Category: Crime, Corrections, Law Enforcement
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Cantor’s Brat Problem
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in Business and Economy, Crime, Corrections, Law Enforcement, Demographics, Disasters and Disaster Preparedness, Economic development, Education (higher ed), Education (K-12), Electoral process, Energy, Environment, Federal issues, Government Finance, Government workers and pensions, Gun rights, Health Care, Immigration, Infrastructure, Insurance, Labor and Workforce, LGBQT, Media, Money in politics, Planning, Politics, Poverty & income gap, Property rights, Public safety & health, Race and Race Relations, Regulations, Gov’t Oversight, Science & Technology, Social Services and Entitlements, TaxesBy Peter Galuszka The jockeying for power among Virginia conservatives is certainly curious if not frightening. It seems the diminished Tea Party is trying to make a comeback and relive its heyday of 2010 at the expense of moderates. I personally hope they don’t because the movement brings up far too much hateful baggage of…
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Herring Rises as McAuliffe Falls
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in Business and Economy, Consumer Protection, Courts and law, Crime, Corrections, Law Enforcement, Demographics, Economic development, Education (higher ed), Electoral process, Federal issues, Government Finance, Government workers and pensions, Health Care, Insurance, Labor and Workforce, Media, Money in politics, Regulations, Gov’t Oversight, Social Services and EntitlementsBy Peter Galuszka Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring’s ruling that undocumented Virginians who entered the state as children can qualify for in-state college tuition is another bold and praiseworthy effort to drag the Old Dominion into the new age. His comments on gay marriage this winter foreshadowed a U.S. district judge’s decision in Norfolk that…
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April Is The Cruelest Month
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in Business and Economy, Consumer Protection, Courts and law, Crime, Corrections, Law Enforcement, Demographics, Disasters and Disaster Preparedness, Economic development, Energy, Environment, Government Finance, Infrastructure, Labor and Workforce, Media, Money in politics, Planning, Politics, Public safety & health, Regulations, Gov’t Oversight, Science & Technology, Water-waste waterBy Peter Galuszka April is the cruelest month, especially for brutal energy disasters. This Sunday is the fourth anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling blowout that killed 11 and caused one of the country’s worst environmental disasters. April 5 was the fourth anniversary of the Upper Big Branch coal mine explosion in West Virginia…
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Why Five Ex-Attorneys General Are So Wrong
By Peter Galuszka The practice of law in Virginia is supposed to be an honorable profession. The state, which produced such orators as Patrick Henry and Thomas Jefferson, loves its lawyers perhaps much more than individuals who actually create or do something of value. It could be why the state has so many of them.…
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An Ex-Coal Baron’s Strange Movie
By Peter Galuszka Almost four years after 29 miners employed by then Richmond-based Massey Energy were killed in a West Virginia mine explosion, its former chief executive under federal investigation for widespread safety violations has come forward with an apparently self-funded “documentary” proclaiming his innocence. Donald Blankenship released the film “Upper Big Branch, Never Again”…
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Coal Giant Alpha Pays Biggest Water Fine Ever
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in Business and Economy, Consumer Protection, Courts and law, Crime, Corrections, Law Enforcement, Disasters and Disaster Preparedness, Economic development, Energy, Environment, Government Finance, Labor and Workforce, Land use & Development, Money in politics, Planning, Politics, Property rights, Public safety & health, Regulations, Gov’t Oversight, Science & TechnologyBy Peter Galuszka Alpha Natural Resources of Bristol, the coal giant that took over troubled Massey Energy of Richmond in 2011, has the dubious honor paying the highest fines ever of $27.5 million for water pollution violations at its coal mining operations in five Appalachian states, including Virginia. Massey Energy, the owner of the Upper…
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Has It Really Come to This?
