This is a letter that Virginia Lynch Graf sent out after the election to her supporters. -MH
The voters of West Virginia’s 2nd Congressional District decided to reward Representative Shelley Moore Capito with two more years in office. As her opponent, I wondered why. Was it her continual votes for war funding? It's now over 3 trillion dollars. Perhaps that makes West Virginians feel secure. Was it her ties to special interests to perpetuate her campaigns? I guess that takes the burden off of ordinary contributors to elect a Congresswoman. Could it be the fact that corporations get tax breaks, loopholes, and other financial incentives from her votes that enable them to trickle their wealth down to the rest of us? Maybe it's the fact that she opposes unions and stimulus money to keep Americans working. After all, if we got rid of unions we could return to unbridled labor laws, which would make all those lazy people work longer and harder for their salaries.
And we all know stimulus money was bad, so Ms. Capito opposed it. Clearly, she knew better than most economists who encouraged an even bigger stimulus to avoid another Great Depression. Ms. Capito knew wasteful spending when she saw it: a tax break for the middle class and small business owners and funding to keep policemen, firemen and teachers at their jobs were just too expensive. Nonetheless, she did get her picture taken each time stimulus money was awarded.
Did our citizens like the lack of oversight for banks or corporations; and did they agree that unemployed workers didn't deserve an extension of benefits in these hard times? Even though Capito said during the campaign that she would protect Social Security (she is on record for wanting to privatize it), I guess it was just a slip-up when she voted against equal pay for equal work for women. Lack of pay equity negatively impacts not only women's current earning power but their future Social Security checks too. We all know how disastrous for society it is if women are paid as much as men. Does it feel good to see Ms. Capito challenge the EPA and keep us fixed on the Fifties? If we deny climate change, then we have no carbon problem.
On the other hand, I wondered why I didn't get more support for my campaign. I didn't even win in my own county of Jefferson where I was sure phone calls would be made in my behalf. Was it the fact that I wasn't born here, but rather chose to make West Virginia my home? Was it that I took no special interest money in my campaign, and the sages knew I couldn't possibly win if I didn't seek mega bucks? Many prophets made sure their prophecy bore truth by not even contributing ten bucks to my campaign. I guess they couldn't believe in a publicly funded campaigner who knows the issues, cares about WV, has a plan to improve our economy, supports unions, and favors revamping our tax system! Why waste your time calling neighbors to support a retired educator who was determined to transform our educational system so that our children and grandchildren could find a career in West Virginia! Why support a candidate who wants our farms and food protected; believes that mountaintop removal is destroying our beautiful state and poisoning our water system; wants to continue working on health insurance reform so that four West Virginians don't unnecessarily die every week?
I’m perplexed. Perhaps I should have skipped sticking my neck out, and just colored my gray hair blond!
--Virginia Lynch Graf
Sunday, November 7, 2010
Saturday, November 6, 2010
Appalachian Art for Appalachian Families
SHEPHERDSTOWN, W.Va. – Appalachian Art for Appalachian Families (AAAF) is on a mission to raise funds for the Sludge Safety Project's purchase of water testing kits for West Virginia communities concerned about the water quality impacts of coal slurry injection and coal sludge impoundments. This month, AAAF will raise funds for the kits in two ways:
· The organization will hold an Art Exhibition at the Shepherdstown Train Station on Friday, November 19, 2010, and is announcing a call for art submissions. (Artists will receive 50 percent of proceeds from their art sales; AAAF will apply 10 percent of art proceeds to the cost of venue and food preparation; and the remaining 40 percent will be designated for the Sludge Safety Project.) AAAF encourages artists who live in the Appalachian mountains — and those inspired by them — to submit their arts and crafts (all artistic mediums welcome) by its November 15 deadline. The exhibition opens at noon on November 19, with the artists’ reception at 6 p.m.
Artwork collection will occur in the Charleston, W.Va., area (phone: 540-535-8458), as well as in Shepherdstown, W.Va. (phone: 304-876-9900).
· AAAF will also host a "Deers & Beers" Fundraising Dinner at the Shepherdstown Train Station at 7 p.m. on Saturday, November 20, 2010. Cost of the dinner is $25 and 100 percent of the proceeds will be donated to the Sludge Safety Project. The dinner will feature locally brewed beer and wild game.
AAAF remains concerned about toxic slurry injection, drinking water quality and the safety of West Virginia residents. As a result, proceeds from the above-mentioned events will benefit the Sludge Safety Project (www.sludgesafety.org), a nonprofit organization that advocates for West Virginia residents' access to clean water and safety for communities at risk from coal slurry injection and coal sludge impoundments.
