About The Banks County news. (Homer, Banks County, Ga.) 1968-current | View Entire Issue (July 19, 2017)
PAGE 4A THE BANKS COUNTY NEWS WEDNESDAY, JULY 19, 2017 Editor: Angela Gary Phone: 706-367-2490 E-mail: AngieEditor@aol.com Website: www.banksnewsTODAY.com Opinion “Where the press is free and every man able to read, all is safe. ” — Thomas Jefferson Georgia has its own mini-Trump For those Georgia voters who couldn’t get enough of Donald Trump in last year’s election, fear not. We have a local version of The Donald who is now running for governor: state Sen. Michael Williams (R-Cumming), who hasn’t served quite two terms in the Legislature but has his eye on the state’s top job. Williams was the first Georgia lawmak er to endorse Trump in the presidential election and his campaign for governor is modeled on how Trump ran for office. He even has a campaign manager, Seth Weathers, who was briefly involved in Trump’s Georgia campaign organization. Like Trump, Williams is trashing his opponents both online and in public, making outrageous accusations that aren’t supported by such things as facts and data. In particular, he is going after Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, the choice of many in the capitol establishment to be the succes sor to current Gov. Nathan Deal. At the state GOP convention in June, Williams claimed that Cagle and the Senate leadership offered him the chair manship of the powerful Senate Appro priations Committee if he would not run for governor. “The establishment, and the career politicians they finance, see our move ment and they know we’re coming for them,” Williams said. He repeated that charge last Thursday at a capitol press con ference: “There's a reason that Casey Cagle's team wanted me out of this race to the point where they offered me a Senate chairmanship for my support.” In the face of numerous ques tions from reporters, Williams would not produce any evi dence at either event to back up his sensational charges against Cagle and the party establishment. Most likely, that’s because his accusa tions aren’t true. The charges have been denied by everyone who would have been in a position to offer him a chair manship, and it’s simply implausible that the Senate leadership would have made such a move. Like Trump, Williams sees himself as a martyr to political correctness, a valiant fighter that the “establishment” wants to bring down because of his opposition to crony capitalism. He declared at last week’s press con ference: “I know that in less time than it takes me to tie my shoes, Casey and his gang of bullies will begin to further assault me and my family. It won't be the first time or the last. We are ready. You cannot break us. . . .We will be here. Your days are numbered.” Like Trump, Williams tweets a never-ending stream of attacks on liberals, the party establish ment, and undocumented immi grants. He appears to hate the establishment even more than he hates immigrants. I guess it won’t be long before he’s referring to the lieutenant governor as “Crooked Casey” and “Low-energy Cagle.” Many of Williams’ tweets include pleas for campaign contributions, promising that if people will just give him money “we can beat the establishment.” That message doesn’t appear to be resonating with Republicans. When the campaign disclosure reports for the period ending June 30 were released last week, Williams wasn’t even close to his opponents in raising money. Cagle reported nearly $2.7 million in contributions, Secretary of State Brian Kemp reported $1.7 million, and even an obscure state senator named Hunter Hill brought in more than $1 million. Dem ocrats Stacey Abrams and Stacey Evans each raised more than $400,000. Williams’ take was a measly $51,404 in outside contributions. Even the Demo crats running for governor were out-rais ing him by a ratio of more than eight-to- one. Like Trump, Williams is now in a posi tion to talk about how he can use his own money to run for office so that the “establishment” can’t buy him. He indicated on his disclosure report that he’s loaned his campaign $1 million in personal funds. Thus, he’s kicking in $20 out of his own pocket for every dol lar he brings in. When a candidate has that much trou ble raising money, attacks his own party, and makes thunderous accusations that he knows aren’t true, the normal rules of politics would tell you that the candidate is on track to lose the race. However, Trump’s presidential cam paign showed us that the old political rules no longer apply. Williams thinks he can do at the state level what Trump did at the national level. Will the voters agree with him? Tom Crawford is editor of The Geor gia Report, an internet news service at gareport.com that reports on state gov ernment and politics. He can be reached at tcrawford@gareport.com. Science fiction now part of careers academies Looking for frogs... and rabbits...and bugs Machine shop and cos metology were in the “voca tional” wing of my high school, and that was where the troublemakers were shunted off. Now, we have “college and career academies.” Machine shops are “mecha- tronics” and have to do as much with computers and math as with grease and skinned knuckles. Diesel technicians work on huge engines with computer diag nostics. “Pathways” are all over the map. Some school dis tricts have a dizzying array of them. The director of Henry County’s program mentioned 47 last week. I did the “college” path way because I was told to by a sophomore guidance counselor, who had looked at my junior high grades and test scores. Now, kids are being asked to imagine their own careers in the sixth grade. Multiple districts in Georgia - Hall Mike Buffington Scott Buffington Angela Gary Cameron Whitlock Sharon Hogan Anelia Chambers County is one near us - are requiring those “plans.” The Hall County super intendent says, “So what if they change 10 times before they’re through.” I just read where Chicago schools are going to require such plans for students. Technical col leges offer “video game design” courses. Lanier Tech has that. It is all com puters - software that is still science fiction to me. It’s a different world - especially if you can remember The Big Chill as an adult, as I was reminded over the weekend while on Facebook. (I’m not there a lot, but I’m gradually moving into the late 20th century.) All of the above came up last