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Common Sense
The Progress
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ia
1 Page 4"
F February 23,2023
From the Staff
Making good neighbors
takes more than solid fences
By Dan Pool, Editor
dpool@pickensprogress.com
Poet Robert Frost gives a pretty full de
scription of the joys and perils of living in
the country in his poem Mending Wall,
which has the oft-quoted line, “good fences
make good neighbors.”
Admittedly I was not familiar with any
more of the poem than the famous line. But
taking the time to read it all, the theme is
more nuanced than simply needing a good
boundary with your neighbor.
Frost is a bit undecided about the neces
sity of a wall; are they walling something
in or out, he ponders. Fie also observes per
haps the fence’s usefulness has passed as it
was there to keep everyone’s cows in their
own pasture but neither he nor his neighbor
have livestock, and he jokes it’s unlikely his
apple trees will wander off.
Taking into account recent news in Pick
ens County, and if he were still alive and
had lived here, I would have called Mr.
Frost.
Me: Mr. Frost, first of all thanks for sub
scribing for so many years. If you have a
moment, I’d like to put your doubts to rest
about whether you need a fence on your
property line. Yes. Yes you do and probably
more than that.
Mr. Frost: Oh my. I wasn’t really offer
ing property management advice. You
know it’s symbolic.
Me: Maybe so. Newspaper guy here, not
that familiar with that. But have you been
reading the news? There seems to be con
stant conflicts between neighbors. It must
keep our planning office up at night.
Mr. Frost: Are people’s rock walls still
falling down because of the rabbit hunters?
That’s too bad. A good rock wall is a fine
thing to behold.
Me: Well not exactly. Up in Whitestone
there is a landfill that has an odor. Accord
ing to the commissioner, they are doing
everything they can to keep it neat and bury
stuff quickly but he says the sheetrock still
smells when it gets wet and people down
wind complain.
Mr. Frost: Well a rock wall will never
solve that. What else can be done?
Me: No quick solution springs to mind.
They are sending an inspector out. And then
there is this gun range on Jones Mountain,
run by the Pickens Sportsman’s Club and...
Mr. Frost: Oh I bet it’s an anti-gun
thing.
Me: No. Not at all. Pure noise. Neigh
bors say it’s like living next to a war zone.
And some fanners on the next property say
they get showered by shotgun pellets while
hoeing com.
Mr. Frost: Wow. That’s a good image.
Mind if I use it in a poem? And by the way
who is the sportsman? Maybe they can rea
son with him?
Me: Hmmm. I think they meant sports
men. There are 450 members. They have
been around forever but not as long as the
neighboring family.
Mr. Frost: Well the rock walls may stop
bullets but not sound. Maybe I’ll get back
to work on a new poem, “good land use de
cisions make all neighbors tolerable.”
Following my imaginary conversation
with the poet, I couldn’t help but think that
for anyone living in the proximity of an op
eration that is loud or smelly or creates a lot
of traffic or operates late at night with
bright lights (and for those who come in the
future), our current system of permits and
conditions have proven about as helpful as
a rock wall.
At planning commission meetings, you
hear the frustration in the neighbors of all
types of commercial properties. And, you
can see planning commission members
looking very uncomfortable when these is
sues are before them.
And often whether its an event venue or
business, there isn’t a middle ground. A
government has trouble imposing bound
aries on private property with businesses or
clubs. They can’t say, we’ll let you be here
but we don’t want you to be too successful
— have too many people or operate a lot.
A question left unanswered at the plan
ning commission meeting on the gun range
is what effect does the regular sound of
gunfire have on the value of the surround
ing properties? Surely they deserve some
compensation for the loss of peace and
quiet. For if they gave a full disclosure, they
would have a harder time selling.
As the community grows and we see
people packing in closer together, it is
clearly time to give these pursuit of happi
ness infringements some additional thought
and put codes in place stronger than rock
fences.
Tell us your thoughts with a letter to the editor. E-mail to news@pickensprogress.com
See letter submission guidelines on the Letters to the Editor page or call us 706-253-2457.
Senior Moments
Never satisfied
By Mary Migliaro
I watch a lot of HGTV, es
pecially the home makeover
shows. Lately, I’ve begun to
get irritated with the home-
owners when they are look
ing for a new home because
they never seem to be satis
fied. They always find some
thing wrong in a perfectly
beautiful home.
They immediately hone in
on the granite countertops be
cause they want marble, or
the bathroom with only one
sink in the vanity because
they want two sinks. I just
keep wondering why we
seem to never be satisfied.
The truth is, we're not
wired to feel content or satis
fied. Ever. There's a simple
reason for that: as expressed
by researchers for the Review
of General Psychology, “If
satisfaction and pleasure
were permanent, there might
be little incentive to continue
seeking further benefits or
advances.”
Perhaps we are not truly
grateful for what we have
now. We always want more,
better, and now. We should
stop to think of those who
don’t even have a house or
live in a house that is practi
cally falling down.
It seems that as a person
achieves more success, ex
pectations and desires rise in
tandem. The result is never
feeling satisfied, achieving
no permanent gain in happi
ness.
Has there ever been a time
when you had a nice car that
was fairly new but a newer
model came out with more
bells and whistles and you
just had to have it. You traded
your car in for the new one
and were ecstatic for a while,
but that feeling didn’t last.
Before long, you are dissatis
fied with something again,
whether it’s your car, your
house, or something else.