About Appalachian Art for Appalachian Families
AAAF's mission is to stand with families of southern West Virginia and pool its resources to help ensure clean water and healthy, safe homes. The nonprofit organization, based in Shepherdstown, W.Va., builds unity among all West Virginian families by showcasing the arts and crafts that celebrate West Virginia's mountain region. AAAF aims to bring people together across county lines so that their lives may be enriched with unity, pride, artistic expression and a shared commitment to human rights.
About the Sludge Safety Project
The Sludge Safety Project (SSP) is a collaborative effort of the Huntington, W.Va.-based Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, the Whitesville, W.Va.-based Coal River Mountain Watch and West Virginia communities concerned about the quality of their drinking water, coal sludge impoundment safety and slurry injection hazards.
SSP (www.sludgesafety.org) educates and advocates on issues related to slurry-based health and safety dangers and access to clean drinking water. The group is currently calling for a ban on ban of wet slurry production in West Virginia.
--Submitted by Viv Stockman
· The organization will hold an Art Exhibition at the Shepherdstown Train Station on Friday, November 19, 2010, and is announcing a call for art submissions. (Artists will receive 50 percent of proceeds from their art sales; AAAF will apply 10 percent of art proceeds to the cost of venue and food preparation; and the remaining 40 percent will be designated for the Sludge Safety Project.) AAAF encourages artists who live in the Appalachian mountains — and those inspired by them — to submit their arts and crafts (all artistic mediums welcome) by its November 15 deadline. The exhibition opens at noon on November 19, with the artists’ reception at 6 p.m.
Artwork collection will occur in the Charleston, W.Va., area (phone: 540-535-8458), as well as in Shepherdstown, W.Va. (phone: 304-876-9900).
· AAAF will also host a "Deers & Beers" Fundraising Dinner at the Shepherdstown Train Station at 7 p.m. on Saturday, November 20, 2010. Cost of the dinner is $25 and 100 percent of the proceeds will be donated to the Sludge Safety Project. The dinner will feature locally brewed beer and wild game.
AAAF remains concerned about toxic slurry injection, drinking water quality and the safety of West Virginia residents. As a result, proceeds from the above-mentioned events will benefit the Sludge Safety Project (www.sludgesafety.org), a nonprofit organization that advocates for West Virginia residents' access to clean water and safety for communities at risk from coal slurry injection and coal sludge impoundments.
About Appalachian Art for Appalachian Families
AAAF's mission is to stand with families of southern West Virginia and pool its resources to help ensure clean water and healthy, safe homes. The nonprofit organization, based in Shepherdstown, W.Va., builds unity among all West Virginian families by showcasing the arts and crafts that celebrate West Virginia's mountain region. AAAF aims to bring people together across county lines so that their lives may be enriched with unity, pride, artistic expression and a shared commitment to human rights.
About the Sludge Safety Project
The Sludge Safety Project (SSP) is a collaborative effort of the Huntington, W.Va.-based Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition, the Whitesville, W.Va.-based Coal River Mountain Watch and West Virginia communities concerned about the quality of their drinking water, coal sludge impoundment safety and slurry injection hazards.
SSP (www.sludgesafety.org) educates and advocates on issues related to slurry-based health and safety dangers and access to clean drinking water. The group is currently calling for a ban on ban of wet slurry production in West Virginia.
--Submitted by Viv Stockman
Friday, November 5, 2010
The Republicanization of Hampshire County
When I first moved to Hampshire County almost two decades ago, the conventional wisdom was that if you wanted a choice in local candidates, you had to register Democratic, because Democrats invariably won county elections. (Even then, however, Republicans were beginning to appear on the county commission, although all the other elected county offices were filled by Democrats.)
I used to joke at that time with my friends back in DC that Hampshire County was so conservative that it was still registered 2-1 Democratic (I haven’t looked at registration figures lately, but I’d be surprised if that ratio still holds.) The joke was, even with the predominance of registered Democrats, in national elections especially, Republicans usually won about 60 percent of the county vote. Hampshire County is solid Bible Belt country, the most Confederate county in West Virginia during the Civil War. But even though most of the South had turned Republican in the wake of Lyndon Johnson’s Civil Rights Act, Hampshire was so traditional that most people here kept their Democratic registration, but voted Republican.
In fact, I’d describe Hampshire County natives as more traditionalist than conservative (although they’re plenty conservative). You can see this phenomenon in some of the voting anomalies. In a year when Republicans dominated county voting, Democratic state senator Walt Helmick and commissioner Steve Slonaker, both incumbents, carried the county easily (like Robert Byrd used to do). These victories can be seen as the last vestiges of the old Democratic machine, a manifestation of both the old southern feudalism and legacy politics that complicate any political analysis.
