Island Issues

Mandatory Wage Increase Will Hammer Hospitality Industry; Island Eatery Trio Nix Local Group For Ideological Reasons

High school kids working as hostesses and food runners and high school dropouts washing dishes who are anticipating a $15 an hour paycheck may instead find themselves with no jobs and no paychecks.

The Biden administration’s plans to  increase the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour will only add to the misery of the hospitality industry’s Covid pandemic suffering. The industry has suffered about one in four Covid-related job losses due to the virus and according to a National Restaurant Association survey, more than one in six restaurants in the US closed permanently just in the first six months of the pandemic.

A myopic Joe Biden sees the industry’s misery as an opportunity to pile on. By demanding these struggling businesses increase the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour he’s delivering even more financial gut punches. A minimum wage hike will have brutally damaging consequences on the local economy, struggling small businesses, and their employees.

Biden incoherently babbles on about a $15 an hour wage lifting people out of poverty.  History has proven him wrong, particularly in liberal cities like Seattle, San Francisco and New York where it has been tried and resulted in employees being laid off and restaurants closing. A study conducted by the restaurant workplace management platform Harri found that to pay for the pay hikes, restaurants raised menu prices, cut worker hours, cut jobs, or in some instances even closed their restaurants down.

Young and inexperienced workers have been priced out of fast-food or other low-wage industry jobs by the higher minimum wage while at the same time, higher minimum wages help turn cashier, dishwasher, and janitorial workers into the long-term unemployed unable to move up a career ladder. The people that need jobs the most, are being ousted as employers retain and hire skilled workers rather than untrained, unskilled workers as both must be paid the higher minimum wage.

A clueless Biden claims that this is part of the COVID-19 recovery effort, but it will have the reverse effect. Local restaurateurs and those in the hotel, resort, and B&B businesses hereabouts agree, it won’t help, just the opposite.

Republican-led and hospitality-heavy Florida is suffering due to the pandemic but not as much as those states with Democrats in charge.

Despite Florida Governor Ron DeSantis allowing businesses to keep their doors open Nassau County’s hospitality and leisure industry has still been impacted by the fall-off in travel and because folks are afraid to go out. Amelia Island was initially hammered hard with some 3,000 employees being laid off early last year as several eateries and resorts curtailed their hours and others closed their doors for good. Governor DeSantis’s policies have helped many reopen, hire back employees, and hang on despite the virus.

I’ve talked to many local restaurant and bar owners as well as those in hotel management and they say the wage increase will have a devasting impact on their businesses and local employees. These aren’t miserly Scrooge type humbuggers, but your neighbors – local business owners and managers working hard to find ways to keep their doors open and keep employees on the payroll.

The federal minimum wage will have a severe negative impact on the folks that Democrats say they champion – the lowest paid, minorities, and those less educated. The smallest of the small businesses with two to five employees will probably stay put but not do any additional hiring, while those with more employees will likely lay some off, cut back on hours, stop hiring and raise prices. Businesses aren’t going to hire or retain employees who in their opinion aren’t worth $15 an hour. To keep their doors open they have no choice but to hire the smartest and most efficient and weed out those who can’t hack it and raise prices to pay the federally mandated wage.

The Biden administration will attempt to combat the efforts of these businesses to operate more economically and efficiently because in the Biden administration’s view there are no standards of excellence. If you’re black, Latino, an illegal immigrant, female, or any of the various sub-groups of the sexually bewildered, you’re supposed to be hired first, fired last, and your competence doesn’t matter in the least. Just look at Biden’s cabinet.

Despite Florida’s top-heavy reliance on the tourist industry, employment here fell only 4.6 percent as a result of the pandemic’s curtailed traffic and because Governor DeSantis kept the state open. Think how far in the tank we’d be if Governor DeSantis’s Democrat opponent, Andrew Gillum, had been elected? Think New York, California, Illinois, etc.

Despite the pandemic employment increased in Republican-led states last month including Texas (64,200), Georgia (44,700), and South Carolina (14,600). Democrat-led states suffered the most job losses including (Michigan -64,000), California (-53,300), Minnesota (-49,800), Pennsylvania (-37,600), and New York (-37,600). Nearly all the job losses were in leisure and hospitality. Despite their shut down rules these states – says the Wall Street Journal – didn’t control the virus any better than states that allowed business to operate with social distancing, and in most cases it was worse.

