It’s interesting that the White House allowed a major news story — the vice president shooting someone — to break in a local Texas newspaper, the Corpus Christi Caller Times. Monday night, MSNBC talk show host Keith Olbermann asked Washington Post reporter Dana Milbank to comment on the novelty of this media approach. Milbank’s bombshell revelation:
“I think this could be the beginning of a new strategy. In fact, I have learned today that, as we speak, there’s a manicurist in Kansas who is revealing the Bush administration’s global warming plan right now to The Wichita Eagle-Beacon. We’ll be able to read about that in the morning.”
Well, unfortunately, the manicurist has not yet come forward. But when she does, The Eagle (drop the Beacon, Dana) will be there to break the story, unless the vice president’s office decides to give Pennypower the exclusive instead.
Posted by Randy Scholfield
Never mind that oil and gas companies are raking in historic, jaw-dropping profits. Never mind that Americans are paying through the nose at the pump. Never mind the soaring federal deficit.
The Bush administration and Congress plan to let oil and gas companies keep an extra $7 billion in the next five years by waiving oil and gas royalties from drilling on federal lands, mainly in the Gulf of Mexico.
With oil expected to stay around the $50-a-barrel level in the next few years, this is highway robbery.
It gets worse: If Kerr-McGee, on behalf of the industry, wins a court challenge to another royalty fee, U.S. taxpayers could lose a total of $35 billion in potential revenue by 2011 — as The New York Times noted, “about the same amount that Mr. Bush is proposing to cut from Medicare, Medicaid and child support enforcement programs over the same period.”
Posted by Randy Scholfield
Should school resource officers be allowed to use Tasers in Wichita public schools to disable unruly students? The answer should almost always be "no."
Parents have a right to be concerned that Wichita SROs will now be armed with Tasers, especially considering reports of Taser misuse in other schools: The Florida case of a 6-year-old student who was Tasered is particularly outrageous.
Still, as our editorial on today’s opinion page argues, SROs might be justified in using Tasers in rare circumstances, to protect themselves or others from serious injury or death — say, from a knife-wielding assailant, whether a student or outsider.
But school district and local police should make sure they have a clear, defensible policy in place. Or they’re asking for trouble. What do you think?
Posted by Randy Scholfield
Howard Dean was his usual unhinged self Sunday on CBS’ "Face the Nation," trying to argue that President Bush has been weak on defense, that we went into Iraq because Iran was the real problem and that Vice President Dick Cheney "is in deep trouble" and "may not be vice president much longer." The last idea, which Dean repeated Monday on CNN, stems from "Scooter" Libby’s leaked grand jury testimony that he was told by superiors (presumably Cheney) to leak the name of CIA agent Valerie Plame to reporters to help discredit Plame’s husband, White House critic Joseph Wilson.
Dean’s wild talk continues to keep the Democrats down, as it reportedly is deterring contributors. It does make you marvel, though, especially in light of what CIA Director Porter Goss has been saying lately, at how selective the outrage is over leaks in Washington, D.C., these days.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
Some separation began to appear this past weekend between Muslims who responsibly protested the Danish cartoons of Muhammad and those who are using the controversy for their own political purposes. About 5,000 Muslims marched in London to both condemn the cartoons and the violent response by other Muslims. Marches in several other European cities had the same message. But in Iran, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (in photo) continued to fan flames. He told a crowd of tens of thousands of people celebrating the anniversary of the 1979 Islamic revolution that "the people of the U.S. and Europe should pay a heavy price for becoming hostages to Zionists."
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
The Kansas House is expected to debate today a bill to exempt property taxes on new business machinery and equipment purchases. This is a smart, targeted tax cut that would encourage economic growth through increased productivity and should help make Kansas more competitive. But because the cost would be borne mostly by local governments, lawmakers should do the right thing and also approve a proposed amendment that requires the state to help cover the loss in local revenue.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
Marci Penner (in photo) was appropriately lauded in the Kansas Senate last week for being the state’s No. 1 promoter. Sen. Carolyn McGinn, R-Sedgwick, helped lead the recognition, reading on the Senate floor passages from Penner’s "Kansas Guidebook for Explorers." Penner, who co-founded the Kansas Sampler Foundation, a nonprofit group dedicated to sustaining rural Kansas culture through education, also heads the Kansas Explorers Club, which, as an Eagle news article reported Sunday, encourages quirky tourism quests — such as eating a hamburger in every county. Penner has described the guidebook as her love letter to her home state. The affection is mutual.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
