Ketchikan: Hospital Auxiliary donates $30,000 - The Ketchikan General Hospital Auxiliary during their annual meeting in January voted to donate almost $30,000 in medical equipment and training costs to the hospital. Funds are raised primarily through the all-volunteer gift shop they operate in the hospital's lobby, as well as an annual or bi-annual raffle. - More...
Tuesday - January 31, 2006

Announcement Ketchikan: To Send Condolences To The Freeman Family - In response to the many requests for contact information for the Freeman family, cards of condolences may be mailed to the following company address for Major Stephen Freeman's family.. - More.... Saturday - January 28, 2006 News Top Stories U.S. News U.S. Politics Alaska Ketchikan

National: Alito Confirmed as the 110th Justice of the Supreme Court - Judge Samuel A. Alito Jr., President Bush's second appointment to the U.S. Supreme Court, was confirmed by the U.S. Senate today. The Senate voted 58-42 to confirm Alito, with overwhelming support from Republicans. Only one Senate Republican voted against Bush's pick, and only four Democrats voted to confirm Alito.

Alito, the 110th Supreme Court justice, replaces retiring Associate Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. "I am pleased that the Senate has voted to confirm Judge Sam Alito," said President Bush. "Sam Alito is a brilliant and fair-minded judge who strictly interprets the Constitution and laws and does not legislate from the bench." - More...
Tuesday - January 31, 2006

National: Spying in U.S. strains debate on Patriot Act By EDWARD EPSTEIN - The House and Senate are back in session this week, and on one issue - the debate over renewing disputed sections of the Patriot Act - it's as if they never left town for a long holiday recess.

The five-week renewal of the 16 expiring sections, which passed just as Congress left Washington in late December, ends Friday, but it seems the most likely action this week is passage of another short-term extension. - More...
Tuesday - January 31, 2006

National: Calling for privacy By PATRICIA SABATINI - The government may not think you're important enough to eavesdrop on your telephone conversations, but did you know that anyone with a passing interest and a few bucks can go online and buy a record of your phone calls?

Don't care? Privacy experts say you should. - More...
Tuesday - January 31, 2006

Back row Patrick Branco, CEO; Scott Smith, Diagnostic Imaging Manager' Governor Frank Murkowski. Seated, First Lady Nancy Murkowski examines a CAD study. Photo courtesy KGH

Ketchikan: KGH Installs New CAD System For Early Breast Cancer Detection - This year, approximately 200,000 women in the United States will be diagnosed with invasive breast cancer and studies show that up to 23.4 percent of breast cancer could be detected earlier. Recently Ketchikan General Hospital (KGH) acquired a Computer-Aided Detection (CAD) system for use in breast cancer screening to assist radiologists by providing "a second set of eyes" during mammograms.

"Early diagnosis is the key to surviving breast cancer, and mammography screening with the benefit of the CAD system could prevent thousands of breast cancer deaths each year in the United States," said Deborah Aaron, KGH surgeon "Regular screening mammograms are the best way to detect breast cancer early-and early is when it is easiest to treat, "she said.

The hospital chose the ImageChecker System from R2 Technology, which is the first U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) approved CAD system for use with screening and diagnostic, as well as digital mammography. Studies show use of the CAD system could result in earlier detection of up to 23.4 percent of the cancers currently detected with screening mammography in those women who had a prior screening mammogram nine-24 months earlier. - More...
Tuesday - January 31, 2006

Viewpoints Opinions/Letters Summer business has helped our downtown By Rich Elliott - Tuesday PM To the citizens of Ketchikan By T. Ernest Freeman - Tuesday PM ON EDUCATION By Jerry Cegelske - Tuesday PM Vote Yes By Thomas Ferry - Tuesday PM Dear People of Ketchikan By Paula Pemberton - Tuesday PM Major Freeman By Ted B. Grant - Tuesday PM Crash Story By John Mooney - Tuesday PM Elizabeth Peratrovich Day By Janice Jackson - Tuesday PM Border incursions By Frank Verderber - Tuesday PM KIC Election Rules/ By-laws By Elroy Edenshaw - Tuesday PM Big Winners By David J. Nelson III - Tuesday PM Thank you to all who have expressed concern... By Cathy Pruett - Tuesday PM Major Freeman By Al Johnson - Tuesday PM This is our home. By Dennis Pope - Monday TAKES BOTH TO MAKE IT HAPPEN By Bobbie McCreary - Monday Thank you Ketchikan By Teresa P. Richardson - Monday Port Renovation Project By Chris Parks - Sunday PM Thank you Ketchikan By Carolyn Pedison - Sunday PM Dear People of Ketchikan By Doyle Cowart - Sunday PM Major Stephen Freeman By Jerry Sandel - Sunday PM Steve Freeman By Leslie Whitmire - Sunday PM More Viewpoints/ Letters Publish A Letter Political Cartoonists Political Cartoons Ketchikan Wednesday, February 01, 2006 - Noon - Chamber Luncheon at the VFW, 3113 Tongass Ave. Pat Cassin will be speaking about his efforts in locating property for Pacific Sun Products, a Sea Urchin Company out of Ventura California. There will also be a brief Presentation from visiting Representatives' from St. Jude's Children's Hospital. Thursday February 02, 2006, 7:00 pm - Ketchikan City Council Regular Meeting - City Council Chambers Agenda & Information Packets Thursday February 02, 2006, 5:30 - 7:30 pm - North Tongass Volunteer Fire Dept. Open House and Board of Directors meeting - Ribbon cutting ceremony for new building and more... Agenda Teleconference meetings - Legislative Information Office - Check the Calendar January Calendar Today's Forecast Current AK Weather Map City Police Report AK Troopers Daily Dispatch Classifieds & Announcements January 2006 Click on the date to read the stories published on that day. S M T W T F S 01 02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31         Front Page Archives

