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Opinion

  •
    Memorial Day is a time to honor,...

    He was a 17-old-boy who knew he was not cut out to be a scholar, a coalminer or a farmer. And so he did the only other thing he could think of: he lied about his age and joined the Army.

    By November 1950, he was on the shores of the Chosin Reservoir in Korea and on Dec. 1-2 he was shot twice, bayoneted 16 times by the Chinese and left for dead on the frozen tundra.

    Back home his parents received a telegram that read, in part, “Your son was slightly wounded.”

    Semi-illiterate, all they knew to do was pray.

  •
    Best food is right in your hometown

    Anyone who knows me at all will tell you I am, at best, a finicky eater. I always have been, and for the life of me, I don’t know why. It certainly wasn’t a learned behavior from my parents, who ate practically everything.

    No, Iee^have a discriminating palate and I am not adventuresome at all.

    Or at least I wasn’t until Iee^met Tom.

    BT (or Before Tom), I was content to eat at any variety of chain restaurants and most of the time would order the exact same thing, over and over.

  • Letter to the Editor

    To the editor:

    In the past week or 10 days, I have read three or four similar accounts of this situation. Without exception, each report contained only half truths, gossip and surprisingly inaccurate statements by Levy County elected officials. Although state laws and Captive Exotic Animal statistics are readily available on the Internet, no one seems inclined to put any effort into accessing them.

    Anything I say can be verified and I will try to give site addresses for anyone interested in facts.

  • Progressive View Introduction

    You don’t often see a newspaper column written by two people, but Terry and I believe that together we can introduce readers to the local aspects of a wide variety of topics that make national headlines. This column will appear twice each month, and we will be trading off authorship. Hopefully you won’t find this confusing—you can assume that we agree on an issue unless we state otherwise. Here’s the story on how Terry and I came up with our idea to work together….

  • Single payer health care

    Last month Barbara and another member of Progressive Voices of Levy County, Drollene Brown, handed out single-payer literature at the farmer’s market in Williston. Almost everyone was willing to stop and discuss the issue. Most agreed that every American should have equal access to comprehensive health care. And some shared their own health care-related nightmares, such as the man who told how his employer had quit paying for health insurance in order to keep everyone’s wages the same, but then cut everyone’s wages anyway.

  • Letter to the Editor

    To the editor:

    There is a fight going on right now in Levy County, a fight between a neighborhood and a few who want to put a rock mine in our backyard. They have a lot of claims about how it would benefit our community, but, we know better.

    I am asking the citizens of Williston to get involved with us in Montbrook to stop the mine on CR 322. It will only be a few miles from your city limits, near your schools and your backyards. Just remember, when the wind blows from the south, the dust and the noise may be headed your way.

  • It’s a pleasure to be...

    Drollene Brown said it best Tuesday. “You get around,” she wrote. Indeed I do.

    Four years after moving to Florida, Iee^have now worked at four of the county’s newspapers. In those four years, Iee^have covered every government agency, except Yankeetown, driven hundreds of miles along the backroads and met scores of people and learned a lot about the state where I have always wanted to live.

  • Letter to the Editor

    To the editor:

  • Letter to the Editor

    To the editor:

    I wanted to take this opportunity to congratulate and thank the teachers at the Williston Elementary School for their success in preparing our children for the FCAT writing test this year.

    Being a parent of a fourth grader, I understand the work effort required to prepare children to receive a passing score on this test.

    Not only did the WES students pass this test, but a large percentage achieved at least a 4 out of 6, which is a high standard set for the students to strive to meet.

  • Letter to the Editor

    Dear Editor:

    After reading the article about the CRA going on’s for improvement to the downtown area of Williston, I had to ask myself what were they thinking when it came to removing the parking area in front of the Ivy House?

  • Letter to the Editor

    Dear Editor,

    Once again I would like to thank everyone who contributed to the successful AARP Tax Aide.

    Levy County is one of our four counties in District 12. The Williston Library is one of two Levy host sites. Michelle Traylor and her staff generously made appointments throughout the season and furnished room for equipment, counselors and taxpayers. Your help is always appreciated.

    The Williston Pioneer Sun News provides publicity for our free services, weekly hours and volunteer recruitment. Thanks for keeping taxpayers informed about this local benefit.

  • Sowing my seed to the birds... or...

    It was the middle of the night and I could not go to sleep. I looked at the clock and it said 2:37 AM. I tossed and turned but nothing seemed to work. The Sandman, usually a faithful worker at our house, was nowhere to be found. I read somewhere that if you cannot go to sleep in the middle of the night, get up go out and watched a little TV and soon you will get sleepy. I am not sure who wrote that and I am not even sure if I actually read it or if it was some delusion of my mind at the time.

  • Letter to the editor

    Dear Editor:

    I would like to take this opportunity to say, “thank you,” to the Williston Fire Department.

    On the night before Thanksgiving our business caught on fire. Some of the chemicals we use are highly flammable. The fire started in the chemical room and wasn’t called in for some time. When the fire department arrived they faced a towering inferno complete with explosions, intense heat and a 500 gallon propane tank 20 feet from the blaze.

  • Letter to the editor

    Dear Editor:

    My husband and I are long-time patients at the Nature Coast Family Health Services.

    We are so glad to see the positive letters and publicity concerning both the hospital and clinic and the efforts of our hard-working staff to provide the very best for all of us who use or will need the services provided. Dr. Dale Block and Mr.ee^James Long P.A. have our complete trust and confidence.

  • My TV career viciously plucked from...

    Whoever said, "Some things are not to be," said a mouthful. I have found that, although I may want to do something, it is not for me. Of course, the opposite is also true. Some things I do not want, yet somehow they find residence upon my person, and usually do not pay rent. Wouldn't it be nice if you could just choose everything you like in life?

  • Remember mom on her big day

    The year was 1997. I remember clearly getting the phone call that my mother had died.

    It’s been a little more than 12 years, but I still miss her.

    I remember the last time I saw her. There was a look that passed between us that sent chills over me. As I drove away to another town where I was working, I had to fight back the tears. Somehow we both sensed that was the last time we would speak. And a week later, the call came.

  • Damaging a nice neighborhood

    Editor:

  • New rule could hurt athletes

    The Florida High School Athletic Association on Monday did what a lot of folks figured they would do, cut the number of games that a team may play during a season.

    Of course, varsity football was exempted.

    The vote was close, 9-6, by the FHSAA board, and the ruling was only for two years. That’s little consolation to this year’s sophomores and juniors who will have to live with this rule for their final two years of high school. They will be gone if the rule is repealed in two years.

  • How many big jets will come?

    When I was a child, back in the dark ages as my children say, we had friends named Edith and Ray who lived in a Brooklyn apartment. We would visit them often, and then they moved to Queens. We went to see them for the first time in their new home, and we were sitting there talking shortly after we got there. Suddenly everyone’s mouths were moving, but you couldn’t hear what they were saying.

    That’s because they had moved to Jamaica and were directly under the approach path for planes landing at Idylwild Airport, which is now called JFK.

  • No one said pirates were smart

    Yo, ho, ho, a pirate’s life for me. Children sing songs like that after taking a trip at Disney’s “Pirates of the Caribbean” attraction, and have been doing so for years.

    But off the coast of Somalia, no one’s laughing.

    On Easter Sunday, an American ship’s captain, whose vessel had been captured by pirates off the coast of Somalia, was rescued by the Navy, whose sharpshooters took out three of the four men holding the American on a boat. The fourth pirate surrendered.