During my unsuccessful campaign for Delegate to the West Virginia State Legislature, I met many young people who were working for or supporting Bernie Sanders. I admired their idealism, which reminded me of the Gene McCarthy people in 1968. I support Bernie Sanders for President, so we became friends.
I recently posted an article on Facebook from American Prospect by Harold Meyerson suggesting that the "Bernie Bros" step back and let Hillary Clinton work against Donald Trump. He is surprised that Sanders supporters say they won't vote for Clinton, thus handing the election to Trump. Meyerson says he is a Sanders supporter and believes in "Socialist Democracy," but that Sanders has no chance to win the nomination, and we must turn our attention to the general election.
I have friends, very close friends, in fact, who are Hillary Clinton fans, although I am not one of them. I respect their reasons for supporting Clinton. I know people who are Trump supporters. I have generally unfollowed them on Facebook, or avoid being around them. Still, the outpouring of support for Trump, particularly in West Virginia, is understandable. People like Jeb Bush or Mitt Romney talking about how tax cuts for the very rich will help everyone, well, no one can fall for that anymore. And most people, even economic conservatives, are not as crazy or as personally unlikable as Ted Cruz. Trump is outgoing and has a message of hope. His comments about women, immigrants and Moslems has scared off support from just about anyone in the Jewish community. The cheers he got at AIPAC show how out of touch that organization is. Jewish clergy of every stripe have denounced Trump's stand on immigration.
Meyerson's article sparked a not-typical firestorm on my Facebook feed, between the Clinton lovers, those who will vote for her because they see Trump as the biggest threat to the country, and the Sanders people who said they will vote for the Green Party or sit out the presidential race. They claim to be revolutionaries who will not settle for the status quo.
The most influential factor in which side people were on was age. People my age were in the Hillary camp, or better-Hiilary-than Donald category. People under thirty were the revolutionaries, willing to go down in flames for Bernie Sanders' cause.
I probably would have voted for Hubert Humphrey in 1968, if the vote had been extended to nineteen year olds at that time. I started that year as a McCarthy supporter, but I became a Robert Kennedy supporter when he entered the race. Kennedy spoke at Johns Hopkins that spring, where I was a freshman. His assassination, never really fully investigated, and with an official story full of holes, left me with psychic scars that have not healed, and a deep distrust of our government. I also heard Spiro Agnew that year at Towson State. He was an ignorant bigoted clown. It was inconceivable to me that he could ever be vice-president.
When the Sanders people say that Clinton has engaged in dirty tricks, like flooding Sanders websites with porn so the sites would have to be taken down, or claim that she is beholden to big banks, or to Gulf State oligarchs and Saudi princes, I just shrug and say "So, what's new?" Back in 2008, I said (probably over breakfast with Joe) that we might get some sort of social justice from Obama, but we were never going to get economic justice. And in fact, Obama eventually came out in favor of gay rights, and has run an inclusive administration. He has tried to bring people together (a thankless and impossible task). Still, he appointed Timothy Geithner, of the International Monetary Fund, as Treasury Secretary, and allowed big banks to gain back, and even surpass the power they had before the 2008 crash.
I am with my peers. I will support Hillary Clinton for President, knowing all the negatives about her. At the Democratic Convention in Charleston next month, I will still support Bernie Sanders. My goal now will be to stop Trump. None of our choices for President are good.
Maybe one day we will get economic fairness, probably not this year. I'll settle for maintaining the social progress we have made in the last eight years, because I don't have a choice.
Thursday, May 26, 2016
Thursday, May 19, 2016
Caution: Partisan Political Rant
I suppose I ran for office because I couldn't stand the lies, bigotry and stupidity we were getting from our elected officials in West Virginia. I was told I didn't "understand" West Virginia. During the campaign, I met a group of old (my age) hippies, brainy college professors, and the smarter class of college students and recent grads, most either from here or who have resided here for decades. Not knowing many people in town, not having the strength to go door-to-door, not advertising on the radio or in the newspaper, I still got twenty-five percent of the Democratic votes in our primary. The final tab was 3,971 for me. People, even those who warned me against running, now say I should consider running again in two years. I might.
