« October 2006 |
Main
| December 2006 »
While we're on the subject of photography, this project just came to our attention and looks like a book worth checking out.
Karim Shamsi-Basha was born in Damascus, Syria, but moved to Birmingham, Alabama in 1989 to work as a photographer for the now defunct Birmingham Post-Herald.
He has a new book out called Home Sweet Home Alabama and was featured on the local television news today.
He also has a couple of Web sites that I could find.
Karim Photography
Karimisms
The Birmingham News's Bob Carlton featured him a few weeks back in this story: Pictures of Home.
If we are not mistaken, Karim was a friend of Spider Martin's and we met him in the late 1980s when he was still working for the Post-Herald at the first newsstand-coffee bar in the American South, NewsBreak, at 30th Street and Highland Avenue.
He seemed like a nice guy with a lot of talent as a photographer. We'll have to check out his book in the book stores during the holiday shopping season...
 by Jeff Pierson |
U.S. Attorney Alice Martin was on local television news yesterday to announce the indictment of local photographer Jeff Pierson, 43, of Brookwood, Alabama.
He was charged with conspiring to transport child pornography in interstate commerce using a computer from January 2003 through 2004.
Since the story was not even news enough to the local bureau of the Associated Press to move a story, apparently, here's the press release.
FLORIDA 'CHILD MODELING' WEBSITE OWNERS INDICTED FOR CONSPIRING WITH ALABAMA PHOTOGRAPHER TO PRODUCE CHILD PORNOGRAPHY.
CNetNews did run this story about the case today: Federal case may redefine child porn.
Here are the links to Pierson's profile and solicitation and photography home page.
And here are some samples of his work.
This stuff may be fairly tasteless and appeal only to rednecks who like going to the races and driving fast cars.
But if this is the extent of what the Bush Justice Department has on the guy, then only in Alabama could this be considered pornography, and probably not even here.
Watch for a judge to throw this case out post haste.
Another loser case from Alice Martin.
That's what you get when you put the Christians in charge of Justice...
I apologize in advance for this.
I said I would never stoop to running tabloid celebrity stuff on this Web site.
But hey, even the staid army guys over at the Associated Press A-wire must be incredibly bored tonight.
They moved this story for Thursday's newspapers:
Britney's Crotch Shots Take Web by Storm
It will be interesting to see how many so-called "family newspapers" run this story.
It's a sure bet they won't run the photos.
But since I once worked a stint for People magazine out of New Orleans and just once got assigned to the Britney beat back in her heyday, I don't feel too ashamed to reprint this one photo here - especially since most of the Web sites now bragging about running them are getting so much traffic their servers are overwhelmed and you can't get to them.
Don't ask me who took them.
They are all over the Web on blog after blog.
The story has also already made Entertainment television and all kinds of cable news shows, although they covered up the crotch part.
And, the story is no doubt all over the European press, where they take a less than prudish approach to news anyway compared to the puritanical American press.
The story is that Britney and Paris Hilton have been out partying of late - wearing no panties. I think they do it as a joke to show how gullible the press is and how easy it is to get publicity - if you are among the idle rich and famous crowd.
You may find more by Googling "Britney Crotch Shots."
Here are a few.
A federal judge struck down President Bush's authority to designate groups as terrorists, saying his post-Sept. 11 executive order was unconstitutionally vague, according to a ruling released Tuesday and reported by the Associated Press
The Humanitarian Law Project had challenged Bush's order, which blocked all the assets of groups or individuals he named as "specially designated global terrorists" after the 2001 attacks.
We can only assume this also means liberal activist groups, including environmental groups and peace groups. It's a major setback for Bush's authoritarian view of the world and a victory for Constitutional freedoms everywhere.
Don't forget, the smartest show on network television is back, with new episodes on Tuesday nights at 9 p.m. Central Time on ABC.
Boston Legal
Alabama coach Mike Shula was fired after a 6-6 season that ended with three straight losses, including a defeat by state rival Auburn, according to this full AP story.
Contrary to what the sports guys on TV said, the Tuscaloosa News broke the story on their Website.
And contrary to all the rampant TV talk speculation:
Saban Says He Has No Interest in Alabama Job
Spurrier Says He's Not Leaving South Carolina
It's not such a big surprise, really, is it? The play calling this year was iffy at best. The kicking game was such that my one big question is: Why did no one think to practice and implement a fake field goal play? That could have saved several games and Mike Shula's job. Duh.
by Glynn Wilson
The leaves are falling from the trees in heaps now.
The sun shining through the trees in the backyard still glistens off of a few splotches of burnt red, auburn and rusty gold on the hickories, maples and dogwoods.
A few robins are still coming around to take a bath in the backyard every day.
But the Thanksgiving Holiday signals a transition to one of my least favorite times of the year.
It's not just the shorter days, or the growing cold, especially at night.
It's not just the blatant materialistic focus of the entire American society this time of year, when the singing Santas go up in the grocery stores and the local television media folks start pumping Christmas shopping as news.
As much as anything else, it's the bad TV programming.
 | Photo by Glynn Wilson | | Thanksgiving leaves... |
Baseball season is over. The college football season is pretty much over, except for the bowl games. And the basic cable networks start running every bad Christmas movie ever made.
Bah humbug.
If you have followed this site for any length of time, you must know by now that I am something of a crotchety old news guy who thumbs his nose at sentimentality.
The only thing I am sentimental about is freedom.
My favorite holiday of the year is the Fourth of July. Independence and liberty are worth celebrating.
Which is why I will still catch parts of Mel Gibson's "Braveheart" even though I've seen it way too many times now. I will also catch "The Partriot" when it makes the late night cable schedule.
I would like to say I am not a Mel Gibson fan since he made the politically incorrect "The Passion of the Christ" a couple of years ago. But thinking back on it now, I would like to think he made that movie for the money and not to push his radical religious views on us all.
I could be wrong about that. But the point, at least for me, is that I can take greed more than I can take hypocrisy or the promotion of unreality.
So let's just tell the truth. The Christmas holiday season is all about propping up the consumer spending segment of the economy. It's not about Jesus.
That at least would be honest.
I don't like the so-called "crass commercialism" either, but I can take it to some extent - even though I won't participate in it any more than I would go out and play a character in a church Christmas show featuring a manger scene.
There are a few things I like about winter more than summer. For one, you don't have to worry too much about being bitten by mosquitoes in the wintertime. And in the American South, there are a few decent golfing days in winter, days when you can get outside and hike.
But the best thing about winter in the South is that it only lasts a couple of months.
If I were a bear, I would sleep through winter too and look forward to waking up when the spring breaks out, when the bees and the flowers come out again.
If you are anything like me in these regards, take heart. If we can just get through the Christmas season without throwing up, and hunker down through January and February, before we know it March will be here in all its spring glory.
The birds will return from South and Central America, and we can break out the digital camera again and get some great shots.
