June 06, 2008

CALLANDER: Obama/Clinton - the dynamic duo

Obama and Clinton should be on the Democratic Party ticket together this fall. They both lasted through the June primaries; they both won many victories and garnered many votes.



May 28, 2008

BLANKENSHIP: You go grads; now get to work

So it’s time for another crop of youngsters to be hurled out into the cold, cold world. 

KERR: Consider our addiction to time

There is probably no other society in human history, save perhaps the Japanese and the Germans, that worries so much about time as we do.



May 21, 2008

BLANKENSHIP: Spent your rebate check yet?

Many people, no doubt, have spent their tax rebate checks. Sorry to say, I already have, and also my wife’s, way back in February, long before they ever arrived.

CALLANDER: County’s playing big brother

Stafford County is going too far in trying to limit the number of unrelated persons living in a home. What is being considered is an affront to civil rights, and it’s simply illogical.



May 14, 2008

KERR: A look at Jim Webb’s ‘new’ GI bill

Even as our nation was mobilizing to fight World War II, we were thinking about the future of our veterans when the fighting would end, generating an unusual and forward-looking discussion. 

CALLANDER: Compromise can remedy roadblocks

Bipartisanship can go a long way in coping with transportation nightmares. We need leaders who spend less time grandstanding and more time working together to come up with viable answers. Our state legislators could learn a lesson from a recent bipartisan success here in Stafford.



May 07, 2008

KERR: Sneezing my way through spring

Nature gave trees and grasses a problem to solve. Just like any other species, plants and trees need to share genetic information with one another to reproduce, but at the same time, unless we’re talking about a plant from a science fiction movie, they have a problem. They can’t move from place to place. 

BLANKENSHIP: Don’t blame Bush for everything

I’m worried about George Bush. Granted, his administration has prevented any further terrorist attacks since 9/11. That’s good, and may we never really know just how good.



May 01, 2008

CALLANDER: Supervisors deserve proper compensation

There’s a movement afoot to discredit members of the Stafford County Board of Supervisors who voted to raise their salaries last year and who aren’t willing to eliminate that pay increase in this tough budget year. 

BLANKENSHIP: Ah spring, birthdays and canna lilies

What’s new? Well, for one thing it’s springtime. And despite a long drought last year, my flowering plants have survived and flourished so far. Some do look battered but unbowed



April 23, 2008

CALLANDER: Maintaining quality of life in Stafford

“Green” is the word of the month. While some talk green as in ecologically sustainable living for Earth Day, others talk green as in dollar bills.

KERR: Advice for Virginia’s Republicans

Normally the Republicans don’t ask me for advice.  I can understand, and what’s more, most of the time they seem to get along just fine without my help. However, Virginia’s Republican Party is in trouble and if it doesn’t do something, and soon, it’s going to be, politically at least, on the outside looking in. 



April 17, 2008

BLANKENSHIP: Blame lawyers for mortgage mess

Be honest now. Did you ever read all the fine print when you signed up for a home mortgage?

Maybe John Wayne had it wrong

America is often called a litigious society. In other words, we sue one another over just about anything. 



April 10, 2008

BLANKENSHIP: Obama, and thoughts on church life

He hit a home run. That was my first reaction to that memorable speech by Barack Obama. That was before all the pundits hailed its greatness, its deficiencies and his gall.



April 09, 2008

CALLANDER: Media fairness needed

Freedom of the press is an integral part of our democracy, but from
what I’ve been seeing lately, for a better America our mass media
should spend more time reporting fact and far less time distorting and
sensationalizing the news.



April 03, 2008

Illegible writing is on the wall

If I were writing this with a pencil, you probably couldn’t read it. 

Board meets with tough choices

Members of Stafford’s board of supervisors considered a difficult question recently: Should the county allow businesses that would generate substantial truck traffic to locate in the courthouse area?

Watch helps memories tick on

Most families have a little something, a trinket or a token perhaps, that connects them to a generation before them. It can be anything. A tea service that belonged to a special aunt, a pen your grandfather used to carry, or in the case of a friend of mine, a St. Christopher’s medal that his dad wore during the Korean War. The possessions can be surprisingly commonplace, but for various reasons, they become a representation of the person who once owned them.

Former editor says he’s still standing

When I made the decision to leave as editor of this fine paper and return to my home state of Minnesota in November 2005, it was for three reasons. 



March 27, 2008

BLANKENSHIP: Economy’s woes hit the aging
See those storm clouds gather. They're not just bringing April showers. Rather, go fetch the handbasket, for that's what the U.S. economy is going to hell in.

March 19, 2008

HOLLIFIELD: Career fair mortifies
I knew I was in deep trouble at the fifth-grade career fair when I eased into the parking lot and the Highway Patrol's fancy display helicopter landed 50 feet from my truck.
CALLANDER: Thoughts on preserving Widewater
In the late 1980s Elaine Miller, a very bright and community-conscious woman, took me on an automobile tour of Stafford's rural Widewater peninsula, and I was awestruck.

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