National: Tracking a new virus that arrives via e-mail By LANCE GAY - Computer-security investigators are tracking a new virus that arrives via e-mail and is timed to destroy data Friday - and the third day of each month thereafter.

"It's a throwback to the early days. We don't often see worms these days that are just out to trash user's data," said Vincent Weafer, senior director of Symantec's security response division.

Weafer said the virus was first discovered Jan. 16. - More...
Tuesday - January 31, 2006

Science: Liar, liar, brain's on fire By LEE BOWMAN - It takes more parts of the brain to lie than be truthful, according to a new report that suggests brain-imaging studies can do at least as well as polygraphs at detecting fibs.

Researchers from Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia describe their work with functional magnetic resonance imaging in the February issue of the journal Radiology, published Tuesday. - More...
Tuesday - January 31, 2006

Bonnie Erbe: I'll take that apology now - I'll take that apology now. You know, the same apology uber-conservatives (UCs) continuously demand from progressives when UCs feign indignation over an alleged progressive faux pas.

I'll take my first apology for invention of the term "junk science." It has been used by UCs to discredit environmentalists and scientists who first discerned human activity is provoking climate change. I'll take my second for uber-conservative insistence that global warming is a fabrication of the looney Left.

For quite some time, most scientists have agreed global warming is for real. This weekend The Washington Post published an item that read, "Now that most scientists agree human activity is causing Earth to warm, the central debate has shifted to whether climate change is progressing so rapidly that, within decades, humans may be helpless to slow or reverse the trend." - More...
Tuesday - January 31, 2006

James Derek: EBay lawsuit has far-reaching implications - A legal case winding its way through the courts could have far-reaching implications for online auctions and e- commerce, especially to powerhouse eBay.com, the defendant.

The suit was filed in New York in 2004 by esteemed jeweler Tiffany & Co. It claims eBay had not done enough to stop counterfeit goods from being sold on the auction site.

It could be a first major challenge to what I call the "telephone defense," in that the phone company isn't liable if someone uses the telephone to set up a murder-for- hire. All it did was provide the wires and the network; the users committed the crime.

EBay may be planning the same kind of defense. The company has consistently said it can't police 80 million items for sale at any one time and it relies on its users and the trademark owners to help keep the site free of counterfeits and knock-offs.

"If Tiffany wins, this is a ground-breaking case," intellectual property attorney Joseph Berghammer of Banner & Witcoff Ltd., told TechWeb News. "It changes the electronic marketplace. EBay would no longer just provide a tent, it would also have to provide police." - More...
Tuesday - January 31, 2006  

Dale McFeatters: Color the rest of Bush's budgets red - President Bush likely would prefer not to dwell on the fact, but new congressional estimates show that one of his administration's legacies will be a running federal budget deficit.

The president took office with a budget surplus and a forecast of a cumulative 10-year surplus of $5.6 trillion. That is now, like, so yesterday.

The Congressional Budget Office predicts a deficit of $337 billion when this fiscal year ends Sept. 30. And these same estimates see the deficits dropping to $241 billion in 2009, the last budget-year Bush will be responsible for, and $114 billion by 2011. Using the same assumptions, the Concord Coalition, an independent watchdog group, says the budget could be in balance the year after.

But these assumptions are unrealistically conservative. They assume the president's tax cuts expire; there is no change in the expanding alternative minimum tax; that the costs of Iraq and Katrina have wound down; and that there are no new federal spending initiatives. - More...
Tuesday - January 31, 2006