It will warm up enough to put the canoe on top of the van again and put it in the water somewhere and run the rapids.
That is what I live for these days.
What is your favorite time of year?
What is your favorite holiday?
Why?
 | Photo by Glynn Wilson | | The leaves in the trees go red and gold this time of year... |
Just coming out of a Holiday slumber and much needed break. Trying to figure out what to blog about next. If you have any thoughts about stories in the news or anything else, here's your chance to start an open thread discussion.
ANALYSIS: Changes In Congress Could Dry Up The Funding
by Glynn Wilson
Editor and Publisher
CENTER POINT, Ala., Nov. 16 – A new citizens group has formed in Clay, Alabama to fight the state transportation department's plan to build a new section of Interstate highway through the headwaters of the Cahaba River and tributaries to the Locust Fork of the Black Warrior River east of Birmingham.
Pat Feemster, the new president of Save Our Unique River Communities and the Environment (SOURCE), says she thinks it will be an "uphill battle" to stop the plan to build a 51-mile northern beltline highway to connect Interstate 459 at Bessemer and Interstate 59 near Trussville and Argo.
But due to the Democratic Party's sweeping victory in the mid-term 2006 elections, it may not be as hard as she thinks.
The Cahaba River Society and the Black Warrior Riverkeeper environmental groups have already been trying to put pressure on the transportation department to mitigate environmental damage from the plan, the thinking being that with Republicans in control of the White House, both houses of Congress and the statehouse, the road planned for economic development purposes, not traffic relief, was inevitable.
"It's not inevitable now," says Brantley Fry, a spokeswoman for the Riverkeeper group.
With the Democratic Party taking over control of the U.S. House and Senate, the party will also take over the leadership positions on every committee in Congress, including the powerful transportation appropriations committees and subcommittees in the House and Senate.
While the Birmingham Business Journal has reported that the millions of dollars to build the project should be forthcoming as long as U.S. Sen. Richard Shelby and U.S. Rep. Spencer Bachus hold key positions on those committees, they are now in the minority and may not be able to deliver the pork in this case.
The new ranking member and most likely chair of the Senate Transportation Appropriations Subcommittee is Patty Murray of Washington State, an avowed environmentalist. Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana is also on the main committee, and her press secretary says she may be open to looking at moving some of the money to projects needed in that hurricane-ravaged state.
Murray's counterpart in the House on the Highways, Transit and Pipelines subcommittee of the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee is James L. Oberstar of Minnesota. A spokesman for the subcommittee said he was the ranking member and most likely new chair in the 108th Congress.
The state transportation department, formerly the Alabama Highway Department and long the most corrupt agency of state government dating back to the days when four-term Alabama Gov. George C. Wallace used the department's budget to reward political cronies, held a so-called public hearing at the Jefferson County Courthouse in Center Point last Thursday.
But even in George Wallace's day, when the department held a public hearing, it would take the form of a town hall meeting with a formal presentation of the plan and an opportunity for the public to comment at a microphone. Sometime in the past few years, someone in Montgomery decided that democracy was too messy a form of government for such things, so there was no real public hearing in this case. Nine employees of the department were positioned around the room at three different maps to answer the public's questions one-on-one. A sign up sheet and comment form were passed out, with about one-third of one sheet of paper provided for public comments.
This is what passes for democracy in Gov. Bob Riley's Alabama in 2006? Back during the 1980s, the highway building process was cleaned up legally in the state when then-Sen. Perry Hand, a Republican from Gulf Shores and an engineer by trade, rammed new gas taxes through the Alabama Legislature and earmarked the money specifically for road construction.
That so-called public hearing last week had to do mostly with preliminary plans for a 4.5 mile span of the proposed highway from Brookwood Road east of Alabama 75 to Old Springville Road and Goodner Mountain Road.
Even transportation department spokesman Brian C. Davis, the only representative authorized to speak to the press at the meeting, said the plan is not ideal.
In an ideal world, he said, the highway would connect to I-59 near I-459 west of Trussville, which would form a more perfect loop around Birmingham.
But you know engineers. He said it would be too hard, disruptive and expensive to cross through Center Point near the Jim Skinner Ford dealership and Edwards Lake Road, or even at Sweeney Hollow Road. It's much easier to take the beltline loop out in the country around Gardendale and Palmerdale and cross over Old Springville Road, even though there's already an exit at Dearfoot Parkway there, which dumps traffic out at the small town of Clay.
The only real traffic bottlenecks east of Birmingham occur at rush hour at the second Trussville exit, which also dumps traffic onto Sweeney Hollow Road and Old Springville Road.
Davis said there is not enough available right-of-way to widen Sweeney Hollow Road, which is used by commuters heading for Highways 75 toward St. Clair County and 79 toward Blount County. And he claims the department has plans to "mitigate" any environmental damage from the new road.
But Ms. Feemster, and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, say the route being pushed now is "the most environmentally damaging plan," since it takes the new highway through all the headwaters of the Cahaba River and many of the tributaries to the Locust Fork of the Black Warrior River.
"Everybody knows the headwaters are the most vulnerable part of any river system," she said.
Beth Stewart, the executive director of the Cahaba River Society, said building the highway out so far from the city will just create more suburban sprawl.
Bob Sargent, a bird expert who lives in Clay, said many people will lose their homes and property to condemnation, which would be a "major loss," he said. But since "the road was going to be built one way or the other," the community will benefit from the "upgraded road system and new easy access to a major highway. Safety on the roads is a major concern for all of us who live here."
Since the road is not now inevitable, due to the changes in Congress imposed by the voters, the citizens groups who oppose it plan to fight on.
Davis said the transportation department is open to new building and mitigation techniques, citing North Carolina's recent highway development in the environmentally sensitive areas near Grandfather Mountain as a source of information for how the construction might proceed.
Warrior Riverkeeper Nelson Brooke wonders, however, why the highway is needed at all.
Since the transportation department does not even deny that the project is being pushed for "economic development" purposes, not to alleviate traffic problems, he and others wonder if there are powerful landowners involved in property speculation along the new highway, perhaps with connections to the powerful in Montgomery.
As with any new highway development, there are winners and losers. Alabama history is filled with examples of the rich getting richer by buying property near new highway interchanges. There have been some pretty big names involved in this in the past, from Garry Neil Drummond to George Barber to Jimmy Faulkner.
Perhaps that is an issue worth investigating by the Democrats with their renewed positions of power in Washington.
 | Map photo by Nelson Brooke | | A map of the proposed new northern beltline Interstate highway around Birmingham |
Public Broadcasting's "Nature" aired a show tonight well worth catching on the re-run.
"Christmas In Yellowstone" was a breathtaking look at wintertime deep within America's first national park, stretching across more than 2.2 million acres of Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho. Yellowstone National Park is one of the greatest expanses of unspoiled nature and wildlife anywhere on Earth.
One day I would like to visit there, when the budget allows.
