Innovest, an influential international financial adviser group, released a report Tuesday that analyzed the risks and benefits of Sunflower Electric Power Corp.’s proposed coal-fired power plant expansion near Holcomb. It found that while the Sunflower expansion would provide additional baseload capacity, “the carbon risks associated with an increased reliance on coal present significant financial risks for the company’s owners and ratepayers.” What kind of risks? Assuming carbon regulation costs based on prevailing market rates of between $21 and $48 per ton, the Holcomb plant could cost Sunflower ratepayers “between $22.4 million and $51.36 million annually,” the study found. The analysis concludes that “Sunflower has failed to account for likely regulatory scenarios, and will therefore expose its ratepayers to the significant financial exposure associated with a strategic focus on developing new coal capacity.”
Ric Anderson of the Topeka Capital-Journal finds a silver lining in the 2008 Legislature’s coal-plant obsession: “For those who subscribe to the theory that the best legislative action generally is none at all, the 2008 session has been one to remember.” Noting that one of the only nine signed bills so far this session requires the state to purchase liability insurance on watercraft used by wildlife and parks personnel, Anderson concluded: “At least we can rest assured the state will be covered if a park ranger’s boat pulls loose from its moorings and scratches some rich guy’s Jet Ski. It’s not a $3.5 billion power plant, but that peace of mind is worth something, isn’t it?”
“Even some Clinton loyalists are wondering aloud if the win-at-all-costs strategy of Hillary and Bill — which continued Tuesday when Hillary tried to drag Rev. Wright back into the spotlight — is designed to rough up Obama so badly and leave the party so riven that Obama will lose in November to John McCain,†New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd wrote. “If McCain only served one term, Hillary would have one last shot. On Election Day in 2012, she’d be 65.
“Why else would Hillary suggest that McCain would be a better commander in chief than Obama, and why else would Bill imply that Obama was less patriotic — and attended by more static — than McCain?
“Why else would Phil Singer, a Hillary spokesman, say in a conference call with reporters on Tuesday that Obama was trying to disenfranchise the voters of Florida and Michigan?â€
Rather than trying to help McCain, the more likely answer is that Clinton still thinks she can somehow get enough superdelegates to pull out the nomination, as remote a chance as that is.
Trustees for Social Security and Medicare issued a critical warning this week that both programs are headed for insolvency. Without reforms, the trustees estimate that Social Security and Medicare will deplete their surpluses by 2041 and 2019, respectively. But the budget impact starts much sooner than that. That’s because the surpluses from these programs aren’t sitting in a bank vault somewhere; they’ve been used to help cover overspending by Congress. So once Social Security and Medicare begin paying out more than they take in in payroll taxes (which starts this year for Medicare), the government will have to pay back this money and won’t have surpluses to help pay its bills.
To his credit, President Bush tried to reform these programs, though his approach was too partisan. Both parties, and the presidential candidates, need to commit to working together to preserve these programs. The longer they wait, the fewer and worse the options.
It’s good that Wild West World has a buyer and that the defunct theme park could have another shot at succeeding. Murphy Brothers Exposition of Tulsa has signed a contract, though other bidders have until May 8 to top the offer. The rock-bottom $2 million sales price for the $30 million park won’t help creditors much. But without the huge debt load and with more cash reserves, the park might be able to make it this time. We hope so.
The outbreak this week of fierce militia fighting in several Iraqi cities, including Basra and Baghdad, is a direct threat to the security gains of the U.S. military surge and a reminder of how shaky Iraq’s political situation remains.
After months of keeping a low profile, radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, a longtime thorn in the side of the U.S. occupation, is once again rattling sabers and threatening nationwide civil unrest and uprisings.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki was in Basra Monday and vowed that the Iraqi government would “restore security, stability, and enforce law in this city.†Today he ordered the Shiite militias in Basra to lay down their weapons within 72 hours or face more severe consequences.
As Time magazine noted, this could be his moment of truth. If Iraqi troops can crush the Mahdi Army and the other Shiite militias holding Basra, it could restore some confidence in him and in Iraq’s ability to govern itself. But if the Iraqi troops fail, it could further undermine the government and Maliki.
