Tag Archives: Kerry Dougherty

Beach School Board Votes on Parents’ Rights Tonight

Posted on August 22, 2023 by | 5 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Tonight’s the night, Virginia Beach. A chance to show the leftist school board members that parental rights matter in the Resort City.

There are several ways to do it: flood school board members with emails, sign up to speak at tonight’s board meeting (you have until noon) or just go to the meeting that starts at 6 and frown when the leftists start wringing their hands about the “rights” of troubled teens to keep their gender confusion secret from their parents.

Last month the Youngkin administration put the finishing touches on its new transgender model policies for schools. What they came up with is a rational, reasonable approach that allows students to change their gender in school WITH PARENT APPROVAL.

The way it should be handled. Continue reading →

5 Comments

Posted in Culture wars, Education (K-12)

Tagged

Leftist Media Canonizes Another Killer

Posted on August 21, 2023 by | 38 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Ronald Albert Barnes.

That was the name of the Southampton County Correctional Center guard who died in March of 1975 after being beaten and stomped by two inmates, including convicted rapist Tony Lewis.

If you read Sunday’s Virginian-Pilot, maybe you were moved by the front-page valentine to “Tony The Tiger,” as he was affectionately known by his family, who are trying to get him out of prison after 50 years behind bars.

The story – “A Pursuit Of Freedom Blocked At Every Step” – is what journalists used to call a “Sunday thumb sucker,” a long-form piece dedicated to a heartwarming topic.

Perhaps you, too, read yesterday’s drivel about how this poor guy from Hampton – grew up fatherless in the projects, blah, blah, blah – and has been incarcerated since he was 16. His first conviction was for a 1973 rape (absolutely zero details on THAT crime) and later for his part in the murder of the prison guard, an escape attempt and other crimes associated with a deadly prison riot.

Inches and inches of ink about a killer. Yet the newspaper couldn’t be bothered to print the name of the man he murdered.

Color me unsurprised.

Let’s be honest, giving the dead man an identity might turn Tony the Tiger into Tony the Ruthless Killer and dilute the sympathy The Pilot is trying to gin up for the inmate. Continue reading →

38 Comments

Posted in Crime, Corrections and Law Enforcement, Ethics, Media

Tagged

Raw Working-Class Anthem By Farmville’s Oliver Anthony Goes Viral

Posted on August 14, 2023 by | 62 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Move over, Jason Aldean, there’s a new country singer on the move.

Meet Oliver Anthony of Farmville, Va., a former factory worker whose plaintive, working-class anthem, “Rich Men North Of Richmond,” went viral in just two days, catapulting this unknown country Virginia singer from obscurity into a viral sensation. It went to #1 on the iTunes chart last week, moving faster than Aldean’s, “Try That In A Small Town.”

I’ve been sellin’ my soul, workin’ all day
Overtime hours for bullshit pay
So I can sit out here and waste my life away
Drag back home and drown my troubles away
It’s a damn shame what the world’s gotten to
For people like me and people like you
Wish I could just wake up and it not be true
But it is, oh, it is
Livin’ in the new world
With an old soul
These rich men north of Richmond, Lord knows they all
Just wanna have total control
Wanna know what you think, wanna know what you do
And they don’t think you know, but I know that you do
‘Cause your dollar ain’t shit and it’s taxed to no end
‘Cause of rich men north of Richmond

Continue reading →

62 Comments

Posted in Culture wars

Tagged

Details of Newport News School Shooting Make Horrific Case Even Worse

Posted on August 11, 2023 by | 70 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Just when we thought we knew all of the horrific details of the shooting of Abby Zwerner we get more revelations.

Chilling ones.

You remember Miss Zwerner. She’s the 25-year-old Newport News first-grade teacher who was almost killed by one of her students in January.

She’s suing school officials for $40 million and they refuse to settle the case with her. Instead, these heartless “educators” pretend that getting shot is just an occupational hazard of teaching – sort of like paper cuts – and she was injured in the course of her daily responsibilities.

If they can persuade a court of this lunacy they will be off the hook for monetary damages.

And the woman who’s endured surgeries and God-knows-what-trauma will collect a few dollars from Virginia’s workman’s compensation fund.

If you’re the praying type – and I am – be sure to bombard the Almighty with petitions for Ms. Zwerner. The courts need to use common sense and give her the green light to sue the ever-loving crap out of a school district that ignored multiple warning signs and tolerated a psychotic child in class with normal kids and a devoted teacher.

Make no mistake. The school board, former superintendent and Richneck administrators set the table for this bloody mess: Continue reading →

70 Comments

Posted in Education (K-12)

Tagged

Oceanfront Unisex Bathrooms? What Could Possibly Go Wrong?

