From Senator Bill Frist, M.D., Sept. 17, 2026- Clean air standards save lives. Weakening them is a step backward for public health and the environment.
This week, the EPA proposed eliminating all remaining greenhouse gas emissions rules for coal and natural gas power plants. Many of these regulations have a history of bipartisan support, grounded in the Clean Air Act of 1970 that was authored by my mentor, Senate Majority Leader Howard Baker (R-TN).
As a heart and lung transplant surgeon and former Senate Majority Leader, I see clean air protections as preventive medicine.
Fine-particle air pollution can trigger inflammation, impair blood-vessel function, and promote abnormal clotting, increasing the risk of heart attacks and strokes. The original power-plant carbon standards were projected to deliver additional health benefits through measurable reductions in air pollution.
Any serious assessment of regulatory costs must also account for the costs of preventable illness: hospitalizations, lost productivity, and lives cut short.
In this week’s Myth Diagnosis, I address the claim that clean air standards are “just more red tape.”
My diagnosis? Prevention reversed.
Prescription? Protect the safeguards that protect our health.
We have made real progress toward cleaner air. Now is the time to build on it.
Clean air protections are health protections. Because the world around us shapes the health within us.
by Rod Williams, Sept. 16, 2026 -Under Trump, the government has taken an ownership stake in over 30 large companies. Socialism is government ownership of the means of production.
Even a lot of people who align with the DSA do not really support socialism.
Government ownership of the means of production, DSA’s defining program and actual textbook socialism, draws support from just 11 percent of voters, with 79 percent opposed and 63 percent strongly opposed. Even among Democrats favorable to the DSA, it nets out at 59 percent opposition.
The DSA’s defining program, public ownership of businesses, is underwater four to one even among those supporting the DSA.
Nor is this the only sign of confused beliefs about socialism among today’s supporters. Other polls of voters under 25 showing 77 percent thought their paycheck should be based on merit, 70 percent wanted to own their own business, and 63 percent saw America as the land of opportunity led Mark Penn and Andrew Stein to remark earlier this month that “today’s young adults must be the most entrepreneurial socialists in history.”
Even socializing only utilities and railways — socialist bread and butter — failed to command majority support among any group polled by The Argument, even though those are exactly the two sectors DSA identifies as pivotal for socialists to nationalize. That proposition is only supported by 48 percent of Democrats who view the DSA favorably, with 38 percent actually opposed.
In other words, while support for the socialist label is rising alongside the DSA’s success, apparent support for the key tenets of socialism remains fringe. (Do DSA Supporters Really Want Socialism? | Cato at Liberty Blog)
Of course, while the DSA actually calls for socialism and they accurately define it, most people don't really want socialism. They favor policies more aligned with Social Democracy policies. They want a regulated capitalist economy and strong social welfare programs to promote what they see as equality and social justice. They do not actually want to nationalize Amazon and Kroger. If you think your paycheck should be based on merit and you someday want to own your own business, you are not really a socialist.
It seems the only people in America who want socialism are Trump supporters. I haven't found any polling to confirm this, but Trump supporters still enthusiastically support Trump and his policies, and I hear no voices on the new right condemning Trump's policy of taking ownership interest in American companies.
If a Democrat administration had taken an ownership interest in over 30 companies, Republicans would have their hair on fire and be screaming bloody murder. Of course, Republicans have abandoned most of what they once believed and now believe whatever Trump is doing is correct. They blindly follow Trump wherever he leads, and he can lead them to accept socialism as long as he doesn't call it socialism. Federal corporate ownership is becoming routine under this Republican administration. Don't tell me that it is not the Republican Party that views socialist policies more favorably.
by Rod Williams, Sept. 14, 2026- It seems most people who pay attention are concerned about the danger of AI. Not the President, of course. Here is what he had to say on his Truth Social today.
I, of course, don't know what should be done about AI. I do not think doing nothing and assuming there is not a problem is the answer.
"Ban it" is not a solution but a slogan. I have no way of knowing whether the dire warnings expressed by researchers and industry leaders are warranted, but enough people are expressing concern that the issue should be taken seriously. The risk of a new wave of biological weapons and autonomous warfare is a serious concern.
