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♦ WEDNESDAY, MAY 7-9, 2005
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OPINION _
Daniel F. Evans
President,
Editor and Publisher
Julie B. Evans Rex Gambill
Vice President Managing Editor
Foy S. Evans
Editor Emeritus
Shortening The Lines
In response to public criticism of long lines where
Georgians must renew their driver’s licenses, the
General Assembly has adopted new rules that will
shorten lines and, more or less, turn it into a revenue
producing service.
Drivers with valid licenses will be able to renew
them over the Internet and can buy either a five- or
10-year license.
If the purpose of issuing driver’s licenses ever was to
keep some control over who has one, this new law
pretty much does away with that feature of licensing.
Not everyone is happy with the new law. Even the
director of the Department of Driver Services opposed
it, claiming that there was a better way to resolve the
problem of long lines and long waits.
We notice that a request has been made to provide a
larger building for the Department of Motor Vehicle
Safety has been made to Houston County commis
sioners because of overcrowding and long lines.
We wonder if this new law will help resolve the prob
lem.
Not Same Perdue
The Houston County Development Authority has
given its stamp of approval for a $3 million grant to
Perdue Farms near Kathleen.
We were surprised when we heard many people
questioning the ethics of “the state giving $3 million
to Gov. Perdue’s farm.”
It shows how people can be confused and how they
can jump at irrational conclusions.
The Perdue Farms receiving the grant is the huge
chicken processing plant which employs approximate
ly 1,900 people.
Gov. Perdue does not own Perdue Farms. He is not
affiliated with it.
It is just a coincidence that the chicken processing
facility is located in Houston County, Sonny’s home
county, and has the same name as our governor.
In view of the confusion and the unjustified criti
cism being aimed at Gov. Sonny Perdue, we felt it a
good idea to straighten out this misunderstanding.
It Could Be Interesting
The political poll said that Secretary of State Cathy
Cox would be running even with Gov. Sonny Perdue if
the election for governor were held now.
You don’t know how the poll was conducted. You
don’t know if it was skewed to convince Democrats
that she has a better chance against Perdue than Lt.
Gov. Mark Taylor would.
We do know that Democrats believe they have a shot
at the governor’s office next year and are going to pull
out all of the stops.
From our perspective, it would be interesting, to say
the least, if Houston County’s favorite son - Sonny -
faces a woman in the general election.
Despite the fact that Cox is a proven vote getter and
a rising star in the Democratic Party, one has to won
der if Georgia is ready for a woman governor.
Whether she can defeat Taylor, we shall see. It could
turn out to be an interesting and unusual summer.
Why I'm not a 'South Park Conservative'
I’ll get to First Lady Laura
Bush’s bawdy stand-up rou
tine in a minute. But I want
to highlight a related new
book out about how young
conservatives are shaking
up the dominant liberal
media culture. It’s called
“South Park
Conservatives.” My name is
listed on the cover along
with many other (mostly)
right-leaning pundits, Web
sites and bloggers, but I
must confess to having
mixed feelings about the
honor.
The best-selling book’s
author, Brian C. Anderson of
the Manhattan Institute,
writes a fun, breezy survey
documenting the rise of talk
radio, Fox News, the
Internet, conservative pub
lishing, and college
Republican activism.
Anderson’s chapter on the
success of conservative talk
radio and the abysmal fail
ure of liberal Air America to
replicate it is incisive.
Another chapter on the blo
gosphere (alone worth the
price of the book) gives read-
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Michelle Malkin
Columnist
Creators Syndicate
ers a useful history of the
explosion of news, opinion,
and political Webvcsites that
have smashed the left-wing
media monopoly.
But how did such a wide
ranging list of individuals
and organizations -
Anderson’s book cover
includes the names of con
servative-leaning Internet
pioneer Matt Drudge and
center-left journalist Mickey
Kaus, the libertarian Tech
Central Station, the cultur
ally conservative
WorldNetDaily, political
Mothers deserve to be honored every day
Businesses, with an eye to
more business, have desig
nated Sunday as Mother’s
Day.
It is appropriate, but I
would prefer that every day
of the year be devoted to
mothers. They deserve it.
My mother had profound
influence on my life. Her
influence and devotion guid
ed me and made it possible
for me to have a good, pro
ductive life rather than
winding up as a stock boy in
someone’s store, which
could have happened had
she not been so strong.
My father died when I was
13. He was buried on a
Sunday. I started to high
school the next day.
I had two sisters younger
than me. Our family was
broke. It was the middle of
the Great Depression. My
father had a SIO,OOO life
insurance policy (a big
amount in those days), but
he had borrowed everything
he could against the policy
to pay doctors in Atlanta
who led him to believe they
could keep him alive.
My mother never had
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UK services are belter
Editor:
In reply to S.K. Cyr’s open
letter to me:
Prime Minister Margaret
Thatcher lowered taxes and
privatized most govern
ment-owned housing during
her long reign. Private hos
pitals are a growth industry
in the UK. Every Brit has
access free to an M.D., and
unlike 45 million
Americans, doesn’t have to
upstart Arnold
Schwarzenegger and politi
cal chameleon Andrew
Sullivan, plus Ann Coulter,
Laura Ingraham, and
myself, along with a feature
blurb from Jonah Goldberg
- all get lumped under the
umbrella term “South Park
Conservatives”?
Anderson argues that
Comedy Central’s cartoon
series “South Park” embod
ies the “fiercely anti-liberal
comedic spirit” of the “new
media” from Kaus to
Coulter. The cartoon, he
writes, reflects a “post-liber
al counterculture” that is
“particularly appealing to
the young, however much it
might offend older conserva
tives.”
