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BARROW JOURNAL
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2016
Opinions
“Private opinion is weak, but public opinion is almost omnipotent. ”
~ Henry Ward Beecher -
Downtown gridlock, Winder style
It’s well before 7 on a Friday morning
and the downtown Winder gridlock is in
full force.
As one pulls up to an intersection,
vehicle after vehicle rolls through. Every
so often an 18-wheeler rumbles by, or
tries to. It’s not daylight yet, and the line
of headlights never stop. Where they are
all coming from or going to
it’s hard to say. One thing is
for certain: they all seem
ingly need to go through the
downtown Winder area.
For those who don’t live
in Winder or drive through
on a regular basis, the traffic
situation here (nightmare is
a more accurate description)
can’t truly be understood or
appreciated. Most respond
with something along the
lines of, “It can’t be that
bad...can it?” or “You have to
be exaggerating.”
Unfortunately, it’s probably an under
statement if anything in describing just
how bad it is. It’s something one notices
after only one attempt to get through
downtown. While city officials deserve
some praise for making certain areas in
downtown more appealing to look at, the
traffic situation has only gotten worse with
each passing year.
We’ve had numerous mayors and
numerous city council members in my
time as a resident locally so the finger
can’t be pointed at one individual. One
previous mayor and I engaged in a back
and forth Letter to the Editor battle well
before this newspaper made its debut
as the one-time city official didn’t really
believe the traffic was as bad as I was
making it out to be.
Another former mayor flat out told me
once that “we don’t have a traffic problem
in downtown Winder despite the fact
you keep saying it.” This former mayor
hated this newspaper so I chalked his
comments up to not liking us more than
anything. I could have said the sky is blue
or up is the opposite of down and he
would disagree just because of who my
employer was.
Our current mayor has never contended
(that I know of) that we don’t have some
traffic issues that need to be addressed,
but some current council members don’t
like the fact that I continue to talk about
the issue and have told me as much.
I realize that the Winder City Council is
limited, to a degree, in what can be done
but there are avenues which can and
should be explored. Denials aside, traffic
in downtown Winder has reached critical
mass. It’s not about being impa
tient and not liking having to wait
for the red light to change three
times before being able to get
through an intersection. It’s not
about not having left turn lanes
or lights at most intersections. It’s
not about the train traveling at a
snail’s pace or, at times, coming
to a complete stop.
It’s actually about safety and if
nothing continues to be done,
then we are going to see more
accidents or worse as the months
and years pass. The reason?
When your road system is still set up the
same as it was seven decades ago, then
you can’t expect it to be able to handle the
amount of traffic it currently has.
• • •
A reader sent an interesting email
concerning a recent column in which
I commented on being amazed at how
many people are arrested locally during
a week’s time.
The reader commented that not all
of the arrests were “legitimate" and that
many of the charges are often dismissed
outright. That claim is certainly correct
and one that I have always thought about
when we list arrests.
Let’s be clear on this point: just because
a person is arrested doesn’t mean that
he or she is ever convicted of any crime
in a court of law. It only means that a law
enforcement officer at that time decided
to arrest someone. As the reader said,
many times the charges are dismissed,
often before it ever even goes before a
judge or jury.
There are often times that arrests which
we print seem, on the surface at least,
to be questionable and a waste of law
enforcement’s time.
Personally, I’ve always felt that any con
senting activity between adults or any
activity undertaken by anyone that does
not physically harm anyone else is not a
crime and should not be something law
enforcement needs to be involved with.
All it takes is a quick search on YouTube
to see any number of people being arrest
ed (and I’m not talking specifically about
local arrests) for things which, quite
frankly, really are not arrestable offenses.
For example, did you know at certain
places in Washington, D.C. it is illegal to
dance? I’m not kidding. It’s an absurd
law and clearly no one can be physically
harmed or robbed of private property
from this activity. Many people hold dem-
ostrations against this law and they are
arrested, often with such physical force
that you would think they must have just
committed armed robbery or assault.