It was designated America's first national park in 1872, thanks to then-President Theodore Roosevelt, and now receives almost three million visitors each year, compared to the Great Smoky Mountains' 10 million. Yet only a small fraction of those who glimpse the park's stunning vistas, geological wonders, and animal residents do so during the winter months, according to the show's Web site, at a time when nature's inhospitality is matched only by its serenity.
"Nature" follows in the snowy footprints of Yellowstone's red foxes, spies on the predatory warfare of wolves and elk, and climbs into the den of a grizzly bear that gives birth to two cubs while deep in hibernation. In addition to mesmerizing footage of landscapes and wildlife, trail alongside author and photographer Tom Murphy, who has been coming to Yellowstone for the past 26 winters, camping and photographing amid the silence and solitude of the park.
Go behind the scenes with filmmaker Shane Moore on the Web site to find out how he kept up with Murphy during an at times harrowing trek, reminiscent of the legendary John Colter's first journey into the park nearly 200 years ago.
PBS's Nature: Christmas In Yellowstone
This letter just in from the Rev. Jack Zylman:
Here's the AP story for reference: Economist Milton Friedman Dies at 94
I studied with Friedman at the University of Chicago, taking his course in economic philosophy in 1964. His 1962 book, Capitalism and Freedom, was the basis of the course.
He distorted Adam Smith in denying that Smith wrote of the need for government regulation of corporations to prevent monopoly, actually denying that Smith wrote it. When I pointed out chapter and verse in Wealth of Nations, he said that Smith didn't mean it!
Freidman was an ideologist and a liar, distorting even Adam Smith to achieve his goal of corporate freedom and license.
I and three others ripped his hatred of public schooling (I came from Phillips High in the inner city of Birmingham, Ala. and was achieving at the highest level in a great university). In fact, he favored education only for those able to afford it themselves.
In his class, he never found anything that should limit corporate power in any way. In my paper at the end of the class, and in my summary of it in class, I attacked this idea. After my three buddies called him a fascist, Friedman looked at me and asked if I was going to call him a fascist, too.
I said "No," that fascism was more than the corporate state, but was a terrorist dictatorship built on the corporate state. Therefore, I said, "You are only the maid that makes the bed that fascism sleeps in." He began to change colors rather rapidly.
In 1973, the fascist government of Auguste Pinochet of Chile was in collapse. Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger, ITT, the CIA and Pinochet had conspired to overthrow the long-time democracy in Chile that had gone on for more than 100 years and establish a fascist military dictatorship (Pinochet admitted, proudly). Three thousand people disappeared in Chile's concentration camps, and Orlando Letellier and Ronni Moffitt were killed in a car bombing in Washington D.C., preformed by an agent of Pinochet.
Well, it was a miserable failure, and in 1973 Pinochet, through the University of Chile, hired Friedman to come down (Friedman claimed that the Pinochet government didn't pay him - it was passed through the university). Friedman in essence set up their "neo-liberal" economy, which constituted a corporate state, with union leaders murdered and unions busted, a huge unemployment rate, and massive military repression of the working class.
Upon finding out that Friedman had instructed the fascist government of Pinochet, I sent him a one-word telegram, "See!"
Friedman has been used to dismantle the defenses that the Roosevelt government built up to prevent another depression, and has us on the verge of another. The founder of the Tri-Lateral Commission, David Rockefeller of Chase Manhattan Bank, hired Friedman-disciple Zbigniew Berzenski to administer the program, and Berzinski immediately started advocating "blurring national boundaries" to allow capital to flow across national lines without hindrance. The globalization we now suffer came from them.
"Public" economists, those the public reads in the papers and hear on TV, are nothing but propagandists for the market. We need to understand that they are not scientists at all, but simply propagandists.
The market does not resemble the market of Adam Smith, largely due to Friedman. For Smith, the market was the market in goods and services. Today, it is a market in money. Money is used to buy money and is sold as a commodity. The standard we miss is not the "Gold standard" of old economics, but the labor standard. Labor today has no value - only capital has value.
Under these conditions, globalization and monetarism, the U.S. debt, rapidly run up by Republican administrations from Reagan through GW Bush, is huge and is held mainly by China and Saudi Arabia.
When they decide to destroy the U.S., it will not be with bombs, but by simply calling in the debt. We will have another great depression, and it should be called the Friedman depression.
Milton Friedman, an enemy of the state, has died. America and decency may well follow him.
Jack Zylman
Southside, Birmingham
Editor's Note: A controversy rages in Alabama over whether to continue calling the Alabama-Auburn game the "Iron Bowl."
Over at Tuscaloosa News columnist Tommy Stevenson's new blog, he's asking the question.
We raised the issue last year in this story, which should tell you where we come down on the subject: It ain't "The Iron Bowl" no more.
What do you think? Sign in below and give us your comments. Onto the story...
by Paul Rockne
It's Traditional Rivalry Week for Southeastern Conference football.
 | Photo by Glynn Wilson | | Funny, when Paul "Bear" Bryant was alive, it was hard to get a picture of him where you could see his eyes, especially on the football field. Now, with the sun behind Bryant-Denny Stadium, it's hard to get a photo of his new statue with his eyes in the picture... |
There are three of these throw-out-the-record-books games, in which the outcome is the be-all and end-all for rabid fans, on tap this weekend - headed by the Iron Bowl, which annually pits Alabama against Auburn.
In the state of Alabama, polls have shown that over the years some three-fourths of the population - young and old, women and men - watch the Bama-AU battle if it is offered on TV. This year it is being carried live on CBS (not a good omen for Alabama, which has fared poorly on that particular network in the past few years).
Outside of Alabamians, few football fans in the other 49 states will be tuned into CBS Saturday because they will be tuned into the big No. 1 Ohio State vs. No. 2 Michigan game over on ABC that will determine the Big Ten title and put the winner into the BCS national championship game.
The Tide-War Eagle game is more important than life or death to a good number of the teams' fans. While it doesn't quite mean that much to the teams and players - winning or losing won't mean a winning or losing season for either and a win won't put either into the Western Division title game - it does have it's importance to both.
For Alabama, it will mean stopping a four-game losing streak to Auburn. A Bama win would also be big in that it would be the first-ever for the Tide in Tuscaloosa. Right now Auburn owns a five-game winning streak in T-Town, owns the Alabama home field. Add to that the fact that, so far, Bama Coach Mike Shula is 0-for against Auburn. No coach can last for long at Alabama if he can't beat Auburn - and Shula knows that.
A win for Auburn would erase the two losses this season and send the Tigers a-bowling with a good taste in their mouths. It would also be win No. 10 for the season for Coach Tommy Tuberville's team. And it would probably mean a new version of the Fear the Thumb T-shirts that AU unveiled after last year's Iron Bowl triumph.
