Brian Lyman

Montgomery

Editor, @ALReflector. Podcaster, @BecomingLincoln. 2024 Pulitzer finalist. Politics, state government, science, history. blyman -at- alabamareflector -dot- com.

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Articles

The language Alabama leaders don't speak

1 week ago | alabamareflector.com | Brian Lyman

A few weeks ago I started learning Irish via an app. The lessons progress like any foreign language course. Start with food and water and how to get them. Gloine uisce, le do thoil. A glass of water, please. Step outside and describe the weather. Tá sé grianmhar. It’s sunny. Or Tá sé dorcha agus scamallach. It’s dark and cloudy. Then point out buildings. Cá bhfuil an ospidéal? Where is the hospital? And languages. Labhraím Béarla. I speak English. I don’t know what drew me to this.
In Alabama abortion fight, it’s conservatives against conservatism | BRIAN LYMAN

1 week ago | montgomeryadvertiser.com | Brian Lyman

There are two sorts of conservatism. There’s the kind espoused by the 18th-century British politician Edmund Burke. It emphasizes restraint; reverence for tradition and maintaining political and social order through mutual duty. Laws must prevent mob rule at the bottom and tyranny at the top. Change is acceptable but not revolution. One should work with the world as it is, inside a moral framework aware of human shortcomings.
The language Alabama leaders don’t speak

1 week ago | yahoo.com | Brian Lyman

A hallway at Vaughan Regional Medical Center in Selma, Alabama on Tuesday, Sep. 3, 2024. Congress is considering major cuts to Medicaid that could affect health care delivery around the state. (Will McLelland for Alabama Reflector)A few weeks ago I started learning Irish via an app. The lessons progress like any foreign language course. Start with food and water and how to get them. Gloine uisce, le do thoil. A glass of water, please. AdvertisementAdvertisementStep outside and describe the weather.
In Alabama abortion fight, it's conservatives against conservatism • Alabama Reflector

2 weeks ago | alabamareflector.com | Brian Lyman

There are two sorts of conservatism. There’s the kind espoused by the 18th-century British politician Edmund Burke. It emphasizes restraint; reverence for tradition and maintaining political and social order through mutual duty. Laws must prevent mob rule at the bottom and tyranny at the top. Change is acceptable but not revolution. One should work with the world as it is, inside a moral framework aware of human shortcomings.
In Alabama abortion fight, it’s conservatives against conservatism

2 weeks ago | yahoo.com | Brian Lyman

Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall prior to the State of the State address by Gov. Kay Ivey on Tuesday, March 7, 2023 in Montgomery, Ala. A federal judge last week ruled that Marshall did not have the power to prosecute Alabamians helping people obtain out-of-state abortions. (Stew Milne for Alabama Reflector)There are two sorts of conservatism. There’s the kind espoused by the 18th-century British politician Edmund Burke.
The age of deilocracy | BRIAN LYMAN

2 weeks ago | montgomeryadvertiser.com | Brian Lyman

By middle school, we’re all taught that the word “democracy” combines “demos,” the Greek word for people, with “kratos,” meaning rule. That doesn’t describe the government we live under. Alabamians say they want Medicaid expansion. They don’t seem keen on the state’s effective abortion ban. If you let Alabama voters decide whether the state should have a lottery, odds are that it would pass, and it wouldn’t be close. None of those initiatives will pass the Legislature anytime soon.
The age of deilocracy

3 weeks ago | alabamareflector.com | Brian Lyman

by Brian Lyman, Alabama Reflector March 31, 2025 By middle school, we’re all taught that the word “democracy” combines “demos,” the Greek word for people, with “kratos,” meaning rule. Rule of the people. That doesn’t describe the government we live under. Alabamians say they want Medicaid expansion. They don’t seem keen on the state’s effective abortion ban. If you let Alabama voters decide whether the state should have a lottery, odds are that it would pass, and it wouldn’t be close.
The age of deilocracy

3 weeks ago | yahoo.com | Brian Lyman

Then-Former President Donald Trump speaks at a fundraiser for the Alabama Republican Party on Friday, Aug. 4, 2023 in Montgomery, Alabama. Republicans in Alabama's congressional delegation have embraced or been silent on Trump's tariffs on cars and agricultural products, which could have major effects on the state economy. (Stew Milne for Alabama Reflector)By middle school, we’re all taught that the word “democracy” combines “demos,” the Greek word for people, with “kratos,” meaning rule.
The past that Alabama chooses to honor says a lot about us | BRIAN LYMAN

3 weeks ago | montgomeryadvertiser.com | Brian Lyman

When you come out from under the rusty monoliths inscribed with the names of lynching victims and the counties that bear the guilt of their deaths at Montgomery’s National Memorial for Peace and Justice, you come to another set of monoliths lying on the ground. They’re duplicates of what you’ve just seen. The Equal Justice Initiative, which runs the memorial, has offered them to each American county where a lynching took place.
The past that Alabama chooses to honor says a lot about us

1 month ago | alabamareflector.com | Brian Lyman

When you come out from under the rusty monoliths inscribed with the names of lynching victims and the counties that bear the guilt of their deaths at Montgomery’s National Memorial for Peace and Justice, you come to another set of monoliths lying on the ground. They’re duplicates of what you’ve just seen. The Equal Justice Initiative, which runs the memorial, has offered them to each American county where a lynching took place.