#TakeTheHill is Clayton Hinchman’s version of the popular Drain The Swamp mantra. The hashtag resonates with Hinchman’s military experience, which he has used as a point of focus in his campaign to unseat U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks. Hinchman announced in May of 2017 that he would be running to represent Alabama’s 5th Congressional District. “We’ve […]

Plato’s greatest contribution to western civilization was not his ruminations on the soul, nor his analogy of the cave, but his idea of the philosopher king. Don’t tune out yet. The concept basically argues that the best ruler is a philosopher, or “lover of wisdom,” in the original Greek. It’s to say that society benefits […]

State and local elections are like the Terms & Conditions of your new app: you know they’re extremely important, but you don’t really have the time to familiarize yourself with them. While the importance of state and local elections has been demonstrated in columns a million times over – “it’s the state and local policies […]

Election season reminds us – as if we had forgotten – of what politics usually is rather than what it ought to be. I’ve often heard Nick Saban and other coaches talk about the ability of their teams to “find a way to win,” meaning it doesn’t matter how the win is secured, as long […]

Stories like Frank Ranelli’s – a Birmingham-area businessman whose more than 130 computers were seized by Homewood police in 2010 on suspicion that some were stolen – were what drove Alabama’s legislators and interest groups to attempt reform of the state’s civil asset forfeiture laws during this year’s legislative session. Significant reform gained early momentum […]

Those vying to be Alabama’s top lawyer generally agree that criminals shouldn’t be allowed to keep the gains of their crimes, but the debate about law enforcement’s ability to seize the assets of suspected criminals pits Attorney General Steve Marshall against his Republican and Democrat competitors. In their responses to an Alabama Policy Institute and […]

Civil asset forfeiture is a useful tool, but it needs reform. That sentiment is unanimous among Republican candidates for governor of Alabama. Civil asset forfeiture is the legal process by which law enforcement seizes the property of those it assumes to be involved in criminal activities. The seizures are allowed by law to occur even […]

Alabama’s workforce won big earlier this year when Toyota-Mazda promised to create 4,000 jobs in the Huntsville area, though the number of tax dollars that state and local coffers will not see, due to abatements granted by authorities at both levels, is in the millions. Some candidates for governor see such tax breaks as a […]

Winning elections requires a strategy, and few strategies garner results like having a famous name. Jim Bonner, a controversial candidate for Alabama Public Service Commission, Place 1, is showing promise as he leads his 6-year incumbent competitor among some Alabama voters, particularly those who used to be represented in Congress by Jo Bonner of Mobile. […]

AL.com’s ‘Reckon’ has nudged its way into the political satire business, with a recent short film called “Life Cycle of an Alabama Politician.” The video features Reckon’s Managing Producer, John Hammontree – who also sits on AL.com’s editorial board – acting as a stumping Alabama politician who recites all the lines about his intentions to […]

A member of President Trump’s cabinet was in Mobile this week, meeting with city officials and local business owners. Ajit Pai, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, stopped by the Port City on his way to Florida for a “Jobs & Digital Opportunity Tour.” Pai stopped by the port, where he championed high-speed internet as […]

Ballots this November will offer Alabama a chance to authorize the display of the Ten Commandments on public property. Here are two quick thoughts on the issue: The Ten Commandments are important, and we are bound to keep them. “In fidelity to Scripture and in conformity with the example of Jesus, the tradition of the […]

Yesterday, I argued that it’s much too soon to be advocating a Nobel Peace Prize be granted to President Trump for his diplomatic progress on North Korea. Rich Lowry, editor of National Review, made much the same argument in his column today but with a few more specific reasons: – “His [Kim’s] father destroyed a […]

If U.S. Rep. Martha Roby’s primary challengers censured every Republican who withdrew public support for President Trump following the release of that infamous Access Hollywood tape, they would lose many conservative allies, including U.S. Rep. Bradley Byrne (R-Fairhope). Rich Hobson, who was the director of the Administrative Office of Courts under former Chief Justice Roy […]

One of Republicans’ favorite stories over the past several years has been the regret that Geir Lundestad, former Nobel Peace Prize committee secretary, expressed about awarding President Obama the prize in 2009. Lundestad, as did many back when the prize was given, said in 2015 that the prize was given to President Obama too early […]

In his essay “The Prevention of Literature,” George Orwell discusses the various inhibitions that political discourse and general literacy were facing in 1946. Orwell goes after his usual suspects for censuring texts: Soviet Russia, fascists, the Catholic Church. But he discusses a more latent and unsuspecting cause of censorship, namely the dispositions of the people. […]

Mick Mulvaney, White House budget director and acting director of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection (known until a few days ago as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau; Mulvaney rebranded it according to its statutory name) spoke at an American Bankers Conference on Tuesday and made some controversial statements. “We had a hierarchy in my […]

New polling obtained by Yellowhammer News offers a peek into Alabama’s attorney general race, with the edges in the Republican primary bid at-the-moment being given to current Attorney General Steve Marshall and former Attorney General Troy King. The poll, conducted by WPA Intelligence, found that 24 percent of Republican primary voters have a favorable view […]

GQ recently published an editorial with a list of 20 books “you don’t have to read,” with justifications and alternatives written by various authors and members of the magazine’s staff. The list, which includes the Bible, outlines its parameters of judgment up front: “Some are racist and some are sexist, but most are just really, […]

“Special interests” and “politically correct nonsense” are responsible for efforts to remove Confederate monuments from public spaces, Gov. Kay Ivey says in a recent campaign ad. At a campaign appearance earlier this week in Foley, Ivey made similar statements on the issue. “We must learn from our history. And we don’t need folks in Washington […]

Charlize Theron recently became part of the elite group of Hollywood actors who have publicly considered leaving the United States because they don’t like the president, or because the country’s previously unrealized dark side has been exposed. In an interview with Chelsea Handler published by Elle last week, Theron offered some analysis of “our current […]

On Tuesday, the Alabama Policy Institute held its 19th annual Mobile dinner event in the airplane hangar at the USS Alabama Battleship Memorial Park. “I cannot think of a better place to discuss freedom and liberty than at the U.S.S. Battleship Memorial Park and Aircraft Pavilion, a place that holds so many reminders of the […]

I spend a lot of time trying to convince people that diverting attention away from the subject of criticism at hand to mount an unrelated attack on an ideological opponent is bad argumentation. For example, on the Michael Cohen office raid, I was told, “If Obama had gotten this type of exam, half of his […]

Conservative commentator and author Michael Knowles will be in Mobile on Tuesday, April 17, for “An Evening with the Alabama Policy Institute.” “I love Mobile, and I also love conservative policies, so it should be a very good night,” Knowles said in a promo video for the event. About Knowles: Knowles, who is Managing Editor […]