Posted on August 9, 2023 by | 17 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Of all the cockamamie ideas cooked up at City Hall in Virginia Beach, this may win an award.

A fat, legal award. But that’ll come later.

Right now the city is bursting with pride over its new, $650,000 5-stall unisex restroom at 20th Street.

Because let’s be honest, there’s nothing women like more than using the potty with nothing to separate them from the men doing their smelly business in the next stall but a thin metal wall.

It’ll be a haven for perverts too, because clueless parents often send their unaccompanied kids into public restrooms. Pedophiles will love the convenience of peeking through cracks at naked children.

The long washing trough is a lovely touch. So is the attendant stationed on a metal folding chair outside.

Best of all, it’s only going to cost taxpayers half a million a year to maintain! Continue reading →

17 Comments

Posted in Culture wars, LGBQT

Tagged

Virginia Beach’s Bad Habit: Reckless Spending on Wasteful Projects

Posted on August 7, 2023 by | 2 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Feckless leadership, wasteful spending and escalating taxes have plagued Virginia Beach for decades.

Despite new faces on city council, the game of spending tax dollars on insane projects that “will pay for themselves” continues.

But let’s back up.

Here’s one prescient story from The Virginian-Pilot in 2007. The headline: “Virginia Beach Sportsplex Misses Its Goal” soft pedaled what was going on. It was yet another pricey project, dreamed up by developers and approved by their political puppets.

And it was failing. Continue reading →

2 Comments

Posted in Business and Economy, Economic development, Land use & Development, Leadership, Politics, Regulations and Government Oversight

Tagged

You’ve Been to Paris but You’ve Never Been to the Luray Caverns?

Posted on August 4, 2023 by | 41 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Today we’re taking a break from politics, woke culture and indictments. It’s Explore Beautiful Virginia time. A midsummer palate cleanser!

But first a question:

Why does every tourist destination sell fudge? More precisely, is there some sort of law that mandates every vacation spot feature a “fudgery”? Is there something about salt air or mountain breezes that creates a sudden craving for a calorie-dense chunk of flavored sugar?

I don’t have the answer, but yes, there is the requisite fudgery just outside the entrance to Luray Caverns. No, we didn’t go in during a family trip to Luray last weekend. The getaway to Virginia’s amazing natural wonder was sweet enough.

Let me just say this: if you’re a Virginian who’s been to Paris but you haven’t been to Luray, shame on you. Continue reading →

41 Comments

Posted in Virginia history

Tagged

No Boys in Girls Sports. Period.

Posted on July 28, 2023 by | 64 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Good news for mediocre male athletes in Virginia: tired of getting cut from the boys’ teams? Slap on some lipstick and play with the girls. The governing body of high school sports has your back!

Yep, the Virginia High School League this week gave the middle finger to Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s policy that biological sex should dictate which sports teams kids can join.

These wokesters just announced that they will continue to follow the policies of the Northam administration that allowed boys pretending to be girls to take coveted slots on the formerly all-female teams. Ralph Northam didn’t give a rat’s patootie about girls’ sports and neither do they. Continue reading →

64 Comments

Posted in Culture wars, Education (K-12)

Tagged

Heat Wave? Here In Southeastern Virginia We Call It July.

Posted on July 26, 2023 by | 47 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Stop the presses. It’s July 26th. And it’s hot. My trusty iPhone weather app says it will hit 91 today, 94 Thursday and 96 on Friday.

Who could have predicted such temperatures? Actually, all of us. It’s called JULY.

And yes, much of the country is in a record heat wave with far hotter weather. It’s not the first heat wave and it won’t be the last. But there is a new breed of “safetyist” afoot. Not the usual alarmists who feel it’s their duty to remind us every summer to wear light clothing, drink water — not tequila — and not to exercise at high noon, as if we are idiots.

This new bunch is raising the alarm on the dangers of temperatures — get this — above 90.
Continue reading →

47 Comments

Posted in Education (K-12), Environment, Public safety & health, Uncategorized

Tagged

I’m Never Voting On Election Day Again. Join Me!

Posted on July 12, 2023 by | 10 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

It’s strange to think that I will never again get up on Election Day and head to the polls. I’ll never again take my granddaughter with me to see me fill out my ballot and drop it into the ballot counter. I’ll never again grab two “I Voted” stickers — one for her and one for me.

I’m voting absentee from now on, something I swore I’d never do.

Let me explain. In January’s special election to fill the 7th District State Senate seat left vacant when Republican Jen Kiggans was elected to Congress, Democrat Aaron Rouse won by a razor-thin majority of 696 votes with 50.84 percent of the vote. The district is split between part of Norfolk and part of Virginia Beach. Republican Kevin Adams won the Election Day contest and even the early voting.

But what clinched the election for Rouse were absentee ballots in Virginia Beach, traditionally a Republican stronghold. Of the 5,884 absentee ballots returned, 4,283 were for Rouse.