week because I heard Jackson County’s dog-and- pony show about its push for a college and career Co-Publisher Co-Publisher Editor Sports Editor Reporter Receptionist academy. It was an impres sive program. The promoter of the idea in Geor gia, Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle, was the fea tured attraction. Cagle was smart. He talked about Jackson County about the world of possibilities through technolo gy, about good jobs without getting a four-year degree. He never mentioned he is a candidate for governor next year. That was quite deliberate. The event was to promote the county’s push for a col lege and career academy. Just showing up for it was a campaign event. Cagle didn’t need to do more. It was nice to see an understated politician for a change. As I said to my wife, Cagle has a real accomplishment he can campaign on. The idea of college and career academies is far from new. It has been around for decades. But he was smart enough to start promoting it years ago, and he was skilled enough to get money put in the state budget to help the idea along. Three college and career academies a year get the $3 million grants Jackson is seeking. I covered a similar program in Putnam County that is now up and run ning. I saw the beginning of a successful push for an academy in Morgan Coun ty- good sense to follow much of that model. It has an impressive list of business es supporting the push. In a lot of ways, this is more “back to the future.” Part of the model for the academies is the German notion of apprenticeships - which was popular in the 1970s. The difference is the updated version has strong academic parts to it - it’s not the “vocational” wing of my youth. Given the ubiquity of computers in our lives, that might be natural. But it takes a bit of getting used to for someone who used a pencil and eraser in school. The publicity for Jackson County’s “EC3” mentions the possibility that Com merce and Banks County also might be part of the academy. Why wouldn’t they? I wondered why both those school systems were not visibly promoting the idea at last week’s event. Equally important was the complete lack of interest or visibility from Jefferson schools? Maybe that sys tem sends all of its gradu ates to colleges. Cagle has a bruising pri mary ahead of him and a number of well-known political opponents stand ing before he can make a general election. But I don’t know of any candidate who has as strong a “plus” as he does starting out. Ron Bridgeman is a reporter for Mainstreet Newspapers. Send email to him at ron@mainstreet- news.com. I spent my childhood playing with Barbie dolls, reading Nancy Drew and Trixie Beldon mysteries and watching Leave it to Beaver and The Brady Bunch. I wasn’t the out doors type at all. I never learned to ride a bicycle. Never learned to swim. Don’t know anything about sports. I don’t want to see bugs or lizards or snakes or any other creepy creatures. I stay away from them if at all possible. If I accidently come upon one, I scream. With all of this in mind, it’s hard to believe I found myself on a recent summer night out in the yard with a flashlight chasing a frog down the sidewalk. My nephew, Grayson, spotted a small frog and thought it would make a great pet. He told me to keep the flashlight on it while he hurried inside the house to find something to put it in. So, there I was at 9 p.m. chasing a frog down the sidewalk with the flashlight on it. Thank goodenss, it ran off into the bushes before Grayson got back. He may have wanted a pet frog but not me. Next, Grayson decided we should catch one of the many bunnies that we see hopping around in the yard. I couldn’t convince him that it would be impos sible to catch a wild bunny. We chased a few bun nies around for what seemed like a very long time. After a while, he finally agreed that we weren’t going to be able to catch a bunny. Our night wasn’t com plete until we chased a few fireflies around the yard. We had a jar all ready to put a few in but we didn’t manage to get any of those either. While chasing frogs, rabbits and bugs is not some thing I ever thought I would be doing, I had a great time just watching Grayson. His excitement brought a smile to my face. Grayson also enjoys something else that is new to me. He loves playing video games and watching you tube videos. These are both activities that have never been fun to me but I have found myself doing both. He likes me to watch while he plays the video games, which his mom insists must be education al. We have found some that fits the fun requirement for him, as well as the edu cational requirement of his mom. Grayson and have also spent many hours watch ing “hilarious” videos he finds on you tube. He knows I love cats so he usually finds one with a cat in it. Some aren’t as funny as others but I always laugh. Again, it’s fun to watch him watching the videos. I’m thankful to have this little boy in my life to open my eyes to so many things that are new to me. Angela Gary is an edi tor with MainStreet News papers Inc. She can be reached at Angie@main- streetnews.com. Phones (all 706 area code): Angela Gary Phone 706-410-1022 Angela Gary Fax 706-621-4112 Homer Office Phone 706-612-5327 Web www.BanksNewsTODAY.com (SCED 547160) Published weekly by MainStreet Newspapers, Inc, P.O. Box908, Jefferson, Ga. 30549 Yearly subscription rate: $25 Periodicals postage paid at Homer, Ga. 30547 (547-160) Postmaster: send address changes to: MainStreet Newspapers, Inc., PO Box 908, Jefferson, Georgia 305494)908 Member: Georgia Press Association Georgia Sports Writers Association Jackson County has the POLICY ON LETTERS TO THE EDITOR The policy for letters to the editor submitted to The Banks County News is as follows: • An original copy of all letters must be submitted 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 be signed with the address and phone number of the per son who wrote them. The ad dress and phone number will be for our verification purposes only and will not be printed unless the writer requests it. • E-mailed letters will be accepted but we must have a phone number and address. • Letters that are libelous will also 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 Angie- Editor@aol.com or 706-410- 1022. The Banks County News Founded 1968 The official legal organ of Banks County, Ga. 142 Old Highway 441 North, Homer, GA 30547
