INTERESTING ELECTIVE: The Clinton School of Public Service's fall 2016 class, Trump vs. Clinton: Follow the Numbers, is a for-real reality show. The hourlong course is the first one to be live-streamed at the Clinton School. It began Aug. 25 and meets at 9 a.m. Thursdays. The class has studied voter turnout; voters by race, ethnicity and age; and the Electoral College.
The Thursday before the election, the students made their Electoral College predictions. Of the 27 students, only one predicted Trump would defeat Clinton -- 279-259.
Xochitl Delgado-Solorzano, a second-year Clinton School student from Springdale, predicted that Trump would win in all of the battleground states except for Michigan and Wisconsin and would win Pennsylvania (which he did).
"Because the African-American voter turnout is low," Delgado-Solorzano replied when asked by the dean, Skip Rutherford, why she'd arrived at those conclusions.
"Her prediction was also the closest to the actual outcome from the almost 200 who submitted predictions in our public Electoral College challenge," Rutherford tells Paper Trails.
SPIRITED WIN: Three whiskeys from Little Rock-based Rock Town Distillery recently scored ratings of "Liquid Gold" in Jim Murray's 2017 Whisky Bible. The company's Arkansas Rye Whiskey garnered a "brilliant" 95.5/100; its Barley Bourbon received a "fabulous" 95/100; and its Single Barrel Bourbon landed a "superb" 94/100.
The annual publication is considered the world's leading whiskey guide, containing more than 4,600 detailed, professionally analyzed and easy-to-understand tasting notes on both the world's leading and lesser-known whiskeys.
"To receive these ratings on three different whiskeys is a tremendous achievement," says Phil Brandon, the downtown distillery's founder and head distiller. "I'm so proud of our team and what our little distillery in Arkansas has been able to achieve in its short six-year history."
KEEPING PACE: Original Sun Records artists Sonny Burgess and the Pacers, most of whom are now in their 70s and 80s, are still rockin'. Two albums by the group have recently been released, and the group has cuts on a third one out in January. Sonny's Back in Town, on Charly records of London, includes 10 songs the band recorded in the 1950s at Sun Studio and the other, Ain't Got No Home, is on the Nashville-based label Muddy Roots. The third release, a double CD from Bear Records of Germany, is a compilation of Sun's greatest guitarists and drummers, and includes two songs by drummer Bobby Crafford and frontman and guitarist Burgess.
The Pacers have future shows booked for Nashville, Dallas, Las Vegas, London and more.
"Next year will be our 62nd," says Crafford, adding, "Not many bands have lasted that long."
Fans in central Arkansas who'd like to catch the band can do so at 7 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 10, at Country Dance in Ward. Door admission is $6.
Contact Linda S. Haymes at (501) 399-3636 or lhaymes@arkansasonline.com
SundayMonday on 11/13/2016