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Beth Chowen beat a brain tumor last year. Doctors found it in June, and by the end of summer, the 64-year-old Everett preschool owner was back on her feet, ready to begin her retirement years. In November, the tumor was back again. It worked like a thief, quietly and quickly, and within months it had robbed Beth Chowen of her ability to move, to live in her own home, even to speak. At first, Medicare paid for everything, her husband, Terrence Chowen, said. Doctors said there was nothing more they could do. Medicare pulled out, he said. "Medicare would only...

Since the Associated Press announced its controversial rate change last year, many newspapers have started considering other content options. And things are not likely to calm down any time soon. A handful of dailies — including several who admit their AP rates actually fell — have given notice to drop the service, editors in several states are forging content-sharing alliances, and Politico and PA SportsTicker are quickly positioning themselves to help replace the 160-year-old news cooperative in daily news pages. "AP is going to lose newspapers, it is a question of how many," says Editor Dean Miller of the Post...

They sing. They dance.And on Oct. 12, they march: Grassroots “Kids for Obama Parade” (Organizing)On Sunday, October 12, Washington State kids and families will parade around Seattle’s Green Lake. “Kids for Obama Parade” will illustrate one of Barack Obama’s core beliefs: Everyone’s voice counts. Join us as Obama’s youngest supporters rally their families and call for change, for a better America. At 2 pm, rain or shine, children and teens will express with words and drawings their hopes for the future of America on “wish flags” that will be mailed to Obama. The first 300 kids will be given a...

NEW YORK The Courier in Findlay, Ohio, has announced its endorsement of Sen. John McCain for President. The newspaper also supported the Republican candidate in 2004. Also committing to McCain:: The Spokesman-Review in Spokane, Wash. E&P is charting every editorial endorsement. Obama had been on a run in the past week. Send any pick to: gmitchell@editorandspublisher.com. The Spokesman-Review views McCain’s “long service” to the country and strong record of leadership as the experience needed to handle America’s affairs at home and abroad. Though the endorsement does criticize Palin as the VP pick, “she is not running for president,” and Obama...

The White House has slammed the bosses of a failed insurance giant who spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on a posh California retreat just days after getting a £48bn bail-out using taxpayers' money. A White House spokesman said the junket was a 'despicable' move from the bosses of American International Group, AIG. AIG executives racked up a huge tab during the week-long getaway.

The Columbian plans to relocate its operations to former offices in downtown Vancouver, Washington so it can generate more revenue from a new building constructed by publisher Scott Campbell and his wife. Campbell says the company is trying to negotiate a new loan with its lender or will seek temporary Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection from creditors.

US election officials believe they have uncovered massive attempted voter fraud less than a month before the country goes to the polls to choose its new president. Eleven separate investigations have now been launched into a voter registration group called the Association of Community Organisations for Reform – or Acorn. The authorities believe they may have duplicated voter forms, employed convicts to register people and even stolen the names of the American football team the Dallas Cowboys in order to create fake voters. The suspicions started when authorities in Las Vegas raided the organisation's offices, removing eight computer hard drives...

(Vancouver, WA) Swept by the double tsunami of a sour economy and rising operating costs, The Columbian Publishing Co., today, announced plans to relocate its business and newsroom operations to former offices at 701 W. Eighth St. in downtown Vancouver (WA). The move, according to Columbian Publisher Scott Campbell, is out of the need to generate more revenue from a new six-story building constructed by Campbell and his wife, Jody, which opened south of Esther Short Park in January. The options, Campbell said, are to either lease all of the 118,000-square-foot $30 million structure or to sell it. At present,...

Lt. Burke Jensen was called five months ago to serve his country in Kuwait. Now he is being told to get an irrigation system and landscaping on his property as soon as possible or face legal action from the Oak Hill Country Estates Homeowners' Association.KENNEWICK — Burke Jensen moved to Kennewick about a year ago, bought a nice house in the country south of the city and began to settle into a new job at Energy Northwest. Then came the call five months ago to serve his country in Kuwait. So Jensen, who says he is an involuntarily mobilized reservist,...

