Blunt Drops In.


Those in attendance at the Chamber of Commerce Eggs and Issues held yesterday morning heard not only from local candidates, but also brief remarks from Congressman Roy Blunt. Blunt altered his scheduled visits to county’s north to make the appearance.

School Board candidates Nate Stokes, Earnest Vaile, Tony Diggs, and Mike Wells took advantage of their allotted three minutes to outline their goals and reasons for running for the three seats up this year. Mike Woody could not make the meeting.

Fourth Ward Council member candidates Carey Murphy and incumbent Jim McPheeters both spoke to the capacity crowd in the McCune Brooks Cafeteria.

Incumbent Mayor Kenneth Johnson spoke of the progressive nature of Carthage and the construction of new infrastructure, housing and businesses that have occurred over the last four years.

Mayoral candidate Lujene Clark referred to what she called "an open attack upon our citizens." She said there is "a strong indication" that City employees have been intimidated to vote a certain way.

Nascar to the Max

The action at Bristol (TN) Motor Speedway was a typical NASCAR short track crash fest. The race featured 14 caution periods for a total of 101 laps of the 500 contested. There were no cars that left the track without some sort of body damage. Often times on the high-banked half-mile track, the only way for a driver to pass is to lightly tap the car in front of him causing the lead car to momentarily lose traction and be passed. Though this is a fairly common maneuver at Bristol, none of the drivers like it to happen to them. There were numerous confrontations in the pits following Sunday’s race in addition to the Busch Series race held on Saturday. Several fines were doled out to drivers involved in these altercations including Dale Earnhardt, Jr., Kevin Harvick and Robbie Gordon. The physical contact involved in a couple of the incidents did not exceed the action you can find in a typical hockey game.

When the dust had cleared, it was a member of NASCAR’s youth movement that stole the show. Kurt Busch, the 2001 Rookie-of-the-Year Runner Up, used late race pit strategy, good tire management, and the aforementioned "love tap" to move Jimmy Spencer out of the way in route to his first Winston Cup victory. The trend of strong finishes by relative newcomers to the series was contined at Bristol with 5 of the top 10 finishers racing only two full seasons or less at this level of competition.

The Winston Cup Series will be idle this weekend following a long tradition of taking off for Easter. Race fans will be able to get their fix this weekend by attending the World of Outlaws series race at Joplin’s Route 66 Speedway on the 29th. Missourian Danny Lasoski will be defending his Route 66 Crown from 2000. NASCAR Superstar Ken Schrader will be in attendance and will be racing in the Modified Feature. Over 70 drivers have reportedly entered to challenge Schrader, more for the opportunity to race a NASCAR regular than the $1000.00 prize.

The City Council approved the $10,000 contract with the Carthage Convention and Visitor’s Bureau Tuesday evening. The idea bein’ to have the organization up and goin’ by the time July 1 rolls around startin’ the new fiscal year for the City. At that time it is anticipated that a more specific contract will be offered for most of the $132,000 expected from the Lodgin’ Tax.

‘Course it will take the first year to see much results from the effort. By the spring of 2003 the expectations are that some traffic will be generated for the hotel/motel industry with a resultin’ in traffic for the tourism and retail folks here in Carthage.

That’s the plan. More overnight stays which generate more lodgin’ tax which will generate more overnight stays. Now to work the plan.

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 wrote to you guys a couple of months ago, but I guess my problem doesn’t rate, because you haven’t answered it yet. Here it is again.

My Oldsmobile stalls on my wife and me once or twice a month. It just stops running and we pull over to the side of the road and wait a minute, and it starts up again.

Our mechanic has put in a new computer, alternator, battery, fuel pump, fuel filter and water pump, and none of those things has stopped the trouble. Do you have any other suggestions for us? - Ray

TOM: Well, the only thing you haven’t changed is the air freshener, Ray. So I’d swap that out next.

RAY: Actually, you’ve already tried a lot of the stuff we would have tried. But if you’re still in an experimenting mood, the next things on my list would be a new ignition module and new coils. So I’d give those a try.

TOM: And sorry about not answering your question sooner (and this goes for everyone who writes to us), but we just can’t answer every piece of mail and e-mail we receive. We’re overwhelmed by the amount of correspondence we get. We get thousands of letters a week - OK, hundreds if you subtract the ones that come from the IRS. But even hundreds is a lot. So thanks for bearing with us!