But a true picture of where the Hampshire electorate is trending can be seen in the vote for US Senate, where Hampshire was out of step with the rest of the state, and voted overwhelmingly for Republican John Raese, despite the fact that Joe Manchin is in the same mold as the conservative Democratic legacy candidates that usually get Hampshire County votes. But here the legacy politics were trumped by the racial politics, and why we saw a resurgence this year of the old Republican “southern strategy,” in their effort to nationalize the election. This was pure and simple an anti-Obama vote. Manchin stopped the erosion of his early lead by “taking aim” at “Obamacare”—that was no accident. (Another indication that Hampshire is more conservative than the rest of the state is that Mountain Party candidate Jesse Johnson got about a quarter of the percentage of votes here that he got statewide.)
The Republican trend in Hampshire also showed itself in the overwhelming vote for Ruth Rowan for delegate against a strong candidate with long experience in the community, Mitch Davis; and in the capture of yet another county office, the county clerk position. This leaves Democrats holding only two county offices: one county commission seat, and the county assessor. I think those seats will remain safely Democratic until Steve Slonaker and assessor Norma Wagoner retire. But after that, if the trend holds, they’ll go Republican, too.
What explains the inexorable Republican trend even more than traditional southern conservatism is the changing demographics of the county. The old New Deal yellow dog Democrats here are dying off, and being replaced by Republican transplants, mostly retirees, from the cities. So whereas the young people of Hampshire County (the under-30 demographic is the most progressive group in the US population) are moving away for jobs and college, retirees of the postwar generation (the parents of the boomers, and more conservative than either the generation before or after them) are moving in, and vastly outnumber the progressive “creative class” transplants. There’s a certain inevitability here.
The biggest problem for the Democrats, both here and nationwide, is that the national party has abandoned its working class base, in service to its corporate funders (why I, personally, changed my party registration to Mountain this year). The degree to which the corporate Democrats of today have diverged from the party’s traditional principles can be illustrated by an FDR quote from his famous “Four Freedoms” speech:
“The basic things expected by our people of their political and economic systems are simple. They are:
Equality of opportunity for youth and for others.
Jobs for those who can work.
Security for those who need it.
The ending of special privilege for the few.
The preservation of civil liberties for all.
The enjoyment -- The enjoyment of the fruits of scientific progress in a wider and constantly rising standard of living.
These are the simple, the basic things that must never be lost sight of in the turmoil and unbelievable complexity of our modern world. The inner and abiding strength of our economic and political systems is dependent upon the degree to which they fulfill these expectations.”
The phrase, “ending of special privilege for the few,” has particular resonance today, in a Democratic administration dominated by Goldman Sachs and the Trilateral Commission. We have been sold out to a corporate plutocracy. The only Americans who seem unaware of this fact are Limbaugh dittoheads and Obamabots. But until the Democratic Party returns to its working class roots, no one should look for any resurgence of the Democratic Party in Hampshire County. Progressive interests will be better served in the meantime by working on specific issues that transcend party lines.
--Michael Hasty
UPDATE: To put an exclamation point on this analysis, AP published an article yesterday with the headline, "Election nearly wipes out white Southern Democrats." It said, "Republican efforts to win over the South, rooted decades ago in a strategy to capitalize on white voters' resentment of desegregation, is all but complete." When the final races are decided, there may be as few as 14 white Southern Democratic members of the House of Representatives, out of 105 total seats in the region.
The important thing to remember about Hampshire County is that, even though West Virginia is the only state to secede from another, it never seceded culturally.
I used to joke at that time with my friends back in DC that Hampshire County was so conservative that it was still registered 2-1 Democratic (I haven’t looked at registration figures lately, but I’d be surprised if that ratio still holds.) The joke was, even with the predominance of registered Democrats, in national elections especially, Republicans usually won about 60 percent of the county vote. Hampshire County is solid Bible Belt country, the most Confederate county in West Virginia during the Civil War. But even though most of the South had turned Republican in the wake of Lyndon Johnson’s Civil Rights Act, Hampshire was so traditional that most people here kept their Democratic registration, but voted Republican.
In fact, I’d describe Hampshire County natives as more traditionalist than conservative (although they’re plenty conservative). You can see this phenomenon in some of the voting anomalies. In a year when Republicans dominated county voting, Democratic state senator Walt Helmick and commissioner Steve Slonaker, both incumbents, carried the county easily (like Robert Byrd used to do). These victories can be seen as the last vestiges of the old Democratic machine, a manifestation of both the old southern feudalism and legacy politics that complicate any political analysis.