So along comes a misguided, doddering, ‘ole Joe to add a federal mandated minimum wage of $15 on top of the industry’s misery. Watch what happens?

One of Amelia Island’s local hotel managers told me that that if the $15 minimum is enacted he’ll  have no choice but to lay off marginal and low wage employees, cut hours of others, and raise room and food prices.

Restauranteur Chet Huntly who runs the newly opened South 3rd Street and Ash Boat House across from city hall, is one of many local restauranteurs who said he’d also have to cut hours and possibly eliminate jobs for some employees.

“It will do several things to the business as well as impact employees,” he said. “I’ll most likely be cutting hours back. When costs go up so do prices,” said Huntley who has been in the hospitality business for many years, most of them running a high-end string of Atlanta eateries before moving here. “Our margins are thin and there only a few costs we can control – labor and what we purchase. Insurance, workman’s comp, rent, and utilities are among those that are out of our control.”

Mr. Huntley echoed what several other local restaurant owners told me, saying that rather than using hostesses and food runners he may have to take a look at fewer employees working the door and running food. He also said he wants to feature local seafood and food from other US regions, but when labor costs are forced upward he may have to look at less expensive Southeast Asian products. “We can only raise prices so high before they become unsustainable,” he explains.

“Our margins are thin, just 12-15 cents on the dollar,” he said. “So, we have to squeeze what we can out of the menu and keep it attractive and do it during a time when people are already scared to come out. Whenever possible we try to pass any savings on to customers who are also feeling the financial effects of this pandemic economy. Federally mandated wage increases don’t help anybody – us, our employees, or our customers, particularly during the pandemic. Just the opposite.”

Currently, the federal minimum wage is $7.25, while the minimum 2021 minimum wage in Florida is $8.65 per hour effective January 1, 2021, with a minimum wage of at least $5.63 per hours for tipped employees.

Some states do not have their own minimum wages and simply follow the federal one, while others, such as California, have a minimum wage as high as $14 an hour.

Biden also would like to get rid of tip credits, which allow restaurant owners to pay below minimum wage to waiters and waitresses who make more than that amount per hour with tip included. If the government can’t regulate it they don’t like it.

Meanwhile Biden’s oblivious to all the financial pain and misery he is causing as his puppet masters drag him into a back room, hand him another Executive Order, and he shuffles out to sign it while reading from cue cards and mumbling unintelligibly for the TV cameras.

***

“Management told me there were conservatives at this table!”

Local Blockheads: Censorship and discrimination aren’t restricted only to the Biden suck up fascists running Facebook, Twitter, Amazon, and Google. The popular local conservative organization “We the People” group, chaired by national author, motivational speaker, and island resident, Deb Boelkes, has been discouraged from meeting at one island location and was told the group isn’t welcome at two others.

One of these south end facilities raised their prices for her event exorbitantly and even requested that Ms. Boelkes submit a list of attendee’s names before they’d agree to host the group. She rightly refused. Management of a north end facility with a private room for such gatherings refused but couldn’t articulate why. The owner is being contacted to see if he can shed light on his myopic management employee’s turndown. The third, a south end restaurant, made a series of lame excuses, before finally admitting they didn’t want publicity that would identify them as a site for the group’s meeting. Really? These facilities are nervous about being identified as sites that host a group of polite, well-mannered, articulate, free-spending area residents who gather to hear speakers that include 4th District Congressman John Rutherford (R); State Representative Cord Byrd and State Senator Aaron Bean; Common Sense founder Jack Knocke; state educators and US diplomats; nationally respected resident authors Neal Freeman and Ken Timmerman; former and current Nassau County Supervisors of Elections, Vicki Cannon and Janet Adkins respectively; Governor Ron DeSantis, and more such folks? This past Monday at the Florida House attendees heard from Ms. Lindsay Hoyt, founder of the Jacksonville’s Cornerstone Classical Academy, a highly successful free charter school, accommodating children grades K-6. These sessions are about as controversial as granny’s quilting bee.

“We the People is an organization with more than 700 local members with a mission to rebuild traditional American values; encourage critical thinking; foster respectful, healthy dialog on matters of importance to our community, state and nation; and motivate citizens to vote,” explains Ms. Boelkes.

