Newspaper Page Text
The Braselton News
Page 4A
Wednesday, December 9, 2020
Hall County
Chamber, NGHS plan
COVID-19 webinar
The Greater Hall County Chamber of Commerce plans
a virtual community forum on COVID-19. Northeast
Georgia Health System is partnering with the Chamber
for this virtual session, planned Wednesday. Dec. 9, at
9 a.m. on Zoom.
The program, “Stay Safe and Healthy: Navigating
COVID-19 During the Holidays” is open to the pub
lic at no charge. The webinar will include the current
COVID-19 status in the community and instructions on
how to keep yourself, your business and your family
safe and healthy during the holidays.
To join the webinar, visit https://us02web.zoom.us/
meeting/register/tZcodeGgqTwiGNVbhGqHyoFO
mjvlUgkmhz90
On the program agenda is Dr. Zachary Taylor, Direc
tor District 2, Georgia Department of Public Health, Dr.
John Delzell Jr., Northeast Georgia Medical Center’s
VP of Medical Education, and Dr. Clifton Hastings.
Chief of NGMC's Medical Staff. Officials will discuss
COVID-19 spikes locally, testing guidelines and plans
for the anticipated COVID-19 vaccine.
For more information on Greater Hall Cham
ber programs and events, call 770-532-6206 or visit
GreaterHallChamber.com
COVID continued from 1A
people a false sense of security.”
While they are more readily available now than
they were at the onset of the pandemic, testing
supplies are still limited, and for most, there is a
two- to three-day wait for test results. To help you
navigate COVID-19 testing successfully, NGHS re
cently released the following information:
• When and where should I get tested if I
have been exposed? The incubation period for
COVID-19 is 14 days, and most patients show
symptoms between five and seven days after ex
posure. It is best to wait 7-10 days after exposure
- or earlier if symptoms appear - to be tested. Re
member, if you’ve been exposed, you should quar
antine following CDC guidelines. To find a testing
location near you, visit www.nghs.com/covid-19/
testing.
• Am I eligible for the rapid test? Symptom
atic first responders, healthcare workers and some
high-risk patients may get a rapid test depending
on availability.
• How long will it take to get my results back?
Rapid tests are processed in a matter of hours. All
other COVID-19 tests are sent out for processing
and returned within two to three business days
when the labs can keep up with demand. We have
seen surges in testing that caused additional delays
at area labs because there were simply too many
tests to keep up - and that kind of surge may be
possible if the numbers of cases in the community
continue to rise.
• Should I get a test before seeing family for
the holidays? If you can find a location with
enough supplies to accommodate testing for an
asymptomatic patient, it’s important to remember:
The test takes two to three business days to process.
You may still be exposed to or come down with the
virus at any time after testing. That’s why it’s still
important to take precautions and plan lower risk
activities like small events for just your household
or virtual gatherings so you can visit with loved
ones remotely.
“We know people are tired of hearing about wear
ing masks, washing hands and watching their dis
tance,” said Dr. Hastings. “Trust me. our nurses,
doctors and other staff are tired, too. But those are
the only actions that can limit the spread of the
virus. The entire spirit of the holidays is to think
about others first and doing whatever you can to
help them, so I hope everyone really takes that to
heart and protects the people they love the most.”
BRASELTON AREA
All four counties in the Braselton area have had a
higher average than the state in new cases over the
past two weeks (per 100,000 residents).
Jackson County remained the hardest hit over the
past two weeks.
Schools in the Jackson County School System are
closing in-school classes as of Wednesday, Dec. 9.
The system is moving to its online class model due
to an uptick in Coronavirus cases hitting the sys
tem.
In a memo to parents, superintendent April How
ard said the community spread rate is “dangerously
high” and that the system had suffered with high
numbers of staff absences.
Hall County was the second hardest hit over the
past two weeks.
