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About Sarah Palin: an e-mail from Wasilla
2008 Election » Alaska »A state 'awash in money' from an extraction economy: It's different being governor of Alaska
- New York Times
- Palin electrifies the GOP convention
- Oh, also, McCain was officially nominated
- Once a pal of journalists, McCain turns on them
Wasilla, Alaska, got $26.9 million in earmarks while Sarah Palin was mayor
- Washington Post
- Palin's vetting was comparatively minimal
- Welcome to the media major leagues!
- The hectic life of 'Gov. Mom'
- 'Mommy Wars, Special Campaign Edition'
Sarah Palin vs. the librarian: Facts are hard to come by
2008 Election »Mayor Palin had a rough record at Wasilla City Hall
Alaska »Under Mayor Palin, Wasilla went the strip-mall route
2008 Election »Sarah Palin's 17-year-old daughter is pregnant and will marry the father
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About Sarah Palin: an e-mail from Wasilla
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Sarah Palin: the liberal voter's worst nightmare
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Is Sound Transit really one of 'the world's biggest boondoggles'?
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The high price of Sarah Palin's candidacy
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The case for Sarah Palin
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A classic evisceration speech by the running mate
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Why Palin, why now
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An Alaska-sized gamble — and possibly a brilliant one
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No post-convention bounce for the Democrats
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The making of an effective arts board
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Crosscut highlights
The vision is to make the University of Washington and the region a major player in the post-carbon economy. Big stuff. Whether President Mark Emmert can make it happen is an open question, however.
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Sausage Links, Pac 10 edition
It's been a busy year for University of Oregon graduates Jill Hazelbaker and Tucker Bounds. Recently named the "Dynamic Duck duo" by The Oregonian, Bounds and Hazelbaker are two of the McCain campaign's top communications officers — the Republicans' first wave of defense against Democratic attacks. As reporter Jeff Mapes points out, it's not an easy job. ...
Biding time until coach Tyrone Willingham is gone, cranky University of Washington football fans at least get to watch an NFL quarterback prospect excel. Jake Locker does so in spite of those around him.
Sausage Links, ice cream man edition
Despite the near-record temperatures predicted for the weekend, officials from around the state are asking agencies to "freeze." Last week, Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire ordered a hiring freeze for state employees in an attempt to ease Washington's mounting budget deficit. Yesterday, the Snohomish County Council ordered a hiring freeze for all of their county's agencies. Not to be outdone, Seattle Mayor Greg Nickels proposed a $5 million spending freeze for the City of Seattle yesterday. On a related note, Seattle's fleet of ice cream carts are expanding their service around the city, in a move experts say could result in widespread brain freezes. ...
Seattle and the elixir of growth
In some moods, I think that Seattle's business renaissance has peaked. Starbucks is contracting, Microsoft is stumbling, Boeing is losing bids, Safeco is sold, and Washington Mutual is sinking. Has our formula of rapid growth spreading across the globe run into the wall?
But then I look at the front page of today's "Marketplace" section of The Wall Street Journal, where three of the four stories are about Seattle-based companies. There's the story of Microsoft's scramble in the executive suite, with the sudden departure of Kevin Johnson, formerly in charge of the Yahoo merger campaign; Costco reporting an earnings squeeze as the prices for merchandise are rising faster than they can pass along costs to its value-seeking customers; and Amazon doubling its second-quarter profits as customers shift from shopping by car to shopping by online.
Sausage Links, cougar-hunting edition
Praise the Lord and release the hounds — because our good state Legislature has enacted a law which makes it legal once again to use dogs to hunt cougars. Now, I didn't even know cougar hunting was legal in Washington — minus Cougars wearing crimson — but apparently, it is. While the bill was actually passed by the Legislature in February, the Department of Fish and Wildlife will hold a public meeting on Friday to discuss whether the pilot program should continue for another three years.
Meanwhile, Micheal Reitz of the Evergreen Freedom Foundation has compiled a list of some other curious laws enacted by the Washington Legislature this year. My personal favorite: Violators may face up to $1,000 or up to a year in jail for selling raw or unprocessed huckleberries without a permit.
Go, Nuke Building!
The University of Washington's More Hall Annex, aka the Nuclear Reactor Building, has become a cause celeb for fans of mid-century modern architecture and atomic history. The UW is planning to demolish the building, but a graduate student, Abby Martin, has mounted an effort to get the structure listed on the National Historic Register of Historic Places. Time seemed to be running out, but it ain't over yet.
A Seattle Expo legacy emerges from the trees
The University of Washington cut down a row of beautiful poplars on campus over the weekend. I love poplars and hated to see that. But as we approach 2009, the centennial year of Seattle's first world's fair, the tree-cutting at least had the benefit of revealing a lovely architectural legacy of the expo.
The sentencing of another in the ELF 'Family'
Beltane is a Gaelic holiday marking the beginning of summer. The first communique sent by the Earth Liberation Front (ELF), in 1997, stated it was sent on Beltane. And now two days before the summer solstice, Briana Waters today will be sentenced in U.S. District Court in Tacoma by Judge Franklin Burgess for her role as lookout during a 2001 arson at the University of Washington's Center for Urban Horticulture. The end is in sight for the government's "Operation Backfire."
