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Amazing life journey

Senator Stephen B. Elkins, namesake for the town of Elkins and Davis & Elkins College, lived the American dream and an amazing life. Last week’s column described his accomplishments as a young man. Now, the rest of the story. Working together with his father-in-law, Senator Henry Gassaway Davis, Elkins’ West Virginia business interests exploded in the late 19th and early 20th century. Railroads were built, lumber harvested, manufacturing expanded, and coal mines opened. Elkins needed a home closer to business interests. Wanting to be on the bank of the Tygart River, he sent a ...

Socialists’ dumb promises

Socialism is popular! A Pew study reports that more than a third of American adults view it positively. How is this possible? Little has brought more misery — first in the Soviet Union, then in China, Cuba, Nicaragua, now Venezuela ... One reason young people support socialism is because their social media feeds show videos made by popular but economically illiterate people. TikTok star Madeline Pendleton has 1.6 million subscribers. My new video shows her telling them: “Socialism is working better than capitalism 93% of the time!” Where does she get 93%? From a ...

Musk acting fast as Trump’s Macbeth

“If it were done when ‘tis done, then ‘twere well it were done quickly.” — William Shakespeare, “Macbeth” “Quickly” is the key word for Macbeth as he muses before the bloody murder of King Duncan of Scotland. He must do the deed with his dagger by night, while the court sleeps. Act now or not at all. “Quickly” is the passcode for Elon Muck — or Musk — as he acts as henchman for the man who would be king, President Donald Trump. The federal government is under a ruthless siege like thunder, lightning and rain — so swiftly that it’s hard to arrest or even ...

Moving the mountains

As your lone state government reporter here in Charleston, I have to cover both the House of Delegates and state Senate at the same time. Sometimes this means going to one chamber or the other. Sometimes that means having two computers open when two different committees are meeting at the same time. This also means I must prioritize the bills and resolutions I write about. I very rarely write about bills and resolutions that are not taken up by committees in the House and Senate. I joke that I’m the tyrannosaurus rex from Jurassic Park: I respond to movement. Because I do not have ...

Unserious new Republican budget plan

Serious problems should be met with serious solutions. We have serious problems, namely a fast-growing debt and a need to extend some tax cuts in an unforgiving environment where interest rates are high and inflation is rising again. Unfortunately, despite a new mandate, House Republicans have yet to rise to the occasion. Their latest budget blueprint shows that fiscal responsibility vanishes the moment real choices arise. As a reminder, government debt stands at 100% of GDP. It will grow to 117% by 2034 if the tax cuts are allowed to expire as scheduled this year. It was 76.5% when ...

European elites

If you follow these things closely, you may have seen a clip of the chairman of the Munich Security Conference breaking down in tears, unable to speak any further while reflecting on Vice President JD Vance’s speech there. This breakdown is remarkable because the chairman, Christoph Heusgen, is not a minor apparatchik but a sophisticated and knowledgeable official who was former German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s national security adviser from 2005 to 2017. He had a front-row seat to Merkel’s epochal decisions —to shut down nuclear plants in 2011, admit 1 million Muslim male ...