RADIOFREEBEAUFORT

Proudly unsullied by corporate sponsors, social media, AI, or the CIA since January 2025

  • Tariffs are all the rage these days so I thought we could start putting some price tracking info up here to test the current administration’s occasional theory that other countries / foreign companies pay tariffs, and that U.S. consumers don’t. I say “occasional” because the rationale for tariffs and the explanations of their mechanics vary from day to day.

    In December, RFB staff decided to buy a dual-fuel generator because of frequent power outages here at headquarters, and because it was already evident that FEMA was in the DOGE crosshairs. Given that Beaufort, SC, is subject to tropical storms and hurricanes, it made sense to start prepping for more outages, and more prolonged outages. After all, future storm recovery efforts are bound to be hampered by the reduction/elimination of FEMA’s infrastructure. Anyone who was in Beaufort for Hurricane Matthew should remember the FEMA-managed recovery assistance in South Carolina, and should also acknowledge that it would be difficult for the state and county to manage that type of effort alone.

    Finally, considering the incoming administration’s oft-stated desire to implement tariffs, it made sense to buy before those were put in place.

    The generator, made in China and sold in the U.S. by WEN, cost $500 straight from WEN in December 2024.

    A few weeks ago, after the first round of new tariffs on products from China, that price jumped to $534.

    Today, that price is $613.

    I’m pretty sure there’s a name for the steady rise of prices over time, but I can’t quite put a finger on it… Expensivation? Costation? All I know is, it was a really bad thing between 2020 and 2024 and now nobody knows what it is.

    And if you’re wondering, I can’t find a similar product that’s manufactured in the U.S. There are U.S.-built generators, but they’re larger and not (in my mind) affordable for a home consumer.

    So I guess the options for anyone generator-shopping now are to a) pay the tariff-inflated price to WEN; b) wait for a U.S. company to build or re-tool a factory, staff it, and start churning out generators; or c) not buy a generator.

    And any time you hear someone in the administration raving about tariff revenue, well, thank your generator-buying neighbors, I guess.

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  • If you can step outside of the current moment, in a way, and consider it from a high-level view, we’re at a morbidly fascinating point in time. We have a person with few tangible business successes, beyond being born wealthy and using that position to build an empire of charismatic grifting, who is now single-handedly setting the country’s trade policy. He evidently made decisions based on gut feelings and then concocted a nonsensical methodology out of thin air (or via AI) to explain those gut feelings. Even the economists cited in his methodology don’t understand why they were included, as their work doesn’t support what transpired last week.

    In a sense, some would say we’ve reached the economic version of injecting bleach or sucking down horse deworming medication to fight off novel viruses.

    At the same time, this person’s support base / political party appears to be shifting from near-constant complaining about inflation and high prices to either ignoring that entire line of thought (look over there! a trans person!), or claiming that dealing with high prices and inflation is okay now, even honorable, because it’s part of a noble effort that will restore mythical glories of the past.

    We’ll all be just fine if we trust the man who found ways to bankrupt casinos (while making millions in salary for himself).

    If you tilt your head just right, the casino debacle mirrors what we’re watching right now: illogical, broad tariffs that hurt everyday investors and consumers followed by a push for a tax plan with trillions of dollars in tax cuts for the wealthy. Bad business decisions, but the people at the top make out like bandits.

    It reminds me of how the bleach/deworming advice has been long forgotten, or is seen as harmless buffoonery, but public health officials are now Public Enemy #1 for daring to recommend evidence-based policies. People in power, and their supporters, are attacking educational institutions and the co-equal branches of government and firing/threatening funding for anyone who stands up to say, “Wait a minute…maybe these decisions don’t make actual sense.”

    Loyalty to an autocrat over country, “feelings” over facts, in a country that purportedly despises kings. Money always flowing toward the wealthy; the rest of us waiting for that magical, ever-elusive trickle-down effect.

    Again, from that higher-level view, you have to wonder how we got here, and how this will play out.

    Regarding how we got here, I’m sure someone smarter than me could give a long list of reasons. The one that keeps popping up in my mind is the rise of TV news as both entertainment and propaganda, and how common it is to see TVs tuned to “news” channels in the background of so many public spaces – airport terminals, waiting rooms, dentists offices, barbershops, etc.

    And then I think of Roger Ailes’ influence over the years, dating back to his Nixon-era memo titled “A Plan for Putting the GOP on TV News.” **

    “People,” Ailes wrote, “are lazy. With television you just sit — watch — listen. The thinking is done for you.”

