'POVERTY' WITH A VIEW!

26 October 2014, Vol.1, No.72 > ‘POVERTY’ WITH A VIEW!

The POCAHONTAS CRIER

‘When the Righteous succeed the people rejoice,

But when the bad govern, men groan!’ – Proverbs 29:2

[New Email address: pocahontascrier88@gmail.com]

‘POVERTY’ WITH A VIEW!

What’s the main reason most folks after hearing about Pocahontas County actually come to this county?  The many come first for a visit and then a few possibly to stay?  What’s the attraction?  IT’S THE VIEW!  Considered the third largest county in West Virginia, with perhaps the smallest population, and being a rather remote & ‘pristine’ underdeveloped county – until the ‘IDIOTA’ at the DOH cut down the canopy of trees along our roadways!   But a visit here is like stepping back in time when West Virginia used to be known as ‘WILD & WONDERFUL’ instead of the stupid slogan chosen by Joe Manchin III, “Open for Business”!  The only thing open-for-business in this state was Joe’s empty-pockets that were stuffed by Massey Coal with around $50+ Million and now the ‘dirty-oil-tar-sands’ of the Billionaire Kansas Koch Brothers who bought Joe’s Senate-Vote for their Keystone XL Pipeline that will make each brother $100-BILLION EACH!  We guess the Koch Brothers could afford to ‘buy-Joe’ for a couple of million compared to what they will each make – so in that respect, to them…Joe’s a cheap-investment!

Meanwhile no one ever tells anyone BEFORE they arrive in Pocahontas County that THERE IS NO CELL-PHONE SERVICE – they just let the visitors find out for themselves!  And no one tells any visitors that this county is just another TOURIST TRAP with higher than usual prices compared to buying supplies in Virginia BEFORE entering West Virginia!  And no one tells anyone BEFORE they arrive here that ‘poverty & pauperism’ is a ‘way-of-life’ in this county compared to either Greenbrier or Randolph Counties!  After a couple of days stay in the county, however, anyone with Common Sense quickly realizes that there are only TWO KINDS of folks here:  A FEW ‘HAVES’ – AND THE MANY ‘HAVE-NOTS’!  A handful of folks are at the economic-top, the vast majority at the bottom – and only a few in-between!  

Here are some things to consider as we approach the 2014 Mid-Term elections in a few more days!  The propaganda on the corporate-media-channels these days is CONTINUALLY REPEATING the same ‘B.S.’ that nobody likes Obama – or anything that he has tried to accomplish – and therefore the Republicans, thanks to the CORPORATE-FINANCING of BILLIONAIRES like the Koch Brothers will buy-up Congress, and the rich & the super-rich will then control Congress AND THE TEA-PARTY-REPUBLICANS WILL MAKE SURE THAT THERE’S:

          ●  NO INCREASE IN THE MINIMUM-WAGE;

          ●  NO MORE SAFETY-REGULATIONS;

          ●  NO MORE ENVIRONMENTAL-REGULATIONS;

          ●  NO MORE RESTRICTIONS FOR MOVING

              AMERICAN JOBS TO FOREIGN-COUNTRIES;

          ●  NO MORE REGULATIONS ON POLLUTION;

          ●  NO MORE SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS;

          ●  NO MORE MEDICARE OR MEDICAID BENEFITS;

          ●  NO MORE UNEMPLOYMENT BENEFITS;

          ●  NO MORE DISABILITY BENEFITS;

          ●  NO MORE INCREASES FOR VETERAN’S BENEFITS

               …and

          ●  NO MORE OF ANYTHING THAT STANDS BETWEEN

              PUTTING ‘PROFITS BEFORE PEOPLE’ & NO MORE

              SOCIAL SAFETY-NET – since everything will become

              ‘PRIVATIZED’ from schools, hospitals, prisons, and

              Natural Resources such as water, timber, minerals,

              AND PUBLIC LANDS!

