Father Bill Bichsel’s Journey of Repentance – an anti-war event in Hiroshima and Nagasaki – appears to be making a big splash in Japan.

A big enough splash that it brought the New York bureau chief of The Asahi Shimbun – Japan’s equivalent of the New York Times – to Tacoma yesterday to interview a supporter and an opponent of the event. Me as well.

Yamanaka Toshihiro, a lanky, soft-spoken man, wanted to talk about an editorial I’d written about the angry local reactions to the “journey” (which I uncharitably described as “moral preening”). The editorial neither defended nor attacked the attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki all those years ago; I was attempting to place those bombings in the larger context of a war in which the mass killing of civilians became a deliberate strategy on both sides.

World War II – which left as many as 70 million people dead – was the worst thing that ever happened to humanity, at least in the space of so few years. (The smallpox vaccine might argue to the contrary, but it had centuries on its side.)

Yamanaka wanted to know why so many of our letter writers were upset about the Journey of Repentance. He said Bichsel and company would be received as celebrities in Japan, “like Michael Jackson.”

Obviously, Americans and Japanese are going to have different takes on World War II, especially on the atomic bombings. The Japanese see the latter – quite accurately – as an unspeakable horror in which vast numbers of their countrymen (and women and children) were burned alive. Most Americans to this day tend to see the A-bomb as a brutal necessity that ultimately saved more lives than it destroyed by bringing the war to a quick end.

Still, many Americans have made gestures of sympathy to the people of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in years past without stirring up the kind of reaction we saw this time.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we’ve never really worked through ...

So said the president who brought Harvard Prof. Henry Louis Gates Jr. and police Sgt. James Crowley to the Rose Garden Thursday for the much-lampooned “suds summit.”

But Barack Obama didn’t utter those words last week. He uttered them as a presidential candidate almost a year and a half ago while trying to extricate his campaign from inflammatory comments made by Rev. Jeremiah Wright, his former pastor.

This time, Obama was doing damage control for his own comment that the police “acted stupidly” July 16 in arresting Gates, a personal friend. Obama quickly swallowed those words, but the world had already seen an American president entangling himself in a front-porch dispute in Cambridge, Mass., that he admitted knowing little about.

It was, as Obama said, “a teachable moment” – for him, for Gates and Crowley, for the country.

White Americans can take one lesson away from this: A black American man can get an Ivy League education, become a constitutional law professor, a U.S. senator and finally president of the United States – and still cringe when he hears of a black friend arrested after an unfounded suspicion of burglary.

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Let’s make this clear: The News Tribune is endorsing incumbent Linda Bird for University Place City Council Position 1. We think she is by far the best candidate in the field of three on the Aug. 18 primary ballot.

But UPlace voters might think otherwise if they’ve seen the many campaign signs posted by one of her two opponents, Dan Carnrite. Big stickers across his signs read: “Carnrite better choice,” and he attributes the quote to The News Tribune.

He took the words “better choice” out of context and is implying that he is the TNT’s choice for the position. That is not the case.

In our July 24 endorsement editorial, “Keep Linda Bird on UPlace City Council,” we clearly stated that she is the best of the three candidates. But we recognize that some voters might want an alternative to the incumbent. We wrote: “For University Place voters who are intent on change in Position 1, Carnrite is the better choice due to his background in planning in Edgewood, Pacific and Tenino.”

We are disappointed to learn that a candidate we thought had promise took our words out of context. Voters should take that into consideration when they mark their ballots.

I don’t get this “czar” thing. When did it start? Can I blame it on Nixon? Carter? Maybe the Gipper’s “drug czar”? Or can we blame it on Bill Clinton for making Hillary the “health czar”? And poor Bill Bennett. He started out as a bona fide secretary of education, but by the time he got recycled into the second Bush administration, he too had to be a “czar.”

Folks, “czars” are from Russia. They are monarchists. Hereditary autocrats. Authoritarians.

This is America. This is a republic. We don’t have “czars” in America.

Well, yes we do . . .

It seems the Democrats are now outdoing the GOP in this “czar” business. Congressman Eric Cantor, R-Va., in a recent Washington Post article, listed a few of President Obama’s “czars”:

“The administration has a Mideast peace czar (not to be confused with the Mideast policy czar), a Sudan czar and a Guantanamo closure czar. Then there's the green jobs czar, sometimes in conflict with the energy czar, who talks to the technology czar, who sometimes crosses paths with the urban affairs czar.

"We mustn't forget the Great Lakes czar or the WMD czar, who no doubt works hand in hand with the terrorism czar. The stimulus accountability czar is going through a rough time right now, as is the TARP czar – but thankfully they have to answer to the government performance czar. And seemingly everyone falls under the auspices of the information czar. In a government full of duplicative bureaucracies, adding more layers with overlapping responsibilities hardly seems the way to go.”

To be sure, Cantor exaggerates a wee bit. But the above quote doesn’t even include Obama’s famed “car czar” (who, BTW, recently quit; I can hear Michelle saying, “Barry, you gotta appoint a new car czar pronto!”)

OK, OK, I’m almost through with the “Czar” rant. But let me end emphatically: In America, we don’t want no steenking “czars”! Hey, all you “czars” out there: Get real jobs!

One of our homeboy members of Congress, Adam Smith, called us from the floor of the House of Representatives Wednesday morning to explain his uneasiness rushing health care reform (an uneasiness we share: see our editorial tomorrow).

"This bill is 1,000 pages long," he said. "I just want to make sure we take time to understand it before we move forward on it.”

Smith is right in identifying cost controls as the key to everything else.

“You will not be able in any sustained way to increase access if you do not control costs. There's not enough emphasis on cost control at this point.”

He argues that Medicare and other insurance plans have to move away from the traditional fee-for-service payment system, which rewards quantity of treatments as opposed to quality of outcomes.

Smith isn’t opposed to the controversial proposal for a so-called public option for health insurance, but he said if it were modeled on Medicare, it would "merely expand the inefficiencies of the current system."

The fact is, the expense of American medical care has already broken the bank. The country has to get a lid on it. If that doesn't happen in the current reforms – assuming they materialize – whatever comes out of Congress will be unaffordable.

The White House "Suds Summit" is over, and the speculation is rampant over its deeper meaning, if any.

Among beer fans, however, the discussion is over the participants' drinks of choice – and what they would have chosen if given the chance.

NPR consulted Atlanta beer expert Matt Simpson on the subject. Here's his perspective.

Bud Light (President Obama's choice): "Bud Light is considered a 'lawn mower' beer, perfect for after mowing the lawn or when you get home from work. It's one step up from a nice, tall glass of ice water . . . "

Red Stripe (Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr.'s choice) from Jamaica: It "is also a pale lager, but it's an official handmade product, with a little more flavor and flair."

Blue Moon (Sgt. James Crowley's choice): It "is also mass-produced, but it's an ale. It's a more flavorful beverage, with some floral character and hints of coriander and orange peel. None of these are microbrews or craft beers, but the closest is Blue Moon, a tasty beer that's a macrobrewer's attempt to join the craft beer market." (I noticed in one of the photos that Crowley had a slice of either orange or lemon in his Blue Moon. Beer fans are hotly divided on the issue of putting fruit in their beer.)

What about Vice President Joe Biden's choice: Buckler's, a non-alcoholic beer? Either he's a teetotaler, and there's nothing wrong with that, or he went the no-alcohol route to decrease the chance of saying something goofy.

Wonder if it worked.

Click here to read the NPR story.

UPDATE: Now the AP is reporting that Gates had a Sam Adams Light, not a Red Stripe. And for snacks, they munched peanuts and pretzels out of small silver bowls.

What we're working on for tomorrow:

Congress should not be trying to rush health care reform through this summer. As Rep. Adam Smith told us yesterday, a plan that would fall apart before passage upon too much scrutiny could be junked in a hurry after passage because of public backlash. That’s happened before: in Washington state in 1994 and with the Medicare catastrophic plan in 1988.

This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Sometimes even the military wants no part of the military-industrial complex.

Congress has a long, long tradition of treating military programs as pork – buying weapons for the benefit of home districts and political allies, not the armed forces.

The most flagrant recent example was the relentless congressional effort to perpetuate production of the F-22 Raptor, a futuristic stealth jet that’s all but irrelevant to the kind of fighting U.S. forces are actually doing. The Raptor would be right at home in a science fiction flick, but it can’t do a thing to fend off road bombs in Iraq or mortar attacks in Afghanistan. And it costs $331 million a copy.

Further production of the F-22 was finally shot down last week after sustained attack by President Obama, Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Sen. John McCain and others willing to face down the jet’s powerful backers.

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This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

There’s hot, and then there’s ridiculous

Hot enough for you? Why, yes, it is, and thanks so much for asking. The record-setting heat is starting to make even the coolest of customers a little, well, hot under the collar.

After intensive fact-finding and deliberation, the editorial board of The News Tribune feels compelled to take a firm stand against the present spell of excessive heat.

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Our editorial today looks at the dangers of using a cell phone or texting while driving. But they aren't the only activities that can increase your chance of getting into an accident.

DWE is a big problem, too. Driving While Eating, that is.