But a true picture of where the Hampshire electorate is trending can be seen in the vote for US Senate, where Hampshire was out of step with the rest of the state, and voted overwhelmingly for Republican John Raese, despite the fact that Joe Manchin is in the same mold as the conservative Democratic legacy candidates that usually get Hampshire County votes. But here the legacy politics were trumped by the racial politics, and why we saw a resurgence this year of the old Republican “southern strategy,” in their effort to nationalize the election. This was pure and simple an anti-Obama vote. Manchin stopped the erosion of his early lead by “taking aim” at “Obamacare”—that was no accident. (Another indication that Hampshire is more conservative than the rest of the state is that Mountain Party candidate Jesse Johnson got about a quarter of the percentage of votes here that he got statewide.)
The Republican trend in Hampshire also showed itself in the overwhelming vote for Ruth Rowan for delegate against a strong candidate with long experience in the community, Mitch Davis; and in the capture of yet another county office, the county clerk position. This leaves Democrats holding only two county offices: one county commission seat, and the county assessor. I think those seats will remain safely Democratic until Steve Slonaker and assessor Norma Wagoner retire. But after that, if the trend holds, they’ll go Republican, too.
What explains the inexorable Republican trend even more than traditional southern conservatism is the changing demographics of the county. The old New Deal yellow dog Democrats here are dying off, and being replaced by Republican transplants, mostly retirees, from the cities. So whereas the young people of Hampshire County (the under-30 demographic is the most progressive group in the US population) are moving away for jobs and college, retirees of the postwar generation (the parents of the boomers, and more conservative than either the generation before or after them) are moving in, and vastly outnumber the progressive “creative class” transplants. There’s a certain inevitability here.
The biggest problem for the Democrats, both here and nationwide, is that the national party has abandoned its working class base, in service to its corporate funders (why I, personally, changed my party registration to Mountain this year). The degree to which the corporate Democrats of today have diverged from the party’s traditional principles can be illustrated by an FDR quote from his famous “Four Freedoms” speech:
“The basic things expected by our people of their political and economic systems are simple. They are:
Equality of opportunity for youth and for others.
Jobs for those who can work.
Security for those who need it.
The ending of special privilege for the few.
The preservation of civil liberties for all.
The enjoyment -- The enjoyment of the fruits of scientific progress in a wider and constantly rising standard of living.
These are the simple, the basic things that must never be lost sight of in the turmoil and unbelievable complexity of our modern world. The inner and abiding strength of our economic and political systems is dependent upon the degree to which they fulfill these expectations.”
The phrase, “ending of special privilege for the few,” has particular resonance today, in a Democratic administration dominated by Goldman Sachs and the Trilateral Commission. We have been sold out to a corporate plutocracy. The only Americans who seem unaware of this fact are Limbaugh dittoheads and Obamabots. But until the Democratic Party returns to its working class roots, no one should look for any resurgence of the Democratic Party in Hampshire County. Progressive interests will be better served in the meantime by working on specific issues that transcend party lines.
--Michael Hasty
UPDATE: To put an exclamation point on this analysis, AP published an article yesterday with the headline, "Election nearly wipes out white Southern Democrats." It said, "Republican efforts to win over the South, rooted decades ago in a strategy to capitalize on white voters' resentment of desegregation, is all but complete." When the final races are decided, there may be as few as 14 white Southern Democratic members of the House of Representatives, out of 105 total seats in the region.
The important thing to remember about Hampshire County is that, even though West Virginia is the only state to secede from another, it never seceded culturally.
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
And to the republic for which it no longer stands
The corporate establishment’s degree of media control has sufficiently and ignorantly relieved and excused those people responsible for our current ecomalaise. Hence, crazies surfaced politically and deceitfully captured the public’s discontent, driving that discontent to fool most Americans into justifying meanness and diminishing the understanding of others’ unfortunate plight.
This creates the foundation for the plutocrats to institutionalize the increasing wealth gap, necessitating even larger majorities in Congress to correct.
--Bill Arnold
This creates the foundation for the plutocrats to institutionalize the increasing wealth gap, necessitating even larger majorities in Congress to correct.
--Bill Arnold
The benefits of equality
Living in a society with massive income inequality—the US has greater income inequality than any other developed nation—makes people anxious, depressed, even physically sick.
The wealthiest and most unequal societies lag behind countries with fewer obvious advantages in every measure of health, happiness, and well-being. Rates of diabetes, hypertension, cancer, lung disease, and heart disease are higher than they are in more equal societies, such as Greece, Finland, Holland (where you can smoke), and Japan. Infant mortality rates are shocking.