Some have wondered whether a president John McCain would be like George W. Bush on steroids — quick to flex military muscle and unwilling to back down no matter what. But McCain began a foreign policy speech today by stating that he detests war and thinks it is “wretched beyond all description.â€
“When nations seek to resolve their differences by force of arms, a million tragedies ensue,†McCain said. “The lives of a nation’s finest patriots are sacrificed. Innocent people suffer and die. Commerce is disrupted; economies are damaged; strategic interests shielded by years of patient statecraft are endangered as the exigencies of war and diplomacy conflict. Not the valor with which it is fought nor the nobility of the cause it serves, can glorify war. Whatever gains are secured, it is loss the veteran remembers most keenly.
“Only a fool or a fraud sentimentalizes the merciless reality of war.â€
Clinton supporter James Carville last week called New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson a “Judas†for endorsing Barack Obama. Now he’s refusing to apologize for the insult. Good for him. It’s starting to get silly, these demands for apologies for strong or insulting language.
Richardson did a painful thing in rejecting his former political benefactors — and many in the Clinton camp do see it as betrayal. Is “Judas†a bit over the top? Sure. And so was an Obama supporter calling Hillary Clinton a “monster.†But they reflect the strong feelings in these two campaigns.
Let’s reserve the outrage for what’s truly outrageous, and quit with the rounds of dueling apologies and forced resignations. Or there will be nobody left to campaign.
Two fun facts from an account of last week’s “Defending the American Dream Summit†in Topeka, an event sponsored by the Americans for Prosperity Foundation that might as well have been sponsored by the Republican Party: Two people were honored with bronze busts of President Reagan, and the audience overwhelmingly identified Fox News Channel as the favored cable news network. “I can see we have a fair and balanced audience,†said speaker Michael Barone of U.S. News & World Report and Fox News.
Talk about curb appeal. Union Station downtown, with its beautiful colonnaded facade, is up for sale. Like many former public buildings, this is an architectural and historical treasure that deserves not just preservation but a place at the heart of our civic life.
Steve Martens, whose real estate company is selling the property, sees a variety of possible uses for the 85,000-square-foot building, including retail, hotel and restaurant. What’s important is to find new life and a high use for such a historic building.
Originally the city’s train depot and most recently the home for Cox Communications, Union Station offers an exciting opportunity for a developer to build on the location’s proximity to the Old Town entertainment district and new arena.
This is a key piece in the downtown redevelopment puzzle. Here’s hoping someone has a vision to match the building’s great potential.Any takers out there, bloggers?
Gangs and drugs so terrorize some parts of Wichita that many people will shrug off the article in Tuesday’s Eagle about the apparent local use of the USA Patriot Act — which is supposed to target terrorism — to do a secret search of the house of a man accused of being a cocaine supplier to the Crips gang, a search that happened 90 days before the man was notified of it. To obtain the search warrant, authorities said the secret search would protect evidence and prevent suspects from fleeing or intimidating witnesses. The courts will sort out whether the evidence was legally obtained in this case. But such use of the Patriot Act certainly raises questions, including about whether it reflects Congress’ intent in passing the law post-Sept. 11. In a 2005 Eagle commentary, U.S. Attorney Eric Melgren assured the public that the Patriot Act “has been used to disrupt terrorist cells and espionage, as well as assist in solving horrific domestic crimes.†Does this alleged criminal activity count?
Hillary Clinton now calls her story about dodging sniper bullets in Bosnia a “misstatement.†But let’s call it what it is — a whopper.
Clinton said last week, “I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base.â€
That’s a pretty vivid memory and effective story, if you want to prove your commander-in-chief mettle. The only problem is, it’s false.
CBS and other video footage from the time shows Clinton walking normally off the plane with her daughter, Chelsea, smiling and shaking hands with dignitaries and an 8-year-old child.
War is hell? Never mind.
This wasn’t just a slip of the tongue. Clinton has told the story several times on the stump to buttress a central claim she’s been making — that she has more foreign policy experience than Barack Obama.
Instead, the exposed fib supports those who argue that Clinton exaggerates her credentials and experience.