People outside Alabama have a hard time understanding exactly why the "Iron Bowl," if we should still call it that, is such a big deal (although ESPN announcers have been debating among themselves if it is or isn't the nation's fiercest rivalry, thus giving the game more national attention).
Remember, this is a series that was put on hold for 41 years over a dispute - following a tie game - over a referee and per diem money paid to players to travel. Alabama owns a 38-31-1 edge in the series, with the lone deadlock coming in that final game before the 41-year break. There have been 22 shutouts in the series (meaning a close, low-scoring game benefits the Tide?), while Auburn owns a 4-1 record in one-point games in the series (meaning a close game is a good omen for AU?).
One final historical fact does seem to lean the Tide's way. This is the eighth time since the series was rekindled in 1948 that both teams come into the Iron Bowl off losses. Alabama holds a 5-2 edge in games that followed the double losses.
The other two other rivalry games set for Saturday include Ole Miss (3-7, 1-5) at No. 9 LSU (8-2, 4-2) and No. 22 Tennessee (7-3, 3-3) at Vanderbilt (4-7, 1-6). The schedule also includes one big non-rivalry matchup - No. 5 Arkansas (9-1, 6-0) at Mississippi State (3-7, 1-5). Arkansas can clinch the Western Division crown with a win over the Bulldogs, or a win over LSU next week.
Other league games on tap this week include a trio of cremepuffs with the SEC taking on two Sun Belt Conference squads and one Divison 1-AA team: No. 3 Florida (9-1) will get no computer points for its national title game bid with a win this week. The Gators host Division 1-AA Western Carolina (2-8). South Carolina (5-5) looks pretty assured of getting that sixth win to become bowl eligible as the Gamecocks host Middle Tennessee (7-3). Kentucky (6-4) will be at home against Louisiana-Monroe (2-7).
Saturday's weekend TV football lineup, other than pay-for-view is as follows:
Miami at Virginia, 11 a.m. (WB)
Yale at Harvard, 11 a.m. (WGN)
Iowa at Minnesota, 11 a.m. (CSS)
Maryland at Boston College, 11 a.m. (ESPN)
Michigan St. at Penn St., 11 a.m. (ESPN2)
Buffalo at Wisconsin, 11 a.m. (ESPNU)
Oklahoma at Baylor,11 a.m. (FSNS)
Tennessee at Vanderbilt, 11:30 a.m. (Lincoln Financial)
Charleston Southern at Coastal Carolina, 12:30 p.m. (SS)
Army at Notre Dame, 1:30 p.m. (NBC)
Michigan at Ohio State, 2:30 p.m. (ABC)
Auburn at Alabama, 2:30 p.m. (CBS)
Alcorn St. at Jackson St., 2:30 p.m. (CSS)
Kansas St. at Kansas, 2:30 p.m. (FSNS)
Bethune Cookman at Florida A&M, 2:30 p.m. (ESPNU)
San Diego St. at TCU, 3 p.m. (VS)
Arkansas St. at Troy, 6 p.m. (CSS)
Washington at Washington St., 6 p.m. (FSNS)
Virginia Tech at Wake Forest, 6 p.m. (ESPN2)
South Florida at Louisville, 6 p.m. (ESPNU)
Rutgers at Cincinnati, 6:45 p.m. (ESPN)
California at Southern Cal, 7 p.m. (ABC)
UCLA at Arizona St., 9:15 p.m. (FSNS)
Public Comments Due in 10 Days
Public hearings will be held Thursday, Nov. 16 from 1 to 3 p.m. and 5 to 7 p.m. at the Jefferson County Courthouse in Center Point on the proposed section of Birmingham's northern beltline Interstate highway between Highway 75 in Palmerdale and I-59 in the Clay-Trussville-Argo area.
This portion of the beltline's route will pass through pristine headwater areas for both the Black Warrior and Cahaba Rivers through beautiful rolling hills along Red Mountain by Butler Mountain, the highest point in Jefferson County, according to a press release from the Black Warrior Riverkeeper group.
The Northern Beltline aims to connect with I-459 and create a full loop around the city of Birmingham. Maps will be available for viewing at the hearing on the proposed route and highway officials will be there to answer questions.
Over the past year or so, Black Warrior Riverkeeper and other river advocates have been meeting with Alabama Department of Transportation (ALDOT) and Federal Highway Administration staff to voice concerns on the proposed route of the Northern Beltline highway and its potential to adversely impact the Black Warrior and Cahaba Rivers.
This last portion of the Northern Beltline will have damaging effects on headwater tributaries of both the Black Warrior and Cahaba Rivers, accoding to Riverkeeper Nelson Brooke.
"Specifically, in the Black Warrior basin to the West of Red Mountain, the headwaters of Dry Creek, a tributary of Turkey Creek - home of the endangered vermilion darter - are directly in the route of the highway so it will essentially be destroyed," Brooke said.
On the East side of the mountain the highway will cross eight headwater tributaries of the Cahaba and its main stem, culminating at I-59 with a major interchange.
"Headwater streams are integral to a river's health, and interstate developments by ALDOT have had lasting impacts on Alabama's streams," Brooke said.
For instance, another new highway being built over the past several decades is Corridor X (I-22). This project filled countless streams and lakes with sediment during its construction.
"I have documented some of these issues along the Mulberry Fork of the Black Warrior," Brooke said. "They are not using adequate erosion control techniques on these massive projects."
The group has offered ideas and techniques for erosion control to ALDOT that are more effective and more progressive than what they are currently required to use, Brooke said.
But, he said, "We have not seen a willingness on their part to take this extra step. Without better erosion control practices, we will see devastation of local streams along the route of the Northern Beltline."
This project's justification is that of commercial and real estate development.
"It is not needed for traffic, and it will travel throughout remote western and northern parts of Jefferson County that currently have sparse populations," Brooke said. "These areas do not have the funding or infrastructure available to handle a surge in these types of development."
Much better planning is needed for a project of this magnitude, he said, and the resulting development of these areas by today's standards will have lasting impacts.
"Large scale commercial and real estate developments are being done quickly and haphazardly with little respect for our fragile resources," he said. "The result is poor water quality (runoff containing mud, trash, oil and other contaminants), highly eroded stream beads, and flooding downstream."
Comment forms will be available at the hearing and comments may be submitted within 10 business days following the hearing.
Comments should be sent to:
Mr. Brian C. Davis, Division Engineer
P.O. Box 2745
Birmingham, AL 35202-2745
Attn: Mrs. Sandra Bonner
For more information, go to BlackWarriorRiver.Org.
 | Photo by Glynn Wilson | | An autumn day drum circle on the mound where Confederate soldiers buried their muskets in surrender on the University of Alabama's quad park. |
Good writing is good writing ... it sets you free, if you are an artist.
- Anonymous
by Glynn Wilson
TUSCALOOSA, Ala., Nov. 11 - It is an almost surreal feeling to be standing in the cold fog within stumbling distance to Bryant-Denny stadium during an Alabama football game - and there's not a person in sight. Not a soul yelling "Roll Tide."
