The Stafford County Board of Supervisors recently pared back severely the county’s capital improvement program in response to bad economic numbers.

The presidential debate season is upon us again. No doubt these TV beauty contests will get the highest viewership ever.

Only in Stafford County…

Are you afraid of black holes? Well some people are. They attempted to halt an experiment called the Large Hadron Collider, a project at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, which they feared would cause miniature black holes that would destroy the planet. 

There’s this problem, you see. I can no longer remember many words I want to say while talking with other people, so I went to a doctor. He reassured me that for an otherwise healthy guy halfway through his seventies, my problem was cause for no alarm. He called it MCI — minor cognitive impairment — but offered no remedy. It’s just the aging process.

I got home, checked my computer, and saw this on the Internet:

When I write about certain topics, ones I think are controversial, or at the very least ones I am convinced will prompt a response from our readers, I am sometimes disappointed that I don’t hear from anyone. The silence can be disappointing. But there is one topic, and this still amazes me, one that always gets a reaction and that’s anything to do with squirrels.

The new Stafford Hospital “ state of the art medical facility”, being built on U.S.1 has a new chief to help guide the facility. Cathleen Yablonski is ready for the hospital to open and has been preparing, making plans and hiring people to help make this a working and functional medical facility. Ms. Yablonkski has a great background in hospital administration and operations. 

As a breastfeeding mother of five children, I am very concerned about the Street Talk question on page A7 of the August 29-Sept. 4 edition. In this day and age, when so many benefits of breastfeeding are known, what would cause you to even ask this question? 

Obama may be an abomination and McCain can really be a pain.

This week on Sept. 11, 2008, you’ll wake up blessed with a new day. You may think it’s like any other, and in some ways, it is. But, just think of it as a reminder, perhaps, as what should be gratitude for life.

I’ve gotta tell ya. I’m up to here with people who are so full of themselves. Exhibit A: Barack Obama. But we’ll get to him later.

Virginia’s very popular former governor, Mark Warner, the Democratic candidate this year for U.S. Senate, had a very humbling experience last week in Denver.

Why did they build more schools than they needed?

The Olympics is a time when the world comes together to give all they have athletically. Often, the events are viewed as a sort of international coming together, a show of diversity, a symbol of solidarity. 

The presidential nominating conventions and the buzz over VP picks have overshadowed another campaign that is also important to area residents: Election for House of Representatives in the First Congressional District, a district that includes Stafford County. A lot has happened since incumbent Republican Congresswoman Jo Ann Davis died last fall. 

Campaign 2008 is one of the most significant opportunities in recent history for Americans to choose the future direction of our country. Not only is there a difference in personality and style, but there also are clear differences between the two candidates when it comes to the issues.

Having spent time around rescued chickens, I view National Chicken Month, September, as a time to celebrate these sweet, inquisitive birds. I only wish everyone would learn to appreciate chickens for their personalities — not for the taste of their flesh.

There has been a lot of rhetoric on BPOL with views on both sides of the issue. What has been written, especially in the Letters to the Editor section of the Free Lance-Star, has expressed views for or against the BPOL tax or criticizing or supporting the supervisors who voted for or against it. But what seems to have been lost in the debate is a much greater issue of the disgraceful manner in which the public hearing process continues to be conducted. 

With just a few days left in August and Labor Day fast approaching, summer is just about gone. But, that doesn’t mean the sun is.

You would think so, given the doomsday talk about us endangering Planet Earth and I don’t know what all.

Local governments, the world over, have a lot in common. They worry about school budgets, zoning, tax rates, and attracting new business. This is certainly the case in one of my favorite parts of England, the High Peak. The High Peak is just what the name implies. It’s a mountain, a lovely part of the English countryside, and visitors going back to the Romans have commented on it.

Help! Hydrilla is taking over the world!

To this day, the Olympics still serve to inspire young athletes and rally a nation. 

Word of John Edwards’ affair and “love child” have been percolating on the back burner of the national media for quite a while now. 

“The American Popular Song goes on and on…” Neil Diamond’s lyrics proclaim. Yes it does. The American popular song industry is huge. Some of the music is great; some is hardly music at all.

Read this selective call to action, from Nobelist Al Gore’s recent energy speech, which contained nary a word about nuclear power.

Editor’s Note: Sent to the editor, the following is written as an open letter to Stafford County Supervisor Paul Milde:
Mr. Milde — a good friend of mine explained the problem you are having with folks attacking your position on BPOL, in just four basic words and quite well I might add— “You can’t fix stupid.”

I am interested in knowing more about the county that I live in and just received the insert in today’s Stafford County Sun. I want to say thank you. I am learning different places and different things that one can do on the side with the time provided. I would love to help around in my community, along with try to keep my credits up in becoming a master gardener. 

Twelve individual private landowners from across the state sat in a room at the Virginia Department of Game and Inland Fisheries Headquarters in Richmond.

Garrett Ebling is a married man. As simple as that may seem, the fact is quite amazing considering that just over a year ago, his body was fighting to merely stay alive. Ebling, the former managing editor of the Stafford County Sun, suffered massive injuries when the I-35W bridge in Minnesota collapsed, ultimately killing 13 people and injuring approximately 145 others.