It has been the honor of my life to serve you these passed eight years as your state representative. However, as a person who believes in term limits, and our Founding Father’s vision of a citizen-legislator who serves for a short time and then returns to his former life, I will not be seeking another term of office.
An Atlanta resident, recently returning from travels to South Africa, has become the first Georgian officially diagnosed with the Omicron variant of COVID-19, following recent similar diagnoses in several other states across the country, most with recent travel to South Africa.
No doubt you’ve noticed that some newspaper columnists occasionally do a “From the Mailbag” column, serving up readers’ comments, questions, and corrections. I am one of those columnists.
As has been the case with so many other school shootings over several years, last week's murder spree at Oakland High School in suburban Detroit might have been avoided if actions had been taken in the face of several obvious warning signs.
Good news can easily get lost.
That was true even during the heyday of serious professional journalism, back in the 20th century. Today’s media are flooded with nonstop electronic nonsense and noise.
This story will tell you a lot about me. It will tell you what friends and family already know about me.
I wish I had a change of heart, but I still can’t support it.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday heard oral arguments for and against a Mississippi law that would ban abortions after 15 weeks. The arguments -- pro and con -- are familiar, but there is a greater argument to be made for upholding the law and, should a majority of justices decide to do so, overturn Roe v. Wade.
The views and opinions depicted here are those of the artists and do not necessarily reflect the views of this publication.
If you would like to see Georgia's GOP days as the dominant or majority party come to an end, you should cheer Perdue's entry into this contest. The party and its grassroots activists would become only further divided, internally adversarial and no matter who the nominee is, the GOP standard-bearer would have depleted funds and a reputation covered with political bruises.
The death of composer Stephen Sondheim at 91 is more than the end of an era. It is the end of a chain of great Broadway musicals dating back to the 1920s when Jerome Kern's "Showboat" first dazzled theater audiences.
The other day, I ran into someone who was too discouraged to give thanks for much of anything. He’s convinced the world is going to end and the USA — led by what the politicians running California are doing to ruin this once great state — is going to hell in a handbasket.
When my sons were teenagers, my wife worked an early morning shift for a period of time, so I was responsible for getting them ready for school. This included breakfast duty, so I prepared a nutritious daily feast of Graham crackers, covered with peanut butter and chocolate chips. (That’s me, Mr. Health Food.)
Every person in America ought to spend one day getting up hay. Just one day.
While a disbelieving nation is focused on the endless border crisis, more immigration sleight of hand is ongoing in Washington. Cloaked in Congress-speak, the troubling details of the Build Back Better Act are being hidden from a bad-news weary public.
One of my frequent topics is customer service. I am old enough to remember when that term was mandatory, not optional.
Before the right to keep and bear arms is stated in the Second Amendment, the Founders wrote why they believed it necessary for people to arm themselves as part of a "militia." They said it is a "necessity to the security of a free state." The Founders knew that liberty is not the natural state of humanity and must be defended against government authorities and lawbreakers who try to limit or abolish it.
I have never purposefully littered. I pick up trash frequently along sidewalks, roads and trails. We’ve switched out all light bulbs at homes for LEDs, conserve water and energy whenever practically possible, and generally try to live a life of reducing, reusing and recycling.
Remember those "shovel-ready jobs" promised by the Obama-Biden administration in 2011? When many failed to appear after passage of this spending boondoggle, President Obama joked, "Shovel-ready was not as shovel-ready as we expected."
Thanksgiving last year. It stills feels like a piece of dry turkey stuck somewhere near my heart.
After two weeks of negotiations, leaders from around the globe gathered in Glasgow for the United Nations Conference on Climate Change announced an agreement. Critics immediately pounced, complaining the accord amounts to diplomatic good intentions, not guaranteed action.
Because life is mostly made up of little experiences, occasionally interrupted by big events, it’s easy to take the little things for granted.
The views and opinions depicted here are those of the artists and do not necessarily reflect the views of this publication.
It was the Fourth of July in 1974 when I first met Max Cleland, then a state senator, running for Georgia's lieutenant governor.
Slick Willie Sutton, the 1930’s bandit who favored elaborate disguises, was once asked why he robbed banks. He famously replied, “Because that’s where the money is.”
