August 7, 2019 Page 5A
aP@orter
ON THE OUTSIDE LOOKING IN
by Don Daniel
T f Commissioner Larry Evans gets his way, County
Manager Jim Hedges is going to have to find another
,place to get his nicotine fix other than on couI ,ty
property. Evans made the attempt to get even with the
county manager. Commissioner Evans is or was attempting
to get his other fantastic four buddies to support an ordi-
nance prohibiting smoking on any county property.
Obviously the commissioner didn't really think his idea
out. If the ordinance passed, I guess there would be no
smoking on county roads, after all
they are county property. Guess it
would have to be enforced by the
sheriff's department. Wonder what
the fine would be.
Of course, the county manager or
any other smoker could take their
puffing pleasure across the street to
a Forsyth city sidewalk off county
property.
DURING MY rearing up days,
I never heard my parents or any "x.
member of my family use the "n"
word but they did use "negro" and
not in a disrespectful manner but
in today's society we are supposed to say ' frican Ameri-
cans". I do not agree with that terminology and I use the
term, American Africans.
The reason I even bring the subject up is the results of an
opinion on the Wall Street Journal's Opinion Page, asking
the question "What Would We Do Without the Word 'Rac-
ism'? I did not hear racism used until 1961 as a student at
the University of Georgia when UGA was ordered by a fed-
eral district court judge to immediately admit two blacks,
Hamilton Holmes and Charlayne Hunter to UGA ending
160 years of segregation.
There were several nights of student anti-desegregationist
"demonstrations", not riots, in downtown Athens for a
couple of nights. No troops were called in but tear gas was
used by the Georgia State Patrol and local police and sheriff
department to disburse the rowdy students. I was not onel
I was not opposed to Charlene and Hamilton attending
UGA. I had the attitude of'so what?"
Going back to the word racism, in the WSJ opinion piece
by Joseph Epstein, he wrote, "The term became pervasive
only after discrimination was banned and blacks made
significant progress" He further stated, "If you are politi-
cally on the left, racism is what you accuse people of who
don't agree with you. If you are on the right, you can accuse
them, I suppose, of socialism".
He continued, "I can think of no more devastating insult
than being called a racist. In a mere six letters the word
suggests one tyrannical, vicious, stupid cruel:' Amen Mr.
Epstein!
}-
THE CITY of Forsyth collected $41,995.20 in hotel/motel
tax for the month of May with $25,197.12 going into the
city coffers and $16,798.08 going to Forsyth Convention
and Visitors Bureau to promote and advertise stop, stay and
eat in Forsyth and advertise the hotels/motels that collected
the tax.
Here are the top five hotels/motels collecting the tax and
the amount: Holiday Inn Express, $8,374.12; Hampton Inn
$5,999.10; Laquinta Inn and Suites, $5,252.38; Days Inn, $4,
239.66 and Comfort Inn and Suites. $3,191.65. The least tax
collected came from Budget Inn, $147.00.
THE FIRST correct answer to last week's The Question
was from Jennifer Goode identifying Mike Burroughs as the
recently named Plant Scherer general manager. Jennifer re-
ceives a certificate for a dozen Dunkin donuts, Dairy Queen
Blizzard, single dip at Scoops, fried green tomato appetizer
at Whistle Stop Caf4, slice of Shoney's pie, slice of pizza at
Jonah's, dessert at The Sweet Tea Cafe, Forsyth Main Street
t-shirt, sandwich, chips and drink at The Pickled Okra.
Here goes The Question for this week: Monroe County
Schools ranked in what place in schools in Middle Georgia?
First correct answer after 12 noon Thursday gets the goodie
certificate.
FROM THE absurd to the ridiculous is the best analogy I
can make about longtime---41 years---school board mem-
ber J.P. Evans wanting to sue this newspaper and making
asinine comments such as "The paper never puts anything
good unless it's in the back". He must be reading some other
newspaper or he is reading from the back page to the front
page.
