An Editorial

Mitt Romney's ill-considered remark about the destitute, "I'm not concerned about the very poor," and his subsequent awkward explanation of it represented something more noteworthy than a rich man's gaffe. The question raised by the episode is not simply whether the candidate can articulate his views more clearly but whether the dire economic circumstances of tens of millions of Americans are truly understood, or can even be acknowledged, by the GOP.

Since the Jan. 13 sinking of the Costa Concordia, disturbing questions have arisen that demand a closer look into this incident and the rules governing passenger safety on the high seas. Whether the rules themselves are at fault, or whether they were disregarded by a careless ship captain, much more needs to be known to allay the public's concerns.

The cruise industry enjoys an enviable safety record. Yet something went badly awry in the sinking of the Concordia.

Ogden School District Superintendent Brad Smith wants a 90 percent graduation rate from Ogden, Ben Lomond and George Washington high schools in the year 2013. It's an admirable goal that won't be easy to accomplish. Last year the combined graduation rate was 63 percent. To have a chance to achieve the high levels requires a combination of tough requirements and motivation from educators, students, parents and the community.

Motivation can't be defined by a graduate degree, a class size, budgets, or a curriculum. Those are components of what's needed to make successful schools. But to see real progress in our local schools, the student needs to love school, needs to want to learn and take real pride and achievement in learning and personal progress. Parents, educators and the community can provide a foundation of support that motivates these students through public education and a high school graduation.

The most important part in the chain are the parents, or guardians. The success of a student -- positive or negative -- will be affected by the home life of the student. Even the best teacher will be hampered in teaching a child who arrives with no motivation. Communities can help as well. There are countless opportunities to promote public education and show support for what students learn.

Under pressure to release his income tax returns, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney decided instead to disclose what percentage of his income he forks over to Washington. It turns out that Romney pays about 15 percent -- less than the share paid by many teachers, sales managers and others who earned far less than he did.

The reason? His income "overwhelmingly" came from past investments, which are taxed at a lower rate than salary and wages. Romney's ability to pay a lower percentage than many taxpayers who aren't wealthy will only feed the concerns about widening income inequality in the United States. But this isn't a case of the rich playing by a different set of rules than everyone else. It's a case of the rules benefiting them far more than most.

Before he entered politics, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney made a fortune at Bain Capital, the private-equity firm he ran from 1984 to 1999.

Romney could have expected that Democrats would give him a hard time about his role buying, building, selling and sometimes closing businesses, which created -- and eliminated -- a lot of jobs. But he's getting ripped by his Republican opponents, too.

What was the biggest political lie of 2011? Lots of competition there.

But recently Politifact, the St. Petersburg Times' fact-checking website, declared its winner: the claim by congressional Democrats that House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan's budget plan would "end Medicare."

Achieving genetic re-assortment of a flu virus is not exactly bathtub biochemistry.

Still, it's understandable that a national biosecurity advisory board wants to suppress key details from being released by scientific teams about how they created new highly transmissible and deadly strains of avian influenza.