"Lawlessness is lawlessness. Anarchy is anarchy is anarchy. Neither race nor color nor frustration is an excuse for either lawlessness or anarchy." - Thurgood Marshall
It is a small country church in which we assemble most Sundays for worship.
Americans have been in a bad mood for the past few years, and as my Papaw Carroll would say about his aches and pains, “It ain’t gettin’ any better.”Americans have been in a bad mood for the past few years, and as my Papaw Carroll would say about his aches and pains, “It ain’t gettin’ any better.”
When past presidents have seen their approval numbers take a dive, they went on foreign trips. Sometimes this works, but more often it doesn't, because failure at home often follows them abroad. World leaders can sense failure and its twin, weakness.
Our mom, then Betty Lynn Ready, was just a little girl, going to school every day with thousands of other kids in Birmingham, Ala. From 1949-1952, a polio epidemic was sweeping the globe. The virus tended to selectively target population centers, often leaving stricken children in wheelchairs, with permanent leg braces and deformed limbs. During the late '40s, the disease caused paralysis in 1 of every 1,000 children aged 5-9.
As a state legislator, I try to refrain from speaking about national issues that do not have a direct impact on Georgia and hope to remain as nonpartisan as I can. However, I feel I must comment on Virginia’s recent election.
Perhaps you remember a line from Waylon Jennings’ career-making hit, “Luckenbach, Texas,” that tips the cowboy hat to “Hank Williams pain songs and Newbury train songs.”
The current gridlock in Congress is frustrating for Democrats who support the extremely expansive domestic spending legislation of President Joe Biden. Note: not all Democrats do back this latest big spending blowout.
November has arrived and things are going to really get hairy now.
My how quickly things can change with the right message and the right messenger.
The views and opinions depicted here are those of the artists and do not necessarily reflect the views of this publication.
About now I can think of in excess of 2 trillion reasons to thank God for West Virginia U.S. Senator Joe Manchin (D-WV). And I also have quite a high five and a few "amens" handy for Arizona U.S. Senator Kyrsten Sinema (D-AZ), this moderate pair of Senate Democrats withholding their votes of approval will likely result in a proposed $3.5 trillion human and green energy infrastructure spending plan coming only in at a still too high $1.5-1.75 trillion.
This is a column I should have written a long time ago, but with the Atlanta Braves in the World Series, now is the perfect time. It’s sort of a confessional, I guess.
The annual "trick-or-treat" ritual is over. Not so the "tricks" perpetuated by congressional Democrats about their tax-and-spend ritual, and their phony numbers.
Halloween was fun while it lasted.
For decades it has been the one day of the year we could all forget our worries and live in the moment.
Quite a while back – this means "many years" to a Southerner – I was on a book tour that included stops in one of my favorite states: Louisiana.
October is the scary month, and not just because of Halloween.
It's open enrollment season for Medicare. Local TV stations and cable networks are flooded with ads for various insurance supplements. They promise "free" dental care, free transportation to doctors, free drugs, free dentures, and lots of other free stuff.
The views and opinions depicted here are those of the artists and do not necessarily reflect the views of this publication.
As I occasionally fret about the larger and seemingly more intractable challenges facing our nation, I am often heartened by the hard work, progress and ingenuity I witness demonstrated by community nonprofits.
I witnessed a rare sight while enjoying my fast food lunch. The manager was at the next table interviewing a job applicant. They were chatting before I started, and the conversation continued after I left. I got the impression the manager didn’t want to let the person go.
Of all the things that have faded away and become no more than faint memories, the ones I miss the most are church bells.
Courageous journalists Maria Ressa of the Philippines and Dmitry Muratov of Russia have just received the Nobel Peace Prize. Each of these remarkable leaders personifies great courage and reflects a nation experiencing challenge to internal repression.
Vice President Kamala Harris, who appears to be in the witness protection program when it comes to her assigned role of restoring our southern border, has re-surfaced in a video she sent to 300 Black churches in Virginia.
Despite the many blessings of living in America, why aren’t more Americans happy?
This is not a scientific poll — results reflect only the opinions of those voting.
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