Many people in West Virginia have health insurance through the Affordable Care Act. West Virginians For Affordable Health Care points out that "more than two dozen hospitals saved $265 million" by treating people who now have health insurance. Before the ACA, the hospitals had to write this money off as a loss. And yet our Republican Junior Senator, Shelley Moore Capito, has voted a few dozen times to repeal the ACA. Why? Our recent "non-partisan" election for a state Supreme Court justice was won by Beth Walker, with half a million dollars in ads from the Republican Governor's Association and Blue Cross/Blue Shield. For some reason, our nation's largest private healthcare provider supports Republicans. Los Angeles School District pays for my Medicare supplement and for Joe's insurance through Blue Cross. We don't have a choice, living outside of California, unless we lay out quite a bit of money for other insurance. I'm thinking about it.
Chris Regan, Vice Chair of West Virginia's Democratic Party, has a blog called "Home Yesterday" (www.homeyesterday.com) In an April 13 post, he wonders how Peabody Coal, following in the steps of other coal companies, has declared bankruptcy, gotten out of its pension and health care obligations, and given their CEO, who already makes ten million dollars annual salary, a bonus of several more million. He calls it "the looting of West Virginia."
Meanwhile, our state Attorney General, Patrick Morrisey, is fighting the Obama administration''s attempts to shield gender non-conforming and trans students from being forced to use a bathroom not appropriate to their appearance or identity. He and many so-called religious conservatives are up in arms, not about bathrooms, apparently, but the fact that there are trans students at schools.
What is the relationship between coal bankruptcies, the Affordable Health Care Act ( Obamacare) and trans people in the bathroom? This: Theft is against the Bible. A CEO, receiving millions of dollars for his work, who takes away pensions and health insurance from people who have worked- worked hard and at great risk in the case of coal miners- and gives himself and other executives millions more in bonuses, is a thief. He should be in prison. Where is the outrage among religious conservatives about this? And why are people not outraged that healthcare is considered a privilege for those who can afford it, and not a right for everyone? The ACA was a compromise to let everyone buy insurance.
The outrage is in the presidential campaigns of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. The important difference is that Trump is a phony and Sanders is the real deal. The outrage is why the favorite of the Republican elite, Jeb Bush, couldn't get traction, and why Hillary Clinton, despite her traditional liberal credentials, is having such a hard time winning the Democratic nomination. Trump says he will put coal miners back to work (at lower pay and with no benefits, no doubt, if he can even do that). Sanders will try to limit executive compensation, find new work for miners and protect workers' benefits. The anti-Bernie people say "He can't do it." Maybe, but no one else will even try.
Here in West Virginia, there is no state budget for July 1. By law, the budget must be balanced. Governor Tomblin called the legislature back into session this week. As of Thursday morning, they have done nothing. Most of our Republicans have signed Grover Norquist's "No New Taxes" pledge.
Meanwhile, the coal moguls, including Bob Murray, who doesn't live in West Virginia, are demanding a cut in the coal severance tax. He and another coal mogul, the lately jailed Don Blankenship, are supporters of many of our Republican delegates. One might be tempted to say that our Congressperson David McKinley, is a whole owned subsidiary of the coal companies.
Meanwhile, the state is bleeding money and population. We will likely lose a congressman in the next census due to the state's declining population. Even in our temple, we will lose four families this summer. The state has a scholarship for in-state students, called "Promise." With no guarantee that these scholarships will be available in the fall, our smartest students are making plans to go elsewhere. Most will not be back.
