Sorted by date Results 276 - 300 of 730
Everybody likes the services provided by tax dollars but nobody really likes paying taxes. We especially don't like it when our elected officials begin raising taxes for fees to provide those services. At Monday night's Flomaton Town Council meeting an ordinance was proposed to add an additional $5 to everybody's garbage bill to help pay for not only the curbside trash pickup, but the dumpster that is located behind town hall. Mayor Dewey Bondurant Jr., pointed out Monday night that the town had been running its trash truck for about five...
Many Americans are probably unfamiliar with a “caste system.” Some may recall from long forgotten Social Studies courses that south Asian societies particularly Hindus subscribed to and some still do to a caste system. A caste system is the vertical stratification of society where mobility between castes is virtually impossible. It can get quite complicated, but in essence it’s a rigid occupational hereditary society. Whatever your parents’ occupation is, you are mandated to follow. Good for the Brahmins at the top, but pretty miserab...
The border agents, military and law enforcement personnel at our southern border are doing their best in difficult circumstances to combat both illegal immigration and attacks from Democrats and the national media. Today I’ll discuss the second half of my recent border visit. After inspecting several points of entry and other spots along the border, our delegation traveled to Fort Bliss outside of El Paso to the Joint Task Force Crisis Response. Many of the active duty soldiers here are working to free up border patrol agents to patrol the b...
There are very few Alabamians left who remember the 1950’s story of Phenix City, Alabama. After World War II, a good many of the military soldiers, enlisted men, stayed on for a while. A host of them were stationed at Ft. Benning in Columbus, Georgia. As many of you know, Columbus, Georgia and Phenix City, Alabama are essentially the same city. They are only separated by a bridge and the Chattahoochee River. Phenix City figured that these soldiers needed some entertainment. Well, they got it in Phenix City. Our border city became the poor m...
In the wake of the mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, I could easily start quoting a lot of old sayings like 'guns don't kill people, people kill people' and 'if you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have guns' but we've heard them all before and they seem to rise to the top every time we have a mass shooting. After every mass shooting, as expected, the gun control nuts come out of the woodwork. Take away the guns and these mass shootings will stop. Make certain guns illegal and...
A few months ago we wrote a story about the new speed device purchased by the Flomaton Police Department that shows motorists what the speed limit is and how fast their vehicle was traveling. Police Chief Bryan Davis said the data collected showed the overwhelming majority of people were exceeding the speed limit. School bells will ring today in most schools across the area. That not only means that the 2019-20 school year has started, it means a lot of children will be out and about crossing roads, streets and highways. Police lower the speed...
From the outside looking in, I think it is time for the town of Century to at least begin receiving proposals from companies that might be interested in purchasing the town's natural gas system. I've read a lot of numbers tossed around about how the gas system is losing money so fast it can't count. I've heard reports where people are getting free gas because they don't get bills and hear reports about the town selling less natural gas than they are purchasing from their supplier. I now hear...
They say you learn something new everyday. We learned something new last week when we learned that a person over the age of 21 who is found guilty of certain sex crimes on a child under the age of 6 'shall' be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. We really thought that the only time you could be sentenced to life without was in a capital murder case when the only two options a judge and jury have are death or life without. Last week an Escambia County (Ala.) jury convicted Christopher Lance Burtram, 34, of sodomizing...
Editor's note: The following editorial was published in the July 27-28 weekend edition of the Oxford Eagle in Oxford, Miss. It was written by Managing Editor Anna Gibbs Guizerix, a Jay native and a 2013 graduate of Jay High School. Guizerix can be reached at [email protected] In the last week, Oxford has seemingly been turned on its head as national news outlets converged on our small town to cover the events surrounding the murder of rising Ole Miss senior Alexandria ‘Ally’ Kostial. In today’s world of instant news, it’s easy to...
Governor Kay Ivey’s first legislative session of the quadrennium was very successful. Her prowess at getting things accomplished with this Legislature has been remarkable. She knows what she is doing. It should not be surprising given her background and experience. Kay Ivey has been around state government for most of her adult life. She has dealt with the Legislature for over four decades. Her adroitness in the passage of the Infrastructure package was similar to the legislative success enjoyed by Governor George Wallace in his prime years. L...
After more than two and half years of Russian collusion frenzy, Democrat fervor for this ridiculous hoax is unlikely to fade. But if you understand Democrats, their insane perseverance is predictable. This whole fiasco was never about Russian interference in our elections or Russian collusion to steal the 2016 election. It always was and still is to disrupt, paralyze, and if possible topple the presidency of Donald Trump. Democrats, “never Trump“ Republicans, and power mad federal bureaucrats still reject Trump and resent his effective effor...
The detrimental effects of the humanitarian and national security crisis on our border extend all the way to Alabama communities. That’s why I’ve made it a priority to address our immigration policies. One of the most obvious ways our insecure border harms our communities is the drug trade. Our porous border is perhaps the most significant contributing factor to the ongoing opioid crisis—the worst drug epidemic in modern American history. In 2017, over 47,000 lives were claimed by opioids. That’s more than those from car accidents and firearm...
