay for.
-La Porte, Texas, wants $7.6 million for a 'Life Style Center.' And Oakland, Calif., needs $1 million for Fruitvale Latino Cultural and Performing Arts Center.
And you thought infrastructure investment meant roads, bridges and schools. It is clear that any infrastructure stimulus money given to the country's mayors will lead to thousands of tennis centers to nowhere.
1. There’s not much to like and a lot to dislike about the $14 billion bailout of U.S. automakers.
2. Washington’s prospects of getting Hanford cleaned up now rest on two thin reeds: Educating the Obama administration about the critical need for opening a nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, and somehow outmaneuvering Harry Reid.
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.