If the country ever needed new direction under a fresh, steady, calm president, this is the time. Sen. Barack Obama is the country's hope, the kind of promising, intelligent leader who comes along perhaps once in a generation. Obama is the best candidate for president. He has the vision, patience and fortitude to put America on a track to recovery after an eight-year run of financial irresponsibility, aggressive adventurism abroad and mismanagement, secrecy and dissembling on numerous fronts. The issues and the superiority of the Obama-Joe Biden team have become clearer than ever in the past few days. Obama spoke...

The "death with dignity" measure, Initiative 1000, sets up a way for a terminally ill person to order a lethal dose of drugs. Make no mistake: This is assisted suicide. It is a grim decision, and many may think it a wrong one, but we believe it should be the right of the terminally ill to decide for themselves. The law would give the right to only a few people: patients who have fewer than six months to live. In Oregon, the only state to have a comparable law, 49 patients used the law to take their lives last year...

Three men have been charged with plotting to attack the publisher of a controversial novel dealing with the Prophet Muhammad, British police said Thursday. The three - salesman Abrar Mizra, 22; cab driver Abbas Taj, 30; and Ali Beheshti, 40 - were arrested Saturday near the north London home and office of Martin Rynja, who plans to publish "The Jewel of Medina," police said. They were arrested after a fire broke out at Rynja's building, but police have refused to disclose any details. The men were charged with plotting to endanger life and damage property. Beheshti was also charged with...

(Legal Newsline)-Washington Attorney General Rob McKenna filed a lawsuit Friday against the state Republican Party over alleged campaign finance violations. The Republican AG filed the lawsuit in King County Superior Court after the state Public Disclosure Commission found that the state GOP misused funds to bankroll three mailers in support Republican gubernatorial nominee Dino Rossi over Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire in the August primary.

Colleen Jones, aunt of Republican vice presidential nominee Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, in an interview by KAPP-TV, said the news media has been brutal to her niece and that investigators had looked in to the drinking habits of Palin and her husband Todd.Jones, who lives in Kennewic, Washington, was interviewed today by Hau Kuiang to get her reaction to Palin's performance in the vice presidential debate with her Democratic party counterpart Delaware Sen. Joe Biden.Jones heaped scorn on the media's bias toward Democratic presidential nominee Illinois Sen. Barack Obama and their obsession for dirt digging about Palin."The media I think...

Having Slept on it, State of Washington Drifts Slightly to Biden in Scoring the VP Debate … The day after Thursday night’s debate between Republican Sarah Palin and Democrat Joe Biden, SurveyUSA again polled the state of Washington. This follows a poll conducted by SurveyUSA Thursday night, seconds after the debate. The first poll was conducted before pundits could have influenced what debate watchers thought. This, the 2nd poll, conducted Friday, was completed after some national polls showed that Biden had performed well in the debate, and after both campaigns had time to ’spin’ the results. Of debate watchers: 36%...

The race for Washington’s next Governor is now a tie. The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in the state finds incumbent Christine Gregoire and challenger Dino Rossi each attracting 48% of the vote. Gregoire is viewed favorably by 51% and unfavorably by 47%. Her job performance is rated 43% good or excellent from voters, while 35% say she is doing a poor job. Former State Senator Rossi’s ratings are 50% favorable, 48% unfavorable. This year’s race has been anything but steady. Last month, Rossi pulled ahead of the governor, 52% to 46%, after trailing behind by four percentage points in...

The race for Washington’s next Governor is now a tie. The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in the state finds incumbent Christine Gregoire and challenger Dino Rossi each attracting 48% of the vote. Gregoire is viewed favorably by 51% and unfavorably by 47%. Her job performance is rated 43% good or excellent from voters, while 35% say she is doing a poor job. Former State Senator Rossi’s ratings are 50% favorable, 48% unfavorable.