My own life now is good. Joe and I have friends here. We are both popular teachers at Life-Long Learning, all our students over fifty and most past seventy.. Joe's current six-week class was oversubscribed and people had to get on a waiting list. We like it here. "Going back" is not an option. Still, should Tree of Life close, or get tired of Rabbi Joe, should we find ourselves victims of discrimination, we have the option of leaving. What happens a generation from now should not be our problem, but I, like Bernie Sanders, eight years my senior, want the world and West Virginia to be a more just, equitable and free place. I'll be out working for Mike Manypenny for Congress and Doug Reynolds for Attorney General this year, attending West Virginia's Democratic Convention in Charleston in a few weeks as a Sanders vote, and supporting my fellow Democrats for Delegate and State Senator. I'm not done yet.
Many people in West Virginia have health insurance through the Affordable Care Act. West Virginians For Affordable Health Care points out that "more than two dozen hospitals saved $265 million" by treating people who now have health insurance. Before the ACA, the hospitals had to write this money off as a loss. And yet our Republican Junior Senator, Shelley Moore Capito, has voted a few dozen times to repeal the ACA. Why? Our recent "non-partisan" election for a state Supreme Court justice was won by Beth Walker, with half a million dollars in ads from the Republican Governor's Association and Blue Cross/Blue Shield. For some reason, our nation's largest private healthcare provider supports Republicans. Los Angeles School District pays for my Medicare supplement and for Joe's insurance through Blue Cross. We don't have a choice, living outside of California, unless we lay out quite a bit of money for other insurance. I'm thinking about it.
Chris Regan, Vice Chair of West Virginia's Democratic Party, has a blog called "Home Yesterday" (www.homeyesterday.com) In an April 13 post, he wonders how Peabody Coal, following in the steps of other coal companies, has declared bankruptcy, gotten out of its pension and health care obligations, and given their CEO, who already makes ten million dollars annual salary, a bonus of several more million. He calls it "the looting of West Virginia."
Meanwhile, our state Attorney General, Patrick Morrisey, is fighting the Obama administration''s attempts to shield gender non-conforming and trans students from being forced to use a bathroom not appropriate to their appearance or identity. He and many so-called religious conservatives are up in arms, not about bathrooms, apparently, but the fact that there are trans students at schools.
What is the relationship between coal bankruptcies, the Affordable Health Care Act ( Obamacare) and trans people in the bathroom? This: Theft is against the Bible. A CEO, receiving millions of dollars for his work, who takes away pensions and health insurance from people who have worked- worked hard and at great risk in the case of coal miners- and gives himself and other executives millions more in bonuses, is a thief. He should be in prison. Where is the outrage among religious conservatives about this? And why are people not outraged that healthcare is considered a privilege for those who can afford it, and not a right for everyone? The ACA was a compromise to let everyone buy insurance.
The outrage is in the presidential campaigns of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. The important difference is that Trump is a phony and Sanders is the real deal. The outrage is why the favorite of the Republican elite, Jeb Bush, couldn't get traction, and why Hillary Clinton, despite her traditional liberal credentials, is having such a hard time winning the Democratic nomination. Trump says he will put coal miners back to work (at lower pay and with no benefits, no doubt, if he can even do that). Sanders will try to limit executive compensation, find new work for miners and protect workers' benefits. The anti-Bernie people say "He can't do it." Maybe, but no one else will even try.
Here in West Virginia, there is no state budget for July 1. By law, the budget must be balanced. Governor Tomblin called the legislature back into session this week. As of Thursday morning, they have done nothing. Most of our Republicans have signed Grover Norquist's "No New Taxes" pledge.
Meanwhile, the coal moguls, including Bob Murray, who doesn't live in West Virginia, are demanding a cut in the coal severance tax. He and another coal mogul, the lately jailed Don Blankenship, are supporters of many of our Republican delegates. One might be tempted to say that our Congressperson David McKinley, is a whole owned subsidiary of the coal companies.