We all do it. I pick up a mocha at least once a week at my favorite drive-thru and commit DWS (Driving While Sipping). I've also guilty of DWM (Driving While Munching), usually on sunflower seeds while on long road trips.

I draw the line at DWEB (Driving While Eating Burgers), though, but only because I'm so messy I'd dribble condiments all over myself.

One survey, by Exxon, found that more than 70 percent of drivers eat while driving and 83 percent drink beverages. (My guess: The drivers who say they don't are lying.)

So what are the most dangerous foods to consume while driving? The Orlando Sentinel came up with a list.

We don't have rights to reprint it, but click here to read it.

You could probably guess what tops the list: hot coffee.

This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

At some point, a train has to close the doors and move out of the station. Even if more people want on board.

Sound Transit has reached that point as it prepares to lay commuter-rail tracks from Freighthouse Square through Tacoma’s Dome District and over Pacific Avenue.

Many of the district’s advocates are bitterly opposed to the transit agency’s plan to build a berm to carry the tracks through the neighborhood. They favor a “post-and-beam” design. Unlike the berm, the post-and-beam structure would be open underneath, not an impenetrable earthen wall.

This controversy quickly becomes very arcane.

For example, Sound Transit planners say the path of the sloping berm could be beautified like a parkway – and the post-and-beam alternative could wind up as a gathering place for transients and derelicts.

Opponents counter that the berm would likely become a neglected, weed-ridden eyesore, and a post-and-beam design would lend itself to vibrant commercial development.

The conflicting claims – some based on hypotheticals – are hard to sort out.

But this isn’t merely a local dispute over the future of a few blocks in downtown Tacoma.

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This editorial will appear in Wednesday's print edition.

Safety officials missed a golden opportunity

The federal agency charged with protecting the public’s safety on our nation’s highways has failed in that mission for the past six years – at least when it comes to warning drivers about the danger of using their cell phones while behind the wheel.

Back in 2003, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration had research pointing to the significant dangers posed when drivers use cell phones. It estimated that those drivers caused 955 deaths and 240,000 accidents in 2002.

But the NHTSA withheld those findings from the public, and agency officials refused to do a large-scale study of cell phone risks. Why? Because officials at the Department of Transportation didn’t want to antagonize members of Congress who controlled the highway budget.

Keeping legislators happy vs. saving lives. How could “traffic safety” officials get that one so wrong?

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"Bob," below, made this snarky comment (below) on our Tuesday editorial about missing out on federal grants to states that lead in school reforms.

Bob's point (as I understand it) is a good one: How can you fairly use student performance to evaluate teachers when there are such wide disparities in students – some wealthy and well-prepared, some disadvantaged, etc.?

I have always understood that the data would be used to measure what the teacher is doing with his or her own students – i.e., how much did a particular class learn relative to where it started out, not relative to how well students were doing elsewhere.

Am I wrong? If not, I fail to understand the unions' opposition to the use of student performance data.

Anyway, here's Bob, speaking for himself:

Bob (coldone)

"...A state must connect data on student performance to individual teachers. The logic for this is blindingly obvious: The data connection can not only help evaluate teachers, it can help evaluate the curriculum they use, the schools of education that trained them and the effectiveness of their principals..."

Fantastic idea. Finally someone has it right.

We'll collect data on the student performance of a school full of gang bangers to their teachers and also collect data on the student performance of the sons and daughters schools of doctors, lawyers, rocket scientists, etc. to their teachers.

We'll throw it in a database and all the worlds problems will be solved.

Maybe I missed that course in college where they throw apples and oranges in a blender and come up with honey?

Well, Al Gore was right after all.

Global warming is upon us, at least here in the Pacific Northwest, at least here in my kitchen. Personally I thought GW was going to be a more gradual process, a degree every century sort of thing. I didn’t think it would come this fast. Truth be told, I haven’t been this hot since I was twenty-two years old. That was the year I drove from California to Texas in a Toyota Tercel with no air conditioning and only one window that could roll down.

So it’s not as if I have never known heat. I am a former military spouse. I have lived in the South, but in the South there is little that air conditioning doesn’t touch. Those people practically put Freon in their under garments and who can blame them? The same cannot be said of our little corner of the world.

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Since House “Blue Dog” Democrats might actually save the nation from financial ruin ---by nixing or dramatically altering Obamacare and Ecocapitalism---it behooves us to review the historic origins of this august group of conservative Democrats.

Conservative Democrats?

The context of Blue Doggism is complex; please bear with me, for politics makes strange bedfellows.

Before the Civil War, it was Democrats, not Whig/Republicans, who favored states’ right and fiscal conservatism. Moreover, in the decades immediately following the Civil War, both political parties developed “liberal” and “conservative” wings. Today’s Blue Dogs are descendants of Democrat conservatives (on the Republican side, John McCain, for example, descends from progressive Republicans like Teddy Roosevelt, Early Warren, and Nelson Rockefeller).

After the Civil War, Democrats began a century-long effort to cleanse their party of the stain of its pro-slavery origins. In the South, “Redeemer” Democrats reluctantly accepted Emancipation while simultaneously ousting Republican African Americans and white GOP leaders; they “redeemed” the South by enacting Jim Crow segregation laws. Fiscally conservative, militant, and staunchly loyal, the “Solid South” became a key to national Democrat resurgence.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

In case you missed it, Washington just flunked the test for school reform.

The failure will sting. States that pass the test are eligible for a piece of $4.35 billion in federal education funding. It looks like Washington’s schools aren’t even in the running.

The money is part of an initiative called “Race to the Top.” Congress and President Barack Obama have charged Education Secretary Arne Duncan (see his commentary on the opposite page) with disbursing it to states that can serve as showcases for what works in public education.

Obama and Duncan told the country Friday how they planned to identify those states. Essentially, a state would have to demonstrate that it can implement successful, student-focused reforms in the face of political obstacles, hidebound K-12 establishments and teachers unions.

Some of their core expectations:

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Bluntness is one of Tacoma City Councilwoman Julie Anderson's virtues (or vices, perhaps, if you're on the receiving end).

This morning, Sound Transit officials led a small crowd on a walking tour of the route on which it will build Sounder tracks from Freighthouse Square to Pacific Avenue in Tacoma.

It was one of those "public process" events. Most of the people there were Dome district advocates who oppose the agency's plan to put the tracks atop a berm instead of the post-and-beam design they favor.

The engineering on the berm is mostly done. The agency has already decided that the post-and-beam structure wouldn't work as well (at least for its own purposes) and would be more expensive.

Still, the people associated with that decision – Sound Transit CEO Joni Earl and Pierce County Executive Pat McCarthy, among others – were conciliatory as could be. They left the distinct impression that they were going to hear everyone out and take everything into consideration. Which is not the same thing as saying anything's going to change.

But Anderson – a member of the Sound Transit board and now a candidate for county auditor – told me the issue is ancient history. "It's unfortunate that people think we're at a decision point, because a decision was made quite some time ago."

There's something to be said for not getting people's hopes up.

They are going to write about us you know.

Someday, in the distant future, books will be written and movies will be made about we the people who lived in the time of the Great Recession. I’m talking “Grapes of Wrath” like stories only instead of traveling across country looking for work in a run down double decker go cart, the people of our time will be symbolized by a picture of a single mother sitting in an emergency room with a crying three year old on her lap and a bored six year old at her side.

Cinematically speaking, a “Grapes of Wrath” sojourn from Oklahoma to California has a far more dramatic effect than a woman in an Emergency Room leafing through a year old edition of People Magazine, but that is our current cross to bear in the year 2009, a health care system that is really no system at all, a lopsided wasteful land where some people gorge and others starve.

I can almost hear the future movie pitches now, and yes there are two rolling around in my skull because as of yet we don’t know which one will win out. We don’t know which version will be part of the great American narrative. Will it be the struggle conservatives have to keep health care embedded in a free market system, a fight to keep an encroaching government out of a business in which they don’t belong, or will it be the liberal struggle, a story of a one hundred year old uphill climb that began with Teddy Roosevelt’s presidential platform and finally succeeded with President Barack Obama?

Here’s the fun part:

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Eric Faison’s decision not to run again for the Federal Way City Council set of a sort of gold rush for his Position 6 seat.

Five candidates want the job: Diana Noble-Gulliford, Roger Freeman, David St. John, Lorie Wood and Troy Smith. We favor Noble-Gulliford, but she’s got some good competition in the Aug. 18 primary.

Noble-Gulliford is a soft-spoken, sensible, thoughtful pillar of the community. A real estate agent, she’s lived in Federal Way for the last 40 years. She follows city issues closely. She has served on the planning commission and on the community council, which functioned as a sort of shadow government before Federal Way’s incorporation.

As president of the city’s historical society, Noble-Gulliford literally wrote the book on Federal Way. That’s a bit of an overstatement, because the recently published “Federal Way” – a history of the community – had several co- authors. But her involvement in the project reflects her deep interest in city affairs.

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From left: Figueroa, Gates, Lashley (front), Crowley

With all the uproar over the arrest of Prof. Henry Louis Gates Jr., I'm surprised there hasn't been more mention of the multi-ethnic nature of the bust.