Of course, if the US calls a halt to technological advancement and China and other countries are not restrained, then nothing is accomplished. Unilateral disarmament is not a solution. That is not a reason for despair and doing nothing, however. We have lived under the threat of nuclear annihilation since 1945 yet we cooperated with an enemy sworn to destroy us and avoided nuclear Armageddon. The arms race was dialed back by things like the Test Ban Treaty and SALT. I think such an approach should be pursued regarding AI, assuming of course, that the threat is real, which I tend to think it is but have no way of knowing with any degree of certainty.
Since Trump has turned much of the world against us and we have lost much of our soft power and Trump has been destroying alliances and the world order, America would have a more difficult time exerting leadership in the world to address this issue than in the past. However, we should attempt to rally the world to deal with this issue, again assuming it is as serious as some think it is.
I am a little suspicious when industry leaders call for government regulations of their industry. I have to ask if this is to lock in an advantage and suppress competition or if it is genuine. I don't know, so while I am skeptical of the motives of industry leaders, I am not prepared to simply dismiss the industry's expressed concerns.
There are a lot of questions about the threat of AI and, as of yet, not a lot of answers. In my view, the threat should be taken seriously. The last thing we need is for the President of the United States to say all is fine because I am in charge and I am strong and smart. Oh, and if you think there is a reason to be concerned about AI you are a conspiracy theorist, treasonous, and a traitor.
One finds fame on platforms like Twitter by being the lamest, the angriest, the least amenable to thoughtful pushback or open debate or introspection. And Zeus forbid that someone reject tribal orthodoxy. The biggest stars of the Twitter age . . . well, let’s just say that rarely have so many people who knew so little been imbued with so much confidence in their intellect. (Democracy in Silos, by David Earsany, NR)
I came across the above the other day, and it expresses well what I have observed and that of which I am persuaded. People are getting dumber and dumber, and they think they are informed and intelligent. I think there was a time when people who were ignorant kind of knew they were ignorant. On certain topics, they would defer to experts and better-informed people. Now, many seem to think an uninformed opinion is just as valuable as an informed one, and they distrust experts. There is a certain pride in having "common sense," and a belief that common sense and a passion are all one needs to argue a case for some proposition or to govern.
I think the rise of new media is a major reason for this. There are "influencers" with no experience and no credentials who are followed by millions. On the right, there is an explosion of podcasters at the junction of the manosphere and Trumpistan. People take them seriously and think they have discovered the truth and that everyone else has been lying to them. Of course, this is not only true of right-wing political podcasts, but you see the same certainty of one's views about healthcare topics, alien encounters, and other topics.
In addition to this certainty of having discovered the truth, those who are promoting unorthodox views are able to reach people who in the past, they would never have reached. Sure, before the widespread use of the internet, one could publish anything one wanted. People had the same right to spread untrue or hatefull or just wrong information, but you can only reach so many people by handing out xeroxed copies on the street, and to found and publish a magazine is a big undertaking. Then, one could only reach a small fraction of the population. In the past, there were gatekeepers. A TV discussion panel was not going to program a person of really fringe views or people who just spread wrong information. Letters to the Editor did not get published if they were too outlandish. Now the gatekeepers are gone.
One thing that led to our current state of political illiteracy is the rise of Donald Trump. Without any evidence and despite over 60 court rulings against the stolen election myths and despite the millions paid in settlements for defamation, about a third of Americans still believe the 2020 election was stolen. Another example of people believing things that are obviously not true is that tariffs are paid by the exporting country. They refuse to believe that it is the consumers who pay the tariffs. This should not even be debatable. The importer pays the tariffs, and he passes them on to the retailer, who passes them on to the consumer. That is a fact, yet many don't believe it. People not only feel entitled to their wrong opinion but also to their own "facts."
Of course, this raises the question: did Trump spread political illiteracy, or is political illiteracy what led to Trump? I think it is a little of both. At some point in the last thirty or so years, schools began focusing on STEM and had to cut other things, like civics and history. Generations of people grew up without an understanding or appreciation of how government works and the conflicts that led to our democracy. People had to wrestle less with competing and complex ideas. Not only did civic education suffer, but other critical thinking skills suffered, with there being less emphasis on literature, reading, and composition.
