Today's News

Graduation Day. For 815 young men and women, today is that day. They will march across a stage at one of four high school commencement ceremonies and become graduates of either Andrew Jackson, Buford, Indian Land or Lancaster high schools.

It’s usually a bittersweet occasion. Parents usually glow with pride, but often get weepy-eyed about how fast their little boy or girl has grown up. “Where did the time go? It seems like yesterday that you were starting first grade,” they say.

The notion that we can’t bring the 250 or so terrorists who need to stay locked up from Guantanamo to this country and lock them up here is pure nonsense.

The talking heads keep referring to these people as “super criminals” or “the most dangerous people alive.” This is good fiction, but that is all it is – fiction. Our regular state penitentiaries are full of people just as dangerous, if not more so, than they are.

Returning to the Columbia Metropolitan Airport from Washington D.C., the terminal was packed with adoring greeters – some active military, many veterans.

There were lots of families, at least one of which with four generations on hand. There were law enforcement personnel and troops of Boy Scouts. There were balloons, signs, banners, flags, and salutes. Some wept. An Army band played patriotic music.

It was a fitting end to a daylong trip all of us will remember for a lifetime.

My name is Betty Price. I moved back to the mill village last year. I was 15 when Mom and Dad bought property up U.S. 521.

Now I am 66 years old. Since police officers have made a showing, it is better already. One officer said they were going to build a substation. They need to put it in a house on the mill village.