Meanwhile, the state is bleeding money and population. We will likely lose a congressman in the next census due to the state's declining population. Even in our temple, we will lose four families this summer. The state has a scholarship for in-state students, called "Promise." With no guarantee that these scholarships will be available in the fall, our smartest students are making plans to go elsewhere. Most will not be back.
My own life now is good. Joe and I have friends here. We are both popular teachers at Life-Long Learning, all our students over fifty and most past seventy.. Joe's current six-week class was oversubscribed and people had to get on a waiting list. We like it here. "Going back" is not an option. Still, should Tree of Life close, or get tired of Rabbi Joe, should we find ourselves victims of discrimination, we have the option of leaving. What happens a generation from now should not be our problem, but I, like Bernie Sanders, eight years my senior, want the world and West Virginia to be a more just, equitable and free place. I'll be out working for Mike Manypenny for Congress and Doug Reynolds for Attorney General this year, attending West Virginia's Democratic Convention in Charleston in a few weeks as a Sanders vote, and supporting my fellow Democrats for Delegate and State Senator. I'm not done yet.
Thursday, May 12, 2016
The Last of the Campaign
Bernie Sanders came to speak in Morgantown last week before the primary. At seventy-four, he had traveled several hundred miles to speak at three different events in West Virginia. This was the last, a campaign rally at Morgantown Event Center, a barn of a space at the south end of downtown. It was raining on and off, not raining when I left the house just after five. I walked to the PRT, the driverless cars that get West Virginia University students from one campus to another, and for those of us nearby, an opportunity to go downtown for fifty cents with no traffic or parking fees. I walked from our house less than a mile to Medical Center station, the last of five. In a few minutes, I was downtown and walked the last half mile or so to the Event Center. There was security with metal detectors at the entrance, and a line almost completely around the building. People of all ages were there, some with children, most dressed in the typically scruffy style of West Virginia, a few more dressed up. People were peaceful and in a good mood, even as the wait to get in extended well beyond the seven P.M. starting time, and rain showers poured down, on and off.
Bernie sounded tired at first, but once he was warmed up, he preached like the best of them. I can't quote him exactly, but his point was that there is plenty of money in the United States, enough to feed everyone, pay everyone a decent wage, provide a college education at public colleges to everyone, and make sure everyone has free healthcare. How to pay for it? Cut loopholes for corporations, tax overseas income, stop "inversions," tax higher income for Social Security. He said that six families have most of the country's wealth. He talked about African-Americans, residents from Latin America, equality for women and choice, climate change, and, yes, gay rights. He spoke for nearly an hour and a half. He had more energy than most of us, who were standing. I got a ride home with a friend in town.
There was no Sunday school this week at Tree of Life because of Mother's Day (started in West Virginia, just south of here, near Grafton). I convinced Joe to ditch his schedule of nothing but work and go with me to Butler County, Pennsylvania, my county to visit in May. I have not yet made it to Butler County, Ohio, April's county. This is a heavily Republican county just north of Pittsburgh. The city of Butler is on Connoquenessing Creek. lined with abandoned factories and mills. The town is pretty, with a neighborhood of grand late 19th and early 20th century homes just north of downtown. Jeeps were built in Butler at the start of World War II, in an area being redeveloped for shopping, including a K-Mart. It looked to me like a town that time has passed, and I can see why people would be angry. I wish people there would vote for Bernie Sanders, but I imagine the county will go heavily for Donald Trump.
My cousin Georgeann came from New York Monday, flying in to Pittsburgh. She missed the bus from downtown Pittsburgh, so Joe and I drove to Pittsburgh to fetch her, and had a lovely dinner in the Cultural District in downtown Pittsburgh.