This decline in critical thinking skills and the ability to reason is greater than just what happens in the political realm. I think it is a general dumbing down of society. There are two articles published in The Atlantic that explore this. One is The Post Literate Age published in the October 2025 issue. This article by George Packer, makes the case about people's failure to read and why it matters:
For one thing, did anyone still read fiction? I mean literary fiction, the kind that aspires to complex characters, subtle themes, and careful attention to prose style. Those novels are gone from the best-seller lists—it’s all sexy dragons now. The novel ceased long ago to occupy the cultural center, giving way first to movies, then TV series, video games, social-media posts, and AI content. The novelist as voice of a generation no longer exists. Literary fiction has become more like classical music—the eccentric taste of a diminishing set of the devoted.
I don't think it matters the topic of the novel so much as exercising the brain the way reading requires. As we read less, we are less capable of rational thought.
The other article that explores this topic is The End of Reading Is Here, by Rose Horowitch published in the August 2026 issue. It points out that "The decline in reading cuts across age groups, gender, and education levels. Even the demographics that traditionally read the most—retirees, women, and college graduates—have seen a collapse."
Not only are people reading less, but their attention spans are also shrinking and what they do read has been dumbed down. Horowitch points out that New York Times bestsellers today have sentences that are about one-third shorter than they were a century ago. Nearly 30 percent of American adults cannot paraphrase or make inferences from a multipage text. In 2017, that number was less than 20 percent. Reading scores are plummeting.
Not only is the decline in literacy found in the average American, but the elites are getting less literate also. The article documents this. Some will say that we are getting information from listening to news or podcasts on headphones. The author says that hearing something is no substitute for reading:
The written word is fundamentally different from oral language. Writing detaches the message from the messenger, allowing for a more dispassionate spread of information than was possible in oral societies. Because writing a phrase takes longer than speaking it, writing forces the author to slow down and reflect. Written language tends to employ more complex sentence structures and vocabulary than spoken language. And unlike speech, it doesn’t disappear into the ether. Readers can return to a text and plumb it for new meaning and understanding. Because writing endures, individuals can temporarily forget what they’ve written but trust that it won’t be lost forever. This frees up the mind to think of new ideas and make new discoveries. ...
Studies have shown that people comprehend less when reading on a digital device than on paper, perhaps because of all these distractions. Devoting extended, undivided attention to a text can now feel like too much to ask. Audiobooks have become a popular alternative to print books at least in part because listening to a book allows for multitasking: You can read while doing the dishes or driving to work.
In this digital age, illiteracy increases: the short-form video and the tweet and the thumbs up and other symbols are replacing reading text and writing text online. The author points out that as America has become postliterate, Trump is our first postliterate president.
Trump’s communication style is perfectly suited to an oral society. He employs epithets—“Low-Energy Jeb,” “Little Marco,” “Sleepy Joe”—that are easy to remember and repeat. He contradicts himself as though there is no record of his previous statements. Even his writing is almost indistinguishable from his speech. (It makes sense; Trump reportedly prefers dictation to composition.) His online posts are full of idiosyncratically placed punctuation, capital letters, and exclamation points. Many are memes with little text:
I am pessimistic about the future of America. Trump's policies have weakened America's standing in the world; the world order that kept the peace is falling apart, and America faces an economic crisis. I could think that when Trump passes from the scene, we can restore the old order and reintegrate a fractured world and address our pressing issues; however, I have my doubts. I fear that an illiterate population, getting dumber by the day, may be incapable of rational thought and discerning the truth from fiction. People want free things and they don't want to pay for them, and they want scapegoats to blame for the problems of the country or their own failings. A post-literate world will be easier to demigod, to manipulate, and to persuade.
by Rod Williams, Sept. 10, 2026- It is hard to believe that it has been twenty-five years since the terrorist attack of 9-11 and the collapse of the Twin Towers. I am an old man now and have witnessed a lot of historic events in my life. For me, the September 11th attack ranks as the most important historic event I have experienced, overshadowing the Kennedy assassination, the US's humiliating defeat and chaotic exit from Vietnam, the moon landing, the resignation of Richard Nixon, the fall of the Berlin Wall, and other historic events. It seems to be fading into the background now for much of the public.
About 30 percent of U.S. residents were born after 2001, and about 7 percent of the population were 5 years old or younger. That’s 37 percent of the population that was at least too young at the time of the attacks to be aware of what unfolded. As divided as we are now, it is hard to believe that there was a time when America was so united, even it was united in grief. I think for those who experienced the attack of September 11, 2001, we will never forget where we were or how we felt. Below is my remembrance written down five years ago.
by Rod Williams, Sept, 11, 2020 - On September 11, 2001 I got up like most days and got ready for work. As I recall, I had the TV on when a program was interrupted, saying a plane had crashed into the World Trade Center. I did not think a lot about it at first. No details were available, and I assumed some private small plane had flown off course and accidentally crashed into the building.
