Jim

As always, relying on just one indicator to measure social well-being is disingenuous. While the US unemployment rate is generally higher than the EU, even taking into account the differences in how unemployment is calculated and our world-record prisoner population (which is subtracted from the labor pool caculations), there are other items to consider. The US infant mortality rate is the lowest among industralized countries and is comparable to that of Costa Rica and Cuba (which has 1/20 the per capita income of the US and has been under economic blockade for some time). Other measures including life expectancy, vacation time, stress-related illness, and lack of health care can make one wonder if there is not a middle ground. And if you look at other economic indicators such as productivity, the US tips out on top because we work so much more than everyone else. Per hour productivity is comparable. So- in the US we have lots of money, no time to spend it except on all the expensive medical procedures and medicine we need for a stressed out life, we have lower life expectancy and higher child mortality, less access to health care and not as much time to spend with our families. Money, money, money. Oh - and more fat people and better bombs. I'm sure the EU would like a better employemnt picture but I don't think they would take that compromise. And the US? We're on borried time - literally. Think our massive debt will have no economic reprucutions?

Sure - Salmon Bay is a K-8 Seattle Public Alternative School in Ballard. It's an Alternative school because the program is dominated by hands-on, project and group work. Cirriculum is developed by the teachers, there is little to no book work. There is an inclusion program for Aspergers synddrome kids (related to autisim), service leaning programs, and outdoor education programs - including the 8th grade camp, which is up at Camp Orkila on Orcas Island. The kids come from a variety of income families and some cannot afford the fees that it costs to go to 8th grade camp - and the school has limited funds to help out. Thus they organize fund-raisers to allow kids to attend that cannot afford the opportunity. It's a passage time for the kids - the last time their together before heading to high school. You have to be 21 because alcohol will be served at the event.

This is where you generally loose your audience. You make some good points, and then try to over-reach. The usual tactic of trying to smear all progressives, or liberals, by associating them with the Soviets, or Marxists, or some other fringe group is straight out of 50s hysteria. Again I would say that it's about as productive as trying to associate the neocons with the Nazis, which for the record is nonsense. Common sense folks realize the pathos of such comparisons. Your more provactive musings on social systems can be intriguing. These broadbrush smears are not.

Blah, blah. Good theater but little else. It would be equally accurate to paint the present neoconservative agenda with that of the Nazis and Stalin. I am, however, impressed with your ability to find obscure quotes on the web.

It is thoroughly disingenuous, if not outright slanderous, to state that Christians who oppose big-government social programs are not "compassionate". For the evangalical right I would say it's entirely accurate. Where do you think the money for Jerry Farwell's moral majority and Roberta Combs cristian coalition is going? It's not going to help anyone but politicians they agree with. Voulenteer with just about any Christian social service organization and you'll quickly understand their leanings. And it's a matter of emphasis. Does friggin gay marriage rise to the top of the chart as christian charitable issues in this country. I think not. One of the least reported stories in the leadup to war was the almost universal denunciation of the war by Church group. Bush, in all is veneer of christian spirit - refused to meet with a coalition of major religious organizations. It's just another tool for the party. By the way - what are you doing to help your community via the non-governmental intrusive way. Little I bet.

The liberal, or progressive movement, has made some broad contributions to major social changes - abolition, women's right to vote, civil rights in the south, an end to the Vietnam War. Conservatism, true to the root of the word, generally fought against such changes. It's interesting that many of these earlier progressive movements were done with a strong alliance with religious groups that shared the social activisim ideals. Now the the far right seems to have hijacked some of the religious group energy and turned it into the homophopic/abortion debate. There is a large group of Christians that look at the bible without ignoring the other issues, such as compassion and responsibility for the poor, general social well-being, and the enviroinment. Especially the past 10 years the Conservative agenda has markedly changed from its base theories. It used to be a fiscally responsible movement, slow to intervene in foreign affairs, and loathe to interfere in the personal lives of its citizens. Now there is only one channel. Increasing redistribution of wealth to the upper income brackets and Fortune 500.

