He also was threatening to quit the Senate, vowing to behave like "a wounded bull on the floor" and saying that "I will be taken out of here on a stretcher" if the Senate blocked money for Alaska's bridges-to-nowhere.

What happened? Stevens made one appearance against Cantwell, which fizzled. The senator brought embarrassment to GOP Senate candidate Mike McGavick, who had to return $12,000 raised at a Stevens-sponsored Anchorage fundraiser.

They will likely carry the 83-year-old Stevens from the Senate. "Uncle Ted" told Alaskans at year's end that he is running for another term in 2008.

A Seattle politician has lately borrowed a page from the book of Stevens. In his tunnel-building zeal, Mayor Greg Nickels recently declared that a new Alaskan Way Viaduct will be built "over my dead body."

Cantwell refused to be browbeaten. But, apparently swayed by Nickels' threat, Gov. Chris Gregoire punted the viaduct decision to Seattle voters.

They've been the big surprises of local government, bringing cool heads to tough, thankless jobs.

After a school closure process that saw threats and shows of racism and ant-Semitism -- and a School Board meeting with the flavor of an asylum taken over by inmates -- Chow was elected board president at year's end.

She has levies to pass, a superintendent search to oversee, and a credibility challenge with middle-class Seattle parents. And, it is hoped, she'll have new School Board members to work with after next fall's election.

Hara has been poring over budgets and asking critical questions at the Port of Seattle. With the lure of foreign junkets, and the threat of nasty rebukes from its boss, Mic Dinsmore, the port has a history of turning would-be watchdogs into lapdogs.

Apparently, Hara still has teeth for the job.

Not this year: Funneling money through front groups, the Building Industry Association of Washington staged a massive, nasty campaign against Chief Justice Gerry Alexander in the September primary election.

The black-and-white, ax-murderer-style TV spots were as personal as the state has ever seen -- and amazing to see against a respected judge with 30 years on the bench. Foot soldiers from the religious right distributed smear literature.

It didn't work. Gregoire put the arm on top Democratic donors to support a political action committee defending incumbent Supremes. Ex-Secretary of State Ralph Munro, a Republican moderate, recorded a furious radio spot denouncing BIAW tactics.

Alexander won going away. A fellow incumbent, Justice Susan Owens, won big in November over an opponent -- state Sen. Stephen Johnson -- backed by a suddenly subdued BIAW.

Clark has brought good cheer and wit to the job, in welcome contrast to the humorless, righteous self-importance of some ideological colleagues.

Clark had a very good year, in contrast to the disheveled council. She was virtually unopposed running for the last year in Compton's term, and starts 2007 as a strong bet for re-election.

The Augusta Hotshots usually work in the George Washington National Forest, but were called across the country to fight a 92,000-acre fire near Billings. Local ranchers were critical of how the fight was directed.

An obscenity-spouting Burns berated the Hotshots. He told them they had done a "piss-poor job" fighting the fire, accused them of not doing a "goddamned thing" and saying they "sat around" during the firefight.

It was a farewell performance for a senator who once referred to Arabs as "ragheads," used the "n-word" to describe Washington, D.C., residents, and warned of a "faceless enemy" of terrorists who "drive taxicabs in the daytime and kill at night."

Burns received late-campaign help from colleague Ted Stevens, but Burns lost his seat on Nov. 7. And he lost to a plain-spoken but civil-tongued farmer from Big Sandy named Jon Tester.