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We have tried our best to keep everyone informed on the developments of COVID-19. Granted, sometimes our figures may not match up with numbers you see posted on Facebook or other social media outlets. We made a decision at the beginning to base our reporting on figures we received from the Escambia County (Ala.) Health Care Authority. Jason Daniels, director of public affairs and marketing at D.W. McMillan Memorial Hospital, said from day one figures may be different depending on where someone gets tested. Tuesday's numbers showed Escambia Coun...
When the House returns to business next Monday, we will take up the National Defense Authorization Act I wrote about last week. Then we will take up appropriations bills for next fiscal year, which begins October 1, and likely another Coronavirus bill. This spring I voted for both of the CARES Acts, which together spent $3 trillion. That was on top of this year’s projected total federal spending of $4.8 trillion, which was already going to add $1 trillion to our national debt. With the CARES Act spending, however, the total deficit for this f...
The much-anticipated battle between former U.S. Senator and U.S. Attorney General, Jeff Sessions and former Auburn football coach, Tommy Tuberville to capture the GOP nomination for the U.S. Senate was the marquee event on Tuesday. Unfortunately, my column for this week had to go to press prior to the primary votes being counted. Polls indicated that Tuberville would win for one reason and one reason only, Donald Trump endorsed him. President Trump is extremely popular among Republican voters in Alabama. There is no doubt in anyone’s mind t...
Americans have been mired in racial turmoil for weeks now and it seems there is no end in sight. All sides are beyond upset, but also somewhat blinded by emotion and manipulated by politics. There are genuine issues at stake, but the looting and rioting have distracted from those issues and the real people affected. Sadly, the media has obfuscated the debate with highly biased sensationalism and politicians have failed to lead or unite the people. We are left with endless accusations, irrational solutions, and no one framing a cogent...
I have to admit that Alabama's 17.36 percent voter turnout and Escambia County's 18.03 percent turnout in Tuesday's runoff elections were higher than I anticipated, but it's still pitiful. To put those percentages in perspective, 82.64 percent of the registered voters in Alabama did not vote and 81.97 percent of the registered voters in Escambia County failed to cast a ballot. I hope that doesn't mean that the overwhelming majority of people in this state don't care about who represents us in...
We applaud the Escambia County (Ala.) Commission for passing a 'continuity of government' resolution that will allow the county government to continue to function in the event the board does not have a quorum to make decisions. Other local governments need take a look at that policy as well. Back in March, when the COVID-19 pandemic was spreading like wildfire and things changed not only daily, but hourly, decisions had to be made. The commission passed a state of emergency resolution to allow the chairman, vice chairman and administrator to...
Believe or not, coronavirus notwithstanding, we have three important GOP runoffs next Tuesday. You will go back to the polls to elect two Congressmen and a United States Senator. That is assuming that you go vote and are not afraid of germs. It will be interesting to see how the turnout is on July 14. Mostly older folks, like me, are the ones that vote in all elections and we have been told for four months not to congregate or get around other people. There could be some concern among older voters about getting out and going to the polls....
It is now clear and inescapable that America is under attack; not just physically in every major city, but existentially at every monument across the land. We are long past the initial outrage at the unjust killing of George Floyd and any pretense of racial grievance has been hijacked by the anarchist mobs looting and torching everything in their paths. It started with Confederate statues, but these moronic marauders are also targeting Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and even Frederick Douglas. If they could by their own words, the rioters...
Last week, the House Armed Services Committee, which I’m proud to be a member of, passed and sent to the full House the William M. (Mac) Thornberry National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021. This is the 60th year in a row that we have passed this act out of Committee, and since we passed it unanimously, we are optimistic it will pass the full House later this month. This year’s version is named after a longtime member of the Committee and former Chairman, Mac Thornberry of Texas. Mac led the charge to increase defense funding whe...
In the March 19, 2020, edition of the Tri-City Ledger as the COVID-19 pandemic began exploding I wrote in this space not to believe any dates you read in my newspaper, any other newspaper or see on the news about when things would be open or how long things would be closed. I looked back at that column this week and the only date that has stood firm is Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey's July 14 date for the runoffs in Alabama. We were supposed to head back to the polls on March 31. The governor pulled the...
Yes, the voting polls will be open Tuesday, July 14, from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. across Escambia County, Ala. We're not electing anybody to any office. What we are doing is having runoffs on the Republican and Democratic tickets to help pick a nominee to be on the November General Election ballot, which is where we actually elect people to office. On the Republican ticket you will choose between Jeff Sessions and Tommy Tuberville for the U.S. Senate and between Jerry Carl and Bill Hightower as the nominee for the U.S. House of Representatives....
Folks, we are less than two weeks away from our election contest for our U.S. Senate Seat. The runoff between former Senator Jeff Sessions and former Auburn football coach, Tommy Tuberville may be close and will be interesting. The two conservatives were in a virtual dead heat in the March 3rd GOP primary. Congressman Bradley Byrne, the Republican U.S. Representative from the 1st District, primarily Mobile and Baldwin counties, finished a strong third. The runoff was initially set for March 31. However, the coronavirus delayed the runoff until...
