Kudos to Gov. Tim Kaine and the General Assembly for passing and signing legislation requiring the General Assembly to give consent to any tolls that would be placed on the Interstate 81 corridor.
According to a press release from the governor’s office, every lawmaker along the I-81 corridor voted in favor of the bill sponsored by Delegate Todd Gilbert and Sens. Mark Obenshain and John Edwards.
The legislation comes as the Virginia Department of Transportation is looking to widen the road to the tune of $11 billion. The plan to expand the highway’s capacity, funded by tolls on commuters and tractor-trailer rigs, has been rightly criticized for the past six years.

In 11 years of writing this column, not one of my suggestions has ever been adopted by Washington County or the Town of Abingdon. For instance, I said that they should build the proposed Wal-Mart underground at the Virginia Highlands Airport, and then pave the new runway over it.  I have yet to see any construction activity at the airport. 
However, I remain undeterred. Johnston Memorial Hospital is going to build a new hospital at Exit 22.  The Washington County Public Library needs a larger facility.  Obviously the library should occupy the old hospital building. 

When I was twelve, Daddy took me out one afternoon to teach me how to shoot a gun.  My brothers went too.  I was the worst shot, and not because I was a girl.  To hit a target, you have to position your body a certain way, do mental math, and not tremble.  Most of all, you have to want to hit your target.

“Saint Joan,” one of the monumental works of modern drama, is a thought provoking work, entirely fitting for this seventy-fifth season of continuous production by the Barter Theatre.  Joan of Arc remains one of the most fascinating and enigmatic figures of the Hundred Years’ War.  An uneducated provincial girl, who since childhood had seen visions and heard heavenly voices in the fields, at age seventeen she persuaded a succession of French noblemen to equip and commission her for military leadership against the English, who controlled vast territories in her country.

Crocuses are starting to bloom. I am seeing more robins every day. And the one sure sign that spring is here (or almost), baseball has begun spring-training. Hallelujah!

It’s an emotional issue that must not be dealt with emotionally.
Good luck with that.

Should a person with Alzheimer’s Disease be prescribed antibiotics?  According to a recent study released by the Harvard-affiliated Hebrew Senior Life Institute for Aging Research, the answer could be no.

It seems to me that the chain stores would make a lot more money if they put the stores that appeal to women next to the stores that appeal to men.  That way, the wife could shop for unmentionables while the man goes to the hardware store next door and asks a thousand questions about a job he has planned for the year 2015.

The Jay Leno pieces that display in full color our nation’s ignorance stopped being funny a long while ago. They’re not even cringe worthy anymore, just pathetic. Just when you find yourself hoping that all those “Jaywalkers” are celebrity-obsessed put-ons hamming it up for the camera comes a report like the one issued last week from Common Core. The information in “Still At Risk: What Students Don’t Know, Even Now” won’t surprise anyone who’s been up watching television past the local news. However, it might, should, make them cry. For example, 10 percent of those surveyed thought Adolf Hitler was a munitions manufacturer. Nearly 25 percent, the same number that thought Christopher Columbus sailed the ocean blue sometime after1750, couldn’t identify Hitler.

Candles flickered across the altar, at times their flames seemingly imbued by the prayers they symbolized. About 20 voices united in ecumenical prayer that on this cold Lenten night was voiced in music.