Federal Judge Susan Webber Wright sided today with the Arkansas Society of Freethinkers. She directed Secretary of State Charlie Daniels to give the group the same consideration for installation of a winter solstice display that he gives to display of a Nativity scene on the Capitol grounds.
The crux of the [...]
The state Board of Education today approved an application for a charter school targeting black males. The Little Rock School District was finally permitted, after some board objections, to speak on the issue. Its attorney reminded the board of its obligations not to contribute to segregation in Pulaski County schools.
Approval of [...]
Recent news events in North Carolina prompt a reminder that the Arkansas Constitution says atheists may not hold public office or serve on juries.
A lawsuit has been threatened to remove a non-believer from the Asheville, N.C., City Countil on account of a similar provision in that state's Constitution. Federal law would [...]
Will Phillips, the West Fork fifth grader whose symbolic refusal to recite the Pledge of Allegiance became known worldwide after David Koon's story in the Arkansas Times, was honored over the weekend in Fayetteville by Mitchell Gold, a gay rights advocate, during a program at the library. This coverage [...]
From the beginning of the Maurice Clemmons clemency discussion, liberals have urged compassion for Mike Huckabee's role in freeing the man who's believed to have killed four law officers. But conservatives, too, have raised questions about a no-mercy prison system. Today it's the New York Times' Ross Douthat talking' [...]
Since it's a slow Sunday, I think I'll share a letter to the editor that commments on a letter by former state Rep. Robert Johnston and my column last week about the city of Little Rock's determination to send sales tax pennies of struggling city resdients and visitors to the Little Rock' [...]
I have some other things to do, plus, it seems dead out there. Except for Republicans trying to block budget bills in Congress.
You're up.
' [...]Mack McLarty, once chief of staff to President Clinton, joins a Washington Post roundtable on health legislation. He thinks something will pass.
I believe in bipartisanship (even though now it feels a bit like believing in the tooth fairy), because I believe that is how you reach most Americans. A bill [...]
Arkansas's cultish Republican legislators are in the news, amusingly, on The Arkansas Project. It seems they don't like their cult being referred to as a cult. So they are issuing news releases proclaiming, "We are not a cult." Thus reinforcing the message.
ADDENDUM: The Blue Arkansas blog piles on.
So let [...]
Is anybody on-line at 7 p.m. Friday? This is a test.
For one hour, you ask, I answer.
UPDATE: Yow. There are other people in the world without a life besides me. We'll do this again. I did the best I could. Our software is ailing and geting worse. I had to' [...]
By commenting on this open line?
Which reminds me: The Arkansas Lottery rolls out a new "draw" game Monday, Cash 3. Too complicated for me.
PS -- Got my Democrat-Gazette renewal when I got home. It will be $180 for a year of home delivery (plus web access, of course), versus [...]
A legislative committee voted today to expand its look at double-dipping by public employees -- drawing both retirement and regular pay.
In many cases, the practice was authorized by law. But at least seven elected county officials apparently didn't follow the required course of fully retiring before then retaking jobs' [...]
-- From conservapedia.com
A survey story looks at the nationwide push this year by the NRA to lift gun restrictions in cities and states. Pistols in pews haven't made it to Arkansas yet, for example, but the fight isn't over.
The subject happened to be on my mind [...]
The state Public Service Commission announced today that it will adopt an "overlay" plan to cope with the coming end of available telephone numbers in the 870 area code in Arkansas.
This means, rather than carving out a new area code, the 870 code will stay the same, but theree [...]
KATV's Amanda Manatt has been hired as the new communications officer for the House of Representatives. You may recall that Stephen Steed was fired from the job a few months back and a consultant, Craig Douglass, was brought in to devise a cutting-age communications strategy for the' [...]
Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar welcomed their 19th child today. She's Josie Brooklyn, according to a Twitter from Jon Woods. The baby was delivered more than three months early at UAMS by emergency C-section because of Mama Duggar's health complications.
Today's THV provides news release from TLC, the cable channel where a reality show' [...]
The Obama administration has announced cash pay caps for executives of company's that benefitted from government bailouts. There are some exceptions.
This ought to be generally popular, though some will bridle at government controls on pay. It's not far from caps on bailout beneficiaries to, say, pay limits on other [...]
The Arkansas Democratic Party announces that it has purchased air time to thank Sen. Blanche Lincoln for her superb work on health legislation. Details on jump.
This mirrors, in a fashion, outsider Republican complaints about Republican Party official support for select congressional candidates. But it may be worse.
There are many [...]
The Democrat-Gazette completed a six-part series today with the delayed lead of the story:
A second test of remains at the state Crime Lab showed Nov. 30 that they are those of Carmeletta Green, who'd been missing since her mother left her at their Little Rock home to work in 1982. The' [...]
The support staff union at the Pulaski County School District decided last night not to strike today. But I wonder if talk of the possibility earlier will depress attendance today. It's Friday, after all.
The support staff and teachers' unions lost their status as bargaining agents on a heated Board vote' [...]
This is a story with resonance in Arkansas, where a proud band of public officials have worked to provide education to children of illegal immigrants against the tide of anti-immigrant sentiment.
It's about growing activism among undocumented students with long lives and academic achievement in the U.S. They are becoming more [...]
