Unlike many of today’s brash sports columnists, John McGill was a quiet man who spoke so softly that you sometimes had to lean close to hear him. But for more than five decades, he spoke loudly and clearly with his typewriter (later his computer) on behalf of the commonwealth’s athletes, coaches, and sports issues.

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The families were lined up along the sideline at Freedom Hall, the color guard was in place at midcourt, and Governor Ernie Fletcher was standing by with the presidents of the University of Kentucky and the University of Louisville.

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The basketball players representing the universities of Kentucky and Louisville come from 10 states and four foreign countries. They come from big cities and small towns, from wealthy parents and those struggling to make ends meet. Their ranks include Anglo-Americans, African-Americans, and Hispanic-Americans.

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As a former University of Kentucky basketball star and a retired Lt. Colonel in the U.S. Army, Thad Jaracz has a unique appreciation of Governor Ernie Fletcher’s “Freedom Calls from Freedom Hall” program that will provide a new dimension to Saturday’s nationally-televised (ESPN) basketball game between Kentucky and Louisville.

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There they were, standing shoulder-to-shoulder in the new Department of Transportation cafeteria, looking for all the world like a reunion of the old Washington Generals, the team that traveled with the Harlem Globetrotters for years and never won a game.

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When Governor Ernie Fletcher reduced the number of Cabinets in Kentucky state government from 14 to nine, the message was clear: A new day finally was at hand — a day where government would truly serve the people of Kentucky instead of only paying lip service to the ideals of honesty, integrity, efficiency, and elimination of waste and abuse.

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