At this moment Alabama is hanging in there with LSU and only trailing by a touchdown in the first half. But there is not a sound around the campus in the dark.
Except for the voices coming from the TV.
Half of the inhabitants from here are on the road too, in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.
Sipping on just enough Jamaican rum to keep the bones warm, I am watching the game and at the same time trying to think some more about what I might say to journalism students at the university about the state of writing for the Web.
While LSU punts, the first thing I want to tell them is why I call it "writing for the Web" and not "writing for the Net."
It's an easy slip to make. I've likely done it myself a few times.
But it is wrong, and being right matters.
So the first rule of any kind of writing - for a Weblog with 50 readers, an independent news Website like this one with 75,000 visitors a month or the Washington Post's Website with 6 million - is to do the reporting so you know what you are talking about to get it right.
It is hard if you are by yourself and don't have much of a budget. But as I said in a recent column, "you can't fake it and make it."
This is sometimes called accuracy in the textbooks and in the biz, although the temptation is great among the creative writing crowd, sometimes, to stretch it. It is true in journalism and in history.
If it is not somehow accurate, it should be referred to as fiction. Which is fine. And quite publishable on the Web.
There's an old American writing saw that goes, "Don't let the facts stand in the way of a good story."
Not anymore.
Not in the intense political and economic media climate that has heated up in the past few years with the rise of the Internet like the average global temperature is rising due to global warming.
Don't believe me. Or the president.
But it is true.
Oh, wait. Bama just fumbled away a chance to tie the game at half time. Time out...
Oh, well. As I was saying, the Net is the almost endless series of computers connected all over the world by telephone lines and cables. There is no way to publish anything on the Net without the World Wide Web.
"Web browsers" are programmed to turn zeros and ones of computer code into words and pictures on your computer screen. That's why I recently started calling it "the Web Press" - so people will know.
It deserves the same First Amendment rights as newspapers printed with ink on paper in our view.
The Net is different.
If you use an Internet e-mail program such as Microsoft Entourage, for example, rather than Web mail, you are simply passing along information on the Net. People cannot read it on the Web. So it is not "printed" or "published" in any sense of the term, unless it is being archived on the Web like posts to a listserv.
Think of the Net as a series of service roads and on-ramps to the Information Superhighway - another name for the Web. Web sites have addresses on that highway because even scientists and computer programmers are sometimes creative people too.
So are football players, given some of the trick plays attempted in the game.
So, you may ask, now fully understanding the Net and the Web: "What is a blog?"
Wait. The third quarter is grinding along with the Tide still trailing, but it's time to sip on a Yuengling before tackling that question...
The best way to look at it is that a blog is simply newfangled software that makes it easy to publish on the Web.
I don't much like the term blog, so I call it a journal. Hopefully that helps people understand it.
You know, a journal can be a diary, the name of a newspaper or a scholarly publication dedicated to research. Or it can be all three.
As educated writers hanging around journalism training programs, we know all about "new journalism." But the tradition goes back further than that. In a journal such as Henry David Thoreau's Walden, or a book of essays like some of Ed Abbey's work, including Desert Solitaire, the writer injects himself into the story line. Hunter Thompson did it in Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.
This is different than what we think of as "objective journalism." Although in a sense, I would argue that it can in some ways be more "scientifically objective" than "economically objective."
I like to think of the Web as the printing press for the "new" new journalism.
Hey, it's not unlike what happens over time in nature. It evolves. Language evolves. Writing evolves. The way we take and display photographs evolves. The game of football evolves.
So-called "bloggers" just happen to be on the current cutting edge of the writing and publishing evolution. The medium changes the message.
Some would rather sit on the sidelines and try to wait and see what the future looks like. Funny, they never seem to get there. But maybe they make money all along the way...
The special thing about the blog format is that it allows you to build an archive and a knowledge base that is linkable from other Web publishers in your community - or all over the world.
One problem. If those links only work for a couple of weeks or so, whatever publication you work for is not making an investment in the online library of the future.
Which brings us to the subject of the state of newspapers or even broadcast news outlets online.
Point one is that if they require you to pay for the "privilege" of using their Website as a news, information, entertainment and advertising source, or even require demographic information on you to login, they are limiting their potential audience and ultimately their revenue stream.
Traffic is the name of the game in making money online.
Making a few bucks off an online subscription will never make up for the lost revenue of dropping print circulation and advertising pages, so I argue they should abandon the subscription model and go open. Build the largest audience possible into the uncertain future.
But then I'm a charter member of the "free" free online club. Even Sen. John McCain is into it as one of the staunchest defenders of no taxes on the use of the Net - to get to the Web.
Whoa. It ain't looking so great for the Crimson Tide on the bayou. And outside, it is getting even colder and I am yet to hear a "Roll Tide" or "yeehaw."
It may hit a low of 36 tonight, and it is bone-aching wet. You feel it especially if you suffer from arthritis like I do sometimes in my knuckles and knees.
[ Note to self: Notice the new hyphenated term "bone-aching." It's more accurate than the cliche it replaces. Quiz question designed to provoke thought, not rote memory: Can you name the missing cliche? ].
Oh, to hell with the details.
Punt Bama punt.
It does not matter whether you are writing for a newspaper or a book or a television show - or a blog.
To build an audience, writing well is important. (Nice pictures help too).
Should you publish your own Website or a blog journal?
If you are an aspiring professional, think hard about it first. It is a great way to get your name out there and market yourself. I highly recommend it as a creative outlet and even a place to learn more about how to write; a place you can practice writing and build an audience too.
But don't forget this. Be careful what you say. Once it's out there in the ether, so to speak, it can help your reputation - or it can come back to bite you.
For myself, the decision to go independent involved an analysis of the state of the U.S. news business and American politics - an issue of freedom.
In producing your very on online newspaper and/or journal, you have in front of you an unlimited news hole (space to write) - and best of all, no corporate publishers or editors to limit your freedom.
That includes the freedom to screw up, but what the heck.
When it comes right down to it, I actually believe in freedom. And I happen to like a lot of it - maybe even more than a hardcore Tide fan likes a winning season.
The Tide lost tonight, but think about it. Freedom.
What is more important to you: Security or freedom?
Do you want to be a professional - or an artist?
Do you think it is possible today to be both?
And what does that have to do with the Democrats taking back control of Congress?
Ah, tricky question. Better left for another day. That would require an essay on objectivity.
I'm not in the mood, tonight. And it's time to update the headlines for Sunday, time to light another smoke and crack another Yuengling.
Roll Tide anyway.
The return of the king … a different kind of homecoming … the oldie-but-goodie hit song, “The Boys (make that “boy”) Are Back in Town” … all could be the theme for the SEC Game of the Week in this, the second week of November, 2006.
