7 Things: Is military in charge? Ivey gets money for sheriffs; and more ….

7. People will complain about anything

• A bar in Birmingham actually had to apologize because they a bartender changed the channel after a basketball game and the movie it landed on had a scene where there was a KKK lynching, while not ideal, this was clearly not intentional.
• The movie was suspected to be “Stars In My Crown” was on a channel called GritTV which shows classic movies and the KKK is not depicted in a positive way. But it is 2023, so one person pretended to have a problem with it and referenced “Black History Month.” The “Tin Roof” bar posted on Facebook an explanation and an apology, that wasn’t necessary, saying, “We are very Sorry for the offensive broadcast images. This was definitely not appropriate and we will be more mindful of what channels are shown going forward.”

6. Layoffs, high-gas prices, and high inflation make people worry

• More layoffs in the tech industry and beyond were announced yesterday with companies like Dell, DraftKings, and Paypal joining the group of major companies as the latest to appear to be worried about the state of the current economy.
• Gas prices continue to creep back up, with 5 straight weeks of higher gas prices starting to slow, with Alabama seeing the 7th-highest increase last week and up to $3.30/gallon on average. These prices continue to put a crunch on wallets and wages, and grocery costs on items like beef, eggs, and sodas keep creeping up as well.

5. Will U.S. Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) tear up Biden’s speech? Unlikely.

• You can take President Joe Biden’s word, as a Biden, that he is hard at work crafting his own State of the Union speech that he will deliver to a divided Congress. He will get some cheers and will surely hear some boos, as well, with a focus on a restart of his agenda.
• But make no mistake, the State of the Union is … tonight, and the previews promise us a really special evening of Joe Biden’s famous brand of “straight-talk,” which means really stupid provably-false lies. The Republican response will come from newly elected Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders.

4. Is the execution botched if the guy still dies?

• The fretting over the second attempt to put a convicted murderer to death continues as Kenneth Eugene Smith continues to suggest he deserves some mercy that he did not provide his victims. Smith whined that his ordeal felt like a knife was cutting him, which is odd because he was convicted in a 1988 murder-for-hire scheme where the 45-year-old female victim was stabbed eight times in the chest and once on each side of the neck with an actual knife.
• Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall has made it clear he does not care for Smith’s argument, with his lawyers arguing, “Allegations of pain related to difficulty achieving intravenous access do not amount to cruel and unusual punishment.”

3. Another Alabama student found with a gun at school in Birmingham

• In what seems to be an all-to-common occurrence, an elementary student in Birmingham was found to have a firearm at school by an alert staff member at Central Park Elementary.
• The school notified parents and the child is being disciplined, but it may be time for the Legislature to step in here and start nailing parents who make a firearm available to a child who ends up bringing it to school.

2. Ivey cuts sheriffs a check – they need it

• Alabama’s sheriffs were not happy to see a constitutional carry law passed by the Legislature go into effect this year, they lost revenue and are seeking help from the state. They already witnessed significant revenue drops from pistol permits leading up to this year and it is expected to all but vanish under the new law so Gov. Kay Ivey is trying to help.
• Ivey has created a program to help make up some of that revenue. In order to be eligible for the money the sheriffs must prove they lost money in 2022 on the permits, which they all surely will. Ivey released a statement saying, “We have amended Alabama law to help our gun owners, we also worked to ensure our sheriffs received their critical funds, and I am proud that these grants will do that.”

1. The U.S. government is meant to be led by elected civilians

• In what should come as a shock to most, but probably won’t, the United States government seems to have a class of non-elected overseers that could be over-ruling and, apparently, neglecting to inform the President of the United States on national security matters. It is now possible that three separate times over the last two administrations, the military leadership has may have made decisions against the wishes of the sitting President of the United States of America or without his knowledge.
• After the 2020 election, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley was in contact with China operating a quasi-shadow government and telling them he would warn them of any American actions. This week it was suspected that the military overruled Biden’s call to shoot down a Chinese spy balloon and that, despite lies to the contrary, it has been alleged Gen. Jim Mattis never informed Donald Trump of previous balloon incursions. This is not how America was designed to work.