Former Secretary of State to speak at UA
NBC13 (Birmingham) – Oct. 31
Alabama native and former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is set to speak and sign books at the University of Alabama, also on Thursday…Set to speak in the Ferguson Center Theater, in the morning, then sign copies of her book in the lobby of Foster Auditorium that afternoon.
University of Alabama students gather in spooky settings
Birmingham News – Oct. 30
The homework for professor Ian Brown’s class at the University of Alabama might just give some students the creeps. Brown teaches a class on the study of gravestones and cemeteries, leading students out into the cemeteries of Tuscaloosa County in search of fodder for their research projects. It sounds like a Halloween gimmick, but Brown, an archaeologist, says examining the ways people bury their dead can reveal a lot about culture and how it changes. “There’s a lot of information that’s contained within the stones,” he said. “These are artifacts and they’re full of information.”…Brown, who is also president of the international Association for Gravestone Studies, teaches the class about every other year. He’s also directing his own long-term study, called “The Marking Graves Project,” which is tracking all of the estimated 250 cemeteries in Tuscaloosa County…
UA biologist studies how snakes digest their food
WAPT (Jackson, Miss.) – Oct. 31
Stephen Secor is a professor and team leader at the University of Alabama. He wants to understand how snakes can stomach their prey…
Banquet organizers seek to raise awareness of hunger
Tuscaloosa News – Oct. 31
…On Monday, the University of Alabama’s Community Service Center and Bama Dining will host a hunger banquet to help raise awareness about worldwide food security and inequality…“We’re trying to open the community’s eyes to huge hunger issues both across the world and in West Alabama,” said Stephanie Irwin, assistant director of UA Community Service Center Public Relations. “Most of the university’s students are from middle-class families and don’t realize that there are serious hunger issues worldwide.”…“We’re hoping that because we’re doing this in the middle of ‘Beat Auburn, Beat Hunger,’ that we’ll be able to increase donations to the West Alabama Food Bank, and less people will have to live with hunger in these tough times,” Irwin said, referring to the annual food drive competition between UA students and Auburn University students…
Observers: Both positive, negative ads against Byrne were successful
Montgomery Advertiser – Oct. 31
Bill Stewart, a longtime political observer in the state and a former professor at the University of Alabama, said the ads attacking Bradley Byrne in the Republican primary were very damaging to the man many considered to be the front-runner in his party…The Alabama Education Association spent more than $1 million attacking Byrne during the primary and runoff. “I think the AEA campaign did more than any one thing to produce Dr. Robert Bentley as the Republican nominee,” Stewart said…
Gambling interests bet $5.6 million on 2010 elections in Alabama, reports show
Birmingham News – Oct. 31
…but most of the gambling-related money has been sent from PAC to PAC, often combined with non-gambling money to obscure the source of contributions to executive, legislative and judicial branch campaigns. “It helps camouflage the ultimate source of the funds, and makes it harder to trace,” said William Stewart, an expert on Alabama politics and professor emeritus of political science at the University of Alabama. Contributing money through dozens of PACs also “dilutes the impression that you’re buying a candidate’s loyalties,” Stewart said. “If the money comes from a lot of different sources … it does not seem like they’re trying to buy an election.” …Most of the new money from gambling interests since the primary has been contributed by the Poarch Band of Creek Indians, disclosures show. “They have a near-monopoly now,” Stewart said. “They like things the way they are. They don’t want efforts made to interfere with their operations.”…Stewart said the amount of gambling money spent for candidates and political campaigns during this election does not surprise him. “It shows how much money they are making and are willing to share with those that are friendly to their cause,” he said.
Deputies to enforce handgun ban in Baldwin buildings
Mobile Press-Register – Oct. 31
…University of Alabama constitutional law professor Paul Horwitz said federal courts have answered part of the question, but a Second Amendment challenge could be possible. Horwitz said that in a gun-control ruling last year “the court made clear that this right also applies against state and local governments.” But, he said the same ruling “strongly suggests that laws restricting the presence of firearms in or around official buildings are constitutional, and virtually every lower federal court to deal with such issues has upheld such laws.”…