"We believe that the science is quite compelling and that climate change is certainly attributed to human activity and to the substantial use of fossil fuels," Jim Mulva, chairman and chief executive of ConocoPhillips, said Wednesday. The oil company is calling for a federal emissions cap on greenhouse gases and has joined, along with fellow oil giant BP, the U.S. Climate Action Partnership. ConocoPhillips’ motives aren’t without self-interest; it wants to help shape the national cap legislation. But critics will have trouble continuing to mock and dismiss concerns about global warming when even oil companies admit that greenhouse gases are a problem in need of action.
Posted by Phillip Brownlee
The standard 12-month tour for a soldier in the U.S. Army has been upped to 15 months, Defense Secretary Robert Gates announced Wednesday. The change should allow consistency between tours for soldiers, giving them 12 months at home between deployments. But it will also strain soldiers and is an indication of how our military is stretched. Another concern is how the change might affect our ability to recruit and retain our volunteer military.
Posted by Ross Stewart
When anybody campaigns for president in the South, he needs to have a ready answer to the question about whether it’s OK for a state Capitol to fly the Confederate battle flag. On Tuesday in Alabama, GOP front-runner Rudy Giuliani said it’s up to Alabamans: “We have different sensitivities, and at different times we are going to come to different decisions, and I think that is best left up to the states.” That surely played well with the audience, but would it have killed Giuliani to call the flag what it is — an offensive symbol best left to history? By calling it a local issue, Giuliani did what John McCain did in South Carolina in 2000, when he waited until he was safely out of the race to say that state’s Confederate battle flag should come down — cowardice that McCain later said he regretted.
It’s also uncomfortable to see anybody address a racial issue by touting states’ rights, once code used by defenders of segregation.
Posted by Rhonda Holman
All charges have been dropped against the three Duke University lacrosse players who had been accused of rape, sexual offense and kidnapping. Though this will offer some sense of closure to the accused, in this generation of googling for information, they likely will forever be linked to this fiasco.
The district attorney in Durham County, N.C., who so zealously rushed to accuse the three college students and declare them guilty without any real evidence, should be disbarred. His self-serving actions not only showed him to be unethical, but have ruined three people’s lives.
Posted by Patrice Hein
No telling whether Arizona Sen. John McCain’s Wednesday speech vigorously defending the Iraq war as “necessary and just” will start a surge in his presidential campaign, just as there’s no telling yet whether the troop surge will work.
But the Associated Press story on McCain’s speech included ideas for two alternate surges, suggested by Democratic presidential candidates:
“What we need today is a surge in honesty,” said Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., calling for leaders to let “the Iraqi government know America will not be there forever.”
“We need a surge of diplomacy,” said Sen. Christopher Dodd, D-Conn.
And noncandidate Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., said a while ago on “Meet the Press” that “we need a surge of concern for our troops, for the veterans, for the injured, for the wounded, for the families of those who lost loved ones.”
What surges do bloggers think we need about now?
Posted by Rhonda Holman
Wichita might have had its Sally Field moment this week: We like Wichita! We really like it!
That was the impression of Janet Harrah, economics guru at Wichita State University, about the surprising and gratifying results of the Visioneering Wichita online survey.
The survey could be a breakthrough in Wichita’s decades-long struggle with its self-image. Turns out the widely held belief that Wichitans are overly negative about their city is wrong.
According to the survey, a large majority of Wichitans (more than 80 percent) have a positive image of their city and its quality of life — they just think their neighbors and outsiders don’t like it.
As Vera Bothner of the Bothner and Bradley agency said, the survey “gives us permission to say, ‘We love Wichita.’”
So go ahead, Wichita — don’t hold back.
Of course, the survey isn’t an excuse for complacency. Most Wichitans, while fond of their city, want to see continued progress on a host of quality-of-life and economic issues.
And still unanswered: Why do we think outsiders have negative opinions about Wichita? Is that perception accurate? And if so, what can we do to get the good word out about Wichita’s strengths?
Posted by Randy Scholfield