Details include:
•Georgia: 448,683 cases; 9,007 confirmed deaths;
844 probable deaths; 42,925 new cases over the
past two weeks (396 per 100,000 residents)
•Barrow: 3,483 cases; 59 confirmed deaths; 435
new cases over the past two weeks (504 per 100,000
residents)
•Gwinnett: 39.375 cases: 513 confirmed deaths;
37 probable deaths; 4,209 new cases over the past
two weeks (433 per 100,000 residents)
•Hall: 13,329 cases; 199 confirmed deaths; nine
probable deaths; 1,349 new cases over the past two
weeks (654 per 100,000 residents)
•Jackson: 3,499 cases; 53 confirmed deaths; sev
en probable deaths; 505 new cases over the past
two weeks (676 per 100,000 residents)
Opinion
Virus of dumbassity infecting our political culture
The Coronavirus is surging in Northeast Georgia and
hundreds of people are getting sick, some are dying.
You wouldn’t know that, however, to see how many
people still eat in large groups inside at area restaurants
and go out into the public without a
mask. Saturday night, I went to pick
up a takeout order from a Banks
Crossing restaurant and the place was
packed with inside diners.
Are we a nation of idiots?
Apparently, we are.
I say that because of the crazy at
mosphere we now live in. We’ve gone
down a rabbit hole where reality no
longer exists, where fact is thought
to be fiction and where lies become
truth.
That’s the case with what people
believe, and don’t appear to believe, about Coronavirus
— and it’s true for what they believe about politics.
We believe what we want to believe, even if the facts
are totally different.
Coronavirus?
I’m more worried about the virus of dumbassity that’s
infecting our country.
• ••
Our politics is the most obvious example. Just look at
the perverted and perverse political culture stemming
from the defeat of President Trump on Nov. 3.
Trump got beat at the ballot box by legitimate votes,
but a lot of his supporters are convinced that the election
was “rigged.” or that it was “stolen” from him.
There is absolutely no evidence of election malfea
sance, but that lie is held up as truth by Trump and a
lot of his boot-licking associates. Social media amplifies
that lie into propaganda and a lot of naive people take it
as truth.
Let’s be blunt — Trump lost the election at the ballot
box and it wasn’t due to cheating or rigging. He just got
beat. If you believe otherwise, you’re wrong.
Despite that, the craziness has gotten so bad that Trump
is actually trying to have the courts and state legislatures
overturn valid election results and crown him president
by hat. He is attempting — unsuccessfully — to weap-
onize the courts and state governments to overturn legit
imate election results.
Here in Georgia, Trump has accused state election offi
cials — all Republicans — of rigging the election for Joe
Biden. who narrowly won the state. He has hied multiple
lawsuits attempting to have the election results changed
here and in other states. Those cases have been thrown
out of court as baseless.
Even worse, Trump attempted to have Georgia Repub
lican leaders, including the governor, call a special leg
islative session to throw out the election results and ap
point Republican electors to the Electoral College from
the state.
Gov. Brian Kemp and other state leaders refused to do
that, drawing Trump’s unending ire and tirades. (Kudos
to Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger for
not bowing to Trump’s assault on democracy.)
By any standard, what Trump is attempting to do in
Georgia, and in several other swing states, is nothing
more than a political coup — an attempt to grab power
by circumventing the will of voters.
Our nation has never seen anything like this before.
It’s insane. It’s not normal. It’s dangerous.
It’s dumbassity at work.
• ••
If you think all of this is just some grand game playing
out on the national stage and that it doesn’t affect you,
you’d be wrong.
The virus of dumassity has trickled down from the
White House to our houses.
We saw that last week at a meeting of the Jackson
County Board of Elections where its newest member, a
Republican, voted against certifying the county’s Nov. 3
election results.
Board member Jeff Hughes was overruled by other,
more sensible members of that board; but his single “no”
vote speaks loudly about how dumb our political culture
has become.
Before the vote was held, Hughes asked a lot of ques
tions about how the county matches signatures on ab
sentee ballots and about cell phones in the room where
ballots are scanned. He pretended to be “just asking
questions” when in reality, he was obviously airing out
talking points from Trump and conspiracy-laced web
sites.
Hughes knows how elections work. He was there on
election night and for the two recounts that were done
with the Nov. 3 ballots.