The group doesn’t expect or request anything free and generously purchases food and beverages. It’s not exactly a rowdy crowd of drunks that participates in barroom brawls attacking each other with broken beer bottles and profane language while abusing the womenfolk.

I know most of the people that attend these sessions, and the blackballing facilities are leaving a bad taste in the mouths of a large crowd of affluent and influential local residents who will spread the word. I had Valentine’s Day reservations for four at one of these blackballing restaurants that I have now cancelled. When it comes to writing about locally owned restaurants I try never to be negative as many are struggling to survive the pandemic and a clueless Democrat administration to stay afloat. But I’m tempted to make an exception with these three twits.

Hats off to The Florida House and Shuckers, two popular eateries that eagerly and enthusiastically provide accommodations to “We the People.” Many attendees whose first visit to these establishments was at a “We the People” meeting frequently return to the two facilities to enjoy their exceptional food, cocktails, ambience, and friendliness.

The next “We the People” session will be held at the Florida House Monday, March 1, 5-7 pm featuring former Nassau County Economic Development Director Laura DiBella, who currently serves as executive director of the Florida Harbor Pilots Association. There’s a $20 cover charge that includes heavy appetizers. There’s a cash bar. Bring an appetite as last time the appetizers included bacon wrapped shrimp, marinated chicken skewers, fried green tomatoes, crab cakes, deviled eggs, a wide variety of fresh fruit and more. Bartenders Ryan and Jennie are fun, fast, and efficient.  Maximum capacity is 55 so if you plan to attend contact Deb at deb.boelkes@BWEising.com or  904/310-9602.These sessions fill up quickly.

Congressman Rutherford is tentatively scheduled to speak to the group April 5 at Shuckers, 5-7 p.m.

***

Oops! It seems that Amazon, Facebook, and Twitter are so busy kicking Donald Trump and other conservatives offline that they have allowed child porn sites to keep on going. Well, we have our priorities and they have theirs.

***

Speaking Of Kids: Teachers unions – which consider kids a nuisance – are demanding that their teacher members be bumped ahead of the elderly, the infirm, nurses and first responders to receive the Covid vaccine even though many teacher unionists refuse to enter a classroom in many states. The damage teachers unions are doing to an entire generation of kids, and especially minority kids is irretrievable now, and is worse than anything terrorists could ever hope to do.  These blockheads should be facing child abuse charges for what they’re doing to America’s children. Not to be outdone, the Biden administration attempted to top their affluent teachers union donator’s ineptitude and contemptuousness, demanding the terrorists at Guantanamo Bay – that were responsible for 9-11 – should be first in line to be vaccinated. That order was rescinded only after the embarrassing news leaked out. Folks, these are just two examples of the hell America is facing the next four years.

***

Suggested Super Bowl Halftime Topics: Two of America’s top-performing professional athletes never won a championship. One played in one and lost while the other never even played on a championship team.

Boston Red Sox legend Ted Williams, the last baseball player to hit .400 (.406 in 1941 with an astounding .553 OBP) and in my opinion the best hitter in baseball ever, never played in a World Series. Legendary Miami Dolphins quarterback Dan Marino, who still holds numerous NFL records for a quarterback, played in only one Super Bowl (XIX) but lost to the 49ers in 1985. I’m fortunate that I saw both of these stellar athletes perform.

One of 90,000 worthless tickets.

Even though these two amazing athletes never played on a championship team they certainly weren’t losers, far from it.

My all-time favorite dud team wasn’t the hapless New York Mets, the lovable losers of 1962 whose 120 losses remains a record in MLB, or the wretched 0-14 Tampa Bay Buccaneers of 1976. Nope, for me the 1964 Philadelphia Phillies hold that dubious honor. And they’re anything but loveable.

This “Dewey Defeats Truman” sports team, which led the National League by 6½ games on September 20, was a cinch to play in the World Series for the first time in almost 50 years and confidently sold 90,000 postseason tickets to their adoring fans. They then proceeded to lose 10 straight games and watch as the St. Louis Cardinals won the National League pennant by one game and went on to defeat the NY Yankees in the World Series.