If any of you had a chance to watch C-SPAN at any time in the past month, then you would have been able to see the DEBATES in the various States for Governor, Senator, & House of Representatives – and IF SO, then you too were witness to the SAME RHETORIC, SAME SLOGANS, SAME ‘B.S.’ coming from EVERY REPUBLICAN since all Republican candidates for Congress had their Campaigns PAID FOR BY THE BILLIONAIRE KANSAS KOCH BROTHERS!

BUT IF YOU were able to watch C-SPAN then you too knows that the LARGEST APPLAUDS both during and after each debate were GIVEN TO THE DEMOCRAT CANDIDATES – not the Republican-puppets!  And the polling done all around the country is showing that Democrat candidates & challengers are actually a few points AHEAD of their robotic-opponents!  SO THE REPUBLICAN-BILLIONAIRES might get another shock on election night as they did in 2012!  But not to worry – FOX NEWS (the ‘F’-word media) will still be in DENIAL as they have been since 2012!

POCAHONTAS COUNTY = POVERTY & PAUPERISM

WITH A VIEW!

In California, any house, apartment, or condo facing the Pacific Ocean – even ten-miles away – sells at the highest possible amount a person is willing to pay!  Why?  BECAUSE IT HAS A ‘VIEW’!  The same goes in New York City for any apartment, condo, and town-house or hotel room – TOP DOLLAR is paid FOR A ‘VIEW’!  But here in Pocahontas County WE ALL HAVE A VIEW of the panorama of majestic mountains & forest trees, etc. – but the vast majority of the Citizens living here find themselves on a ‘fixed-income’ of POVERTY & PAUPERISM due to MINIMUM-WAGES and NO ECONOMIC EMPLOYMENT OTHER THAN MINIMUM-WAGES!  Thus the vast majority are only a few-dollars away from what they need – and just a few-dollars away from financial-ruin! IT’S CALLED A RUT!  Everyone is just getting by the best they can by ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul’, as the saying goes!

BUT THERE IS HOPE – IF WE ELECT THE

RIGHT COMMISSIONERS!

On the local level BOTH David McLaughlin & William Beard, Jr., Democrat candidates for county commission, believe that FARMING can save & grow this county – BUT IF THAT IS SO – THEN WHY IS POVERTY & PAUPERISM EVERYWHERE YOU LOOK?  It ain’t so in Greenbrier & Randolph counties – there they have lots of new jobs that pay LIVING-WAGES instead of MINIMUM-WAGES!  And for a rural-farming-community to be prosperous – it takes 4 – 5 successful farms to support each local business!  Farmers that are ‘just-getting-by’ themselves are no different than workers in a local-gas-station-convenience-store, or working at Snowshoe / Silver Creek on Minimum-Wages!  There is no MIDDLE-CLASS without LIVING-WAGES, and without a MIDDLE-CLASS there is NO PROSPERITY!  Organized Labor Unions built the Middle-Class from the 1950s during the ‘Eisenhower Era’ until Ronald Reagan began destroying Unions and the Middle-Class in the 1980s until the WALL-STREET-BANKERS took over during the ‘Bush-regime’ and the same has continued with Obama!  We cannot control the international or national economic ups & downs – but we can control our own DESTINY if we…

BUT JUST CONSIDER…

► WHAT IF…Cell-Phone service was brought into this county with long-term jobs to eliminate the high cost & poor service of Frontier Communications?

► WHAT IF…A PURE-WATER-COOP were established to sell the Natural Spring Water and provide a steady NEW INCOME for all those with Natural Springs on their property that runs for more than six-months a year?

► WHAT IF…WIND TURBINES produced Electricity that could be sold to all the counties surrounding Pocahontas, besides providing low-cost Electricity to every household in this county?