Here, look at the results: Continue reading →

10 Comments

Posted in Elections, Electoral process

Tagged

Virginia: Look West To See What’s Coming

Posted on June 29, 2023 by | 108 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Reason #5,692 not to vote for ANY Democrats running for the General Assembly this fall:

We all know that Virginia’s leftists in Richmond yearn for our lovely commonwealth to be more like California. When last they controlled the state legislature these nuts directly tethered our energy policies to that “progressive” utopia.

It won’t stop there, so let’s see what else is on its way from the West Coast.

Looky here! It’s Assembly Bill 665, working its way through the legislature. When this passes — and it’s just wacky enough to win approval — it would essentially emancipate some 12-year-olds, allowing them to seek mental health care without their parents’ approval. Continue reading →

108 Comments

Posted in Children and Families, Culture wars, DEI, Elections, General Assembly, Uncategorized

Tagged

Public School Clubs: What Happened To Chess, Drama and Debate?

Posted on June 28, 2023 by | 17 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Never mind that public school test scores are plummeting and that kids from coast to coast are falling hopelessly behind. The Biden Administration is focused on one thing: “inclusion.”

On June 21 the Department of Education issued a “toolkit” called “Creating Inclusive and Nondiscriminatory School Environments For LGBTQI+ Students.”

Included in the toolkit is the Biden Administration’s recommendation that “teachers and administrators help students establish Gender and Sexuality Alliances” in their schools.

Those are clubs, based only on sexuality. If your local high or middle school doesn’t have one yet, it’s coming.

Count on it.

At the risk of sounding like a fossil, I need to ask: since when do schools urge kids to start clubs on sexuality? What’s next, the Future Dominatrixes of America club? A Furry Fan club? A Pup Play club?

Enough, already. Continue reading →

17 Comments

Posted in Culture wars, Education (K-12)

Tagged

Virginia Primary Elections: Dems Lurch Leftward, GOP Moves to the Middle

Posted on June 23, 2023 by | 17 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Virginia’s November elections for control of the General Assembly may be the most important in a generation.

Will Virginia become Berkeley east? Or will it return to being a sane, moderate commonwealth?

Great news! Tuesday’s primaries saw the GOP cut loose its clown candidates, while Democrats embraced theirs.

A look at this week’s primary results are an excellent sign for those on the right who support reasonable restrictions on abortion, school choice and parents rights.

Put simply, Democrats gave the boot to more moderate, bipartisan members of the state legislature to nominate wacky, far-left candidates. Republicans rejected the far right and nominated common-sense conservatives who were endorsed by Gov. Glenn Youngkin. In fact, every one of the 10 candidates endorsed by Youngkin won their races. Continue reading →

17 Comments

Posted in Elections

Tagged

Light Rail: Idiotic Idea In 2016. Idiotic Idea Now.

Posted on June 16, 2023 by | 4 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Virginia Beach voters THOUGHT they drove a stake through the heart of the absurd plan to bring light rail to the city after an overwhelming vote in 2016 against the nutty, developer-driven boondoggle.

But never underestimate cultists with an agenda. You know, developers who believe taxpayers have a duty to open their wallets to help THEM get rich. Or climate kooks who don’t understand a cost/benefit analysis.

No surprise, then, they’re back. Some shadowy online group is beginning to push a bad idea that was buried in a landslide 7 years ago.
Continue reading →

4 Comments

Posted in Economic development, Government Finance, Infrastructure, Money in politics, Uncategorized

Tagged

Virginia Beach School Board Holds Virtue-Signaling Vote at 2:15 a.m.

Posted on June 14, 2023 by | 26 comments

by Kerry Dougherty

Wanted: One more member with common sense for the Virginia Beach School Board. Unfortunately, that won’t happen until the next election in 2024.

In the meantime, the narrow woke majority that did its best to keep masks on kids, keep schools closed, dumbed down the city’s public schools and pandered to special interests, will continue to virtue signal and hold pointless, anti-parent votes under the cloak of darkness.

At 2:15 in the morning to be precise.

Perhaps you heard, the Beach school board held a marathon meeting Monday night that stretched into Tuesday morning. Not because the members were desperately trying to find ways to improve academics or test scores, but to grant LGBTQ+ students special protected status that isn’t extended to any other minority, including children with disabilities.

Oh, and there is another, more insidious reason the board passed this resolution: to extend a defiant middle finger to Gov. Glenn Youngkin whose Department of Education has prepared policies guaranteeing parental rights regarding trans students.

The Beach’s ill-conceived resolution passed by a vote of 6-5.

One more member, folks, and we can put an end to this late-night lunacy. Continue reading →

26 Comments

Posted in Education (K-12)

Tagged