Huckleberries Best of the Northwest — 8/18/05
ABC News' Barbara Walters interviews actress Margot Kidder at her home in Montana several years ago after Kidder was found dazed and confused in Glendale, Calif. See Item No. 2.
Eight people, including four from Plummer, Idaho, are named in an 88-count federal racketeering indictment returned Wednesday as part of a four-year investigation into the sales of contraband cigarettes. The tax loss to the state of Washington associated with the case is more than $56 million, according to Bill Morlin/Spokesman-Review, here.
1. Eric Devericks/Seattle Times provides a formula re: how to get the media's attention here.
2. Actress Margo Kidder (Lois Lane/"Superman") became a U.S. citizen during a naturalization citizen in Butte, Mont., so she can protest the war in Iraq without fear of deportation here.
3. For the first time, Washington voters will be required to show their ID before voting in the September primary here.
4. Eighty-five years ago, sixtysomething widow Ellen McNamara crashed through a skylight to her death -- and has haunted Spokane's Davenport Hotel ever since, according to columnist Doug Clark/Spokesman-Review, here.
5. No Surprise Here: The 17-year-old thug who allegedly beat a Good Samaritan trying to help a badly injured girl in Spokane this week has an extensive and violent criminal history here.
6. IMHO-NW: David Bond/Silver Valley Mining Journal (Of drunks, babies & Hecla Mining), Doug Floyd/Spokesman-Review (Cindy Sheehan's protest), Missoulian (Legal system encourages irresponsibility), and Kalispell (Mont.) Daily Inter Lake (No tolerance for gang activity), and Dave Boling/Tacoma News-Tribune (Losing Royals inspire M's crowd).
*Wanna help write Spokane's $121M budget for next year? The city Web site has a calculator that lets amateurs try here.
*Something that looks like an alligator is loose in a Puyallup pond here. Free subscription required.
*A South Everett couple are trying to make sense of their 5-year-old's brief abduction by a stranger here.
Orbusmax provides the rest of the Northwest here.
