Columns

The time to speak out is now.

    This Thursday, Nov. 10, a public hearing will be held to give citizens the chance to speak out about proposed changes to Bedford County’s zoning ordinance.
    The county recently completed the first phase of updating the zoning ordinance, which was first adopted in 1998. The Board of Supervisors has approved the changes that were submitted by the Planning Commission after many months of deliberation.
    And not everyone has agreed on the process, or the changes.

two weeks ago special agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement raided a farmers market in Washington, D.C. They seized $3 million worth of counterfeit goods including purses, wallets, perfume, watches, shoes, clothes, music and movies. In total they found almost 20,000 pieces of counterfeit merchandise.

    If ever there was a political cartoon that was just perfectly brilliant, it was the one in the Roanoke Times last week.

    In it, a man and his wife step outside onto their front porch to see a space ship sitting in the front yard. They look at and listen intently to the alien who has emerged from the craft.
He says, “We have been watching transmissions of something called ‘the Republican debates,’ and we see no reason for your species to continue.”

Next Tuesday is the big day! It's the day that we get to do more than just gripe about the government. It's the day we get to do something about it. Nov. 8 is election day.

    Last month the people of the little North African country of Tunisia got to exercise a basic human right that Americans have had for more than two centuries. That country had its first free and fair election in its history and that day didn't come easy. They had to run a dictator out of the country earlier this year and some Tunisians died in the effort.