The professor was led off in handcuffs by a rainbow trio of police officers: Sgt. James Crowley, white; Sgt. Leon Lashley, black; Patrolman Carlos Figueroa, Latino.

To muddle matters further, black officers in the Cambridge police department have been closing ranks with Crowley, describing him as a stand-up guy. Lashley, who was at the scene, said he supported Crowley's actions "100 percent."

The farther you get from Cambridge, though, the more the reaction breaks down into the old Bull Connor-vs.-uppity-black narrative. Columnist Leonard Pitts, for example, draws broad racial conclusions from the incident: "We all look like some dangerous, predatory black man intent on mayhem."

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Health care reform must begin with parsimony, not generosity. Without the former, you can’t get to the latter.

“Bending the curve” – ratcheting down the rate of hyperinflation – is the key to broadening health insurance coverage, whether it be publicly or privately financed. Without effective cost controls,
Congress could approve a plan that offers all the wonders of modern medicine to all Americans – and that plan would go bust faster than you can say “Medicare.”

At this point, the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate don’t get that. They’ve been paying lip service to frugality without proposing any serious way to achieve it.

One measure that won’t achieve it, at least by itself, comes from the House: an independent public commission that would identify effective treatments and lean on insurers not to pay for ineffective ones.

The concept is worthy. Untold billions are squandered every year on useless care, as evidenced by studies showing that retirees in communities drenched in Medicare money aren’t any healthier than retirees elsewhere.

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Here's what we're working on for over the weekend.

SUNDAY: Health care reform won't go anywhere unless it gets a handle on runaway costs.

And editorial page editor Patrick O'Callahan rides the new Central Link light rail and looks at what might have been – had King County voters not rejected transit packages in 1968 and 1970.

MONDAY: Only one Federal Way City Council race will be on the Aug. 18 primary ballot. We make our choice. That editorial will be posted here by 9 p.m. Sunday.

The accolades continue coming in for the late Walter Cronkite. But blogger/author Diana West has a different take on "Uncle Walter" – all but blaming him for the U.S. losing the Vietnam War.

Cronkite's offensive history

It’s time for a post-Cronkite post-mortem, but not on the late “icon” himself — the “most trusted man in America,” the “voice of God,” “the gold standard,” the “proxy for a nation,” or, in plainer English, the lush-lived celebrity “anchor” who died this month at age 92. No, the Cronkite post-mortem that’s needed is for the zombies who conjured up the hollow rapture and the living dead who fell for it.

Harsh words? You bet. But I don’t know how else to begin to assess a nation that sees fit to celebrate, crown, even worship a man who said his “proudest moment” was when he declared on CBS, having misinterpreted the 1968 Tet offensive as a victory for North Vietnam, that the Vietnam war was unwinnable for the United States.

“If I’ve lost Cronkite, I’ve lost middle America,” almost every Cronkite obituary approvingly quoted President Lyndon B. Johnson as having said in response — never mind that Cronkite was flat-out wrong in his reporting.

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This editorial will appear in Friday's print edition.

Keep Linda Bird on UPlace City Council

There’s a big, ugly hole in the center of University Place, potentially big enough to bury the political careers of City Council members who helped dig it.

But it would be unfortunate if voters took out their frustration over the slow progress of Town Center on Linda Bird, a fine incumbent who is on the Aug. 18 primary ballot.

Two other council incumbents also are running for re-election, but their races will be decided in the Nov. 3 general election because they each have only one opponent. An open seat will also be decided in November.

If anybody on the University Place City Council embodies the spirit of the city, it is Bird.

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This editorial will appear in Friday's print edition.

Fiscal sanity the winner in F-22 vote

The Senate took a small but welcome step toward getting a handle on military spending Tuesday by voting to clip the wings of the Air Force’s hugely expensive F-22 Raptor.

The vote should have been a formality. After all, Defense Secretary Robert Gates told Congress he doesn’t want to continue the Lockheed Martin Corp fighter jet program: It’s too expensive, the country already has 141 (with 46 more on the way), and it doesn’t have much of a role to play in the kind of wars the United States is fighting now or expects to fight in coming years.

Raptors – primarily designed for air-to-air combat – haven’t been used in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the Pentagon figures it could better spend the $1.75 billion to build seven more planes on something it can actually use.

What a concept.

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Although four seats on the University Place City Council are up for election, only one will be on the Aug. 18 primary ballot. Our endorsement editorial will be posted here by 8 tonight.

Also, the Senate was right to vote against funding for the F22 Raptor. Now the House should agree. The military has said it doesn't want the jet, and members of Congress who see it as a jobs program in their district need to face budget realities.

This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

There’s no mystery why Federal Way Municipal Court Judge Michael Morgan faces five challengers on the city’s Aug. 18 primary ballot.

Morgan is dragging an iron ball and heavy baggage into his quest for a second four-year term.

The ball chained to his ankle is the reprimand he got in December from the state Commission on Judicial Conduct. The commission scolded him for making threatening remarks and discussing sexual matters with the municipal court staff.

The baggage is a broader public perception that the court has lost its way since it was created 10 years ago. Its troubles have included the commission’s severe 2007 censure of former Judge Colleen Hartl, who subsequently resigned.

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This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

Port of Tacoma: Re-elect Connie Bacon

The last two years have not been great for the Port of Tacoma.

First came the bust on the port’s $21 million gamble to buy up land near Maytown in Thurston County to build a rail yard. Then port officials fumbled cost estimates for a shipping terminal that helped lure NYK Line here from the Port of Seattle.

Those missteps, coupled with the economic downturn that cut deeply into the port’s cargo volume, have been big setbacks for a port that just a few years ago seemed to know no limits.

In May, 47 port employees received letters notifying them that their jobs had been eliminated. Soon after, a third of the port’s staff declared a no confidence vote in the port’s executive director, Tim Farrell.

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Harvard Prof. Henry Gates' tussle with a Cambridge police officer has the chattering classes arguing over whether it proves:

a) America remains saturated with racism.
b) Gates was "playing the race card."
c) The sergeant was a bully.
d) They're both hotheads.

Bonus option: e) You can be one of the most prominent professors in the nation and the locals still won't know you from Adam.

Choices: a, a and c, b, or b and d. If you don't also choose e, you must be an academic.

I'm posting a lovely little point-counterpoint on the incident from two Washington Post reporters, Wil Haygood (black) and Neely Tucker (white). Haygood's is below; Tucker's is on the next post down.

By Wil Haygood
The Washington Post

I loved living in Cambridge, Mass., except when I didn’t.

And when I didn’t was when I had left my apartment late at night to walk to the all-night corner grocery store with just that $10 bill stuffed into my pocket, having left my wallet on the bookcase in the hallway.

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By Neely Tucker
The Washington Post

One of the common-sense rules of life can be summed up this way: Don’t Mess With Cops.

It doesn’t matter if you are right, wrong, at home or on the street, or if you are black, Hispanic, Jewish, Muslim or whatever. When an armed law enforcement officer tells you to cease and desist, the wise person (a) ceases and (b) desists.

The End.

Like Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr., I am interracially married, live in a predominantly white neighborhood, have a healthy respect for armed men wearing uniforms, and have had police come to my house in a confrontational manner, doing the job they’re paid to do.

It happened when our house alarm went off at 2 a.m. a few months ago, on a night the electricity was off and the neighborhood was dark as pitch. WANH!! WANH!! WANH!! It sent my wife and me leaping out of bed. I sprinted downstairs with a baseball bat, our Rottweiler and a flashlight to confront any possible intruder. I checked all the windows and doors, the dog yawned, and it quickly became apparent that there was a short circuit from a rear door.

My wife called the alarm company and gave them the code for a false alert.

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I can't help notice the juxtaposition between Washington's two behemoth manufacturers:

Microsoft announced today the imminent release of Windows 7 to a world long-tormented by its bloated, glitch-infested Vista operating system.

Meanwhile, Boeing still can't get its 787 Dreamliner off the ground. The Seattle Times reports today that a flaw in the wing design won't be fixed for another four to six months.

Two years after its maiden flight was supposed to happen, the only thing the jet can do is taxi pathetically around Paine Field.

Microsoft, of course, has the advantage of sending "beta" preview copies of its software to a legion of geeks who ferret out its bugs. Any volunteers for a test ride on a "beta" Dreamliner?

Our primary election endorsements continue Thursday with our two choices in the six-way race for Federal Way Municipal Court. Five candidates are challenging the embattled incumbent, Judge Michael Morgan.

We also endorse in the Port of Tacoma race in which two candidates are challenging incumbent commission member Connie Bacon.

Both editorials will be posted here by 8 tonight.

To read earlier election endorsements, click here.

This editorial will appear in Wednesday's print edition.

Brandstetter for Lakewood City Council

With three open seats up for election, change is coming to the Lakewood City Council in a big way. Helen McGovern, Pad Finnigan and Ron Cronk are stepping down, so there will be three new faces on the seven-person council come Jan. 1.

Only the race for Position 2 will be on the Aug. 18 primary ballot, because it’s the only race in which more than two candidates are running. The top two vote-getters will progress to the Nov. 3 general election, which will also decide Positions 1 and 3. All council positions are at-large.

