4A
| OCTOBER 10, 2012
||
Viewpoint
O U R
O PI N I O N
THE NEWPORT MINER
||
LE T T E R S POLIC Y We welcome letters to the editor. Letters should be typed and submitted to The Miner and Gem State Miner office no later than 5 p.m. Friday for publication the following Wednesday. No letter will be published unless it is signed by at least one individual, even if the letter represents the view of a group. The letter must include a telephone number and address for confirmation of authenticity. Letters should be no longer than 300 words. The Miner reserves the right to edit to conform to our publication style, policy and libel laws. Political letters will not be published the last issue prior an election. Letters will be printed as space allows.
City Light pays sales tax – thank you
A
t the end of September, Seattle City Light paid sales tax to Pend Oreille County for a new turbine delivered directly to Boundary Dam. All eyes in Pend Oreille County government and a few in the Washington State Department of Revenue were watching to see if they would check the box for Pend Oreille County or Seattle on their state sales and use tax return. Everyone was pleasantly surprised because the Seattle-owned public utility had made it a habit of claiming Seattle as the end user for many purchases and thus sending the sales tax to themselves in the past. Pend Oreille County should salute Seattle City Light and the Seattle City Council for not making this a fight. Most of the tax on the $4 million dollar equipment goes to the state but 1.1 percent is returned to the county where it is used. In this case, Pend Oreille County received more than $40,000 for the turbine, which is part of the major rebuilding of Seattle City Light’s Boundary Project. Hopefully, this will begin a new policy of the utility to send the taxes back to the county where the equipment is being used. This issue had been on the table when Pend Oreille County officials and City Light argued about the amount of impact payments. The impact payment issue was settled but this sales tax issue wasn’t. The county is pleasantly surprised with these unexpected tax dollars in these hard economic times. The county is also the beneficiary of sales taxes from the Pend Oreille PUD’s turbine project and fiber-to-home project this year. We hope the county commissioners will put these funds to use in the county’s budget like capital expenditures or reserves that won’t be needed year after year to balance the budget. These kinds of big construction projects don’t happen regularly. --FJW
Behind the scenes of a debate This is written before the first presidential debate because it didn’t mesh with my deadline so I will have to deal with that later, but I look forward to watching it and the slew of other candidate debates in this final month before the election. I am anxious to see if the news people selected to ask the questions betray their bias. You’ll generally know where they stand by what media they represent. It was the same here during the 30 years I was an active political writer expected to give readers the who, what, why and wherefores without indicating how I felt about it personally. That changed when I continued writing only an opinion column in 1993. I was a panelist on many occasions as a questioner. I would sit down one day shortly before the event and write out my questions, trying for at least 15 or 20. You knew you’d never get in more than maybe three questions whether it was an hour or more because politicians on those occasions gave long, long answers to take up time, knowing full well that cut down on what they’d have to answer. Also, you never knew if one of the other questioners would ask one of your questions before you got around to it, so you had to have a bunch of them for spares. Emcees can cause you trouble too. I remember one Evans-Rosellini panel where the emcee told us questioners in advance that we got only one shot at a time for a question. No follow-ups. He made that very clear. Absolutely, positively NO follow-ups. Which was bad news because frequently you’d ask a question and the person to whom it was addressed would answer some previously asked other question he felt needed elaboration on his point yet you were forbidden to follow up with, “You didn’t answer my question.” And it was not unusual for the political participants if it was a one-on-one match for them to be privately asked in advance if they had any suggestion as to who they’d like to have do the asking. On the aforementioned Evans-Rosellini
event, I learned later that I was the only newsperson suggested by both sides. When my name first came up with the Evans people, someone groaned and said, “She’ll chew him up.” “Yeah,” was the response, “but she’ll do the same to Rosellini.” The same conversation took place among the Rosellini planners so I was in. I don’t remember a thing about what we asked or what they answered. It was the last Gov. Evans versus ex-Gov. Rosellini matchup where Rosellini scathingly referred to Evans several times as GUEST Danny Boy and a OPINION lot of voters felt it wasn’t just Evans ADELE but their govFERGUSON CORRESPONDENT ernor who was being put down. It hurt Rosellini badly. Evans and Rosellini were two of my favorite pols, however. Evans was one of the long answer types but I couldn’t swear it was to avoid further questions because he liked to deal with the press. He just couldn’t give a short answer to anything. We reporters who covered his press conferences used to sit in his conference room waiting for him and making up out loud the answers we expected to hear since he was almost 100 percent predictable. We were seldom wrong. Rosellini, on the other hand, was always a bit nervous when being questioned. Not that he didn’t know the answers but some reporters played on that nervousness and would ask questions such as (true case): “How are you going to deal with this problem, Governor? With your usual wishy washy straddling the fence?” No, not me. He was one of the best governors we ever had. On the current governor’s race, I’ll take McKenna over Inslee any day. I knew Al Rosellini and Jay Inslee is no Al Rosellini. (Adele Ferguson can be reached at P.O. Bo 69, Hansville, WA 98340.)