John McCain is mostly getting a free pass on his positions and misstatements (Iran is training al-Qaida?) while the Democrats engage in the usual circular firing squad. As the editors of the New Republic observe, “Democrats are spending millions of dollars bludgeoning one another in ways that can’t help but abet McCain — while McCain does a neat job of consolidating his base and building good will with the rest of the electorate.â€
In response to last week’s coverage of the fifth anniversary of the Iraq war, former Eagle editor Davis Merritt has a commentary in today’s Opinion pages arguing that the news media share blame for the Iraq mess. He wrote:
“In the media universe that is obligated to challenge every facile government assertion and official pronouncement, only Knight Ridder’s Washington bureau did so. Its reporters looked behind the evidence about weapons of mass destruction and the administration’s claim about direct links between Saddam Hussein and al-Qaida, and found serious questions.
“But they could not reach enough people. So, in substantial part because of journalistic failure to question authority, we slid into an ill-conceived and badly executed adventure.â€
When Gov. Kathleen Sebelius signed two bills last week before vetoing the energy bill, it brought the signed bills for the session to a grand total of nine. That compares with 17 signed bills last year at about the same time and 24 in 2006. One of those signed last week at least served the fine cause of designating parts of seven highways to honor veterans of the Civil War, Spanish-American War, World War II, Korean War, Persian Gulf War, Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom. “These designations will remind all those who visit our state of the courage and sacrifice of our veterans,†Sebelius said in a statement.
Barack Obama often mentions how his mother was a white woman from Kansas. But a recent New York Times article provided more background on the woman who helped shape the candidate. The profile described Stanley Ann Dunham Soetoro (she was named after Obama’s grandfather from El Dorado) as idealistic but also exacting (she used to wake up Obama at 4 a.m. to work on a correspondence course). She was an anthropologist who championed women’s work and helped bring microcredit loans to the world’s poor before dying of ovarian cancer in 1995, the Times reported. “She gave us a very broad understanding of the world,†Obama’s half-sister said. “She hated bigotry. She was very determined to be remembered for a life of service and thought that service was really the true measure of a life.†Obama wrote of his mother, “I know that she was the kindest, most generous spirit I have ever known, and that what is best in me I owe to her.â€
Last week the number was five — years of the Iraq war. This week the number is 4,000 — U.S. deaths so far in that war. As a military spokesman said, each death is “equally tragic,†lessening the significance of the tally. And, of course, the cost in U.S. lives does not compare with that of Iraqis, 82,000 to 89,000 according to one creditable count. There also are reasons to believe in the surge strategy, which has shown fragile progress in securing Iraq. But as we observed in October 2005, when the 2,000th U.S. death occurred, such milestones raise the question: “Is the sacrifice worth it?â€
With Congress having raised the federal minimum wage last year, it seemed only a matter of time before Kansas would do something — anything — about its embarrassing $2.65-an-hour minimum wage, the lowest in the land. But the majority of House Republicans saw no urgency last week, blocking a vote to increase the wage by returning a bill to committee. Officials estimate that the wage applies to 19,000 workers at small Kansas companies that aren’t covered by federal wage laws. The roll call is here.
“We’re paying the price for willful amnesia,†New York Times columnist Paul Krugman wrote about the financial crisis. “We chose to forget what happened in the 1930s — and having refused to learn from history, we’re repeating it.†Krugman argues that the banking crisis that followed the 1929 stock market crash “showed that unregulated, unsupervised financial markets can all too easily suffer catastrophic failure. As the decades passed, however, that lesson was forgotten — and now we’re relearning it, the hard way.â€
The 16 appointments so far to the citizen committee helping search for a new city manager say a lot about the Wichita City Council’s priorities — a predominance of real estate and business professionals, with a few nods to diversity and neighborhoods. To be sure, these people know Wichita well and will bring distinct perspectives to the search. But many have agendas, too. And there’s a good case to be made that members Ben Sciortino and Greg Ferris do not belong on such a panel, because their work has involved lobbying the City Council.
The following satirical headlines come from borowitzreport.com:
OBAMA CONVERTS TO JUDAISM; Bold Attempt to Settle Religion Issue
LEWINSKY RELEASES WHITE HOUSE SCHEDULE; Heavily Redacted Document Raises Questions
FERRARO: I WISH I WERE A BLACK MAN; Racist Comments Wouldn’t Be Racist, Former Congresswoman Claims
SPITZER RESIGNS FROM EMPERORS VIP CLUB; Client No. 10 to Succeed New York Guv
BUSH REVEALS TAP WATER AS PRESCRIPTION DRUG PLAN; Hopes Doped Water Will Be His Legacy, President Says
