There is no hope of diplomatic resolution of the crisis taking the lives of hundreds on both sides each day. Death tolls have soared beyond 2,000, with more bodies and atrocities being discovered as IDF reach massacre scenes and Hamas fighters dig out from the rubble of punishing Israeli aerial bombardment.

A taciturn, fearless, relentless and old-fashioned newspaper editor, Baron has written a 548-page memoir, Collision of Power: Trump, Bezos and The Washington Post (McMillan).  He came off as humorless as played by Liev Schreiber in the Oscar-winning movie Spotlight but reveals a dry wit in the book and at breakfast.

Mark Meadows said he’d take a bullet to get Trump back in the White House and asked Hutchinson if she too would take a bullet for Trump. Cassidy joked, “Perhaps in the thigh.”

Here are common distractions that can diminish your enjoyment, no matter how great the wine may be. So ask yourself – am I missing out?

Asked directly if democracy itself would survive another Trump presidency, she answered no, in part because of his announced plans to end civil service protections -- what she calls the essential ballast in a democracy.

“Now Ukraine funding is hanging in the balance, and we have a war thrust on Israel,” lamented Schrier. “Now, at a precarious moment, we have chaos in the House.”

I was told that this would be the year that I finally received my much deserved, and much delayed, MacArthur Genius Award. Wrong again!

With all the hand-wringing, the oh-my-God-what’s-the-world-coming-to, let’s have a little interest in why they did what they did. Much of it was that McCarthy, they said, had lied to them. He was untrustworthy. He had promised to do certain things and hadn’t. Okay. But lied about what?

He was a West Seattle native born in 1905.  He came from a family (Swedish father, Norwegian mother) steeped in music, Swedish traditions, and sea-faring lore.  The Alki and Seattle waterfronts were Ivar Haglund’s playgrounds.

Builders are typically looking for favorable climates to build things, and generally oppose things like rent control, requirements for affordable units, and high construction impact fees. All three of the candidates they’re backing face progressives who are likely to embrace those ideas. 

It’s interesting to see what's left in a box that could tell someone the story of your life.

The Park Services proposes to introduce three to seven bears a year to the North Cascades over the period of a decade, to areas with “no confirmed evidence of a grizzly bear presence.”  Careful monitoring is promised.

A Danny Westneat column declared that the homelessness problem cannot be solved unless cities, including Seattle, have the authority to sweep away homeless encampments.

I’ve been away from Seattle for a time this summer. On returning, one of the things that is noticeable is how bad actors enact a big toll on the rest of us. Here are some examples of things I noticed after my being gone for a couple months.

The common theme among those speaking to the committee on Tuesday was that AI is here to stay, stressed by Bob Battles with the Association of Washington Business.

That failure just cost Putin a crucial regional ally and exposed him to further vulnerability to arrest for alleged war crimes.

Did the rebels expect the Democrats once more to save McCarthy's hide?

You must wonder why Xi Jinping, as head of China, replies to a letter from an obscure nonprofit in Washington. Well, in fact, Xi has been a kind of pen pal, as KING-5 News once described, with mayors of Tacoma, Steilacoom, and the principal of Lincoln High since his visit to Tacoma.

Even with someone new at the mayoral desk, there’s no significant shift away from a failing status quo. Why not at least try something different?

I encountered “DiFi” on a hotel balcony, two weeks into a 1978 fall trek to the base of Cho Oyu and Mt. Everest, on leave from my newspaper job and strengthened by what our Sherpa guides described as “much up go, much down go.”

Simply put, Seattle needs a police department large and smart enough (and openly responsive to review by the city’s Office of Police Accountability and Community Police Commission and others) to investigate and arrest those involved.

Unsoeld rankled men in Congress by such remarks as, “When I was in Congress, women tended to be problem solvers and to be issue-oriented. Men tended to be interested in acquiring power and moving up the leadership ladder.

Cal Raleigh's pain was emotional, daring to question whether the commitment to winning among management and ownership was as sincere as what he felt in the clubhouse after three consecutive regular season win totals of 90, 90 and 88.

The household names in twentieth-century architecture are Frank Lloyd Wright (1867-1959), Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, “Mies,” (1888-1969), and Le Corbusier (1887-1965). Alvar Aalto (1898-1976) is less well known, but I am increasingly drawn to his work.

McBride named this quartet New Jawn, “jawn” being a Philly term used as a placeholder for something above or maybe below immediate naming. Curious about its grammatical use? The Internet Provides. “Pass me that jawn.” “This jawn is packed.” In Hawaii they have a similar term, “Dakine.” Perhaps we need a Seattle variation.

Though most of the valley’s wineries are quite small and the wines sold principally out of tasting rooms and local retailers, a few have reached beyond and deserve much wider recognition.

It was 1929. Seeing that it was impossible to return to Boeing Field, Robert Wark scanned the territory below.  The smoothest, nearest flat area was the roof the Bon Marche, Seattle’s premier downtown department store (later Macy’s).

Ministry has to be something more than just doing a bunch of tasks. And that challenge is not limited to clergy. For all of us, life is full of tasks and can devolve into “one damn thing after another.” What gives the tasks deeper meaning?

Inequality, the big issue four years ago, is not what bothers Republicans. What boiled the political juices of the seven on stage Wednesday night was China.

Reagan authored the GOP’s famous 11th Commandment: “Thou Shalt Not Speak Ill of any Fellow Republican.” It was disobeyed dozens of times last night. Ex-New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said of frontrunner Donald Trump, who deliberately skipped the debate: “He put $7 trillion on the national debt and he should answer for that.”