In a split decision Thursday, the state Supreme Court rejected a plea by a Kent property owner seeking compensation for damage done during a drug raid. Affirming lower court decisions, five of the court's nine justices found the city of Kent was not required to pay $5,000 for damage to buildings owned by Leo Brutsche during a failed 2004 anti-methamphetamine operation. During the raid, narcotics officers used battering rams to knock down doors in buildings owned by Brutsche while searching for a meth lab they believed Brutsche's son to be operating on the property, according to court records. No drugs...

State of Washington Awards Split-Decision on Palin-Biden Vice Presidential Debate: Immediately following tonight's debate between Republican Sarah Palin and Democrat Joe Biden, SurveyUSA interviewed 1,100 state of Washington adults, of whom 806 watched tonight's debate. Of debate watchers: 42% say Palin was the clear winner. 39% say Biden was the clear winner. 18% say there was no clear winner. Debate audience was 26% Republican, 33% Democrat, 34% Independent. Republicans by 6:1 saw Palin as the winner. Democrats by 5:1 saw Biden as the winner. Independents, the most critical and coveted group, broke 5:4 for Palin. Of debate watchers: 52% say...

A Craisgslist advertisment offered $28.50 an hour for landscaping work but it failed to mention the possibility of being a decoy for a grab-and-run robbery. A man wearing a blue, long-sleeved shirt, yellow safety vest, safety glasses or other eye protection and ventilator mask -- the outfit specified in the ad -- accosted a Brinks armored truck guard with pepper spray about 11 a.m. in Monroe, Wash. Tuesday during a cash delivery to a Bank of America branch, grabbed a bag of money and eluded pursuers after entering a nearby creek. Left behind were a number of similarly clad workers...

TOPPENISH, Wash. - Business has never been so good at the Brulotte Hop Farms, where 60,000 pounds of hops a day are plucked from the fields. It's the best harvest ever for the Brulottes. "We've added about 200 acres this year as well as 200 acres last year, which has almost doubled our production," said Reggie Brulotte. Prices for hops - the little green flowers that give beer its bitterness - bottomed out at 50 cents per pound in 2002. But a global shortage over the past two years has pushed the price to 16 times that today. For the...

MONROE, Wash. – In a move that could be right out of a Hollywood movie, a brazen crook apparently used a Craigslist ad to hire a dozen unsuspecting decoys to help him make his getaway following a robbery outside a bank on Tuesday. He then made his escape in an inner tube on the Skykomish River. The robbery happened about 11 a.m. on an armored truck guard at a Bank of America branch. "He was wearing a dust mask, a particle mask. At first I thought it might be a surgical mask. I still didn't think anything was wrong, just...

Thousands of Washington Mutual employees across the country whose stock options are worthless now face the possibility that their pension benefits may be at risk. JPMorgan Chase & Co., which took over Washington Mutual’s banking assets last Thursday, is expected to make a decision about employees’ pension plans by the end of this week. The company has not disclosed the alternatives it’s considering. WaMu’s employees also have suffered significant losses on their 401(k) plans because many of them were invested heavily in WaMu stock or WaMu funds that held company stock, according to an executive who recently left the company...

WASHINGTON, Sept. 30, 2008 – The Defense Department today announced replacement units scheduled to deploy next year to Iraq. About 26,000 troops from an Army corps headquarters, an Army division headquarters, a Marine expeditionary force headquarters, an Army fires brigade and six Army brigade combat teams are scheduled to rotate into Iraq between this winter and next summer, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said. Units receiving deployment orders are: -- 1st Corps Headquarters, Fort Lewis, Wash.; -- 1st Cavalry Division, Fort Hood, Texas; -- 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force Headquarters, Camp Lejeune, N.C.; -- 1st Brigade Combat Team, 1st Armored Division, Fort...

