The Morgantowner: 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.