For Position 2, Lakewood voters must choose between Clover Park School Board veteran Connie Coleman-Lacadie; Bates Technical College’s dean of academic programs, Mike Brandstetter; and computer consultant Levi Wilhelmsen.

Any of the three would be acceptable, but we favor Brandstetter. He seems most likely to ask tough questions and challenge decisions that seem overly focused on short-term economic development at the expense of long-term quality-of-life issues. He recognizes the negative effects of gambling and supports a process to wean the city’s operating budget from casino revenues.

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Although there are three open seats up for election this year on the Lakewood City Council, just one of them will be on the Aug. 18 primary ballot. Because only two candidates filed to run for the other two positions, they will automatically advance to the Nov. 3 general election.

Wednesday we offer our choice among three candidates running for Position 2. The editorial will be posted here at 8 tonight.

This editorial will appear in Tuesday's print edition.

No mission of local government matters more than ensuring the education of the next generation, yet school boards, as a rule, don’t usually attract vigorous election races.
This year, Tacoma is the exception.

It’s easy, perhaps too easy, to attribute the crowded field for Tacoma School Board position 2 to the Charlie Milligan factor.

The ousted schools superintendent’s abrasive management style and dismissive attitude toward community groups left the district bruised and adrift by the time he was sent on his way with a $418,000 settlement after only a year on the job.

The debacle certainly makes incumbent Connie Rickman, who was board president during the tulmultuous time, vulnerable. But it alone doesn’t explain why so many candidates are jumping at a chance to be on the board.

The state’s second largest school district has long struggled with the issues confounding many a district: widespread poverty, high dropout rates and the “achievement gap” between white and Asian students, on the one hand, and black and Latino students on the other.

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I feel like I’ve almost worn my fingertips off over the last 20 years writing arguments for building a light rail line in the Puget Sound region.

So I couldn’t turn down Sound Transit’s invitation to a sneak-preview ride on Central Link, the first 14 miles of what will become a much larger system. Mid-afternoon at Westlake Station (in Seattle’s downtown bus tunnel), I crowded into the cars along with a throng of media and political poobahs, including Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels and U.S. Sen. Patty Murray.

The ride was silky smooth. You watch the Mariners and Seahawks stadiums roll by, then the concrete jungle of industrial south Seattle. There were “Oohs” and “Aahs” going into the Beacon Hill tunnel. (This was a crowd eager to be impressed.) Then down the Rainier Valley and out to Tukwila Station, where we got out and milled around on the platform somewhat excitedly before heading back.

I found myself encouraged, not so much about Sound Transit as about my country. Like the new Narrows bridge that opened two years ago, Central Link is unexpected evidence that America can still build something big.

We endorse two candidates for Tacoma School Board, Position 2. The seat is currently held by Connie Rickman, who is facing five challengers for re-election.

The editorial will be posted here at 8 tonight.

On July 20, 1969, American families huddled around the TV set (most of us only had one back then) to watch the lunar landing. We held our collective breath as the astronauts looked for a good place to land the Eagle.

I remember thinking, "What if they land on the edge of a crater and go tumbling down? They won't be able to leave the moon."

I was 16 and babysitting that summer night for the Schulwolf family in Norfolk, Va. The children were already in bed, so I sat all alone in a dark living room watching the events unfold on TV.

I called home to talk to my mom just after the landing. It was an experience that we all wanted to share.

Do you have an interesting story about what you were doing for the moon landing? Leave a comment.

This editorial will appear in Monday's print edition.

40 years later, sense of awe remains

“Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.” – Astronaut Neil Armstrong from the moon, July 20, 1969

For Americans who are middle-aged or older, the events of July 1969 – when man went to the moon and came back – are the stuff of vivid memory.

Just as we know where we were when we heard that John F. Kennedy had been assassinated, we remember where we were 40 years ago today as we watched Apollo 11 astronaut Neil Armstrong climb down the ladder from the Eagle lunar lander and leave man’s first footprint on another heavenly body.

That summer evening, most Americans were transfixed by their TV screens. In cities around the world, crowds gathered to watch as Eagle touched down, and Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin emerged to walk on the moon’s surface in ghostly images transmitted through space.

We – all of mankind, as Armstrong noted upon stepping onto lunar soil – had taken a giant leap forward. Kennedy’s 1961 challenge of putting a man on the moon within the decade had been met.

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This editorial will appear in Sunday's print edition.

Dill, Taylor, Boyle for Puyallup City Council

Anyone who’s been tracking Puyallup City Council meetings knows they aren’t lovefests.

The discussions frequently break down into sharp clashes between two voting blocs. The four-member majority is – unsurprisingly – comfortable with the direction of the city government and its manager, Gary McLean.

The other three, two of whom are up for election, are far more critical and would quickly fire McLean if they acquired another ally on the council.

This isn’t a good guy vs. bad guy split. The City of Puyallup has in fact been moving in a positive direction, with major downtown improvements and healthy finances. But the minority offers legitimate complaints about difficulties both they and the public have had prying information out the administration. Open government is no small consideration in evaluating a city’s operation.

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Sacha Baron Cohen’s films “Borat” or rather, “Borat: Cultural Learnings From America Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan,” his 2006 box office hit, and now his latest release “Bruno” seem to have two main objectives: to shock and to awe.

If you don’t walk out of the theater after seeing a Sacha Baron Cohen film feeling as if your sensibilities have just been terribly violated then the movie didn’t succeed as it intended.

One look at Borat in his “mankini” or Bruno in his sexy Hassidic uniform and you’ll get a hint of what I mean. Both “Borat” and now “Bruno” hold political correctness and polite prejudices up to the light and then proceed to – gee, there’s no nice way to put this – shove them where the sun don’t shine.

Rolling Stone called "Borat" “one of the greatest comedies of the last decade, and perhaps even a whole new genre of film.” Not sure about "Borat" being the greatest comedy, but a new genre of film may be point on.

Sure there have been mockumentaries like "Borat"; Christopher Guest’s “Best in Show” comes to mind. But no one, I mean no one, manipulates people on screen and in the audience into such uncomfortable positions as Sacha Baron Cohen.

Think of Baron Cohen’s work as Candid Camera with a pornographic mean streak.

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On Sunday, we'll make our endorsements in the three Puyallup City Council races on the August primary ballot. Check here Saturday evening for an early posting of our picks.

Our editorial on Monday marks the 40th anniversary of the moon landing. For Americans who are middle-aged or older, the events of July 1969 – when man went to the moon and came back – are the stuff of vivid memory.

If you have comments or questions about these topics, please email them to kim.bradford@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.

John Miles, our pick for Tacoma City Council's District 5, sent us a copy of a message he received this morning from a former neighbor in the 8th and I neighborhood, where Neighbors' Park is. We said in our editorial that he "helped develop" the park. The neighbor took issue with that statement.

John,
I am happy for you that you received the endorsement. However, I feel that it is wrong to take credit for developing the park. Neighbors' Park was developed by the intensive hard work of neighbors even before I became an 8th & I Neighbor in 2000. John, a few work parties does not equal developing a park.

John's response:

I’m so sorry that they wrote it this way. I did not tell them that I “developed” the park; I told them that I carted wheelbarrows of bark mulch when the new playground went in.  I agree with you that it would be wrong to take credit for the park. I used my work as an example of my civic involvement from before my years with Edison.

Please accept my apology. Your group has made a tremendous difference and will never be recognized sufficiently. In fact, you should take credit for training me in making a difference.

- John Miles

We rechecked our interview notes. Miles told us he "worked" on the park. "Helped develop" might have been too strong a description, but any mistake is ours, not John's.

Community organizers put in a lot of work, so I can understand the sensitivity to giving credit where credit is due. For the record, we did contact people Miles has worked with in the Edison neighborhood who gave him good reviews.

I’ve been in the business of candidate endorsements since Ronald Reagan was president, and I’ve never run into the dilemma presented this year by the District 5 race for the Tacoma City Council.

It’s the only time our editorial board has ever had to evaluate a fellow News Tribune employee as a candidate for public office. Joe Lonergan, who’s running against Beckie Summers Kirby and John Miles, is a TNT advertising account representative. His desk is literally a 30-second walk from my office. He’s been here for years. We see him all the time. We know, like and respect him.

How do we sort out that familiarity when we’re sizing him up against Summers and Miles? How do we be fair to them? Or to him, if we’re bending over backwards to be fair to them?

We wound up endorsing Miles, but we first did a lot of talking about the Joe-as-co-worker issue.

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This editorial will appear in Friday's edition.

No matter who voters pick among the many candidates running for Tacoma City Council this year, the council will look a lot different come January.

That’s the result of the city’s term limits, which are showing three council members and the mayor the door. Voters reaffirmed their support of term limits’ purging power last year when they defeated an attempt to repeal the city’s 10-year limit.

Two of the four Tacoma City Council races this year drew enough candidates to make the August primary ballot. Our choices in those races kick off this year’s election endorsements. We’ll publish other primary election recommendations over the next couple of weeks, and then start working on our general election picks in September.

How and why we endorse:

The editorial board offers its opinions year round on public policy decisions. We don’t think it makes sense – when election season arrives – to suddenly go silent on who ought to hold public office and make those decisions.

