The race is on to Election Day
As the front page of this week’s paper illustrates, it’s election season. Trouble is, it’s just not feeling much like…
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Certain medicines can be a killer combination
By Dr. Allan Zacher & JC Walkup Editor’s note: A recent overdose by a patient inspired Dr. Allan Zacher of…
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Workers need help to secure their future
The month-long celebration of Canton’s centennial Labor Day festival, which had much to offer, wasn’t really about organized labor. Now…
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In Taylor-Shuler race, party does make a difference
By Kirkwood Callahan • Guest Columnist As the final weeks of summer fade into the cooler days of autumn, we…
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Who’s the wimp now?
Just in the past couple of months, I have been forced to confront a prejudice I didn’t really know I…
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Maggie re-invents itself – again
People are saying the new Ghost Town will be a shot in the arm for Maggie Valley. That’s probably an…
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Canary Coalition is leading in the right direction
Too often people tend to write off efforts by the most hard-core social activists as excessive or simply impossible to…
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Jim Black’s enablers carry on
The scandals around N.C. House Speaker Jim Black, D-Mecklenburg, multiply like mushrooms on the forest floor. Yet a casual reader…
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Quarry plan showcases planning shortfalls
Citizens in Jackson County’s Tuckasegee community should consider themselves lucky. The problem, however, is that luck doesn’t always hold. It…
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Immigration and a complicit, angry America
On July 13, the Buncombe County Republican Action Club posted two billboards in Asheville featuring a photograph of a Mexican…
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Unified voices calling for a better big box
When Waynesville leaders met earlier this month to discuss the site plan and variance requests for the proposed big-box development…
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A little surer, a little more lost
I can’t help feeling, just slightly, like we cheated. You be the judge. The table had been set on our…
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The time has come to lift Cuban embargo
This is about political ignorance, ignorance highlighted by the recent news about Cuban leader Fidel Castro’s apparently serious illness.
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Meds vs Medicare
Louis Garnett • Guest Columnist This wasn’t my doctor’s office; it was the vendor exhibit hall at a symposium on…
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Somebody get that cow a pizza
Driving down Russ Avenue on yet another scorching day, I saw a couple of girls out in front of the…
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Alcohol vote reveals changing attitudes, new demographics
Ho-hum. Franklin voters approved the sale of mixed drinks and beer in a vote held last week. Few were surprised…
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Developers haven’t earned a break from the rules
They didn’t show up. That alone signals, or maybe “symbolizes” is the proper word, a shift in citizen attitudes that…
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Lottery’s proceeds unfairly flowing east
The effort to change the lottery funding formula so that counties in Western North Carolina get their fair share of…
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I hear the mountains calling
Even though she’s an Indiana girl who had only seen the ocean once before we met, there is something about…
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Congressmen should weigh in on relicensing
When a room full of elected officials pleaded with a U.S. senator and a congressman last week to step into…
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Oh, the irony of it all
“Sausage is good!?” My 7-year-old son was looking out the window of the van when he blurted the words out…
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NC GreenPower is inexpensive way to take a small step
When Louis and Talitha Mes put up a 100-foot windmill two weeks ago in the Crabtree community of Haywood County…
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Someone who understands me
In every town I’ve ever lived in — and I have lived in several — I have made a Sports…
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N.C. counties have gotten more democratic
By Lee Shelton After the primary election results were in, I offered a commentary on county government and the implications…
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Media freedom could easily slip away
When Federal Communications Commission officials came to Asheville last week to discuss media ownership regulations, they got an earful from…
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Once and for all, stop the influence peddling in Raleigh
For most people who live and work in Western North Carolina, the inner workings of our citizen legislature in Raleigh…
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Truth about kids and synchronicity
Before our son was born almost a year and a half ago, Tammy and I made an important decision. She…
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Authenticity often doesn’t lend itself to good drama
Back in 1952, when I was one of a dozen Western North Carolina high school students who wrote winning essays…
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Support for downtown Sylva is a wise investment
Sylva town officials have OK’d a budget for the upcoming fiscal year that has just about eliminated funding for the…
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Saving farms is not about nostalgia
If you think taking tangible steps to protect farmland is more about nostalgia than anything else, guess again. As change…
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The difference between co-opted and compromised
By Avram Friedman In January of 2006, Jim Hansen, a climatologist advising the Bush Administration, said that we have “at…
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Look at TDA structure, and then let’s move on
After last week’s surprising meeting of the Haywood County Council of Governments regarding the tourism board, perhaps there is finally…
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Scared of the Dark?
By Stephanie Wampler • Columnist The dark is a strange creature. It has so many faces. “Dark” is how we…
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A heated rivarly where everyone’s a winner
By Eric Larson Where I grew up, you had to choose sides early: You were either a University of Alabama…
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Finding a father while keeping a Dad
By Marshall Frank Imagine having a fathers of all varieties. Step, biological and adopted? Here’s a story about such a…
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The principle is always important
“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures,…
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So how far have we come?
Each year as summer dawns, when children begin counting the days until shoes become something they just have to keep…
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Paddlers will not do damage to the Chattooga
By Bruce Hare • Guest Columnist In response to your article (“Tug of War over the Chattooga River,” May 31…
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Gibson case highlights larger problems
When the jury came back with a not guilty verdict in the case against Michelle Gibson, many across the country…
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Making Jennings Randolph proud
Jennings Randolph does not leap from the pages of history. Perhaps he should. His likeness is not found on any…
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Personal heart therapy with Homer Harris
I have found that not being able to hear in a crowded room is a constant frustration. Usually, when people…
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The art of the graduation speech
A few years ago, I was asked to give the keynote speech for an area high school’s graduation ceremony. At…
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The test, and nothing but the test
I don’t bash public schools. My wife’s a teacher, my children have gotten a great education at these schools, and…
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Selling the library out for all the wrong reasons
Back last fall, about the time the Jackson County Library controversy mutated into an issue with all of the appeal…
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An encore for mama
By Joanne Meyer • Guest Columnist A soft, spring breeze wafted through the open window, sending a sheer, cafe curtain…
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Tammy deserved better
Mother’s Day was probably not everything Tammy had hoped for. She may have had visions of sleeping in until 9…
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Osteoporosis is real – get tested
By Darcia Bondurant I would like to think of myself as a healthy, 46-year-old woman. My weight, blood pressure, blood…
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Leadership is all about good ideas
Ideas. Those who have them become leaders and gravitate to places where they can implement them. All of the counties…
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Becoming one with the multi-taskers
By Stephanie Wampler • Guest Columnist Multi-tasking? Not me. Or so I’ve always thought.
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Gas prices, HCC’s needs and Sylva’s liquor dilemma
Around the region and throughout the world, there’s a lot going on right now. My “column ideas” folder runneth over,…
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