Steve Spurrier, the ex-Florida Gator head coach who brought the national championship trophy to Gainesville in 1996 and built a dynasty on the way to the title, returns to The Swamp Saturday, bringing his South Carolina Gamecocks in to face Urban Myer’s version of the Gators.
This game has more story lines than a national election. Spurrier is the winningest coach in the SEC, with a 95-21 record at Florida and now South Carolina. His name stands atop a list of legends. No. 2 is Tennessee’s Gen. Robert Neyland. No. 3 is Alabama’s Frank Thomas, followed in fourth place by Alabama’s (and Kentucky’s) Paul Bear Bryant.
Spurrier, who won a Heisman Trophy while playing for Florida, will be making his third trip to Gainesville this season and he is only hoping the third trip will be as pleasant an experience for him as the first two. Spurrier attended a reunion for the ’96 national title team in early September and then later in the month came back to be inducted into the Florida Ring of Honor.
Another question Saturday in Gainesville is can Spurrier keep his winning streak alive in Florida-South Carolina games? Spurrier has never been on the losing sideline of a Gator-Gamecock matchup. He posted a 10-0 record at Florida against South Carolina and is 1-0 at S.C. vs. the Gators. Spurrier’s Gamecocks beat Meyer’s Gators last season in Columbia, S.C. – the first and only time Florida has lost to S.C.
And while the storyline being watched by most is that of Meyer trying to escape the shadow of Spurrier’s legend at Florida, there are some real-time storylines as well. Spurrier bringing his 5-4 Gamecocks into Florida hoping for a win that will make his team bowl eligible and send South Carolina bowling for a second year in row. Meyer has his 8-1 Gators in the national championship mix, ranked No. 6 in AP and No. 4 on the BCS list.
Other league games on tap this week include: Georgia (6-4, 3-4) at Auburn (9-1, 5-10), Vanderbilt (4-6, 1-5) at Kentucky (5-4, 3-3), Tennessee (7-2, 3-2) at Arkansas (8-1, 5-0), Alabama (6-4, 2-4) at LSU (7-2, 3-2).
This week’s college football TV schedule kicks off tonight with Texas El-Paso at UAB live from Legion Field in Birmingham, Ala., at 7 p.m. on ESPN2. Saturday’s weekend TV lineup, other than pay-for-view is as follows:
N.C. St. at Clemson, 11 a.m. (WB)
Samford at Jacksonville St., 11 a.m. (CSS)
Wisconsin at Iowa, 11 a.m. (ESPN)
Cincinnati at W. Virginia, 11 a.m. (ESPN2)
Minnesota at Michigan St., 11 a.m. (ESPNU)
Georgia at Auburn, 11:30 a.m. (Lincoln Financial)
Baylor at Okla. St.,11:30 a.m. (FSNS)
Miami at Maryland, 2:30 p.m. (ABC)
South Carolina at Florida, 2:30 p.m. (CBS)
Michigan at Indiana, 2:30 p.m. (ESPN)
Texas Tech at Oklahoma, 6 p.m. (FSNS)
Tennessee at Arkansas, 6 p.m. (ESPN2)
Duke at Boston College, 6 p.m. (ESPNU)
Alabama at LSU, 6:45 p.m. (ESPN)
Wake Forest at FSU , 7 p.m. (ABC)
The Black Warrior Riverkeeper’s 5th Birthday Party in Tuscaloosa is tonight, Friday, November 10, at “4th and 23rd” (yes, that is the address AND the name of the bar) at 401 23rd Ave. from 9 p.m. to 1:30 a.m. The live entertainment will be provided by Baak Gwai and Hambagby, and the University of Alabama's mascot "BIG AL" will allegedly make an appearance. A $5 cover charge will go to support the Riverkeeper's efforts to protect and restore the Black Warrior River Basin and Tuscaloosa’s clearn drinking water.
The group made the news today for its fight against pollution from a prison in Jefferson County.
Black Warrior Riverkeeper Group Fights Plan to Dismiss Prison Pollution Suit
Replacing Donald Rumsfeld at the Pentagon with Robert Gates is a sign the Bush Family is circling the wagons around the embattled presidency of George W. Bush.
Gates is a trusted hand of George H.W. Bush, but there remain troubling questions about whether Gates is a trustworthy government official. Since his last confirmation as CIA director in 1991, new evidence has surfaced suggesting that he may not have told the full truth.
For the full story, go to the the independent ConsortiumNews.Com.
A Newsweek poll published October 21 found 51 percent of Americans supporting the impeachment of President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.
A USA Today/Gallup poll released October 25 showed 51 percent of Americans supporting "major investigations" of the Bush administration's failed policies, including the debacle in Iraq.
Much of that support was generated by books and independent Internet journalism and organizing by the speakers who will participate in a national movement to impeach Bush and Cheney, according to an e-mail press release.
A coalition of national organizations and political leaders will announce plans to mobilize a national movement to impeach Bush and Cheney at a rally Saturday, Nov. 11 at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, just across from Independence Hall where the U.S. Constitution was written and signed. The mobilization is being billed as "Impeach For Change."
Speakers will include Elizabeth Holtzman, former Member of Congress, served on the House panel that voted to impeach President Nixon, and author of "The Impeachment of George W. Bush: A Practical Guide for Concerned Citizens"; Cindy Sheehan, Co-Founder of Gold Star Families for Peace; David Swanson, Co-Founder of AfterDowningStreet.org and Washington Director of Democrats.com; Tim Carpenter, Director of Progressive Democrats of America; Jodie Evans, Co-Founder of CODE PINK Women for Peace; Bill Perry, Veterans for Peace; and Bob Fertik, President of Democrats.com and ImpeachPAC.org.
Participating organizations include the National Organization for Women, the Hip Hop Caucus, Constitution Summer, and many of the 200 plus organizations in the After Downing Street Coalition.
The speakers will be followed by a discussion of impeachment by prominent bloggers, including Glen Ford (Black Agenda Report), Sally Hemings (Sally Hemings in Paris), Rob Kall (OpEdNews.com), Dave Lindorff (ThisCantBeHappening.net), Martin Longman (BoomanTribune.com), Susie Madrik (Suburban Guerilla), Liza Sabater (Culture Kitchen), and Bob Fertik (Democrats.com).
The Locust Fork News and Journal have long-supported such a movement and an investigation. Now that it is clear that Democrats will take back control of both houses of Congress in January, perhaps the investigation can get underway.
Our position is that a repudiation of an imperial presidency that is above domestic and international law is critical to re-establishing the reputation of the United States around the world.
Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., who is set to become the House Majority Leader, has said impeachment is "off the table." Unless she changes that position, the Democratic Party base will be looking for new leadership in 2008.
And would someone either put a muzzle on Sen. John Kerry or hire him a new writer and tell him to stick to the script? We can't afford any more gaffes from another Massachusetts liberal - if we are going to take back the White House in 2008.
