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Weather: A slight chance of showers, then showers and thunderstorms likely after 11am. Mostly sunny, with a high near 90. Chance of precipitation is 70%. Thursday Night: Showers and thunderstorms likely before 8pm. Partly cloudy, with a low around 74. Chance of precipitation is 60%.
- Daily weather briefing from the National Weather Service in Jacksonville here.
- Drought conditions here. (What is the Keetch-Byram drought index?).
- Check today’s tides in Daytona Beach (a few minutes off from Flagler Beach) here.
- Tropical cyclone activity here, and even more details here.
Today at a Glance:
County Attorney Candidate Interviews: The Flagler County Commission holds open, public interviews with two candidates for county attorney, to replace Al Hadeed. The interviews are in the context of a commission workshop at 4:30 p.m. at the Government Services Building, 1769 East Moody Boulevard, Bunnell. The candidates are Michael Rodriguez and Marsha Segal-George.
Town of Marineland Commission Meeting, 6 p.m. in the main conference room at the GTMNERR Marineland, 9741 N Oceanshore Boulevard, St. Augustine. See the town’s website here.
Model Yacht Club Races at the Pond in Palm Coast’s Central Park, from noon to 2 p.m. in Central Park in Town Center, 975 Central Ave. Join Bill Wells, Bob Rupp and other members of the Palm Coast Model Yacht Club, watch them race or join the races with your own model yacht. No dues to join the club, which meets at the pond in Central Park every Thursday.
The Palm Coast Democratic Club holds an “After Dark” Recap Meeting (previous daytime business meeting) at 6 p.m. on the third Thursday of each month to accommodate working Democrats. We will meet at the Flagler Democratic Party Headquarters in City Marketplace, 160 Cypress Point Parkway, Suite C214, Palm Coast. Hope you will join us. This gathering is open to the public at no charge. No advance arrangements are necessary. Call (386) 283-4883 for best directions or (561)-235-2065 for more information.
Story Time for Preschoolers at Flagler Beach Public Library, 11 to 11:30 a.m. at the library, 315 South Seventh Street, Flagler Beach. It’s where the wild things are: Hop on for stories and songs with Miss Doris.
Notably: The sweatshirts above and below were glimpsed the other day for sale at Buc-ee’s, mecca of nationalist Christianity and revanchist trumpism. I don;t think the designers caught the irony of their message, which on both counts is more accurate than they intended.
—P.T.
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The Live Calendar is a compendium of local and regional political, civic and cultural events. You can input your own calendar events directly onto the site as you wish them to appear (pending approval of course). To include your event in the Live Calendar, please fill out this form.
August 2025
Palm Coast City Council Workshop
Community Traffic Safety Team Meeting
Disaster Preparedness Expo
St. Johns River Water Management District Meeting
Flagler County School Board Workshop: Agenda Items
Flagler Beach Library Book Club
Flagler County Planning Board Meeting
Random Acts of Insanity Standup Comedy
River to Sea Transportation Planning Organization (TPO) Bicycle/Pedestrian Advisory Committee Meeting
U.S. Rep. Randy Fine Visits Palm Coast’s Oldest Sewer Plant
Separation Chat: Open Discussion
The Circle of Light A Course in Miracles Study Group
Weekly Chess Club for Teens, Ages 9-18, at the Flagler County Public Library
For the full calendar, go here.
Some days are born ugly. From the very first light they are no damn good whatever the weather, and everybody knows it. No one knows what causes this, but on such a day people resist getting out of bed and set their heels against the day. When they are finally forced out by hunger or job they find that the day is just as lousy as they knew it would be. On such a day it is impossible to make a good cup of coffee, shoestrings break, cups leap from the shelf by themselves and shatter on the floor, children ordinarily honest tell lies, and children ordinarily good unscrew the tap handles of the gas range and lose the screws and have to be spanked. This is the day the cat chooses to have kittens and housebroken dogs wet on the parlor rug. Oh, it’s awful on such a day! The postman brings overdue bills. If it’s a sunny day it is too damn sunny, and if it is dark who can stand it?