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Give him credit: Judge Michael Morgan of Federal Way stopped by here for an endorsement interview Wednesday despite a year and a half of receiving less-than-flattering coverage in The News Tribune (and criticism from this page).

Facing five challengers in the Aug. 18 primary, Morgan offered a vigorous defense of his first term in the city’s municipal court.

He created some of his own troubles with intemperate dealings with court staff and other city employees. He was reprimanded on one occasion by the state Commission on Judicial Conduct, and he wound up in a long-running battle with this newspapers over a report on his court he didn’t want released. But – as he pointed out – no one’s been questioning his performance in the courtroom.

Being under fire for so long, he said, resulted in “the worst year and a half of my life.”

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We plan to make our endorsements in the Tacoma City Council races that will appear on the August primary ballot. Check back here this evening for an early posting of Friday's editorial.

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.

This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Bar codes have been the object of deep suspicion in certain circles since they were introduced in the 1970s. Some of the conspiracy-minded have even identified them as the apocalyptic Mark of the Beast.

The latest flowering of this suspicion is a lawsuit challenging the use of the codes on ballots used by some of Washington’s smaller counties.

The lawsuit, filed by liberal-minded activists, argues that the unique identifiers on those ballots can allow officials to match voters with votes, in violation of the law.

The secretary of state’s office – which supervises Washington’s elections – sees things differently.
Here’s how its Web site explains the bar codes:

“Voters in one precinct are eligible to vote on one set of ballot measures and candidate races, while voters in the neighboring precinct are eligible to vote on a slightly different set of ballot measures and candidate races, all based on the set of jurisdictions that cover that precinct.

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This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

Fight over Plan B rules not over yet

A court ruling restoring the state’s mandate to dispense “Plan B” emergency contraception should not be mistaken for a checkered flag, but it could well signal the final lap.

A three-judge panel of the 9th Circuit Court has lifted an injunction against a state rule requiring pharmacies to fill valid prescriptions for legal drugs and sent the case back to a federal trial court in Tacoma.

An Olympia grocer and two pharmacists argue that requiring them to dispense the so-called morning-after pill would trample their constitutional rights since they see Plan B as tantamount to abortion.

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A court ruling restoring the state's mandate to dispense "Plan B" emergency contraception should not be mistaken for a checkered flag. Up next is the true test of the rules: whether they pass constitutional muster.

The claim that secret ballots are threatened in Washington because of bar codes is ridiculous.

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.

The Washington State Labor Council, frustrated by its failures to advance its cause in Olympia this year despite strong Democratic majorities, has announced that it will no longer give to House and Senate party funds, but rather donate directly to individual candidates who are judged to be supporting labor priorities.

Interestingly, both labor and free market advocates are cheering the move. Here's Horse's Ass blogger Jon DeVore:

Yeah, the days of dumping money into party committees probably should have ended long ago. There’s still a place for that, and there’s no reason the state labor council (or other groups) can’t pump money into party committees as situations warrant. But the system of kissing rings in Olympia has broken down, at least as I see it from SW Washington. Candidates that could have scored major upsets have been sold short, and squishy, milquetoast types get an automatic nod. That’s a sign of institutional sclerosis.

And Piper Scott of the Evergreen Freedom Foundation:

Well, all I can say to this effort by WSLC is PA-LEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEZE do it! And the sooner the better...Pa-leeeezzze, pa-leeeeeze, pa-leeeeze, pa-leeeze, pa-leeze! What a great way for them to marginalize their influence and free many in the Legislature from being under labor's domineering thumb!

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Sonia Sotomayor undercut her critics and supporters alike Tuesday by simply walking away from the line that’s been bedeviling her nomination for the U.S. Supreme Court.

The line, from a 2001 speech to group of Latino law students: “I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experience would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.”

To the Senate Judiciary Committee, though, she said, “It was bad ... a rhetorical flourish that fell flat.” The remark was meant to inspire minorities, she said, but they left the false impression “that I believed that life experiences commanded a result in a case.”

Sotomayor’s liberal supporters have been tying themselves in knots trying to defend those unfortunate words. Conservatives say they betray an inclination to skew justice in favor of select groups. Her explanation was reasonable, and it came with a welcome promise to apply the law even-handedly.

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This editorial will appear in Wednesday's print edition.

Get creative against partyers in Lake Tapps cove

It’s easy to sympathize with the folks who live along Lake Tapps’ Fairweather Cove. On nice days, they have to endure an armada of noisy boaters who all but commandeer the cove with their partying. In fact, they’ve so taken over that they even have their own name for it: Party Cove.

Sure, it’s a public lake. But that’s no excuse for the behavior of some boaters – including retaliation against cove homeowners who have complained. Loud, boozy parties and public urination wouldn’t be tolerated on a neighborhood street corner or in a city park, and it shouldn’t be tolerated in Fairweather Cove.

But the solution being considered by the Pierce County Council – prohibiting all boats from stopping in the cove or channel leading to it through August 2010 – would penalize the law-abiding and the abusive alike. And it likely would just push the hard-core partyers to another location to bother other residents.

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Senate Republicans organizing tit-for-tat vote against Sotomayor in response to Dems' votes against John Roberts ought to stand down – the better to restore the tradition of giving any president's nomination the benefit of the doubt.

Our second topic is TBD, but one possibility is a comment on the sheriff's crackdown on raft parties in Fairweather Cove on Lake Tapps.

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.

Case Inlet has proven quite the troublesome patch of shoreline for Taylor Shellfish, which leases land there to grow geoducks that fetch top dollar in Asian markets. A Department of Natural Resources employee was recently investigating a complaint from an upland property owner and noticed that Taylor's farm might have strayed onto state-owned tidelands.

The possible trespass (Taylor is cooperating and paying for a survey to determine where the actual boundary is) plus another in Totten Inlet has prompted Lands Commissioner Peter Goldmark to order a survey of all state-owned tidelands.

This isn't the first time Taylor has run into problems at Case Inlet near Allyn. Back in 2007, Pierce County officials told Taylor that the company's permit for land owned by the Foss family had expired and suggested the company apply for a new one. A hearing examiner later upheld that decision, raising questions about whether Taylor would be allowed to harvest its $15 million crop.

The county relented last fall and allowed Taylor to dig up mature clams, but the legal battle continued. It's been a while since we checked in on the case, so I emailed Bill Dewey at Taylor to ask him what's become of it. He says Taylor won its lawsuit and doesn't expect the county to appeal. The same might not be said of neighboring property owners or other geoduck farm opponents.

Here's a summary from Taylor's attorneys:

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

At times we thought we’d never see the day. But it arrives Saturday: the first big section of regional light rail.

Celebration is in order. Supporters can welcome the realization of their decades-old vision. Skeptics should find some satisfaction that Sound Transit is finally – if belatedly – delivering on service it promised in 1996.

What’s opening Saturday isn’t the 21-mile line originally proposed to the voters that year. It’s a truncated 14-mile stretch that runs from Sea-Tac Airport through downtown Seattle. The shrinkage came amid an almost-fatal fiscal crisis Sound Transit endured nine years ago, when its original cost estimates proved wildly optimistic. At the time, the odds were against the survival of light rail.

In 2001, the agency regrouped under new management, adopted rigorously realistic cost-projection methods and shortened the tracks to bring the project in line with revenues.

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The military ouster of Honduran President Manuel Zelaya has largely been reported in this country as an illegal coup. Here's another view:

By Miguel A. Estrada
Special to the Los Angeles Times

Honduras, the tiny Central American nation, had a change of leaders on June 28. The country’s military arrested President Manuel Zelaya — in his pajamas, he says — and put him on a plane bound for Costa Rica. A new president, Roberto Micheletti, was appointed. Led by Cuba and Venezuela (Sudan and North Korea were not immediately available), the international community swiftly condemned this so-called "coup."

Something clearly has gone awry with the rule of law in Honduras — but it is not necessarily what you think. Begin with Zelaya’s arrest. The Supreme Court of Honduras, as it turns out, had ordered the military to arrest Zelaya two days earlier. A second order (issued on the same day) authorized the military to enter Zelaya’s home to execute the arrest. These orders were issued at the urgent request of the country’s attorney general. All the relevant legal documents can be accessed (in Spanish) on the Supreme Court’s Web site. They make for interesting reading.

What you’ll learn is that the Honduran Constitution may be amended in any way except three. No amendment can ever change (1) the country’s borders, (2) the rules that limit a president to a single four-year term and (3) the requirement that presidential administrations must "succeed one another" in a "republican form of government."

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Excuse me while I bask in the civility. It’s so rare, especially in politics. It was found in abundance today during the political theater that was the first day of Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s confirmation hearings for Supreme Court Justice. It seems worth taking a moment just to say ahhh.

Today was also the national debut of Senator Al Franken from Minnesota, who took his senatorial oath less than a week ago. Political watchers were half expecting long time political rival Republican Norm “let’s hold the longest election night in history” Coleman to knock Franken out of his chair, but of course those high jinks belonged in Franken’s last career as actor/comedian, not this one (although Senate chambers are no stranger to slapstick).