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Immediately following last night’s debate between Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama, SurveyUSA interviewed 1,000 state of Washington adults, of whom 631 watched the debate. Of all debate watchers: 40% say McCain was the clear winner. 38% say Obama was the clear winner. 23% say there was no clear winner. But: Independents, the most critical, coveted and arguably most dispassionate group of debate watcher, gave by 4:3 the nod to McCain. Republicans by 6:1 say McCain won. Democrats by 6:1 say Obama won. Those two groups offset. Debate watchers say McCain understands Iraq better, McCain understands Iran better, McCain...

Reader Mike in Seattle sends the latest manifestation of Palin Derangement Syndrome: Abort Palin street graffiti. He writes: Michelle, I live in Seattle’s Greenwood neighborhood, just north of the Woodland Park Zoo. Below is a sprayed-on stencil graffiti I discovered at Greenwood Ave. N and N. 71st Street. Ironic that a mother who wouldn’t abort her disabled child is attacked next to the curve cutout to be used by people in wheelchairs. I haven’t seen any others in the neighborhood, although it’s likely there are some. Since Greenwood is considered a “nice” middle-class neighborhood, this hints of the hatred Palin...

WaMu Recognized as Top Diverse Employer—Again Washington Mutual, Inc., September 24, 2008 Washington Mutual, Inc. (NYSE:WM), one of the nation’s leading banks for consumers and small businesses, has once again been recognized as a top employer by Hispanic Business magazine and the Human Rights Campaign. Hispanic Business magazine recently ranked WaMu sixth in its annual Diversity Elite list, which names the top 60 companies for Hispanics. The company was honored specifically for its efforts to recruit Hispanic employees, reach out to Hispanic consumers and support Hispanic communities and organizations. The Human Rights Campaign, the largest national gay, lesbian, bisexual and...

King County Superior Court Judge Richard Eadie ruled Friday that Republican governor candidate Dino Rossi could keep his designation as "prefers GOP Party" on the November General Election ballot. The Washington State Democrats sued to force Rossi to describe himself as a Republican. Some voters might be confused about what "GOP" means, a King County Superior Court judge said Friday, but that's not reason enough to change the way gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi describes himself on the general election ballot. State Democrats sued last week, saying Rossi was trying to hide his party affiliation because of low approval ratings for...

Immediately following tonight's debate between Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama, SurveyUSA interviewed 1,000 state of Washington adults, of whom 631 watched tonight's debate. Of all debate watchers: 40% say McCain was the clear winner. 38% say Obama was the clear winner. 23% say there was no clear winner. But: Independents, the most critical, coveted and arguably most dispassionate group of debate watcher, gave by 4:3 the nod to McCain. Republicans by 6:1 say McCain won. Democrats by 6:1 say Obama won. Those two groups offset. Debate watchers say McCain understands Iraq better, McCain understands Iran better, McCain understands...

State of Washington Independents Say McCain is Clear Winner of 1st Presidential Debate: Immediately following tonight's debate between Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama, SurveyUSA interviewed 1,000 state of Washington adults, of whom 631 watched tonight's debate. Of all debate watchers: 40% say McCain was the clear winner. 38% say Obama was the clear winner. 23% say there was no clear winner. But: Independents, the most critical, coveted and arguably most dispassionate group of debate watcher, gave by 4:3 the nod to McCain. Republicans by 6:1 say McCain won. Democrats by 6:1 say Obama won. Those two groups offset....

State of Washington Independents Say McCain is Clear Winner of 1st Presidential Debate: Immediately following tonight's debate between Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama, SurveyUSA interviewed 1,000 state of Washington adults, of whom 631 watched tonight's debate. Of all debate watchers: 40% say McCain was the clear winner. 38% say Obama was the clear winner. 23% say there was no clear winner. But: Independents, the most critical, coveted and arguably most dispassionate group of debate watcher, gave by 4:3 the nod to McCain. Republicans by 6:1 say McCain won. Democrats by 6:1 say Obama won. Those two groups offset....