Didn't seem to interfere with his quest. What a bunch of crap.

Hmm, I'm ambivalent on this one. High school campuses are a different matter... NCLB REQUIRES that high schools allow recruiters on campus and REQUIRES access to students home phone numbers so they can call.

These days their looking for anyone. They've bumped the age limit up, have set records in missing their recruiting targets, and the number of reported violations of recruiting folks that don't meet the minimum criteria (arrest records, drug records, education) are increasing. Frankly they are desperate and putting a lot of pressure on the recruiters. Now that has to be a bad job these days.

Back to the orginal concept - it's a great one. And I don't have any problem with the military in general, just the way the politicians weild the power. A stint in the armed forces might do some good to many kids. Especially the ones with soft hands from counting money.

Oh yea, The CATO Institute. There's an unbiased source.

This question is on the same level as "Have you stopped beating your wife yet?"

Thanks. Maybe that will save me wandering around the forest like last time. That blue trail is grim towards the bottom. At least with frozen crust. Next weekend maybe Vesper Peak, weather dependent, which has zero thrash factor. Just the stream crossing.

I've always left from the bottom of the Silver Fir chair, skin up the ski run to the base of the black diamond run, then left on the cattrail to Grand Junction. From there it's west then northeast on a logging road until you hit the blue diamond-marked trail thru remnant old growth to Nordic Pass, then straight up the clearcut, thru a band of trees and into the lower basin. The trick is to pick the logging road that gets you the highest and avoiding some of the lower blue trail thrashing on crust. We missed our turnoff on the way down and paid with what only slighly resembled skiing before finding the next road. We went to the upper basin and skied down. If you have two cars you can leave one at the Annette Lake trailhead, ski up the basin and down the west slope, which is a great 1,500 ft or so of a very even pitch. Then ski out via Annette Lake trail.

Empty nester now!

When: Friday evening, April 22nd, 7:00 to 9:00 PM Where: Sunset Hill Community Club, 3003 NW 66th St. Why: All proceeds to benefit the Salmon Bay 8th grade camp scholarship fund! Details: Pre-registration for tickets is $15, contact Nancy McKinney, 789-2173, ncmckinney@seattleschools.org, or Judy Challoner, 282-2444, challoner@comcast.net. Tickets will be available at the door for $20, but the building only holds 150, so reserve you tickets now! Finger food will be provided and there will be no-host beer and wine sales. No one under 21 please!!! Steve will give the slide show, a retrospective of his climbing career, which he recently presented at the American Alpine Club annual meeting. Steve has a uniqe relationship with folks in Pakistan and gives back to that community, and is kind enough to offer his time for this fund-raiser. The funds go to paying for 8th grade camp for those kids that could not afford to go otherwise. You can PM me with any questions. Thanks.

We did a BC tour to the Silver Peak basin on Saturday and found some decent skiing. While loading up the car a couple of vehicles pulled up and spilled out a bunch of 20-somethings with various piercings and interesting hair. They were going up on the closed ski area slopes to ride these odd boards they called snow skates. The mail board is about 3/4 the size of a snowboard with ends that pitch upward and the whole top is covered with rubber. Then, attached with a 1 inch square brace is ANOTHER board beneath it about the size of a skateboard. And there is no foot attachment on the top board. They said the feel is more like surfing and you can walk up and down the board. Never heard of such a thing.

Siver Peak basin had decent snow, and lots of it compared to January, to my surprise. We made fresh turns before passing some folks coming up from the basin bottom, a couple of groups and one with a very happy dog. One group caught up with us in the forest beyond Nordic Pass as we all struggled with the hard crust. Seems like there is some spring turns to be made yet.

We're kinda bad off if we can't spare a helicopter or two over here.

"Scientists" are human beings, and when they conduct their work with a bias and an agenda, it is distorted, and no longer "science" as you describe it. Sadly, this occurs on a daily basis. And that work does not get published in peer-reviewed scientific journals. Gawd - this type of general hand waving, with no backup is the primary argument tool of the right. It's just like Bush. He says we need a strong look at the climate change issues, and put the National Academy of Sciences to the task. Then when the report comes out and says that yes, the vast majority of scientists (included input from over 1,500 of the top climate scientists) climate change is occurring due to man's influence, and that we should get on the ball and do something - what is Bush's response? He says that the jury is still out and we need more research. That is bias - ignoring the facts.

