Wade on July 2006
By Wade KwonA last look at the ’06 …
Then and now
Dry run: The troubles began in June, as drought conditions became noticeable with triple-digit highs and farmers in need of aid (rain, too.).
July saw Birmingham moving to restrict water usage to specific days. The voluntary curb remained in effect until the end of September. Rainfall for the year is slightly above average, though the last half of the year has been particularly dry.
Stupid Al Gore inventing stupid global warming.
Livin’ large: Alabama (along with Mississippi) is the nation’s fattest state. While our state could likely beat up your state, or at least, sit on it till it turns three shades of blue, some hoity-toity folks think those extra pounds are a bad thing.
Mayor Kincaid put the city, his wife and himself on a diet called Get Healthy Birmingham. He reported losing 20 pounds within the first two months. (The photo shows him at mid-year and this month.)
Former American Idol Ruben Studdard reported in October losing 100 pounds with the help of Duke University’s weight management center. Now a vegetarian, the formerly 400-pound singer took on a bigger challenge, encouraging the whole state to lose 10 million pounds during the eight-week Scale Back Alabama program, starting in a week.
Big ups if we can pull that off. Bigger ups if we can keep that off.
The fun back in fund-raising: The White House came a’callin’ for the first of two fund-raisers for Gov. Riley’s re-election campaign. Vice President Cheney stopped in Dothan for a $5,000-a-couple dinner for a cool $250,000.
The next stop was President Bush’s visit in September for a fund-raising speech at the Birmingham-Jefferson Convention Complex, with a stop in Hoover to see its alternative fuel fleet.
That, by the way, was his second visit of the year. Bush also spoke at Tuskegee University in April about competing for high-tech jobs.
Three visits from the White House to Alabama in one year? Pays to be a Red State.
Haiku flashback
exercising restraint (July 3)
Freedom means power
not to do things as well as
doing them unchecked.
• • •
Archives: July
Special report: The ’06 … a last look