I spent Election Day showing Georgeann Morgantown. It was raining, so we headed to the mall, where I bought new shoes with her help. She kept asking if I was nervous. I guess I wasn't. The election was out of my control. We saw Evan Hansen, one of the candidates in my race, twice on street corners with other people, waving his signs around in the drizzly weather. We stopped by our local polling place, where a young man with a "Trump" sign was standing on the edge of the parking lot, which was full. We picked up Joe and had dinner at Ali Baba, a fine Middle Eastern restaurant at Morgantown airport. It was not crowded on a Tuesday night. We watched a plane come in, which doesn't happen often.
Polls closed at 7:30, and after 8 we drove to the county courthouse. No one was there. Votes were counted at Mountaineer Mall, the mostly-empty mall south of town, where OLLI has classes. I didn't know to go there, so we headed to the Bernie volunteer party at the Ramada Inn's bar, south of Morgantown. We all watched the results. Bernie Sanders took every county in West Virginia. I was happy with that. The results in my race were less good. I came in last of eight candidates, one hundred fifty votes below the next closest candidate. Still, I had over 3,900 votes, so it wasn't a total loss. We left about ten, and I was up until 12:30, looking at election commentary on Facebook and Twitter.
People are upset that Jim Justice, a coal mine owner and the wealthiest man in the state, won the Democratic primary for Governor, Beth Walker, a right-winger in the Scalia mode, supported by the coal industry and with millions spent in her behalf by the Republican party in her "non-partisan" race, was elected to the state supreme court. Even some of the candidates who won in our district are considered party hacks, meaning there might not be any important change in West Virginia politics.
I'm glad I ran, happy to meet many new people of what passes for a leftist political bent in this country today. I got my message out about how it is not acceptable to demonize LGBT people; I stood up for teachers, WVU employees and unions generally. Although the paper says I got 3.2% of the vote, my sister Robin pointed out how that number is incorrect, because people could vote for five people in my race. I figure the correct number is 26%, nearly 4,000 of 15,000 voters.
Will I do this again? I'm living in the present for now. We'll see what the future brings.
Bernie sounded tired at first, but once he was warmed up, he preached like the best of them. I can't quote him exactly, but his point was that there is plenty of money in the United States, enough to feed everyone, pay everyone a decent wage, provide a college education at public colleges to everyone, and make sure everyone has free healthcare. How to pay for it? Cut loopholes for corporations, tax overseas income, stop "inversions," tax higher income for Social Security. He said that six families have most of the country's wealth. He talked about African-Americans, residents from Latin America, equality for women and choice, climate change, and, yes, gay rights. He spoke for nearly an hour and a half. He had more energy than most of us, who were standing. I got a ride home with a friend in town.
There was no Sunday school this week at Tree of Life because of Mother's Day (started in West Virginia, just south of here, near Grafton). I convinced Joe to ditch his schedule of nothing but work and go with me to Butler County, Pennsylvania, my county to visit in May. I have not yet made it to Butler County, Ohio, April's county. This is a heavily Republican county just north of Pittsburgh. The city of Butler is on Connoquenessing Creek. lined with abandoned factories and mills. The town is pretty, with a neighborhood of grand late 19th and early 20th century homes just north of downtown. Jeeps were built in Butler at the start of World War II, in an area being redeveloped for shopping, including a K-Mart. It looked to me like a town that time has passed, and I can see why people would be angry. I wish people there would vote for Bernie Sanders, but I imagine the county will go heavily for Donald Trump.
My cousin Georgeann came from New York Monday, flying in to Pittsburgh. She missed the bus from downtown Pittsburgh, so Joe and I drove to Pittsburgh to fetch her, and had a lovely dinner in the Cultural District in downtown Pittsburgh.
I spent Election Day showing Georgeann Morgantown. It was raining, so we headed to the mall, where I bought new shoes with her help. She kept asking if I was nervous. I guess I wasn't. The election was out of my control. We saw Evan Hansen, one of the candidates in my race, twice on street corners with other people, waving his signs around in the drizzly weather. We stopped by our local polling place, where a young man with a "Trump" sign was standing on the edge of the parking lot, which was full. We picked up Joe and had dinner at Ali Baba, a fine Middle Eastern restaurant at Morgantown airport. It was not crowded on a Tuesday night. We watched a plane come in, which doesn't happen often.