Web story comments policy
The Miner staff invites readers to comment on select stories on our Web site, www.pendoreillerivervalley. com. Commentators have the option of adding their name or writing anonymously. The Miner staff will review each comment before it is posted and reserves the right to omit or edit comments. If you want to comment only to our writers and editors let us know that you do not want your comment published.
|| Skoog will make excellent commissioner To the editor: I first met Karen Skoog as she was going door to door around Diamond Lake. She had a sincere interest in our high water problems and wanted to see our shoreline damage. She helped to bring a hydrogeologist to inform local residents and explain the causes of the high water and offer possible solutions. I know she worked quietly in the background to promote better communication between parties without taking over. I believe her respect for people and desire to listen to problems while searching for solutions makes Karen Skoog an excellent choice for county commissioner. It’s time for a change, and I know of no better choice than Karen Skoog. - Terry Konkright Diamond Lake
McMorris Rodgers
LE T T E R S
nearly 72 million uninsured, doubling the out-of-pocket costs to most families, and adding anywhere from $100 to $200 billion to the deficit, depending on which study you choose to believe. • She touts herself as the savior of rural health care, despite the fact that the Romney-Ryan Plan will have a far more devastating effect on critical access hospitals, if implemented. • She continues to support deregulation of the EPA, leaving people within her constituency vulnerable to continued exposure to toxins in the Upper Columbia and other rivers. We have a viable candidate who understands and cares about the people and economy of the 5th Congressional District, a candidate who knows how to get people back to work without destroying the budget or the environment in the process. Please join me in voting for Rich Cowan. -Gail Cory-Betz Newport
is wrong choice To the editor: I could write a book on why Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., is wrong for northeast Washington and needs to be replaced, but that would exceed the word limits allowed by this paper. I will instead attempt to summarize key points to convey my message: • She has repeatedly stated that she supports the repeal of “ObamaCare,” and has joined 33 times with the obstructionist GOP/Tea Party led Congress to repeal it, wasting nearly $50 million taxpayer dollars in the process. • She fully supports Romney/ Ryan’s proposed changes to the health care act, that would leave
||
R E A D E R S’
Better off? I think not To the editor: In August 2008, just before the Lehman Brothers collapse, the number of employed persons in the United States was 145.47 million. Over the subsequent years, the employment figure dipped to as low as 139.27 million. Today it stands at 142.1 million. Median household income, adjusted for inflation, fell 8.1 percent nationwide from 2007 to 2011, to $50,054. Even if this is considered recovery, to “rescue” those 2.8 million jobs, it took the federal government an additional $6.421 trillion worth of debt ($2.3 million per job), and a $1.9 trillion (203
P O LL
||
Visit The Miner Online to answer our readers’ poll question through Tuesday morning. Find it on the left-hand side of the page at www.PendOreilleRiverValley.com. The results will be printed next week on this page. You need not be a subscriber to participate. If you have ideas for future readers’ poll topics, submit them to minernews@povn.com.
The first of the presidential debates was held last week between Barak Obama and Mitt Romney. What did you think of the debate? Who won?
||
percent) expansion of the Federal Reserve balance sheet. Based on the Treasury’s most recent statistics, U.S. government interest payments to China will total at least $26.055 billion this year. The real figure may be much higher given that China has been purchasing Treasuries for decades, back when interest rates were much higher. They’re still getting paid on those higher rates today. Even still, this year’s interest payment to China totals more than all the silver that was mined in the world last year. Read the facts neighbors! -Judson Lightsey Newport
and HR 4215 – the “Medicare Pharmacy Transparency and Fair Auditing Act.” These bills will not allow fraud to escape and will not interfere with the free market. They will help preserve access to a pharmacist in rural America. Because she stood up for eastern Washington, McMorris Rodgers took a hit from a sponsor of the conservative Newsmax website. She listened to her constituents and followed principle over political pressure. Let’s send McMorris Rodgers back to DC to continue standing up for the real Washington. -Sue Lani Madsen Edwall
McMorris Rodgers stands up for eastern Washington
Reasons to vote for Wear
To the editor: How many have heard of a PBM? It’s the acronym for Pharmacy Benefit Manager, the intermediaries between your pharmacy and your insurance company. PBMs set the contract prices and conditions for your pharmacist, and do field audits to ensure that private insurance, Medicare and Medicaid are not being taken advantage of. A good thing, right? Yes, until the PBMs start abusing their position to intimidate independently owned pharmacies, like those we rely on in small town eastern Washington. Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., stood up to the PBMs and their deceptively named Affordable Pharmacy Action Network PAC. The PBMs own the mail order pharmacies, and closing down community pharmacies boosts their business. McMorris Rodgers co-sponsored HR 1971
||
To the editor: Ten reasons to vote for Diane Wear as our Pend Oreille County Commissioner: 1. We have just spent four years training her. Don’t want to lose that experience. 2. She stays in Pend Oreille County. She knows we are the ones she serves. 3. She works well with the department heads. 4. She covers meetings all over the county. 5. She is always looking for ways to get the most for our tax dollars. 6. She works hard. 7. She supports our county businesses. 8. She is not in it for the money. 9. She is fair even though she might not agree with you. 10. She is crazy enough to want that thankless job for another four years. -Perry Pearman Sacheen Lake SEE LETTERS, 5A
R E A D E R S’ P O LL R E S U LT S
||
What do you think of the NFL referee strike?
50%
33%
I’m pleased they were able to come to an agreement. Now teams can stop blaming losses on a ref’s call.
Obama won. He was more substantive. He was more truthful. Romney won. He was well prepared and articulate. I liked how he challenged Obama. I don’t know who won but moderator Jim Lehrer definitely lost. He shamefully let both candidates run over him. I don’t care who won, I’m glad we have the debates. Presidential candidates didn’t always debate. The country is better off seeing the candidates interact and hearing what they have to say.
It’s just a game. I don’t understand what the big deal is.
We all lost. The debates are a joke. Letting the Democrats and Republicans control who is in the debates and what questions are asked completely negates what little informational value they have.
The games played with replacement refs should be asterisked in the standings.
8% 8%
I don’t think the NFL should have played without the highest level of refs officiating.
I think the replacement refs made it a more entertaining game, and that’s what sport is all about.
0%
Total Votes 12