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Saturday, August 13, 2011
The Vicksburg Post
THE VICKSBURG POST
EDITORIAL
Founded by John G. Cashman in 1883 Louis P. Cashman III, Editor & Publisher • Issued by Vicksburg Printing & Publishing Inc., Louis P. Cashman III, President Karen Gamble, managing editor | E-mail: kgamble@vicksburgpost.com | Tel: 601.636.4545 ext 123 | Letters to the editor: letters@vicksburgpost.com or The Vicksburg Post, P.O. Box 821668, Vicksburg, MS 39182
JACK VIX SAYS: What a week on Wall Street.
OTHER OPINIONS
Recovery Keep disaster reserves flush with capital From other Mississippi newspapers: • The Greenwood Commonwealth: It’s hard to argue with a proposal by Sen. Roger Wicker and other sponsors of a bill to direct more money to Gulf Coast recovery efforts related to the Deepwater Horizon tragedy. But you could. Wicker, Mississippi’s junior Republican senator who is an avowed conservative, reports on “a bill introduced last week by all Gulf Coast senators” to distribute directly to gulf states revenue collected from Clean Water Act penalties related to the disaster. Wicker writes in a newspaper article that “under the Clean Water Act, the
Environmental Protection Agency has the authority to collect fines for the estimated 4.9 million barrels of oil that were spilled into the Gulf of Mexico last year. The EPA can charge up to $4,300 per barrel from the parties found responsible.” “Current law calls for these collected damages to go to the U.S. Treasury, where they are reserved for the cleanup of future oil spills,” Wicker continued. “This would do little to help Gulf Coast residents. Penalty money for this localized disaster should be used for local recovery projects in communities still dealing with the effects of the worst oil spill in U.S. history.” The bill the Gulf states senators are
pushing would direct 80 percent of the damages levied against BP and other responsible parties to a Gulf Coast Restoration Trust Fund. “By keeping these funds close, Mississippi and other Gulf states can have the flexibility to prioritize economic and environmental restoration efforts that serve their needs,” Wicker wrote. Maybe so. But what happens the next time there is an oil spill, the federal government is called upon to help clean it up and there’s no money in that reserve to pay for the effort? Oh, well. We just raised the debt limit, didn’t we?
Eminent domain bill bad for everyone The Clarion-Ledger, Jackson: Mississippi Development Authority Director Leland Speed is right to continue to press for the eminent domain initiative to be dropped from the Nov. 8 ballot. Although Speed was acting as a private citizen when he filed suit seeking to block the ballot measure, his arguments are pro-business and, essentially, pro-Mississippi, while those who want the measure on the ballot are inflaming the issue with half-truths and misleading, fiery rhetoric. Speed has appealed a Hinds County judge’s ruling that the ballot measure is not unconstitutional to the Mississippi Supreme Court. The court has not yet scheduled oral arguments in the case. Incredibly, Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann’s attorneys have argued
that the ballot item is proper because it doesn’t significantly change the eminent domain laws or how they’re carried out. That’s incredible because the purpose of the bill — while touted as supporting property rights — calls for a 10-year period before land taken by the government for economic development purposes can be conveyed to a private entity. That very definitely is a change in how the law is carried out and would damage many of the state’s economic development efforts. Supporters of the bill try to mask that fact by saying that the change, if approved, wouldn’t apply to land needed for public infrastructure projects or property condemnation. That’s fine if you’re building a high-
way, but if Mississippi is looking to attract a major project, such as a Nissan or Toyota plant, then it becomes a major hindrance. Neighboring competitive states aren’t likely to fail to point out this “10 year” clause to prospective industry. It should gain attention that such bona fide pro-business conservatives as Speed and Gov. Haley Barbour (who vetoed it when it appeared as a bill) say it will hurt job creation. What’s really frustrating is that Mississippi’s eminent domain law already bends over backward to protect property owners. Unlike some other states, it’s frankly just not an issue here. Rather than protecting property owners, the initiative would just kill jobs.
State trending toward the GOP Enterprise-Journal, McComb: The most noticeable trend from the primaries, both at the state and local level, is the rising number of people participating in the Republican primary. Democratic participation, meanwhile, is declining. Statewide, about 395,000 voters cast a ballot in the Aug. 2 Democratic primary. That’s down 12 percent from 2007, when 446,746 people voted Democratic. Republicans, on the other hand, made huge gains. This year about 282,000 people voted in the GOP primary. That’s up 43 percent from the 197,647 who participated in 2007. There is an obvious trend toward the
GOP in the state, mostly because the Democratic national party’s ideals are out of step in a generally conservative state like Mississippi. But two other factors surely increased Republican turnout this year: competitive primaries for governor and lieutenant governor; and some competitive local primaries. Phil Bryant easily won the Republican nomination for governor, while Tate Reeves, who won the GOP primary for lieutenant governor, faces no Democratic opposition in the general election. The results from Pike County are a good example of growing Republican
strength. In 2007, about 1,100 voters participated in the GOP primary. This time around, that number more than doubled, to about 2,650. A full 1,000 of those votes were in the District 4 supervisor’s race, where two candidates ran hard for an open seat. There are still far more Democratic voters than Republican. But the gap is narrowing fast, and Republicans have won many of the recent big elections. These trends make it clear that state Democrats will continue to face challenges in convincing supporters to stay the course.
OLD POST FILES 120 YEARS AGO: 1891 Ex-mayor R.F. Beck dies. • Alderman G.C. Peagram leaves for Colorado.
MODERATELY CONFUSED by Jeff Stahler
110 YEARS AGO: 1901 Friars Point beats Vicksburg, 10-2. • Jessie Conway goes to Canton to visit friends. • Carroll Kain is very ill.