Today, Frankencame as a member of the judiciary committee, and was chosen to make opening remarks. His speech was eloquent, saying the Supreme Court was the last place in America people can go to in search of justice. After being momentarily interrupted by a protester (Coleman, was that you?) Franken said Sotomayor was the most qualified nominee in 100 years.

Franken’s gravitas was appropriate, but still, I couldn’t help wishing his introduction would have given a wink and a nod to a former gig, something like “Live, from New York, it’s Sonia Sotomayor.”

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I had a few goals at the Art on the Ave festival Sunday: Hear Vicci Martinez, eat some good street food and see some politicians get dunked.

Mission accomplished. Martinez rocked, the new Sax restaurant/nightclub had the best deal on Sixth Avenue with $1 sliders and chicken skewers, and I got to see mayoral candidate Jim Merritt go into the dunk tank. Repeatedly.

He was a good sport and probably scored some points with voters just for braving the chilly water on such a chilly day.

Merritt's opponent, Marilyn Strickland, was not on the dunk tank schedule, but several other politicians were, including Metro Parks Commissioner Ryan Mello, Tacoma City Council candidate Marty Campbell and unopposed council incumbent Jake Fey.

The one I'm sorry I missed was Pierce County Councilman Tim Farrell, dressed up as Carmen Miranda (pictured). But at least News Tribune photog Drew Perine was there to get the shot. I particularly like the Cher wig.

To see more photos from the festival, and to see a slideshow of editorial cartoons, click here.

We're working on an editorial for tomorrow cheering the debut of Sound Transit's long-in-coming light rail line. Anyone who has ventured north lately has seen the blue-and-white trains on trial runs; now comes the more important test of whether they convince people to get out of their cars.

We're also planning to run the blog post about state workers' share of health care costs as an editorial on tomorrow's page.

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.

You'd have thought the state has struck down 40-hour work weeks, the minimum wage and child labor laws in one fell swoop to hear the leaders of the biggest state employee labor union tell it last week.

Greg Devereux of the Washington Federation of State Employees came unhinged after the Public Employees Benefits Board voted to – get this – not raise state workers' share of their health care costs.

To be fair, Devereux wasn't protesting the board's decision to require employees to continue to pay 12 percent of their health care premiums, but how the board got to that number.

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This editorial will appear in Monday's print edition.

L&I, Justice Sanders run up the bill

Withholding public records can be costly – and so can judges who neglect to recuse themselves from cases that pose conflicts of interest.

That’s the pair of lessons stemming from a recent Thurston County court ruling, in which the state Department of Labor & Industries was slammed by a $500,000 judgment for failing to turn over public records.

A Benton City man who was cited by L&I for allegedly improper electrical work on his house had requested copies of inspections and permits issued by the department for that work. He waited more than 300 days to get those copies, an inexcusable delay.

Of all the public records that ought to be immediately forthcoming, documents that could help citizens defend themselves against government actions ought to top the list.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Now it’s official: Boeing wants a no-strike guarantee from its unions, or it’s going to create a second 787 plant elsewhere.

Boeing hasn’t said it out loud. But U.S. Rep. Norm Dicks and Gov. Chris Gregoire confirmed last week that they’d heard as much from the company. We doubt they’re making it up.

The ball – or is it a bomb? – is now in the court of the International Association of Machinists and the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace.

The machinists – the fighting machinists, as they style themselves – are sounding more conciliatory than they did during last year’s punishing strike: “We are working to improve our relationship with Boeing,” said District 751 President Tom Wroblewski in a statement, “and the Machinists Union has made several overtures to that effect. Improving the relationship to bring about a different result in bargaining is a priority. We plan to dedicate a lot of time and resources to this effort.”

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Two things baffle me about the argument over lethal injection.

One is the position of the state – not just Washington but the thirty-plus other states that use the same “humane” method of executing condemned murderers.

Three Washington death-row inmates have sued to abolish the current lethal injection regime, which employs three drugs: one to cause unconsciousness, a second to paralyze, a third to stop the heart. A Thurston County judge ruled against them Friday.

Critics say the three-drug system could inadvertently leave the prisoner conscious and suffering excruciating pain while paralyzed. The lawsuit argues for substituting a single, lethal overdose of sedatives.

When we had to put the family dog down some years ago, the veterinarian used the big-dose method. The experience was heartbreaking, but the death was almost instant and obviously painless.

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For Sunday: Now it’s explicit: Boeing wants a no strike guarantee, and it’s holding all the cards. The company’s very well paid machinists and engineers helped bring this on by using walkouts as a routine negotiating tactic.

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.

The editorial board is at a stalemate no more. After Pat and I posted our pro-con on the proposed smoking ban for Tacoma parks earlier today, the board found a compromise. This editorial will appear in Friday's edition.

Metro Parks and the Tacoma-Pierce County Health Department think they have an offer Tacoma’s leaders can’t refuse.

Want to give smokers a new incentive to quit? Tell them they can’t light up in a Tacoma park.

Want to prevent children from getting addicted? Make sure a trip to the neighborhood sprayground doesn’t include the sight of someone taking a drag.

Want parks to look nicer? Stop cigarette butts before they start.

The proposed smoke ban for Tacoma’s parks could accomplish all these things – in theory. Reality is another story.

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This editorial will appear in Friday's print edition.

Google’s Chrome could offer welcome competition

Speed, simplicity, security.

To owners of personal computers, those qualities can be agonizingly out of reach. Calling up a Web site can seem to take forever, but everything can inexplicably come crashing down in a matter of seconds. Viruses and identity theft are almost constant concerns.

Enter Chrome OS, due out in 2010. Google Inc.’s planned free operating system, based on its Chrome Web browser, will be a full frontal assault on Microsoft’s Windows system – especially in the surging market for the small, relatively inexpensive netbooks, which will be its first target.

For consumers, anything that offers competition to the hugely dominant Windows would be a plus, giving them more options and the promise of lower prices.

It’s already having an effect. A full year before Chrome is scheduled to come on the market, Microsoft is reacting by offering a low price on its older Windows XP system for netbooks. And it is assuring users that its next operating system due out this fall, Windows 7, will work well on netbooks as well as on larger computers.

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From our Word on the Street blog: Tacoma ranks in bottom fourth of safe-driving cities

Could this have anything to do with the fact that drivers around here consider it strictly optional to signal before they turn or switch lanes?

The six of us on the editorial board usually figure out something to say about any controversy we tackle. Not so with the proposal to ban smoking in Tacoma’s parks.

Three of us – David Zeeck, Cheryl Tucker and myself – would welcome smoke-free public parks. The other three – Karen Peterson, Kim Bradford and Dale Phelps – think that would be too much government.

Kim’s going to lay out their side of the argument. Here’s ours:

• It’s a protect-the-public-interest issue. Smokers don’t invade our air space, but smoke does. Parks are public accommodations. But if you can’t sit on a park bench or your kid can’t swing on a swing without getting a whiff of obnoxious tobacco smoke, you’ve been intruded upon – and not by government.

• You ban smoking in parks for the same reason you ban smoking at ballparks: Nobody should be forced to breathe someone else’s toxic exhaust.

• It’s a quality of life issue. Parks with clean air are more attractive and greater community assets.

• It’s a litter issue. Many smokers routinely drop their butts on the ground. Either the public pays to have the butts cleaned up, or park users have to play in an ashtray.

• Yes, it would be hard to enforce a smoke ban in parks. But it’s harder to enforce litter laws; unlike littering, smoking is easily spotted. In any case, laws often serve to spell out social expectations even when they aren’t enforced. Law-abiding smokers – the majority, I assume – won’t need the threat of a ticket to comply.

Pat makes good arguments for why Tacoma should ban smoking in public parks. I just don't find them convincing.

As the mother of a 2-year-old, I spend plenty of time in Tacoma parks. I don't challenge parks officials' assertion that discarded cigarette butts are a problem, but what mostly catches my eye is the bigger stuff – the bottles, cans, hamburger wrappers, empty bread bags at the duck pond, used condoms in the woods, discarded diapers at the sprayground.

But this isn't really about litter. It's about sending a message. Metro Parks' top 10 reasons to pass a smoke ban mention litter but primarily focus on the public health costs of smoking, what we say to kids when we allow people to light up in parks, and the tired justification that other cities are doing it and so should we.

Smoking is legal. I know the toll on a smoker's health and the public health care system is atrocious. If we as a country want to have a conversation about outlawing tobacco use altogether, I'm there.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

The “Journey of Repentance” to be staged in Japan this summer by a handful of Tacoma-area anti-nuclear folks seems little more than moral preening.

But the big, angry response it’s gotten from this newspaper’s readers (see opposite page) shows that American feelings about World War II remain raw 64 years after the war ended. What’s mostly overlooked in this millionth dispute over Hiroshima and Nagasaki is the wartime context of the nuclear strikes on those cities.

Each time someone condemns the atomic bombings, someone else snarls back about the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and the Bataan death march. But the issue is more complex than Pearl Harbor vs. Hiroshima. The bombs reflected the industrial nature of the conflict – a “total war” that drove attacks not only on enemy forces but also on enemy homelands.

