Plug-in vehicles are making great progress, with their share of U.S. car and light truck sales jumping from 2% to 4% in 2020-2021 and projected to exceed 6% by the end of 2022. But sales of gas-guzzling pickups and SUVs are also surging. This other face of the market subverts electric cars’ carbon-cutting progress.
Florida & Beyond, and All Opinions
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Friday, September 23, 2022
It’s a weekend of theater: Sondheim’s “Assassins,” at City Repertory Theatre, “Oliver!” the musical, at Flagler Playhouse, “Pippin,” at the Daytona Playhouse, Brahms v. Radiohead, and The Inside Joke That Became Trump’s Big Lie.
Candidates Grab Headlines With Name-Calling. But Voters Don’t Like It.
Uncivil messages by politicians have become more and more common in the last decade. Political attacks are now a regular occurrence in an increasingly polarized political environment, encouraging voters to get mad and plan to vote ahead of Election Day in November. But that doesn’t mean these kinds of advertisements and personal attacks actually work.
Lawsuit Cites DeSantis Trickery in Seeking to Block Further Migrant Flights
Lawyers representing asylum seekers who were allegedly “tricked” into going from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard on flights funded by Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration said Wednesday they are seeking a nationwide injunction to block the governor from luring immigrants to travel across state lines.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Thursday, September 22, 2022
The Flagler Beach City Commission takes on smoking on the beach, college admission interviews, Iraq, Iran and Ronald Reagan, and Henry James’s English Hours.
DeSantis’s Martha’s Vineyard Trafficking May Be Illegal
Transporting consenting migrants who have the paperwork to be in the U.S. is legal. But certain factors – like DeSantis’ intent and knowledge of the migrants’ immigration status – could create potential civil and criminal liability.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Wednesday, September 21, 2022
Palm Coast government’s final tax and budget hearing, Weekly Chess Club for Teens, Ages 9-18, at the Flagler County Public Library, International Day of Peace, Bill McKibben’s “Small World,” mountaintop removal’s disasters.
DeSantis Pulls From Segregationists’ Playbook with Anti-Immigration Stunt
Governors Greg Abbott in Texas and Ron DeSantis in Florida are following the playbook of segregationists who provided one-way bus tickets to Northern cities for Black Southerners in the 1960s. At that time, the fight for racial equality was attracting national attention and support from many white Americans, inspiring some to join interracial Freedom Rides organized by civil rights groups.
Judge Clears Way for Challenge to Law Allowing State to Override Local Police Budget Decisions
A Leon County Circuit judge on Tuesday cleared the way for a lawsuit challenging part of a controversial protest law that gives the governor and Cabinet the authority to override local governments’ decisions about police spending.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Tuesday, September 20, 2022
A rare Jimmy Rice Act trial in Flagler court, The Palm Coast City Council makes planning board appointments, Freedom Readers Club at the Flagler County Public Library, Jelly Roll Morton.
Discovering the Billions of Bigger and Better Super-Earths Out There
There are tens of billions of super-Earths in habitable zones where liquid water can exist in the Milky Way alone. To date, astronomers have discovered two dozen super-Earth exoplanets that are, if not the best of all possible worlds, theoretically more habitable than Earth.
Federal Judge Skeptical of DeSantis Suspension of Elected Prosecutor, But No Reinstatement for Now
A federal judge refused on Monday to reinstate Andrew Warren as state’s attorney for Hillsborough County, saying he first wants to fast-track a trial to better establish the motivation behind Gov. Ron DeSantis’ suspension of the elected prosecutor.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Monday, September 19, 2022
The Flagler County Commission meets for a very busy, multi-layered meeting this evening, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone at the public library, French pianist Jean-Efflam Bavouzet’s complete Haydn sonatas, Ian Frazier on the destruction of Baghdad.
‘Not My King’: Protesting a Monarchy in Mourning
A professor from the United States who tweeted a critical comment of the queen has been subject to significant public backlash. Police in Britain have questioned protestors expressing anti-monarchy sentiments, and in some cases, arrested them.
Sen. Rick Scott’s Epic Fail: Squandered Millions and Crap Candidates
Republicans often have unsavory friends, people like Hungarian despot Viktor Orbán, white nationalist Tucker Carlson, and that petulant Oompa Loompa who kept top secret nuclear documents stuffed in a box at his beach house. So why is Rick Scott getting hated on?
Republicans Complain About WESH-2’s Requirement That Debate Candidates Be Vaccinated
Scotty Moore, Republican nominee challenging incumbent Democrat Darren Soto in Congressional District 9 in Central Florida, declined an offer by WESH-2 in Orlando to participate in a virtual debate after he refused to adhere to the news outlet’s vaccine requirement.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Sunday, September 18, 2022
Live Like Cameron’s 5th Annual Flagler Warrior Fun Run/Walk in Town Center, the anniversary of the Battle of Antietam and the 50th anniversary of the premier of M*A*S*H.