–From Steinbeck’s Sweet Thursday (1954).
Jim says
About the 3rd party cartoon…. Will it fly?
Well, it’s “founder” is Elon Musk.
Based on his support of DJT in the last election, I’ll assume his politics are ever so slightly right of center.
Based on DOGE, I don’t think he has much appreciation for working folks, veterans and the like.
He’ll likely push for tax deductions for electric vehicles… Unfortunately for him, since he’s virtually torpedoed Tesla for most Americans (and Europeans…and Chinese….), it won’t help save his company.
I don’t see Elon as someone who really gives a damn about democracy or humans in general. Elon seems infatuated with Elon.
So, based on those assumed positions, no, I don’t think it will fly. However, I do hope he pumps millions of dollars into it anyway.
Pogo says
@And then the actual day of the final calamity arrives
…and is documented and as a sedimentary layer — or otherwise; the extinct…are extinct, highbrow, lowbrow, no distinction matters anymore.
The dude says
The man who threw out Nazi salutes on stage and declared himself “Dark MAGA” is NOT the person to represent the “middle”.
He does not in any way, shape, or form have the middle’s best interests at heart, and never will.
Not today, not tomorrow.
Ray W, says
The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System describes the purpose of its Beige Book as follows:
“[T]his report is published eight times per year. Each Federal Reserve Bank gathers anecdotal information on current economic conditions in its District through reports from Bank and Branch directors and interviews with key business contacts, economists, market experts, and other sources. The Beige Book summarizes this information by District and sector. An overall summary of the twelve district reports is prepared by a designated Federal Reserve Bank on a rotating basis.”
The “National Summary” of the July 16th Beige Book reads as follows, in three segments:
1. Overall Economic Activity
“Economic activity increased slightly from late May through early July. Five Districts reported slight or modest gains, five had flat activity, and the remaining two Districts noted modest declines in activity. That represented an improvement over the previous report, in which half of Districts reported at least slight declines in activity. Uncertainty remained elevated, contributing to ongoing caution by businesses. Nonauto consumer spending declined in most districts, softening slightly overall. Auto sales receded modestly on average, after consumers has rushed to buy vehicles earlier this year to avoid having to pay tariffs. Tourism activity was mixed, manufacturing activity edged lower, and nonfinancial services activity was little changed on average but varied across Districts. Loan volume increased slightly in most Districts. Construction activity slowed somewhat, constrained by rising costs in some Districts. Home sales were flat or little changed in most Districts, and non-residential real estate activity was also mostly steady. Activity in the agricultural sector remained weak. Energy sector activity declined slightly, and transportation activity was mixed. The outlook was neutral to slightly pessimistic, as only two Districts expected activity to increase, and others foresaw flat or slightly weaker activity.”
2. Labor Markets
“Employment increased very slightly overall, with one District noting modest increases, six reporting slight increases, three no change, and two noting slight declines. Hiring remained generally cautious, which many contacts attributed to ongoing economic and policy uncertainty. Labor availability improved for many employers, with further reductions in turnover rates and increased job applications. A growing number of Districts cited labor shortages in the skilled trades. Several Districts also mentioned reduced availability of foreign-born workers, attributed to changes in immigration policy. Employers in a few Districts ramped up investments in automation and AI aimed at reducing the need for additional hiring. Wages increased modestly overall, extending recent trends, with reports that ranged from flat wages to moderate growth. Although reports of layoffs were limited in all industries, they were somewhat more common among manufacturers. Looking ahead, many contacts expected to postpone major hiring and layoff decisions until uncertainty diminished.”