Opponents of the nuclear bombings tend to see them as unique moral horrors. But in terms of their killing power – far less than later nuclear warheads – the bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were simply more efficient ways of visiting wholesale death on enemy cities and factories. Conventional bombers had already killed vast numbers of noncombatants before the atom bombs fell.

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This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

Those who love Tacoma’s historic structures and root for downtown’s revitalization are accustomed to raised hopes and dashed expectations – but the two don’t usually arrive on the same day.

They did Tuesday when two developers announced news that they have a promising plan to save the 93-year-old former Elks Temple in downtown Tacoma.

Grace Pleasants of Heritage Properties and development partner Rick Moses unveiled a deal to purchase the Elks building from its Portland, Ore., owner, immediately resell it to the famed McMenamins pub-and-hotel brand, and then build a grocery store and apartments next door.

Meanwhile, down at City Hall, Tacoma officials were delivering some bad news: The 119-year-old Luzon Building may finally succumb to years of neglect.

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Not all journalists are of like minds, even when it comes to the practice of journalism itself. Like several readers, TNT columnist Peter Callaghan disagreed with our editorial yesterday about former Tacoma resident Warren Yeakey's lawsuit against the Seattle Post-Intelligencer for its news coverage of a fatal November 2006 construction crane accident in Bellevue.

Pete's e-mail to editorial page editor Pat O'Callahan:

Disagree with your conclusion. In our attempt to combat all libel lawsuits and rulings we stood firmly behind some of the worst reporting I have seen in a decade or more. The PI did much more than report two fact. It breathlessly suggested that it had solved the crime. Any reader would have concluded that a terrible accident that killed a man in his apartment had
been caused by a drugged out crane operator.

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This was meant to be a comment on Michael Allen’s post today, but I’m a wordy gal, so I thought I'd post it as an open letter. I’ll preface it by saying it’s an honor to have this dialogue with Mr. Allen.

Mr. Allen:

In your previous post you wondered why people "hate Palin." To which I say, there is a difference between “hating” a candidate, and finding them under qualified for office.

If an athlete doesn’t perform well, and we say he’s not ready for the big leagues, this is not “hate,” this is not a personal attack, but rather a little closer to stating the obvious.

All politicians know that when they run for an office they expose their family to harsh scrutiny from the media, and as you said, Sarah Palin got more than her fair share. True, some in the media, mostly comedians, portrayed the Palin family like they belonged in the Jerry Springer Show not in the governor’s mansion.

They capitalized on the teenage romance that played out on Myspace. They made tabloid fodder out of Palin’s teenage daughter’s pregnancy. They were all too happy to air the grievances of the disgruntled teenage father and play up his mother’s drug use and run-in with the law. They turned the employment termination of an estranged brother-in-law into “Troopergate.”

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Well Sarah Palin is resigning. And in retrospect, it’s not surprising that she failed to endure the hateful media barrage that began just about a year ago.

No, Sarah is not, as she hints, resigning the Alaska governorship to launch a 2012 presidential campaign. There is no way she can be a serious presidential candidate without serving one full term as Alaska’s governor (that was always the media’s purported objection to her candidacy, that she “lacked experience”).

In fact, the main reason Palin is resigning is to bring peace to her family. The vicious attacks on the Palins are unprecedented in modern American politics. Even for Gerry Ford, Reagan, Dan Quayle, Dick Cheney and George W. Bush, the media stopped short of an all-out attack on the children. But the Palin family got both barrels from day one. And the poison would have continued.

Why did they despise her so? True, Gov. Palin had failings and she made mistakes. But I think the real reason they hated her also has to do with family. Palin touched a raw nerve in liberals. She had the audacity to successfully combine traditional femininity, motherhood and conservative ideology with a powerful career – her own brand of feminism.

Moreover, she had the audacity to conceive and raise a Down's syndrome child while pursuing that career. To feminists and media leftists, that was Sarah Palin’s unstated, and unforgivable, sin.

Now she and her husband can raise their family in relative peace and stability. The Palins will be much happier now. But there is no joy in the fact that the left succeeded in running her off.

Sarah is gone now, yet upon reflection I don’t believe she is gone from our national life forever.

Prediction: In 2013, or 2017, Sarah Palin will become President Bobby Jindal’s secretary of the interior.

This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

It would be wonderful if Barack Obama’s glowing vision of warm and cooperative U.S.-Russian relations became a reality. But history hasn’t been kind to such hopes.

Obama talks about hitting the “reset button” with Russia, and he’s been passing out bundles of olive branches in Moscow this week. On Tuesday, he repudiated traditional conceptions of great-power rivalry and the notion “that the United States and Russia are destined to be antagonists and that a strong Russia or a strong American can only assert themselves in opposition to one another.”

It takes two to tango, though. Obama no doubt believes what he’s telling Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and President Dmitry Medvedev. But Russia’s leaders aren’t prone to idealism. If they regard the United States as a powerful potential menace – and they do – they may see Obama’s effusive rhetoric as evidence of an untested president’s exploitable naivete.

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This editorial will appear in Wednesday's print edition.

Boeing, in announcing its purchase of a South Carolina fuselage assembly plant, is making it abundantly clear to Washington state that it’s got options.

This isn’t the first time. The company that picked up and moved its Seattle headquarters to Chicago in 2001 is a different beast than the airplane-maker that built the great B-17s and B-29s of World War II and pioneered the revolutionary 707, 737 and 747 jetliners.

Today the aerospace giant makes decisions on the basis of economics, not history. Boeing can ill afford to let sentimental attachment to the Puget Sound region hold sway over business decisions.

It also can’t afford to ignore obvious customer frustration over repeated delays for the new 787 Dreamliner.

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The blogosphere is abuzz over a column by McClatchy Newspapers military writer Joe Galloway which all but eviscerates the late Robert McNamara, defense secretary during much of the Vietnam War.

The column, headlined "Reading an obit with great pleasure," starts off: "Well, the aptly named Robert Strange McNamara has finally shuffled off to join LBJ and Dick Nixon in the 7th level of Hell." After that, Galloway gets really snarky.

Read that column, and another titled "Shed no tears for Robert McNamara," on the McClatchy Newspapers Web site here.

I really get the feeling Galloway didn't like the guy.

Quick, and without warning, Sarah Palin used the Band-Aid technique to resign from her position as governor this past Friday.

Her minute-and-a-half explanation “I want to advance in a different direction,” to “effect more change outside government” so “I’m not a lame duck,” left many questions unanswered.

Like, what the heck did she just say?

And why now? Why quit the term with 16 months left to go?

With ethics violations heading downstream, including one issued today that says Palin pocketed per diem money she received for her 45-minute commute to work, many are wondering if she’s getting out to avoid further corruption charges. This latest allegation comes two weeks after Palin was forced to pay back the $8,000 she took for her children’s travel.

Then there’s the blogger who keeps purporting rumors of Palin’s involvement in shady business dealings with the firm Spenard Building Supply.

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You know those gift cards that have been lying around the house since last Christmas? Many of us have them. Indeed, a recent study shows Americans hold $5 billion in unredeemed gift cards!

The existence of that much available dough has not gone unnoticed. Recently, over a dozen cash-strapped state legislatures have passed laws declaring the gift cards “unclaimed property” and, as such, subject to government seizure!

So, to try and balance their bloated budgets, these states now require businessmen to sift through their records, identify the unredeemed cards, calculate their worth and write the government a check.

What won’t they think of next?

Washington has no such law… yet.

Spend your gift cards now.

This editorial will appear in Tuesday's print edition.

It’s take five for the University Place Town Center.

City officials, determined to salvage the $250 million project, have cut strings from their fourth developer in six years. Instead of relying on a single developer to create a true commons where people can shop, eat, live and just hang out, the city will sell off the 12 acres piecemeal.

A Seattle consulting firm will help find investors interested in developing or leasing out Town Center’s parcels. The city will retain the ability to choose tenants and to enforce design standards.
The new strategy is the latest twist for a project long frustrated by disagreements between the city and its developers and most recently by the credit crisis.

To critics, the change of course is further evidence of the city’s folly in betting on its ability to lure upscale development – a bet that we viewed as a justified gamble to expand the city’s threatened tax base.

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This editorial will appear in Tuesday's print edition.

Truth is a valid defense
in man’s defamation case

Examine these two scenarios as if you were a reporter. How would you handle them?

• A popular entertainer dies under suspicious circumstances at a relatively young age. It is widely known, and in fact was testified to in a court case a few years before, that the star had a serious problem with prescription drugs. Do you mention that problem in your article about his death?

• A child disappears from her home while in the care of a baby sitter. In checking out the baby sitter’s background, you learn that she was convicted several years ago in a child abuse case in which a toddler she was caring for almost died. Do you mention that case?

It might turn out that the earlier problems of the entertainer and the baby sitter had no bearing on either scenario. If you mention those problems in your article, are you tarnishing the subjects’ reputations by reporting facts that might – or might not – eventually be found to be pertinent?

That question is at the center of an important First Amendment case in Pierce County Superior Court. If decided in favor of the plaintiff, it could have a chilling effect on reporting.

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This editorial will appear in Monday's print edition.

From the no-duh files comes the latest study on Americans’ waistlines, which concludes that the country is getting fatter.

