And the winner was …

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Belatedly, but proudly, we reproduce the winning entry in the 2007 Arkansas State Fair This is Arkansas Photography Contest, sponsored by the Arkansas Times. Thomas Opitz of Little Rock won $75 and the blue ribbon for his photo of a canoeist on a Buffalo River paddle during weather suitable to our recent cold snap. Joyce Opitz of Little Rock was second and Kent Croswell of Little Rock was third.

Good cop

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One of the best and best-known of the liberal, anti-Bush websites is bartcop.com, and an Arkansas Times staffer is a regular reader. The Timesman recently sent a small check to bartcop headquarters in Tulsa, responding to an appeal for contributions to keep the operation going. The Timesman’s home address was printed on the check. He received a thank-you note, in which bartcop remarked that he used to live only a few blocks from where the Timesman lives. Bartcop is from Little Rock? We asked with the idea of writing an article about him.

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He replied that he graduated from Little Rock Catholic High School while the legendary Father Tribou was the principal, that he still has relatives in Little Rock, and that many of his relatives had worked at the old Arkansas Gazette, mostly on the switchboard. Several members of the Times staff worked at the Gazette until it folded in 1991. But bartcop wasn’t agreeable to an article unless the Times would agree not to use his real name or publish a picture. That wasn’t acceptable to the Times, particularly since we’d already seen an i.d. of bartcop in Wikipedia, the on-line encyclopedia. We’ll just repeat what Wikipedia says: “Bartcop is the pseudonym of Terry R. Coppage (born September 1, 1953), a left-wing blogger and internet radio host from Tulsa, Oklahoma. He is a liberal Democrat, and is known for his intense and often scathing commentary and fierce humor, criticizing George W. Bush and other Republicans, as well as other conservatives. … ”

He’s good at what he does, which is to give the Rush Limbaugh types the disrespect they deserve.

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