Something is changing. People are angry, auto-calling their representatives, making signs, demonstrating and showing up at town halls. But Republican representatives don’t show up, not any more. They don’t like getting booed. They don’t like facing outraged citizens. A few tried holding town halls. Did not go well. But hey, at least they actually held town halls. Nobody’s seen hide nor hair of Florida Republicans.
Florida & Beyond, and All Opinions
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Sunday, April 6, 2025
‘Sense and Sensibility’ at St. Augustine’s Limelight Theatre, “Something Rotten,” at the Daytona Playhouse, Daytona State College Spring Orchestra Concert, Robert Reich on the new tax on Americans, Don DeLillo on American irrelevance.
Florida Could Target 341,000 Haitian and Venezuelan Migrants for Expulsion
Florida leads the nation in the number of immigrants with Temporary Protected Status, or TPS. Of those, 59% are Venezuelan and 35% are Haitian. Homeland Security Director Kristi Noem issued a termination notice that canceled TPS for Venezuelan recipients as of April 7. Then a judge intervened. But the judge’s order doesn’t stop the expulsion of Haitians.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Saturday, April 5, 2025
Alice Munro’s “Carried Away,” the Tolpuddle Martyrs, Annual Turtle Fest in Flagler Beach, the Flagler Beach All Stars hold their monthly beach clean-up, Sunshine and Sandals Social at Cornerstone.
Cory Booker’s Challenge
The Democrats have been under intense pressure to find an effective way to challenge US President Donald Trump without control of either chamber of Congress or a de facto opposition leader. They may have just found one in New Jersey Senator Cory Booker.
Judge Orders Return of Maryland Man Wrongly Deported to El Salvador Prison
A federal judge in Maryland Friday ordered the Trump administration to return a national from El Salvador by April 7 who was erroneously deported to a notorious prison in El Salvador, despite an order blocking such removal. Vice President J.D. Vance wrote on social media, without evidence, that Abrego Garcia was a convicted member of the MS-13 gang and White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt this week echoed Vance.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Friday, April 4, 2025
Pastor Charles Silano talks about the Trump-ordered cuts that have drastically reduced the budget of the Grace Community Food Pantry, on Free For All, First Friday in Flagler Beach, campaign diary.
How Tariffs Wreck Trust in the United States
What’s really at stake in the sweeping tariffs just imposed on American allies and other countries is trust – America’s long-standing reputation as a stable and predictable destination for global investment. And once that trust is lost, it’s incredibly hard to win back.
Florida House Approves Draconian Restrictions on Citizen-Led Constitutional Amendments
The Republican controlled Florida House of Representatives has passed a measure that will make it prohibitively harder for a citizen-led constitutional amendment to get on the ballot. The vote was 76-31. Its passage comes just five months after two constitutional amendments that would have respectively enshrined abortion rights and legalized recreational cannabis for adults narrowly fell short of passage.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Thursday, April 3, 2025
CJ Nelson Jr. Sentencing, Richard Powers on Detroit, consumer confidence falls to its lowest level since 2022, Model Yacht Club Races at the Pond in Palm Coast’s Central Park.
A Presidential Order Manipulates U.S. History Through the Smithsonian
Of course, history is contested. There will always be a variety of views about what should be included and excluded from America’s story. But most recent debates center on how much attention should be given to the history of the nation’s accomplishments over its darker chapters. The Smithsonian, as a national institution that receives most of its funds from the federal government, has sometimes found itself in the crosshairs.
Trump Targets China, U.S. Allies and Others with Sweeping and Steep New Tariffs
The president unveiled a baseline 10% levy on all international imports, plus what he described as additional “kind” and “discounted” tariff rates that will increase but not match the rates other countries apply to American imports. The levies, effective at midnight, will hit U.S. industries from agriculture to manufacturing to fashion. U.S. tariffs will reach 34% on imports from China, 46% on products from Vietnam and 20% on European Union imports, including beer and wine.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Wednesday, April 2, 2025
Barring marine LePen from running in the 2027 presidential election endangers French democracy, the Palm Coast Code Enforcement Board, the Flagler Beach Parks Ad Hoc Committee meets, Voltaire on French fanaticism.
Presidential Term Limits Are There for a Reason
No one is supposed to serve more than two full terms as president, according to the 22nd Amendment. The only way someone can serve more than two terms is if they served less than two years in a previous term in which they weren’t elected president. It is worth understanding why the two-term tradition was considered so important that it was turned into constitutional law the first time it was violated.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Tuesday, April 1, 2025
It’s Election Day: choose your next Congressman in this special election to replace the secrets-spewing Mike Waltz, the Palm Coast City Council and the planning boards in Bunnell and Flagler Beach meet, ICE raids, Democratic sheep.
Marine Le Pen’s Familiar Victim Narrative
Marine Le Pen, figurehead of France’s Rassemblement National (RN), one of the most established far-right parties in Europe, has been found guilty of embezzling funds from the European parliament. Le Pen is highly unlikely to be able to stand as a candidate in the next presidential election in 2027.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Monday, March 31, 2025
Cello Studio Recital presented by the Stetson School of Music, Sara Novak and Principal Kristin Bozeman of Matanzas High School and Assistant Superintendent Dr. Angela O’Brien earn a milestone, Omar el Akkad on becoming American.
