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Allow me to share some observations from the year thus far. First of all, I have never seen anything like the coronavirus shutdown of the country. Hopefully, it is a once in a lifetime disaster. Governor Kay Ivey remains popular. Even though some people consider the defeat of Amendment One a personal rejection, it was not. Alabamians just like to vote to elect their political and, in this case, educational leaders. As you recall, Amendment One was asking Alabamians to give up their right to vote on the State Schoolboard and to allow the...
The grave uncertainty created by the Chinese corona virus pandemic can be very stressful. Worrying about you, your family, or vulnerable loved ones contracting this highly dangerous contagion can be daunting; and then there are the very valid concerns about the economic damage from the government forced shut down. All these thus far unknown variables threatening Americans, their families, and their livelihoods can wreak havoc on individual mental wellbeing, public morale, or simply society in general if you have no other certainty in life to...
Once the coronavirus became a pandemic and got its own name as COVID-19, there has been one constant theme – protect yourself and protect others. It started with social distancing and telling people to wash their hands. It's grown to multiple states of emergency and mandated stay-at-home orders. The snowball began to roll downhill after the NBA announced it was shutting down. The SEC basketball tournament held one night of games in Nashville and then announced the tournament would continue w...
With children at home, we took a trip back to yesteryear and reached out to the daughter of Philippa Hamilton. Back in the 1980s Miss Philippa, as her students called her, was teaching at Brewton Elementary School. Educating children was her passion and making learning fun was another passion. Ms. Hamilton understood that all children don't learn the same. She began developing games and puzzles for her second grade students that taught them multiple skills while having fun. It started out as a hobby to help her students and later turned into a...
In Genesis 2, God says “It is not good that the man should be alone.” He made us for Himself, but he also made us for one another. Separation is painful for us all. This fight against the coronavirus called COVID-19 is hard. We are forced to separate from one another. Our economy is sorely wounded. Worse, our neighbors are infected with this disease, some fighting for their lives, some tragically losing that fight. We are better, stronger than this disease. All of us have a role to play, to responsibly social distance from one another, to pra...
Our primary runoffs have been postponed until July 14, 2020. It was a wise and prudent decision by Secretary of State John Merrill and Gov. Kay Ivey. Most voters are older and you are asking them to come out and vote and at the same time stay home. The main event will be the GOP runoff for the U.S. Senate. The two combatants, Jeff Sessions and Tommy Tuberville, will now square off in the middle of a hot Alabama summer. The winner will be heavily favored to go to Washington. We are a very reliably Republican state especially in a presidential el...
Adversity brings out the best and worst in people. Fortunately, Americans exude much more goodness in trying times than random acts of greed and malice. For every toilet paper hoarder attempting to profit from these illogical shortages, there are thousands of Americans reaching out to help their shut in neighbors. For every political hack trying to extort some pork from this crisis, there are thousands of businesses retooling to meet our urgent needs. And for every muckraking pseudo journalist promulgating paranoia, there are thousands of...
To quote the great Yogi Berra, it is deja vu all over again this week as we navigate ourselves through the COVID-19 pandemic. Since we first started reporting on the virus several weeks ago, I've been consistent in telling people to not pay attention to time and date deadlines, because they change daily and sometimes hourly. Cities and states will tell us some things will resume at such-and-such date, but they really don't know. They don't know because those dates are based on the best informati...
COVID-19 may very well expose another big flaw in this country in addition to the health risk. It probably already has and it certainly will dispel the thought that most people have ready and available access to the Internet. Colleges, high schools, middle schools and elementary schools are closing their doors for the remainder of the school year. Many of those schools are asking students to complete their course work online. That sounds fine and dandy if everybody had access to not only a computer, but to the Internet. There is a big...
The GOP contest for who sits in our number two U.S. Senate seat has been delayed until July 14, 2020 due to the coronavirus. The winner of the battle between Jeff Sessions and Tommy Tuberville will more than likely be our junior US. Senator for six years. Neither are spring chickens. Sessions will be 74 and Tuberville will be 66, when the winner takes office. This is not the optimum age to be a freshman U.S. Senator because seniority equates to superiority in the U.S. Senate. Given their age of arrival neither will be given much deference or...
It’s been a crazy couple of weeks. Less than a month ago, the Wuhan virus was just a Chinese virus barely getting any attention as it was rapidly spreading around the globe. Within little more than a couple weeks, it has stunned the world and literally locked down countries, states, and cities. We are witnessing an historic invisible pernicious threat, but we are also each of us part of an historic response. Our governments are taking aggressive unprecedented measures to protect the public and the private sector is stepping up with American i...
As the COVID-19 coronavirus continues to change the way we live our daily lives, its important to take note of the ways this challenging time has brought our communities together. It has been reassuring to see stories of neighbors helping neighbors in communities in Southwest Alabama and beyond. As we continue to treat this unprecedented challenge with the seriousness it deserves, let’s not forget to help our neighbors as best we can. Whether dropping off supplies to senior citizens or supporting local businesses, we all can do something for o...