The Trust for America’s Health report, while largely a confirmation of what any sighted person already knows, also provides a timely reminder of a big factor driving up the cost of overhauling the nation’s health care system.

First, the facts: As late as 1991, no state had an obesity rate greater than 20 percent. Today, every state but Colorado does. Washington ranks 28th, with one in four residents considered obese.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

It is infinitely easier to keep a big employer in the region than to recruit a big employer from elsewhere. Yes, we’re talking about Boeing.

The aerospace company is again signaling that it is feeling footloose and disenchanted with its one-time homeland in Puget Sound. This time, the signaling has taken the form of negotiations – reported by the Wall Street Journal – to purchase a fuselage assembly plant near Charleston, S.C., owned by Vought Aircraft Industries

You don’t have to decipher tea leaves to get the message. Here’s how it reads:

• Delivery of Boeing Commercial Airplanes’ new 787 has been severely delayed. More than 860 of the cutting edge airliners are on order, and the company may need a second assembly line to speed production and keep its customers happy.

• Boeing sees greener pastures elsewhere. A study commissioned by Gov. Chris Gregoire concluded in April that Washington has the highest construction, labor and workers compensation costs compared to rival states.

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As a Southern transplant, I've always been bugged by one thing about Fourth of July in the Northwest: It gets dark so late here in early July that fireworks shows can't get started until it's almost July 5. I'm planning to take in Steilacoom's show, which doesn't start until 10:30 – about half an hour after my regular bedtime.

One way to try to stay awake is to watch a movie, then head out to watch fireworks.

My Netflix movie for the night is "W." Otherwise I'd be watching "Independence Day" (1996), starring Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum (pictured).

In the movie, the alien-fighting action appropriately culminates on the Fourth of July. The president (Bill Pullman) proclaims that the world will henceforth consider July 4 as its independence day in what a BBC reviewer described as "the most jaw-droppingly pompous soliloquy ever delivered in a mainstream Hollywood movie."

I think the reviewer was just jealous that it was a Yank computer geek who figured out how to take down the invaders. No wonder we revolted.

For a list of other movies with a 4th of July theme, click here.

This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Thomas Jefferson – chief author of the Declaration of Independence we celebrate tomorrow – had a lot to say about an informed electorate.

On one occasion, he wrote: “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.”

On another occasion: “The information of the people at large can alone make them the safe as they are the sole depositary of our political and religious freedom.”

Native-born Americans can, if they choose, remain ignorant as stumps about their government. Maybe that’s a luxury of living in a country that enjoys political stability unheard of in many parts of the world.

But what a dubious perk if ignorance keeps Americans marginalized on the periphery of civic life. They cannot hope to hold government accountable from that vantage point.

This week, more than 6,000 immigrants will become citizens. They have demonstrated a grasp of U.S. history and government that sadly eludes many Americans for whom citizenship is a birthright, not a privilege.

Here are a few question from the citizenship test that naturalized citizens must pass. Test your own knowledge and see how “free” you really are.

1. What is the supreme law of the land?

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“[America’s Independence Day] will be celebrated by succeeding Generations as the great anniversary Festival…It ought to be solemnized with Pomp and Parade, with Sh[o]ws, Games, Sports, Guns, Bells, Bonfires, and Illuminations, from one end of this Continent to the other, from this Time forward, forever more.” John Adams to Abigail Adams, July 3, 1776

John Adams’ prediction about our July 4 celebrations, quoted above, is pretty much on the money. True, he thought July 2 was Independence Day (that’s a long story), and he left out fried chicken and potato salad; he also stated there would be “Acts of Devotion to God Almighty.” So he was a little off. But for the most part he got July 4 right.

But what about the “Illuminations”? “Illuminations”? That’s 18th-century speak for “Fireworks.” And, as it turns out, Adams only got part of the “Illuminations” prediction right.

True, we will have many “Illuminations” this Saturday night. But we’ll also have overbearing anti-fireworks laws in action – neighbors ratting out neighbors and dozens of police squad car patrols, all to smell out and arrest the “Illuminators.” And then there’ll be the poor kids who have only sparklers and smoke bombs, because mom and dad want them to be “safe and sane.”

Give me a break! The American Revolution was fought in opposition to centralized authority, by patriots who refused to bow to an overbearing government – “Don’t Tread on Me!” “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death!”

Two hundred years later, we have the Nanny State, watching our every move, protecting us from ourselves because of the fundamental progressive (not Revolutionary) belief that most of us common folks are too irrational (read “stupid”) to take care of ourselves.

Thank Heavens for the Indians! Thank Heavens that a group of Americans so betrayed by American Revolutionaries has endured into the twenty-first century, embraced capitalism, and built Fireworks (“Illuminations”) Stands! The only truly free territory in Pierce County is on the Puyallup and Muckleshoot Reservations!

“Give me Illuminations or give me Death!”

p.s. #1 Thanks to DA, whose thoughts are always “illuminating.”
p.s. #2 Note John Adams also refers above to “Guns” as part of the celebration. Keep that thought…

One word described the first major forum for Tacoma's mayoral candidates last night: Jarring.

On one side was Jim Merritt, whose three decades working as an architect in Tacoma have been marked by strong involvement in civic life. Merritt's had a hand in numerous community undertakings: the siting of Interstate 705, redevelopment of the old Asarco smelter site, the cable-stay bridge, the Tacoma Convention and Trade Center, Union Station and the Foss Waterway master plan, among others.

All that, and he's the candidate running as the outsider. Merritt repeatedly told the City Club crowd last night that the city hasn't been listening to its citizens. He said City Hall isn't reaching out to its neighborhoods, and worse, it's driving businesses away. I lost count of how many times Merritt mentioned getting back to the "grassroots." (Fellow editorial board member Pat O'Callahan remarked, "I was ready to have him work on my lawn.") Merritt called for a 100-year plan for Tacoma, saying "We need to start setting a course that we can believe in."

And then there was Marilyn Strickland, who just a couple of years ago was a relative newcomer to city politics, albeit a well-networked one. Strickland, as a city councilwoman, is essentially cast in the role of incumbent in the mayor's race. She can't criticize the direction of the city without faulting herself by association.

Strickland defended the city's decision to pass out fat raises to non-union employees last year, saying that it would have been "unfair of the city to treat them badly at this time" after asking them to make do with 1 percent raises in previous years. And she said she's proud of the city's efforts to focus on the city's public schools, a development she chalked up to her race for council two years ago.

Merritt and Strickland don't square off until November, so their campaigns likely won't hit their stride until after August's primary. But out of the gate, the fall's race is shaping up to be one laced with contradictions: the anti-establishment member of Tacoma's who's-who vs. the fresh-faced, next-generation insider. That alone should be interesting to watch.

This editorial will appear in Thursday's print edition.

What’s happening south of our state line is enough to make the likes of Tim Eyman, as well as a number of thwarted Washington Democrats, green with envy.

On Monday, Oregon legislators wrapped up a session – marked by their bracing refusal to let policy ambitions bow to the economy – that has left the state ripe for a tax revolt. Business leaders announced last week that they plan to spend big to defeat $733 million in tax hikes.

Eyman might wish for some of that mojo. As the perennial tax-cut hawker’s annual appointment with the secretary of state’s office draws near today, it’s looking like he’ll cross the finish line huffing and puffing, if at all.

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This editorial will appear in tomorrow's print edition.

Taken too far, efforts to fix past racial discrimination tip over into reverse discrimination. But how far is too far?

The U.S. Supreme Court took a well-aimed stab at that knotty question this week when it ruled that a group of white and Hispanic firefighters in New Haven, Conn., shouldn’t have had their high test scores thrown out because the exam hadn’t produced any black candidates for lieutenant or captain.

A case like this turns on the details. It’s easy to imagine promotion requirements that are clearly unfair to minority candidates. In fact, American fire departments used to routinely screen out minorities – especially blacks – with a variety of practices unrelated to job performance. Passing out jobs to the sons and nephews of other firefighters, for example. Or simply not hiring and promoting blacks – or ostracizing any who did wind up getting hired.

New Haven, like a lot of cities, once had a nearly lily-white fire department. That’s why it went to considerable lengths to come up with a neutral promotion exam that tested for actual job skills.

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How valuable would it be to watch the arguments in such landmark U.S. Supreme Court cases as Marbury vs. Madison, Brown vs. Board of Education, Bush vs. Gore? Technology wasn't possible for that to happen with the first case, but it was with the other two.

And what about big cases happening in the present? Will future generations look back and wonder why they were denied the chance to watch Antonin Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg interrogate hapless attorneys?

Providing a window into history is one reason Washington Supreme Court Chief Justice Gerry Alexander wholeheartedly supports televising high court proceedings. I talked with him Tuesday for today's editorial about cameras in the U.S. Supreme Court.

Alexander speaks from experience: TVW has been airing arguments in his court since 1995. He likes it – and thinks it would be a great idea for the U.S. Supreme Court. Televising can help the public learn about government and democratic institutions, he said, and demystify the court process.

"It's been a very pleasant relationship (with TVW), and there's been no disruption in proceedings," he said by phone from Olympia.

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