Tampa Bay Rants and Raves is a weekly airing of national and local politics, sports, lifestyles and nostalgia items from a very politically incorrect viewpoint. As always, beware - some of what is printed here should not be taken literally.

Leading off: Powering our future

You probably didn’t notice it, but one state to our north, the first nuclear power plant in three decades fired up and is providing power to half a million homes – including some in north Florida. The Georgia Power plant is one of two that will be fully on line by late this year or next spring. No other such plants are on the drawing board in the nation but supporters and critics alike will be watching closely to see if the Georgia plants might be a renaissance for nuclear and an alternative to unproven, pie in the sky alternatives like wind and solar (see Texas). Stay tuned.

Tampa Bay, politics and stuff:

The Department of Justice has appointed Delaware’s David Weiss as Special Counsel in the Hunter Biden case – a spectacularly poor choice. Weiss is the same person who attempted to create a sweetheart plea bargain for young Biden that was swatted down by a U.S. District Judge.

Florida’s troubled 9^th Judicial Circuit will have their third State Attorney in a little over three years. Governor DeSantis removed Monique Worrell after she failed to prosecute numerous cases including an individual arrested for several gun crimes who later murdered his pregnant girlfriend.

A recent headline in a far left newspaper read “An abortion ban made them teen parents.” Ah, if you attended biology class, that’s not exactly how it works.

Jack Butcher was the straight forward publisher of the bay area’s straight forward newspaper The Tampa Tribune. The veteran of nearly fifty years in the newspaper profession died last month at age 90.

Just as it’s heartening to see various groups make sure students have the proper gear to head back to school, it’s disheartening to see teachers shelling out for their classroom needs. Perhaps our teachers unions could spend a little less on lobbying and political contributions and a little more taking care of their members’ needs.

Just asking, would you go to Wawa solely for food? Neither would we.

From the, shall we say, special mind of the 5:05 Newsletter editor: I have to believe that behind every warning label there is an awesome back story.

Three icons died this week – on August 16 to be exact – Babe Ruth (1948), Elvis (1977), and Aretha Franklin (2018); also on that date in 1969 there was Woodstock and on that same day an otherwise very bright girl married your Humble Blogger – in Clearwater, not Woodstock.

Sports, media and other stuff:

Number of the Week: 54 – the astounding number of U.S. born players who played for other teams in the recent Women’s World Cup.

Michael Lorenzen basked in the glow of Philly fan cheers during his no-hitter last week. Give it time Michael, after one or two bad starts the jackals will turn on you.

If you follow the World Series and elections, you would appreciate the sweet irony of the Houston Astros visiting the White House last week.

Hard to believe the young kid who was once our next door neighbor during Spring Training is retiring, but former Phils’ ace Cole Hamels called it quits last week at age 39.

With NFL season just a few weeks away, people forget that the guy in Pittsburgh who is beginning his 17^th season (and has never had a losing year), Mike Tomlin, broke into pro coaching with our Bucs.

We’ll take the under on a 3-win season for USF football - more on USF below.

Remember when the Pac 12 was one of America’s premier conferences? It’s now down to four teams and counting.

…and another thing: You knew this was coming

We read, with great amusement, a few weeks ago an article about why our alma mater, the University of South Florida, is the dregs of college football. It is simply that they have not yet spent multiple millions of dollars on an on-campus stadium while being forced to play in a stadium that somehow is good enough for a two-time Super Bowl championship team. It was nothing to do with their knee-jerk firing of the best football coach they ever had with 11 winning seasons in his 13 years at the helm. In the following 13 seasons, USF has had five winning years plus the last three where they’ve won four games total. It has nothing to do with weak leadership in the athletic department or lousy recruiting. No, it all boils down to not having a multi-million dollar on-campus stadium they can’t afford. Whatinsanity.

UP NEXT: The Babe, what if? Cadillac; Puppeteers

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