“Glad to see the Tribune place importance on the race for Superintendent of Public Instruction. Too bad that you couldn’t comment on the fact that Kotterman will enhance and improve public schools whereas Huppenthal will try to dismantle them.”

“So the Tribune editorial writer thinks that it is not a tragedy that thousands of teachers are losing their jobs across the state (Our View, Wednesday). I think that it is a tragedy, because these good people in our society spent millions of dollars and thousands of hours on getting their education to help the youth of America. I challenge your editorial writer to spend just two weeks in a classroom.”

“Bank and the oil change place!” the man shouted. We were in the waiting room of an oil change place.

Ted Simmon, the TV Host of KAET’s “Horizon” TV Program asks “What is wrong with Arizona?”

I remember when I first came to Mesa in 2001, everything was booming. You couldn’t find a parking space at Wal-Mart and all the check-out lights were on and the lines were 10 shopping carts long. I just came back from my Monthly trip to Wal-Mart and was struck by how deserted and down-sized it has become. My Fry’s Supermarket had hordes and hordes of winter visitors, shopping carts full to the brim with top-of-the-line liquor and huge roasts. We “locals” dreaded going shopping. Now we go and there are just 2-3 lanes open because no one is buying anything. Full to the brim shopping carts are as extinct as the dinosaurs.

Congress, says Sen. John McCain, is "spending money like a drunken sailor," and you can't help but wish the Arizona Republican were exaggerating.

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio won again.

Taylor Jones: It’s hard to “clear, hold and build” piles of rubble punctuated by poppy fields. Why re-enact the Charge of the Light Brigade? 

Very strange how the media screamed about the amount of time it took President Bush to send FEMA and government workers and government aid to the individuals who lost their homes, etc. when the hurricane hit New Orleans. Why have we not heard a peep from the media in the past few years while the tornadoes devastated the middle of our country. Why is it that the media showed, and told, of the devastation caused to the hundreds of homes and the individuals living in the states who lost everything they owned to mother nature, but never questioned why the Obama government was not on the scene the very next day, and why the Obama government did not supply homes for those who lost their home and all their belongings in the horrific weather in the past three years?

February 26, 2005

When are big-time college football fans going to learn that postseason games are about money, not about settling who is No. 1?

The state of Arizona continues to spend money it doesn’t have — or as John McCain says, “like drunken sailors and the bar is still open.”

Memorial Day 2007 is upon us, and so is the traditional start to summer. Boats are shipshape, loaded into their trailers and ready to hit the water. Valley residents mop perspiration from their brows and look longingly to cooler climes. Outdoors lovers retrieve their camping tents and sleeping bags from closets.

“I really feel sorry for the senior citizens that live on Chaparral Road in the Villa Monterrey area. However, they are quite selfish when they called for the destruction of homes and the widening of Camelback Road from the Loop 101.”

Reading the details about Catherine Alexandrowicz’s death brought more anguish to Judge Jeffrey Cates than any case he’d seen in 26 years on the bench.

Here's a shot to the beer gut: Government bodies across America are looking to increase taxes on beer.

 I am outraged that the government thinks it can fix health care without spending time in the trenches. As a family doctor in Phoenix since 1974, I am convinced Washington is completely off the mark. Having zero medical experience, politicians delude themselves that they can heal a system tangled in a web of malignant complexities by blindly wrapping it in costly bureaucratic bandages.

Arizonans should expect some programs and services they now use to disappear entirely because of the budget crunch, Gov. Jan Brewer said Monday.The governor said prior cuts in state spending have been made pretty much across the board, with virtually all state agencies having to trim a little.

Movie director Peter Jackson began his “Lord of the Rings” saga with an ominous message: “The world is changed. I feel it in the water. I feel it in the earth. I smell it in the air,” Cate Blanchett darkly says. “Much that once was … is lost.”

The makeup of Gilbert’s legislative district will finally see a new face in office after three terms with the same pair of lawmakers.

That was quick. Hours after the official start of NHL free agency, the Coyotes jumped into the first-day frenzy of activity Tuesday, signing free agent defenseman Kurt Sauer and forward Todd Fedoruk to multi-year deals.

Resembling the Republican national convention on a miniature scale, Senator John McCain, supported by his former vice presidential running mate Sarah Palin, stumped at Mesa’s Dobson High School on Saturday and wasted little time in attacking the policies of President Barack Obama.

The young cast of the Valley’s newest holiday pageant is all atwitter. Opening night is only a week away, and for the first time, the pre-teen actors are getting a glimpse of their costumes.

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