Category: 21st Century Viking

Here’s the link to my latest opinion piece for the Ballard News-Tribune.

This piece discusses my opposition to an operations levy and a capital levy totalling $1.25 billion to fund Seattle Public Schools. I do not discuss the details of Propositions 1 & 2 but instead condemn the practice of holding elections on issues like this at times of the year when voters are less likely to participate.

As with all Washington State elections, this one will be held by mail and the votes will be tallied on February 12th.

Here’s the link to my latest opinion piece for the Ballard News-Tribune.

It is a follow-up to a piece I did last month about the proposal to build coal export terminals on the Washington state and Oregon coats. If these terminals are built, Washington state and the Ballard neighborhood in particular would experience a lot more train traffic.

The environmentalists are vehemently against this project for a variety of reasons and quite vocal in their opposition. For the first piece, I interviewed a railroad union representative who had some real issues with the stances of the anti-coal advocates. For the second, I did some further research some of the union rep’s best points and asked someone from the Sierra Club, which is leading the fight against the coal trains, to see what they had to say.

My intent with these pieces was to objectively present the facts about an emotionally charged issue and hope that the readers will use them to come to their own conclusions.

My latest 21st Century Viking opinion piece for the Ballard News-Tribune is my first foray into the coal train issue. There is currently some proposals going around to build coal export terminals at ports along the Washington and Oregon coasts. The coal will have to be shipped by rail through Seattle (and Ballard) to these facilities.

There is a concern among local environmentalists and activists about the increased pollution from the coal dust and length of these trains. Most of the dialogue around the coal trains is coming from the anti-side so I wanted to take more balanced look.

My plan is to learn more about this subject and the state of freight and transportation in general around the Northwest.

After the Ballard News-Tribune published my 21st Century Viking column about why Jim McDermott should debate his general election opponent, Ron Bemis, I got a hot tip. McDermott was going to debate someone the week before the Nov. 6, 2012 General Election- but it turns out that it was going to be conservative talk show host Michael Medved rather than Bemis!

I decided to get to the bottom of it and filed another 21st Century Viking column called “McDermott debates…but not with the right person.”

I covered the McDermott/Medved debate for the Ballard News-Tribune. The debate was taped and was supposed to be broadcast the Saturday following the debate on UWTV, but it turns out they never aired it.

While it would have been interesting to find out why it was never aired, the General Election has passed- the latest figures show that McDermott beat Ron Bemis 79.48% to 20.52%. The election may be over, but the issue of deeply entrenched incumbents- regardless of party- ducking their duty to participate in the democratic process remains.