“It is cruel. It is immoral. And it breaks my heart,” says former first lady Laura Bush of the Trump administration policy of “zero tolerance,” under which the children of illegal migrants are being detained apart from their parents.
Nearly two years after the worst flood in the history of Livingston Parish, we still see and hear reminders of what we endured and learn new aspects about the disaster that changed life as we know it here.
State legislators will spend the next week in debate over the lesser of two evils.
One of my favorite shows on HGTV is Love It or List It. It is, in my opinion, the most accurate and insightful look into the high level couple drama that often accompanies home decisions and example A of why Psychology 101 and Couples Counseling should be mandatory course requirements in the…
For quite some time, business managers and owners across the country held the belief that technology would allow them to reduce personnel because employees could use innovation to do their jobs, and the labor of others.
Can you smell it from where you are?
H ere’s what I hope Robert Mueller will conclude when he is done investigating Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign: The president is innocent of criminal wrongdoing. He did not know of or approve contacts with Russians to influence the election. His interactions with FBI Director James Comey and ot…
At the G-7 summit in Canada, President Donald Trump described America as “the piggy bank that everybody is robbing.”
It’s sad and shameful when it takes the actions of celebrities to reopen discussion on a subject many prefer not to discuss.
Here goes another $60,000 in taxpayer revenue – and where it will bring us, nobody knows.
I say this when a prospective homeowner makes a face at me when I suggest they get a home inspection before completing the purchase process. I get it. No one wants to spend $400 on a house only to find out the house isn’t worth buying. However, losing $400 is nothing compared to the tens of …
A recent announcement by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers of $14 million to the Comite River Diversion Canal shines a ray of hope on the project. While the sum is roughly 1/20th of the total pot, that’s quite alright, because there’s several reasons this particular announcement has excited b…
The governor of Louisiana is not politically omnipotent. (I’m referring to the storied position of governor, not the man or the woman who asked for the empowering votes.) And despite the campfire tales we grew up with down here, the governor of Louisiana is not the most powerful governor in …
The tweet that caused an uproar that led to the cancellation of Roseanne Barr’s ABC sitcom was a reminder of the most illuminating and depressing reality of our time: the stubborn centrality of race and racism in our national life.
“There is no Republican Party. There’s a Trump party,” John Boehner told a Mackinac, Mich., gathering of the GOP faithful last week. “The Republican Party is kind of taking a nap somewhere.”
“The interstate highway is that wonderful creation that allows us to travel from one end of America to another without seeing a thing,” the late Charles Kuralt once said.
It came as little surprise that lawmakers would not budge toward compromise on how to settle the $648 million shortfall that looms over the state once the calendar moves past June 30.
I see Jason Ard is asking for a 1/2 cent tax increase to put a deputy in every school and the Livingston Parish Public Works is using road tax money for drainage projects in certain areas. It seems to me, they are getting enough money but need to learn how to manage it better. Instead of a d…
I’ve always been a bit of a cynic on the importance of staging a home for sale. While I’ve always thought it was a good idea and could contribute to getting a home sold, my mantras have always been, “Price sells homes,” and “you have to look beyond the fluff to the important stuff.” Like so …
With no real fix to Louisiana’s budgetary woes in sight, one has to wonder – are the right questions being asked?
The course can still be corrected over the next few days, and the Capitol is certainly capable of producing last-minute Christmas morning miracles, but this latest policymaking experiment in Baton Rouge already looks like The Special Session That Didn’t Happen.
A lot has happened in America since April 25, 2001 -- the 9/11 attacks, two major wars, the Great Recession, the first black president, the iPhone, a Cubs World Series title and Donald Trump. That was the day the Dream Act, to protect young immigrants brought here illegally as children, was …
After being sworn in for a fourth term, Vladimir Putin departed the Kremlin for Annunciation Cathedral to receive the televised blessing of Patriarch Kirill of the Russian Orthodox Church.
The end of the school year and shift toward summer vacation used to bring with it a certain rite of passage for teenagers, but as Bob Dylan once sang “The Times They Are a Changin’.”
Unless something drastic changes by the time you read this, you’ll know that some things that aren’t supposed to last tend to stick around considerably longer in state government.
U.S. birth rates dropped again last year, and the fertility rate is the lowest ever recorded according to a new report released by the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics last week.
Food for thought. Let’s take all the money we’re putting into these libraries and build us a nice coliseum here in the parish. That way we can have our graduations in the parish. I don’t know why we need all these libraries, but y’all keep paying the tax. Thank you.
Time waits for no man (or woman). With ever present accuracy, thanks to the invention of the clock, every second of our lives ticks away with easily measured precision.
You know what you never forget? You never forget your ninth legislative session.”
That joking retort we heard as children, “Is the pope Catholic?” is starting to look like a serious question.
We sometimes come across larger-than-life individuals we considered invincible and took for granted they would be around forever.
Memorial Day weekend brings mixed emotions among Americans, as we will see this weekend.
Way back in the 90’s, when I was an undergrad at LSU, I took Economics 1001. It wasn’t a subject that particularly appealed to me at the time. I was much more interested in what was going on in Tigerland or where we were tailgating this weekend, but I definitely retained one key bit of knowl…
Governmental finance is always a real snoozer. It’s a balance between expenditures and revenues in several different categories, but the three to focus on in terms of balanced markets are foreign trade, local commerce, and local taxes collected.
One day after Rep. Neil Abramson’s constitutional convention legislation failed in the state House by a 52-47 vote, an organization involved with the effort released a statement saying it would work to have a similar bill introduced in the approaching special session that convenes Tuesday, May 22.
From the beginning of his campaign for president, Donald Trump portrayed illegal immigration as a forest fire that threatens to spread rapidly and engulf us all. Mexicans, he charged, are “bringing drugs. They're bringing crime. They’re rapists.” He thought Americans should be afraid.
For Bibi Netanyahu, Israel’s longest-serving prime minister save only founding father David Ben-Gurion, it has been a week of triumph.
We’ve been down this road, and we will soon head that way again.
It’s seldom considered a wise move for one parish to sue a neighboring parish, but a recent turn of events represents a rare exception.
Well, Louisiana House Bill 500 tried, and Louisiana House Bill 500 failed.
T hree well-known political consultants and a man who has won two statewide offices all say the road to victory for Louisiana’s next secretary state could be bumpy and uncomfortable.
T he case against the nuclear deal with Iran is reminiscent of what Woody Allen once said: “Life is full of misery, loneliness and suffering -- and it’s all over much too soon.” The agreement, critics insist, is terrible and doesn’t last long enough.
This next week may determine whether President Trump extricates us from that cauldron of conflict that is the Middle East, as he promised, or plunges us even deeper into these forever wars.
Tourists can learn plenty about an area during a brief road trip, just as they can a lot about its past.
Two years can bring forth a lot of change and progress – that is, if it does not involve the federal government.
Vacationing along the stretch of the Gulf Coast from Orange Beach to Pensacola affectionately known as the Redneck Riviera, is a long standing tradition for many south Louisiana families. You grow up going to the beach with your parents. Then you take your kids to the beach. Somewhere along …
Most residents of Livingston Parish don’t think “tourism’”when pondering the selling points of their home parish.
Being a Democratic member of the Louisiana Legislature isn’t always unicorns, rainbows and lollipops. Sometimes it can get a little rough.
President Donald Trump says if his meeting with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un “is not fruitful,” he will “respectfully leave the meeting.” My advice would be to wear his walking shoes, because he will probably be taking a hike.
“Together,” French President Emmanuel Macron instructed President Donald Trump, “we can resist the rise of aggressive nationalisms that deny our history and divide the world.”
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