3. Prices
“Prices increased across Districts, with seven characterizing price growth as moderate and five characterizing it as modest, mostly similar to the previous report. In all twelve Districts, businesses reported experiencing modest to pronounced input cost pressures related to tariffs, especially for raw materials used in manufacturing and construction. Rising insurance costs represented another widespread source of pricing pressure. Many firms passed on at least a portion of cost increased to consumers through price hikes or surcharges, although some held off raising prices because of customers’ growing price sensitivity, resulting in compressed profit margins. Contacts in a wide range of industries expected cost pressures to remain elevated in the coming months, increasing the likelihood that consumer prices will start to rise more rapidly by late summer.”
Make of this what you will.
Ray W, says
The Hill published a story devoted to businesses passing through tariff costs to consumers.
Here is an excerpt from the article:
“‘Since the Trump administration began imposing tariffs, the dollar has depreciated, which could lead to a larger pass-through from tariffs to consumer prices,’ Michael Pearce, deputy chief U.S. economist at Oxford Economics, told the Reuters news agency. ‘A weaker dollar boosts the likelihood that firms pass on a larger share of tariffs.'”
From the beginning of the year, the U.S. dollars has lost about 9% of its value relative to other currencies.
Make of this what you will.
Ray W, says
NBC NEWS reports that one of the three Iranian nuclear enrichment sites struck by U.S. bombs was “mostly destroyed.” The other two “may have been degraded only to a point where nuclear enrichment could resume in the next several months. …”
The assessment, per the news outlet, is a “snapshot” of the damage, amidst what is expected to be a monthslong gathering of intelligence.
The story placed significance on the fact that during a Pentagon briefing, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Gen. Dan Caine, “talked extensively about the strike at Fordo but not the strikes at Natanz and Isfahan.”
The reporter wrote that U.S. officials “knew before the airstrikes that Iran had structures and enriched uranium at Natanz and Isfahan that were likely to be beyond the reach of even America’s 30,000-pound GBU-57 ‘bunker buster” bombs. …”
Make of this what you will.
Ray W, says
The Wall Street Journal has reported that a number of unnamed House Republicans have been encouraging the Trump administration to “focus on changing immigration law to allow some workers to gain temporary legal status and make sure that people can remain on the job.”
The Hill reports that Indiana Republican Congressman Marlin Stutzman showed a Journal reporter a text message sent from a poultry farmer, who is one of his constituents.
Stutzman commented:
“I have people they call me. They’re like, ‘I’m not sure if my crew is going to show up for work Monday morning, because if there’s a raid, or something like that, right. … If you try to deport all of them, you’re going to crash the economy.”
Pennsylvania Republican Congressman Glenn Thompson, House Agriculture Committee Chair, told the reporter:
“The excuse that we’ve had from not taking steps to pass measures ensuring certainty and availability of workforce has been that the border hasn’t been under control. … That excuse is gone.”
Make of this what you will.
Ray W, says
The Washington Post devoted an article to how “an example of government initiatives can begin with falsehoods.”
President Trump, during the 2024 campaign, first commented that 88,000 children had been lost during the Biden administration. He then turned the number into 320,000.
During the vice-presidential debate late in 2024, now Vice-President J.D. Vance repeated the claim that 320,000 children had been “effectively lost” by the Biden administration.
The database from which the 88,000 “lost” children had been culled, the story reported, defined the missing as the number of children who had not responded to telephone calls from a government agency. That figure included data gathered during both the first Trump administration and the Biden years, and that the percentages of non-respondents to phone calls made during both administrations was the same.
The second figure, 320,000, was culled from a different database detailing the number of children who had never been given a notice to appear in immigration court or those who had missed an appearance in court. The reporter noted that the 320,000-figure, like the first one, dated from two-and-a-half years before the end of Trump’s first administration, but the number of children who fit this statistic was greater for the Biden years than for the Trump years because more children entered the country during the Biden years.