Well, I’m 34 and no fan of
“South Park.” I have many
good friends who are indeed
huge boosters of the show,
but I find that the charac
ters’ foul language over
whelms any entertainment I
might otherwise derive from
the show’s occasional, right
leaning iconoclastic themes.
“South Park” may be
ilUk if
Foy Evans
Columnist
foye vans 19@cox.net
worked out of the home. She
had no skills, except being a
wife and mother. But she
was determined to hold the
family together and to pro
vide for us.
I wanted to go to work to
help support the family. She
put her foot down. No way.
The only way out of poverty,
she said, was by getting a
good education.
She went off to Macon to a
beauty school to acquire the
ability to earn money.
Family friends took my sis
ters and me into their
LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
grovel in an emergency
room. Most of our poor
would be better off in the
UK as their social services
are in many ways superior
to ours. And their life
expectancy and infant mor
tality rates are better than
ours.
The only thing that I did
n’t like in England was the
weather!
Frank W. Gadbois
Warner Robins
“politically incorrect.” But
“politically incorrect” is not
always a synonym for “con
servative.”
My discomfort with
“South Park’s” increasingly
mainstream vulgarity is not
a matter of nitpicking. We’re
not just talking about a
stray curse word here or
there. As liberal New York
Times columnist Frank Rich
points out, “South Park”
“holds the record for the
largest number of bleeped
out repetitions (162) of a
single four-letter expletive
in a single television half
hour.” That’s probably
about the same number of
profanities uttered at John
Kerry’s infamous New York
City celebrity fundraiser last
summer, which Republicans
rightly condemned for its
excessive obscenities.
Rich is wrong about most
things, but he’s painfully on
target in noting the incon
gruous pandering now tak
ing place by some in the
cool-kids clique on the
Right. Conservatives criti
cize Hollywood relentlessly,
homes while she was away,
living with my father’s
brother and his wife.
When she returned home
she began doing hair. In
those days it was hard work.
To give a permanent wave,
hair had to be wrapped on
curlers, attached to electric
wires and a machine. It took
hours. But the customer
paid a whole dollar for a
wave.
My mother worked six
days a week from early
morning into the night. I
tried time and again to get
permission to drop out of
school and go to work full
time. The answer was no.
I did get part-time jobs
after school and on
Saturdays. It left no time for
social activities, but survival
was the goal.
Looking back I have trou
ble imagining how my moth
er did it. She must have
been exhausted all the time,
but she smiled and was
unbelievably optimistic.
She said she wanted all of
her children to go to college.
It seemed a far-fetched
dream, but she clung to it
Not your gramma's
grammar
Editor:
I am at such a loss I don’t
know what to do. When my
grandchildren say some
thing that is improper gram
mar, how do I or their par
ents correct them?
For instance, last night
one said “more happy,” and
her father corrected her to
“happier,” and the former is
but as Rich notes, “the
embarrassing reality is that
they want to be hip, too.”
Which brings me to Mrs.
Bush. She demonstrated at
the celebrity-studded White
House Correspondents’
Dinner this weekend that
you can entertain without
being profane. Most of her
humor was just right: Edgy
but not over the edge. But
her off-color stripper and
horse jokes crossed the line.
Can you blame Howard
Stern for feeling peeved and
perplexed? And let’s face it:
If Teresa (“I’m cheeky!”)
Heinz Kerry had delivered
Mrs. Bush’s First Lady
Gone Mildly Wild routine,
social conservative pundits
would be up in arms over
her bad taste and lack of dig
nity.
The First Lady resorting
to horse masturbation jokes
is not much better than
Whoopi Goldberg trafficking
in dumb puns on the Bush
family name. It was wholly
unnecessary.
Self-censorship is a con
servative value. In a bril-
THE HOUSTON HOME JOURNAL
and, eventually, saw it hap
pen.
I graduated from law
school. Both my sisters
became schoolteachers. We
owe it all to a real “steel
magnolia” who came along a
long time before the term
was popularized in a movie.
We didn’t always have a
lot of food to eat. Sometimes
we went without meals.
Some of our clothes had
patches on them. We half
soled shoes time after time
until the tops wore out.
But we were a family. We
were happy. We had a moth
er who was an inspiration to
us and, even in the toughest
of times, never complained.
How could I not want to
honor and remember her
everyday of the year?
Every mother is some
thing special to someone.
I suggest that you remem
ber to tell your mother you
love her today. You’ll regret
it someday if you don’t. She
won’t be here forever. Let
her know what she means to
you while it will mean so
much to her.
the way they are being
taught in school. I have
stopped trying to correct
them, and I am a “nut”
about good grammar. I don’t
know what to correct or how
to do it. We have not been
advised of these changes
and, therefore, have been
correcting to OUR correct
grammar and the children
get mixed teaching and are
corrected to the books OF
TODAY.
Micky Kelly
liant commencement speech
at Hillsdale College last
year, Heritage Foundation
president Ed Feulner called
on his audience to resist the
coarsened rhetoric of our
time: “If we are to prevail as
a free, self-governing people,
we must first govern our
tongues and our pens.
Restoring civility to public
discourse is not an option. It
is a necessity.”
Lighten up, you say? No
thanks. I’d rather be a G
rated conservative who can
only make my kids giggle
than a “South
Park’’/’’Desperate
Housewives” conservative
whose goal is getting
Richard Gere and Jane
Fonda to snicker. Giving the
Hollyweird Left the last
laugh is not my idea of suc
cess.
Michelle Malkin is author
of “Invasion: How America
Still Welcomes Terrorists,
Criminals, and Other
Foreign Menaces to Our
Shores” (Regnery). Malkin’s
e-mail address is
malkin@comcast. net.