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[Kamikaze] You Got This One Right
I have been a staunch supporter of Ward 6 Councilman Marshand Crisler's "Buy Jackson" campaign. Based on the fact that I helped spearhead a movement to get folks to better support our local artists, I thought it was high time that someone took a stand; a circling of wagons was long overdue. Though some will disagree, I'm ecstatic that the City Council has shown some cantaloupes in adopting a "stay in Jackson or lose our business" stance. The council recently rejected three low bids for services from out-of-town companies. Preference will be given, they say, to local businesses.
[Gregrory] Plight Of A Sports Widow
I hate sports so much that I purposely avoid the sports category any time I play Trivial Pursuit because there is a 90 percent chance that—unless the answer to the question is "David Beckham in his underwear"—I have no idea about the correct response.
Johnson Slams Commission
Jackson Mayor Harvey Johnson Jr. opposes part of a new state law allowing the city to levy a 1-percent sales tax increase on some businesses' sales. The tax, which would fund infrastructure repair, does not apply to retail sales of food at grocery stores and restaurants, or hotels or motels.
Voters to Question Politics Beyond Sound Bites
Jackson residents are trying to bring a Neshoba County Fair-style festival to Jackson this month in hopes of circumventing piecemeal, sound-bite political coverage of upcoming races.
Bond Proposal Triumphs
To the astonishment of naysayers (and some supporters), an overwhelming majority of Jackson voters approved the recent $150 million Jackson Public Schools bond issue. Like the Convention Center bond proposal passed in 2004, the school bond issue required 60 percent approval citywide. It got 81 percent of the vote.
‘Massive' Pre-Existing Condition
Since the age of 2, Madeleine Kelly-Kellogg, now 7, has gone through three surgeries to remove a benign brain tumor. After the first surgery Madeleine lost all ability to function on the right side OF her body and underwent two months of therapy to learn how to walk and speak again.
BREAKING: Judge Won't Rule on Melton Health Today
Full JFP Melton Archive/Blog
District Court Judge Dan Jordan's office has confirmed that he will not rule on Mayor Frank Melton's ability to stand trial next week until Wednesday morning. According to an order, Jordan will "conduct a confidential telephonic conference with all parties" at 8:30 a.m. on New Year's Eve to get the medical opinion of Dr. J. Murray Estess Jr., appointed by the court to comment on Melton's medical condition. He will then issue an order. Read Dr. Estess' vitae here.
Exercise: Work or Luxury?
The catalyst for New York artist Claudia DeMonte's art is a perfect balance between the internal world of ideas and the external world of possessions. Through her collection, "The Luxury of Exercise: Small Sculpture and Works on Paper," she not only expresses the struggles of women but also their blessings.
First black woman to serve as representative of Ohio dies
Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones died of an aneurysm Wednesday. She was 58. From CNN:
Post Offices Safe Until May 15
The U.S. Postal Service is in what one might call a tough spot. Since people learned how to pay bills online, parents learned how to tweet baby pictures and companies discovered pop-up ads, the centuries-old agency has tried to cope with lowered revenues by raising stamp prices, moving services online and making cuts.
Stop the ‘Boys Will Be Boys' Attitude; It Kills Women
As we approach Chick Ball weekendstarting with a poignant one-woman show about a victim of domestic abuse and ending with a celebration of women and their artI urge everyone to think back to September 2007 when Doris Shavers and Heather Spencer were brutally murdered by men who had supposedly loved them. The JFP did a detailed investigative narrative within days of those murders that showed that domestic abuse happens in all neighborhoods to all income levels, it a pattern that needs to be stopped, and is often not taken seriously by law enforcement (shown poignantly by documents in the story we obtained that showed how authorities mishandled the case after George Bell nearly killed Heather Spencer just weeks before he finished the job).
[Rev] Lady Driver
Hey! Truckers don't like to be called truckers. I know because I had the pleasure of interviewing Suzie Baxman about her experiences as a driver—a lady driver. She's done long haul and local driving on and off for the past 30 years, driving a 1945 Diamond Rio, a yellow school bus, and her current ride, a 1984 Peterbilt 359 with a dump box on the back!
[Tisserand] Throw Us Something, America
The silence can be terrifying. Not just the silence that still shrouds so much of greater New Orleans—the silence of neighborhoods on the brink, homes and schools empty, stores shuttered, communities scattered, friends out of touch.
You Can't Imagine
I was enjoying my late morning leisure. The kids were in school, and Kitty was at her office. This was Tom Time. I was nestled into the sofa, Café Cubano in one hand and TV remote in the other, toggling back and forth between MSNBC and The Food Network.
Bill Minor on the Willie Morris Library
I just ran into Mr. Minor's column about the Willie Morris library dedication. And I'm honored that he repeated what I told him at the dedication in it. The Jackson Free Press is also honored that Mr. Minor has offered us the use of his long-time desk in the media room in the Capitol this legislative session. We'll do our best to deserve to sit in it!
CNN Money Wants to Hear from Jacksonians on Inauguration
All, CNN Money editor Amy Haimerl -- a very good friend of mine and the JFP -- is working on CNN Money's "real people" galleries. In advance of the inauguration, she is looking for people with good ideas about how Obama can help common Americans in these trying economic times. What should he do to fix the economy? What should he leave alone?
‘Passing the Trash'
Good job of reporting on that "Herding the Homeless" piece (volume 7, issue 29). I used to be a journalist, and I appreciate a clean, straight-forward story. But for years now, I've worked with the homeless. Thought you might like to know that people on the street refer to this herding concept as "passing the trash."
WTF Is Zoogma?
Zoogma. It's a word that on the surface doesn't make a whole lot of sense. To some people, the word represents absolutely nothing. To others, it's a misspelling of the literary device Zeugma, a Greek word meaning "to bond." And to an increasing number of people, it's a guaranteed good time on a Saturday night.
‘Get Lost While You Can Still Be Found'
On Circus of the Seed's somber, fan-favorite track, "Rain," vocalist and trumpeter Stephen Phillips sings, "I hope that you can swim so that you don't drown/My broken heart is going to flood this town/You better get lost while you can still be found."
Beauty, Pain of Womanhood
Sometimes when people find that the play "For Colored Girls..." is going to be performed in their town, they think of the Tyler Perry adaptation. "I already saw the movie," they think. Perhaps they didn't like it and assume they won't like the choreopoem play either. But like the song by Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell says, "Ain't nothing like the real thing."