Other times, there are people arrested
for preaching from the Bible. Yes, you
read that correct. A preacher on a side
walk reading from the Bible can be seen
placed in handcuffs and put inside a
police car and taken away.
And one of my favorites has to be in
some cities where it is illegal to feed the
homeless. Police actually show up and
arrest people who are simply trying to
help a person down on their luck for
whatever the reason may be.
While I don’t ever recall anyone being
arrested locally for dancing or preaching
or feeding the homeless, there are many
arrest reports which make little sense
in terms of why an arrest was ultimately
made. There are those who will tell you
law enforcement is a business (as the
emailer did) and if you don’t keep the jails
full then the amount of money alloted to
local departments might not continue to
be offered up from city or county officials.
One interesting place to our north is
Keene, New Hampshire where many
people fight against arrests for what they
term “victimless crimes.” These activists
are more than willing to be arrested and
go to court for things which most concur
should not be arrestable offenses. If a
judge decides to empose a fine, the defen-
dent will often refuse to pay it and tell the
judge to send them to jail instead. To me,
that’s somewhat of a steep price but it cer
tainly makes a point about questionable
arrests for victimless crimes.
Chris Bridges is editor of the
Barrow Journal. You can reach him at
cbridges@barrowjournal. com.
Lawmakers keep fighting the Civil War
tom
crawford
You may have the impression
that the Civil War ended sometime
around 1865, after the
Confederate armies
stacked their weapons,
the soldiers returned
to their homes, and the
southern states were re
admitted back into the
Union.
It would be entirely
reasonable to think that,
but in some areas of the
Georgia capitol it would
also be a big mistake.
Today, more than 150
years after Robert E. Lee
worked out surrender
terms with U.S. Grant at Appomattox,
battles continue to rage between some
of our state legislators over the late
unpleasantness and how it should be
remembered.
In Georgia and all over the South,
we’re still having squabbles over
the display of the Confederate bat
tle emblem and whether statues of
Confederate generals and leaders have
a rightful place in any public area.
The “general” in this latest conflict is
a balding, retired history teacher, state
Rep. Tommy Benton (R-Jefferson),
who has often displayed his fondness
for the “lost cause” of the Confederate
States of America.
During his 12 years in the House,
Benton has made numerous speeches
about historical figures of the Civil War.
“I think what they tried to do was very
noble,” he told one reporter in a typi
cal comment.
He also objected to the removal two
years ago of the statue of Tom Watson,
a notorious white supremacist and
anti-semite, from the front of the capi
tol building.
“You can’t pick and choose what
history you’re going to remember or
you’ll lose a whole bunch of your
past,” Benton said at the time. “Watson
was a racist and anti-Semite, but he
was also probably the most powerful
politician in Georgia for 25 years.”
Benton’s sympathies for the
Confederacy and its associated causes
have never been a secret to the capitol
crowd. But he now finds himself in
the middle of a raging controversy
for restating his well-worn opinions in
several media interviews last
week.
In the interviews, Benton
reiterated his belief that the
Ku Klux Klan “was not so
much a racist thing but a vigi
lante thing to keep law and
order... It made a lot of peo
ple straighten up. I’m not say
ing what they did was right.
It’s just the way things were.”
Benton also claimed that
the Civil War “was not fought
over slavery,” an assertion
that is not held by most seri
ous historians who’ve written
about that conflict.
Benton’s words aggravated a legisla
tive conflict that has been going on this
session with state Sen. Vincent Fort
(D-Atlanta), a black Democrat.
Fort has introduced a bill that would
prohibit the designation of any state
holidays honoring the Confederacy.
He and other black lawmakers have
said it’s time the state stopped paying
tribute to the Confederacy at Stone
Mountain Park.
Benton introduced a bill that would
require the reinstatement of Robert
E. Lee’s birthday and Confederate
Memorial Day as state holidays. He
sponsored another measure that would
preserve the Confederate memorials at
Stone Mountain Park.
Benton compared Fort to a Muslim
terrorist: “That’s no better than what
ISIS is doing, destroying museums and
monuments.”