The long hot summer has brought some crystallization to the 2020 U.S. Senate race. This seat is the Senate Seat held by Senator Jeff Sessions for almost two decades. He unwittingly made a strange and probably very regrettable decision to join President Donald J. Trump’s administration as attorney general. Very few U. S. Senators with 20 years seniority would leave their permanent seats in the illustrious, powerful and elite United States Senate for a temporary four year at best tenure in a tumultuous and transient cabinet post. Trump is tempest...
Dubbed “the squad,” four freshmen Democrat Congresswomen have seized the national spotlight and made quite a splash in Congress. Their elections are remarkable firsts. Representatives Ilhan Omar (MN) and Rashida Tlaib (MI) are the first Muslim women to be elected to Congress. Representative Ayanna Pressley (MA) is the first black woman elected to Congress from Massachusetts. And young upstart, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY) won an incredible upset to become the youngest member currently serving in Congress. While these achievement...
When I read the story about a drug-sniffing K-9 who died following a contraband search at the Staton Correctional Facility on July 18 I scratched my head, felt sorry for the dog and really felt sorry for the dog's handler who I later learned was Sgt. Quinton Jones. But what really stood out to me is the fact that the dog died from complications when he inhaled synthetic marijuana, better known as spice. I read a lot of arrest reports in my job and right now the top three or four are meth, spice,...
We didn't know Garrett Ryan Salter; that's probably a shame. We've probably covered him in football and baseball games, but we didn't know him as a person. After the T.R. Miller High School graduate died in a single-vehicle crash last Wednesday just outside of Brewton we reached out to people who knew him. There was a single theme: He had a big heart and a big smile and people liked to be around him. When we talked with David Jennings who coached him and coached against him in youth baseball Jennings said that while Salter's athletic ability...
Protecting the safety of the American people is our must fundamental duty in Congress. In a city where few things receive bipartisan support, providing for the national defense has remained an area of compromise. For 58 straight years, the House of Representatives has passed a bipartisan National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA). Last month, the Senate did its job. By a vote of 86 to 8, it passed a bipartisan defense authorization bill. In the House, things were to play out differently. If you’ve followed anything going on in Washington the p...
In our hyper politicized society, there seems to be no respite from partisan politics anymore; it has invaded every faucet of daily life from the car you drive to the coffee you drink. The news is bluntly liberal and sometimes conservative. Education has been subsumed by political correctness. It’s difficult to just enjoy music because at any concert you will very likely endure a vitriolic political rant. Sports seemed to be the last sanctuary, but now even athletic competition is succumbing to pointed partisanship. Politics has always been s...
The 2020 Presidential Election year has already begun. It usually begins on Labor Day of the year prior to the Election. However, in recent decades the parade has started early. They really are four-year caravans. They begin the day after the President is sworn in. Indeed, President Trump never shut down his campaign organization, He essentially has never stopped campaigning. He loves to campaign. He loves to entertain. That is really what he was before he was President and that is what he has been as President, an entertainer. He treats the...
Much like Flomaton's decision to have a firm come in and help the town develop a Form Base Code in hopes of creating economic opportunities for the town, the town of Century took a positive step Monday night by hiring former Gulf Breeze Manager Edwin 'Buzz' Eddy to come in and help the town not only evaluate but to turn around their utility departments which have been struggling to reach black ink for years. There's that old saying about not seeing the forest because of the trees and sometimes it takes a different set of eyes to focus on what...
It was 50 years ago that Neil Armstrong said those famous words, “One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” when he became the first human to set foot on the surface of the moon. I remember being packed into the gym at Camp Laney in Mentone, Ala., to watch that historic moment. While not the same magnitude, I think the Flomaton Town Council took one small step Monday night when it voted unanimously to move forward with establishing a Form Base Code for the town limits. It's my hop...
For Americans from coast to coast, Independence Day is a celebration of our nation’s birthday with friends and family. The day also offers an opportunity for reflection. In Washington, President Trump held a “Salute to America” celebration on the National Mall in honor of our troops. The patriotic spectacle, featuring military bands, aircraft flyovers and fireworks, was highlighted by a speech in which President Trump praised our “truly extraordinary heritage” and recounted our unique American story. “It is the epic tale of a great nation whos...
Folks, don’t look now, but the 2020 Presidential Election is upon us. Indeed, as many as 21 Democratic aspirants are already announced and campaigning. They are quite a liberal group as you might expect. Leading the pack of Democrats trying to take Donald Trump out of the White House is an avowed, true socialist, Bernie Sanders. Behind ole Bernie are a host of ultra-liberal U.S. Senators who are socialists wannabes. They hail from either the left coasts of California or New England. Included in the pack of CNN/MSNBC/Stephen Colbert watchers a...
Determining citizenship in a census of the United States of America would seem intuitively appropriate and logical. Most Americans probably assume the census is supposed to count all citizens to determine representation in Congress. In part the answer is yes, but there is more to it than just that. Last included in the 1950 census, the Trump Administration is trying to include the citizenship question again which has precipitated several lawsuits alleging the citizenship question is intended to suppress the count of non-citizens and thereby...
You can tell politics are heating up for the 2020 elections with new cries for paying black Americans reparations for the many years some of their ancestors were enslaved in the United States. It seems we don't hear much about this issue until elections are on the horizon. I've seen some staggering figures into the trillions of dollars should such reparations come to fruition. But the bottom line is who should pay for those reparations. U.S. Sen. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has come under...
