Below is the OCR text representation for this newspapers page.

(51?e Ahuattce The ADVANCE, September 7, 2022/Page 7A A free press is not a privilege but organic necessity in a great society. -Walter Uppmann COMMENTARY out of CONTEXT A compilation of quotations on a variety of issues by national, state and regional writers, well-known personalities, just plain everyday people and from various publications collected by the editors of THE ADVANCE. Quotes for our Times: Monica Showalter, writer for American Thinker: Biden's unconstitutional and delu sional decrees, mandates, and orders. The American Constitutional Rights Union's Committee to Support and Defend has cre ated a hotline where members of our mili tary can tell their stories. I encourage you to reach out to 877-730-2278. The stories we've heard so far are horrific. Is there any wonder why recruitment and retention in the military are lacking? I would have never believed that we would see such hatred towards those who serve us and support and defend the Constitution. Then again, it all makes sense — those called to defend our Constitution are the big gest enemies of the leftists in America. Those of us who love the Constitution and our rule of law must be the voice for those, such as the unborn and our military service men and women. We must protect them from this law less administration's unconstitutional and de lusional decrees, mandates, and orders. Rebecca Downs, Web Editor at Townhall. com: Very bad news for Stacey Abrams. Particularly telling for Kemp is that a ma jority of his donations have come from Geor gia, while a significant amount of Abrams' donations are coming from California. Axios published a helpful chart last week. That Axios report where the chart is in cluded noted that "If the trend holds, Abrams would be the only Georgia gubernatorial nominee from either party since at least the 1990s to receive a majority of campaign funds from out of state, according to an Axios analysis of campaign finance records." Guy Benson, Townhall.corn's Political Edi tor, Fox News contributor, and author: Stacey Abrams: My radical abortion stance is rooted in free will, given to us by God. Unless I've missed something, and I doubt I have on this, Abrams' abortion stance is the same extremist position that her national party has nearly universally embraced. Their view is that there should be zero limitations on abortion whatsoever, meaning legalized elective abortion-on-demand, all the way to the moment of birth, for any reason, financed by taxpayers. This is an appalling view, and a deeply unpopular one. Abrams, who has ma jor ambitions, has adopted this radical line, as demanded by major donors, hardcore activ ists, and the deep-pocketed special interest groups in the abortion lobby. It's grotesque on the merits, as far as I'm concerned, but it's particularly odious being wrapped in the ve neer of religious faith. Eric Utter, writer for American Thinker: Pe ter Strzok says Russia might have tried to infil trate Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence. But anything is possible. Maybe the DOJ should send Hunter Biden, Hillary Clinton, and Eric Swalwell to Mar-a-Lago to help investi gate. A crack team to get to the bottom of this Chinese puzzle of deception and intrigue! We know Hillary and Hunter worked with "for eign agents," so they know what to look for. As previously mentioned, it's possible that a for eign agent infiltrated Strzok's soul. (Possibly his phone, as well?) And a foreign agent named Fang Fang apparently infiltrated Swalwell's pants. But I'm sure none of them shared any classified information. Write Us A Letter Have you a gripe? How about a compliment for someone for a job well done? Let us know about it with a letter to the editor. We urge anyone to write us about any subject of general public interest. Please limit all letters to 250 words double spaced. All letters must by signed, but we may withhold the writer's name upon request. Please write to us at The Advance, 205 E. First St., Vidalia, GA 30474 or email: theadvancenews@ gmail.com (Subject Line: Letter to the Editor). Republicans Can’t Run and Hide on Abortion The Republican Party only had about a half-century to prepare for the end of Roe v. Wade yet is still scared and confused now that the late, unlamented decision is no longer with us. It may be that the media is exaggerating the extent that the Dobbs decision has changed the trajectory of the midterms, but there is no doubt that it has energized Democrats and that pro-lifers suffered a signal defeat in a Kansas referendum in early August. Some Republicans seem to think they can run and hide from the issue, a cowardly tack that won’t work. To the extent that Republicans are vague and non-responsive, Democrats will eagerly fill in the gaps with Handmaid’s Tale-level dystopian accusations of extremism. Other Republicans apparently believe that they can act as if it is still the pre- Dobbs world when staking out maximalist positions — for instance, bans with no exceptions for rape or incest — had no significant downside because such proposals would never take effect. No more. Most places, this is politically deadly overreach. The answer here is, to paraphrase Ronald Reagan, simple, if not necessarily easy. Pro-life Republicans should say that they ultimately seek sweeping protections for unborn life but realize that they have to do much more public persuasion and, in the meantime, support a compromise proposal of some sort, say a gestational limit of 15 weeks. For pro-lifers, this falls painfully short. But it would be in keeping with the trajectory of successful past campaigns of moral and social reform — settle for progress in the right direction, occupy politically defensible ground, and then advance over time. Meanwhile, abortion restrictions are under assault for allegedly not providing broad and clear enough exceptions for the health of the mother. In a viral video out of South Carolina last week, a Republican state representative said he regretted voting for a heartbeat bill, banning abortion after about six weeks, after he heard an excruciating story of a 19-year-old denied care for her miscarriage. According to Rep. Neal Collins, a doctor told him the usual standard of care would