Fort replied: “I’m not going to
respond to anyone who’s an apologist
for the Klan and for slavery.”
As a practical matter, neither
Benton’s bills nor Fort’s bill is likely
to pass or even make it to the floor for
debate. But their heated exchanges got
the war started again.
Nikema Williams, first vice chair of
the Georgia Democratic Party, accused
Benton of “spewing the kind of half
witted hatred that divides. Benton
should be ashamed and his party
should denounce him.”
Better Georgia, a progressive organi
zation, called for House Speaker David
Ralston to remove Benton from his
post as a committee chairman. “His
defense of the KKK ignores a grave
and dark history of violence and rac
ism in Georgia,” Executive Director
Bryan Long said.
Ralston has tried to downplay the
matter as just another disagreement of
the kind you often see between legis
lators. When asked if there were any
plans to remove Benton as a chairman
or change any of his committee assign
ments, Ralston’s spokesman replied:
“No changes.”
Similarly, I doubt there will be any
changes in the level of hostilities
among lawmakers. We’ve kept on fight
ing the Civil War for 150 years - why
stop now?
Tom Crawford is editor of The
Georgia Report, an internet news ser
vice at gareport.com that reports on
state government and politics. He can
be reached at tcrawford@gareport.
com.
Keeping meaningful
memories
I recently read through a journal I began keep
ing as a child. Most of the entries are general ram-
blings about school, books, recipes and movies.
Some are poems, or sketches, or short stories.
Some are clever, most are readable, and all of
them are embarrassing.
I’ve tried to keep a journal for most of my
life. Keeping a handwritten
journal helps me prioritize
my thoughts, because I put
more care into it than I
would in something written
on the Internet. I like to look
back through the years and
compare my writing style
and viewpoints. It helps me
recall the details of impor
tant days and reconnect
with the thoughts of my
younger self. And it gives
me a good laugh.
I’ve often wondered what
it would be like to go through
the journal entries of my ancestors, reading their
thoughts and opinions about the world. I’d like to
learn their priorities and what they thought was
worth being written down and remembered. I’d
like to know their beliefs and to hear their voices
in my mind as I read their words.
I don’t have access to many written records
from my ancestors, but I do have a collection of
old pictures. Most were taken on a porch with
family and children all around the yard. Some
were posed, some candid, and most of the faces
had smiles. These are my ancestors. This is the
only way I know them and remember them.
It’s not just the people in the picture that help
me connect with my family. Sure, I can point
out familiar faces; I can recognize the eyes and
smiles of my younger grandparents and other
family members in the pictures. But what better
describes my family is the chosen subject of the
picture...the people. When I look through saved
pictures - the ones that someone thought were
worth keeping - people are a constant. Someone
in the past valued my family members enough to
both take their picture and to save the picture and
pass it down through the generations.
Today, most of us have access to a camera at
all times. Whether we carry one with us, or use
the camera installed in our phones, we have an
increased ability to take pictures that past gen
erations did not have. We can visually document
the details of our day easier than we ever could
before. And access to digital photography and
social media has increased our ability to share
those pictures and to create an online scrapbook
of memories. We can also record and share our
thoughts and our journal entries online through
social media and blogs.
I sometimes take this for granted. Since I
have this seemingly unlimited ability to share
my world online, I don’t put as much care into
my words as I do when writing in my journal.
Similarly, I don’t take as much care when taking
pictures with a digital camera as I would if I were
relying on film. I wind up taking pictures of food
and flowers instead of family and friends. And I
wind up writing about nonsense online instead
of preserving the memories that mean the most.
Our words and pictures will remain online after
we are gone, giving our ancestors something
to look back on. We’ll leave behind well-docu
mented online accounts of our memories with
small details of our every day lives. These online
scrapbooks and journals will reflect our lives and
priorities and contribute to the future memory of
us. Hopefully, we can use them to preserve the
memories that mean the most.
Alex Pace is a reporter for the Barrow Journal.
She can be reached at apace@barrowjournal.
com.
Barrow Journal
Winder, Barrow County, Ga.
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