Income inequality is the biggest cause of ill health in the world. The bad health effects of inequality are not confined to the poor, but spread like a pollutant throughout society. Having more poor people is not what makes more unequal societies sicker. Greater equality helps those at the bottom. Rich people and poor people alike are less healthy in more unequal countries.
Everyone receives roughly proportional benefits from greater equality. In more equal societies, everyone is better off. The vast majority of the population is harmed by greater inequality. Cooperation and friendship stimulate the reward centers in the brain, while the experience of social exclusion involves the same areas of the brain as physical pain. People who live in rich countries are under constant hormonal assault from the competitiveness and lack of connection in their lives.
One explanation for our poor health; the most powerful sources of stress affecting health seem to fall into three intensely social categories: low social status, lack of friends, and stress in early life. Add to that a culture based on competition for status, class-stratification, and criminalization of the lower class, and you have a sort of cycle of violence that ruins everyone's health. Violence is generally a response to threats to status: disrespect, humiliation, loss of face.
An experiment in India showed that boys of high and low caste performed at about equal levels on puzzles, with the low-caste boys performing a bit better. But when the boys were asked to state their fathers' names, where they were from, and their caste, the low-caste boys' performance plummeted. Likewise, in this country, African American youth lose confidence and their scores decline on tests, when told they are being evaluated against their white counterparts. It's a form of violence.
Despite historic heights of luxury in our modern societies, we talk as if our lives were a constant battle for psychological survival, struggling against stress and emotional exhaustion. Celebrities and the super-rich have a toxic effect on society, by inducing feelings of inferiority in the rest of the population. Their income should be redistributed in the name of public health.
--Bill Arnold
The wealthiest and most unequal societies lag behind countries with fewer obvious advantages in every measure of health, happiness, and well-being. Rates of diabetes, hypertension, cancer, lung disease, and heart disease are higher than they are in more equal societies, such as Greece, Finland, Holland (where you can smoke), and Japan. Infant mortality rates are shocking.
Income inequality is the biggest cause of ill health in the world. The bad health effects of inequality are not confined to the poor, but spread like a pollutant throughout society. Having more poor people is not what makes more unequal societies sicker. Greater equality helps those at the bottom. Rich people and poor people alike are less healthy in more unequal countries.
Everyone receives roughly proportional benefits from greater equality. In more equal societies, everyone is better off. The vast majority of the population is harmed by greater inequality. Cooperation and friendship stimulate the reward centers in the brain, while the experience of social exclusion involves the same areas of the brain as physical pain. People who live in rich countries are under constant hormonal assault from the competitiveness and lack of connection in their lives.
One explanation for our poor health; the most powerful sources of stress affecting health seem to fall into three intensely social categories: low social status, lack of friends, and stress in early life. Add to that a culture based on competition for status, class-stratification, and criminalization of the lower class, and you have a sort of cycle of violence that ruins everyone's health. Violence is generally a response to threats to status: disrespect, humiliation, loss of face.
An experiment in India showed that boys of high and low caste performed at about equal levels on puzzles, with the low-caste boys performing a bit better. But when the boys were asked to state their fathers' names, where they were from, and their caste, the low-caste boys' performance plummeted. Likewise, in this country, African American youth lose confidence and their scores decline on tests, when told they are being evaluated against their white counterparts. It's a form of violence.
Despite historic heights of luxury in our modern societies, we talk as if our lives were a constant battle for psychological survival, struggling against stress and emotional exhaustion. Celebrities and the super-rich have a toxic effect on society, by inducing feelings of inferiority in the rest of the population. Their income should be redistributed in the name of public health.
--Bill Arnold
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
In defense of Jeff and Jesse
One of the most remarkable aspects of the campaign to fill the remaining term of the late West Virginia senator, Robert Byrd, is how little attention has been given to the fact that half the people sitting at the table at the CSPAN-televised candidate debate, were 9/11 truthers.
Both Constitution Party candidate Jeff Becker and Mountain Party candidate Jesse Johnson have made public statements questioning the official story of the events of September 11th. Becker features his skepticism at his official website; Jesse Johnson is apparently so embarrassed about having been associated with 9/11 truth in an AP story in the Charleston Gazette that he doesn’t even list it in his press clips. But he does have a video endorsement at the top of his page from former US Senator Mike Gravel, a noted 9/11 truther (who doesn’t mention it in the video); and the national Green Party, with which the Mountain Party is now affiliated, has re-opening the 9/11 investigation in its platform.
