The hike from my crib in Shepherdstown across the university campus, then crossing the bridge over the Potomac and into Maryland today was about as close to perfect as we’ll see on this earthly realm.

The old C & O Canal towpath above the river was well ridden and trod by folks taking care of their bodies.

Deep green leaves fading, beginning to change to their autumn colors. Bright sun shining through soft blue sky and fluffy clouds. A healthy breeze pushed the river’s current. Summer is a memory. Autumn arrives in its amazing stages.

Soon we’ll be layering as they say these days, under the brightest sky of October leaves.

NOVEMBER 3 IS ELECTION DAY

The direction of America will change on November 3.

If Trump, Maga and the Republican Party win, we’ll see a hard, jolting, rightward turn toward ever more corporate control of our economy and our personal financial well-being and more expressive fascist action like stepping up the enemies list prosecutions, crippling labor unions, punishing poor people, punishing people of color, destroying the environment and whole vulnerable communities of humanity. We would also see increasing disrespect of women, gay and trans folks, Black people and Latino folks with an ever larger chunks of the world’s wealth and resources going to fewer and fewer people. We will see how low people can go. The squeeze on the  working class will force more young people and older families into poverty. Trump and Maga won’t stop what they’re doing now. They will intensify, lean hard into their corporatist/fascist agenda.

On the other hand, if the Democrats win the House and pick up seats in the Senate, we will speed the ending of the Iran War which will loosen oil supplies and lower diesel and gas prices. We will end the ridiculous, inflationary tariffs re-opening markets for farm products again, lowering costs of goods on the shelves. The country will focus on the welfare of all Americans. We will step up the fight for women’s rights to full healthcare and for more access to healthcare for everyone.

If we beat the GOP Governor’s legislative team that passed HB 2014, we’ll stop the data centers in West Virginia. 

October 7

Eastern Panhandle AFL-CIO President J.B. Christensen and I doorknocked a neighborhood with Dave Michael’s who’s running for State Delegate from the Inwood area. 

We all need to support Dave. He’s a retired electrical engineer, a Baptist preacher and part time pastor. He’s a conservative Democrat, former union member, still union supporter who lives his faith.

He’s running against about as hateful a person you know. Chris Clagett is the Republican maga racist and misogynist running against Dave Michaels in the 91st district. Clagett on his social media and on Martinsburg radio WRNR admitted his racism:  Clagett has called Black women “worst behaved loud mouths” of any ethnic group. He later modified it to include white women.

As a southern union organizer I saw the Republican Party gain power and votes and win elections in Texas and Georgia defeating Democrats by attacking civil rights.

The foundation of today’s Maga Republican Party is white supremacy. That’s what Make America Great means.

Vote for a better West Virginia and a greater U.S.A.  

He has never explained his conflict with …

People who follow politics in Jefferson County and the Eastern Panhandle know Congressman Riley Moore very well. We have protested in front of Moore’s district office in Martinsburg for over a year and a half.

We know him and his district staff well. We know their disregard for the people from the district and the looks of disgust on the staff faces, the refusal to explain or justify total slavishness to Trump and Maga.

Moore is from a very corrupt Republican family. The patriarch was Arch Moore, disgraced governor who spent time in prison for corruption and illegal politicking.

Little Riley Moore rode Trump’s coattails into the office of Second District West Virginia Congressman.

He has done not one thing to help West Virginia. Or its people. Or the Second District.

Moore is Maga through and through following every hateful move of Maga.

We’ve protested every Thursday morning at Moore’s Martinsburg office these many months because Moore has supported every single priority of this evil, hateful, dangerous, authoritarian, immoral and traitorous act of the most crooked president in history.

Moore claims to hold his Roman Catholic faith as one of his highest priorities. He’s been very welcoming to the new pope, Pope Leo, who has preached, prayed, beseeched and called for Christlike treatment of undocumented immigrants. Riley Moore with his enthusiasm for ICE and their torture and murder of immigrants has never explained his conflict with the teaching of the Church, the teaching of this Pope and Biblical scripture such as Jeremiah 22: 3 in the Old Testament and the consistent teaching of Jesus Christ on treatment of the alien or stranger in Matthew 25: 40.

Without explaining or justifying himself Moore flew to El Salvador to stand in front of men caged like animals in the torture prison called Cecot. He stood like a fool with his thumb turned up in hatred for the prisoners and those deported from the United States.

Back in the Second District our biggest issue is data centers that GOP Governor Pat Morrisey has ordained to be constructed all over West Virginia. Republican, Independents and Democrats hate the data centers and have been organizing against them all year. Republicans are so angry about the data centers that Senator Jim Justice is thinking out loud about running against Morrisey in our next election.

Guess who hasn’t said a word or lifted a finger to help his constituents stop the damn data centers? That’s right, Arch Moore’s grandson, Riley Moore who’s still counting on nepotism.

The most damning vote of Riley Moore’s congressional nothing-burger career is his vote for Trump’s big beautiful bill that cut taxes of the rich by throwing West Virginians off Medicaid and healthcare and endangering financial sustainability of our rural hospitals.

Policy and budget analysts like the West Virginia Center on Budget and Policy have warned that Trump’s big beautiful bill will cause “tens of thousands ” to lose healthcare coverage. The funding cuts take $1 BILLION annually from our state’s rural healthcare system.

Cuts in food and nutrition in SNAP have already taken food from the mouths of 14,000 impoverished and hungry West Virginians.

Thank goodness, there’s a great candidate running against Arch Moore’s grandson. His name is Ace Parsi and, unlike Riley Moore, Ace has been all the district campaigning in person everywhere. Ace has been an active participant in the resistance against the Trump authoritarianism, war and violence and punishing the poor and starving the hungry. Notwithstanding the religion, Ace Parsi acts and talks more like Jesus did 2000 years ago than corrupted Congressman Riley Moore.

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A version of this piece appeared in the “Spirit of Jefferson”, Jefferson County, West Virginia