I do admire Nicole Coon for her bravery in stepping forward to promote passage of the so-called “revenge porn” bill that now awaits Governor Terry McAuliffe’s signature. The pretty nursing student had sent an, um, embarrassing video to a boyfriend who, presumably when he was no longer a boyfriend, posted it on a website that…
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McAuliffe Peruses Tobacco Commission
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in Business and Economy, Courts and law, Crime, Corrections, Law Enforcement, Demographics, Economic development, Environment, Government Finance, Government workers and pensions, Infrastructure, Labor and Workforce, Land use & Development, Planning, Politics, Public safety & health, Science & TechnologyBy Peter Galuszka What’s going on with the Tobacco Commission? Gov. Terry McAuliffe wants to know and is asking for a detailed accounting of its finances over the past five years. The Tobacco Indemnification and Revitalization Commission, created in 1999 with a $1 billion endowment from lawsuit settlements with four major tobacco companies, has been…
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“We Don’t Need No Stinking Ethics Reform!”
By Peter Galuszka It’s no surprise but Virginia legislators appear to doing as little as possible to upgrade the state’s lax ethics rules. In fact, they may be backtracking on some of them. In a rational world, one would think that something would be done after the indictment of former Gov. Robert F. McDonnell and…
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Virginia’s Philosophical Crossroads
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in Business and Economy, Courts and law, Crime, Corrections, Law Enforcement, Demographics, Economic development, Education (higher ed), Education (K-12), Electoral process, Environment, Federal issues, Labor and Workforce, Land use & Development, LGBQT, Media, Money in politics, Planning, Politics, Race and Race Relations, Regulations, Gov’t OversightStanding before a trim, white, clapboard house off Lafayette Boulevard in Norfolk last week, friends and supporters of gay rights cheered loudly as two same sex couples approached a front-yard podium to celebrate their legal victory in having Virginia’s gay marriage ban overturned. The night before, U.S. District Judge Arenda Wright Allen, citing Abraham Lincoln…
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Tar Heel Grief Just Down the Road
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in Business and Economy, Courts and law, Crime, Corrections, Law Enforcement, Demographics, Disasters and Disaster Preparedness, Economic development, Education (higher ed), Education (K-12), Electoral process, Energy, Environment, Federal issues, Government Finance, Government workers and pensions, Health Care, Housing, Infrastructure, Labor and Workforce, Land use & Development, LGBQT, Media, Money in politics, Planning, Politics, Poverty & income gap, Property rights, Public safety & health, Race and Race Relations, Science & Technology, Social Services and Entitlements, Water-waste waterBy Peter Galuszka It’s sad to see two states to which I have personal ties – North Carolina and West Virginia — in such bad ways. The latest raw news comes from the Tar Heel state where we are seeing the handiwork of hard-right- Gov. Pat McCrory who has been on a tear for a…
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Yet Another Coal-Related Mess
By Peter Galuszka More and more, “The War on Coal.” seems like “The War On Us.” Just a few weeks after 300,000 people in the Charleston, W.Va. area were without drinking water because of a coal preparation chemical leaked into the Kanawha River system, another spill involving coal could threaten the drinking water of Danville…
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Why Is Anatabloc Still Being Sold?
By Peter Galuszka One real question involving indicted former governor Robert F. McDonnell may well not be the issues about the ethics of public officials he raises. Indeed, according to Forbes and Slate, the real problem is that unregulated dietary supplements that McDonnell was promoting for his former friend and benefactor Jonnie R. Williams Sr. of…
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Message to GOP: Shoe’s On The Other Foot
By Peter Galuszka Not three weeks ago, Newly elected Gov. Terry McAuliffe stood before the Virginia State Capitol and extolled a new era of bipartisanship in Richmond. It doesn’t seem to have lasted very long. Whether by design or chance, a series of events have strengthened the state Democrats’ hand and terrified the Republicans who…
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In Court With the McDonnells
By Peter Galuszka The courtroom was packed and I ended up in the hallway of Richmond’s fairly new and modern look federal courts building. Inside, history was being made: a bond hearing for Robert F. McDonnell, the first Virginia governor, former or sitting, ever to be charged with misconduct while in office. Inside, U.S. Magistrate…