The Broadband Deception: Accurate Speed Data
Unlike other advertisements for goods and services – for example, what a car manufacturer tells a customer about expected fuel efficiency – there are no federally set standards for measuring broadband service speeds. This means there is no clear way to tell whether customers are getting what they pay for.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Saturday, September 17, 2022
Flagler County Sheriff’s Office’s Safety Expo at European Village, Judge Andrea K. Totten on the 10th Amendment, Flagler Open Arms Recovery Services’s 2nd Annual Music Festival, the prosecutorial spirit against blue collar workers.
Between Too-Early School Start Times and Too Much Screen Time, Teens Are Zonked Out
Less than 30% of high school students sleep the recommended amount. Among middle schoolers, nearly 60% do not get enough sleep at night. The causes: too- early school start times, lack of morning exposure to daylight and excessive exposure to bright electric light and screens late in the evening.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Friday, September 16, 2022
Luciana Celestin is sentenced on a second degree felony charge of neglect of a child, unemployment numbers, “Pippin,” at the Daytona Playhouse, “After the Massacre,” Bertrand Russell on happiness.
Developed Nation No More: How the U.S. Is Falling
The United States may regard itself as a “leader of the free world,” but an index of development released in July 2022 places the country much farther down the list, ranking between Cuba and Bulgaria. Both are widely regarded as developing countries..
DeSantis Defends Martha’s Vineyard Migrant Flight But Details of ‘Repulsive’ and ‘Cruel Ruse’ Scant
Saying undocumented immigrants were sent to “greener pastures,” Gov. Ron DeSantis on Thursday defended Florida’s participation in a pair of flights carrying about 50 migrants, including children, that landed Wednesday at Martha’s Vineyard Airport.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Thursday, September 15, 2022
Drug court, “Pippin,” at the Daytona Playhouse, a tropical depression nearing the Leeward Islands is far from a tropical storm, William Howard Taft, John Hinkley and “Ideology Masquerading as Medicine.”
Child Poverty Falls to Record Low Thanks to Government Help
The U.S. government’s most accurate measure of child poverty fell to 5.2% in 2021, the lowest level on record and a decline of 4.5 percentage points from a year earlier. This sharp reduction was due, in large part, to generous government benefits. The decline would have been even larger had the government made it easier for families to receive those benefits.
Another DeSantis ‘Press’ Conference Basks in Applause and Takes No Questions
Gov. Ron DeSantis opened the floor for questions at the end of a Jacksonville news conference Monday and left after allowing a single person in the crowd to shout what sounded like, “We love you.”
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Wednesday, September 14, 2022
The Flagler County Association of Realtors hosts its 14th annual Meet the Mayors, Devandre Williams is in pre-trial, Dante in search of his own circle of hell, Adam Begley on Ian McEwan.
The Catholic Church Is Diversifying Down to Its Controversies
Tribalism, debates over LGBTQ rights, polygamy, the ordaining of women, along with poverty, adapting to local culture, sexuality and gender, church governance and the continuing sexual abuse crisis are all part of a changing Catholic Church.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Tuesday, September 13, 2022
The Palm Coast City Council talks legislative priorities and meeting times, Kwentel Moultrie has a pre-trial, The Flagler County Planning Board meets, remembering, not fondly, John Rocker, the Number 7 subway line and Edward Gibbon’s echoes.
1st a Law Gagging Talk of Gender. Now a Gag Order on Lawsuit Information. Plaintiffs Complain.
Plaintiffs challenging a Florida law restricting instruction on gender identity and sexual orientation in schools are asking a judge to reverse an order stalling their ability to gather information in the case, arguing that the law is being used throughout the state to “censor any positive or supportive reference to LGBT people.”
Barbara Ehrenreich Made Not Getting By in America Visible
Barbara Ehrenreich, who died on Sept. 1, is best known for her 2001 book “Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America.” Ehrenreich’s ability to document in clear, accessible prose exactly how low-wage work forced people into an unavoidable grind remains a revelation of a wide divide on how the other half lives.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Monday, September 12, 2022
The Flagler County Commission meets to consider the latest budget-cut proposal by its administration in light of the tax rate reduction, on Alfred A. Knopf, America’s greatest publisher, Florian Ross’ Architexture.
The Southern Ocean Is Absorbing Too Much Heat
This Southern Ocean warming and its associated impacts are effectively irreversible on human time scales, because it takes millennia for heat trapped deep in the ocean to be released back into the atmosphere.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Sunday, September 11, 2022
The Palm Coast Fire Department’s Sept. 11 commemoration at heroes Park, “Pippin,” at the Daytona Playhouse, Walt Whitman on Manhattan’s resilience, Martin Amis on Mohammad Atta.