By the time I got to work, the second plane had hit and it was clear that the U. S. was under attack. My long-time, long-distance girl friend, Louella Ballenger, who is now my wife, worked in Washington DC at the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics, located right next to Union Station which is across the street from the back of the US Capitol. I do not recall the sequence of events exactly, but it must have been after the Pentagon was hit and I started wondering what was next. I feared we were under an all out attack. I tried several times to reach Louella. I wanted to see if she was all right and tell her I loved her. I feared the worst.
After several attempts, I reached her. Chaos reigned at her workplace. People were free to leave work, but the subways were not running and the roadways were jammed. She was waiting out the crisis at her office. We told each other how much we loved each other.
After getting off the phone with Louella, I just had a sense that I needed to talk to people I love so I next called my daughter. Rachel was in no danger of course. She was in Chattanooga attending college but I just wanted to hear her voice and tell her I loved her. I then called my mother. I remember how everyone at work and everyone I talked to was affected by the event.
I was working at the Woodbine Community Organization, which was a community-oriented social services agency, neighborhood organization, and a housing counseling agency. I went to my boss, Cathie Dodd, and said we ought to do something. She agreed. We busied ourselves the next day putting together a program and emailing and calling people to tell them about it. With little advance notice, we had a full house. Co-workers and people from other agencies we work with, friends, agency clients, and people from the community joined in a memorial service at work. We prayed and sang songs and were comforted. All rancor and petty conflicts were put aside as we held hands in prayer and hugged and comforted each other. People cried. It was a healing process.
After the immediate crisis was over, I asked Louella to quit her job and move to Nashville. We had, had a long-distance relationship for about ten years and were in love and we planned that when she retired, she would then move down to Nashville and we would get married and be together. I think 9-11 made us realize that you don't know what tomorrow holds and that life is short. Louella took early retirement, we bought a house, and on Thanksgiving weekend Louella moved to Nashville.
This song by Alan Jackson captures that day perfectly for me. Alan Jackson said a day or two after the event, he woke up and this song just poured out of him. He said it was the easiest song he ever wrote.
Where Were You When the World Stopped Turning
Were you when the world stopped turning
that September day
Out in the yard with your wife and children
Working on some stage in LA
Did you stand there in shock at the site of That black smoke
rising against that blue sky
Did you shout out in anger, In fear for your neighbor
Or did you just sit down and cry
Did you weep for the children
Who lost their dear loved ones
And pray for the ones who don't know
Did you rejoice for the people who walked from the rubble
And sob for the ones left below
Did you burst out in pride
For the red white and blue
The heroes who died just doing what they do
Did you look up to heaven for some kind of answer
And look at yourself to what really matters
I 'm just a singer of simple songs
I'm not a real political man
I watch CNN but I'm not sure I can tell you
The difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to God
And I remember this from when I was young
Faith hope and love are some good things he gave us
And the greatest is love
Where were you when the world stopped turning that September day?
Teaching a class full of innocent children
Driving down some cold interstate
Did you feel guilty cause you're a survivor
In a crowded room did you feel alone?
Did you call up your mother and tell her you love her
Did you dust off that bible at home?
Did you open your eyes and hope it never happened
Close your eyes and not go to sleep
Did you notice the sunset the first time in ages
Speak with some stranger on the street
Did you lay down at night and think of tomorrow
Go out and buy you a gun
Did you turn off that violent old movie you're watching
And turn on "I Love Lucy" reruns
Did you go to a church and hold hands with some stranger
Stand in line and give your own blood
Did you just stay home and cling tight to your family
Thank God you had somebody to love?