Is anyone aware that in GERMANY they are producing so much electricity from WIND & SOLAR that they are actually turning-off their Wind-Turbines until they decide how to distribute the electricity to all parts of their Nation?  And the Germans are so environmentally conscious, that rather than build huge-towers with electric-wires going in every direction, or rather than BURY huge-wires in trenches going in every direction – THE GERMANS ARE BUILDING LOCAL POWER-PLANTS – whereby every town & city will have its OWN POWER SUPPLY on a local level under LOCAL CONTROL via PUBLIC-UTLITY-CORPORATIONS or individual private-owners for their own homes & communities!  Germany does not permit privatization of any Natural Resources since such resources are the Sovereign Property of all Citizens in Common – but Wind Turbines are privatized for individual & COOP use!

And are you aware that Donald Trump had a provision placed in the Snowshoe-RAD proposal that NO ELECTRIC GENERATION could be placed on his Snowshoe-RAD?  That’s how STUPID TRUMP IS since Wind Turbines could generate more capital than any seasonal recreational business or casino!  That’s just one more reason why Snowshoe Mountain, Inc. should have its Charter REVOKED and the resorts turned over to a WORKERS COOP in this county for Daily Operations & the spending of  the PROFITS HERE AT HOME!

THAT’S WHY, as important as this mid-term election is, ordinarily we’d say VOTE STRAIGHT DEMOCRAT to keep the SOCIAL SAFETY NET & MEET the SOCIAL NEEDS of everyone – but since the two Democrat candidates for County Commission are so inept by lacking the knowledge and skills necessary to govern a county –

COMPARED TO THE TWO EXPERIENCED REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES FOR COUNTY COMMISSION – we say

Vote Democrat at every level EXCEPT for County Commission…

For COUNTY COMMISSION:  VOTE FOR…

Charles Wilfong who is perhaps the most experienced and successful farmer this county has ever seen – besides working for all farmers in this state in the leadership of the West Virginia State Farm Bureau…

And,

Norman Lee Alderman who has never stopped trying to benefit the folks of this county in all his various efforts as a school teacher, pastor, former county commissioner, and editor of his powerful non-subscription Website –

< www.pocahontascommentatorplus@blogspot.com >

THAT’S WHY…

On 04 NOVEMBER…there’s no excuse…

 IT’S YOUR CHOICE…

TO CHANGE THINGS FOR THE BETTER!

Just say ‘NO’ to those who want to keep this county in Poverty & Pauperism

– and –

Just say ‘YES’ to real Progress & Prosperity for the future!

On Election Day – YOU have a chance to elect two persons that will always put YOU first!  They know that:

THE GREATER COMMON GOOD ALWAYS COMES BEFORE SELF OR ANY SELF-SERVING SPECIAL INTERESTS!

Keep up to Date – Stay tuned to these Websites:

www.pocahontascommentatorplus@blogspot.com

www.crier88.blogspot.com

   On 04 NOVEMBER it doesn’t matter how you are registered – YOU CAN VOTE for:

CHARLES WILFONG – ND

&

NORMAN LEE ALDERMAN - SD

The Pocahontas Crier is an independent Internet News Service that has now endorsed

two candidates for County Commission

–      CHARLES WILFONG & NORMAN LEE ALDERMAN   –

in addition to providing in depth news reporting on important issues directly affecting the Citizens of Pocahontas County!

Email comments & suggestions to: pocahontascrier88@gmail.com  

The Pocahontas Crier is a free, non-subscription,

Internet News Service meant for entertainment in the

true ‘muckraking’ & iconoclast tradition of questioning authority, challenging corruption, exposing impropriety

and the appearance of impropriety, and offering

Common Sense Alternatives for

The Greater Common Good before Self…or any Special Interests! 

We fight for Social Justice on all fronts and are an integral part of The Crier Coalition of Internet News Services comprised of  The Pocahontas Commentator, The Pocahontas Crier,

Signal Fires of WV, & Rolling Thunder in association with Echoes from the Holl’r.  