    Aile’s plan, as laid out in the memo, was to provide “pro-Administration, videotape, hard news actualities to the major cities of the United States.”

    The overall Ailes plan, then, was underpinned by a clear formula: People are lazy + The thinking is done for them (by television) + Pro-Administration messaging is sent out as television “news” = the people are thinking what the administration wants them to think because people are too lazy to think for themselves.

    There’s an interesting implication to be unwound from all of that: if people think for themselves, they won’t think what the administration wants them to think.

    When Rupert Murdoch launched Fox News in 1996, he made Roger Ailes the CEO. Under Ailes’ leadership, Fox News became one of the most watched news channel in the country (now at the top of the list).

    How will this play out?

    How do you put more informative content out there in an easily digested form? TikTok dances?

    I don’t see a way to re-work how so many of us are programmed, which leaves me thinking that it will take a giant shock, bigger than what we’ve experienced in the past three months, to get people out of their recliners. Carefully researched and well-presented news programming simply won’t garner the same attention as an Ailes-inspired DramaRama.

    In the meantime, I still think it’s important to write all of this down. To take notes. To provide any sort of counter to the fire hose of misinformation. And, because we’re at Baghdad Bob levels of communication from the administration and it’s pro-administration channels, it’s important to turn off the TV.

    ** I’m hosting the PDF, originally sourced from the Richard Nixon Presidential Library, on RFB because I wonder how long it will be before people start attempting to scrub it from history, or bury it behind paywalls. You can also find the entire Ailes files at https://ia800805.us.archive.org/12/items/59037838TheAilesFilesComplete/59037838-The-Ailes-Files-Complete_text.pdf, or you can contact RFB for a copy (it’s too big for our hosting package).

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  • I posted in March about the “anti-DEI” legislation in the South Carolina legislature, and how organizations have already started renaming things to maintain compliance. This week, the South Carolina House of Representatives finally made enough last-second modifications and passed their “anti-DEI” bill. (I feel like I have to highlight “anti-DEI” in quotes because it’s so ludicrous to even be discussing this.)

    There’s not a lot new to say about these types of bills. To the fair and balanced mind(s) here at RFB, they reek of opportunistic political pandering, much like the paranoia-fueled CRT scare a few years ago. I do have to point out, as many have lately, the irony of this kind of hysterical squawking about meritocracy when former TV show hosts are bumbling around the Department of Defense, group-chatting like middle schoolers, or misinformation-spreading offspring of political dynasties are in charge of public health.

    Back on topic: Beaufort’s representative, Shannon Erickson, did have one interesting thing to say, calling the passage of her prized “anti-DEI” bill: “a critical step toward protecting students and educators from political agendas that have no place in our classrooms.” That’s welcome news, because back in December the South Carolina Department of Education partnered with PragerU, a conservative media organization known for producing “educational” videos chock full of political agendas and inaccuracies.

    We here at RFB look forward to Erickson working with SC Superintendent of Education Ellen Weaver to ensure the PragerU materials “have no place in our classrooms.” Unless, of course, this is all about making room for their own political agendas.

    Also two weeks ago: RFB predicted that Dr. Edward Simmer, nominated by SC Gov. McMaster to lead the newly created South Carolina Department of Public Health, would drop out due to the threats he’s received, and the fairly ignorant line of questioning posed to him at a recent confirmation hearing. The good news: he didn’t drop out. The bad news: the committee continues to wallow around in COVID-era conspiracies and won’t advance his nomination. While there’s a slim chance that the full SC Senate could vote to confirm Simmer, that appears unlikely.

    New prediction: I’ll take my quip about McMaster from 2 weeks ago and re-state it as what is most likely to occur. South Carolina’s deep thinkers in the Senate will pick “someone peddling essential oils, horse dewormer, and measles parties on TikTok” to lead the Department of Public Health.

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  • Two weeks ago I mentioned that I’d be tracking other “Radio Free” concepts out there in the ether, and what better day than today to add an entry – this morning I read that Radio Free Europe lives to fight propaganda for…at least the rest of the fiscal year. It’s somewhat heartening to see checks and balances at work (i.e., the executive branch should not be able to randomly cut off funds already approved by Congress).

    Today’s “Radio Free” concept might be one of the older ones around. I found it when I was testing out searches to see how people might find RADIOFREEBEAUFORT, a blog being broadcast from Beaufort, South Carolina, and not at all stuffed with SEO-gaming keywords like travel blog, travel tips, Lowcountry history, favorite South Carolina beaches, most conservative church in Beaufort, historic Beaufort, or anything like that.

