Merry Christmas!

...or, to be more generic, and more friendly to a wider audience, Happy Holidays.

     I hope you were able to give the gifts you wanted to give.

     Looking across the Christmas morning news landscape: 

• A warning for Alabama's elected officials. The Birmingham Business Journal reports Alabama's population is growing...but slower than all but one other southern state: Mississippi. The result is Alabama could give up its place as 23rd most populace state to South Carolina. Why is Alabama growing so slowly? Has the state's leadership presented the state as a less welcoming place than Georgia, or Tennessee?

 

• Tuscaloosa County authorities are sending in the arson dogs to see if the fire that destroyed Rolando McClain's $1.5-Million lake house was set intentionally. A car was seen speeding away from the scene just before the blaze started. 

• Eleven Alabama hospitals are among the 700+ being punished by Medicaid for having too many infections reported. None of those in Alabama are in Montgomery, But University Hospital in Birmingham is on the list.

• Governor Bentley's sudden embrace of Medicaid expansion is not unique, reports The Charlotte Observer. Other Republican Governors have also seen the light. Bentley insists this is not an example of him flip-flopping. But he admits it is unlikely the Feds would approve his block-grant scheme today. He'll have to wait till the GOP controls both houses of Congress next month. Would a GOP/Tea Party Congress say yes to the billions in federal spending for Alabama? We'll see.

• And finally...a treat on Christmas morning. An Alabama gospel group says the positioning statement "Sexy but saved" might fit them? Listen to the NPR "Morning Edition" interview with Committed and their Home for Christmas album. Guess I don't pay enough attention to the gazillion talent shows on TV. Committed formed in High School in 2003, but this is the first I've heard of them.