swvacsas2

In KY- for the Clintwood folks- - Hazard beat a really good Williamsburg team 7-0. Also in KY- Belfry downed Breathitt 41-20. Fairview beat Pikeville, Harlan County won, and Bell County lost. Hazard may make another run. Good to see some mountain teams alive over there. Had a chance to see the Hazard game streamed- the world has changed.

Voter fraud will exist as long as their are politicians and their partisans with ambition. The provision of free photo IDs would eliminate many possibilities of fraud not only in voting but also in many social welfare and licensing situations. It could help cut down on identity theft. Why would anyone oppose it? 1. Might turn up fake identity. 2. Might have an outstanding warrant. 3. Might expose welfare fraud. 4. Might turn up an illegal alien. 5. Might turn up a felon illegally trying to vote in some states. Just this year their have been charges of vote fraud in WV. It is not as common locally as it used to be, but it still exists.

The individuals I heard of at Alpha would be classed as office-support so probably nothing major.

Heard there was an additional Alpha layoff but have had no confirmation.

Sure did. Got a good shake in Pound.

Nothing wrong with IDs. Voter fraud does occur, I have personally witnessed or seen fraud in all of this five state area. SWVA was notorious for absentee ballot fraud. A distant cousin of my Mother's- Ebbie Combs from Russell County- was a Byrd organization stalwart. He served as circuit court clerk in Russell and was Democratic state chairman and also national committeeman. In his papers- I believe at UVA- one of his correspondents stated "Democrats could not win an election west of the Blue Ridge if it were not for absentee ballots." I may be a little off on the quote but I believe I am correct as to the exact wording. In 1948 the entire slate of officials elected in Dickenson County- '47 election- was removed from office for voter fraud. Might add they were all Democrats. It is only too easy for voter fraud to occur. I do believe photo IDs should be provided free of charge. . The courts have not looked favourably on states that do not provide free IDs. It is a form of poll tax to force people to pay for government required IDs. Nobody is being intimidated. The only people scared of photo IDs are people who have something to hide.

The Republican party has to come to terms with practical politics. Example: Great uncle's grandson- traditional Republican- cast his first vote for Eisenhower- moved to Ohio about '51. Has never voted Democratic until this year. He was a regular Republican voter until '92 when he went for Perot. He and the family worked in various manufacturing concerns until jobs started going overseas in the 90s. Got mad at the older Bush because of free trade and Bush's veto of the extension of unemployment benefits in the '92 recession. When Newt Gingrich helped Clinton get NAFTA through he became a certified Newt hater. A mortal and undying foe of free trade and business-banking deregulation. He will not vote for any candidate who supports unrestricted free trade. Many of the family have experienced layoffs, loss of insurance etc. When the house GOP- with concerns about the budget- took some of the actions they took on umployment benefits etc.- they were furious. Romney' positions on the auto bailout, the 47% comment, plus free trade killed him with these people. Romney's position on Chinese trade did not help him since he endorsed Latin American free trade. I pointed out that Obama had backed free trade- but he covered himself with them with his proposal to eliminate tax breaks for companies creating overseas jobs. They hate Americans for Prosperity and The Club for Growth. Needless to say they are not hostile to Obamacare- too many of them have lost insurance with the Midwestern jobs climate. Paul Ryan hurt with them. Republicans cannot elect a President without doing better in the Midwest. Until the party can get Midwestern voters back prospects are dim. We also have had problems since the late Reagan era with small farmers in much of the Midwest. A laissez faire conservative is pretty much dead in the water in that area, Ryan was a mistake. Marco Rubio would have helped tremendously. Ryan was too controversial, had too much baggage. This election was really about economic security. Voters in the Midwest, NV, CO, FL, etc. felt that Obama would give them that security- so he won. The cousin I mentioned from Ohio is pretty well informed, one of his last comments to me the other day was "I don't want to live in or see an Ayn Rand type America." Figuring out how to solve this problem is key to how Republicans survive.

According to SI both the Kiffins are on the hot seat. If he makes it through this year he may be gone next year if things don't improve.

