“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.
Criminal justice reform advocates discussed the impact of fines and fees on marginalized Alabamians, as well as possible solutions, at a panel discussion last month.
Alabama lawmakers in recent years have enacted dozens of fines and fees, many through local bills, that increase the cost of going through the criminal justice system or in getting a license plate for a motor vehicle. While some fees go to victim restitution, others are levied to pay for basic operations of the court system. Most fall disproportionately on those least able to pay.
In the 1964 Winter Olympics in Innsbruck, Austria, six-time medalist Eugenio Monti from Italy was favored to win the gold medal in the bobsledding pair event. After his team’s last run, it looked like they were going to make it.
The British team, led by Tony Nash Jr., still had a chance, but before their final run, Nash discovered a critical axle bolt had broken on their sled. They were done.
While I believe that good things tend to happen to people who consistently choose the high road, the correlation between ethics and success is a loose one at best. Thus, it’s pretty hard to sincerely promote ethics by appeals to self-interest.
More than 80% of people who make New Year’s resolutions have already given up on their goals by February.
While there’s a lot of resolution advice on the internet, much of it fails to highlight the crux of behavioral change.
To make individual decisions – whether it’s what to wear or which gift to buy for someone – you draw on brain systems involving executive control. You make the decision, add a shot of willpower and, voilà, it’s done.
I hope the past year will go down in your book of life as one filled with great pleasures and grand memories. But whether the year was good, bad, or indifferent, I hope you’ll enter the new year wiser and stronger for your experiences and optimistic that the best is yet to come.
A vital quality of a happy and successful personal and professional life is continual growth spurred by a commitment to learn through study and experience. This requires the humility to accept that however good you are, you can get better.
Author’s note: Perhaps I’ve become rusty in the realm of interviewing subjects, but this was just plain traumatic all around. Nonetheless, here’s my interview with the upstart drag queen (female impersonator) Miss Fallopiana Fontaine Fabrege.
JP: So how are you doing, Miss Fabrege?
FF: I’m good… all good. Thank you very much.
It’s a familiar start-of-the-year scene. You’ve committed to a healthier lifestyle and are determined that this time is going to be different. Your refrigerator is stocked with fruits and veggies, you’ve tossed out processed foods, and your workout routine is written in pen in your daily planner.
Yet, as you head out one morning, the tantalizing aroma of fresh doughnuts wafts through the air. How can you resist the call of this sugary treat and stick with your healthy choices?