    I can’t remember the exact search, but I ended up at Radio Free Satan, an online radio network founded way back in 2000 (and a perfect foil for RadioFreeFlorence, a Christian pop-themed online station I mentioned two weeks ago). Radio Free Satan serves up everything from music to comedy to commentary, and it’s really interesting stuff (not saying that ironically…I spent some time listening and enjoyed it). So, hats off to the RFS team for doing this for 25 years now – until proven otherwise, they are the site to beat in the “Radio Free” originality contest.

    I realize bringing Satan into the conversation can make people uncomfortable, especially here in the South where churches hold so much sway. Therefore, I’m going to continue down this path into the darkness for a moment as I describe how I joined a mass of people yelling “Hail Satan” in downtown Charleston.

    Back in July 2022 I went to the Holy City to see one of my favorite bands, The Mountain Goats, and toward the end of the show they played “The Best Ever Death Metal Band in Denton,” which is a crowd favorite for a variety of reasons. Thematically, it’s a story about two kids who are ostracized and punished for their dreams of starting a death metal band:

    Jeff and Cyrus believed in their hearts
    They were headed for stage lights and Lear jets and fortune and fame
    So in script that made prominent use of a pentagram
    They stenciled their drum heads and guitars with their names

    This was how Cyrus got sent to the school
    Where they told him he’d never be famous
    And this was why Jeff, in the letters he’d write to his friend
    Helped develop a plan to get even

    When you punish a person for dreaming his dream
    Don’t expect him to thank or forgive you
    The best ever death metal band out of Denton
    Will in time both outpace and outlive you

    And one of the things that The Mountain Goats do best is employing irony, or standing convention on its head, in support of the marginalized, picked-on, or forgotten – so the song concludes with a rousing chorus of “Hail Satan!” I can’t speak for the Goats, but my joining the chorus wasn’t a true hailing of a dark lord…it was a sign of solidarity with the “person dreaming his dream” who has been punished and sent off into the margins.

    And as I type that out, it sure seems relevant today – a time when dissent is prosecuted, people are “disappeared,” the LGBTQ community is told they shouldn’t exist, due process is optional depending on how masked agents interpret your social media posts, etc. etc.

    Here’s the song, a wonderful way to end the week:

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  • Back in January, Beaufort County parents (and others around the state) received notifications about a data breach affecting PowerSchool, a cloud-based information management service sold to school districts across the U.S. and in many different countries.

    PowerSchool’s Student Information System (SIS) tracks everything from attendance to grades to medical information, and on the administrative side it offers scheduling, compliance reporting, and parent engagement tools. Students’ social security numbers and other personally identifiable information (PII) are stored in the PowerSchool cloud.

    You won’t find any mention of the data breach on PowerSchool’s site (at least, not that I can see), but they do have the standard platitudes about their top notch security:

    Schools and districts can communicate with confidence to shareholders that their student data is safe and secure.

    PowerSchool is committed to being a good custodian of student data, taking all reasonable and appropriate countermeasures to ensure data confidentiality, integrity, and availability.

    Yes, PowerSchool is very committed to data availability – it’s now available to everyone, everywhere, all at once.

    This topic has been nagging at me ever since January. I’ve narrowed it down to to main reasons:

    1) It’s amazing how accustomed we are to companies being careless with our PII. Data breaches like this barely register, and we all must be up to at least a half-dozen offers of “one year of free credit monitoring.” Now my student can join the club.

    2) Here in Beaufort County, we’re at the heart of South Carolina’s book banning movement. I won’t go into a long summary, but a handful of Moms for Liberty-inspired residents began demanding the removal of books from public schools. At the same time, state and national politicians have been exploiting the moment by flooding the airwaves and state legislatures with histrionics laced with homophobia, xenophobia, and anti-intellectualism. All in the name, of course, of “protecting the children.” On the ground, as a parent with a student in public school here, I can say that this is a manufactured controversy. But if you listen to people like Ellen Weaver (whose political hackery deserves a post of its own), they’re saving children from certain doom by banning books from public schools…and in the case of Shannon Erickson, even promoting legislation that bans the discussion of certain ideas so nobody has to think too hard.

    Obviously, the less children know, the safer they are, right?

    As far as reason #1 goes, I have to write it off as a sign of the times. It’s been twelve years since South Carolina’s Department of Revenue gave away all of my PII in a breach of taxpayer data. What’s another breach? Criminals are probably tired of seeing my name on their list(s). Maybe that’s the best way to deal with the issue of “consumer privacy,” anyway – just keep giving everything away, and at some point all value will be lost. (As of 3/24/25, we may need to call this “The Hegseth Principle.”)

