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Sept. 11 and the forever war: An anniversary and a presidential address

originally published in The Herald

Americans mark the 13th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks against the backdrop of last night’s on-the-offensive ISIS address by President Obama.

Thirteen. When today’s seniors at Everett High School fumbled in kindergarten, panic flickered on a screen.

History takes years to come into focus.

That week in September, Gov. Gary Locke reassured Washingtonians that the Hanford Nuclear Reservation and the Columbia and Snake River dams were secure. Secure? After 9/11, we could suddenly conjure worst-case images. Fear migrated from the ruins of the World Trade Center to Naval Station Everett.

This was no ordinary attack, presaging no ordinary war. In his 2014 documentary “The Unknown Known,” Academy Award-winning filmmaker Errol Morris asks former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld about Dora Farms. That’s the forgettable place in Iraq where the U.S. tried but failed to kill Saddam Hussein prior to the 2003 invasion. Would Hussein’s death have averted war?

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September 11, 2014 phjackson Leave a response , , ,

Coal terminals’ death rattle: Oregon’s rejection of Morrow Pacific

originally published in The Herald

For more than a century, three currents animated the American West: the railroads, extractive industries and the federal government. During and after World War II, the reach of the feds (think Hanford and Bonneville) swelled, while Boeing and McDonnell Douglas fed the defense industry. This is the paradox of regions like Eastern Washington, the oversized hand of the federal government and the majority population that bites off its fingers. But the rekindled cliches of the 1940s sound obsolete in the 21st century: You can’t fight the railroad or the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers or Big Timber (remember Big Timber?)

The grand strategy to build a series of coal export facilities in the Pacific Northwest, such as the proposed Gateway Pacific Terminal at Cherry Point near Bellingham, traces a narrative arc that could have been hatched by an industrialist 60 years ago. Begin with single-bid leases on public lands — in this case, the Powder River Basin of Montana and Wyoming — in a cozy public-private scheme that rips off the American taxpayer, with Bureau of Land Management functionaries determining fair market value for Big Coal. Then contract with consultants who grease the political gears, ensuring buy-in from unions and politicians. This is how it is, and how it’s always been. Repeat the “you can’t fight the railroad” refrain.

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August 21, 2014 phjackson Leave a response , , ,

Your right not to be killed: Brisenia Flores Humanity Event

originally published in The Herald

You have a right not to be killed.

Human agency means that we are endowed with reason and conscience and, according to the aspirational language of Article I of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, “should act toward one another in a spirit of brotherhood.”

If we could only make it so.

Human nature and the politics of hate were thrown into relief Tuesday when Holly Grigsby, an Oregon white supremacist, was sentenced to life behind bars for her role in the 2011 murders of four people, including David “Red” Pedersen, and his wife, DeeDee Pedersen, both of Everett. They were the father and stepmother, respectively, of Grigsby’s boyfriend and partner in hate, David “Joey” Pedersen. As The Herald’s Diana Hefley reported, prosecutors allege Grigsby was responsible for tying up DeeDee Pedersen and slashing her throat inside the Everett grandmother’s home.

Both Grigsby and David “Joey” Pedersen were animated by antisemitism and an appetite for revolution. As Eric Hoffer wrote in his 1951 masterpiece, “The True Believer,” “It is by its promise of a sense of power that evil often attracts the weak.”

It’s a legacy with an uncomfortable heritage.
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July 17, 2014 phjackson Leave a response , , ,

Bergdahl tests public values: Guantanamo and ‘Dirty Hands’

originally published in The Herald

The tempest over former Army POW and Idaho native Bowe Bergdahl teases out two themes: The problem of “dirty hands” in international relations and the madness of an American gulag, the Guantanamo Bay prison.

There also is the question of Bergdahl himself, and the circumstances of his 2009 capture by the Taliban. In a blink, the ecstasy of a POW homecoming morphed into a mouth-foaming hatefest, magnified by TV’s chattering classes. The rumoring is a public version of the kids’ game “telephone,” as the message gets progressively mangled. Was American blood shed in searching for then-Pvt. Bergdahl? As New York Times’ Charlie Savage and Andrew Lehren reported last week, there is no evidence to suggest a link. Still, Bergdahl’s former army “buddies” loathe him, and peg him as a deserter or, worse, a traitor. There will be a resolution, perhaps in the form of a court martial.

The “dirty hands” question is more complex. First, we negotiate with terrorists, a violation of moral norms. As columnist Charles Krauthammer reminds readers, we always negotiate with terrorists: “Everyone does, while pretending not to. The Israelis, by necessity the toughest of all anti-terror fighters, in 2011 gave up 1,027 prisoners, some with blood on their hands, for one captured staff sergeant.”

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June 11, 2014 phjackson Leave a response , , , ,

Push back on the city budget: Everett’s structural deficit

originally published in The Herald

Everett’s once-endearing lack of civic imagination has morphed into a long-term liability. The top-down budget process brings into focus a get-along, go-along political culture that for years has poorly served the people of Snohomish County’s largest city.

Although we hate to reveal the ending, the city council will accept the mayor’s recommendations and soon pass a budget that includes hiking the utility tax from 4.5 percent to 6 percent, a higher business-license fee, and formation of a transportation benefit district with a $20 car-tab fee (any steeper for a tab fee and it would go to the voters). Service cuts, such as eliminating the library’s outreach program, are relatively modest. Emotion-laden options, including closing the Forest Park swim center, were floated in a manner that recalls the famous 1973 National Lampoon cover: If you don’t buy this magazine, we’ll kill this dog. (Everett will remain an aquatic-friendly destination).