It wasn’t the number of games the Phillies lost, but the way they lost that earned them the  distinction of legendary lamentable losers and it left a long-lingering bitterness among Philly fans. It was soon after that traumatic ’64 season that Philadelphia residents earned a well-deserved reputation as the nastiest sports fans in America, booing Santa Claus and even kids who failed to find Easter eggs during breaks in games. Philadelphia’s Old Veterans Stadium even had a court room and a jail because its fans were so rowdy.

***

Speaking Of Sports: The spineless Cleveland Indians and Washington Redskins have curtsied to political correctness and changed their team’s names. Soon the Atlanta Braves and the Kansas City Chiefs will cave to the will of these self-righteous, cancel culture pinheads.

So, “why,” asks west coast columnist Burt Prelutsky, “isn’t anybody calling for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People to clean up their racially insensitive act?”

He adds that the NAACP could solve the problem very easily, even retaining the “C” by merely changing Colored to Communist.

***

Wait! What? “Black Lives Matter (BLM) nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize” is a story that the annual satirical newspaper Amelia Island News Wrecker wouldn’t print as it would be too outrageously unbelievable, even for that publication which holds nothing sacred.

Apparently it’s true, as a whack job from the Norwegian socialist left party, Petter Eide, who nominated these thugs, thinks the anarchist terror organization that loots businesses, beats and shoots onlookers, and torches government buildings, is an agent for good.

How many BLM rioters are roaming the streets of Mr. Eide’s Norway terrorizing his former warrior Vikings turned worried wusses? Adolph Hitler and Joseph Stalin, who combined to slaughter 40 million people were both nominated for this worthless award.  I’m surprised they haven’t posthumously bestowed this Nobel Peace “honor” on Osama bin Laden and ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.

Alfred Nobel, the Swedish inventor of dynamite, who was branded “The Angel of Death” by the media, created the Peace Prize to make people forget his explosive past. But for many years the nitwits that run this phony baloney peace prize organization have blown up the inventor’s name. For example, Palestinian mass murderer and terrorist Yasser Arafat was given the award for reasons nobody can remember or understand. Do-nothing sermonizer Barack Obama was handed one a few days after he was elected US President, and even he admitted he didn’t know why. Rumpled, overweight and exceedingly unattractive radical leftist Stacy Abrams, who thinks she is the governor of Georgia, was also nominated. I hear others up for the prize this year are Jeffrey Dahmer and Charles Manson.

31 Comments

M. Calderwood - 16. Feb, 2021 -

Hey Dave,

I have owned a business of my own for 37 years. I had an idea when sitting on my porch one evening and watching the Nassau river flow by. We know the new minimum wage is a bad idea for all concerned (including the worker), what we need is some creative thinking. Who’s to say that a quick course (1.2.3 step brochure) cannot be handed to high school kids and college students seeking employment. The name of this course might be:
“Three Easy Steps to Becoming Your Own Sub-Contractor”. Contractor signs sub contract agreement with employer and charges $80 a day (or whatever he/she likes). Employer issues a 1099 to the contractor at the end of the fiscal year. End of problem! I believe it’s perfectly legal and not that hard to do. Hey Joe- “Come on Man!”

Dorothy Caroline Adams - 11. Feb, 2021 -

We are the most bullied nation on earth. We allow it to happen because we are dying to be politically correct. The realization of the fact that we financially support and aid the bullies who have no power of their own is just unfathomable.

Richard Troxel - 08. Feb, 2021 -

About the $15.00 minimum made law by
Executive Order.( Our new Congress )
I understand it to apply to Federal Gov.
employees and Federal Govt.Contract
employees.As far as I know the states
set minimum hourly rates for hourly
workers in their states not the Federal
Govt.Any changes to that would be a
State Matter and have not heard anything
about that.

John Goshco - 08. Feb, 2021 -

I believe you are correct regarding the executive order applying only to Federal employees & contractors. It’s only an “order”, not actual law.

The Federal minimum wage, however, applies to all states. Individual states may voluntarily increase that amount, but there is no option to go below the Federal minimum.

John (Lost my taste buds) Goshco - 06. Feb, 2021 -

Great food and service is great food and service. I wouldn’t miss out on a great experience unless the establishment was “in your face” about their political beliefs. Of course, back in the ’60s, that’s precisely what sit-ins were all about. Maybe it’s time for a modern version of the sit-in?