    But reason #2 is the sticky one. Aside from the standard, “This wasn’t really our fault, it was a vendor problem, here – have some credit monitoring,” from state superintendent* Ellen Weaver, I’ve heard nothing from Beaufort County’s legislative delegation, or any other state leader, about the fact that their chosen education information management system vendor compromised children’s PII. Names, social security numbers, medical information, and who knows what else – all free to the Internet winds.

    People who climb all over each other to grab a microphone to spout “protect the children!” when they see a book about diversity are silent when children’s records are compromised. Where are the committee meetings? Where are the pledges to hold PowerSchool accountable? When will contracts come up for bids? What are some alternative systems?

    Where’s Moms for Security?

    (*) I have to add an asterisk any time I spell out Weaver’s title due to the masters degree shenanigans required to make the former conservative “think tank” CEO eligible for the position.

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  • Or: “Begun, the leaf blower wars have.” – Yoda, 2009, somewhere in the Degobah system when the live oaks awaken

    While I have noted repeatedly that this blog is proudly unsullied by corporate sponsors, I’m happy to report that we do offer limited sponsorships to certain entities or concepts that prove worthy.

    Today’s post is presented by our dear, humble friends RAKE and TARP.

    Down with leaf blowers!

    Though I’ve lived in the south for 20+ years, I’m still somewhat surprised each spring when live oaks start dropping their leaves. I happen to be surrounded by oak miscreants so everything is covered in leaves from late February through early April.

    I’ve read that trees can share resources and will even favor relatives via underground mycorrhizal networks, and I think the oak family around my house uses that network to plot against me. Rather than six or seven trees dropping their leaves all at once, they time it in the most aggravating fashion. One or two will let loose and then there will be a pause for several days. I’ll wait and wait, get annoyed, rake up the leaves, and then one or two more will immediately start dropping their leaves. We go through three or four cycles of this, me shaking my fist at the canopy, the trees deliberately dropping more leaves and then adding pollen blizzards and eventually the little squiggly catkins that get everywhere, even infiltrating the house.

    Most people around me favor gas or battery powered blowers for leaf management, and neighbors on both sides will spend anywhere from 2-3 hours walking back and forth across their postage stamp lawns, blasting leaves to and fro. Everyone’s houses are pretty close together, so often this means a leaf blower-wielding person walking up and down between the houses relentlessly pushing a leaf twenty yards one way, and then twenty yards another way.

    This drives me up the wall for two reasons: 1) the sound is horrible and it sets off a fight or flight sensation in my brain that makes me want to jab pencils in my ears, and 2) our friends RAKE and TARP up there can be used to complete this task in a much more efficient, cheaper, and quieter way.

    I know this because here at RADIOFREEBEAUFORT we are nothing if not data-driven, and I’ve timed Team Leaf Blower, and I’ve timed Team Rake & Tarp, and I can say with certainty that I can rake and clear every area around my house in less than an hour. All a casual passer-by would hear is the soothing swish, swish, swish of my rake, along with the chirping of birds and the occasional deafening roar of an F-35.

    Our dedicated sponsor, TARP, pictured above, has been a faithful helper since Hurricane Matthew hit Beaufort in 2016. This is its ninth season of service. It cost $20 at Home Depot, and you could probably find something similar for $10 or less at Harbor Freight. RAKE came to us three years ago by way of Tractor Supply Company and was also $20. Now, that rake price might seem a little high but the one flaw with the rake & tarp plan is that cheap rakes break easily and you might find yourself rake-less, which messes up the whole system.

    Still, $40 along with an occasional rake replacement isn’t too bad compared to ~$100 for an entry level leaf blower (and who wants entry level power? better shell out $200+ for maximum suburban prestige). On top of that, you either have to manage fuel jugs and small engine maintenance, or deal with rechargeable batteries that die every 3-5 years.

    Is this method easy? No, and I think that’s the main factor in its lack of popularity. After all, what would you rather do – (a) stand around, and occasionally wander aimlessly, while making a lot of noise, or (b) move your arms back and forth a lot, bend down, and pull things on a tarp in a relatively quiet fashion? Most people would choose (a) before you could even finish asking the question – because wandering around making a lot of noise is the quintessential American activity.