BIRMINGHAM, Ala., Nov. 9 - The brutal torture and murders of three Colombia union leaders and workers at Drummond coal company's Colombian mines continue to run low on the American justice radar screen. Now, the civil murders case may be silently swept under the rug if Drummond lawyers get their way in an Alabama courtroom.  | Exclusive file photo | | The three union leaders killed in Columbia |
Drummond lawyers from the firm of Starnes and Atchison in Birmingham and from Baker Botts in Washington, D.C., the firm of long-time Republican fixer James Baker, were back in U.S. Federal Court in November seeking to, in a sense, freeze-wrap in a super seal all documents in the civil murders case.
The case could possibly help connect the dots between Drummond and a Colombia right-wing death squad designated as "terrorists" by the U.S. government, the State Department and Justice Department, the president of Colombia, the specious takeover of a lucrative Colombia oil concession from two Dutch brothers and the Alabama multinationals alleged complicity in the 2001 slayings of several union leaders.
In the latest attempt to sweep all those dots away from public and media scrutiny, Drummond lawyers moved "to place under seal the memorandum in support of defendants motion for summary judgment and exhibits" in a terse, one-page filing in U.S. District Court in Birmingham.
Drummond's latest brief in a salvo of legal parries and thrusts over the last few years - in a case which may not go to a jury until March, 2007, if at all - asks U.S. District Judge Karon O. Bowdre to consider all "highly confidential exhibits" to be "filed under seal."
This summary judgment motion presents the judge, the same judge who presided in the U.S. Justice Department's losing case against HealthSouth founder Richard Scrushy, the opportunity to throw out the whole case in the coming months, according to Birmingham attorney Barry A. Ragsdale. He filed a First Amendment petition on behalf of Stephen Flanagan Jackson, a journalism professor at Stillman College in Tuscaloosa and editor with LatinAmericanPost.com, to unseal many of the documents in the case.
"I am the only gringo journalist to have a copy of many of these sealed documents," Jackson said, referring to a Colombian's deposition and also to the deposition of Garry Neil Drummond, CEO and head of Drummond Co.
Mr. Drummond, a University of Alabama trustee emeritus and a member of the UA Business School Hall of Fame, testified in a deposition about paying a half million dollars in "stipends" to the Colombia police and military for protection of the Drummond mines and port in areas of northeast Colombia. It is widely known there that the police and military are notorious for moonlighting as right-wing paramilitaries, which hire out for protection of the Drummond assets under threat from leftwing guerrillas, who are also designated as "terrorist actors" in Colombia's interminable civil war.
Jackson also is the only journalist to personally interview the controversial, star eye-witness in the case - the so-called "Colombia Canary" - in a prison cell in Bogota.
"Rafael Garcia looked me in the eye and swore up and down that he witnessed a payoff from Drummond's top man in Colombia, Augusta Jiminez, to 'Bloque Norte' paramilitary hitmen in order to kill trade union leaders at Drummonds La Loma coal mines," Jackson says.
The sealed documents also reveal the extent and details of Drummond's alleged influence on the U.S. State and Justice departments to have the Drummond civil murders case dropped due to the possibility of disclosing sensitive, secret relations between the U.S. and Colombian governments.
Other witness testimony comes from a Drummond worker who claims to have heard the same Jiminez utter the now infamous, implicating threat about the union workers: "The fish who opens his mouth dies."
Drummond has consistently stated that the allegations of its complicity in the murders are false.
"The charges are liesdamnable lies," said William Jeffress, Jr., a Drummond attorney, in 2004, previous to the judges first gag order.
The civil murders case is in court under the obscure Alien Tort Claims Act of 1789. Coca-Cola, Del Monte, UNOCAL and other multinationals are being called to task by international labor under the almost-forgotten law which permits foreigners to sue private U.S. citizens or corporations for alleged wrongdoings abroad.
Coca-Cola recently won a round in a similar case when a judge in Miami ruled that there was not enough evidence to proceed with charges against several Coke bottlers in Colombia.
"These Colombia murders are very similar to the civil rights violations which were perpetrated in the U.S. in the early 1960s," Jackson says. "Especially comparable to the murders of Goodman, Chaney, and Schwerner in Philadelphia, Mississippi, and the killings of the four little girls in the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing in Birmingham.
"All were victims of civil rights struggles and justice long denied - just like in these 2001 murders in Colombia in this case meandering turtle-slow in federal court," Jackson says. "And not only slow, but under a cloud of secrecy that is not warranted at all - and in fact, is a gross violation of the First Amendment rights of the press and the public."
"Judge Bowdre's constant sealing and gag orders have a chilling effect by cutting journalists off from sources, potential sources and information about this case," he said. "The judge is throwing a shroud over this case."
He says he and Mr. Ragsdale are not threatening Drummond's Sixth Amendment right to a fair trial.
"We are looking out for the right to monitor the administration of justice without any undue restrictions on the monitoring and without regards to the manner and style in which the information is communicated," he said.
Ragsdale said the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit has scheduled oral arguments on Jackson's appeal to have the documents made public for the week of Jan. 29, 2007 in Montgomery.
"I am not sure what is going to happen if the judge throws the case out on summary judgment before then," Ragsdale says.
Drummond ships coal from its profitable Colombia mine all over the world. Southern Company is one of Drummond's largest customers for its coal-fired nuclear power plants in Alabama, Mississippi, Florida and Georgia.
Rumsfeld Ousted As Secretary of Defense
by Glynn Wilson
The sweep is final and complete. The Democrats will now control a majority in both the Senate and the House for the first time since 1994 as the two close races still in play on Wednesday in Montana and Virginia ended up going to the Democrats, according to the Associated Press and other news organizations.
Jim Webb's close victory over incumbent Sen. George Allen gave Democrats their 51st seat in the Senate, an astonishing turnabout at the hands of voters unhappy with Republican scandal and unabated violence in Iraq, according to the AP, which called the race first this evening.
The Senate teetered at 50 Democrats, 49 Republicans and one independent for most of Wednesday, with Virginia hanging in the balance. Webb's victory ended Republican hopes of eking out a 50-50 split, with Vice President Dick Cheney wielding tie-breaking authority.
The AP contacted election officials in all 134 localities where voting occurred, obtaining updated numbers Wednesday. About half the localities said they had completed their postelection canvassing and nearly all had counted outstanding absentees. Most were expected to be finished by Friday.
The new AP count showed Webb with 1,172,538 votes and Allen with 1,165,302, a difference of 7,236.
An adviser to Allen, speaking on condition of anonymity because his boss had not formally decided to end the campaign, told the AP the senator wanted to wait until most of canvassing was completed before announcing his decision, possibly as early as Thursday evening. The adviser said that Allen was disinclined to request a recount if the final vote spread was similar to that of election night.
The victory puts Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., in line to become Senate majority leader.
