Newspaper Page Text
PAGE 4A
THE BANKS COUNTY NEWS
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 2008
Editor: Angela Gary
Phone: 706-367-2490
E-mail: AngieEditor@aol.com
Website: www.mainstreetnews.com
Opinions
“Where the press is free and every man
able to read, all is safe.”
— Thomas Jefferson
Things aren’t always
what they seem
T he other night I got out of bed around 2
a.m. to get some water. As I walked down
the hallway, I felt something brush up
against the side of my face. With another next step
I felt it again, this time on my forehead. I screamed
and ran to the nearest light switch.
After waking up everyone in the house, I quickly
saw what I thought was trying
to reach out to get me — curl
ing ribbon! One of the chil
dren had received a bouquet
of balloons earlier in the day.
Although they had been left it in
the den, a ceiling fan in a near
by room had coaxed the bal
loons down the hallway, where
one by one they were staggered
against the ceiling.
The long strings dangling
from above had brushed up
against my face as I passed by
each one. Needless to say, it was a creepy feeling,
especially when unexpected during the middle of
the night!
When I was a youngster, I remember playing a
game at school in which you had to put on a blind
fold and reach down into a brown paper bag and
pull out an object. Without looking, just by touch
you had to guess what the item was.
There were objects such as seashells, feathers,
rocks and leaves in the bag. However, one time
when we were playing the game, someone in class
had the nifty idea of sneaking a lizard into the bag.
Guess who was first in line to play that day? After
all of the excitement passed, the whole class ended
up begging to take turns petting the terrified little
creature.
Many times when the unexpected takes us by
surprise, we don’t quite know just how to respond.
Many times we overreact and later realize that it
wasn’t as bad as it seemed, after all.
Like with the balloons. Instead of staying cool,
I panicked and woke the whole family up with
my jumping and screaming. If I had only held my
breath and quickly tiptoed to the light switch, I
would have probably been laughing when realizing
that it was only a loosely tied bouquet of pretty
balloons that had caused the scare. This was just
another reminder that we as humans are guilty of
quickly jumping to conclusions, when many times
things aren’t always what they seem.
sherri
Stephens
Sherri Stephens is a contributing columnist for
The Banks County News. She may be contacted at
charmbug5@hotmail.com.
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The Banks County News
Founded 1968
The official legal organ of Banks County, Ga.
Mike Buffington. .
Scott Buffington . .
Angela Gary
Chris Bridges . . . .
Sharon Hogan. . . .
Anelia Chambers .
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Co-Publisher /Ad. Manager
Editor
Sports Editor
Reporter
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Church News
Phones (all 706 area code):
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Homer Office Fax 677-3263
Sports Fax 367-9355
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The ongoing Georgia-Tennessee border war
E very once in a while, a crisis
comes along that tells you
everything you need to know
about the character and courage of our
elected leaders. When circumstances
collide to create a situation where only
tough trade-offs and compromises
offer the chance for a real solution to a
problem, that’s when you can see if the
people we have entrusted with elected
office are up to the task. Anyone can
pass laws or manage state agencies
when everything is humming along. It’s
when leaders are in a position where
they have to make someone mad to
solve a problem that we learn if they’re
really worthy of the power we’ve given
them.
Georgia’s water crisis is the most
recent test of our elected officials’ seri
ousness of purpose and courage, and
they have so far failed miserably. Last
year we had Gov. Sonny Perdue throw
ing tantrums about Alabama, Florida
and mussels in the Apalachicola River.
He led a prayer vigil (duly publicized
by his press office) for rain on the steps
of the State Capitol. Our governor has
essentially viewed the greatest natural
resource crisis in Georgia’s modern his
tory as a personal public relations issue
and has focused on generating news
stories that deflect attention from his
failure to address the problem.
Even the water-planning legisla
tion Perdue recently signed is little
more than a talking point that allows
him to tell us he’s “doing something.”
The water plan passed by this year’s
General Assembly is so watered down
(no pun intended) that it really isn’t
anything more than a plan to get a plan
to solve the crisis at some point in the
future.