You're confusing two things - or mixing them for distortion. Science is science - there is no "political bias" in it. It always great when folks who know little or nothing about science, internet sprayers, talk show hosts, politicians, refute the vast amount of research and scientific consensus based on - opinion. One of my favorite recent mixed metaphors was Rush bellowing about how the alarmists in this country were worried about polar bears starving in the Artic due to global warming while no one was doing anything about the starving Terry Shaivo. We're pretty ignorant in math and science in this country - but I'm still amazed how easily people are swayed by such crap.

That the large corporate media really has leftist sympathies that are destroying the moral fabric of this country.

Scientific America April 1 Editorial: There's no easy way to admit this. For years, helpful letter writers told us to stick to science. They pointed out that science and politics don't mix. They said we should be more balanced in our presentation of such issues as creationism, missile defense and global warming. We resisted their advice and pretended not to be stung by the accusations that the magazine should be renamed Unscientific American, or Scientific Unamerican, or even Unscientific Unamerican. But spring is in the air, and all of nature is turning over a new leaf, so there's no better time to say: you were right, and we were wrong. In retrospect, this magazine's coverage of socalled evolution has been hideously one-sided. For decades, we published articles in every issue that endorsed the ideas of Charles Darwin and his cronies. True, the theory of common descent through natural selection has been called the unifying concept for all of biology and one of the greatest scientific ideas of all time, but that was no excuse to be fanatics about it. Where were the answering articles presenting the powerful case for scientific creationism? Why were we so unwilling to suggest that dinosaurs lived 6,000 years ago or that a cataclysmic flood carved the Grand Canyon? Blame the scientists. They dazzled us with their fancy fossils, their radiocarbon dating and their tens of thousands of peer-reviewed journal articles. As editors, we had no business being persuaded by mountains of evidence. Moreover, we shamefully mistreated the Intelligent Design (ID) theorists by lumping them in with creationists. Creationists believe that God designed all life, and that's a somewhat religious idea. But ID theorists think that at unspecified times some unnamed superpowerful entity designed life, or maybe just some species, or maybe just some of the stuff in cells. That's what makes ID a superior scientific theory: it doesn't get bogged down in details. Good journalism values balance above all else. We owe it to our readers to present everybody's ideas equally and not to ignore or discredit theories simply because they lack scientifically credible arguments or facts. Nor should we succumb to the easy mistake of thinking that scientists understand their fields better than, say, U.S. senators or best-selling novelists do. Indeed, if politicians or special-interest groups say things that seem untrue or misleading, our duty as journalists is to quote them without comment or contradiction. To do otherwise would be elitist and therefore wrong. In that spirit, we will end the practice of expressing our own views in this space: an editorial page is no place for opinions. Get ready for a new Scientific American. No more discussions of how science should inform policy. If the government commits blindly to building an anti-ICBM defense system that can't work as promised, that will waste tens of billions of taxpayers' dollars and imperil national security, you won't hear about it from us. If studies suggest that the administration's antipollution measures would actually increase the dangerous particulates that people breathe during the next two decades, that's not our concern. No more discussions of how policies affect science either - so what if the budget for the National Science Foundation is slashed? This magazine will be dedicated purely to science, fair and balanced science, and not just the science that scientists say is science. And it will start on April Fools' Day.

By this definition then the lead up propaganda to the war (remember WMDs?) fits the category. And no, it's not worth it.

I was working on some fish surveys on a large reservoir and stopped to talk with some recreational fishermen, ask what they caught and chew the fat. Somehow the conversation turned to the water level rising that day because of recent storms - then one guy says that the tide is rising too and his companions nodded. I snorted because I thought they were yanking my chain, but then had to explain in solemn terms about the huge dam dam within eyesight.