The Crosscut Blog

I have written a couple of times recently criticizing militant atheist rhetoric and pointing out that in America, atheists rank near the bottom of the popularity list in politics. I'm not against atheism, indeed, I consider myself an atheist sympathizer, but the movement could sure use a new PR man.

The latest flap was over an anti-Christmas sign in the state Capitol in Olympia which declared that "There are no gods, no devils, no angels, no heaven or hell. There is only our natural world. Religion is but myth and superstition that hardens hearts and enslaves minds." I pointed ...

If you're a wine lover like me who refuses to drink those 4-ounce bottles of Sutter Home or whatever swill they're serving on airlines these days, keep this tip to yourself. Please.

The six-hour flight from Seattle to New York City can get mighty annoying and boring if you're enduring cranky toddlers, insipid in-flight movies, and seatmates hypnotized by laptops or headphones. Guess what? For the first time since 9-11, you can carry on, open, and sip your own excellent bottle of wine to make the long flight more pleasurable. No one is going to tell you ...

The dramatic loss of steam is already clear in the 2008 numbers. The core states of Washington, Oregon, and Idaho recorded payroll growth last year of only 0.2%, as compared to 3.1% in 2006 and a still-hefty 2.2% in 2007. This year, Parks estimates, the three states will be shedding ...

The U.S. Postal Service may be in free-fall, having lost nearly $3 billion last fiscal year and with mail volume down by some 9.5 billion pieces due to e-mail, recession, and the continued imprisonment of the Unabomber. But the USPS ain't dead yet, and while it's still kicking, it's still commemorating. Two states in the Great Nearby benefit this year.

First up is Alaska which celebrates its 50th anniversary of statehood this month. A statewide celebration and tourism push is planned. The USPS is issuing a 42-cent Alaska stamp which features snow, mountains, a dog ...

President-elect Barack Obama is unlikely to be distracted by several political scandals and messes on the eve of his inauguration. But they will be harmful to the degree that they draw media and public attention from the big public agenda lying in front of us.

Sunday afternoon, New Mexico Gov. and Commerce Secretary-designee Bill Richardson, a 2008 Presidential aspirant in his own right, joined Obama in announcing that he was withdrawing from his Commerce nomination in order to cope with federal corruption charges in his home state. Earlier Sunday The New York Times broke a front-page story disclosing that an ...

Mossback is biased on the subject of beards: They're always in style. But chin whiskers are still subject to debate outside the Great Nearby where fashion sometimes flirts with the beard, but razors usually win out in the end.

Maybe the Santa-season has something to do with a recent outbreak of beard-talk. Prince William of Great Britain made the Huffington Post with his new beard--something long associated with once and future kings. They even have a poll where you can vote on whether he should keep it (last I looked, readers were narrowly favoring the new look).

In the ...

Maybe it's just me, but it seemed like 2008 was filled with Nazi and Hitler stories and references. I wrote about it on a number of occasions, including pointing out brouhahas over local conservatives comparing environmentalists to Nazis, critics accusing the Seattle-visiting Dalai Lama of having Nazi sympathies, and the Olympics controversy over the Chinese torch relay, a ceremony invented by the twisted PR geniuses of the Third Reich.

Then there was the case of a Bellevue retiree accused of being an SS soldier who participated in war crimes in World War II Serbia, and further the arrest of ...

If you need further proof that newspapers are racing downhill, it was provided on New Year's Eve when New York's Village Voice announced that columnist Nat Hentoff, who had worked for the Voice since 1958, had been laid off. Two lesser known writers also were terminated.

Music devotees valued Hentoff's commentary on jazz and his liner notes on countless albums by leading jazz artists. He also was perhaps the country's leading commentator on First Amendment issues. His "Sweet Land of Liberty" commentaries in the Voice, also syndicated nationally, often were brave and went against conventional wisdom ...

As a frequent visitor to New York City for the past five years, thanks to a son working and living in Manhattan, I've become somewhat immune to the oft-remarked reaction I get when I say I'm from Seattle. OK, technically I'm from Whidbey Island, but it's just easier to say Seattle.

It's not the usual suspects like Starbucks, Bill Gates or any one of our pathetic sports teams including the Seahawks, Mariners and that basketball team formerly known as the Seattle SuperSonics. The number one response is: "I hear it's really beautiful there, but ...

In a step toward making driving in your own vehicle akin to taking a taxi cab that charges by distance traveled, Oregon governor Ted Kulongoski plans to recommend his state transition away from the gas tax in 2009, eventually replacing it with a mileage tax. A task force has studied how this could be done:

As part of a transportation-related bill he has filed for the 2009 legislative session, the governor says he plans to recommend “a path to transition away from the gas tax as the central funding source for transportation.” What that means is explained on the governor ...

While conservatives wail about federal financial bailouts being a return to socialism, the budget problems at the states signal new momentum for the opposite: privatization.

States have been looking for ways to raise cash for some time, and leasing or selling toll roads (as in Illinois and Indiana) has been one route. Others have looked to public-private partnerships and private investment to raise capital for infrastructure projects, something that was floated here (and rejected) with the new Tacoma Narrows Bridge and was proposed for the Deep Bore tunnel under Seattle, an Alaskan Way Viaduct alternative.

But an Associated Press story ...

The story is sobering to those who hope for success in efforts to clean-up Puget Sound, the beautiful, once bountiful defining waters of our region. The Washington Post has an analysis of the historic $6-billion Chesapeake Bay clean-up effort, launched 25 years ago this month. The results: overall there is little if any improvement, sea life (oysters, crabs) continue to decline, and it appears that the federal Environmental Protection Agency has been exaggerating, some might call it lying, about progress for years:

The agencies charged with the cleanup have never mustered enough legal muscle or political will to overcome opposition ...