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Roundup: Cell driving-ban, Eyman's financier, cap-and-trade, Inslee for governor, etc.

• Published June 30, 2009

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Several interesting items in the news over the weekend. I was out yesterday and am just catching up.

Niki Sullivan has a Capitol Record piece on the ineffectiveness of the cell-phone ban one year later, with links to a KUOW report by Austin Jenkins. She wrote: "The conclusion: It hasn’t been a big success. Only 1,600 tickets have been issued for the secondary offense."

And we all see drivers every day with phone to ear and not a care in the world.

Rich Roesler at Eye on Olympia had this bit on Mike Dunmire, the big donor to Tim Eyman and why Dunmire likes the state's professional initiative backer. Without Dunmire's hundreds of thousands of dollars, it's fair to ask if Eyman could have gotten signatures for his latest tax limiting measure this year.

The Association of Washington Business noted a sign of life in the forest-products sector with a small bit of hiring by Longview Fibre, which is still about 700 jobs below its 2007 levels.

The Seattle Times rounded up the Northwest delegation’s explanation of its votes on the cap-and-trade bill, which U.S. Rep. Jay Inslee took a lead role in crafting. Included is Republican Rep. Dave Reichert, who voted for it and was the lone Washington member to cross party lines.

Speaking of Inslee, Josh Feit of PubliCola interviewed him on cap-and-trade and included this bit on Inslee’s interest in running for governor (which sounds as noncommittal as that of state Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown):

Lastly, travel writer Rick Steves, who was in Iran last year for a documentary, had an interesting op-ed piece in the Saturday Seattle Times on the future of freedom in Iran in the wake of the June election turmoil.