These Times

I talked to Santa Claus on the telephone Sunday morning. After spending 40 minutes with Santa, I was left with a feeling of joy and optimism, which is always nice.

You know what else is nice? Interviewing someone who gives you more usable quotes than you can use. It makes this job so much easier.

Bob Partlow is a former newspaperman I worked with at The Olympian. He was the political reporter for the paper, stationed on the Capitol Campus, and I often copy-edited his stories. He quit the paper after an unmerry run-in with an editor — which was not rare for him — and then he took a job with the...