As our major cities smolder upon our 244th Independence Day, some of us may be wondering how many more years we will be able to celebrate our independence and freedom. America has conquered many challenges over the past couple centuries, but this generation now faces its greatest test. We have defeated many enemies all over the globe, but now we face an internal crisis as the anarchists and Marxists declare America fundamentally and inherently racist and therefore hopelessly irredeemable. And sadly our largely brainwashed youth are ripe to...
This weekend America will celebrate its 244th birthday. Unfortunately, we do so in a time of a pandemic, a struggling economy, and violent protests. But, it’s still our birthday and we should both commemorate and celebrate it. We usually do a good job in our celebration, although this year will be different since social distancing means we’ll be in smaller groups and public fireworks displays have been cancelled. I suspect most of us will find a way to gather with family and close friends to cook out and show the red, white, and blue. But, a c...
With everything going on in the world, between COVID-19, state lockdowns, murder by racism, political war-of-the-parties, rioters destroying small businesses that were already in trouble due to being shut down for long periods of time, I must admit, I’d had my fill of life on the ground. So, my solution? I took to the skies. The plan? To dive out of a plane- yes, a perfectly good one. Now this happened to coincide with the celebration of the boyfriend’s birthday, but the truth is, I just nee...
In the song labeled 'Henry the VIII' it repeats the line saying the second verse is same as the first. It's a song that can drive you crazy. But as we enter the Fourth of July weekend we want to remind people of something we put in this spot every time the Fourth of July come around. Fireworks are small bombs. Over the past several years we've have people seriously injured, some who have lost fingers due to fireworks. Fireworks are great; we all love them. But we must also realize that one-second loss of judgement can mean serious injury or...
Escambia County (Ala.) School Superintendent John Knott says we will start school on Friday, Aug. 7; we've got dates for the beginning of college football, high school football, major league baseball and basketball. Don't believe what they tell you. I'm not calling Knott a liar. Knott is and his school board are making the best decisions they can with the information they have in front of them. I had already written a story Wednesday morning about some changes Flomaton had made concerning the...
America has been roiled by rioting for weeks, but what started as protests to voice outrage at the callous unjust killing of George Floyd by the Minneapolis Police was quickly hijacked by domestic terrorists, namely ANTIFA. ANTIFA is an extremist Marxist group intent on fomenting civil war to destroy the United States of America. Since Marxism is still rejected by most Americans, ANTIFA has chosen racism as their wedge issue to divide Americans and sow discord. They side with Black Lives Matters which is also a Marxist group based on some...
As we end the first half of 2020, there is no doubt that the coronavirus is the story of the year. The coronavirus saga of 2020 and its devastation of the nation’s and state’s economic well-being may be the story of the decade. How has the coronavirus affected Alabama politics? The answer is negligibly, if at all. The Republican Primary runoff to hold the Junior U.S. Senate seat was postponed by the virus epidemic. It is set for July 14, which is right around the corner. The race between Tommy Tuberville and Jeff Sessions should be close and...
Our brilliant Founders built our democracy upon two different but complimentary pillars. The first and more obvious pillar is our constitutional system itself, what the writers of the Federalist Papers called the “new science of politics.” Our representative democracy would not be possible without our revolutionary constitution and the laws that uphold it, separation and enumeration of powers, and effective checks and balances. The second pillar is more difficult to define but just as essential – nationally shared values and a common morality....
Our 2020 public observance of Memorial Day in Escambia County Alabama was once again held on the courthouse grounds in front of the monuments bearing the names of the 175 Escambia County heroes who died during World War I, World War II, Korea, and Vietnam. Both the young and aging participants in this local observance anxiously await the placement of a monument to the Americans who lost their lives during the September 11, 2010 (911) attack, and our local heroes who have died during combat operations conducted in Iraq and Afghanistan related...
I want to congratulate, applaud and give a big thumbs up to the Brewton Area YMCA. I can't say the same about the Hardee's restaurant in Flomaton. On June 18 the YMCA learned that a member who had used the facilities had tested positive for COVID-19. They not only immediately contacted the Alabama Department of Health and shut the facility down, they also sent out an email to YMCA members telling them that a person who tested positive visited the Y on June 17 and used the gymnasium, the...
Just about every health official predicted it, and now their predictions are becoming true. COVID-19 cases are increasing at a rapid pace after our so-called opening. We've all been out and about, there is no real social distancing, people are acting like the virus never existed. Folks, this thing is far from over. Our gut feeling is it will get worse before it gets better. We get a report from the Escambia County (Ala.) Health Care Authority every Tuesday and every Friday. From last Friday to this Tuesday there were 35 new confirmed cases of...
America is ablaze literally and figuratively. In a prolonged temper tantrum, anarchists and assorted malcontents have rioted, looted, and burned cities across the country for weeks. Average Americans are aghast watching incessant senseless violence on the nightly news, infuriated when elected leaders blame the police writ large, and then stunned when pundits scold law abiding citizens as culpable for the carnage and turmoil. Despite all of these cities being run by Democrats for decades, leftists insists it’s Republicans’ fault, it’s conservati...
Does Racism exist? Yes. It does. There's no running from it. It's been here and has been here for centuries. Especially here in the south. To argue it, is stupid. To deny it, is ignorance. To ignore it, is intolerable. To tolerate it, is insufferable. And to suffer it, well, that's a form of denying it. See what happened there, folks, it's circle logic. We, as Americans, have been stuck in this circle of cruelty to one another for far too long. We didn't start it. No one alive today started this...
