Welcome to Thinking Out Loud, a blog that contains postings from The Tampa Tribune’s Editorial Board and from various Tribune Community Columnists. Unlike the unsigned editorials that represent the newspaper’s institutional voice, the blog postings offer personal perspectives on the issues, personalities and events of Tampa Bay.
We invite you to participate by posting your comments. We’ll do our best to respond.
Contributors:
Joe Guidry
Joe Guidry is the deputy editorial page editor of The Tampa Tribune. He is a Tampa native and a graduate of the University of South Florida. He is married and has an adult son.
Jeff Stidham
Jeff Stidham grew up and lives in Bartow. He has been with the Tribune for nearly 22 years, the last 10 on the editorial board.
William Yelverton
William Yelverton is a Tribune editorial writer who has worked for the paper nearly 22 years. He lives in the Dade City area.
Jim Beamguard
Jim Beamguard is a Tribune editorial writer. He is a native of North Carolina and a graduate of Davidson College. He and his family live in Brandon.
Jackie Papandrew:
Jackie Papandrew is a freelance writer and editor. Her syndicated humor column appears in publications in the United States, Canada and India. She lives in Largo with her husband and children. Visit her website at www.jackiepapandrew.com.
Camille Beredjick
Camille Beredjick is a senior at Chamberlain High School, an avid musician and a scribbler with a quirky sense of humor. In the fall, she will be attending Northwestern University to study journalism, political science and music, and she plans to pursue a career in journalism.
Jim Harnish
Jim Harnish is in his 17th year as Senior Pastor at Hyde Park United Methodist Church in Tampa. He and his wife, Marsha, have two daughters and two grandchildren. He is a graduate of Asbury Theological Seminary and received the honorary Doctor of Divinity degree from Bethune-Cookman University. He is the author of six books and numerous articles and studies. He enjoys playing with his grandchildren and cheering for the Florida Gators.
Angela Hunt
Angela Hunt is a novelist living in Pinellas County with her husband and two 220-pound mastiffs.
Sheryl Young
Sheryl Young was a Tampa Tribune Community Columnist in 2005-2006. A freelance writer since 1997, including the Tampa Bay Business Journal, Tampa Style Magazines, St. Pete Times and nationally in Better Nutrition, Today’s Christian Woman and more. She’s received a First Place Amy Foundation national "Roaring Lambs" Writing Award, and has lived in Tampa Bay with her family for over 20 years.
Christie Gold
Christie Gold teaches English and journalism at Freedom High School in Tampa where she advises Revolution, the school newspaper. She has been both the Hillsborough County Teacher of the Year and Florida Journalism Teacher of the Year. She lives on a small farm in Wesley Chapel where she trains as a competitive equestrian.
Natalie D. Preston
Natalie D. Preston is a karaoke singing, only-child pouting, Seminole Tomahawk waving, newlywed bride blushing, 50-state traveling, girlie girl who loves to shop, read, run and jump up and down on her soapbox.
Fernando Figueroa
Fernando Figueroa is a researcher, educator and lives in Riverview.
Gary Beemer
Interests include humor, politics, economics, community and world affairs, finance, people, religion, music, sports, current events, the arts and education.
Nicole Yunger Halpern
Nicole Yunger Halpern is an undergraduate at Dartmouth College, where she studies everything she can get her nerdy little hands on. Desired major: life. No, not necessarily biology. Life.
Kris DiGiovanni
Kris DiGiovanni is a Tribune Community Columnist, Huffington Post contributor, Daily Kos diarist, and teacher, who recently moved from NW Hillsborough to another planet - a small beach community in Pinellas County. She also blogs at www.sandscript.wordpress.com
H. David Braswell Jr.
H. David Braswell Jr. is an Information Systems Professional. He is a native New Yorker and a lifelong NY Giants fan. He attended college in California (Cal State Northridge) and moved to Tampa in 1998.
Sean Marcus
Sean Marcus teaches creative writing, journalism and reading at Chamberlain High School. He has one son and is
expecting a daughter in early March. He can be reached at wuizabug@gmail.com
So there are a few things I’d love to see left behind as we march into 2010.
First, wouldn’t it be wonderful in this new year to be free of all the goofy governors? No more sex scandals or monetary misdeeds. No cornucopia of corruption around every corner. Could we just have a temporary cessation of book deals or rambling, press-conference confessions or backroom bribery? How about no more quitting when the going got tough or refusing to leave office when the gig was obviously up? What if we didn’t laugh (or cry) when someone referred to “Blago”? What if “hiking the Appalachian Trail” actually still meant putting your feet on that beautiful place to hike? Wouldn’t that be lovely?
And I could sure go a year without all the endless stories of disgraced celebrities. Actually, I could go the rest of my life without hearing about another sex tape “accidentally” released. And imagine if for a whole year, not a single celebrity got into a drunken brawl or was stopped for DUI or beat up his girlfriend or slept with his subordinates.
What if President Obama and Taylor Swift and anybody else who wanted to got to give an uninterrupted speech? What if celebrity child molesters got locked up like any other child molester, and everybody said “good riddance,” and nobody pointed out that the celebrity child molester had made a couple of good movies?
And what if a golf club and a banged-up SUV in Florida were just a golf club and a banged-up SUV in Florida? What if we could go all year long without hearing about nightclub hostesses and surreptitious (and lame) text messages? What if Britney and Lindsay and Ashton and Demi kept right on tweeting, but no one reported it? What a glorious year that would be.
And while we’re dreaming about this marvelous time free of celebridiocy, imagine, if you can, a year without any reality TV stars or reality show wannabes. What if we didn’t have to hear a word about Jon and Kate or their unfortunate eight? Or what if we could have 365 days devoid of that new mutant breed of Balloon Boy celebrities who arise out of thin air, talentless, borne aloft to capture our attention like a silver balloon racing through the skies with absolutely nothing in it? And what if we never had heard the name “Levi Johnston” and could sail into the new year without knowing that he has apparently bared far more than his soul for our collective enjoyment? Or what if, in this new year, our consciousness would not be penetrated even once by celebrity seekers the way White House security was penetrated by those crazy party crashers obviously willing to get on the wrong side of the Secret Service in their quest for their own reality show? Now that would be nice.
A little less knowledge is the change I’m hoping for in the new year. Sometimes, ignorance really is bliss.
