In their words

“Maybe candidates have always wanted young people to get involved; maybe young people will get involved. But what’s particularly powerful this time around is there’s a medium that’s specific to that demographic.”

– Mead High School teacher Kevin Workman, commenting on the role Web sites such as MySpace and Facebook can play in getting young people interested in the current presidential campaign.

“In hindsight, I should have left my business card. I’ve been in law enforcement for a lot of years, and I just thought there’s no damage so I just left. If I had a do-over, certainly I’d do it differently.”

– Bonner County Sheriff Elaine Savage, who struck a parked car while driving a county vehicle, then left the scene without filing a report.

“This bill is about certain government entities seeking to remove their work from public accountability. That is not what the founders of this state intended.”

– Washington state Auditor Brian Sonntag, testifying against a measure that would allow school districts to bill his office for the cost of providing information requested by the auditors.

“I am mechanically challenged, and I’m not even sure I’d be able to operate a tape recorder.”

– Thurston County Commissioner Diane Oberquell, testifying in Olympia against proposed legislation that would require boards of county commissioners and other governing bodies in the state to make an audio recording of what they do in closed executive sessions.

“We had an older black man released instead of a younger white man. That’s pretty hard to miss.”

– Geiger Corrections Center Commander John McGrath, saying an employee, not the system, was to blame for the release of the wrong inmate last month from the facility on the West Plains.

“We could decide that we don’t want to do this anymore, but the movie’s going to keep going on, and if you thought the first reel was bad, just wait for the next four.”

– U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker, during a visit home to Spokane County, describing what he considers the long-term justification for America’s current role in Iraq.

“Any biofuel that uses productive land is going to create more greenhouse gas emissions than it saves.”

– Researcher Timothy Searchinger of Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, commenting on studies that show that carbon released through cultivation and fuel production more than offsets the benefits of crops grown for biofuels.