That Time Change Affects Your Body and Mind Longer Than You Realize
Your biological internal clock is controlled in a small region of the brain called the hypothalamus. It regulates hormone release, body temperature and metabolism. So if your circadian rhythm is out of kilter, those things will be disrupted too.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Sunday, March 30, 2025
‘Violet’ at City Repertory Theatre, Palm Coast Farmers’ Market at European Village, Karen Russell’s “Prospectors” and the Florida writer’s love of weird.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Saturday, March 29, 2025
Peps Art Walk, Phenomenal Women’s Event at AACS, Richard Slotkin turns Star Wars upside down, Curtis Yarvin welcomes the end of American democracy, Christopher Lasch bemoans American narcissism.
Ukraine’s Minerals Explained
Ukraine is often recognised for its vast agricultural lands and industrial heritage, but beneath its surface lies one of the world’s most remarkable geological formations, the “Ukrainian Shield”. These geological processes created favourable geological conditions for forming several mineral deposits including lithium, graphite, manganese, titanium and rare earth elements. All these are now critical for modern industries and the global green energy transition.
Florida Unemployment Rate Rises to 3.6%, Flagler’s to 4.6% as State Revises Labor Force Numbers Upward
The Florida Department of Commerce on Friday said the unemployment rate increased from 3.5 percent in January to 3.6 percent in February. Florida had a 3.4 percent jobless rate in December. The unemployment rate in Flagler County jumped to 4.6 percent after the Department of Commerce revised figures substantially–adding several thousand people to Flagler County’s labor force.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Friday, March 28, 2025
‘Violet’ at City Repertory Theatre, Acoustic Jam Circle At The Community Center In The Hammock, the curious retention pond in front of Flagler Beach’s coming Margaritaville Hotel.
Freedom of Expression, the Extreme Right’s New Totem
Won with great difficulty by citizens against the powers of the State and the Church in the 18th century, freedom of expression is now brandished like a totem by the bosses of social networks and by the extreme right.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Thursday, March 27, 2025
The Flagler Beach City Commission meets, the Marineland Town Commission meets, Model Yacht Club Races at the Pond in Palm Coast’s Central Park, the eternal adolescence of Air Force One.
The Heritage Foundation’s Long War Against the Education Department
The Heritage Foundation first called for limiting the federal role in education in 1981. That’s when it issued its first Mandate for Leadership, a book offering conservative policy recommendations. It renewed the call in its Project 2025, a conservative political initiative to revamp the federal government.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Wednesday, March 26, 2025
Clay Jones on the Voice of America, Tyrese Patterson sentencing, Weekly Chess Club for Teens at the public library, in praise of Hooters, refuge against conversion therapy.
Bezos’s Washington Post About Face
Journalists report news to inform the public, while editors and opinion writers analyze and explain news, putting facts into a larger context to aid understanding. Jeff Bezos is throwing that model of journalism out. Opinion and analysis in the Post will limit itself to one particular apparently libertarian viewpoint: what Bezos calls personal liberties and free markets.
Florida Senate Committee Approves Ignoring Preferred Pronouns in State and Local Government
A measure (SB 440) prohibits requiring any employee to refer to another person using that person’s preferred pronouns if such pronouns don’t correspond to that person’s sex at birth. Job applications in public workplaces may only ask an applicant whether they are male or female and may not provide a nonbinary option.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Tuesday, March 25, 2025
The Flagler County School Board meets at 1 p.m. in an information workshop and again at 6 p.m., Budgeting by Values, where people are the happiest (and the least happy).
What You Should Know About What TikTok Calls News
Here are three crucial things to know about news you get on TikTok: What videos count as news, how they got to you, and what you should do when you see them. These are three of what media researchers know as the “5 C’s” of news literacy: content, circulation and consumption. While they can be applied to any kind of news use, they are especially important for TikTok, where anyone can create content, and the algorithm decides what we see.
Federal Judge Dismisses Lawsuit Against Florida Law Restricting Minors on Social Media
Senior U.S. District Judge Mark Walker in Tallahassee dismissed a challenge against the state’s law barring Floridians younger than 14 from using social media apps with addictive features filed by industry organizations NetChoice and Computer & Communications Industry Association representing companies including Google, Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, and YouTube.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Monday, March 24, 2025
A new flag flies above the Flagler Beach Police Department, the Bunnell City Commission meets, the Flagler County Beekeepers Association, Sheldon Cooper’s fun with flags, Omar el Akkad’s fear of flags.
Americans Still Believe They Live in a Compassionate Country
A new study on the state of compassion in America by the Muhammad Ali Center, which the late boxer co-founded 20 years ago in Louisville, Kentucky, to advance social justice, found that the desire to help others still animates many Americans despite the nation’s current polarization and divisive politics. Cities with high compassion scores have more community engagement and civic participation than those with low scores.
