Ketchikan: National spotlight has Alaska town uncomfortable By SEAN COCKERHAM - Mike Salazar, the Ketchikan borough mayor, had just fielded a call from Reader's Digest. Another reporter wanting to talk about "the Bridge to Nowhere."

The proposed $315 million bridge from this small Alaska city to a neighboring, nearly uninhabited island has become a sensation. It's made Ketchikan famous, but not in a way Salazar likes.

"It makes me frustrated that we haven't been able to communicate our need well enough for the rest of the United States to understand it," said the mayor, who was first elected to the town council in 1976.

"Everybody calls it a bridge to nowhere. ... It's a bridge to our future." - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

National: Terror experts alarmed by delay in immigration reform By BILL STRAUB - Immigration reform, which had surged toward the top of the nation's political agenda, will apparently be delayed until next year in deference to Hurricane Katrina, leaving critics of current policy concerned that the nation's borders will remain open to potential terrorists.

Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., chairman of the House Judiciary Committee that is charged with addressing the issue, has indicated that the job of rebuilding the Gulf Coast and providing assistance for victims of the disaster likely will force the postponement of legislative action on a number of fronts, including immigration. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

National: Storm insurers report they're ready By DAVID WHITNEY - Hurricane Katrina is virtually certain to become the most costly natural disaster in U.S. history, but the companies that insure the homes, businesses and automobiles say they are not worried.

"We're certainly prepared to handle this," said Dick Luedke, spokesman for State Farm, the largest insurer in Katrina's wasteland. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

National: Strong hurricanes becoming more common, study finds By LEE BOWMAN - The number of hurricanes with sustained winds in excess of 131 mph - the catastrophic Category 4 and 5 strengths that Katrina reached at her peak in the Gulf of Mexico last month - has nearly doubled around the globe in the last 35 years, according to a new study. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

National: Lynndie England's court-martial set this week By MICHAEL A. FUOCO - Her mocking, sneering visage in photographs with naked, hooded Iraqis became the face of the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

National: HHS secretary lied about morning-after pill, senator says By LES BLUMENTHAL - After nearly 14 years in the Senate, Patty Murray thought she had seen just about everything.

But the Washington Democrat said she had never been lied to by a cabinet secretary until Health and Human Services Secretary Michael Leavitt broke a promise and again delayed a final decision on whether to allow over-the-counter sales of a morning-after contraceptive known as Plan B. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

National: Roberts a Scalia/Thomas clone? By MICHAEL MCGOUGH - Long before John G. Roberts Jr. testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee last week, liberal groups and some Democratic senators were suspicious of the chief justice nominee because of President Bush's high praise for the Supreme Court's two most conservative members, Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

National: Cyber bad guys find money can be honey By STEVE ALEXANDER - The motives of Internet hackers have shifted from malicious behavior to monetary gain, and the growth of online identity theft, extortion and fraud are highlighted in the semiannual Internet Security Threat Report released Monday by the California-based security firm Symantec. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

Male (top) and female sockeye salmon at the ends of three-to-five year lives that concluded in Yako Creek, north of Dillingham. Stephanie Carlson photo.

Alaska Science: Early death may benefit bear-pressured salmon by NED ROZELL - While snorkeling in Alaska's largest lake a few years ago, Stephanie Carlson watched sockeye salmon change from aggressive red creatures with wolfish jaws to drab, lethargic slugs. That conversion was so quick she wondered if fish that fall apart faster have some advantage over fish that linger.

A shorter lifespan appears to be a good strategy when bears are plucking your comrades from the water next to you, Carlson reported in Anchorage at a recent meeting of the American Fisheries Society. She is a graduate student at the University of Washington enrolled in its Alaska Salmon Program. For more than 50 years scientists involved with the program have studied one of the world's richest salmon areas, Bristol Bay. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

Alaska: New research tracks vegetation changes on tundra By DOUG O'HARRA - The tundra of Alaska and northern Canada has been "greening" dramatically as the Arctic warms, with more plant growth and longer growing seasons, according to a new study that analyzed thousands of satellite images taken over two decades.