At 9:40 a.m. on Friday, five buttoned-down bankers rolled their suitcases into the lobby of Washington Mutual's Seattle headquarters. They said they were from JPMorgan Chase & Co, but they didn't need to: nearly everyone else at the WaMu Center was in jeans. The night before, JPMorgan agreed to buy WaMu's branches and deposits for less than $2 billion as the federal government closed down an institution that survived the Great Depression of the 1930s only to be felled by the mortgage crisis of 2008. "We don't think we'll have our jobs in a couple of months," said Bryan Johnson,...

NOT ONE PENNY FOR ACORNLindsey Graham: "And this deal that’s on the table now is not a very good deal. Twenty percent of the money that should go to retire debt that will be created to solve this problem winds up in a housing organization called ACORN that is an absolute ill-run enterprise, and I can’t believe we would take money away from debt retirement to put it in a housing program that doesn’t work." READ: Inside Obama's ACORN WRITE/PHONE/FAX NOW ACORN VOTE FRAUD MAP: ACORN Suspected of Voter Fraud State Year Details AR 1998 A contractor with ACORN-affiliated...

Seattle (AP) -- A judge says the word "Republican" doesn't have to appear next to Dino Rossi's name on the November ballot for the Washington governor's race. Rossi had listed his affiliation as "prefers GOP party," referring to the Republicans' Grand Old Party nickname. Democrats sued this week after a survey showed Rossi had more voter support with the "GOP" tag than he did with the "Republican" tag.

SEATTLE, WA (September 24, 2008) – Washington Mutual, Inc. (NYSE:WM), one of the nation’s leading banks for consumers and small businesses, has once again been recognized as a top employer by Hispanic Business magazine and the Human Rights Campaign. Hispanic Business magazine recently ranked WaMu sixth in its annual Diversity Elite list, which names the top 60 companies for Hispanics. The company was honored specifically for its efforts to recruit Hispanic employees, reach out to Hispanic consumers and support Hispanic communities and organizations. The Human Rights Campaign, the largest national gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT) civil rights organization, also...

The Baltimore Examiner and The Washington (D.C.) Examiner announced Wednesday early editorial endorsements for the McCain-Palin ticket. They joined the New York Post in that, with the Seattle Times endorsing Obama. National security and leadership potential were the main factors in the decision. The papers cite leadership, public service, and toughness among Senator Mccain’s strengths. The next president must have “the hard-earned experience” and quality of character to win the war abroad, according to the endorsement. Gov. Palin only adds to the toughness of her “maverick” running-mate, according to the papers. Palin “has the instincts, temperament and backbone” necessary to...

OLYMPIA — The state Democratic Party filed suit Tuesday in an attempt to force Dino Rossi to list his party preference as "Republican" on the November ballot instead of "GOP Party." Democrats say the Iraq War and low approval ratings for President Bush have left the Republican Party a damaged brand and that Rossi is trying to distance himself by using GOP as his affiliation. Rossi is running against Democratic Gov. Christine Gregoire. He lost to Gregoire by 133 votes in the 2004 election, and polls show this race to be close as well. Polls by Stuart Elway have suggested...

Olympia, Wash. (AP) -- Washington state Democrats sued a state official Tuesday to get a Republican listed on the ballot, arguing a candidate is obscuring his party identity by ballot language that says he "prefers GOP party." The candidate, Dino Rossi, is facing a rematch this November with Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire, who beat him by 133 votes four years ago after three counts and a court challenge. The lawsuit the party filed against Secretary of State Sam Reed argues that "allowing Mr. Rossi to obscure his true party preference and affiliation directly violates the law, would mislead a substantial...

IN AN AMERICA where any remark hinting of prejudice can force its maker into endless mea culpas, the mocking of a world religious leader ought to invite political suicide. But one religion, the Catholic Church, seems to be exempt -- at least by some advocates of Initiative 1000, which would legalize physician-assisted suicide. Pope Benedict XVI took an anti-euthanasia message to Lourdes last week, saying, "A society unable to accept its suffering members and incapable of helping to share their suffering is a cruel and inhumane society." "Dignity never abandons the sick person," he declared, adding that people must accept...