HERE ARE a few "outstanding" payments our tax money
went to: somebody at the Sheriff's Department---not
revealed---got a $1,040 check for per diem reimbursement
for travel, former animal control director Ty Oppelt got a
$2,281 check for travel reimbursement, Protecom main-
tained phones in the amount of $1565.50, local Red Dog
Safety Outfitters got a check for $2,675.10, the county fire
department spent $7,137.37 at Ten-8 Fire and Safety Equip-
ment (a local business), Accredited Security refurbished
tasers in the amount of $2,396, United American Life
Insurance got paid $9,347.40, and the biggie went to AT&T
for $26,231.23. Buice's Garage got $7,179.94, The City of
Forsyth got $5,418.42 for utilities, we paid $13,489.30 to
Correct Health for medical/dental hospital services. Here's
one more biggie, $5,037.14 to Forsyth Cablenet for watch-
ing TV. Office Depot got a check for $3,269.48.
Ninety six checks were issued totaling $216,318.51 of our
tax dollars.
YOU GOT a comment, suggestion or want to answer The
Question? Contact Donald Jackson Daniel at tullaybear@
bellsouth.net and listen to The Reporter On The Radio on
Majicl00 on Sunday mornings at seven or anytime by click-
ing on the radio tab at mymc.net.
Don Daniel is the founder and former publisher of The
Monroe County Reporter. Email him at mediadr@bellsouth.
net.
TO THE
To the Editor: tion of the new due date was posted and the applicable fees, also ques-
Tgot my county water bills (3) on Aug. 1. With all due respect, tion why so many are exempted
Aug. 2 for meter readings who goes to the county website to - one in, all in, or none - its only
ofJuly22 (11 days), to find the get nformaUon? Surely, if these $50 ayear with Secretary of State
JLnew due date is no longer the new rules were to be imposed in Monroe County: $175, then $125,
20th, now its the 10th. a more business-like or right at Christmas - if imposed, at
The online payment fees COlmnercial manner, we least consider staggering as they do
are unrealistic, so we de-
pend on checks and snail
marl. So we have just six
days (gotta send on 8th to
get there on time) to pay
our water bills and avoid
the now strictly enforced
"on-time"-or-get-a-pen-
airy-for-late payment (the B'flIN|
county used to accept post
mark of due date - no more, gotta
"absolutely, positively be there").
I submitted a complaint to the
county website. I am interested to
see where it goes! I saw the notifica-
would have been given a
month's notice in LARGE
PRINT on the bill to give
people time to make the
necessary arrangements.
It seems that since we
have the new County
Manager, the spending
and changes are com-
ing thick and fast it's
concerning. Must be due to his
domicile - too much time to think
up stuffwhile commuting!
I also have concerns as to the
proposed County Business License
for tag renewals.
Regarding the change in the due
date change for county water bills, I
have asked Will Davis to congratu-
late the water department on their
newfound efficiencies. It doesn't
seem all that long ago when I had
to complain that it was taking three
weeks for my check to go through
the bank.
I've shared this note county
commissioners George Emami and
John Ambrose. Over to you.
Laurence Byrne
Bolingbroke
JUST THE WAY IT IS by Sloan Oliver
,ll
Last month, NBC said that
President Trump was
e winner of the first
emocratic debate. Even
uber-leftist NBC knew that the
Democratic presidential candidates
were so wacky that no sane person
would ever vote for such lunacy.
Now after the second
debate, it's obvious that
Trump was again the
winner. The second
debate could be sum-
marized with the acro-
nym - SOS, Same Old
Stuff. Again, the Dems
reaffirmed their desire
to give free stuff to
everyone - free college
tuition, free monthly
income to everyone,
student loan forgive-
ness, free medical to all,
and open borders and
citizenship to all ille-
gals. However, the "free stuff" isn't
really free because YOU pay for it.
When Dems say that something
is free they really mean - they will
raise taxes On taxpayers in order to
give free stuff to anyone who prom-
ises to vote for them. Anywhere
else it's called bribery but politicians
write the laws so they make it legal
to buy votes with your money.
AS IN the first debate, the only
sane Democrats appear to be Tim
Ryan and John Delaney. Both are
less crazy than their fellow candi-
dates and both think it's idiotic and
stupid to promise trillions and tril-
lions of dollars in new government
give-away programs and even cra-
zier to have complete open borders
with endless benefits to all illegals.
Sadly, sane candidates are a dying
breed in the Democratic Party and
both were booed into silence.
IF PRESIDENT Trump was the
winner, who was the loser? That
would be President Obama. The
Democratic candidates pum-
meled front-runner "Sleepy" Joe
Biden and his ties to Obama. They
blamed Biden (and Obama) for the
Obamacare disaster, for the crisis at
the border (which was made worse
by Obama) and for deporting
hundreds of thousands of illegals.
