Wanted: A modest Obama

By all accounts, Barack Obama's father, the Kenyan student studying in America, was cocksure and impressed with his own talents. The arrogance gene must be dominant. Obama clearly has it.

Democrat not sold on health care reform plan

I called Democratic Congressman Jim Marshall who represents Georgia's 8th Congressional District in Middle Georgia to check the status of health care reform currently lurching its way through Congress. I know what is being proposed. What I wanted to know was if this hydra-headed monster has a chance of passage. I had been told he was one person in Washington who would not give me the party line on this controversial issue. He would tell it like it is. And he did.

Water wars could divide region

If you're like me you can't wait till Southeastern Conference football starts back in the fall. Many people believe it just can't get any better than watching Georgia, Alabama, Florida, Tennessee and South Carolina duke it out on the gridiron.

Obama can't tell truth about health care reform

Barack Obama raised near-millennial expectations last year. If elected, he'd transform the dreary realities of Washington with his blazing freshness. He'd win over Republicans with his engaging post-partisanship. He'd solve long-standing national problems with his nonideological pragmatism.

Maybe Obama and I need to calibrate better

If comments made in this space have in any way angered, dismayed or caused dry heaves to anyone who has read them, it may be that I should have calibrated my words differently. I'll guarantee Barack Obama knows what I'm talking about.

State revenues are still tanking

The fiscal year '09 figures for Georgia's state budget are in and the news is concerning.

An ideologue in a hurry

When Barack Obama pilfered Martin Luther King Jr.'s line about the "fierce urgency of now," he wasn't kidding. The line has come to define his presidency. His legislative strategy moves in two gears - heedlessly fast and recklessly faster.

Miller is a hard dog to keep under the porch

This is my first column since my rotator cuff surgery and it hasn't been easy getting the words to come out the way I intended them to. My left hand is slower than a Georgia Income Tax return and my right hand is totally unsympathetic and hops across the keyboard like a bunny rabbit. What results are some newly-minted words that would feel at home in your basic Kazakhstani dictionary. My computer's spell-check has quit, saying life is too short to be looking up words like "jgoflnib" and "dopwrogz."

Public officials' private lives

Public officials' private lives

As happens every so often, we have recently been through a spate of embarrassing reports about the lives of prominent public officials. Adulterous affairs by Nevada Sen. John Ensign, South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford, and former presidential candidate John Edwards, entanglements in prostitution by Louisiana Sen. David Vitter and former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer - these are just the latest in a long line of revelations about people in whom the American voters once put their trust.

The rosy apocalypse

Barack Obama spent all of 2008 running against the sputtering economy, and warned earlier this year of a crisis "we may not be able to reverse." Yet, as the unemployment rate climbs beyond the administration's projections, Vice President Joe Biden informs us that the administration "misread how bad the economy was."

Kids are smarter than school critics

OK, you Neal Boortz Kool-Aid drinkers (including those who wrote to defend your boy and couldn't even spell his name correctly), I have a few questions for you:

Technology could help solve transportation woes

To buy and sell goods, make money and interface with others, humans relied on the horse and buggy back in the 18th Century.

Other opinions

Athlete McNair remembered for good, bad reasons

Avoid rental car surprises

Many folks plan summer vacations that involve a lot of driving. For those sticking close to home, gas and maintenance are usually the biggest car-related expenses. But if you're planning to rent a car at your destination, many other factors can influence the overall impact on your travel budget.

It shouldn't take years for city to act

"What I am saying is, we spend too much time, we waste time, the city's time that the people have us up here to do. We waste that time. We looked at it the first of October and November and December, we're still going over the same stuff. Why don't we go on and do what we're supposed to do? Get it approved and move on to the next issue that this council is supposed to be doing".

Congress' spending bill seems anti-conservative

When thinking about the $1.1 trillion spending bill passed by Congress last month, one might ask, "What does Congress have against conservation?"

Elder passes advice to great-grandson

Dear Cameron Charles Yarbrough: For the past 15 years, I have taken the opportunity at the beginning of the New Year to share some advice - first with your dad and his cousins and now with you, my great-grandson. I hope you don't mind and will bear with me. You probably would rather be playing with your Legos and I understand that but maybe something in this letter might make a difference in your life in years to come. I pray that will be so.

Wounded Warrior Project is like a scam

Editor, I've been seeing a lot more commercials for the Wounded Warrior Project on television recently, requesting that I send in my $19 per month.

Southerner's, welcome newcomers from start

A few years ago, the magazine I have long loved - Southern Living - changed. Like most Southerners, I have an aversion to change, which is why our traditions have such stranglehold. We never let go.

Rules hard to enforce on the road

There's nothing like a good, old-fashioned road trip to ensure that good parenting habits and ground rules are not only broken, but stomped to smithereens and tossed out of a (moving car) window.

Easy-to-keep resolutions for the environment

It is 2015, which means a fresh start for all of us. If you are looking for some realistic New Year's resolutions that you can really keep, here are my suggestions for habits that will be easy to incorporate into your 2015 lifestyle.