It does nothing to actually put into
place a system to ensure that the grow
ing metro Atlanta region plans for the
future by both conserving water and
finding new sources of it. Doing so
would risk Perdue angering his friends
among the big
developers who
have funded his
campaigns and
provided him with
chances to get
rich on land deals
during his time
in the Governor’s
Mansion.
This past week,
Sen. David Shafer,
R-Duluth, pro
vided us with the
latest diversionary publicity stunt of
our water crisis. Shafer introduced a
bill, which is now moving through the
General Assembly, to shift northward
the Georgia-Tennessee border so that
a small part of the massive Tennessee
River flows through Georgia. That
would presumably allow the state to
build a water pipeline from that big
water source to feed expanding metro
Atlanta’s need for water.
The bill is based on the fact that a
fellow named James Camack, who was
trying to survey the border in 1818
with primitive instruments and among
warring Indians, apparently made a
miscalculation that led to Georgia’s
border being a bit too far south, and
consequently missing the Tennessee
River’s “Great Bend.” Other evidence
includes deeds given to Revolutionary
War veterans who were granted land in
the Great Bend area that indicate the
land then was considered to be part of
Georgia.
All of that ancient historical informa
tion may be true. Camack apparently
even admitted his error in the 1820s.
The chances of Shafer’s scheme to
move the border succeeding, however,
are closer to none than slim.
Property law has long included the
concept of “adverse possession,” which
states that if a property owner does
not assert a claim to land occupied by
someone else, he loses the ownership
of the property after a time, traditional
ly 20 years. Considering that Camack’s
error occurred in 1818, we are at the
190-year mark since that poor guy’s
ineptitude cost our state a piece of the
banks of the Tennessee River.
As Shafer’s bill has progressed dur
ing this legislative session, the media
has dutifully reported on it and the
claim that if the border is moved, metro
Atlanta’s water crisis would be solved.
Once again, though, Shafer’s bill, like
just about everything else our elected
officials have done during this crisis,
is about putting on a show for us about
how hard they are trying to solve the
problem, without them actually doing
anything to fix the mess.
Shafer and his pals may not real
ize the extent of public anger over
the water crisis. A phony solution just
won’t fly. However, if the General
Assembly should somehow succeed in
Georgia being allowed to haul water
out of Tennessee, a new era of litiga
tion may be launched. Reader Steve
Andrews of Thomasville offers this
suggestion:
“Our Legislature is a shameful farce.
The water-grab resolution is just idiocy
tinged with greed, or vice versa.
“But as long as, ‘It’s never too late
to right a wrong,’ the state of Georgia
should move to restore the lands of
the Creeks and Cherokees. That would
probably put a crimp in the developers’
grand schemes. But as long as you’re
opening a can of worms, open two cans
of worms.”
Steve’s idea may sound far-fetched,
but it is more likely to become real
ity than Shafer’s grandly announced
hope to raise the Georgia flag over the
Tennessee River.
You can reach award-winning politi
cal columnist Bill Shipp at P. O. Box
2520, Kennesaw, GA 30156, e-mail:
shipp1@bellsouth.net, or Web address:
billshipponline.com.
bill
shipp
Letters to the Editor policy given
The Banks County News has estab
lished a policy on printing Letters to
the Editor.
We must have an original copy of
all letters that are submitted to us for
publication.
Members of our staff will not type
out or hand-write letters for people
who stop by the office and ask them
to do so.
Letters to the Editor must also be
signed with the address and phone
number of the person who wrote
them.
The address and phone number
will be for our verification purposes
only and will not be printed unless
the writer requests it. Mail to,
The Banks County News, P.O. Box
920, Homer, Ga. 30547.
E-mailed letters will be accepted,
but we must have a contact phone
number and address. Letters that are
libelous will not be printed.
Letters may also be edited to
meet space requirements. Anyone
with questions on the policy
is asked to contact editor Angela
Gary at AngieEditor@aol.com or by
calling 706-367-2490.