You can see why Jesse is playing down his association with truthers, in the reaction that Jeff Becker got when he brought up the destruction of World Trade Center Building 7 and other anomalies in the official story during the debate. Everybody looked at him like he’d just cut a piece of really smelly cheese, and then proceeded to ignore everything he’d said. It was my one moment of hope in the debate that Jesse would, having been passed the opportunity, step up to the 9/11 plate. But he failed. I’m voting for him, anyway, because he’s still the closest candidate to me, ideologically. I’m a Mountain Party member. But it was a disappointment, however smart it may have played strategically.
As you can imagine, my heart went out to Jeff Becker, the very portrait of the courageous nerd as he plunged ahead with his suspicions, transparently aware of the disapproval of all the establishment types, politician and journalist alike, sitting with him there on the podium. Being a 9/11 truther myself, I’m used to being the oddball in the room. The concept of “conspiracy theory,” invented by the media after the JFK assassination to ridicule the growing skepticism among the populace about the credibility of the Warren Report, has proven to be one of the most durable and successful psychological operations ever launched against the American public. The rigid censorship of corporate media, where 80 percent of Americans still get their news, keeps any real questions about what scholar Peter Dale Scott calls America’s “Deep State”—the nexus of finance, intelligence and the criminal underworld—safely enclosed in the conspiracy ghetto—just another eccentric subculture in the national cavalcade of pre-apocalyptic weirdness.
But given the fact that the only consensus in the 9/11 truth movement is the call for a new investigation, that broad a definition of the movement includes most Americans. You can test this on yourself by taking the following quiz*:
All researchers of the destruction of the World Trade Center, official and skeptic alike, agree that the fires in the WTC never got hot enough to melt steel. Yet in early 2002, the US Geological Survey released a report which included an analysis of the WTC dust by RJ Lee Associates, which found that, whereas the dust from a normal office fire contains 0.04 percent of iron “microspheres,” formed by the propulsion of molten metal through the air (you’d expect a little of this phenomenon in every fire), the percentage of iron microspheres in the WTC dust was 5.87 percent—almost 150 times what’s expected. The USGS recommended follow-up study; no further research was done.
Also in 2002, the Federal Emergency Management Agency did a study on the steel girders of Building 7. Their research found “intergranular melting” of the girders, with “Swiss cheese-like holes” in the steel and one-inch steel flanges reduced to “razor thinness.” Remember, officially, none of the fires got hot enough to melt steel. The New York Times called FEMA’s discovery the “deepest mystery” of 9/11. FEMA recommended further analysis of the WTC steel. None was done.
Now we’re not talking about “theory” here. We’re talking about cold, hard physical evidence, as reported in official US government documents. So here’s the quiz: do you think those follow-up studies should be done?
If your answer is yes, you’re a 9/11 truther. Welcome to the oddball club.
*Links to both of the reports mentioned here can be found in David Ray Griffin’s excellent article, “Left-leaning despisers of the truth movement: Do you really believe in miracles?” at:
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=20039
--Michael Hasty
Both Constitution Party candidate Jeff Becker and Mountain Party candidate Jesse Johnson have made public statements questioning the official story of the events of September 11th. Becker features his skepticism at his official website; Jesse Johnson is apparently so embarrassed about having been associated with 9/11 truth in an AP story in the Charleston Gazette that he doesn’t even list it in his press clips. But he does have a video endorsement at the top of his page from former US Senator Mike Gravel, a noted 9/11 truther (who doesn’t mention it in the video); and the national Green Party, with which the Mountain Party is now affiliated, has re-opening the 9/11 investigation in its platform.
You can see why Jesse is playing down his association with truthers, in the reaction that Jeff Becker got when he brought up the destruction of World Trade Center Building 7 and other anomalies in the official story during the debate. Everybody looked at him like he’d just cut a piece of really smelly cheese, and then proceeded to ignore everything he’d said. It was my one moment of hope in the debate that Jesse would, having been passed the opportunity, step up to the 9/11 plate. But he failed. I’m voting for him, anyway, because he’s still the closest candidate to me, ideologically. I’m a Mountain Party member. But it was a disappointment, however smart it may have played strategically.
As you can imagine, my heart went out to Jeff Becker, the very portrait of the courageous nerd as he plunged ahead with his suspicions, transparently aware of the disapproval of all the establishment types, politician and journalist alike, sitting with him there on the podium. Being a 9/11 truther myself, I’m used to being the oddball in the room. The concept of “conspiracy theory,” invented by the media after the JFK assassination to ridicule the growing skepticism among the populace about the credibility of the Warren Report, has proven to be one of the most durable and successful psychological operations ever launched against the American public. The rigid censorship of corporate media, where 80 percent of Americans still get their news, keeps any real questions about what scholar Peter Dale Scott calls America’s “Deep State”—the nexus of finance, intelligence and the criminal underworld—safely enclosed in the conspiracy ghetto—just another eccentric subculture in the national cavalcade of pre-apocalyptic weirdness.