I'm just a singer of simple songs
I'm not a real political man
I watch CNN but I'm not sure I can tell you
The difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to God
And I remember this from when I was young
Faith hope and love are some good things he gave us
And the greatest is love
I'm just a singer of simple songs
I'm not a real political man
I watch CNN but I'm not sure I can tell you
The difference in Iraq and Iran
But I know Jesus and I talk to God
And I remember this from when I was young
Faith hope and love are some good things he gave us
And the greatest is love
The greatest is love
The greatest is love
Where were you when the world stopped turning that September day
by Alex Tokarev, Kristin Tokarev, The Independent, Sept. 9, 2026- It’s easy to fear and hate a giant windowless warehouse full of computers, sucking up electricity and destroying jobs. Data centers sound at best like a bad deal for the communities that host them. At worst, they could be an existential threat to the human race.
People are always uneasy when new technology disrupts the old ways of working. At the start of the Industrial Revolution, textile workers feared that machines would replace them and used their wooden shoes (sabot) to break the gears. That may be how we got the term “sabotage.”
Over time, machines improved productivity and safety, increased incomes and living standards. The AI boom will be no different. It is disruptive like all previous innovations. And, as with previous changes, tomorrow’s benefits will vastly outweigh today’s costs.
What about those utility bills? The higher demand will surely put a nasty dent in your family budget, right? Economics often produces counterintuitive answers. Sometimes, adding a gigantic new customer can lower the average cost of electricity for everyone else.
For a couple of decades, electricity demand in the USA was basically flat. We built infrastructure for a certain capacity and then spread those costs across all users. Data centers can utilize the grid more efficiently. Your bill can go down because the average fixed cost declines.
Higher consumption can lower the cost per unit consumed. Between 2015 and 2024, the arrival of data centers was associated with a modest decline in average retail electricity rates. The explanation is economies of scale in generation, transmission, and distribution.
Data centers can also shift computing workloads from expensive peak hours to cheaper off-peak periods. That reduces total grid costs by flattening demand and making better use of the existing infrastructure. The AI boom could make the system more efficient, benefiting everyone.
Here’s where the economist adds, “On the other hand…” Yes, the opposite can also happen. If a data center arrives where the grid is already under strain and the government intentionally sabotages the construction of new power plants, the result will be high bills and shortages.
Rather than imagining a post-apocalyptic world ruined by AI, we should focus on restraining politicians with a knack for making things worse. Our public servants should neither block nor subsidize the development of new data centers. The market can handle that one if left alone.
Unfortunately, at least 38 states compete desperately for data centers with their residents’ money. They waive or reduce sales taxes on essential tech equipment. They offer sales tax exemptions on the electricity consumed. And they grant long-term property tax reductions or abatements.
Data centers are extraordinarily capital-intensive. They also create very few local jobs once construction is over. If governments subsidize them while customers and taxpayers fund the new infrastructure, we are transferring wealth to some of the world’s richest investors.
Of course, a data center isn’t just a building. It is a gigantic piece of infrastructure linked to a vast global network, supporting cloud computing, artificial intelligence, and many industries. Most of the economic benefits accrue elsewhere. And they register much later.
Judging a data center solely by the number of people employed inside its walls is like judging a railroad by the number of people working at the local station. Still, instead of speculating about the net effect of the externalities involved, let the investors pay their costs as the rest of us do.
The data-center boom may turn out to be a terrific economic opportunity. It may also produce some spectacularly bad government deals. If a new facility requires a $500 million transmission upgrade that wouldn’t otherwise be needed, don’t make retirees and small businesses finance it.
It’s a terrible idea to craft our policies based on what Keynes called the “animal spirits”—the public’s overconfidence or anxieties. Current evidence suggests that data centers are neither the economic disaster their critics fear nor an automatic windfall for the communities that host them.
States and counties must end the costly competition to attract businesses at the expense of their taxpayers. A coordinated repeal of all direct and indirect subsidies is a step toward refocusing government action on promoting the general welfare rather than special corporate interests.
Free enterprise means that producers are free to compete for the customers’ money on the value they create, not on how much “free” money they can extract through politics.
by Nicolle S. Praino, Nashville Post, Sep 9, 2026 - The Nashville Zoo has canceled its 2026 Zoolumination Festival of Lights due to visa issues for the Chinese company that had crafted the displays.
Inlight Festival Group artisans have traveled to Nashville from Zigong, China, for the partnership since 2019 to create what has been billed as the largest lantern festival in the U.S.
... Nashville Zoo provided a statement that visa applications for the Inlight Festival Group artisans were denied. (link)
by Rod Williams, Sept. 8, 2026- So many people blame their increase in property taxes on the most recent reappraisal. Most of the time, that is simply not why your property taxes went up.