But in the vast boreal forests that stretch from Alaska's Interior into northeastern Canada, the satellites uncovered a far different outcome. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

Viewpoints Opinions/Letters BRIDGE TO SOMEWHERE By Mary Ida Henrikson - Monday PM Bridge To The Future By Pete Ellis - Monday PM 'Under God' By Ben Rosenfeld - Monday PM RE: Ketchikan Bridge Funds By Marie L. Monyak - Monday PM Ketchikan Bridge Funds By Kenneth A. White - Monday George W. Bush's "Wager" By Robert J. Freedland - Monday Nation Founded Under God By Linda Williams - Monday Pennock Island + Gravina Island = Desecration Bridge By Don Hoff Jr. - Monday GOD? By Marie L Monyak - Monday More Viewpoints/ Letters Publish A Letter Political Cartoons Government Is The Problem And The Solution RJ Matson, The St. Louis Post Dispatch- Distributed exclusively to subscribers by Cagle Cartoons, Inc. Political Cartoonists E-mail a political cartoon Ketchikan Calendar, Meetings, Events Today's Forecast City Police Report 09/12/05 AK Troopers Daily Dispatch Classifieds & Announcements September 2005 Click on the date for stories and photos published on that day... S M T W T F S   29 30 31 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    Front Page Archives

Lanie Welch: Fish and shellfish farming quest - The new Marine Aquaculture Task Force is on a quest to learn everything it can about one of our nation's industries du jour: aquaculture. Farming fish and shellfish is one of the fastest growing segments of food production on the planet, and already accounts for one-third of seafood consumed worldwide. The task force will make recommendations to policy makers on national aquaculture standards in U.S. marine waters.

"This comes primarily from the push by our government to increase U.S. aquaculture production five-fold, in both offshore and nearshore waters," said Arliss Sturgulewski, a task force member and Sea Grant advisor to the University of Alaska School of Fisheries. "But what does it all mean to the environment and our wild fisheries? There are so many things we need to know before we start down a certain path," she added.- More...
Monday - September 12, 2005

Alaska Outdoors: Big Oil set to shaft Alaska's pristine North Slope By STEVE POLLICK - The 19.6-million-acre Arctic National Wildlife Refuge on the North Slope of Alaska, hard by the Beaufort Sea, is both a dream and reality.

It is so remote, so far away, that it seems to exist as only a dream. But it is real, one of the few remaining intact ecosystems on the planet; it is still free of man's interference. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

Preston MacDougall: Chemical Eye on Plan B - Latex is a water-based suspension of natural rubber. If properly tapped, it is secreted by Hevea brasiliensis, which is better known as the rubber tree. For sexually active college students, latex is also referred to as Plan A.

I am probably compounding my metaphors, but when two students are in love, latex is the "chemistry between them"and an unwanted pregnancy. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

Bonnie Erbe: A vote in Afghanistan - A little-noticed aspect of this past weekend's elections in Afghanistan was the high rate of voter turnout among women. It was a heroic effort deserving of international acclaim.

Yes, turnout overall was disappointing: only half of eligible Afghans went to the polls to elect members of parliament. A year ago, more than three-quarters of eligible citizens voted in that dust-lined, mountainous, bombed-out shell of a country's presidential election. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

Dale McFeatters: Maybe, perhaps, possibly a breakthrough - More than two years of what seemed absolutely futile diplomacy has maybe - a big maybe - paid off. North Korea has agreed to abandon "all nuclear weapons and existing nuclear" programs.

The bellicose dictatorship further agreed to abide by the international Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and to allow U.N. inspectors access to its facilities to verify that promise - the sooner, the better. - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

James Glassman: Recipe for energy disaster - "An angry public wants quick relief from high prices" at the pump, says Business Week. That's hardly a surprise. Over the past year, the Energy Department reports, a gallon of regular gasoline has gone from $1.86 to $2.96.

But even at less than bottled water, $3 gasoline hurts consumers and the economy as a whole. The question, however, is what to do? - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005

John Hall: Syria's terror pipeline - Syria's terrorist pipeline into Iraq is as wide open as it has ever been, with arms, suicide bombers and fighters from all over the radical Arab world pouring across the border.

Word of that comes from the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Zalmay Khalilzad, who must deal with the consequences every day of deadly bombings.

The administration is reaching the end of its rope with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. With the White House privately discussing chapter two of regime change, Khalilzad publicly warned, "Our patience is running out with Syria." - More...
Monday - September 19, 2005