Burning Man’s Hold on Our Primordial Need for Ritual
The overwhelming majority of the 70,000 people who attend the Burning man festival each year in Nevada identify as nonreligious, yet the deeply spiritual experiences they report resemble those of religious groups. Indeed, the similarities with religion are no accident.
The Tragedy of Turning Florida’s Rural Lands Into Urban Sprawl
Lately, it seems Florida’s big-money developers, aided by politicians from the governor on down, have put a target on every rural spot that’s left on the map of Florida. From the Panhandle to the Keys, they want to change everything that’s now slow-paced and softly green to match the cookie-cutter concrete sprawl found everywhere else.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Saturday, September 10, 2022
Gamble Jam at Gamble Rogers Memorial State Recreation Area, “Pippin,” at the Daytona Playhouse, Picasso, Niebuhr and Jesse Jackson react to men walking on the moon.
Can A ‘Christian’ Wedding Website Designer Deny Service to Same-Sex Couples?
Lorie Smith designs websites. She intends to begin designing wedding websites and is unwilling to create them for same-sex couples, saying it would go against her Christian beliefs. Under Colorado’s Anti-Discrimination Act, though, it is discriminatory and illegal to refuse services to someone based on “disability, race, creed, color, sex, sexual orientation, marital status, national origin, or ancestry.”
Federal Judge Clears UCF Prof Robert Cassanello to Sue Over DeSantis’s ‘Stop Woke Act’
Cassanello, a history professor at UCF, and other plaintiffs, including public-school teachers and a student, filed the lawsuit in April after DeSantis signed the law (HB 7), arguing that it violated First Amendment rights and was unconstitutionally vague.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Friday, September 9, 2022
Desiree Rodriguez is sentenced, the sales tax holiday continues until midnight, “Pippin” at the Daytona Playhouse, when Russell Baker covered the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II.
Queen Elizabeth II: The Moderniser who Steered the British Monarchy Into the 21st Century
Elizabeth II, whose 70-year reign makes her the longest reigning monarch in British history, leaves her successor with a sort of British monarchical republic, in which the proportions of its ingredients of mystique, ceremony, populism and openness have been constantly changed in order to keep it essentially the same.
Florida Supreme Court Issues, then Retracts, Order on Anti-Abortion Law
The Florida Supreme Court issued an order rejecting a request by abortion providers to block enforcement of the state’s 15-week abortion ban — and then withdrew it, blaming an error by the court’s clerk’s office in releasing the order.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Thursday, September 8, 2022
The ILA oversight committee meets, the Palm Coast City Council meets in the first of two public hearings on its tax and budget proposals, as does the Flagler Beach City Commission, which also meets in a regular session after the hearing.
Fears of a Polio Resurgence in U.S. Has Health Officials on Alert
When news broke in July 2022 that an unvaccinated adult man in New York had contracted polio – the first case in the U.S. since 2013 – and developed paralysis from the disease, it sent a ripple of fear throughout the public health community and raised the question of whether an old foe was making a comeback.
In 4th Legal Challenge Against DeSantis’s ‘Stop Woke Act,’ USF Professor and Student File Suit
In a 91-page complaint, lawyers for USF associate professor of history Adriana Novoa, student Samuel Rechek and the First Amendment Forum at University of South Florida raised a series of arguments that the law violates speech rights.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Wednesday, September 7, 2022
Sales tax holiday continues, Palm Coast’s code enforcement board meets, heat index up to 109 as tropical storms brew, the founding of Google, the shooting of Tupak Shakur and Moby-Dick.
The Banalization of Tragedy
The difficulty of sustained focus on events like the war is due not only to the inherent fragility of moral attention. The 24/7 news cycle is one of many pressures clamoring for our attention. Our smartphones and other technology with incessant communications – from trivial to apocalyptic – engineer environments to keep us perpetually distracted and disoriented.
Nikki Fried Challenges Gov. DeSantis’s ‘Publicity Stunt’ in Vote-Fraud Arrests of 20 Felons
Commissioner of Agriculture and Consumer Services Nikki Fried notes that it is the responsibility of the Division of Elections to screen prospective voters for criminal records, because the county supervisors of election lack access to the necessary state databases.
The Daily Cartoon and Live Briefing: Tuesday, September 6, 2022
The school board meets for the first time since the election, the Palm Coast City Council pays more for splash pad repairs, Lech Walesa at FIU, Samuel Alito’s crusade.
The Difference Between Free Speech and Academic Freedom
In the era of today’s heated culture wars, the concepts of academic freedom and freedom of expression have become increasingly conflated. Divisive political debates around critical race theory and talk of establishing “free speech guardians” are just some recent examples. Academic freedom is being subsumed into the oftentimes polarizing rhetoric concerning what is commonly referred to as free speech.