    But I’ve been told we are a strong, resilient, bootstraps-yanking nation of patriotic heroes who believe in honest, hard work and callused hands and the satisfaction of a job well done. So I, along with sponsors RAKE and TARP, believe society can change. Throw down your leaf blowers, Beaufort, and any area with conspiratorial live oaks. We can work more efficiently. We can be quiet. We can jump off the consumerist treadmill that has us constantly searching for the latest shiny thing.

    Maybe all the live oaks want is some peace and quiet. Maybe I’ll be rewarded when they see that I’m actually trying to scrape lightly over the surface of the Earth rather than blasting everything to kingdom come.

    Or maybe my raking is irritating their mycorrhizal networks and I’m the real enemy here. Good thing I have a backup leaf blower.

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  • A couple of amusing items in South Carolina news this week:
    (both courtesy of articles at SC Daily Gazette, a good, non-paywalled site for South Carolina news)

    1) Because DEI hysteria has replaced CRT hysteria, South Carolina now has at least one anti-DEI legislative effort making its way through the SC House of Representatives. This article notes that the bill would prohibit “state agencies, local governments and universities from using diversity, equity and inclusion,” but later we learn that (emphasis mine): 

    “Most state universities have already gotten rid of diversity statements and DEI division names in preparation for a law change. The bill only prohibits offices that use the words ‘diversity, equity and inclusion,’ McGinnis said.

    For instance, Clemson University changed the name of its equity and inclusion office to the Division of Community Engagement, Belonging and Access. Under that name, the office would not violate the bill, legislators said.”

    Ever since this iteration of the CRT/DEI panic-revenge tour began, I’ve wondered if organizations would simply change the name(s) of programs and then continue to go about doing the terrible business of diversifying applicant pools and fostering inclusive workplaces/universities. Clearly if this was such a serious problem our dedicated state legislators wouldn’t simply ban the words “diversity, equity, and inclusion” and leave it at that?

    But it sounds like Clemson changed the name of its office and that was fine. Chalk up another victory for the SC House Committee on Performative Nonsense.

     

    2) South Carolina has split up the Department of Health and Environmental Control, and SC Gov. Henry McMaster has nominated a pretty reasonable-sounding guy to lead the newly created Department of Public Health. Why is this amusing? It’s way too normal, and of course that means somebody’s getting death threats.

    I often marvel at the speed with which South Carolina politicians wallow around at the feet of our new Orange King. People like Nancy Mace (SC-1) seem to spend most of their time trying to get attention for outlandish acts, as if that will gain them a new position in DC if only they can get noticed. So when Gov. McMaster had the opportunity to appoint a top-level public health official, I halfway expected him to choose someone peddling essential oils, horse dewormer, and measles parties on TikTok.

    Instead, we get Dr. Edward Simmer, who formerly oversaw Tricare for the military after working for years as a naval doctor. Dr. Simmer appears to believe in things like science and research; because this is 2025, that also means he has received death threats from anonymous “patriots,” and ludicrous questions from top notch state legislators who spread lies about vaccines.

    Perhaps the funniest part, though, is Gov. McMaster’s bewilderment:

     “He’s enormously qualified. He’s enormously talented,” McMaster said. “I don’t know why it is that people are criticizing him, because I don’t think anybody can put a finger on something he’s done that’s either unethical or wrong.”

     

    I don’t know why it is that people are criticizing him…

     

    Hmmm… I can’t imagine why in the world people would think they can invent worm-brained criticisms of established public health policies, and also think that they can threaten or intimidate anyone who responds with facts and logic.

    Let’s take a moment to think about where we are at this point in time – in terms of community, society, culture, as a nation facing nearly infinite problems requiring serious inquiry, research, and consideration.

    After reading this article and learning about the threats to Dr. Simmer, my first thought was that I expect he’ll drop out after continued threats to his, and his family’s, safety. I respect his pushback on the lies and his refusal to be intimidated by threats…but the forces at work here are strong, and they don’t let up. I hope that I can believe in people like him – that there are still people willing to stand up to this collective bullying – but we’re not starting off 2025 well in that regard.

    So that’s where we are: We have somehow reached a point where it’s acceptable to threaten harm against public health officials whose work is backed by decades, if not a century or more, of established science.

    In a way, I share Gov. McMaster’s bewilderment, but I also hold him responsible for helping to create this social-political environment that is slowly punishing any form of critical thought. We are collectively sticking our heads in the sand and we’re all going to drown.