Still – most restaurants around here (including those which attempt to place a Heinz 57 variety of table salt in your bloodstream) are not so special that they can’t be replaced by other equally hard-working and deserving restauranteers.

Name the names and let the market decide. I suspect it won’t make much difference in their business anyway.

Vito - 06. Feb, 2021 -

Marino is a very nice fellow, I went to high school with him (Pittsburgh Central Catholic) he was also a pretty good baseball player.

Yes, also if you want please share the information regarding the establishments that blackballed We the People, if you want please email to me.

Thanks

Lori Lecker - 06. Feb, 2021 -

I am shocked and dismayed that a local restaurant would not host a “We the People” meeting. This is a new low. I’d like to know which restaurants turned Deb down. It’s cowardly and just plain wrong. I heard that there was a local FB private page which has all the Republican businesses listed so the members can boycott. I’d like to know who is a part of this nasty movement so I can FLIP THE SWITCH and tell them that they are NOT welcome in any of my 4 retail stores downtown. This is communist behavior and we can’t tolerate it. 70% of Nassau County voted for Trump and I will make my decisions accordingly.

Wesley Sheffield - 09. Feb, 2021 -

Name your stores Trumper

Richard Troxel - 06. Feb, 2021 -

If BLM protests ( RIOTS ) are 93 percent peaceful I certainly would not want to be any where
near the 7 percent that was not.This organization has got to be the largest boondoggle in the
history of America.How can anyone with a smidgen of common sense support this group of
unwashed rabble rousers hell bent on destroying the police forces of our country.I doubt very
seriously they care not one wit about black lives.I’ve never seen them protest the terrible
shootings and killings in Chicago have you?

Cynthia D Arnett - 06. Feb, 2021 -

Yes! Please share names of the blackballer establishments! I don’t get to go out to eat much, but will certainly make my choices easier when I do!

John (formerly a business guy) Goshco - 06. Feb, 2021 -

Another couple of thoughts…

What happens to the “experienced” workers who are currently making $10, $12 or $14 an hour due to their education and on-the-job contributions over many years? If an inexperienced entry level employee is suddenly entitled to $15 an hour, then what about the other long-time employees? They’ll rightly demand a higher wage in order to reflect their greater contribution to the company. In the end, the customer pays, or if they are unwilling, the business / employees take the hit.

Can’t happen? McDonalds, Panera, Starbucks and many other businesses allow you to phone in your order or even place your order on a self-service screen in the restaurant. There goes one more (order taking) job to compensate for the other employee expenses and benefits. Automation is everywhere and increasing every day. Several years ago I saw a vending machine that makes custom, individual pizzas from scratch in about 5 minutes. You can’t (maybe you can, but I can’t) stop the technolgical revolution. Forcing an increase in human wages, without a corresponding contribution in skills or benefit to the company’s bottom line only accelerates the automation process.

A minute ago, just for kicks, I Googled “bed making robot”. I quickly found a video of a heavy, stationary industrial robot awkwardly moving a pillow and sheet and also found a small, mobile R2D2 type robot doing a similar job. I’m betting the R2D2 bot repaces a lot of local workers in ten years time. $15 per hour times zero hours = ZERO DOLLARS.

It may be argued that small, incremental increases in the basic wage, over long periods of time can be helpful to some individuals in some situations. On the other hand, teaching a person to fish, as opposed to giving them a fish might be better for their overall well-being and for the economy as a whole.

Eddie Browm - 06. Feb, 2021 -

When it comes to servers most do not understand tipped employees will not fall under the $15.00 per hour limit. Most servers that do a good job easily meet more that $15.00 with bas pay and tips. I am one that tips 25% for fair service, 30% for good service, and 35% for great service.

Non-tipped workers will benefit possibly if this goes into law. Workers that have several years of service are most likely at $15.00/Hr. or above. Newer companies coming into the area are already promising $15.00/Hr.

If restaurants raise prices due to the $15.00/Hr. mandate I will make one of three choices: 1) Pay the increased price. 2) go home and cook. 3) go to a less expensive restaurant.

