This can’t be good. The Associated Press (read the whole article at the Virginian Pilot’s Web site, pilotonline.com) is reporting that Virginia Senate Majority Leader Dick Saslaw, a powerful Democrat, is threatening to kill payday lending reform, unless an industry-approved compromise is reached. How will that protect those who are lured in and then bled dry by the industry?

Meanwhile, House GOP Caucus Chairman Terry Kilgore, who was championing a decent reform bill, has indicated the House will drop its five-loan-per-year limit. That’s not a positive development either. That was the provision of the House bill that had the most potential to actually help the lower-income “customers” who are most likely to fall into an inescapable cycle of debt.

Photo of payday lending protest in Abingdon by David Crigger.

Weber City’s Jim Ketron says he learned a lot about woodworking from his Grandfather, who used to like to piddle with wood. But, Jim’s turned into a whole lot more than just a piddler—or a whittler.

I was looking forward to making another entry in my blog today (Wednesday).  But we were so busy with the shootings in Bristol, Tennessee that I didn’t have time to write. 

SJR0127 is a proposed Tennessee Constitutional amendment, passed by the state senate and currently before a subcommittee of the House Public Health and Family Assistance Committee.