News department contact numbers
Anyone with general story ideas,
complaints or comments about the
news department is asked to call edi
tor Angela Gary at 706-367-2490.
She can also be reached by e-mail
at AngieEditor@aol.com.
Anyone with comments, ques
tions or suggestions relating to the
county board of commissioners,
county government, county board of
education, Maysville City Council
and crime and courts is asked to
contact staff member Chris Bridges
at 706-367-2745 or by e-mail at
chris@mainstreetnews.com.
Bridges also is sports edi
tor of the paper and covers local
high school, middle school and
recreation sports.
Anyone with comments, ques
tions or suggestions relating to
Alto, Lula, Baldwin and Gillsville,
should contact Sharon Hogan at
706-367-5233 or by e-mail at
sharon@mainstreetnews.com.
Calls for information about the
church page should go to April
Reese Sorrow at 706-677-3491.
Church news may also be e-mailed to
asorrow@mainstreetnews.com.
The Banks County News web
site can also be accessed at
www.mainstreet.news.com.
No such thing
as perfect timing
I like it.
My mother doesn’t.
I like that there’s daylight
when I leave work.
She doesn’t like the change in sleep
patterns.
“So soon?” she asks. “It seems like I
just got used to the other time.”
Now that I think about it, I wonder
about convincing a toddler that it
really is bedtime, even though it’s still
light outside. Daylight Saving Time
means nothing to her.
My sister swears
by some sort of
dark covering over
the windows.
But my daughter
has a pretty defined
sense of what’s
“right” and I imag
ine her indignation
- “That’s not right!
That’s not right!”
Whether we
are ready or not,
Daylight Saving Time is coming, and
it is “so soon.” In the past, we’ve usu
ally had about six months of Standard
Time and six months of Daylight
Saving Time, but that changed in
2007, with the DST span stretching
out. This year, we’ll have March 9
to November 2 or “spring forward”
time, almost eight months of “Summer
Time.”
•••
From the very beginning of time (at
least as we know it), there have been
disagreements about what to do about
it.
For years, people relied on the sun
and sundials to tell the time. When
clocks were invented, a city might
have one standard clock, but each city
might have a slightly different time.
In the United States, the increase
in railroad activity in the late 1880s
necessitated a “Standard Time,” one
upon which everyone could agree.
By the time of World War I, DST
made an appearance because of the
need to conserve fuel for electric
power. An act was approved in 1918
to “preserve daylight and provide stan
dard time for the United States.” That
DST was followed for seven months
in 1918 and 1919 and then was
dropped because it was unpopular. The
decision to have DST or not became a
state issue.
During WWII, DST was reinstated
— it was called “War Time” - and
was year-round for three years to con
serve fuel and energy.
But from 1945 to 1966, time was a
free-for-all. What time was it? No one
could really agree because DST or no
DST was a local option. After years
of confusion, DST became federal law
again in 1966. The most recent change
in time came with the passage of the
Energy Policy Act of 2005 which —
effective last year — extended the
DST to eight months. The idea is that
we save energy in the evenings if it is
light longer.
Still there are protests, with some
saying they use more energy in the
long summer evenings, not less, while
others say sleep issues related to the
time change cause more accidents and
less productivity.
•••
There are some interesting DST-
related anecdotes listed on a website
provided as a public service by the
Institute for Dynamic Educational
Advancement (IDEA) (http://webex-
hibits.org/daylightsaving/k.html).
•One man dodged the Vietnam draft
by using a DST loophole.
•A 1999 bombing in Israel was
thwarted because of DST. The bomb
went off an hour earlier than expected.
•The new DST allows longer light at
Halloween, thus reducing the number
of children’s pedestrian deaths.
•Twins born on a DST day can tech
nically have different birthdays.
•During the years of non-uniform
time, passengers on one bus route
between Ohio and West Virginia had
to change their watches seven times in
35 miles.
See Mitcham on page 5A
jana a.
mitcham