McCall” at the Joy Theatre.
40 YEARS AGO: 1971 Mr. and Mrs. Melvin Morgan announce the birth of a daughter, Jessica, on July 26. • Mrs. D.A. Pettit dies. • Richard Boone stars in “Big Jake” at Showtown USA.
30 YEARS AGO: 1981
100 YEARS AGO: 1911
Robyn Robb is cast as Mrs. Stevenson, invalid housewife, in “Hitchhiker” at the Parkside Playhouse. • Denise McCullough is 6. • Mr. and Mrs. Glen Jones are the parents of a daughter, Christy Amber, born Aug. 17.
Mrs. James Cassell and sons return from Birmingham, Ala. • Matt Stockner, wellknown editor in Lake Providence, dies.
90 YEARS AGO: 1921
20 YEARS AGO: 1991
Mrs. T.W. McCoy is the first feminine guest of the Kiwanis Club. • Hunter Ladner returns from Tampa, Fla., his boyhood home. B.W. Griffith dies. • W.J. Hart at King’s Crossing brings to Vicksburg, to be ginned, the first bale of cotton for the 1931 season.
Employees of the Vicksburg National Military Park clean Bloom Fountain at Monroe and Crawford streets. • A home owned by Terry Mayfield on China Grove Road is destroyed by fire. • Tom R. Wilson III of Vicksburg graduates from the Harrison County Law Enforcement Academy at Gulf Park.
70 YEARS AGO: 1941
10 YEARS AGO: 2001
80 YEARS AGO: 1931
Frank Reinhardt, former resident, is here from Greenville. • Mrs. John Troxell and Martha Dell Parker are visiting in Memphis.
60 YEARS AGO: 1951 Mademoiselle Gabrielle Macaire, chic young French ambassadress, arrives from Belfort, France. • A record cotton harvest is
being predicted for Warren County.
50 YEARS AGO: 1961 W.R. Southard, former resident, dies in Pine Bluff, Ark. • Roy Foster is a patient in Mercy Hospital. • Mr. and Mrs. D.H. Boone announce the birth of a daughter, Donna, on Aug. 16. • James Garner stars in “Cash
Rose Shaifer is named the Vicksburg Fire Department’s first woman deputy chief. • A ring ceremony is held for the Warren Central Vikings, Mississippi Class 5A State Baseball Champions. • Jenna Laird of Tallulah is selected for membership into the National Society of Collegiate Scholars at LSU.
I generally like doggie dogs, not prissy, silky-haired purebreds that sashay about aware of their superior lineage.
Losing Hannah as tough as saying goodbye to Mabel FISHTRAP HOLLOW, Miss. — After losing Mabel, the yellow dog, I put up defenses. She’d be the last dog I’d treat like a child, the last one whose basket would hold all my emotional eggs. I swore it. It hurts too much to say goodbye when you irrationally get close to a creature who, in all probability, will go the bone yard before you. I already had two other male dogs, but, in all honesty, they played second (and third) fiddle to Mabel’s vocals and lead guitar. She definitely was leader of this pack, the blond bombshell whose demeanor demanded we all were her love slaves, canine and human. Enter Hannah. Hannah is a step-daughter, a 15-year-old Springer spaniel who came to the hollow with her master last Christmas. The boys, Boozoo and Hank, did not rejoice. There were a few unholy nights. And I stuck to my plan to keep an emotional distance. Oh, I’d rub Hannah’s head and feed her treats, same as I did the other two, but I figured it was a losing proposition to fall head over heels for a dog already well into retirement. Besides, a Springer wasn’t really my kind of dog. I generally like doggie dogs, not RHETA prissy, silky-haired gRIMSLEY purebreds that sashay about aware of their superior lineage. Best-laid plans of mice and women go aft astray — and into the toilet. Hannah has these eyes. They are not quite Bette Davis eyes, but Little Orphan Annie eyes if her creator Harold Gray had colored them in with his darkest ink. Big, sad, beseeching eyes. They bore holes in me on a regular basis. Still, I resisted. We were in Colorado when it happened. It was on our customary early-morning walk. I had my two dogs on leashes that the city life required, and Hannah and her master were bringing up the rear. They often were stopped by pedestrians who wanted to pet Hannah. I looked back. Hannah, who usually trotted along like a much younger dog, was having an arthritic stumble. She was showing, the way only a dog can, what is going to happen to us, the humans, in a few years. Dogs lead artfully compressed, illustrative lives that force us to acknowledge our own mortality. Hannah slowed to a crawl, and the rest of us took it down a few notches to match her gait. And something about the vulnerability of the moment, the stark realization that Hannah and the rest of us aren’t going to be around forever, melted my resolve into a puddle of pretense. All of a sudden it was as if I’d raised her from a puppy, watched and loved her at every juncture of her long life. It just didn’t matter that loving her was going to hurt eventually. Love comes with no insurance policy against pain. Love, by definition, means the opposite. We celebrated Hannah’s 15th birthday in April. Took a long walk in the Garden of the Gods. Except for the rare moment, Hannah remained fine, almost puppyish, until about a month and a half ago. She’s finding it harder and harder to walk now, having lost most control of her back legs. She often sleeps on the rug beside me while I write, Hannah finding comfort in another sedentary type. I watch her sleep and know it won’t be too long before she joins Mabel beneath pretty rocks across the branch. It is a rare privilege to know and love Hannah, even in these, her benedictory days. •
JOHNSON
To find out more about Rheta Grimsley Johnson and her books, visit www.rhetagrimsleyjohnsonbooks.com.