But given the fact that the only consensus in the 9/11 truth movement is the call for a new investigation, that broad a definition of the movement includes most Americans. You can test this on yourself by taking the following quiz*:
All researchers of the destruction of the World Trade Center, official and skeptic alike, agree that the fires in the WTC never got hot enough to melt steel. Yet in early 2002, the US Geological Survey released a report which included an analysis of the WTC dust by RJ Lee Associates, which found that, whereas the dust from a normal office fire contains 0.04 percent of iron “microspheres,” formed by the propulsion of molten metal through the air (you’d expect a little of this phenomenon in every fire), the percentage of iron microspheres in the WTC dust was 5.87 percent—almost 150 times what’s expected. The USGS recommended follow-up study; no further research was done.
Also in 2002, the Federal Emergency Management Agency did a study on the steel girders of Building 7. Their research found “intergranular melting” of the girders, with “Swiss cheese-like holes” in the steel and one-inch steel flanges reduced to “razor thinness.” Remember, officially, none of the fires got hot enough to melt steel. The New York Times called FEMA’s discovery the “deepest mystery” of 9/11. FEMA recommended further analysis of the WTC steel. None was done.
Now we’re not talking about “theory” here. We’re talking about cold, hard physical evidence, as reported in official US government documents. So here’s the quiz: do you think those follow-up studies should be done?
If your answer is yes, you’re a 9/11 truther. Welcome to the oddball club.
*Links to both of the reports mentioned here can be found in David Ray Griffin’s excellent article, “Left-leaning despisers of the truth movement: Do you really believe in miracles?” at:
http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=20039
--Michael Hasty
Monday, November 1, 2010
Election controversy
This account of a local Tea Party meeting last Friday night comes from Tom Lewis, a Democratic activist. Since it’s so inflammatory, and comes just before the election, I asked Rob Wolford to send me his version of the events. He didn’t have time to write anything, but characterized Tom’s piece as “inaccurate.” About the only thing he agreed on was that Mitch Davis, Democratic candidate for state delegate, spoke last at the meeting.
I decided to post this, late as it is, because there has been some justifiable complaining from Democrats about Mitch’s treatment by the Review, and this provides some context in answering Commissioner Bob Hott’s accusations in last week’s paper. Since I wasn’t at the Tea Party meeting, I can’t make any judgment, but anyone with more information is welcome to comment. Comments will be deleted for incivility. -MH
(Romney WV October 30, 2010) -- Hampshire County Republicans continued a strident, last-minute counterattack against the candidacy of Democrat Mitch Davis last night at a forum sponsored by the local Tea Party affiliate, "We the People of Hampshire County." Davis is a candidate for the 50th House of Delegates District now represented by Republican Ruth Rowan.
The counterattack began on Tuesday, when Republican County Commissioner Bob Hott, during an official meeting of the county commission, attacked Davis for not being truthful in a campaign statement listing Davis's contributions to the county over many years. Hott's rant, which misrepresented Davis's statements, was run verbatim in the Hampshire Review in the last newspaper to appear before the election. The newspaper made no attempt to contact Davis for his reaction to Hott's misstatements.
The counterattack continued Friday night when Mrs. Rowan's son-in-law and campaign manager, Rob Wolford, asked every candidate who spoke (until he was stopped by the master of ceremonies) to comment on what he said were lies by Davis.
By lot, Davis was the last speaker of the evening. Wolford asked him for an explanation of his statement, but as Davis began to speak, Wolford, Ruth Rowan herself and her husband Tom Rowan began shouting at Davis, refusing to let him speak. (Meanwhile, members of the Tea Party listened to Davis respectfully and expressed their disapproval of the Rowans' tactics.) Eventually, when order was restored, Davis said he stands behind every statement he has made about helping the county in various ways, and offered to provide anyone who contacts him for details with confirmation of each one, along with many that were not in the published statement.
