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Jan 22, 2025 | 
pmg-va.com | Dan Edwards
FBI Director Christopher Wray is resigning three years early from a ten-year term when Donald Trump assumes office on January 20th. The decade long term for an FBI Director was set by congress after Watergate and the death of J. Edgar Hoover who served as FBI Director for 48 years. The 10-year term, by design, does not match any election cycle reaffirming the agency’s independence from politic pressure.
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Jan 15, 2025 | 
pmg-va.com | Dan Edwards
The ongoing tug-of-war over US Steel Corporation is an interesting case study of the tradeoffs of free market competitiveness, tariffs, corporate governance, and protectionism. In 1901, financier JP Morgan formed US Steel as a merger of America’s steel manufacturers. The deal made Andrew Carnegie the world’s richest man and US Steel the most valuable company in the world. In 1942, during WWII, it employed 340 thousand workers. In 1953, it produced 36 million tons of steel.
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Dec 11, 2024 | 
pmg-va.com | Dan Edwards
In June, the FDA removed over-the-counter livestock antibiotics from the shelves of farm stores and on-line suppliers. Since then, the purchase of such medicine requires a relationship and prescription from your veterinarian. On our farm, we’ve only needed an antibiotic when a cow or calf contracted pink eye. There are few things more miserable than a blind cow on a system of rotational grazing. A single injection has always cleared up the problem before it spread to others in the herd.
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Dec 4, 2024 | 
pmg-va.com | Dan Edwards
An idea has been kicking around Russia since 2020 that the United States will be breaking apart. In an interview with world news agencies, just before a 2021 meeting with Biden, Vladimir Putin explained the belief saying “As a former citizen of the former Soviet Union, I will tell you what the problem of empires is.
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Nov 27, 2024 | 
pmg-va.com | Dan Edwards
Billionaires donating millions of dollars to politicians running for office in an election year is a risky proposition. If your politico wins, you are golden. You have their ear and influence. If your politician loses, well, you do too. No ear, no inside, no personal influence.
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Nov 20, 2024 | 
pmg-va.com | Dan Edwards
In the days since the election, I have little patience for the post-game finger pointing of how the Dems lost the elections. Until we have the perspective of time, most pundits are grasping at thin air. In 2020, Biden received 81 million votes and Trump had 74 million. In this election, at time of writing, Trump received 75 million and Kamala had 72 million. So, part of the explanation is easy, 7 million voters who voted for Biden in 2020 didn’t bother to show up and vote, period. Why? I have no clue.
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Nov 13, 2024 | 
pmg-va.com | Dan Edwards
Submitted by Dan EdwardsCongratulations voters, the election is behind us. A hearty thankyou to our local election workers for enabling and protecting a fundamental pillar of our democracy. Trump won, fairly, just like Biden did in 2020. I do think we need to figure out how to shorten the election season. Kamala, after Biden stepped aside, put together a competitive campaign in four months.
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Nov 6, 2024 | 
pmg-va.com | Dan Edwards
When this opinion comes out in the Bedford Bulletin, we may know who our next president will be, but I doubt it. Given the dead heat and the fact that Wisconsin and Pennsylvania can’t start counting the mail-in ballots until election day, it may take a while. While we wait, we finish the very last Amendment this week in the Constitution Revisited series. Our 27th Amendment was first proposed in 1789 along with eleven other constitutional amendments. Ten of those became our Bill of Rights.
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Oct 23, 2024 | 
pmg-va.com | Dan Edwards
The world of science along with research and development can be incredibly competitive. I am sure this doesn’t surprise anyone. It should be. It needs to be. Funding for programs can depend not only on the merit of a proposed idea but also on the reputation and track record of the scientist or engineer proposing. Egos can be immense.
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Oct 9, 2024 | 
pmg-va.com | Dan Edwards
A frequent comment I hear from my long-time republican friends is that they don’t recognize the party today that goes by that name. I expected Trumpism to have died out by now since he lost every election since 2018. While Republicans controlled both the House and Senate when Trump became President, he lost the House in 2018 and both Houses in 2020. The promised “Red Wave” in 2022 barely made it to the shore giving Repubs the slimmest majority in the House these last two years.
