I have no inside sources in the White House.
I do not have access to military intelligence. Or any expert knowledge of the Middle East.
But I’ve spent my adult life watching American presidents try to bomb the region into peace. It never works.
Which leaves me wondering how Alabama’s senators, who on paper have better sources than us Goat Hill wretches, think that President Donald Trump’s decision to attack Iranian nuclear facilities solved anything.
Our leaders call Alabama’s effective voucher program the CHOOSE Act. There’s some grim irony in that.
Of course, you can choose to pay for private school tuition, whatever your reasons may be.
But it’s not my choice. Or what the families of 730,000 Alabama students want. We pay taxes to support the teachers educating our children in public schools. And we want teachers and staff to have the resources they need to help students thrive.
Yet our leaders plan to divert that money from classrooms into the pockets of wealthy families, in the form of $7,000 tax breaks. More if they have more than one kid enrolled in a private school.
By middle school, we’re all taught that the word “democracy” combines “demos,” the Greek word for people, with “kratos,” meaning rule.
Rule of the people.
That doesn’t describe the government we live under.
Alabamians say they want Medicaid expansion. They don’t seem keen on the state’s effective abortion ban. If you let Alabama voters decide whether the state should have a lottery, odds are that it would pass, and it wouldn’t be close.
Pity the poor state lawmaker.
They work hard on a law to punish Alabamians showing kindness to the vulnerable — normal, everyday stuff in the Alabama Legislature — and inadvertently revive the Fugitive Slave Act.
Wednesdays, am I right?
Republican Sen. Wes Kitchens of Arab said he didn’t intend SB 53 to reflect the language of that infamous antebellum law, which authorized kidnapping and threatened fines and imprisonment to those who helped enslaved people flee to freedom.
Imagine if Alabama politicians started treating geothermal energy as a crisis.
And not just criticizing particular practices or businesses. We’re talking about a heat pump apocalypse.
Introducing legislation to criminalize steam. Storming library board meetings and demanding the removal of any book with the phrase “hot springs.” Using Hot Springs, Arkansas as a snickering shorthand for everything wrong with the country. Putting on flak jackets and filming television ads outside Iceland’s geysers, vowing that Alabama will not become Reykjavík.
For the past several decades, Alabama’s power has been centered around the U.S. Senate – primarily because of Richard Shelby’s immense power and influence. During Senator Shelby’s 36-year tenure, he chaired the Intelligence, Banking, and Rules Committees. However, he became immensely powerful his last six years as chairman of the Appropriations Committee.
Shelby practically moved Washington to Alabama when it came to bringing home earmarked funds to the Heart of Dixie. We received more federal funding than any state in America. National publications labeled Shelby the Greatest Pork King in federal history, surpassing the late Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia. Less we forget, Shelby also had a very respected and tenured wingman in Sen. Jeff Sessions, who served with distinction for 20 years in the U.S. Senate. They were a great team.
The marquee race in this big 2022 election year is for our open U.S. Senate seat. It is beginning to percolate.
The race has been raging for over a year already and we are getting poised to begin the final press to the finish line. The Republican Primary is three months away on May 24 with a monumental runoff on June 21. The winner on that day will be Richard Shelby’s successor.
When Sen. Richard Shelby announced he would not run for reelection to a sixth six-year term in 2022, speculation immediately began as to who would run for our iconic senior senator’s seat. Numerous names were floated as to who might line up for the coveted seat. It is expected to be a fairly large field.