In the Post’s fact-checking process, the reporter first noted that since the signing of a 1997 executive agreement, the federal government has to release, rather than detain, immigrant children where relatives or sponsors can be found. Second, a 2008 bill signed into law during the second of the two Bush administrations, exempted children from “prompt return” to their home country, unless they were Mexican or Canadian, in order to reduce the risk of child trafficking of returned children. And third, when in 2002 Homeland Security took over the duty to track immigrant children, the law required that it place up to three calls to the children or their sponsors during a time frame 30 to 37 days after release from detention.
In the end, the Post gave the Trump administration claims “Two Pinocchios”, writing that the claims of lost children were “half-true.”
“There are documented problems with keeping track of unaccompanied children — and serious accounts of abuse — that administration officials say they are determined to address. But the administration is still touting a phantom number as its Rosetta Stone.”
Make of this what you will.
Me?
If one has to lie to support one’s argument, is it reasonable to infer that the argument is unfounded from the start?
Ray W, says
I don’t suppose that any FlaglerLive reader would dispute the fact that cow manure, when decomposing in manure “lagoons” on dairy farms, releases methane into the atmosphere.
And I don’t suppose that any FlaglerLive reader would dispute the fact that methane is a potent heat trapping gas, said by scientists to prevent some 80 times the heat from escaping the atmosphere when compared to that prevented escape by carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
So, it struck me as significant that The Cool Down reported on an experiment being conducted on a Tulare County, California dairy farm, whereby a methane-trapping tarp, called a “dairy digester”, seals a manure lagoon; it is being used to capture methane, which is then filtered and used as natural gas fuel in place of diesel fuel.
In a two-year observation of the system, the level of methane release has been reduced by 80%.
More than 130 dairy digesters are in use in California.
University of California, Riverside climate scientist, Francesca Hopkins, stated:
“This is not for every farm. … But for dairies that can make it work, this is one of the most cost-effective ways we have to cut these greenhouse gas emissions.”
Make of this what you will.
Me?
I think Pogo would agree: Cool!
Ray W, says
U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem is on record as suggesting that farmers help their immigrant workers self-deport, according to Alternet.
She said, should farmers help employees this way:
“And so, that’s what I think is so remarkable, is that we will let them come back the right way, and we’re facilitating that today. … So every individual that’s here in this country that’s concerned, or every farmer out there that has somebody that’s working for them, that’s concerned, you know, you know, work with getting them home, so they can come back and get in the right way.”
Said President of Refugees International, Jeremy Konyndyk:
“Noem’s ‘claim that people can come ‘come back’ after self-deporting is ludicrous on its face.’ … ‘Why then deport in the first place? And in any case, that does nothing for farmers who need crops picked NOW.'”
Make of this what you will.
Me?
Again, if someone has to lie to support their point, is it reasonable to argue that the point is invalid from the outset?
Immigrant who self deport must get in line for legal reentry into the country, just like everyone else. According to the reporter, some of those who attempt reentry face bans on entering the line for reentry, with some bans forbidding entry into the reentry line for up to 10 years.
This is where the gullibly stupid among us misunderstand immigration law. Those who are deported and those who self-deport cannot always just get back into the U.S. It can take years, up to a decade, according to the reporter, to enter the line, and some may not ever be permitted to get into the line.
So, what happens to the 50-year-old woman whose parents brought her into the country when she was two, sans documentation. She has not lived in the nation of her birth for 48 years. She might have a husband and a family. She might have a church home. She might have worked for a local business for decades. She might never have been convicted of any type of crime. She might volunteer in her community and be a mentor to many. Yet, to this administration, she is vermin who needs to be crushed.
Can under existing immigration law someone such as she just self-deport and then easily come back, as Secretary Noem suggests?
This fact pattern is happening. I have already commented on an Oregon vineyard manager who spent more than 30 years working the grapes to earn the respect of those around him, including winning an Oregon vineyard association award of the year in 2020. Now, he awaits deportation is a facility some 1500 miles from his home for a more than 30-year-old minor misdemeanor offense.
Pogo says
@Ray W
Dear sir, agree, is an understatement; keep up the good work — and thanks for all of it.