Davis's accomplishments, as published in the Cumberland Times-News and the Weekender, are:
In recent years, Mitch has become known as the "go-to guy" when it comes to making sure Hampshire County gets what it needs from the state government. In recent years he has played a major role in:
· Moving the $2.5 million Interconnector Project -- the sewer and water line from the Hampshire County High School to the Romney treatment plant -- from number 67 on the state's list of projects to be funded up to number 14, and assuring that the funding would be 100 per cent of the amount applied for;
· Persuading the Hampshire Building Authority to apply for, and then making sure it received, an energy conservation grant of $200 thousand toward the remodeling of the old county jail;
· Getting state money for two pickup trucks for the Central Hampshire County Public Service District;
· Obtaining half the funding to replace the roof on the Hampshire County Senior Center;
· Getting the Capon Bridge Rescue Squad the money to pave its parking lot;
· Arranging a grant of $15,000 for the Capon Springs Volunteer Fire Department and Rescue Squad to get the trailer they needed to transport their cascade (breathing-air supply) system;
· Facilitating a meeting of Governor Manchin with representatives of Valley Health System and the Hampshire Memorial Hospital at a time when the deal leading to the sale of the hospital and the building of a new facility was in jeopardy (the meeting resolved the problems).
"You didn't see any pictures in the paper when these things got done," Mitch says, "because I didn't want credit then and I'm not looking for credit now. All I want is a chance to get more things done for Hampshire and Mineral Counties."
The Republican counterattack has had the effect of bringing to many peoples' attention the fact that Mitch Davis, as a private citizen, has a remarkable track record of getting things done for his county, while Mrs, Rowan's six-year record is one of doing nothing much.
--Tom Lewis
I decided to post this, late as it is, because there has been some justifiable complaining from Democrats about Mitch’s treatment by the Review, and this provides some context in answering Commissioner Bob Hott’s accusations in last week’s paper. Since I wasn’t at the Tea Party meeting, I can’t make any judgment, but anyone with more information is welcome to comment. Comments will be deleted for incivility. -MH
(Romney WV October 30, 2010) -- Hampshire County Republicans continued a strident, last-minute counterattack against the candidacy of Democrat Mitch Davis last night at a forum sponsored by the local Tea Party affiliate, "We the People of Hampshire County." Davis is a candidate for the 50th House of Delegates District now represented by Republican Ruth Rowan.
The counterattack began on Tuesday, when Republican County Commissioner Bob Hott, during an official meeting of the county commission, attacked Davis for not being truthful in a campaign statement listing Davis's contributions to the county over many years. Hott's rant, which misrepresented Davis's statements, was run verbatim in the Hampshire Review in the last newspaper to appear before the election. The newspaper made no attempt to contact Davis for his reaction to Hott's misstatements.
The counterattack continued Friday night when Mrs. Rowan's son-in-law and campaign manager, Rob Wolford, asked every candidate who spoke (until he was stopped by the master of ceremonies) to comment on what he said were lies by Davis.
By lot, Davis was the last speaker of the evening. Wolford asked him for an explanation of his statement, but as Davis began to speak, Wolford, Ruth Rowan herself and her husband Tom Rowan began shouting at Davis, refusing to let him speak. (Meanwhile, members of the Tea Party listened to Davis respectfully and expressed their disapproval of the Rowans' tactics.) Eventually, when order was restored, Davis said he stands behind every statement he has made about helping the county in various ways, and offered to provide anyone who contacts him for details with confirmation of each one, along with many that were not in the published statement.
Davis's accomplishments, as published in the Cumberland Times-News and the Weekender, are:
In recent years, Mitch has become known as the "go-to guy" when it comes to making sure Hampshire County gets what it needs from the state government. In recent years he has played a major role in:
· Moving the $2.5 million Interconnector Project -- the sewer and water line from the Hampshire County High School to the Romney treatment plant -- from number 67 on the state's list of projects to be funded up to number 14, and assuring that the funding would be 100 per cent of the amount applied for;
· Persuading the Hampshire Building Authority to apply for, and then making sure it received, an energy conservation grant of $200 thousand toward the remodeling of the old county jail;
· Getting state money for two pickup trucks for the Central Hampshire County Public Service District;
· Obtaining half the funding to replace the roof on the Hampshire County Senior Center;
· Getting the Capon Bridge Rescue Squad the money to pave its parking lot;
· Arranging a grant of $15,000 for the Capon Springs Volunteer Fire Department and Rescue Squad to get the trailer they needed to transport their cascade (breathing-air supply) system;
· Facilitating a meeting of Governor Manchin with representatives of Valley Health System and the Hampshire Memorial Hospital at a time when the deal leading to the sale of the hospital and the building of a new facility was in jeopardy (the meeting resolved the problems).
"You didn't see any pictures in the paper when these things got done," Mitch says, "because I didn't want credit then and I'm not looking for credit now. All I want is a chance to get more things done for Hampshire and Mineral Counties."
The Republican counterattack has had the effect of bringing to many peoples' attention the fact that Mitch Davis, as a private citizen, has a remarkable track record of getting things done for his county, while Mrs, Rowan's six-year record is one of doing nothing much.
--Tom Lewis
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