A Florida ethics panel has opined that it creates the appearance of conflict of interest when a judge "friends" a lawyer on a Facebook account. It advises against it.
Hypersensitive? Silly? Should judges have Facebook accounts? Know any who do?
[...]Stephens Media's account of Stanley Reed's entry into the U.S. Senate race as a newly minted Republican doesn't include mention of his campaign manager, David Sanders, (former?) columnist for Stephens Media who wrote warmly of Reed's chances in a column yesterday.
UPDATE: I'm informed that earlier versions of the Reed' [...]
It's official. Former Farm Bureau president Stanley Reed of Marianna is in the race for the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate to oppose a woman he's supported with financial contributions, Sen.Blanche Lincoln.
Reed filed papers today with the Federal Election Commission to establish a campaign committee.
Former Stephens Media conservative columnist David [...]
I'm moseying on.
HOLD THAT TIGER: I have to add that a British court has issued an order blocking publication of nude photos or videos Tiger Woods. Not that Tiger's lawyers are admitting, mind you, that such photos might exist. Just a prophylactic legal action, so to speak.
[...]Sen. Blanche Lincoln told reporters today that as talks of a compromise on health care legislation move forward, the Senate is "steering more toward private insurance and less toward public insurance." Lincoln said that not all the details had been worked out and that senators were waiting on more information and guidance [...]
COMPETITION?: If this creche can be erected at the Capitol (one of the ugliest nativity scenes in the world according to the Freedom from Religion Foundation), why can't the Society of Freethinkers erect a winter solstice exhibit?
The ACLU, on behalf of the Arkansas Society of Freethinkers,' [...]
I haven't seen them yet, and I can't find a copy on YouTube yet, but a labor-funded political group has begun running TV ads in Arkansas blasting Republican U.S. Senate candidate Gilbert Baker. The suggestion apparently is that he's no fiscal conservative. It's a big buy: $134,000 in Little Rock and $83,000 [...]
I can't count the number of Republican news releases and front groups blasting Arkansas's two senators for whatever they do on health care, including their recent participation in potential compromise legislation. So that's one point of view.
Then you have the Doctors for America, a fairly progressive, group, praising the work' [...]
The Little Rock School Board will have a special meeting tonight to consider creating a new full-time position at Central High for the remainder of the year to hire a football coach to succeed Bernie Cox.
I'm trying to find out who the nominee -- or nominees -- might be. Interviews' [...]
Monthly polling shows all Republicans gaining on President Obama, with Mike Huckabee doing best, in a virtual dead heat -- 46 Obama, 45 Huckabee. Huckabee's numbers up with Dems, down a bit with Repubs. Democrats like soft-on-crime liberals, apparently.
UPDATE: To all those looking for a Christmas present for' [...]
Fox 16's David Goins posts some instant video via Twitter on the protest at the Pulaski School District administration building by teachers on a one-day strike over the School Board's decertification of the teachers' union as a bargaining agent. Several hundred are demonstrating, he says.
Goins is further reporting that' [...]
John Brummett examines the complaint from richly paid medical specialists that efforts at Medicare cost-cutting could affect patient care. No, he concludes, the changes will mostly affect specialist pay as Medicare pushes more attention to the primary care physicians where future expensive problems can sometimes be avoided.
I'm not going to' [...]
Monticello Live reports an acquittal in what's believed to be the first prosecution under a new state felony animal cruelty law.
It's gruesome. A man beat a Shetland pony to death with a baseball bat. The defense was that the man believed he'd been given instructions to kill the sick animal.' [...]
The Pulaski County Tea Party's idea of a good Christmas party is to bring the national grinch, Dick Armey, to town. They can gather at his knee while he tells of the unfortunates he wants to screw in the name of serving special interests.
Dec. 15, Embassy Suites. Bring lumps of' [...]
US News and World Report is again ranking U.S. high schools. The ranking is more involved this year, beginning with an evaluation of standardized test scores. To make the list, student performance on standardized tests must exceed expectation based on factors such as enrollment of disadvantaged students. Then the [...]
Wednesday night comments here.
There's always Tiger Woods, a massive stock implosion story, what with cancelled endorsement deals, disappearance of advertising, etc. doing to his billion-dollar brand much worse damage than the recession did to the market. But Playgirl also has nudies of him? A supposed girlfriend proclaiming, Nixon-like, she is not' [...]
The Senate's Bobbsey twins say there's no "deal" per se on health care, just some new ideas that might be acceptable depending how costs look.
Isn't it a proud moment that these two senators from the great states of Louisiana and Arkansas are in control of the health care' [...]
A special meeting of the Pulaski County School Board began at 2 p.m. today Employee pay was on the agenda.
Update from Fox 16's David Goins: The Board approved a 2 percent across the board pay increase for employees. That's the amount included in a proposed contract settlement with employee unions that [...]
Report confirms that Lt. Gov. Bill Halter met recently with liberal bloggers and political activists about a primary challenge to U.S. Sen. Blanche Lincoln.
The gathering was held at the D.C. home of blogger Jane Hamsher, whose group Accountability Now encourages primary challenges. Reached by phone, Hamsher confirmed the gathering, [...]