Polls closed at 7:30, and after 8 we drove to the county courthouse. No one was there. Votes were counted at Mountaineer Mall, the mostly-empty mall south of town, where OLLI has classes. I didn't know to go there, so we headed to the Bernie volunteer party at the Ramada Inn's bar, south of Morgantown. We all watched the results. Bernie Sanders took every county in West Virginia. I was happy with that. The results in my race were less good. I came in last of eight candidates, one hundred fifty votes below the next closest candidate. Still, I had over 3,900 votes, so it wasn't a total loss. We left about ten, and I was up until 12:30, looking at election commentary on Facebook and Twitter.
People are upset that Jim Justice, a coal mine owner and the wealthiest man in the state, won the Democratic primary for Governor, Beth Walker, a right-winger in the Scalia mode, supported by the coal industry and with millions spent in her behalf by the Republican party in her "non-partisan" race, was elected to the state supreme court. Even some of the candidates who won in our district are considered party hacks, meaning there might not be any important change in West Virginia politics.
I'm glad I ran, happy to meet many new people of what passes for a leftist political bent in this country today. I got my message out about how it is not acceptable to demonize LGBT people; I stood up for teachers, WVU employees and unions generally. Although the paper says I got 3.2% of the vote, my sister Robin pointed out how that number is incorrect, because people could vote for five people in my race. I figure the correct number is 26%, nearly 4,000 of 15,000 voters.
Will I do this again? I'm living in the present for now. We'll see what the future brings.
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| Waiting in the rain to see Bernie Sanders |
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| In the hall |
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| Bernie Sanders |
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| Saxonburg, PA at the home of John Roebling, who designed the Brooklyn Bridge. A replica is next to the house. |
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| Butler, PA. 1895 monument to Union soldiers in the Civil War. |
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| Photo by Benyamin Cohen with my sign in front of his house. |
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| Photo by Georgeann on Election Day. |
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| With Joe at the Bernie Sanders party after the election |
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| Watching Bernie win |
Thursday, May 5, 2016
The Radio Interview
I always wondered what I would do if asked to work for Fox, or asked to do an interview on Fox News. I thought I wouldn't do it. Then I got a call from Sunshine Wiles, one of the hosts of the morning talk show on our local Fox affiliate radio station, WAJR, owned by the same people who own our local newspaper, The Dominion-Post.
What people told me is "You have to do it . Everyone listens to them." So I agreed to do it, and we set up Monday, May 2 at 9:30 for a ten-minute interview, no phone calls. I could have called in the interview, but I really wanted to see the hosts, Sunshine Wiles and Kyle Wiggs, in person, in the studio. They interviewed two other candidates that morning before me: John Lucas and Barbara Evans Fleischauer, the only Democratic incumbent.
We were a bit late getting started. I was there early due to a leftover L.A. paranoia about being held up in traffic forever. That could happen here, too, even though Morgantown is tiny in comparison to Los Angeles.
I thought the interview went well. My voice sounded awful, as if I had asthma and acid reflux both destroying my vocal chords. Still, I felt confident about talking off the top of my head. The hosts asked good questions, and gave me time to answer. They were surprised that I would end up in West Virginia after living in so many other more interesting places. It said that I came here because Joe had a job here, and I said that I'm happy here. What I thought but didn't say, is that I was too old, poor and married to stay in L.A. We couldn't have bought a house there, we don't care about bars at this point in our lives, and the rapid gentrification of our old neighborhood in West Hollywood, including tearing down the Trader Joe's on our corner for million-dollar condos, was going to help make Los Angeles unliveable. We both miss our friendships of many years in San Francisco and L.A., I miss the film festivals and the good theaters. I've stopped going to movies at all, because when I read about a movie I like, it's not playing in Morgantown. I keep busy here, but we don't have the network of people and places we had. It was my choice to come here with Joe, and as I said in the interview, I insisted he apply for the job here. I don't regret moving.
