IT WAS A GOOD WEEK FOR …
BEER DRINKERS. The state Alcoholic Beverage Control Commission approved a permit for UALR to sell alcoholic beverages at the new Stephens Center basketball arena.
MISSISSIPPI. Once again, Arkansas is thankful for our neighbor across the big river. Without its hapless football teams, Arkansas wouldn’t have any wins in the SEC. Latest triumph: Hogs 44, Mississippi State 10.
BILL CLINTON. The former president celebrated his library’s first birthday — and 500,000 first-year visitors — with a Little Rock trip during which he said his wife’s potential presidential candidacy should spell continued high interest in the facility.
The UNIVERSITY OF ARKANSAS BOARD OF TRUSTEES. Though they are Huckabee appointees all, the trustees wisely decided not to offer an endorsement of the governor’s problematic highway bond proposal — an unlimited revolving credit deal that will go before voters Dec. 13 along with a college construction bond program. The trustees thought it better not to get the college bond program entangled in the highway bond controversy.
PULASKI COUNTY CRIMINALS. Another week passes without a solution to a money crisis that restricts space in the county jail. County Judge Buddy Villines says cities in the county haven’t offered enough money to fix things.
IT WAS A BAD WEEK FOR …
GOOD LAWYERING. It had to be pure politics. How else to explain how Attorney General Mike Beebe’s office could go before the state Supreme Court and ask the court to reverse its ruling that the state Constitution requires adequate funding of schools. Justices promptly remonstrated Beebe’s deputy for making the argument. (See Brummett this week on the subject.)
STATE HUMAN SERVICES. Amid reports that it is leaving key medical positions that serve children and others unfilled at the Health Department in the name of saving money, the Human Services Department did find time to file a pointless appeal of a circuit court ruling that the state cannot ban placement of children in foster homes where gay people live.