Warner campaign releases first ad
Item by Chris Graham
freepress2@ntelos.net
The first commercial of the Senate campaign season will begin airing Monday, and it will feature Democrat Mark Warner.
The 60-second spot will also feature former Republican state senator John Chichester, who served as president of the Senate and the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee until his retirement earlier this year.
You can get a sneak preview of the ad below.
In Memoriam: Mrs. Carly at the Movies passes
Item by Chris Graham
freepress2@ntelos.net
Dr. Celeste Rhodes, long-time director of Mary Baldwin College’s Program for the Exceptionally Gifted, passed away on Monday, May 26th, at her home in Murrysville, Pa.
She was survived by her husband, Augusta Free Press columnist Carl Larsen, her three sons, David, Adam and Jason, her brother, Samuel, and her sister, Naomi, and a loving extended family including seven grandchildren.
Dr. Rhodes received her B.S. at the University of Maryland in 1966, her M.A. at Columbia University on 1972, and her Ph.D. in Educational Psychology at the University of Virginia in 1996. She served as director then executive director of the PEG program from 1989 through 2001, then as director of PEG research until her retirement, due to cancer, in 2004.
A memorial in her honor will be held in Francis Auditorium on June 27 at 10 a.m. Donations in her name may be made to the Program for the Exceptionally Gifted, Mary Baldwin College, Staunton, Va. 24401.
See for yourself what happened Tuesday night
Op-Ed by Ellen Winter
Opinions Wanted! Click here to learn more
The best show in town this week is Channel 14 from about 9:10-9:40 p.m. See your city government in action. Unfortunately, it is a reality show not fiction — even though some of it is unbelievable. Read more
Photocast: Soap Box Derby Day in Waynesboro
Photos by Chris Graham
freepress2@ntelos.net
This assignment wasn’t hard. The sound of the “Star-Spangled Banner” to open this year’s Blue Ridge Classic Soap Box Derby in Downtown Waynesboro was what awakened me out of bed this morning.
Main Street in front of the Augusta Free Press Publishing headquarters is a racetrack today, with kids in pairs heading down the steep hill at speeds in the 30-miles-per-hour range all morning and most of the afternoon.
Has the local GOP passed its moderate wing by?
The Politics Beat column by Chris Graham
freepress2@ntelos.net
One guy gets more votes, the other guy has friends in high places, and you can guess who wins.
I could be talking about George Bush, Florida, the U.S. Supreme Court in 2000, but I’m not. I’m talking about the Augusta County Republican Committee, which elected Larry Roller chairman last month, only to have the will of the local party subverted earlier this month by the Sixth District Republican Committee and today by the State Central Committee of the Virginia GOP. Read more
Bad money after good to play to the base
The Politics Beat column by Chris Graham
freepress2@ntelos.net
More of your taxpayer dollars are headed toward the wastebasket.
“It is my belief that Virginia’s partial-birth abortion ban, passed overwhelmingly by the people’s elected representatives in the General Assembly, is constitutional. Given the significance of the issues at stake, and the fact that the United States Supreme Court recently upheld a very similar federal ban on the procedure, the full court should review the ruling by the divided three-judge panel,” Attorney General Bob McDonnell said today in a statement announcing that his office will ask the full Fourth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to review the decision of a three-judge review panel that struck down Virginia’s ban on partial-birth abortions. Read more
The loudest silence I’ve ever heard
Fear and Loathing in Waynesboro column by Chris Graham
freepress2@ntelos.net
Silence. Absolute silence. That’s what we’ve gotten from Bruce Allen regarding the effective firing of city manager Doug Walker that he helped engineer.
The official word, according to a News Leader reporter with whom I spoke Thursday, is that Allen is out of town, and that’s why he has not been able to get back to anybody in the local news media regarding the Walker news.
I don’t know. According to a story in the News Virginian earlier this month, Allen has two cell phones, and he knows how to use them. So maybe he just doesn’t want to talk to reporters about his role in this curious move. Read more
Ethanol plant draws opposition
Op-Ed by Shirley Rothman
Opinions Wanted! Click here to learn more
Is there anyone out there who can help us in Mecklenburg County? The Planning Commission and the County Board of Supervisors are ignoring the citizens. Osage Bio Energy LLC from Glen Allen is forcing an ethanol plant down our throats. This is the same outfit that is attacking Hopewell. Osage has never made a drop of ethanol, but the Tobacco Commission (TICR) approved $1 million to run a water pipeline 13 miles to the site, a beautiful farm on the edge of Chase City that Osage wants rezoned heavy industrial. Read more
Eagles concert provides ‘Peaceful, Easy Feeling’
Column by Jim Bishop
The stage lights came up, applause and cheers erupted, and I stared down on music legends. The Eagles had landed.
The incredibly popular band, formed in the early 1970s in Los Angeles, Calif., was in Charlottesville, Va., on its “Long Road Out of Eden” tour. Tickets, though outrageously priced, were available, the venue just one hour’s driving distance from Harrisonburg. Opportunity knocked, and I had to answer.
It felt especially good to make the excursion with daughter Sara, half my age and always ready for an adventure. I anticipated a mob scene, and it would be the early morning hours before we’d return home in the middle of a work week. Read more
Play it, Sam
Item by Chris Graham
freepress2@ntelos.net
You know how it ends. But you want to see it anyway.
“Casablanca” will be on the big screen at Court Square Theater in Downtown Harrisonburg on Tuesday, June 3. Read more
Why let facts get in the way of a good argument?
Fear and Loathing in Waynesboro column by Chris Graham
freepress2@ntelos.net
It would seem to buttress the case of the ultraconservatives that the average tenure of a city manager was five and a half years according to the International City/County Management Association, given that Doug Walker will be finishing up five and a half years in the city-manager job in Waynesboro when he steps down on June 30.
Only if it were true … Read more
War, economy, high gas prices? No, it’s the Second Amendment again
The Politcs Beat column by Chris Graham
freepress2@ntelos.net
Why is Bob Goodlatte banging the drum on the Second Amendment?
“You can count on me to fight to protect our rights,” Goodlatte wrote in a fund-raising letter dated May 16 that he began with mention of a case now in front of the United States Supreme Court that he said “could impact our constitutional right to own a firearm.” Read more
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