For what it’s worth, I will be voting for Rusty Glover for Lieutenant Governor of Alabama. This is not an “endorsement.” As a journalist, it is almost never my place to make endorsements, which imply that I am asking other people to vote for somebody. And even though I write this post as a private […]

  For young Alabama lawyer Brett Talley, his withdrawal from consideration for a federal judgeship should not be the last word on his promising career. With the right combination of graciousness and gumption, Talley can rise above this setback — just as a then-40-year-old judicial nominee named Jeff Sessions did when his nomination was derailed […]

  The final House-Senate tax-reform bill unveiled on Friday does indeed include extra energy-royalty payments to Gulf of Mexico states, as originally inserted into the Senate version of the bill by Alabama’s U.S. Sen. Luther Strange and Louisiana’s Bill Cassidy. Yellowhammer reported on the battle for this extra funding earlier this week when U.S. Rep. […]

  Alabama Republicans are leading a last-ditch, regional fight to secure some extra money from federal oil revenue from drilling off the coasts of Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas. Their attempt is both reasonable and admirable. The Gulf Coast House and Senate members want the major tax reform bill pending in Congress to include a […]

  When it comes to protests, America has lost its senses. A previous column of mine provided a single example, from southern Alabama last week, of an overreaction to a silent, respectful protest. That one example is indicative of a larger problem, on both sides of the protest equation. The overly broad (but accurate) description […]

    Even if we don’t know for certain whether Roy Moore had sexual contact (of a sort) with 14-year-old Leigh Corfman, we now know that Moore has made a conscious decision to lie about his onetime relationships with teenage girls.   We know this from a combination of his own words and of new […]

    Did you see the Sunday guest column at al.com by Alabama’s temporary U.S. Sen. Luther Strange? It would be risible if it weren’t also so insulting to readers’ intelligence.   Entitled “The importance of taking on corruption,” Strange’s column bragged (in effect) that “the National Association of Attorneys General asked me to deliver […]

  Alabama faces a barn-burner of a Republican primary for state attorney general next year, with at least four highly qualified candidates. The one perhaps the least well known to the general public is, oddly enough, the one who has almost certainly spent the most quality time with the biggest state and national Republican luminaries. […]

    Roy Moore’s Senate campaign is running a TV commercial featuring a cheap lie that harms public faith in our constitutional system. On a personal level, the lie isn’t as vicious as the smear-by-out-of-context-innuendo to which a recent Doug Jones ad has subjected Moore. In terms of systemic damage, though, Moore’s commercial is somewhat […]

    Conservatives rarely oppose the judicial nominations of brilliant conservative lawyers, but Alabama’s Brett Talley, under renewed assault from the usual liberals, may indeed deserve to be blocked by Republicans as well. Talley already has been under attack because he has never actually tried a case in federal court, but his record is otherwise […]

  Never one to flinch from a stand on principle no matter whose ox is gored, Alabama’s 11th U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Bill Pryor on Wednesday used a New York Times column to criticize the court-packing proposals of many of his conservative friends. Pryor is right, and deserves points for logic and courage. Pryor’s […]

  Roy Moore and his team are getting a taste of their own poison this week, but that doesn’t make the poisoning justified. Democratic Senate candidate Doug Jones’ latest ad highlights three Alabama Supreme Court cases in which then-Chief Justice Moore “sided” with defendants accused of sexual crimes involving minors. The obvious implication is that […]

  Hmmm…. So… Remember back, wow, a six-week lifetime ago, when so many Alabamans were calling for the guillotined head of Auburn football coach Gus Malzahn? Don’t they look rather silly now that Auburn is in the SEC title game and very much alive for the national championship? No, this isn’t a sports column, although […]

    The continuing efforts to explain away the allegations against Roy Moore as merely a new front in some national war between political factions have reached a new, utterly dishonest, and immoral low with a piece by the otherwise esteemed Angelo Codevilla in The American Spectator. Back before enough people were making such observations, […]

  Once Alabama’s horrendous special election for the U.S. Senate is finally settled, it will be time for Governor Kay Ivey to earn her keep. So far, Ivey has been able to surf on a wave of warm fuzziness, with her representing apparent stability, honesty and decency in contrast to the tawdriness of her predecessor. […]

    An unbecoming hysteria continues on both sides of the Roy Moore debate, and our civic life is made worse by it. Witness a recent column against Moore by the liberal but usually thoughtful Kyle Whitmire of al.com, and witness the outlandish conspiracy-mongering in defense of Moore by Alabama Senate President Pro-Tem Del Marsh. […]

    Yes, Jeff Sessions really is making a difference at the Justice Department, as a new order curbing the department’s own power makes clear. The other day, a friend said to me that he figured Sessions really would be better off accepting a write-in bid for his old Senate seat because “he’s not really […]

    The people of Alabama would be well served if both Roy Moore and Doug Jones withdraw from the December 12 election, with both major parties formally acquiescing, effectively forcing the election to be postponed until November of next year. Both candidates, or either, could run again next year, but without the circus atmosphere, […]

  From the “This is Actually Rather Important Good News” Department…. The City of Mobile this week secured a nearly $7 million grant for coastline/marshland protection and restoration. Quoting the press release from the office of Mayor Sandy Stimpson: The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) awarded the City of Mobile a $6,923,800 grant to conserve […]

  Weird messes sometimes require weird remedies. The Republican Party, state and national, is in a huge, weird mess because of the ongoing situation involving Judge Roy Moore. Because of the nature of the allegations, the timing of the allegations, and the complicated interplay between state law, state party rules, and Senate rules, there is […]

    A remarkable program to help juvenile offenders held its annual luncheon in Mobile yesterday, and the rest of the state should emulate it. The program is called n.e.s.t., for the first words in the group’s goals to “nurture children, equip parents, strengthen families, and transform communities.” (Henceforth, I’ll call it NEST for the […]

  Yes, there are good reasons to believe Roy Moore misbehaved with teenage girls 40 years ago. My previous column explained why it’s not obviously absurd for many Alabamans to disbelieve the allegations against the former chief justice. A man’s longtime public reputation does merit at least some benefit of the doubt. On the other […]

    Without taking a position on whether to believe Roy Moore or to believe his accusers, a fair-minded observer can see a rational basis for the beliefs of each. This column will explain to Moore haters why many (not all, but many) Moore defenders aren’t foolish, ignorant, or hypocritical for believing the allegations false. […]

  In my opening column for the new and improved Yellowhammer News, one of my paragraphs made this assertion: Alabama’s government is far too centralized rather than open to local innovations, which makes it both ossified and much more easily corruptible. It also allows a small number of groups – often known as the “Big […]