One College of the Environment deserves a look back at another
The man who created Huxley College of the Environment at Western Washington University, the nation's first such college, hasn't followed the controversies surrounding a similar college at the University of Washington, but he has some succinct advice: "Devote yourself to the science, the hard data," says C. J. (Jerry) Flora, "and don't get swept up in the fads."
UW is planning to move a historic fair pavilion
Next year will kick off the centennial of Seattle's first world's fair, the Alaska Yukon Pacific Exposition of 1909. The expo was held on what is now the University of Washington campus, and while most of the fair's pavilions are long gone, a few original structures remain. One is the Women's Building, now named Cunningham Hall after Seattle photographer Imogene Cunningham. The university plans to relocate the hall by the end of 2009 to make room for the new Molecular Engineering Building.
For some of the more than half of Seattle residents who rent, such a program could mean better conditions without the onus of ratting out a landlord. For the 4,300 owners of an estimated 100,000 rental units, required regular inspections sound onerous.
A University of Washington prof interviewed 450 members of liberal and evangelical Christian churches in the Pacific Northwest. His mission: to understand the "clash of cultures" between two sides of the same tradition.
A former staff member of the University of Washington's Center for Urban Horticulture wonders why, seven years later, the crime makes no more sense than it did the morning Merrill Hall went up in flames.
Invoking the Red Scare of the 1950s, some environmentalists claim the federal government is committing something similar against the green movement of the 2000s. Of course, it could simply be vigorous enforcement of laws against violence and property damage.
The newcomer name game
The Chinese have a saying: "One move is like two house fires." It's very disorienting to be in a new place, even if you moved within the U.S. and can therefore depend on the cultural differences between your previous burg and Seattle to be, relatively speaking, minimal. I've lived in the Northwest for nearly six years and Seattle for almost three, and I'm still doing double-takes over little things, such as proper nouns.
State universities have clumsy and stingy masters in state capitols. Is it time for divorce court? Here's the story of how some people advising the University of Washington looked at such a scheme.
Red balloons and hot dogs help in a University of Washington grad student's fight to save the Nuclear Reactor Building. Plus: Honors for the state's historic preservationists.
How the West was nuked
One of the best trends in historic commemoration is a greater willingness to honestly embrace history some would like to forget. In the bill containing Washington's new Wild Sky Wilderness that just passed Congress, there is funding for a National Park Service memorial on Bainbridge Island commemorating the shameful internment of Japanese civilians during World War II. The internment proposal was pushed hard by Rep. Jay Inslee and Sen. Maria Cantwell. Coming to terms with our nuclear past is another problematic area, but one that is also getting a more attention in the West.
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Heart attack on McCain
I saw this coming. Last night after John McCain's GOP convention speech, the hall was blasted with the sounds of Seattle band Heart's rocker "Barracuda," which became the convention's theme music for Sarah "Barracuda" Palin (Barracuda was a high-school nickname). I figured an objection would be raised.
'Me' for president
Palin wouldn't be the first Northwest secessionist on a national ticket
Seattle Symphony's Benaroya Hall celebrates its tenth birthday
Leader of African-American lecture forum is departing
The music you like tells a lot about your personality
The Washington Mutual board ousts CEO Kerry Killinger
Washington and Idaho score very high as business-friendly states
A columnist tries swearing off Google for 24 hours
There's sudden movement in updating Seattle neighborhood plans
I've been tracking the City of Seattle's proposal to update the neighborhood plans since March in the series There Go the Neighborhoods. You wouldn't think I'd be caught unawares before the only currently scheduled public hearing before City Council's Planning, Land Use, and Neighborhoods Committee's special meeting. Guess what? It's scheduled for Monday, Sept. 8, 5:30 p.m. in City Council Chambers at City Hall. The agenda lists only one item: public comment.
Factoring in Alaska's first family
'Wishful budgeting' and other distortions of the convention speeches
Mount Baker
Proposed: Rename Seattle's Freeway Park for Jim Ellis, civic leader
Whassup with Wasilla
In touch with the average American
The funny thing about Seattle ...
'Drill their brains out!'
The supposedly promising Seahawks are Buffaloed
Weird call by refs helps Huskies to lose to BYU, 28-27
Brandon Morrow, in debut, comes close to pitching a no-hitter for Mariners
Washington and Idaho score very high as business-friendly states
In the governor's race, Gov. Chris Gregoire understandably often cites the state's recent rating by Forbes magazine, which names Washington as the third best state for business. The magazine's annual ranking put Virginia first and Utah second; Idaho retains its high rank, this year as 7th. Oregon finished 16th, Colorado is 6th, Minnesota is 11th, Montana is 24th, California is 40th, and Alaska is 48th.
A columnist tries swearing off Google for 24 hours
My word of mouth on Kindle
Salmonella sickens nine; health officials eye alfalfa sprouts
A new wine region emerges in Colorado
Slow Food Nation: now a political movement
Our Convention Center has growing pains
Seattle's Convention Center is taking a close look at expanding, perhaps at a different location. It might complicate the coming legislative session if it puts its hand in the state trough of money for tourism-related taxes. Also crowding around the trough are the Huskies, King County arts, Seattle Center, KeyArena, low-income housing, Puget Sound cleanup, and more. And the Convention Center might topple some other interesting transportation dominoes.
Mount Baker
A new wine region emerges in Colorado
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