While Obama should be blamed
for wrecking healthcare and
worsening the border crisis, there's
much more that he and Biden
should be blamed for. Following are
specific examples: Obama attacked
the police and praised criminals
(Michael Brown from Ferguson,
Missouri); turned race relations
back 60 years by making every-
thing racial (the media and Dems
learned well and continue making
everything racial); destroyed the
sanctity of marriage; attempted
to turn the military into a social
experiment (women in combat
arms); weaponized the IRS to go
after political oppo-
nents; wasted billions
of dollars on the
climate change hoax;
selectively enforced
some immigration
laws while ignor-
ing others; greatly
empowered the radi-
cal Iranian clerics by
giving them billions
of dollars which they
use to fund terrorism;
allowed men into
women's bathrooms;
and corrupted the
DOJ, the FBI, and the
intelligence community by turn-
ing them into the KGB to spy on
candidate Trump in an attempt to
prevent his election victory.
THE REASON that President
Obama was never criticized for
his "destroy America" agenda is
because he's half black. If you criti-
cized Obama, the Dems and the
media (I repeat myself) labeled you
a racist. And the cowardly Repub-
licans, who stupidly try to curry
favor with the media, stood by and
watched, saying nothing, while
Obama did all he could to destroy
America. Now, the 2020 Democrat-
ic candidates are trying to destroy
"Sleepy" Joe but to do so they must
destroy Obama's legacy. Very ironic
that Republicans and conserva-
tives were called racist for criticiz-
ing Obama yet the Democratic
candidates aren't racist when they
criticize Obama. Certainly makes
the "racist" accusation meaningless
when the exact same words spoken
by conservatives are racist but not
when spoken by Dems. (This is
further proof of Undeniable Truth
#2 - Liberals (and Democrats) are
Hypocrites.)
IN THE two nights of the
Democratic debates not one of
the 20 candidates was the least bit
inspiring. Everything they said
about America was negative. How
do any of the candidates expect
to become president when their
entire message is one of finding
fault with and criticizing the United
States, of criticizing the people, and
criticizing the very existence of the
country? Why would anyone vote
for someone who hates the country
the way all the Dems appear to hate
the country? The theme of their
campaigns seems to be, 'America
is racist, so vote for me" It really is
a bizarre strategy that might work
among the loony fringe of liber-
als, leftists and illegals. But I can't
imagine a majority of the country
buying into such a negative, anti-
America message.
ANOTHER EXAMPLE of
Undeniable Truth #2 occurred last
week between President Trump
and Representative Elijah Cum-
mings (D-MD). The back story:
For months Cummings has been
railing against the Border Patrol
claiming they're racists, they put
children in cages, and screamed
at the head of the Border Patrol.
Tired of the bogus accusations,
President Trump tweeted, "Rep
Elijah Cummings has been a brutal
bully, shouting and screaming at
the great men & women of the
Border Patrol about conditions at
the Southern Border, when actu-
ally his Baltimore district is FAR
WORSE and more dangerous. His
district is considered the Worst in
the USA " Trump followed with
another tweet, proven last week
during a Congressional tour, the
Border is dean, efficient & well run,
just very crowded. Cummings Dis-
trict is a disgusting, rat and rodent
infested mess. If he spent more
time in Baltimore, maybe he could
help clean up this very dangerous &
filthy place"
EVERYTHING THAT President
Trump said about Cummings'
and his district is 100% accurate -
Cummings screamed at the Border
Patrol, his district is dangerous, and
his district is filthy and rat-infested.
However, to libs and Dems, facts
don't matter. President Trump
was quickly labeled a racist solely
because Cummings is black. As it
turns out, 20 years ago Cummings
himself said the exact same thing
about Baltimore, the mayor of
Baltimore has said the same thing,
and Baltimore newspapers have
written the same. Yet President
Trump is called racist. Can you say
hypocrites?
WEEKLY THOUGHT: The
Left claims it's racist to hold black
politicians accountable. Actually, it's
racist to not.
Sloan Oliver is a retired Army of-
ricer who writes a weekly column for
the Reporter. Ernail him at sloanoli-
ver@earthlink, net.
FF
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