Lawless Persecution of Mahmoud Khalil Is a Threat to Free Speech Everywhere
Without a warrant or charges, plainclothes Department of Homeland Security agents forced their way into Columbia University’s student housing and detained Palestinian student Mahmoud Khalil, who had demonstrated against the Israeli genocide in Gaza. They then shipped him to an immigration jail in Louisiana, impeding his access to attorneys and visits from family. Khalil is a lawful U.S. permanent resident who hasn’t been charged with any crime. Khalil’s fate — and the larger battle over the First Amendment — concerns all of us.
Can Democrats Get Their Act Together Before Its Too Late?
For more than a century, Democrats were the party of slavery, states’ rights, and Jim Crow, but, gradually and imperfectly, became the party of civil rights, voting rights, and workers’ rights, switching places with Republicans, who once had a strong streak of social progressivism. For 30 years, Florida elected New South governors such as Reubin Askew, Bob Graham, and Lawton Chiles, leaders who believed in education, open government, protecting the environment — crazy stuff like that. Where are they now?
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Sunday, March 23, 2025
‘Violet’ at City Repertory Theatre, “Warbirds Over Flagler” fly-in at the Flagler Executive Airport, Palm Coast Farmers’ Market at European Village, a conjunction between David Copperfield and Willie Nelson.
The Hidden Epidemic of Violence Against Nurses
An alarming 8 in 10 nurses face violence at work. As a result, health care workers are more than four times as likely to be injured by workplace violence than workers in all other industries combined. Despite these staggering numbers, the full extent of this epidemic may not be fully understood because nurses and other health care workers chronically underreport violent encounters.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Saturday, March 22, 2025
‘Violet’ at City Repertory Theatre in Palm Coast, “Warbirds Over Flagler” fly-in at the Flagler Executive Airport, Gamble Jam, The Flagler Wellness Expo, George Hanns’s one-liners are still sharp.
Why Forecasting A Tornado’s Strike Zone Is Still Elusive
Pinpointing exactly where a tornado will touch down – like those that hit states including Indiana, Missouri, Arkansas, Mississippi and Alabama on March 14 and 15 – still relies heavily on seeing the storms developing on radar.
Edward James Is Killed by Lethal Injection for Murders of Betty Dick and her Granddaughter, Toni Neuner in 1993
More than three decades after he murdered a Seminole County woman and her 8-year-old granddaughter, Edward James was put to death by lethal injection Thursday night at Florida State Prison. James, 63, was pronounced dead at 8:15 p.m. and became the second person executed in Florida this year. Earlier Thursday, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected attempts by James’ attorney to halt the execution.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Friday, March 21, 2025
‘Violet’ the musical opens at City Repertory Theatre in Palm Coast, J.S. Bach is 340 years old and we celebrate with the Art of Fugue, the Friday Blue Forum and Free For All.
President’s Defiance of Court Order Fuels a Constitutional Crisis
The president is flouting U.S. District Court Judge James Bloasberg’s order that planes carrying deportees must return to the United States. The subsequent legal back-and-forth, which is still going on, intensified so quickly and dramatically that many legal scholars say the U.S. is past the point of a constitutional crisis, as the Trump administration appears to be defying a federal court order, for which Boasberg may hold the government in contempt.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Thursday, March 20, 2025
Shawn Peter Cona on trial over written threats, Town of Marineland commission meeting, The Bronx Wanderers at the Fitzgerald Performing Arts Center, following the logic of going childless as an ethical choice.
Israeli Politics Kill Gaza Ceasefire
While Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has sought to blame Hamas for the resumption of fighting that killed more than 400 Palestinians on March 18 – “only the beginning,” Netanyahu warned – the truth is the seeds of the renewed violence are to be found in Israeli domestic politics.
Flu Deaths Near 7-Year High As Anti-Vaccine Disinformation Spreads
Flu-related deaths hit a seven-year high in January and February, the two months that usually account for the height of flu season, according to a Stateline analysis of preliminary federal statistics. There were about 9,800 deaths across the country, up from 5,000 in the same period last year and the most since 2018, when there were about 10,800.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Wednesday, March 19, 2025
The Palm Coast Planning Board meets, the Palm Coast administration and members of the council break ground on a new maintenance facility, the William McKinley tariffs in a very different era.
Anti-DEI Rules Are Gutting Educators’ Free Speech Rights
The Trump administration’s attacks on diversity, equity and inclusion have continued in the form of a “Dear Colleague” letter from the Department of Education to educational institutions – from preschools through colleges and universities.. The directive the letter infringes on free speech, misunderstands the law and undermines education.
Florida Attorney General Threatens Removal of City Council Members Who Blocked Cooperation with ICE
Attorney General James Uthmeier is threatening three Fort Myers city council members with removal from office after they refused Monday to deputize police officers to participate in immigration enforcement. Uthmeier, who became the attorney general a month ago, warned the council that Gov. Ron DeSantis could remove them from office if they didn’t allow the city police to question people about their immigration status and detain those subject to deportation.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Tuesday, March 18, 2025
The Palm Coast City Council meets at 9 a.m., with an expected pro-Mayor Norris rally preceding it, Random Acts of Insanity at Cinematique, how the Washington Post is dying at Jeff Bezos’s hands.