The regular property reappraisal is for the purpose of equalization. Take for example, that you live in an established neighborhood of older, established homes. Assume lots of homes in your neighborhood get added on to, beautified, freshly painted and updated, and you do not do that to your home. You should not be paying the same taxes as your neighbor. The reappraisal values your home at market value, so the neighbor who improved their home pays more property taxes than you do.
Or, consider that you live in a home of a certain age, size, and condition in one part of town and your friend lives in a similar home in another part of town. Assume that since the last appraisal, your friend's neighborhood has become very trendy and more expensive. He should pay more taxes than you do because his property is more valuable, even though he did nothing to make it more valuable.
After the reappraisal, your property should go up in value only if it has increased more than the average home. It should go down if it increases less in value than the average home. This is the law. The Tennessee Certified Tax Rate process is designed to ensure “truth-in-taxation” following a county-wide reappraisal. The process ensures the amount of total taxes collected for a county remains the same after a reappraisal, even if the combined value of all property in the county rose or fell following the reappraisal. Let me quote the law:
TN Code § 67-5-1701 (2025)
(a) (1) Upon a general reappraisal of property as determined by the state board of equalization, the county assessor of property shall certify to the governing bodies of the county and of each municipality within the county the total assessed value of taxable property within the jurisdiction of each governing body.
(2) The assessor shall also furnish each governing body an estimate of the total assessed value of all new construction and improvements not included on the previous assessment roll and the assessed value of deletions from the previous assessment roll.
(3) Exclusive of such new construction, improvements and deletions, each governing body, in the event of a general reappraisal as determined by the state board, shall determine and certify a tax rate which will provide the same ad valorem revenue for that jurisdiction as was levied during the previous year.
(4) For the purpose of calculating the certified rate, the governing body shall use the taxable value appearing on the roll exclusive of taxable value of properties appearing for the first time on the assessment roll. The governing body may also exclude from the taxable value appearing on the roll:
(A) The taxable value of properties subject to tax increment financing provisions adopted by the governing body pursuant to title 13, chapter 20, part 2; and
(B) The taxable value of properties within an area for which an economic impact plan has been approved by the governing body pursuant to § 7-53-312 or § 7-53-314.
(5) In calculating the certified tax rate, the governing body of the county or municipality may adjust the calculation, according to a method approved by the state board of equalization, to reflect extraordinary assessment changes anticipated from appeals to the state or local boards of equalization. The state board of equalization shall order recapture of an excessive adjustment in the following year if the certified tax rate is found to have been overstated due to overestimation of the appeals adjustment, and in these cases the jurisdiction may exceed the recapture rate only after public hearing.
So, why do most of us get a tax increase after a reappraisal? This is what normally happens. Following the finalization of the mass reappraisal, the new certified tax rate is calculated. Since property values increase, the new certified tax rate, which is lower than the current tax rate, is passed by the Council. Then, in almost all cases, the very next order of business is to pass a bill establishing a new tax rate that is higher than the certified tax rate that the Council has just passed. The Metro Council has chosen to set tax rates above the state‑required “revenue‑neutral” level.
Politicians who just raised your taxes will blame the tax increase on the reappraisal. They know better. They may also defend the increase in taxes by saying the tax rate is lower than last year's tax rate. That is irrelevant; they raised your taxes. What I would like to see happen is for a state law to be passed prohibiting a local government from raising the tax rates in a year in which the certified tax rate is adopted. That would be real "truth-in taxation."
The Pamphleteer has created a tax calculator tool that shows you how much of any tax increase you may have experienced is due to the reappraisal and how much is due to the city choosing to raise taxes. Below are the results for my home. Notice that the reappraisal would have lowered my tax bill by $157. Instead, I had a property tax increase of $825, all due to the Council's new tax rate.
Beacon, September 3, 2026- Today, we released the latest installment of the Beacon Poll, a statewide survey of 1,200 Tennessee voters featuring questions about voters’ views on artificial intelligence, data centers, and the forthcoming November general election.
Senator Marsha Blackburn starts out with a commanding 21-point advantage over Democrat Jerri Green in the race for governor, 55% to 34% among likely voters. Blackburn’s big lead comes after a hard-fought and divisive Republican primary against Congressman John Rose and state Rep. Monty Fritts that left some bruised feelings within the party, but any lingering divisions have not yet dented her standing heading into November.
