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Senator's punch not the first one A certain reporter for one of the state's daily newspapers had a penchant to slip away from legislative activity at times for a round or two of golf and a few beers. He would then slip back into the pressroom after adjournment and rummage through the trash cans, reading other reporters' stories, to see if there was anything he had missed. One day a couple of his buddies concocted a story about two of the golfing reporter's senators getting into a fight on the floor of the Senate, wrote it up, and left a carbon copy in the trash. If you guessed that our golfing reporter rewrote the story and sent it to his newsroom, you would be correct. Fortunately for him, the culprits who planned the gag, told him in time for his paper to "kill" the story before it got in print. The fistfight (punch would be a better description) when Sen. Charles Bishop R-Arley slugged Sen. Lowell Barron, D-Fyffe on the Senate floor last week, a scene that propelled Alabama into the national spotlight, was not fiction. The video showing Bishop slugging Barron was the topwatched video on CNN.com's web site this past weekend. It has, by now, received perhaps 200,000 hits on You Tube. In the 1980's when Bishop was a Democrat in the Senate, he invited Sen. Larry Dixon RMontgomery to "join him in the little-boys' room" to determine the outcome of a disagreement. Dixon had the good sense to decline. This time Bishop didn't ask. It wasn't a blind punch because he was face-to-face with Barron, but it certainly could be described as a "sucker punch." Bishop claims Barron had called him a "son-of-ab- - " and that he was defending his mother's name. Sorry, Senator, that won't wash. All of you have probably been called worse by the taxpayers. The Birmingham News has suggested that Bishop undergo anger-management treatment. Perhaps a better solution would be for the Senate, instead of keeping a jar of candy on the floor, to keep a jar of Valium tablets in the cloakroom. +++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Gov. Riley's former chief of staff Toby Roth, who has been involved in political activities with Karl Rove, says Rove's alleged involvement in the Siegelman-Scrushy case is not accurate and says affidavits implicating him provided by two individuals are "tainted" because the two lost in a bidding for a state contract last year, Roth defends Rove by suggesting that the affidavits were "sour grapes" from two employees of a company that lost out on a state contract. Roth was involved with Rove in State Supreme Court Justice Harold See's campaign in 1996. The two who provided the affidavits, Jill Simpson, a Rainsville lawyer and Riley campaign worker, and Mark Bollinger, a former employee of the Attorney General's Office, have denied the lost bid had anything to with their claim. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ More continues to surface on the activities of former two-year college chancellor Roy Johnson. An Anniston architect who helped Johnson build his million-dollar-home in Opelika will earn millions on the lease-purchase of a Lawson State Community College dorm. Lawson State is located in Jefferson County. According to The Birmingham News Lawson State officials in 2005 approved, at the former chancellor's urging, a deal to rent a three-story dorm from a development company created by Julian Jenkins, founder of Jenkins Munroe Jenkins architectural firm. Jenkins' development company, Weldon-LSDP, agreed to build and finance the $4.6 million dorm. The college agreed to rent it for 15 years for a minimum annual payment of $534,300, and it would assume ownership from Jenkins after paying off the lease. Jenkins, an architect who has received millions in two-year college contracts, last year said he helped Johnson build his Opelika home in 2005. Jenkins said he agreed to waive nearly $35,000 in fees until Johnson sold the house. The dorm deal requires Lawson to pay Jenkins' company about $8 million over 15 years.
Columnist Bob Ingram is resting at home after a hospital stay. Bob Martin, editor and publisher of The Montgomery Independent is filling in for him.
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