Combined with the major victory in taking over the House of Representatives on Tuesday by re-capturing at least 27 seats and leading in four other races, Election Day 2006 was a repudiation of the failed policies of President George W. Bush.
In an acknowledgement of that defeat and the failed war strategy in Iraq, the president handed the Democrats the head of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in a last gasp attempt to appear willing to acknowledge mistakes and avoid total lame duck status by appearing to be willing to work in a non-partison fashion for his last two years in office.
Rumsfeld resigned with a short statement in which he quoted the great British war strategist of World War II Winston Churchill.
To paraphrase Richard Nixon, let's make one thing perfectly clear. Mr. Rumsfeld, you are no Winston Churchill.
Bush replaced Rumsfeld with Robert Gates, who may come under close scrutiny during his Senate confirmation hearings, which will now be led by Democrats, for his controversial role in the Iran-Contra scandal when he worked for then-Vice President George H.W. Bush in the late 1980s.
In a repudiation of the policy failures of the administration of president George W. Bush, the American people returned power in "the people's House" back to the Democratic Party Tuesday in a historic awakening vote.
As of press time, Democrats were surging in the U.S. Senate, picking up at least four seats and needing 6 to take control and leading in critical races in Virginia and Montana.
Democrats also ruled in governor's races all over the country, but not in Alabama, where the safe Republican manager Gov. Bob Riley won handily over Lt. Gov. Lucy Baxley, who in the end did not have an organized, enthusiastic base of support to mount a serious challenge.
It also looks like Alabama will escape another right-wing Christian Republican as Chief Justice of the Alabama Supreme Court. Sue Bell Cob, the Democrat, led Drayton Nabers 53-47 percent with 80 percent of the precincts reporting.
And it looks like former Gov. Jim Folsom will win the race to replace Baxley as lieutenant governor, restoring power back to that office and Democratic Party hands.
The Yuengling is flowing over here. We hear the new slogan in Seattle and Portland is: "Happy Days Are Here Again!"
But not for Georgie and GOP company!!
For the updated headline links, turn to the Locust Fork News.
by Glynn Wilson
Turning to the polls online to look for hope or impending disaster on election day 2006, it is surprising to find the online pollsters more optimistic for the Democratic Party than even the national corporate broadcast media at this point.
It's a balanced picture on TV, of course, with the Republicans coming back in the end.
But the best pollsters seem to think it's over and the Democrats will take back both houses of Congress.
We are not so sure, due to the "too close to call" nature of many races - and our fear that the Republicans will likely do their best to disengranchise voters where they can and "steal" any close election.
Let's hope the pollsters are right.
According to the Cook Political Report, the Democratic Party should pick up 20 to 35 seats in the House, four to six seats in the Senate and six to eight more governor's races than the GOP.
"All Monday there was considerable talk that the national picture had suddenly changed and that there was a significant tightening in the election," Cook says, but it's not true.
"This was based in part on two national polls that showed the generic congressional ballot test having tightened to four (Pew) and six (ABC/Wash Post) points," he says.
But seven national polls have been conducted since Wednesday, November 1 and give Democrats an average lead of 11.6 percentage points, "larger than any party has had going into an Election Day in memory."
Even if you knock five points off of it for the margin of error, it's 6.6 percentage points, he says, "bigger than the advantage that Republicans had going into 1994."
"Furthermore, there is no evidence of a trend in the generic ballot test," he argues.
In chronological order of interviewing (using the midpoint of field dates), the margins were: 15 points (Time 11/1-3), 6 points (ABC/Wash Post), 4 points (Pew), 7 points (Gallup), 16 points (Newsweek), 20 points (CNN) and 13 points (Fox).
In individual races, some Republican pollsters see some movement, voters "coming home," in their direction, and/or some increase in intensity among GOP voters, he says. But "all seem to think that it was too little, too late to significantly change the outcome."
It might be enough to save a few candidates, but no one thinks it is a major change in the dynamics of races.
For all the details on each individual race, go to the Cook Political Report.
Sabato's Crystal Ball is predicting about the same result, 4, 5 or 6 seats going to the Democrats, "resting party control of the Senate squarely on the edge of the butter knife," according to Larry J. Sabato and David Wasserman of the University of Virginia Center for Politics.
"We think the Democrats may replicate their feat from 1986 (the sixth year election of Ronald Reagan's Presidency) and capture just enough seats to take over," they said. When they add together all their predictions, Democrats pick up six seats, "sufficient to wrest control from the GOP."
For all the details on each individual race, go to Sabato's Crystal Ball.
So, it looks good tonight, but don't count on it. Go to the polls yourself and make it happen. Your future freedom depends on it.
If the power does change hands, it means above all that Rep. John Conyers will become chair of the House Judiciary Committee. No one is campaigning on the issue, but he will no doubt launch a major investigation into President George W. Bush's war crimes and bring articles of impeachment against the dicktater in chief.
He's already drawn up the articles and held hearings in the Capitol basement, since the Republicans would not use their Constitutional oversight responsibilities to do the right thing for their country. They won't even give him a room or put his hearings on the agenda.
It's at least worth an investigation, some hearings, a national discussion and a damn vote. Otherwise, we are a democratic republic no more and the world will never believe us or look up to us again...
 | Photo by Glynn Wilson | | The Red Star coal mine looms as an ugly brown blotch on the mountainside amongst the autumn color and the great blue herons on the Black Warrior River |
by Glynn Wilson
COPELAND FERRY, Ala., Nov. 3 - The great blue herons were already fishing when we put the shiny aluminum Black Warrior Riverkeeper patrol boat in the water.
Riverkeeper Nelson Brooke captained the boat, while yours truly and legal eagle Mark Martin took in the scene.
Our mission? To search out one of the most enigmatic contradictions of modern life: Nature's beauty for the camera and industrial pollution responsible for fouling it up - for the record.
Since we were patrolling in one of the most diverse watersheds in North America, it didn't take long to find the beauty. The breezy cold front down from Canada turned the sky a cobalt blue, the perfect backdrop for the peaking autumn color turning the leaves on Alabama's hardwood trees a vivid yellow, gold and orange.
Since we were heading up river into North Alabama coal country in Walker County, it also didn't take long to find the pollution.
 | Photo by Glynn Wilson | | Nelson Brooke captains the Black Warrior Riverkeeper patrol boat |
As we approached the new Red Star coal mine on a ridge behind the old Washington Camp on Stevens Lake, a cloud of dirt, rock and coal dust shot out of the woods and drifted over the river. Due to the noise from the Evinrude motor, we didn't hear the blast.
But when we were hailed on the boat dock of Ray Manasco within earshot of the mine, he told us we just missed the warning siren and dynamite blast by only a few minutes.
Manasco, 64, retired to a place he considered paradise on the Black Warrior River three years ago. But his place in the sun has turned into something of a nightmare since the Drummond Coal company started mining the mountainside behind his house last summer. Due to the incessant vibrations fro |
