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Columns

  • A killer is lurking near you

    A killer once stalked me, almost snuffing out my young life.

    The deadly force didn't lurk around corners, sneaking quick peeks or huddle outside the shrubs in front of my house - watching, waiting.

    This frightening phantom was hiding inside my chest, little by little, growing over many years.

    It was coronary heart disease.

    The dreaded slayer takes more lives than any other disease in the U.S., and it had my number.

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  • Facebook keeps us in touch

    My cell phone rang just after 7 Sunday evening. By habit, I glanced at the screen, but I didn't recognize the number.

    "Hello?"

    The voice on the phone was one I hadn't heard in nine years. It belonged to a high school friend with whom I had lost touch. For the next hour, we caught up with one another's lives. We hung up with a promise to not lose touch again.

    How did she find me?

    Facebook.

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  • No power not as bad as we thought

    I'm spoiled, I'll admit it. I like a hot shower, clean clothes, fresh coffee, warm food, lights, heat, television, Internet and phone service. And I don't like doing without those things.

    But I don't imagine I'm the only person like that. Especially lately.

    With last week's ice storm, our family had to do without. But we weren't the only ones, and many were - and still are - in worse shape.

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  • A digital delay in the airwaves

    With less than two weeks to go before the switch, Congress has voted to delay the transition to digital TV until June.

    Whew!

    It's nice to see that our federal government is still tackling the big issues. Sure, people are losing their jobs, families are being forced out of homes they can't pay for and businesses are shutting their doors, but we all know nothing is more important than TV.

    The rationale is that people haven't had time to prepare and that the federally funded coupon program has run short of cash.

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  • This is not the stimulus bill that America needs

    For several months I’ve heard from many Kentuckians who have told me how this economic crisis has hurt them and their families. Too many people are out of work. And too many are worried about paying for health care, education or the mortgage.

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  • No government ‘of the people, by the people and for the people’ when it comes to expansion of gambling

    On Lincoln’s birthday, when we remember his heroic words at the Gettysburg battlefield, that government of the people, by the people and for the people shall not perish from the earth, the members of the Kentucky House of Representatives serving on the House Licensing and Occupations Committee are acting in direct contradiction to those great words.

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  • Mother Nature tests our resolve

    For the second time in just six months, Mother Nature has again tested our resolve. The destructive winds that swept across Kentucky in September have been replaced by snow, ice and bitter cold. Although very different storms; the end result is much the same.

    A record number of Kentucky families are again without power, homes are damaged, lives have been lost and Kentucky is in a state of emergency. My thoughts and prayers are with the more than 600,000 families who lost power in the wake of this devastating winter storm.

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  • It's hitting us where it hurts

    I'm not sure where it started, but I'll be glad to see it end.

    The downturn of the economy has everyone tightening their pocketbooks and pausing before we spend our hard-earned paychecks.

    I have discussed this very issue with several people, who all, like me, seem to have no idea just where the economy went sour. What exactly happened that has trickled down to making people fear they won't have a job much longer?

    Why have property sales slowed? What caused the stock market to plummet?

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  • Raising the minimum wage in hard times

    The federal minimum wage was not enacted during good times, but during the extraordinarily hard times of the Great Depression. When it was established in 1938, the unemployment rate was still 19 percent.

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  • Let's not go there ... on Sundays

    I voted "no" last year to alcohol sales in Campbellsville. I was, and will likely always be, against the sale of alcohol in our town.

    I understand the reasons people have given to approve the sale of alcohol in our town, but I honestly think the reasons against it are more convincing and protect the sanctity and peace of our community.

    But that's not really what this column is about.

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