Kiffin was the worst hire in the history of Tennessee. We were lucky he went when he did or we would have ended up with the death penalty.

A treaty with severe restrictions on private firearms would never clear the senate.

"Why can't a majority of the under age 30 crowd including the minorities in the U.S. not pay attention to the problems that are going on in Europe? Do they really think the U.S. is immune to those kinds of problems of over spending & hand outs?" Be hitting the fiscal cliff soon. Its just not under 30's and minorities that did Romney in. In the Midwest Romney did not get a big enough percentage of the blue-collar and lower-middle to middle-middle sector to win. Same happened in parts of VA. Truth of the matter is the countries in Europe in so much trouble- Greece and Italy etc.- do not practice Scandinavian style socialism. They spend money and dodge taxes, etc. You can keep a lot of programs if you adopt the Scandinavian model- 80% tax rates, little defense spending, and so forth. This is the model that a lot of the Obama supporters want. Have a cousin who went Obama and is infatuated with that brand of socialism.

Rap is the evisceration of civilization.

Hate to say but I feel its going to be 291-257 Obama. Romney will pick up 5 states from Obama- IN, NC, Fl, VA, and CO. Can't see him taking Ohio.

Think the key for Romney is the Philly suburbs. The city has been trending pretty bad for a long time. Chester, Delaware, Bucks, and Montgomery are the keys, You need to try to use those counties to break even or at least reduce the loss in Philly. This election is different because of the situation in the mining areas. These have been- along with Philly- the keys to Democratic wins in the state. Westmoreland, Greene, etc. in the SW usually roll up good Democratic margins. Same with Lackawanna, Lizern, Northampton in the NE. If these areas do not go Obama or if Romney breaks even- Obama will have to do as well or better than he did in the Philly suburbs in '08.

I believe PA could be as close or closer than Ohio. Romney has about as good a chance there- based on some of the better polls. Mining is more significant to the PA economy.

" There is no Union or Central High School yet. It's still PV and JJK until they're in a new school. It's a shame they had to change the name of those schools to accomodate a handful of morons in 3 towns. " " They should have been more organized about it all but the few morons did pretty much have their way with it. " This is not something I would like to discuss on this board- however, I feel compelled to answer, You seem to imply that only a handful of people in the three towns opposed consolidation- you could have meant that a handful wanted changes in colors etc.- I am not certain on that point- but the vast majority of the people in these communities opposed this project and still do. I was one of the strongest opponents of school consolidation in Wise County. Far from being moronic those of us who opposed consolidation are being proved true in every facet of our opposition, The proponents of consolidation were fiscally ignorant and in many cases downright liars. The claims made by the supporters of consolidation were: 1. School expenses would be reduced- there is not the slightest evidence of this nor was there any intention to reduce expenditures. 2. No tax increases would be needed to pay for the schools. An obvious falsehood. Those of us who opposed this were not only correct but we appear to be on target as to the extreme amount of the increases. 3. The schools would be a boon to economic development. This was silly to begin with- any benefits would accrue only to those areas the schools would be located in. 4. Academic performance would be improved. No evidence of this- though we shall see if new buildings make a difference. 5. There would be a plethora of new course offerings. This was stupid on the face of it- if your enrollment is declining you aren't going to have enough students for greatly extended offerings. The courses haven't happened and they will not ever happen. 6. The proponents of consolidation claimed that the smaller communities were imposing a greater fiscal burden on the larger communities in the taxes needed for the upkeep and operation of the schools. In reality this was the opposite- the three smaller communities furnish the bulk of county revenues. The sharp decline in the severance tax is driving this home. St. Paul alone will furnish at least 35% of all county property taxes. 7. It was claimed by the proponents that no significant loss in revenue would occur because of consolidation- this was again silly to begin with and exactly the opposite has happened. The loss of enrollment from St. Paul alone has wiped out a good portion of any savings. The problem the Wise County school system has and had is fiscal irresponsibility. They have sucked in huge amounts of money over the last several years with no thoughts of good management. No small rural school system can survive with a tax and spend mentality. None of the opponents of this scheme ever asked for school names etc. to be changed. The push for wasting money came from consolidation supporters, St. Paul is a good example- not a single person from St. Paul asked that Coeburn's colors be changed. At the meetings of consolidation opponents in Appalachia and Pound the subject was never brought up.

