Tag: University of Virginia
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Punting on Obamacare
By Peter Galuszka The Virginia General Assembly is taking a powder on Obamacare. Faced with a federal mandate of next January to show they are making progress, Richmond legislators have dilly-dallied past the problem, many apparently fearful that too much action on setting up state-run exchanges for people to shop for health insurance will bring…
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The Cooch’s Personal Cops?
By Peter Galuszka Virginia’s zany attorney general wants to create his own armed, flying squad of crime-busters. In what could be a 21st century version of “Dragnet,” Kenneth Cuccinelli wants to create his own police force. He wants to arm 40 of the 83 members of his Medicaid fraud investigative arm. They’d have badges, too. Cuccinelli…
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“The Iron Lady”
By Peter Galuszka “The Iron Lady,” a biopic starring Meryl Streep, has brought fresh attention to the policies and philosophies of Margaret Thatcher, the ground-breaking leader who served as Great Britain’s Prime Minister for 11 years – from 1979 to 1990. Always controversial, Thatcher pioneered much of the conservative framework still in play today, such…
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The Ultrasound Abortion
By Peter Galuszka Abortion is always a very unpleasant topic just as it must be horrendous for a woman to be in a position to make such as choice. Still, it is her constitutional right, the law of the land. So, after years of trying, Virginia’s conservative legislators are on the verge of putting themselves,…
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Up to Our Alligators As Area Warms?
By Peter Galuszka Holy magnolia! The area just south of Washington on the Potomac River and all the way north of Baltimore on the shores of Chesapeake Bay have become noticeable warmer over the past 22 years. Consequently, it is possible to grow species of plants in that zone that previously needed warmer, more southerly…
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Good Move on Uranium
By Peter Galuszka Gov. Robert F. McDonnell has punted on the uranium controversy and that’s a good thing, assuming the General Assembly doesn’t lift the mining ban anyway. There are simply too many unknowns about mining the tract owned by Virginia Uranium near Chatham and the state has no knowledge or regulations about mining the…
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Malodorous Portsmouth
By Peter Galuszka Is there something stinky going on in Portsmouth? It’s a question that has suddenly wafted up when residents of the port city learned that the Virginia Ports Authority has been in secret talks with Canadian-owned PCS Phosphate to put in a plant to melt sulfur pellets for fertilizer production. The same project…
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What’s McDonnell Up To With Transportation?
By Peter Galuszka The McDonnell Administration is taking a chain saw to policies that promote smarter, more efficient growth by axing reforms to make neighborhoods connected and pushing design contracts that fast-track road construction and discourage public input. Such are the conclusions drawn from two blog postings by David Alpert of Greater Greater Washington and…