Too often we... enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought.
John F. Kennedy
As a community newspaper, one of our most important functions is to provide an opinion page that is open to all residents and offers every perspective a place to be heard.
As a newspaper, we also take on the responsibility of providing our own opinions on topics as found in this "Our Thoughts" section. The editorial board that forms those opinions is comprised of our publisher, general manager and editor. During the past year, we've shared more than 300 opinions.
If you ever agree or disagree with a stance we take, all three members of our board are more than happy to discuss your take. In fact, we're happy for the feedback; we don't get nearly enough of it. You can also always respond through a letter to the editor, which we pride ourselves on running, even if they're not flattering to The News.
We also run local and syndicated statewide and national columnists who represent different options. If you're interested in taking a stab at writing a local opinion piece, we'd be thrilled to speak with you. We're built on local news and we'd love to have an opinion page filled with local takes on the issues.
As far as syndicated columnists, we first look for Georgia writers, and Jackie Gingrich-Cushman and Dick Yarbrough have been two of our favorite peaches.
Since most of our syndicated columnists tend to lean to the right, we've begun running Pulitzer Prize winner Eugene Robinson, who is about as far left on his views as we've found on the national scene.
Whether we agree or disagree with his comments, or those of any of our columnists, is beside the point. We want to offer the full range of perspectives.
To that end, we've got a treat in store for you today. As the counter to Eugene Robinson, we're adding Ann Coulter, who is about as right in her views as you can get. We hope you enjoy our new presentation. If you have any suggestions for national writers you'd like to see, please feel free to let us know by sending an email to our editorial board members.
We want you to participate in these pages, because they're really your pages.