I talked about diversity. There is a new Hindu temple in town, a mosque and a synagogue. It's not like the rest of West Virginia. I went so far as to say "People here should understand that everyone in Morgantown is not a straight, white Christian." That might have been over the top.
They interviewed three other Democratic candidates for legislature in our district Tuesday, and the last two Wednesday. I only listened to Barbara and John Lucas. I'm starting to appreciate Donald Trump, saying outrageous things to get attention and having his ratings go up. Last election, four of the five Democrats lost. I felt that people didn't vote for them because they were too cautious, afraid to stand up to the Obama-hating Republicans (which at that point included the United Mine Workers) and embrace liberal values like choice, LGBT rights and guns.
I'm clearly the odd man out, the one with the least experience and lacking any kind of organization. Stiill, I have my fans.
Last week, I told someone in my writing group about what happened in the senior center (see previous blog post). Someone else in the group overheard it, and, enraged, wrote me a note about how awful I was to say that. The gist of it was that he has been polite to me (against his real feelings, apparently) and knows enough people in town, being a descendant of one of the founders of the town in the 1700s and knowing everyone, to cause me real trouble.
I sent back a note apologizing for my rudeness and explaining that my ancestors were not in the United States before 1886, and that my European relatives were all murdered, which is why that guy's stupid comment got under my skin.
What I saw from the note writer is how white privilege works even against other (more-or-less) white people, and why my fellow candidates will talk about being an 11th generation West Virginian. Not important to me, but I guess it is to someone. I'm less important because my ancestry is not here, and if it were, and they were slaves, we would still be less important than the White people here.
I got a note also from a prominent person in town, Jewish, but never seen at temple, who read last week's post and said that he has heard similar anti-Semitic remarks, and is still considered an outsider after more than forty years in Morgantown. Baltimore was a little like that, but in Los Angeles, someone called me "an old-timer" after three years there.
Maybe I'm just paranoid, but attendance at my OLLI class Tuesday ( The Top 40 Hits of 1961) was down from twenty-four to fifteen. Maybe they heard me on the radio.
I missed an event yeaterday for the State Auditor Democratic candidate who is the best of the three running. There was a shiva minyan for the mother of a congregant who died out of town, and I met Joe there and accompanied him to his class after. Being busy doesn't excuse one from observing mitzvot or supporting your spouse in his work.
Tonight, I'm going to see Bernie Sanders here in Morgantown. The city has done nothing about parking, transit or or traffic for this event. The site only holds three thousand people. I'm betting many more come, despite this being finals week at WVU, with many students already gone. It will probably rain all day. Should be fun.
To hear the podcast of my interview, go to wajr.com, go to podcasts all the way down, morning talk May 2. My interview starts at 27:40, or, for comparison, you could listen to the other two candidates.
It wasn't a bad experience for me. I thought Sunshine (her real name, "it was the seventies", she explained) and Kyle were nice to me. They had good questions, and although it looked like it was easy, I know there was a lot of work for them to prepare. Maybe I'll even start listening to their show.
What people told me is "You have to do it . Everyone listens to them." So I agreed to do it, and we set up Monday, May 2 at 9:30 for a ten-minute interview, no phone calls. I could have called in the interview, but I really wanted to see the hosts, Sunshine Wiles and Kyle Wiggs, in person, in the studio. They interviewed two other candidates that morning before me: John Lucas and Barbara Evans Fleischauer, the only Democratic incumbent.
We were a bit late getting started. I was there early due to a leftover L.A. paranoia about being held up in traffic forever. That could happen here, too, even though Morgantown is tiny in comparison to Los Angeles.
