Our Congressman Paul Broun wants to get rid of Medicare as we know it. I’m not kidding. I’m not exaggerating, and I’m not trying to scare anyone. This is one of the bullet points of his own “health care” bill which was read to a group of seven Democrats and Independents by his very gracious aides in his Athens office last week. Three of us Morgan Countians attended and were joined by four from Oconee County.
Nothing Broun says surprises me anymore, but his words at a Clarkesville town meeting last Tuesday were just as inciting and untrue as those who are halting the debate at town hall meetings of Democrats across the country. Broun’s efforts at speechifying to his constituents were at the same time shameful and pitifully comical.          
Go online to www.onlineathens.com and search for “rotten fish.”
    That’s one of the phrases he used to describe health care reform as proposed by Democrats.
    Immediately will pop up the newspaper article of his Clarkesville meeting. The scare tactics were rampant – watch out or they will declare martial law…old folks will be encouraged to just let go and die…etc.
Broun said he is not going to vote for the current House bill no matter what. So rather than working in a bipartisan manner to make this House bill better, he is championing his own ideas.
    His twisting of facts and his past actions will make it hard for his colleagues to take him seriously.

By: Fred Johnson: Columnist

Nancy Pelosi says that the people protesting Barack Obama’s healthcare plan are not grassroots people. She calls them Astroturf people (when she’s not calling them swastika-carrying, rightwing mobs). Sen. Barbara Boxer insists the protestors are too "well-dressed" to be true grassroots activists White House spokesman Robert Gibbs says this is all “manufactured anger” because the protestors – he calls them the "Brooks Brothers Brigade" –are too tastefully dressed to be “authentic” protestors.
    However, it has become apparent from videos and photographs of town hall meetings that it is the supporters of “Obama Care” who carry professionally made signs with identical messages while the “Brooks Brothers Brigade” carry homemade signs that oppose nationalized healthcare. So which side really has the paid supporters?
    The LA Times recently reported on a Web site with a large-type headline that announces: "Work to Pass Obama's Healthcare Plan and Get Paid to Do it! $10-15 hr!" They go on to say that it's a Web ad on Craigslist: "You can work for change. Join motivated staff around the country working to make change happen. You can make great friends and money along the way. Earn $400-$600 a week."

By: Dick Hodgetts: Columnist

The whole county revs up for back-to-school.  The Morgan County High Bulldogs are practicing intensely in the August heat for their first Friday night game.  The MCHS band can be found at the DuPree Track marching and developing new formations.  Lots of Moms have taken kids to Wal-Mart and Family Dollar store for back-to-school supplies. The photos of those kindergarten and first graders off to their first day simply pull at your heart strings.  And, if your house is like mine when I attended school, back-to-school requires a visit to the eye doctor, and the dentist.  But, this year is a bit different.  It’s not just the kids getting ready, but horses too.
 Yes, Morgan County High will have its first equestrian team.  The team Coach is Kat DeMas Mulkey-who Coached the Equestrian club team at UGA, and her associate: Coach Kimberly Hezzelwood, who was Manager of her college equestrian team which won back to back national championships. The local team is located at Four Seasons Farm out 441 North on Plantation Road.  If you have not visited Plantation Road in the last decade, you have missed part of the horse industry that is growing in Morgan County.  Four Seasons Farm is a hunter/jumper farm, Rythmn & Balance across the road is an impressive indoor Dressage facility, Charles Young does trail riding all over the USA, The Stables at Apalachee offers quality boarding services, and the multi-talented Sally Buffington at Stone Creek specializes in Eventing.  The newest farm is 14 Hands where Parham has high hopes of competing at a national level.  And now we have an equestrian team for our high school with all these skills and experience readily available.

In the food service industry, there are rules about polished fingernails and hair and shoes.
But at Starbucks in Madison, just days away from the store's official closing, there are acrylic fingernails wrapped around the cups holding espresso. Painted fingernails, too. Fire engine red, even. Lovely hairstyles, with long, graceful locks falling delicately across foreheads, uncapped and, well, free. There are even the forbidden collarless shirts.

There are also signs on the front door, the drive-thru window, the drive-thru menu board... Signs that explain to patrons that this store will be closing on Friday, August 21 and thank you for being a customer and aren't you glad you like Starbucks and visit one of these other stores for your favorite drink, real soon.

There is a female commuter from Atlanta who visits the store regularly as a stop off en-route to where-ever she goes on a daily basis who cries when she reads the sign the first time. There are locals and visitors from across the country who sign the petitions, begging whatever random Starbucks employee working telephone customer service that day to reconsider closing a store that, to them, is comfort and consistency. There are moments of confusion when partners are told that there have been more calls about their store closing than any in this most recent rash of store shutdowns.

There is a man, the story goes, who offered to help Starbucks pay for their billboard that had been rented for a year along Interstate-20, and then removed in July 2008, so interstate traffic would be alerted to the presence of the store, therefore increasing sales.

“My son wants to run faster. He has foot inserts but they haven’t helped. Do you have any suggestions?”

There are many factors involved in creating speed, one of the most important components in any sport. Among these are genetic predisposition, conditioning, coaching and determination. So his inserts may not be a factor at all. That said, a really good set of custom foot inserts can make all the difference in the world, but they must be extremely precise and unfortunately, most aren’t.

The normal foot (whether walking or running) hits the ground on the outside of the heel and then rolls inward (adapting to the surface). This motion is called pronation, and a certain amount of it is necessary. The problem is that most people pronate or roll in excessively. This is not only wasted, time consuming motion, but leads to all sorts of injuries.

The goal of a custom performance foot insert is to hold or stop the foot at its ideal position and not let it roll in excessively. This allows the foot to be on the ground less time, which translates into faster speeds. The foot will also be a much more rigid, powerful lever, with quicker push off. That’s exactly why sprinters use a starting block; to have a more rigid lever to propel from. So an ideally corrected foot insert is like having a starting block in your shoe for every stride you take!

Studies have shown that if you can decrease the amount of time the foot is on the ground by only five one thousandths of a second, (a blink is one, one thousandth of a second), you can decrease a forty yard dash time from 4.8 to 4.6 seconds or less. That’s a significant amount for a competitive athlete, and a really good set of custom inserts can do that.

Caitlin Byrnes: Staff Writer

Pulling into Rutledge, I thought about how I should check the event off on my list of life firsts.

Being a city girl to the core, my knowledge of small-town USA is limited to gas stations, fast food restaurants and what can be learned from listening to country music on the way to the nearest mall.

The town is just over three square miles? I didn’t know towns could be that small.

I looked down at my directions: right at the four-way intersection, left at the stop sign, right over the railroad tracks.
There is something beautifully quaint about directions that don’t need street names and a head’s up on where the camera lights are.

I parked next to City Hall, and nervously walked in. My past experiences with administrative meetings have been filled with angry people yelling amidst budgetary shortfall. I took a deep breath and prepared for the worst.
I walked in to a small group of happy city council members, bringing the visitor count to a whopping one.
They talked about someone who applied for a business license, momentarily discussed improving the park entertainment area in the future and scheduled a public discussion of the annual budget.

A-ha! So the meeting of angry people I was expecting is happening later!

Not so much. The budget, about the price of a suburban home, is not expected to bring any contention.
“We keep people happy,” Mayor Knight said. “We watch our spending and don’t overspend.”

Wow- sounds like a concept a few other Georgia towns should embrace.

On my way home I thought about my first experience in a small town- kids throwing around a football, a man mowing his front yard in the rain, American flags prominently displayed outside buildings other than a post office.