Last week, The Anniston Star announced it was severing ties with long-time editor H. Brandt Ayers after a number of sexual misconduct allegations against him surfaced. If you haven’t heard by now, Ayers is accused of spanking female employees decades earlier, which has resulted in his resignation from the board of Consolidated Publishing, the […]

    It is disheartening to see the ongoing rift between those conservatives supporting President Donald Trump and those opposing him — a rift that began before Trump and may survive his presidency. Many conservatives opposed Trump’s nomination because they believed he was not a true conservative — not even really a bona fide Republican […]

    What caused the FBI to open a counterintelligence investigation into the Trump campaign in July 2016, which evolved into the criminal investigation that is said today to imperil the Trump presidency? As James Comey’s FBI and Special Counsel Robert Mueller have, for 18 months, failed to prove Donald Trump’s “collusion” with the Kremlin, […]

    The longest-serving Republican senator in U.S. history announced this week that he will finally, finally, finally, finally, finally, finally, finally retire. That’s seven “finallys” — one for each of the consecutive six-year terms Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, served. He began his occupancy in 1976, when all phones were dumb, the 5.25-inch floppy disk […]

          Listen to the 10 min audio Read the transcript: REPUBLICAN COMEBACK? TOM LAMPRECHT: Harry, I remember back when it was 2008 – President Obama had just won the presidential election – and I remember hearing one political pundit say, “The Republican Party is dead. It’s over for them.” Here we […]

    President Trump is unpopular. He’s unpopular because he’s boorish, crude and silly; he’s unpopular because he has a unique capacity to turn winning news cycles into referenda on his use of Twitter. But the United States under President Trump hasn’t seen any serious anti-liberty revanchism. In fact, under Trump, regulations have dropped precipitously; […]

    In the race for the U.S. Senate, Doug Jones cast himself as a moderate Democrat who would work across the aisle and get things done; now one wonders if this was all just a marketing ploy. On the day of his swearing in, Jones decided to choose former Vice President Joe Biden to […]

          Listen to the 10 min audio Read the transcript: NEW YORK BANS AND FINES CONVERSION THERAPY TOM LAMPRECHT: Harry, I’d like to take you to a headline out of World Magazine: “New York City Votes to Ban Conversion Therapy.” Conversion therapy, Harry, would be a counselor or a pastor sitting […]

  As a society, many parents are failing. Not only are they failing themselves, they are also failing their children. This “failing” has a lot to do with the techniques they use in raising and teaching their children. Children must be taught to love while abiding the law and others. It seems as though more […]

Listen to the 10 min audio Read the transcript: MEASURING TRUMP AGAINST HIS PROMISES IN FIRST YEAR TOM LAMPRECHT: Today, specifically, I’d like to take a look back on the first year of Donald Trump’s administration and his presidency – what he promised and then what he accomplished – again, let’s sort of go through […]

  We are a nation of 325 million people. We have a bit of control over the behavior of our 535 elected representatives in Congress, the president and the vice president. But there are seven unelected people who have life-and-death control over our economy and hence our lives — the seven governors of the Federal […]

(Opinion) Many national news media made many mistakes in covering President Trump and Republicans in his first year. Too many mistakes, in fact, to simply write off as honest errors. Over the past few days, numerous editorial writers and contributors at the Washington Examiner have been reflecting on the media failures of 2017, while offering […]

  Saturday morning, the Montgomery Advertiser’s Brian Lyman made a tenuous argument that current U.S. Rep. Bradley Byrne (R-Fairhope) could be blamed for the election of Doug Jones to the U.S. Senate earlier this month. According to a thread initiated by Politico’s Daniel Strauss, the indefatigable Lyman postulates Byrne’s lackluster effort in the 2010 Alabama gubernatorial […]

Looks like I have a new and improved excuse to stand firm as the only non-Crimson Tide fan in my family: Nick Saban is my trigger. I’ve been having some strange reactions to sports news lately but I couldn’t think why … — First, SEC commissioner Greg Sankey announced that SEC Media Days will no longer be […]

        Listen to the 10 min audio Read the transcript: TOM LAMPRECHT:  Harry, today is our last In Perspective of 2017. We look down through the years and it is history, or “His Story.” Today, I’d like to talk a look of “His Story” through 2017: I’m going to go through a […]

    There are talkers and doers, sowers of dissatisfaction seeds and agents of lasting change. Much of my column work over the year is dedicated to exposing the worst crapweasels in politics, pop culture, media and the policy arena. But to ring out 2017, I’m raising a toast to some of my favorite bulldogs […]

    OPINION The stock market is booming. Consumer confidence is soaring. The unemployment rate is falling. The economy is getting more robust every day. And President Donald Trump’s approval ratings have just hit a new low. Congratulations, Trump. You are the president of a loyal base whose members adore you. The bad news, Mr. […]

          Listen to the 10 min audio Read the transcript: TOM LAMPRECHT:  Harry, John Stonestreet recently addressed the fact that America is shrinking. He said, “I don’t mean we’re getting shorter.” What he was referring to is the latest official estimates taken from two years of data that puts the U.S. […]

    We frequently wish for a happy and prosperous New Year. As an economist, I know more about prosperity than happiness. Because economic freedom is closely related to prosperity, 2017 closed with some good news for Alabama. The Economic Freedom of North America report, published by Canada’s Fraser Institute, measures the freedom of markets […]

    Last week, Democrats and many in the mainstream media became highly perturbed by the Trump administration’s suggestion that the United States might tie continued foreign aid to support for its agenda abroad. Foreign dictators agreed. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who spent the last year arresting dissidents, announced, “Mr. Trump, you cannot buy […]

    OPINION |reckon|: A new media endeavor branded with a folksy, down-home name that promotes regurgitated left-of-center tripe. Intended to make an Alabama readership think a whiny progressive ideology represents Deep South values. Back in October, AL(dot)com launched its social media-centric “space” for what Alabama Media Group vice president of content Michelle Holmes called […]

It’s now been a week since the election of Doug Jones prompted Al.com’s editorial board to breathlessly declare that the “voice of justice” had spoken for a “burning movement” of “black voters, LGBT activists, women and young voters” who represent the future of our state. Their words crackled with confidence and jubilation because, in their […]

It’s time to come together, y’all. Conservatives have been at each other’s throats in recent years, and nowhere is that more evident than in Alabama, and nowhere have the results of that infighting been more damaging than in Alabama. Consider the last few years alone. After taking control of the State Legislature in 2010 for […]

Even in an age when security cameras catch us and DNA samples condemn us, the Weinstein – Franken – Conyers – Lauer – (etc. and so on) roll out of #pervnado allegations, denials, half-truths and firings should remind us we’re a society still dependent upon an old-fashioned concept: our word.  We depend upon accusers to tell […]