We had just stepped into the makeup store when people began running. You could see them through the entrance, in groups of five and six, passing by every second, racing from the mall walkways into a nearby Nordstrom.
I couldn’t tell what was happening. Was the mall closing? Was there some flash sale taking place?
Then the metal gate crashed over the Nordstrom entrance. Then the employees in our store ordered everyone to stay put as they pulled gates across the front of the entrance.
Donald Trump’s anti-immigrant rhetoric has been a staple of his political career, but his attacks on undocumented migrants turned more ominous during his 2024 presidential campaign.
Beyond disparaging Haitians living in Springfield, Ohio, Trump in September compared undocumented immigration with a “military invasion.” And on a radio program in early October, Trump said immigrant criminals have “bad genes.”
Many Americans want a more secure U.S.-Mexico border specifically and stricter immigration policy in general.
The 1986 Alabama governor’s race will be remembered as one of Alabama’s most amazing political stories. In 1978, Fob James sent the Three B’s, Albert Brewer, Jere Beasley, and Bill Baxley packing. Brewer and Beasley had been permanently exiled to Buck’s Pocket, the mythical destination for defeated Alabama gubernatorial candidates. However, Bill Baxley resurrected his political career by bouncing back to be elected lieutenant governor in 1982, while George Wallace was winning his fifth and final term as governor. Another player arrived on the state political scene. Charlie Graddick was elected as a fiery, tough, lock ‘em up and throw away the key attorney general. Graddick had previously been a tough prosecuting district attorney in Mobile.
“I am a farmer, an engineer, a businessman, a planner, a scientist, a governor, and a Christian,” Jimmy Carter said while introducing himself to national political reporters when he announced his campaign to be the 39th president of the United States in December 1974.
As journalists and historians consider Carter’s legacy after his death at age 100, this prelude to Carter’s campaign offers insight into how he wanted to be known and how he might like to be remembered.
My book “Delay, Deny, Defend: Why Insurance Companies Don’t Pay Claims and What You Can Do About It” was thrust into the spotlight recently, after UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was shot and killed in what authorities say was a targeted attack outside the company’s annual investors conference. Investigators at the scene found bullet casings inscribed with the words “delay,” “deny” and “depose.”
The unsettling echo of the book’s title struck me and many others.
“I am definitely not following the news anymore,” one patient told me when I asked about her political news consumption in the weeks before the 2024 U.S. presidential election.
This conversation happened around the time I talked with a local TV channel about why we saw fewer political yard signs during this year’s election season, compared with past ones.
Imagine it’s Monday morning, too cold and too dark, but once that alarm goes off, you know you’ve got to rally. The kids have to get to school. You’ve got to get to work. And, of course, your ever-growing to-do list hangs over your head like a dark cloud, somehow both too threatening to ignore and too threatening to start its tasks.
On days like this, you may be grateful simply to make it through. But then it begins, all over again.
Take a look around. Business, education, politics. If there’s one thing we don’t have enough of, it’s good leaders —men and women who have the vision and the ability to change things for the better.
Former Air Force General William Cohen wrote a fine book called "The Stuff of Heroes" in which he identified eight laws of leadership. Here are his rules:
We have about 16 months before the 2026 state Republican primaries, the only elections that matter in Alabama. Big offices, including governor and attorney general, will be up for grabs.
That means a lot of GOP candidates, many with little to no name recognition, will fight for the attention of the 20% of the adult population of Alabama who vote in the primary.
I wish that would mean serious discussions of issues like criminal justice and health care. But we know what they’ll talk about.
Donald Trump has made clear his intent to supercharge his “America First” approach to foreign policy in his second term – and Mexico looks set to be at the tip of the spear.
While many of Trump’s predecessors have also followed a “realist” strategy – that is, one where relative power is at the forefront of international relations, while diplomatic success is viewed through how it benefits one’s own nation – the incoming president has displayed an apparent unwillingness to consider the pain that his plans would inflict on targeted countries or the responses this will engender.