I thought the interview went well. My voice sounded awful, as if I had asthma and acid reflux both destroying my vocal chords. Still, I felt confident about talking off the top of my head. The hosts asked good questions, and gave me time to answer. They were surprised that I would end up in West Virginia after living in so many other more interesting places. It said that I came here because Joe had a job here, and I said that I'm happy here. What I thought but didn't say, is that I was too old, poor and married to stay in L.A. We couldn't have bought a house there, we don't care about bars at this point in our lives, and the rapid gentrification of our old neighborhood in West Hollywood, including tearing down the Trader Joe's on our corner for million-dollar condos, was going to help make Los Angeles unliveable. We both miss our friendships of many years in San Francisco and L.A., I miss the film festivals and the good theaters. I've stopped going to movies at all, because when I read about a movie I like, it's not playing in Morgantown. I keep busy here, but we don't have the network of people and places we had. It was my choice to come here with Joe, and as I said in the interview, I insisted he apply for the job here. I don't regret moving.
I talked about diversity. There is a new Hindu temple in town, a mosque and a synagogue. It's not like the rest of West Virginia. I went so far as to say "People here should understand that everyone in Morgantown is not a straight, white Christian." That might have been over the top.
They interviewed three other Democratic candidates for legislature in our district Tuesday, and the last two Wednesday. I only listened to Barbara and John Lucas. I'm starting to appreciate Donald Trump, saying outrageous things to get attention and having his ratings go up. Last election, four of the five Democrats lost. I felt that people didn't vote for them because they were too cautious, afraid to stand up to the Obama-hating Republicans (which at that point included the United Mine Workers) and embrace liberal values like choice, LGBT rights and guns.
I'm clearly the odd man out, the one with the least experience and lacking any kind of organization. Stiill, I have my fans.
Last week, I told someone in my writing group about what happened in the senior center (see previous blog post). Someone else in the group overheard it, and, enraged, wrote me a note about how awful I was to say that. The gist of it was that he has been polite to me (against his real feelings, apparently) and knows enough people in town, being a descendant of one of the founders of the town in the 1700s and knowing everyone, to cause me real trouble.
I sent back a note apologizing for my rudeness and explaining that my ancestors were not in the United States before 1886, and that my European relatives were all murdered, which is why that guy's stupid comment got under my skin.
What I saw from the note writer is how white privilege works even against other (more-or-less) white people, and why my fellow candidates will talk about being an 11th generation West Virginian. Not important to me, but I guess it is to someone. I'm less important because my ancestry is not here, and if it were, and they were slaves, we would still be less important than the White people here.
I got a note also from a prominent person in town, Jewish, but never seen at temple, who read last week's post and said that he has heard similar anti-Semitic remarks, and is still considered an outsider after more than forty years in Morgantown. Baltimore was a little like that, but in Los Angeles, someone called me "an old-timer" after three years there.
Maybe I'm just paranoid, but attendance at my OLLI class Tuesday ( The Top 40 Hits of 1961) was down from twenty-four to fifteen. Maybe they heard me on the radio.
I missed an event yeaterday for the State Auditor Democratic candidate who is the best of the three running. There was a shiva minyan for the mother of a congregant who died out of town, and I met Joe there and accompanied him to his class after. Being busy doesn't excuse one from observing mitzvot or supporting your spouse in his work.
Tonight, I'm going to see Bernie Sanders here in Morgantown. The city has done nothing about parking, transit or or traffic for this event. The site only holds three thousand people. I'm betting many more come, despite this being finals week at WVU, with many students already gone. It will probably rain all day. Should be fun.
To hear the podcast of my interview, go to wajr.com, go to podcasts all the way down, morning talk May 2. My interview starts at 27:40, or, for comparison, you could listen to the other two candidates.
It wasn't a bad experience for me. I thought Sunshine (her real name, "it was the seventies", she explained) and Kyle were nice to me. They had good questions, and although it looked like it was easy, I know there was a lot of work for them to prepare. Maybe I'll even start listening to their show.
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