Liqour Gets Up To A Year.



The City Council Public Safety Committee voted to recommend a Council bill that would forbid the Council from denying a liquor license to any location that has been so licensed in the past twelve months.

The bill is specifically intended to allow the owner of a business adequate time to sell the business and guarantee a liquor license can be obtained if the state approves it. This clarification comes after the Council increased the distance a business locate in relation to a "church, school, or regular place of worship." Some established businesses may now be closer to such organizations than the 300 feet required.

The bill would in particular protect an established business that changed owners and a church had established itself within the 300 foot distance. The new owner, if the business was purchased within the allowable year, would not have to meet the 300 foot requirement.

If a twelve month period passed without a legitimate license being issued, any new business would have to adhere to the applicable ordinances.

Letters to the Editor
Opinions expressed reflect those of the writer
and not necessarily those of the Mornin' Mail.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the 2001 Maple Leaf Queen contestants. What a wonderful job you did! Everyone of you should be proud of your self, you represented your community with great poise and beauty.

The commuinty of Carthage should be very proud of these fine young ladies we have and I hope in the future they will come out and support them at the pageant. Also a big thanks to Pam Irwin for coordinating the event.

Sylvia Crowton

NASCAR to the Max

This week the NASCAR tour heads to the series’ longest and fastest track the 2.66-mile high-banked Talladega Super-speedway. Bill Elliott set the speed record for stock cars at almost 213 miles per hour at Talladega. That was before NASCAR mandated restrictor plates, which restrict airflow to the carburetor thereby slowing the car, as well as several aerodynamic modifications that create drag and further slow the cars.

For the safety of the drivers and fans, NASCAR attempts to keep top speeds below 190 mph. These modifications lead to a tightly packed group of cars often running three, four, and sometimes five abreast. The winner at Talladega is usually the driver who can best position his car with two laps remaining to make a charge to the lead.

Last year the late Dale Earnhardt won the race after being in 18th place with five laps remaining.

Multi-car teams typically have an advantage at Talladega. Dale Jarrett, Ricky Rudd, Kevin Harvick, Jeff Gordon, and Dale Earnhardt, Jr. will be among the field of 43 who will consistently be mentioned among the leaders.

Contrasted against Talladega was last weekend’s race from NASCAR’s shortest track, the .526 mile oval in Martinsville, VA. Ricky Craven took home his first career win in a race postponed from Sunday to Monday because of rain.

The race included 13 caution periods for 81 of the 500 laps. Rookie Kevin Harvick was required to serve a one-lap penalty after retaliating against Bobby Hamilton for what Harvick deemed an intentional bump. Harvick has been criticized of late for over-aggressive driving techniques and NASCAR has let the rookie know that they are watching his tactics with a critical eye. Future indiscretions on his part could lead to fines or loss of championship points. Jeff Gordon, who finished 9th, extended his points lead over Ricky Rudd who suffered a 39th place finish as a result of a blown engine. Gordon now leads Rudd by 334 points in the season points championship. Gordon need only finish 11th or better in the remaining 6 races to win the title.

The local editorial in the Tuesday evenin’ paper made some good points, but the theme of courage missed the mark.

I have never questioned the courage of our City Council, but to say that steps to revive Memorial Hall result from "courageous action" seems to diminish the term to mundane slang.

Those memorialized by the Hall faced life and death decisions and many took "courageous action" in light of those decisions.

I don’t believe this particular decision to spend $1.2 million to partially renovate a building is a life or death situation. (By the way, the Council still has ta vote on it.)

But, movin’ money from the bridge maintenance fund to help pay for the renovations when we have a bridge out by the depot tryin’ ta fall in, now that took guts.

This is some fact, but mostly,

Just Jake Talkin’.

by

Metcalf Auto Supply

Click & Clack
TALK CARS

by Tom & Ray Magliozzi

Dear Tom and Ray:

I’m an aerodynamics engineer. When I was in the U.S. Air Force a few years back, I worked with folks from the Lockheed low-speed wind tunnel. In the 1970’s, aircraft production went into a slump, and Lockheed started looking for other customers for its wind-tunnel services. Prime candidates were the auto makers, and Lockheed was successful in convincing Ford, among others, that the wind tunnel would help them reduce drag and wind noise on their vehicles. Needless to say, in the past 15-20 years, Lockheed has learned a lot about car and truck aerodynamics.

Anyway, they actually performed tests on pickups with the tailgate both up and down, and found that drag was actually LOWER with the tailgate CLOSED! This ran counter to their intuition. The reason is that a closed tailgate sets up a large "bubble" of stagnant air that slowly circulates around the bed of the truck (we aero types call this a "separate bubble"). When air approaches the truck, it "sees" the bubble as part of the truck. So to the air, the truck looks like a nice, flat covering over the bed, and the air doesn’t "slam" into the vertical tailgate.

So, believe it or not, it’s best for gas mileage to keep the tailgate CLOSED. Hope this information is helpful.

TOM: Sounds pretty convincing. We also heard from none other than Bob Stempel, the former GM president, who wrote us to say that aerodynamically it doesn’t make that much difference. But, he says, a pickup truck is structurally much SAFER with the tailgate up.

RAY: So for that reason alone, we suggest you throw away those tailgate nets, folks, and return your tailgate to the upright and locked position.