As Mayor Ray Stephanson notes, the city faces a structural deficit, with expenses growing at 4.1 percent and revenues at just 2.3 percent a year. Sales-tax revenue remains anemic, especially as retailers bypass Everett for Lynnwood, Marysville and Arlington. The council, if it still had a budget committee (hint), might review the reason so many businesses treat Everett like Kryptonite.

A structural problem demands a structural response. That is absent in the 2015 budget, kicked to “phase two” of the mayor’s agenda, an in-depth review of the city’s largest departments. But phase two should be phase one, identifying and wringing out every possible efficiency before racing to taxpayers.
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June 4, 2014 phjackson Leave a response , , ,

Brace for inevitable inaction: UCSB shooting

originally published in The Herald

There is arrogance to hindsight, a reflex to rattle off lessons learned when the same narrative plays out, week after week. A mentally ill young man stockpiles guns and ammo and murders at random.

We know how to curtail the risk — not eliminate it, human nature is immutable — but lawmakers choose not to act. And as a society, we make a decision by not making a decision.

“We’re all proud to be Americans. But what kind of message does it send to the world when we have such a rudderless bunch of idiots in government?” asked Richard Martinez, father of Christopher Michael-Martinez, 20, one of Friday’s mass shooting victims near the campus of the University of California, Santa Barbara.

The story arc is identical, just switch out the venue and the narcissistic killer. Real victims whose lives are abruptly cut short and the grieving families who never actually heal — that is the too-tangible thread.

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May 27, 2014 phjackson Leave a response , , ,

Boeing: NW’s fickle partner: an exodus of engineering jobs

originally published in The Herald

Last year, Olympia lawmakers went eyeball to eyeball with Boeing, and lawmakers blinked. (OK, Boeing had them at “hello.”)

The $8.7 billion tax package, the largest state tax break in U.S. history, was designed to secure production of the 777X and fabrication of its carbon-fiber wing. It was informed by mistakes made in 2003, when sweeteners to land the 787 Dreamliner avoided any mention of a second, out-of-state assembly line.

Enter Charleston, S.C.
This time, Olympia’s proactive thank-you was minus a no-net-job loss provision.

The zeroing out of 1,000 Puget Sound-area engineering jobs throws that omission into relief.
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May 4, 2014 phjackson Leave a response , , ,

Natural heritage not for sale: Cliven Bundy

originally published in The Herald

America’s public lands give expression to public values. It’s why glorifying Cliven Bundy, the hidebound Nevada rancher who pocketed $1 million in grazing fees from the American people, is an abomination.

That Bundy (surprise) also is a racist doesn’t repel autograph hounds or local militiamen. Interest groups follow the law of gravity: The paranoid and the bigoted hang together.

Bundy has antecedents. The Sagebrush Rebellion of the 1970s and 80s agitated for local control and even liquidating federal lands. While Bundy masquerades as a rugged individualist, his tale flows from greed, not principle.

The only plus to his Nevada standoff is revisiting the question of American values and public lands. As poet Gary Snyder wrote in “The Practice of the Wild,” “In North America there is a lot that is in public domain, which has its problems, but at least they are problems we are all enfranchised to work on.”
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April 29, 2014 phjackson Leave a response , , , ,

The limit to good intentions: No Child Left Behind Act

originally published in The Herald

On education policy, Washington’s push-the-envelope M.O. — forehead slapping at times — throws light on a federal law that needs to be overhauled or given the heave-ho.

Last week, Washington became the first state in the nation to have its conditional waiver of the No Child Left Behind Act denied. The bugaboo is that Olympia won’t hitch teacher evaluations to student testing.

It’s more nuanced than a teachers-union uprising against a culture of standardized testing. The required use of poorly vetted tests to measure student achievement and linking those results to teacher performance is unworkable over the short term, however much it creates the illusion of accountability.

“There is widespread acknowledgment that NCLB isn’t working,” Superintendent of Public Instruction Randy Dorn said. “Congress has failed to change the law at the federal level, so states are forced to come up with workarounds.”

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April 28, 2014 phjackson Leave a response , , ,

A model for moving forward: The Skykomish Initiative

originally published in The Herald

The Oso tragedy brings into focus the central role of recreation in revitalizing rural economies, particularly in east Snohomish County. The Green Mountain Lookout Heritage Protection Act, signed by President Barack Obama last week, is a recent example. Darrington residents viscerally understand that the timber economy and recreation are not mutually exclusive. (You can work at Hampton Lumber and support the local recreation industry as a fisher or backpacker.)

Rural communities need recreational options that complement existing small businesses and are integrated into the region’s fabric. The key is to develop a broad, workable vision that knits together a diversity of interests.

The Skykomish Valley is a case study. Recently, Forterra, the innovative land-conservation organization known for its lions-and-lambs canoodling, shepherded a plan that blends economic development and recreation. The Skykomish Economic Development, Recreation and Natural Resource Conservation Initiative (avoid repeating while operating heavy machinery) is concentrated along the historic Great Northern Railway line and Highway 2 corridor. It’s an area that extends from Stevens Pass west to Everett and Puget Sound. Much of the valley is part of the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest.

On April 15, a committee of the King County Council voted in support of a motion that enshrines the Skykomish Initiative. It goes before the full council today.
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April 24, 2014 phjackson Leave a response , , , ,