"Disturbing (to me, at least) is that the 9th has been steadily creeping northward. What I didn't say in my previous post is that eventually folks in Southwest Virginia may be choosing between one candidate from Roanoke and another candidate from Loudon County to represent them in Congress." You are right on target. Hurt's opponent is from Fauqier. Amazing that the 5th would already stretch that far. When I started hearing about politics and started taking an interest in it in the late 50's- SWVA from Roanoke to Cumberland Gap had 13 or 14 members in the House of Delegates- now we have half of that.

If the 9th continues to lose population expect either Bath and Rockbridge etc. or Franklin and Martinsville to be added the next census. You will probably see neither Goodlatte or Hurt put in the 9th District unless major changes occur in the legislature- providing they are still in office.

The 9th is not rated as a competitive district and I doubt any public polling has been done for several months, There may have been some private surveys done- but probably very few of those. Polling is expensive and unless a district is in play you don't get much money.

"Who will play the role of Ollie? " Forget Ollie- who will play Fawn Hall ? "Go google Herbert Hoover or James Buchanon" "Franklin Pierce, Millard Fillmore rank in the pantheon of wretched Presidents." Depends on who writes the history. Fillmore, for instance, was not all that bad. Pierce was not popular in the North but was very popular in the South- especially in this section. We really have been blessed in having very few really bad Presidents. No real fools in office- stupid men don't really get elected. Many of the so-called great Presidents are ones that I have disagreements with- respect the intellect but don't like the policies. One example is Wilson- another Lincoln- respect his intellect but I would have fought against him.

Latest Quinnipiac poll has Obama up 5 in Ohio. Think that may be a bit high- he is probably ahead by three or four. Romney is just not doing as well as one would think with blue-collar types and some of the rural vote.

" Losing this many jobs is really going to hurt the areas economy. And there could be a significant population shift downward to depending upon how many take jobs elsewhere... " The only saving grace on local population loss- there are no jobs elsewhere. Back in the late 50s and in the 60s I remember droves of people heading north to find work. Those jobs are gone. Skilled equipment operations can find work- far away work- oil patch in ND etc. Have heard a couple of miners discuss Australia. This is as going to be as bad as the 30s in this area unless the skid stops somewhere, sometime.

"This concerns me. Without Ohio, Romney must take CO, NV, NH and steal WI or IA. I think Romney may get 2 of those 5." The only one of those I feel good about is CO. NH will be the closest of the lot- but at this point I don't see Romney breaking out in any of them.

"I think people predicting a comfortable Romney win will be gravely mistaken. I think it's as much of a toss-up as 2000 was." You are correct. Have long been active in politics and believe that this will be as close or closer than 2000. This may be the first election where the Republican candidate wins the popular vote but loses in the electoral college. Romney must carry Ohio- and I am not optimistic about his chances there- depends on the blue-collar vote. Have relatives there and the vibes I'm getting aren't good.

From what I have been told the rule regarding size- larger schools not having to play smaller ones- is still in effect. This makes the Piedmont situation with Franklin County absurd. Small districts are close to useless in providing scheduling help for many schools. No district should have less than six schools. There will be inevitable problems in trying to mesh district and conference tournaments and regular season play in non-football sports. Our local school of myth and legend is a good example. Abingdon might play a basketball schedule composed of only Class 1 and 2 schools. This will leave them at a seeding disadvantage in a Class 3 tournament. "Haysi and Grundy can attest to the difficulty alot of schools have finding teams to play." Good point, If Grundy played a conference schedule and scheduled Hurley, Twin Valley, Haysi, and Honaker as non-district games they would be right at 9 football games- providing the aforementioned schools would still schedule them. Haysi might not be so well off, but if you add Clintwood, Castlewood, Eastside, and Grundy plus the Conference 47 schedule they are at nine. Most of those schools- if not all- would probably keep Haysi on their schedule.