At that board meeting last week, he even made a point
of praising the county’s elections staff for how they han
dled the election.
Then he turned around, without any explanation, and
voted against certifying the county’s election results; all
election results for all races, not just the presidential race.
Those results includde the fact that Trump won Jack-
son County with 79% of the vote.
Hughes, in effect, voted against certifying results that
helped Trump.
Dumbassity.
• ••
Imagine what would have happened if other members
of the county elections board were as disconnected from
reality as Hughes.
If the board had voted against certifying the election,
then every single winning candidate on the ballot, in
cluding all county offices, would not be valid.
Jackson County wouldn’t have a sheriff as of Jan. 1,
2021 if Hughes had his way. Nor would we have any
judges or other county officials.
Hughes, of course, doesn’t care. He’s part of the mob
that wants to burn down the nation. It’s like the idea
during the Vietnam War that American had to destroy a
village in order to save it.
For Hughes and many of his colleagues, if an election
don’t go the way they want, then just throw a bomb into
the ballot box by not certifying the results.
The truth is, however, that Hughes’ effort to block the
county’s election results was a middle finger to every sin
gle person who voted in Jackson County (over 37,000
voters.)
It was a knife in the back to the county’s elections staff,
which did a damn good job of running an election under
extremely trying circumstances in 2020.
Hughes’ vote was a baseless attack on our electoral
system.
Dumbassity.
• ••
That action wasn’t the only odd thing at the election’s
board meeting.
In a highly-unusual move, the board refused to call for
a March election for a school SPLOST vote.
That’s never happened before in Jackson County.
The vote was tabled technically because the draft refer
endum had a typo and because board members only got a
copy of the referendum just before their meeting.
But make no mistake, that was just the surface reasons.
The underlying reason for the delay was due to a com
plaint aired by Republican board member Larry Ewing,
who was obviously opposed to the whole idea of a school
SPLOST vote in March.
Ewing complained that the referendum should have
been held in conjunction with the Nov. 3 election to pre
vent the cost of a separate special election. He was also
critical of the overall idea of a SPLOST, questioning why
the county’s three school systems needed the money.
Typically, when local governments, including school
boards, call for SPLOST referendum elections, they do
that outside of big general elections. Lower turnout helps
SPLOST votes pass since there is often little organized
opposition to referendums, but there is often a strong or
ganized push by the governments asking for the funding.
So calling for a referendum in March is certainly a stra
tegic move by the county’s three school systems. Local
systems have a pressing need to build additional facilities
to accommodate growth and they want the SPLOST vote
to pass.
That is either smart, or manipulative, depending on
your point of view.
But for the board of elections, none of that should be
an issue.
It’s not up to elections board members to determine the
merits of a proposed referendum called by school boards,
or by any other local government.
Nor is it up to election boards to pass judgement on the
strategy of calling special elections.
The board of elections oversees elections, not public
policy. Ewing’s vocal attack on the merits of the referen
dum was above his pay-grade — that’s not for the board
of elections to decide. If people don’t like it, they can
vote it down.
• ••
We’ve long heard complaints about “activist” judges
who use the courts to legislate and overstep their bounds.
But what about activist election board members who
overstep their authority out of personal or partisan ide
ology?
Have we come to a point in American politics where
the end justifies the means?
Hughes was wrong to vote against certifying local
election results. If he had reason to believe the results
were wrong, then he should have laid his cards on the
table.
And Ewing was wrong to inject his personal feelings
about the merits of a proposed SPLOST during a discus
sion over calling for an election. That wasn’t his job.
It’s all poisonous political water flowing downhill from
our national political culture, a culture that has become
infected with the virus of dumbassity.
Mike Buffington is co-publisher of Mainstreet Newspa
pers. He can be reached at mike@mainstreetnews.com.
The Braselton News
Mike Buffington Co-Publisher
Scott Buffington Co-Publisher & Advertising Manager
Alex Buffington Editor
Ben Munro Sports Editor
Wesleigh Sagon Photographer/Features
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