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New restaurant zones

Local Columns

We non-smokers are tickled that most restaurants are now smoke-free. No longer do restaurant hostesses ask, “Smoking or non-smoking?” At the risk creating work for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), I’d like to propose some other “zoning” in public eating places. How about a Cell Phone Zone in a restaurant where the folks who can’t speak quietly on their cell phones can be seated. Admittedly, I tend to speak loudly on the phone myself but I try hard to crank it down in a public place. In fact, I try to avoid making/taking calls in a restaurant altogether. Maybe ...

Small world

Local Columns

Tom Myers never really left the family farm northeast of Webster City. It was just up the Stonega blacktop from Old Highway 20, but before you reached Mulberry Center Church. In those days — I’m talking the late 1950s and early 1960s — Mulberry Center was more than a church; it was a neighborhood. Before the church was moved into Webster City and sited at Wilson Brewer Historic Park, it was the hub around which families that shared names and experiences gathered. Miller. Dinsdale. Curtis. Myers. It's a small world. It seems at one time or another, each lived on another’s ...

Burgess had a strong literary mind

Local Columns

“The voices that speak the loudest are books.” — Edward Burgess Another week, warmer weather returns and fall seems to have been put aside for a few days at least. As one who reads, a lot, I’m almost anxious in my desire to see a bit more weather to “keep me in.” Reading, for ...

Vote for someone who wants to limit campaign contributions

Letters to Editor

To the editor: I saw a Republican Congressman on TV say we are spending 7 trillion and collecting only 5 trillion, so he wasn’t voting to not shut down the government. Wasn’t it the previous Republican administration that gave all the tax breaks to the rich? It isn’t rocket science, it’s simple math. You can’t have it both ways; the rich have to pay their fair share. And on inflation, when the decision on Citizens United let there be unlimited campaign contributions then corporations started sending more to politicians. In my opinion, I don’t think they are cutting ...

Church rising, state falling in Washington

Editorials

An autumnal sky hung over the Capitol Monday afternoon. It was Yom Kippur, the day to atone, which seemed apt. Four thousand tourists come to the Capitol every day now, but the place will likely be dark next week. Gone was the cloud of uncertainty about a pending government shutdown. Most members of Congress dread the prospect. It's the last thing their voters need in a time of turmoil. The Senate finished its work on funding the government in good time, but House Republican lawmakers are too angry to get homework done. Meanwhile, everyone knows Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., ...

Estes built an empire here

Local Columns

“Elections belong to the people. It's their decision. If they decide to turn their back on the fire and burn their behinds, then they will just have to sit on their blisters.” — Abraham Lincoln When I was a postmaster, not too many years ago (just seems like a hundred), political ...