In a surprising twist, President Trump’s job approval in deep-red Tennessee has gone underwater for the first time since Beacon began polling the state in 2023, with just 48% of voters approving of his job performance and 51% disapproving (-3%).
by Kim Jarrett, The Center Square, Sept 6, 2026 - Two Tennessee counties have taken action on automated license plate readers as questions of privacy and efficacy continue.
Former Knox County Mayor Glenn Jacobs signed a bill this week that would ban Flock cameras in his last action as mayor.
Hamilton County, Tenn., Sheriff Austin Garrett said his department is pausing the use of Flock License Plate Recognition and Motorola License Plate Recognition. Chattanooga is the county seat.
"The primary factor is the tremendous concern regarding public data and potential misuse of what is captured," Garrett said in a statement posted on social media. "Within the HCSO program, your Sheriff’s Office oversees approximately 70 cameras across Hamilton County."
Garrett asked state and federal leaders to begin a conversation about the technology.
U.S. Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Eric Burlison, R-Mo., are. They introduced the FLOCK OFF Act, which bans the use of taxpayer money for the technology.
"The federal government shouldn’t provide 'security' grants to cities and police departments that have gone beyond the pale and turned their communities into a version of 1984," Massie said in a statement.
Flock Safety has defended the use of automated license plate readers, which are now synonymous with the company's name.
"In 2025, we estimate Flock technology supported more than one million public safety investigations, assisted in 20% of solved cases in jurisdictions that partner with Flock, and helped locate more than 10,000 missing people," the company said in a July email to The Center Square. "Rather than banning a critical public safety tool, Congress should consider strong, clear safeguards that ensure accountability, oversight, and responsible use are enshrined in law. We do not have to choose between protecting privacy and giving law enforcement the tools it needs to keep communities safe. We can – and should – do both."
A database from the Institute of Justice shows 203 reports of reported abuse of the automated license plate readers as of Sept. 4. The incidents range from the arrests of law enforcement officers who have used the technology in some cases to stalk romantic partners to innocent people being held at gunpoint by police because the camera misread a license plate.
Law enforcement agencies are defending the use of the cameras, saying they are a tool for capturing criminals.
The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation said use of automated license plate reader technology from Georgia helped the agency find a 1-year-old child taken from Tennessee.
"ALPR information has helped the bureau and its partner agencies locate missing and endangered children and vulnerable adults, identify vehicles associated with wanted fugitives, and develop leads in investigations involving violent crime, drug trafficking, and organized criminal activity," the agency said in a statement.
Christopher Ingraham, an investigative reporter for the Institute for Justice, said in an interview with The Center Square that the fundamental question is whether the crimes would have been solved without the cameras.
"We don't know," Ingraham said. "The thing that I get concerned about is our law enforcement agencies crediting a camera with the entire case when it's really just a small piece of a case."
Rod's Comment:
I am concerned about the increased loss of privacy. I find it concerning that the government can read the license plate of every car passing through an intersection and follow a car with a network of cameras.
Much of the loss of privacy is because we voluntarily surrender it. We choose to use a feature on our phones that can know our location at all times. The use of facial recognition software is coming. Facial recognition has already been perfected. There will be a temptation to use it. In a mass protest, the technology is already available that would allow the government to be able to identify everyone in attendance, unless they hid their face.
Some argue, "I am not doing anything wrong, so I don't care if the government searches my home, or surveils me, or intercepts my email." I do not agree. I find a surveillance state a threat to liberty. I do not want to live in a Big Brother state. I concede that if we were all watched and followed all the time and we no longer had protections against unreasonable search and seizure, it would reduce crime. I am not willing to pay that price for crime reduction.
There may be places and circumstances where license plate readers can be justified, but guardrails on their use need to be in place, and their use should be limited. I welcome the pushback against Flock cameras.
by Rod Williams, Sept. 5, 2026 - Pretty soon we won't have Andy Ogles to keep us entertained. He will fade from the scene. Here is one more piece of Andy Ogles jackassery before he goes. At least in this piece of jackassery, he let it be known that he was joking. See the story at this link.
As the author of A Disgruntled Republican I often post items which I think may be of interest to the conservative, Republican, libertarian or the greater community. Posting of a press release or an announcement of an event does not necessarily indicate an endorsement. Rod
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