    Yet…this is Friday, and I want to end the week on a positive note. In a strange, very very small way, both of these situations could provide a microscopic glimmer of hope if one were inclined to believe in such a thing. I think there’s a decent number of people who understand what is performative, and what is right. We’re in an historical moment where seeing the “right” part materialize is like spotting a rare, nearly extinct bird, and I’m not saying that’s happened here, but at the very least we’re seeing some bad ideas’ momentum stalled by the mundanity of bureaucratic processes.

    Of course, Gov. McMaster is term-limited and won’t be running for re-election…he doesn’t have to do as much performing these days. I do wonder how he’d be talking about public health if an election was on the line. My guess is that the aforementioned TikToker would be front and center.

    Okay, okay.

    Positive note.

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  • I’m sad, but not surprised, to see that the U.S. Agency for Global Media, under which Radio Free Europe and Voice of America (and other pro-democracy outlets) operate, has become the latest government agency to be effectively shut down.

    I gave a criminally brief summary of Radio Free Europe in ORIGIN STORY, and I’ve mused in another post about the viability of legitimate news outlets in the face of Trump’s authoritarian impulses. One of the pillars of such a regime is control of the mainstream media and I’d say that control is pretty much locked up at this point. Now it’s just about ferreting out the smaller pockets of resistance and applying pressure until they’re snuffed out, or until they’re pushed into smaller and smaller spaces within the information/misinformation broadcasting ecosystem.

    How long until copycat state-level legislators follow suit? In Tennessee they’ve already passed a bill that criminalizes voting the “wrong” way. If a state legislator’s vote can now be a crime, it’s a minuscule step to write a law criminalizing the publication of dissenting views (and the “dissent” can be defined as just about anything). How long until the government targets Substack and other sites that host “the opposition”? How long until pointing out Trump’s terrible makeup gets Pam Bondi on your case?

    I’ll continue to track the shutdowns and/or capitulation (looking at you Washington Post, LA Times) out of morbid curiosity. I don’t claim to offer anything particularly valuable here aside from some kind of documentary evidence – and if anyone else out there is shouting into the void about this, well, at least know that you have company here at the recently founded pro-democracy outlet based on an R.E.M. song (proudly unsullied by corporate sponsors, social media, AI, or the CIA since January 2025).

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  • Buckle up. It’s Adventure Street.

     

    While it’s way too early to address any readers of this blog, if there were any readers, they might be asking an important question: Which Beaufort are we talking about? The inferior northern variant – “bo-fort,” in North Carolina? Or the superior southern variant – “byoo-firt,” in South Carolina. The answer should be clear: Beaufort, South Carolina. Taking a cue from our Orange Leader, I do not acknowledge the city with the stolen name in North Carolina, nor do I appreciate their pernicious pronunciation.

    Working from this superior location makes the RFB concept even more fitting. While Beaufort was at one point the heart of the secessionist movement, it was quickly occupied by the Union Army at the start of the Civil War and subsequently became an interesting (and one could say progressive) pocket of resistance starting in the early 1860s and extending to the present day. My summary here is very brief but I’m sure I’ll touch more on it later. Curious readers should take some time to learn about the Penn Center or the new-ish Reconstruction Era National Historical Park, or contemporary issues like the community’s resistance to book banning efforts.

    My broader point is that this is a natural place from which to write with concern about, and opposition to, the ill winds surrounding us. A pocket of resistance. And it’s a place to explore the fact that even within that pocket, there are legislators and community leaders who embrace those ill winds.

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  • As I mentioned on the ORIGIN STORY page, the idea for this blog – the concept of an idea, if you will – came to me when listening to an R.E.M. song. The initial hook was the sound of the actual words “Radio Free Europe” and “Radio Free Beaufort,” as I discovered it was fun to drive around Beaufort singing “Rad-i-ooo Freee Beaufort.” Then I learned about Radio Free Europe and combined that with watching the world melt down around me…and here we are.

    But one thing I learned long ago in my writing workshop days is that it’s important to understand where a creative work sits in comparison to other stuff that’s out there. Part of that can be acknowledging influences, rather than charging ahead without ever recognizing that others have stumbled upon similar concepts of similar ideas.

    Therefore, I will occasionally track all of the other “Radio Free” ideas I see out there, partly to say yeah, this isn’t completely original, but also to see what other fun stuff is going on.

    Here are some Radio Free outlets I’ve seen in the wild:

    RadioFreeTom – Tom Nichols, a writer at The Atlantic

    RadioFreePhoenix – a radio station dedicated to Free Form Rock

    RadioFreeFlorence – a “music and media outlet” dedicated to Christian Pop and Rock music, which a deity of some sort must have decided to shut down in May 2023.

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