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George Will on the Declaration of Dependence

George Will’s column today is really worth a read on FDR and how the New Deal did little more than continue the depression longer than it’s natural course and have placed us in our current situation of dependence on the State.

Much to the horror of my grandfather, I have long believed that FDR was the worst president in the history of this country. That’s saying something, especially considering Jimmy Carter could was up for the award. The affects of FDR’s insane policies and programs are still being felt today.

Look no further than the land swap deals that occur here in the Tennessee Valley where lake front property is traded for other plots of land to private developers. TVA took this land by eminent domain to flood the valley, then decided decades later to trade it away. Are the original owners or their posterity being fairly compensated for lakeside plots that were once the tops of hills?

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So It’s the Oil Companies That Are Price Gouging?

I’ve had more arguments than I can count with people about this. They always claim that the oil companies (and Bush) are fixing the prices, there is nothing the common man can do about it, blah blah blah, waa waa waa.

Today in the KNS, Glen Eastes made a point that I think is utterly brilliant about the cost of education. The University of Tennessee is trying to justify another tuition increase, and I hope people will remember this the next time they feel like they’re getting gouged at the pump:

I attended a Big 10 university in 1948. The tuition was $75 a semester. Gasoline was about 25 cents a gallon. Today the tuition at UT will be about $3,000 a semester. Today, gas is $3 a gallon. So, if the oil companies are taking advantage of the public, I don’t know the word to describe the tuition cost.

Beautiful. I could write pages and pages on yet another gouging by the gov’ment, but you get the idea.

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Barbie Cummings Misses Court

All she had to do was show up and her ticket would have been dismissed. Now she’ll have to pay it. 🙁

Since her old site has been taken down, she has a temporary blog. According to that, she’s been pretty busy lately, traveling to the West Coast for some business engagements and even getting married in Las Vegas.

It states there that she’s moving from Knoxville to L.A. soon, so I guess the court date completely slipped her mind.

***UPDATED 7.25.07
You COULD read about it in her own words, but Blogger deleted her site…probably because there was extremely explicit material on there. You can always depend on me to stay well informed on this story. 😛

What a truly strange story to be cumming (sorry, had to) out of sleepy old Knoxville!

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KPD Prostitution Sting Wildly Successful

The KNS reports that a sting ending at 6 am in the Magnolia area caught eleven “criminals”. Apparently ten women and one man were engaged in swapping services one party was willing to provide for money the other party was willing to pay.

Stay tuned to the KNS. I’m sure they’ll have a follow up story once the victims of these crimes are found and identified.

In (somewhat) related news, the former Highway Patrolman involved in the Barbie Cummings traffic stop is under further investigation for other traffic stops he made involving women. Not sure if they are looking for evidence of him disposing of drugs or receiving sexual favors from the women he has stopped. Based on the photo I saw of him, I’d say the former is more likely than the latter.

Again, they should let this die. Cummings herself says there was no exchange of services involved and he still gave her the ticket. The guy has already been fired, and I think that’s enough–not because of what he did, but because he was stupid enough to tell everybody about it. We should expect our Highway Patrolmen to be at least a tad bit brighter than former presidents.

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Should Villa Collina Raise My Asking Price?

All I can say is that it is really nice to own a property that is right across the street from a $40M mansion. Hopefully this will be taken into account when I put my condo on the market this month. I can just hear my real estate agent now explaining what a bargain my place is compared to the other homes in the neighborhood.

Sorry. This house just doesn’t make sense in Knoxville. I mean, I LOVE living in Knoxville and East Tennessee, but if I ever live in a $40M home it will be on a beach in Hawaii, not on a dirty lake in Knoxville.

The big spider on the wall at Halloween is cool though. 😉

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The Barbie Cummings Saga Continues

It’s odd that this latest KNS article releases her real name (it’s Justis Ellen Richert by the way). It’s odd that in their first article they stated that she asked not to be named out of safety concerns–not sure who she was afraid of, or whether she’s okay with it at this point, but the cat’s out of the bag now.

The officer, James Randy Moss, has been fired and may face criminal charges for destroying the drugs she had on her. Continue reading “The Barbie Cummings Saga Continues”

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Barbie Cummings and the Highway Patrol

Could it be the title of her next movie?

Barbie Cummings is a clever, clever girl.

The porn star based out of Knoxville was pulled over by a Tennessee Highway Patrolman outside of Nashville and engaged in an exchange of favors with the officer. Actually, she still got the ticket, so there actually wasn’t an exchange.

This genius took photos and videos and bragged to his fellow patrolmen about it and has subsequently been suspended. All Barbie did was write about it on her blog.

Very clever. Hope all of you SEO masters are paying attention. This is TRUE viral marketing. The story has caused such a stir in Tennessee and presumably created so much traffic to her blog that it, ahem, went down last night.

No worries, they got it up again. 🙂 I was able to go there and do some fact checking. Don’t visit it from the office, but if you want to see free speech in action, it’s worth a look.

Maybe you’ll read it, maybe you won’t, but this girl is lucky that my friend BGE no longer lives in Knoxville. Their lives are about as parallel as the two rails of a train track. If they ever cross, look out!

Story about the incident in the KNS

***UPDATE***

Obviously, demand for information is high. Subscribe to this feed and I’ll update with news…

I just checked out her site to see if there were any updates since this story went national. Apparently she either got a nice offer for her domain name or she’s put her own Barbie store on her site. I’d guess the former. Unfortunate for all of you who were looking to get a firsthand look/read. I’m sure her site will surface again at a new address. Stay tuned.

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Knox County Schools To Address Academics?

Now we are hearing the other side of the issue, from parents who are supportive of the rezoning efforts.  Most of these supporters realize that someone has to be moved, and although it may be a tough pill to swallow, it has to be accepted.  School board chairwoman Karen Carson is encouraged, and looks forward to moving ahead:

“We have other issues that we’ve got to start addressing, like the budget, the superintendent search and academics,” she said.

Wow!  As soon as the rezoning issue is resolved, academics will crack the top 3 of the school board’s priorities!!!  I may have to rethink my position that public schools are horribly ineffective and a waste of tax dollars.