No matter our choice once Senile Buffoon Biden and his minions get their way it will never be reduced. We will forever be stuck and those of us on Social Security and Pensions will know immediately what our dinning out look will be. A roof over my head, food, utilities, healthcare, and medicine will always be my first choice. I will never waste my time going to a Baptist Affiliated Physician as long as I can get to Shand’s or Ascension.

As to the leaders of Fernidina Beach you have one, and only one choice. Recall the ones that mismanage the towns finances leading to the dismissal of the Town Manager and Town Attorney and select town Department heads. With the exception of two new member the other three members, all town hall employees, planning Director, Fire Chief, police chief and command officers should have to apply for their jobs and prepare a zero-based budget where every penny requested for salaries, benefits, position and rank, capital Improvements, vehicle purchase, fire station build, and new employee and every existing employee is rejustified in the budget approval process.

If a recall is successful, any replacement must be elected by the voters who provide a photo state issue ID for a ballot. One the new board is seated first action is to establish a citizens committee of business’s man, Sheriff’s Deputies, Volunteer Firemen and Fire women, restaurant workers, Animal Officers, store owners to interview and recommend staff for every department with the number one goal being someone that never utters the words; “That is not my Job!”

No department head should have the authority to expend more that $1500.00 without Board Approval and any purchase of $300.00 must be by open competitive bid over 5 days with bids open day five by three department heads present to prevent monkey business.

Then, only then can expenses be trusted.

Andy Ward - 05. Feb, 2021 -

Plenty on the left have tried to organize boycotts of a multitude of businesses because their lefty feelings got butthurt. Chick Fil A, Goya, Susan G Komen, Hobby Lobby and now Publix, to name just a few. These boycotts were intended to get the masses (ie, John Q Public) to stop doing business with said companies to force them to bend to the leftist mantra. Why is anyone offended that turnabout is fair play? Oh yeah, cuz that’s not how lefties define fairness. I have a right to know who I give my business too, just like those who boycotted the above businesses do. What goes around, comes around. I feel for these businesses in FB, because they KNOW that if the left can find anything they do that is in direct opposition to their liberal creed, they stand to be crucified by these loonies! You know, people standing outside with signs wearing vagina hats and harassing paying customers. Well, it damn sure won’t scare me away!?

Debbie Wasdin - 05. Feb, 2021 -

And I’m submitting a request for the restaurants as well, especially on the South end where I live. I’m interested in taking my conservative behavior to restaurants that choose to treat people equally instead of discriminating.

Discrimination is discrimination.

NEIL BORUM - 05. Feb, 2021 -

I would like to join those asking for the name of the restaurants that want to lose my business.

Hedley Lamar - 05. Feb, 2021 -

Hello Dave,

Just read this past week that the SEC was going to investigate the reddit mob concerning Gamestop trading. The best point made concerning this after i read this was?
“ The Wolf jumped over the fence and got beat up by the sheep.” “ The wolves called the police to arrest the sheep”.

Patty Wiedman - 05. Feb, 2021 -

Another good blog Dave…Thanks!
We can’t fix a problem if we do not know where it lies! If a business declines to do business with someone for whatever reason, they need to feel the pain of their poor decisions and discrimination. Please post the names for your readers! (or least give us enough information to know who they are!) This is wrong, and I don’t want to do business with them! Too many other good places on this island.

Coleman Langshaw - 05. Feb, 2021 -

Maybe we should boycott the boycotters, since its all in the name of free speech. Please send me the names of those boycotters, so if they own businesses, I in kind, can boycott them, so they can feel the same impact of their freedom of speech. Stupid is as does, but, funny thing, ALL of us are Americans, and ALL of us are Patriots, I am for sure, and I am a liberal. All this Horse Manure from the Right, is as usual, hypocritical. Remember all the indignant right-wing hoopla about someone choosing to boycott stores in town with Trump signs?…its just too damn funny watching people speak (and write) out of both sides of their mouths. Just a bunch of Cheese and Whiner Hypocrites, once again!

CoCoNUT haiRRy - 06. Feb, 2021 -

Sounds like you’re all for “unity” …. smh

Trudie Richards - 05. Feb, 2021 -

Dave, you are fast becoming an tired anachronism – recurgitating same old falsehoods. I know, an opinion can be based on lies and misinformation and still appear in print – that’s democracy, right?
To wit, and this according to Time magazine (hardly a bastion of left wing thought) “The vast majority of Black Lives Matter protests—more than 93%—have been peaceful, according to a new report published Thursday by a nonprofit that researches political violence and protests across the world.

The Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project (ACLED) analyzed more than 7,750 Black Lives Matter demonstrations in all 50 states and Washington D.C. that took place in the wake of George Floyd’s death between May 26 and August 22.”

Nomadi Costieri - 05. Feb, 2021 -

If the 93% was “mostly” peaceful as reported, shouldn’t most BLM activists and advocate/supporters focus some attention on the 7% who were responsible for property damage exceeding $2 billion? Obviously, the 7% is giving the organization an unbelievably bad reputation. But then again, if you are a Marxist in a post-capitalist society, the “the abolition of private property” is a goal, yes?

CoCoNUT haiRRy - 06. Feb, 2021 -

Please post ANY news media reports of BLM doing something to HELP peace prosper … I’ll wait.

DAVID LOTT - 05. Feb, 2021 -

Yes Dave, publish the names of those establishments that are banning ANY group no matter which end of the political spectrum. Of course I suspect many of them will deny their actions or indicate there was a “misunderstanding”.

Gary McKillips - 05. Feb, 2021 -

Add the 1978 Boston Red Sox to the mix of “dud” teams. Sox led Yanks by 14 games, but as Joe Garigiola told me, “watch those Yankees, they’re comin’ like a freight train.” Indeed they did. Coming from that 14 game deficit in late July, they caught the Sox and forced a one game playoff won by the Bombers. What a finish. Billy Martin resigned that year, Dick Howser took over for one game and Bob Lemon lit the fire that led to the comeback. New York swept K.C. in four in the playoffs and then beat the Dodgers 4-2 in the World Series. The Series, like the regular season, saw the Yankees come from behind. Down 2-0, they again won four straight.

Trudie Richards - 05. Feb, 2021 -

The last time there was a raise in the federal minimum wage was, I’m quite sure, 2011. That was 10 years ago. It’s past time these workers, the lowest paid of all, got a raise. Those of you who are wealthy enough to complain, make a contribution to your staff from your own paycheque.

Les Zeilnhofer - 05. Feb, 2021 -

Would like to know the names of those restaurants.

Nomadi Costieri - 05. Feb, 2021 -

Excellent observations on the impact of a $15.00 an hour wage on the service industry. In addition to being required to provide paid sick leave to part-time employees, San Francisco has had a $15.00 an hour minimum wage for several years. For most restaurants, the minimum wage requirement resulted in menu price increases or surcharges, ranging from 3% to 5% of the tab, or a combination of both. Surcharges are typically disclosed on restaurant menus and are not “tips”. The expense of dining-out, a local pleasure, will increase.

By the way, who owns these discriminating establishments? Do I now have to worry about my voter identity registration?

Peg Dickinson - 05. Feb, 2021 -

For once I agree with you, there is no such thing as living wage, if the minimum wage goes up so will the cost of living. It doesn’t take genius or math wizard to figure that out!

Sharon Kutz - 05. Feb, 2021 -

I am interested to know the names of those that are against America and those inalienable rights of all citizens. We can boycott!

Tom Yankus - 05. Feb, 2021 -

I saw every Tampa Bay home game loss in 1976. $5.00 end zone seats. Were you still with the Tampa Bay Tribune in the sports department? I had a sour taste in my mouth for the Bucs for many years as they were partially responsible for my school, the University of Tampa Spartans, dropping football in 1974. The Leon McQuay, Freddie Solomon, John Matsuzak etc. led Spartans were perennial powerhouses in Division 2 and several times #1 in the country long before a playoff system. Trivia…Tampa beat Kent State around 1973 in Orlando’s Tangerine (now Citrus) Bowl. Can you name Kent State’s Middle Linebacker and Defensive Safety on that team? Future Steelers All-Pro and Hall of famer Jack Lambert and current Alabama HC Nick Saban!
The Spartans won the game and dropped football a year later.

CHUCK HALL - 05. Feb, 2021 -

Share those restaurant names with us please.
Many of us would prefer to support those that support the Constitution’s rights.