Don’t get me wrong, con
stant dissatisfaction with
yourself or your actions is ab
solutely unhealthy. But as the
famous saying goes, what
doesn’t kill you makes you
stronger. The same applies
with some mild feelings of
dissatisfaction.
I am beginning to practice
more gratitude in an effort to
be less dissatisfied and I’ve
found some tips that might
help you as well, if you feel
the need.
• Be satisfied with dissatis
faction. Once you reach a
certain point, your level of
happiness and satisfaction
will not increase by a large
amount. And you need to
leam that that’s okay.
• Is your dissatisfaction
with yourself or your ac
tions? Differentiate between
being dissatisfied with your
self and with your actions.
Too often, we associate our
self-worth with what we’ve
done. But remember that you
are not only defined by your
actions but by your reactions
to situations.
• Focus on what you’ve
earned. This might sound
cheesy but you will only be
satisfied when you are your
best self. And guess what?
Your best self will keep
evolving as you become bet
ter and better and gain new
skills and experiences.
Mary Migliaro is a Senior
Golden Girl who contributes
regular Family Matters arti
cles and Senior Moment
columns. She may be reached
at maiymigliaro@aol.com.
(USPS 431-820)
Published by Pickens County Progress, Inc.
94 North Main Street, Jasper, GA 30143
(706) 253-2457
www.pickensprogressonline.com
DAN POOL
Publisher/Editor
Published each Thursday at Jasper, Pickens County, Georgia.
Entered at the Post Office at Jasper, Georgia 30143
as Mail Matter of Second Class.
POSTMASTER: Send address changes to
PICKENS COUNTY PROGRESS, 94 N. Main St., Jasper, GA 30143.
One Year Subscription: $41.17 for residents of Pickens County
or the cities of Ball Ground, Fairmount, and Ranger;
$52.30 for all other Georgia residents; $62.32 out of state residents.
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Other Voices
Battling Big Tech's Advertising Monopoly
The following is adapted
from Rep. Ken Buck’s new
book "Crushed: Big Tech s
War on Free Speech "
[Submitted by Ga.
Press Association]
The first brilliant idea
Google founders Sergey Brin
and Larry Page had was to
“crawl” — and trawl — the
World Wide Web. Using spi
ders, it would copy what it
found, create vast databases
of web content, and then
“index” that content, evaluat
ing it for relevancy against
search queries. The logic
rules driving those relevance
evaluations are known as the
Google algorithm.
That algorithm is used to
return search results. Google
then launched its business
using other sites’ content.
And one of the primary reli
able content creators is news
papers.
In 2018, Google earned
an estimated $4.7 billion by
including links to newspaper
articles in its search results,
according to a study by the
News/Media Alliance.
Google doesn’t produce
any original news content;
earnings are primarily gener
ated by selling targeted ads
tied to its search results. This
means the content of news
articles — searchable words
and images — is directly
connected to driving ad sales.
According to the study,
news articles represented 40
percent of the links on search
results. Despite that, Google
did not pay a single cent to
newspaper publishers for dis
playing their content and
providing links to their sto
ries. In the last decade,
Google profits have skyrock
eted. Alphabet, the company
that now owns Google, re
ported revenues of $75 bil
lion in Q4 of 2021, of which
$62 billion was generated by
Google advertising.
By optimizing and selling
its ad vision, Google and its
Big Tech brothers have
stripped local newspapers
and magazines of the adver
tising dollars these commu
nity institutions rely on to
survive.
The papers have seen
their news-gathering budgets
slashed. This effectively si
lences speech within com
munities and shrinks the
marketplace of ideas at a
grassroots level.
The collapse of local
newspapers doesn’t end with
the loss of jobs and the elim
ination of important big news
stories.
The small stories that
unite communities disappear,
too. The coverage of church
events, town hall meetings,
local fairs, and local team
sports evaporates. These
types of stories help commu
nities define and cement
themselves. They are a bond
ing agent.
Ensuring our free press
has the financial strength to
operate and fulfill its role as
an unimpeded publisher of
information is critical to
keeping the marketplace of
ideas open. To counteract the
erosion of the press’s finan
cial stability, initiated in part
by Google and Facebook, we
need to allow the free press
to defend itself.
As crazy as it sounds,
newspapers and other news
providers are prohibited by
the antitrust laws from ban
ning together and negotiating
a deal with the monopoly
tech platforms. That, appar
ently, would be unfair — to
the monopolies!
You can’t make this stuff
up.
that I’ve championed would
lift antitrust restrictions
against small media compa
nies banding together to ne
gotiate. This will let
publishers negotiate and col
lect from the digital plat
forms that have greatly
profited from news organiza
tions’ work.
The proposal provides a
four-year safe harbor win
dow to hammer out terms to
recoup advertising and sub
scriptions from digital giants
who used news articles to
gather data.
Google and Facebook
don’t have any incentive to
negotiate with deserving
members of the media be
cause as it currently stands,
the monopolies get their con
tent for free and receive all
the revenue. The only lever
age that small newspapers
can have is to band together
and deny Google and Face-
book a large quantity of orig
inal content. But I hope a
legislative solution can be
crafted that allows a more
even negotiating position.
Ken Buck represents Col
orado s 4th Congressional
District.
WEATHER
By William Dilbeck
HI
LOW
RAIN
Feb.
14
64
37
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Feb.
15
57
48
.15
Feb.
16
67
45
1.76
Feb.
17
45
25
.00
Feb.
18
57
25
.00
Feb.
19
60
40
.00
Feb.
20
67
42
.00
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