An economic Katrina is shattering the confidence of hardworking, middle-class Americans. The war that should never have been in Iraq is dragging on too long. At a time of huge challenge, the candidate with the intelligence, temperament and judgment to lead our nation to a better place is Sen. Barack Obama. Obama should be the next president of the United States because he is the most qualified change agent. Obama is a little young, but also brilliant. If he sometimes seems brainy and professorial, that's OK. We need the leader of the free world to think things through, carefully. We...

Washington Mutual CEO Kerry Killinger stood before a Wall Street investors' conference last September and declared that his company — the company he had led since 1990 and built into the nation's sixth-largest bank and one of its biggest home lenders — not only would survive the collapse of the mortgage bubble but would prosper. Despite what Killinger called "a near-perfect storm" in the U.S. housing market, he said, "We have appropriate capital and sources of liquidity (i.e., cash) to weather the storm." Killinger declared that WaMu would add billions in new mortgages to its books, in a bid to...

1. If the election for President were held today would you support the Democratic ticket of Barack Obama and Joseph Biden or the Republican ticket of John McCain and Sarah Palin? Obama/Biden 47% McCain/Palin 42% Other 3% Undecided 8%

VANCOUVER, Wash. -- It may soon be illegal for Vancouver residents to wash their cars in the driveway, according to a local newspaper report. The Oregonian article reports that the state of Washington wants Clark County to come up with laws that control what water goes into storm drains, including banning the soapy water from car washes at private homes. “Well it seems kind of strange forcing people to go through a car wash… Some people can’t afford to do that and would prefer to wash at home,” a woman told KGW as she waited in line for a professional...

The Pentagon's top weapons buyer said the proposed aerial refueling tankers from both Northrop Grumman and Boeing were "technically outstanding" but differed by almost $3 billion on price. John Young, the undersecretary for acquisition, technology and logistics, said in an interview at the Pentagon yesterday that under the tanker proposal from Northrop Grumman and its partner European Aeronautic Defence & Space, developing the first 68 aircraft would have cost $12.5 billion, compared with $15.4 billion under Boeing's plan.

The Wall Street Journal Reports that Palin instead will join John McCain to meet foreign leaders at the United Nations next week.

HUNTS POINT, Wash. -- Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin will not be making an appearance in Washington next week. Republican donors had been invited to a fundraiser with Palin next Wednesday in Hunts Point on the Eastside, but the McCain campaign said Tuesday night that she will not be here. The Wall Street Journal Reports that Palin instead will join John McCain to meet foreign leaders at the United Nations next week.

The latest Elway Poll mirrors other surveys that show the presidential race in Washington state tightening. Democrat Barack Obama now leads Republican John McCain 45 percent to 38 percent, with 17 percent undecided. Obama led McCain 47 percent to 35 percent when Elway polled in July. The latest survey of 450 registered voters was taken Sept. 6-8 and suggests that McCain's pick of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has moved the meter here. According to pollster Stuart Elway: * McCain led Obama 34 percent to 32 percent among Independents when just the two of them were included in the questions. Throw...

Barack Obama’s old friends at ACORN have been busy this election cycle. The McCain campaign had a golden opportunity to bring the left-wing, tax-subsidized con artists to light, but McCain’s already blown it with his effusive praise for Obama’s “outstanding” community organizer record last week at Columbia University. Anyway, we forge ahead. Hoping the truth will get out there. Hoping that people will change their minds about Obama and his radical Chicago-based racket of election saboteurs and anti-free market thugs. Hoping that someone else in the MSM will start asking pointed questions about the $800,000 Obama failed to report in...

U.S. House of Representatives Roll Call Votes 110th Congress - 2nd Session (2008) as compiled through the electronic voting machine by the House Tally Clerks under the direction of the Clerk of the House