Ketchikan: Going Home: Yahtzee's journey back to the sea - Story & Photos By CARL THOMPSON - Wednesday was a great day for an adorable seal named Yahtzee and for the staff of the Alaska SeaLife Center. It was the day Yahtzee returned home.

Yahtzee was released Wednesday afternoon at Ketchikan's Bugge Beach by staff from the Alaska SeaLife Center along with help from the NOAA Office for Law Enforcement.  On hand to watch this inspiring event were a few Ketchikan residents and children from a local school.

Yahtzee was alert and calm. When released, he made his way directly to the water with a few sideways glances.  Once in the water, Yahtzee looked back as if to say good-bye and thanks. Yahtzee then made his way out to deeper water and was gone... his long journey back home coming to an end. - More...
Thursday - October 27, 2005

National: Special prosecutor's decision may bring new debate on war By MARC SANDALOW - Many elements of the investigation threatening to tear apart the White House are familiar to anyone who follows Washington: ruthless leaks, character assassination, a cozy relationship between journalists and government officials.

What distinguishes the CIA leak case from ordinary Washington business is the substance of the leak and the standing of the leakers. - More...
Thursday - October 27, 2005

National: With threat of avian flu, bird smuggling becomes issue By LANCE GAY - Bird smuggling is big business in the United States, and animal-rights groups say that's going to cause a major headache if an outbreak of the lethal avian flu comes to the United States.

Illegal movements of birds have already caused disease outbreak here. - More...
Thursday - October 27, 2005

National: Final Volcker Report on U.N. Oil-for-Food Scandal Ready for Release - The Volcker committee, which conducted an inquiry into the scandal surrounding the U.N. Oil-for-Food Program, will issue its final report Thursday, which will list all the companies named in Iraq files as involved in paying kickbacks to Saddam Hussein.

"The Iraqi's were very good at keeping meticulous records," said Paul Volcker, head of the investigating committee. Volcker, former chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve, spoke October 26 at Johns Hopkins University's Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies. - More...
Thursday - October 27, 2005

News In Photos Candlelight Vigil Honors Troops Front Page Photo By Carl Thompson

Ketchikan: Candlelight Vigil Honors Troops Photo By Carl Thompson - A small group attended the candlelight vigil held Wednesday evening in front of the Federal Building. The event was planned by organizer Perry Reeve to honor the men and women serving in the Iraq war and to honor those whose lives have been lost. Since the war began, 2,000 Americans have died and 100,000 Iraqis have lost their lives. - More...
Thursday - October 27, 2005

Science: Scientists offer explainations for our sleep habits By LEE BOWMAN - All animals need sleep, but scientists are increasingly discovering that neither snooze time nor type of sleep is anything close to uniform across species.

An analysis of research published Thursday concludes that animals, including humans, have adapted to sleep habits that restrict waking hours to times when they are most likely to be successful finding food and least likely to face danger. - More...
Thursday - October 27, 2005

Viewpoints Opinions/Letters Dock expansion By Patti Mackey - Thursday Avian influenza: A bit of perspective needed By Richard Mandsager, M.D. - Thursday Mistakes Made & Constructive Advice By Chris J. Herby - Thursday Marine passenger fees aka head tax By Marty West - Thursday Whining and Complaining By Jerry Cegelske - Wednesday AM Re: Mission Possible By Joseph Prows - Wednesday AM More Viewpoints/ Letters Publish A Letter Political Cartoonists Political cartoons Ketchikan Calendar, Meetings, Events Today's Forecast City Police Report AK Troopers Daily Dispatch Classifieds & Announcements October 2005 Click on the date for stories and photos published on that day... S M T W T F S 25 26 27 28 29 30 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

Bill Steigerwald: Judge Andrew Napolitano: Fox News' 'Born-again Individualist' - Judge Andrew Napolitano, who appears as a legal analyst on more Fox News Channels shows than anyone can count, is a judge no more. But before he became the most steadfast defender of civil liberties on TV, Napolitano was a life-tenured Superior Court judge in New Jersey who saw the serial abuse of government power every day in his courtroom.

His 2004 book, "Constitutional Chaos: What Happens When the Government Breaks Its Own Laws," details those abuses. With cover-blurbs from both Rush Limbaugh and Nat Hentoff, it also explains his political journey from a super-hawkish Richard Nixon supporter during his undergraduate days at Princeton University in the late 1960s to "a born-again individualist" who says the Patriot Act is "the most abominable assault on human liberty by the Congress since the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798." - More...
Thursday - October 27, 2005

Dick Morris: Subsidize Heating Costs For Zero Dollars This Winter - President Bush had better initiate a program to subsidize home heating-oil costs before sticker shock turns the red states blue with cold this winter.

With heating-oil prices expected to increase by at least 50 percent because of the high global demand for petroleum and Hurricane Katrina-induced damage to American refineries. Prices for natural gas and electricity will also inflate, lagging not far behind.

And there's a way Bush can subsidize those costs without further adding to the federal budget deficit. The U.S. strategic petroleum reserve contains about 700 million barrels of oil, approximately a one-month supply of oil for the nation (and a bit more than two months if we assume that only foreign oil were to be cut off). - More...
Thursday - October 27, 2005

Dale McFeatters: Internet works fine as it is - The Internet was devised by U.S. military researchers in the 1960s, and under U.S. auspices it has flourished into the omnipresent tool of communications, information and entertainment it is today.

Now that it is running so well, other nations think that they ought to take it over, that what the Internet needs is more supervision by other governments, preferably through the United Nations. The effort at imposing international control on the Internet is being led by a handful of nations, including China, Iran and Cuba, which should tell you something. - More...
Thursday - October 27, 2005

John Hall: Judith Miller is a Times problem - The Judith Miller case has become another cause for self-examination by the American press. In particular, the relationship of reporters, editors and news sources is being scrutinized in a new way because of the government's alleged misuse of a reporter to achieve a short-term foreign policy goal.

It's always good to look at ourselves - particularly at the ancient problem of confidential news sources. - More...
Thursday - October 27, 2005

Will Durst: Contract on America 2.1 - The calendar says the middle of autumn but for the Democrats it should be dead solid springtime. As a group, I'm fairly flabbergasted they aren't spending all their spare time twirling and spinning and throwing spears of asparagus into a bonfire while wearing nothing but stringed acorn necklaces or however it is that godless secularists make their sacrifices. For this should be a good time. One that calls for slow-motion skipping on the beach with bouquets of ribbons attached to helium balloons trailing in the breeze over their sun-kissed shoulders.

Why? Because the GOP is in deep doo doo. How deep is the doo doo? Real deep. So deep that every Republican member of Congress will soon be issued a three-foot length of bamboo for use as a breathing tube. So deep that watching Saddam Hussein plead "not guilty" is just a grim reminder that it won't be long before Karl Rove, Scooter Libby and Bill Frist get the chance to do the same. So deep that the best news the Republicans received all week was their House Majority Leader avoided a nationally televised perp walk by surrendering to Houston authorities on his own. - More...
Thursday - October 27, 2005