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Reader amazed by national political scene

“We have met the enemy and they are ours…” Navy Commander Perry wrote the statement in 1813 just after he walloped the Royal Navy during the war of 1812, and sank or captured about a half-dozen British ships in the Battle of Lake Erie. President Trump can do the same thing in November, metaphorically speaking. As I keep saying, I have followed politics since JFK’s election and nothing like what’s happening now has been recorded. It would take at least two Watergates to equal what we’re witnessing now. If Nixon had simply fired a dozen or two people immediately he could ...

Church Women United increases donations to local nonprofits

The Elkins Area Church Women United has great news to share despite the current uncertainty of the pandemic. We would like to inform everyone of our continuing support within our Elkins area community. In the past, we have provided yearly monetary donations to several different local nonprofit agencies through our Holy Week Lenten luncheons supported by 17 different local churches. This year the community was not able to worship and lunch together during Holy Week, so we worried how we could continue to support these different agencies without the luncheon donations. Jane ...

Not wearing masks is maddening to reader

This week I drove my mother home and returned to West Virginia. Along the way, in our neighboring states, I passed through many a door with precautions on state masking laws. Yet inside the stores, neither staff nor customers wore face coverings. In West Virginia I didn’t even see these signs on doors. Folks, it doesn’t count if your nose is out. It certainly doesn’t count if it’s around your neck, as I observed in grocery stores and restaurants and other places of business in West Virginia. I admit that I find masking unflattering, embarrassing and sad, as I’m ...

Washington touted as statuary replacement

Each state is represented by two statues in the National Statuary Hall Collection. West Virginia is represented by Francis Pierpont, the state’s founding father, abolitionist and the only governor of the Restored State of Virginia, and John Keena, a once-popular senator who is now largely unknown. Booker T. Washington was a freed slave, educator and inspirational leader of national historic significance. He spent his formative years and received his earliest education in West Virginia. He was the author of “Up from Slavery” and a founder of the Tuskegee Institute. He would ...

Coronavirus causing problems nationwide

When our president and vice president say we have COVID-19 under control and cases coming down, that is not true. It is just a bald face lie. When it comes to wearing a mask, we are told that to enforce mask wearing would be against our rights. Yet when it comes to seat belts or helmets, that’s OK. What’s the difference? Do they want to stop COVID-9? Or do they want to just kill us off? Just make a law to force all people to wear a mask when out in the public. It is proven that wearing a mask will save lives. School opening Sept. 8 is just to soon. We just can’t make it ...

Coronavirus threatens public education

Thanks to COVID-19, universal public education as we’ve known it in the United States may be dead. Here are just some of the areas of concern: — Parents/kids. Many parents had already been concerned about sending their kids to school where classmates had colds or the flu or something, and now we have COVID-19, which can kill. Will those same concerned parents be willing to send their kids (some with pre-existing conditions such as asthma) to school this fall with COVID-19 lurking? Some will not. They will seek alternatives. Home schooling? Maybe. Private schools that have rigid ...