have potentially involved removing the fetus immediately. But the heartbeat bill supposedly prevented that, and the woman went home to expel the fetus on her own and assume enormous health risk. The South Carolina law, though, like most such restrictions around the country, stipulates that the prohibition “does not apply to a physician who performs a medical procedure that, by any reasonable medical judgment, is designed or intended to prevent the death of the pregnant woman or to prevent the serious risk of a substantial and irreversible impairment of a major bodily function of the pregnant woman.” This should have been ample warrant for the young woman to get the appropriate care (and she did end up returning to the medical facility for the requisite treatment). This looks like a case of a bad reading of the law causing unnecessary medical distress and creating a horror story with considerable political resonance. In a paper on health exceptions, the pro-life Charlotte Lozier Institute notes: “It would be prudent for state medical boards, state medical societies, state boards Please see Lowry page 9A GRITTY Government the Problem, Not Solution, on College Costs No sooner had President Joe Biden announced his plan for student loan debt forgiveness — $10,000 for non-Pell grant recipients and $20,000 for Pell Grant recipients — the president of the NAACP was complaining that it should be more than twice as much. At least $50,000. Brookings Institution scholar Andre M. Perry echoed the sentiment. The plan, according to Perry, “does not go far enough in addressing the root of the problem: a postsecondary education system that has seen tuition rise three-fold in the last 30 years. That same system will put future borrowers in peril.” We have a problem here known popularly as the chicken and the egg. Do we need to pump a lot of tax money into higher education so students can afford to deal with runaway tuition costs? Or do we have runaway tuition costs because we’re pumping billions of taxpayer funds into higher education? A picture of the stark reality of way- out-of-line tuition costs is provided by blogger/economist Mark Perry where he shows relative price increases of various goods and services from 2000 to 2022. From January 2000 to June 2022 the overall rate of price increases — the average of all goods and services — was 74.4%. But over the same period, the increase in the costs of college tuition and fees was 178%, and the increase in prices of college textbooks was 162%. More than twice the average rate of inflation. The prices of new cars, household furnishings and clothing were unchanged Please see Star page 9A By Star Parker Those Terrifying Boogers From the time I could walk to the time I went off to college, I lived in per petual fear of something my Aunt Gloria referred to as a Booger. The term Booger does not refer to the nasty dried mucus that lines the inside of a nostril. No — in this context, a Booger is a monstrous imaginary figure. It is a Bugbear, a Bogeyman, a creature that lurks in the shadows, hides in closets, under beds, and every other place where my childish imagination hid monsters. My Aunt Gloria and Grand mother Jarriel had filled my head with Booger tales, purely designed to scare me into a state of compliance. They would warn my cousins and me not to wander too far away from my grandmother’s house, adding a string of intimidating words, “If you wander too far away, a Booger will get you!” And I believed them. I lived my entire childhood being terrified of Boogers, even though I did not know what a Booger looked liked, what a Booger smelled like, where a Booger lived, or what a Booger ate, al though my aunts and uncles implied that they ate unruly children. What I did know was that they were clever, unpredictable creatures who at any point during the day or night, might sprint out of the woods and grab me, so I was always on alert — always on the lookout. I certainly didn’t want to die at the hands of a Booger! It probably didn’t help matters that my cousins and I made up a game called “The Booger Game.” After the sun went down, one of us (the desig nated Booger) would hide in Grand mother’s dark, rurally-isolated yard, while we seekers closed our eyes and counted to fifty. Then, we seek ers would hold hands in a chain, skip around the yard, and sing and chant: There ain’t no Boogers out tonight! Grandma killed them all last night! At the point where we would skip close to the hidden Booger, he (or she) would leap from the shadows and chase us around the yard, all the while screaming like a South Georgia wild cat and grabbing at us. We raced for the safety of my grandmother’s poured concrete steps, hearts pound ing like African drums in response to the unadulterated, indescribable fear. We would play this game for hours, because interestingly enough, be ing frightened to the point that we needed a defibrillator to revive each other was the greatest fun that any one could ever imagine. Why do children love to be scared here and there? Why did I? I’m not sure. I loved Scooby-Doo because the show made my heart beat a little faster. Sitting on the edge of my seat, I watched as the mummy chased Fred, Daphne, Velma, Shaggy, and Scooby- Doo through the creepy, old cartoon house. I slapped my hands togeth er just under my chin and prayed, “Please God, let them get away. Just let them escape.” Back then, I was a bona fide scaredy cat — scared of the dark and scared of my own shadow. Watching television shows fed my fears with morsels of mummies, vampires, were wolves, zombies, and other horrific creatures. After seeing The Wizard oj Oz, I was scared of tornadoes, flying monkeys, crystal balls, and wicked witches. Rod Serling’s Night Gallery made me scared of statues that come to life at night and follow you around your house. Twilight Zone reruns made me scared to fly, terrified that a wild and wooly beast would perch on the wing of the plane and dismantle the lift flaps and engines until the air craft failed and fell from the sky like a boulder. Today, my belief that good al most always triumphs over evil brings a freedom and fearlessness to my world, and like butter, my childhood fears have slowly melted away with Please see Amber page 10A : rom the Porch By Amber Nagle