7 Things: Prices going up, vaccine mandate impacts continue to be concealed, debt ceiling goes up despite Alabama GOP congressional opposition and more …

7. Alabama wins big next-generation missile defense contract

Northrop Grumman has announced that they will be hiring 500 more engineers in Huntsville to work on a missile defense program with the Air Force. Huntsville was selected for the “rich expertise and legacy” in the area for this industry.
Vice president and general manager of Northrop’s Space Systems Strategic Deterrent Systems Greg Manuel detailed that the plan to develop a missile launch system was always prepared as a way to update the current systems and said communications will be done through “Colorado Springs, Bellevue, Nebraska, and San Diego…but Huntsville is our largest what we call ‘spoke location.’” He added that work will be done from Montgomery, as well.

6. AG Marshall pleased to see scrutiny on one of the prison lawsuits facing Alabama

Alabama legislators recently passed a $1.3 billion plan to build new prisons because of a variety of legal issues surrounding the current prison system, but many questions remain about resolving those issues. A federal judge ruled this week that the Department of Justice’s concerns on the matter are overly vague “shotgun pleading,” and Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall is glad to hear it.
Marshall noted that the issues facing the prison system are real, but to satisfactorily address them, the DOJ needs to be more clear. He advised, “For all of the accusations that the state has been the cause of delays, DOJ’s repeated failure to provide clarity on these points is slowing down a resolution of this matter.”

5. More details in the Gabby Petito case have emerged

After the autopsy was complete, the details were released by Teton County Coroner Dr. Brent Blue in Wyoming in the death of 22-year-old Gabby Petito. Blue announced that Petito was killed three to four weeks before her body was found and she was strangled to death. Petito wasn’t discovered until September 19.
The main person of interest is still Petito’s boyfriend, Brian Laundrie, but authorities have been unable to locate and apprehend him. In other news, “Dog The Bounty Hunter” has refuted reports that he has stopped searching for Laundrie while his search for relevancy goes on.

4. Debt ceiling increase approved and waiting to be signed

The measure to raise the debt ceiling passed the U.S. Senate and has now been cleared by the U.S. House of Representatives. This is only a temporary increase in the debt limit that will last until December 3, and Republicans intended for the increase to be a way to give more time for negotiations in budget measures.
However, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) has suggested giving the power to raise the debt ceiling to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, but House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) has suggested doing away with the limit altogether, saying “all it does is have a threat to global instability.”

3. Vaccine mandates face hurdle in New York; Southwest does not want to enforce the mandates

Vaccine mandates are going into place across the country, and people are losing their jobs, the economy is suffering, delays in shipping and travel are being experienced, and people are still looking for a way around the mandates. A judge in New York has ruled that government and private entities can’t enforce the mandate because doing so infringing on both the religious and free speech rights of workers. While the CEO of Southwest is seemingly lying about the issue his airline is facing, he noted he wanted nothing to do with vaccine mandates but lamented the amount of business he does with the federal government requires it.
In Alabama, the Delta variant surge of the coronavirus seems over as the number of coronavirus cases and hospitalizations continue to go down, same with the number of deaths. The drop in cases and hospitalizations in places with and without restrictive mandates should prove once and for all these mask mandates have little real impact on the number of cases, but some are still enamored with the little covering that do nothing.

2. Biden administration will continue to ignore the obvious

As expected, President Joe Biden and his administration will take no responsibility for the issues the workforces in America are facing after Biden issued his vaccine mandate that is forcing many individuals out of work. Instead, White House press secretary Jen Psaki has dismissed the concerns that the mandate is keeping people from working.
Psaki said that she didn’t believe it’s “widely acknowledged or echoed by business leaders who have implemented these mandates or by health experts” that the mandate would be the reason why people aren’t working. Instead, Psaki said that the mandate is “good” for the economy, and she added that the massive amount of flight cancellations were unrelated to the mandate.

1. Alabama gas prices are increasing quickly — all prices are

In Alabama, the average gallon of gas is currently at $3.01, according to AAA. In only a week, the average has increased by 12 cents, and this has been the sixth-highest increase in gas prices across the country.
The national average for a gallon of gas is at $3.27, and while it was expected that prices would fall, they continue to rise due to the price of crude oil. It’s likely that the increase will continue. This time last year, gas prices in Alabama averaged $1.90 per gallon.