Years ago there was a song made famous by The Judds. It had a line that said “Grandpa, tell me ‘bout the good old days”. Now, the good old days the song was referring to were the days following World War II, when life was on the rebound after facing a true global adversary. They were the days of healing. Days of mending a broken world. Well, as a millennial, I dealt with my coming of age in the wake of 9-11, a recession, the Afghanistan war, countless school shootings, movie theater viole...
As we continue to deal with COVID-19, things haven't changed much since last week. Dates you see about school starting back and other public buildings being open are good starting points, but may change any day. Alabama has tentatively moved its March 31 runoffs to July 14. I use the word tentatively because that date could change as well. County commissions and city councils have set certain dates to reopen, but we're really not sure if those dates will hold true. I attended a special meeting...
You've had to have had your head in the sand if you haven't heard of people hoarding toilet paper in the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak. Stores are selling out as soon as a shipment comes in. It appears that the panic is someone will be quarantined for weeks or months without any toilet paper. We guess we can understand that to a degree, but what would be worse is to be quarantined for a month or so with no working toilet. Flomaton Utilities Superintendent Shaun Moye and Jay's Operations Manager Eric Seib are begging people not to flush anything...
I wanted to update you on the latest COVID-19 coronavirus developments. While the situation remains serious, the risk to most Americans remains low. It is important that we stay calm and do not panic unnecessarily. The federal government continues its aggressive response to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, secure access to testing for those who need it, and ensure those who have contracted the disease receive the treatment they need. Vice President Pence and his coronavirus response team have been outstanding and have held regular press c...
We have a great race for the U.S. Senate. When the votes from the first primary were counted Jeff Sessions and Tommy Tuberville were in a virtual tie at 32% and 33%, respectively. Mobile-Baldwin Congressman Bradley Byrne garnered 25% of the vote which is significant and Judge Roy Moore’s 7% is nothing to sneeze at. Tuberville and Sessions will be fighting to convince Byrne and Moore voters to come to their aid. However, the most important quotient of Sessions’ and Tuberville’s missions will be to get their voters back to the polls. Turn out i...
It’s absolutely amazing that just a little more than two months ago few people had ever heard of the corona virus, but in about the last two weeks, this virus from China is shutting down practically the entire world. People around the planet are stunned not by the speed the virus is spreading, but by the speed panic is spreading. Any pandemic of a contagious infectious disease should cause serious concern and sober measures to contain it, so people and nations want to be cautious and safeguard the public health. But how much caution is prudent...
The one thing I've learned, especially over the past week, is that what I learn today won't necessarily be true the next day or even the next hour or so. As everybody scrambles to make decisions about how to react to the coronavirus COVID-19 things change on an hourly basis. Friday afternoon I sat down with Escambia County (Ala.) Circuit Judge Dave Jordan to see what the court system was going to do. At the time they had a court session scheduled to start Monday morning with hundreds of people...
For a few months now, we have been watching the news and seen the horrors unfold in other far-away, distant countries caught in the grips of the smallest of invaders, a virus called COVID-19. We didn’t think it would affect us. We went about our daily lives attending sporting events, shopping, worshiping with our congregations, dining with our families in niche restaurants, booking flights for vacations, grabbing drinks with coworkers for evening social hours, and casually wrote life off as n...
As public officials and private businesses make decisions on how to deal with the coronavirus many employees will be allowed to work from home. Many businesses and public entities will have skeleton crews on hand to take care of daily business. But there is a group of people who can't work from home and can't avoid having contact with the pubic. That group includes police officers, firefighters and emergency medical technicians. These are the people we need to be praying for. They will be the ones exposing themselves at a higher risk. During...
Although the COVID-19 coronavirus is dominating the news, it’s important to know the facts about the virus and the ongoing work to prevent its spread. I’d also like to dispel some misinformation regarding your government’s actions to fight it. Despite what some fearmongers have said, the federal government has been preparing for a public health challenge such as this. In fact, according to the 2019 Global Health Security Index, the United States ranks number one in a “comprehensive assessment and benchmarking of health security and related...
Allow me to Share some thoughts and analysis on the March 3rd Primary results. The Primary is referred to as the Presidential Preference Primary. Voters choose which Party Primary they want to vote in and which presidential candidate they prefer to be their Party’s nominee. The turnout was amazingly high, despite rain and inclimate weather over the State. 1,168,000 Alabamians voted. 725,000 voted in the Republican Primary and 450,000 voted in the Democratic Primary. That equates to 62% Republican and 38% Democratic voters. It is my a...
The morning after Alabama’s bruising Super Tuesday GOP US Senate primary to select a challenger to current Democrat Senator Doug Jones, most Alabama voters woke up wondering how we wound up with a run off between former Attorney General Jeff Sessions and former Auburn football coach Tommy Tuberville. Tuberville received about 34% and Sessions received a very weak 31% for someone who had held that same seat for two decades. Congressman Bradley Byrne came in a strong third with about 26%; and Byrne was the second choice for the vast majority of v...
The words of John F. Kennedy 'Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country' seem to have been lost since he echoed those words in his inaugural address. Today, too many Americans want the government to solve all of their problems. At Monday night's Flomaton Town Council meeting, Sarah LeMesurier approached the board to say the youth group at Flomaton Pentecostal Holiness Church was ready to make a difference in the lives of people living in the Flomaton community. She talked about not only beautifying public pr...