ENOUGH ALREADY! ENOUGH!

22 October 2014, Vol.1, No.71 > ENOUGH ALREADY!  ENOUGH!

The POCAHONTAS CRIER

‘When the Righteous succeed the people rejoice,

But when the bad govern, men groan!’ – Proverbs 29:2

[New Email address: pocahontascrier88@gmail.com]

ENOUGH ALREADY!  ENOUGH!

By now…is there anyone who is not sick & tired of the HUGH POSTCARDS jamming their mailbox everyday from the so-called ‘Republican Party’ and its ersatz-candidates financed by the Billionaire Kansas Koch Brothers?  The Koch Brothers are the sole-beneficiaries of the proposed Keystone XL Pipeline that proposes to pipe the dirtiest of all OIL-SLUDGE-TAR-SANDS, called ‘bitumen’, from Canada to Texas so the TWO KOCH BROTHERS WILL MAKE $100 BILLION EACH to add to their already tens-of-billions! 

Thanks to the stacking of the U.S. Supreme Court by the two ‘Bush-regimes’, CORPORATIONS can now spend as much as they want trying to INFLUENCE LEGISLATION BY BUYING UP THE VOTES IN ADVANCE VIA ‘CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS’ – and that’s exactly what they have done in the 2014 General Election!  The campaigns of every single REPUBLICAN CANDIDATE for the U.S. Senate & House of Representatives is being paid for by the Billionaire Koch Brothers & their cartels!  The Corporate-Billionaires are even spending in excess of $100 Billion to ‘get out the vote’ in the hope that DEMOCRATS STAY HOME believing ‘they can’t win’ so only Republican votes are counted!

It’s no secret that POLITICS HAS ALWAYS BEEN A DIRTY-BUSINESS with the rich always trying to get richer off the blood, sweat & tears of those with less money – but this election may go down in history as THE WORST EVER before it is over on 04 November!  For those that weren’t absent the day they taught Early American History in school, you may remember the struggle between the lowland ‘TIDEWATER-PLANTATIONS’ and the mountainous ‘PIEDMONT’ whereby the owners of plantations with thousands-of-acres fought against those folks who were freed as ‘Indentured-Servants’ after seven years and moved into the ‘Wilderness Areas’ of the Appalachia to carve out a couple of acres to build a cabin & grow a garden & such.  The overwhelming majority of Plantations were ‘granted-title’ via Land Grants issued by the King to Loyalists & such.  And as for the workers, the Plantation-Owners offered ‘free-passage’ from England to America in exchange for SEVEN-YEARS OF SERVITUDE on their respective plantations – and the workers became known as ‘Indentured Servants’!  When the seven-years were up, many ‘servants’ left for the ‘Wilderness Areas’ to start a life of their own-choosing.  Many folks in these hills to this day can trace their Ancestry through these brave men & women who carved out the wilderness – that is what is meant by being a ‘MOUNTAINEER’!

BUT – THE PROBLEM BEGAN WHEN THOSE IN THE ‘PIEDMONT’ went to vote!  Only MEN could vote, and only MEN WHO OWNED PROPERTY could vote!  And the Plantation-Owners with thousands-of-acres were usually educated compared to the Common Folk living in the ‘PIEDMONT’ – so the Plantation-Owners felt they should have ONE-VOTE PER/ACRE in stead of ONE-VOTE PER/LANDOWNER regardless of acreage!  S0unds a lot like the proposed SNOWSHOE RAD (Resort Area District) doesn’t it – whereby majority interest, such as that of Donald Trump, is based on ACREAGE-OWNERSHIP instead of by ‘SQUARE-FEET’?  At any rate, the matter was eventually settled when the U.S. Supreme Court issued the policy of ‘ONE MAN, ONE VOTE’ regardless of acreage as long as a male-voter was also a landowner!  The plantation-owners wanted to establish a ‘two-tier-system’ with a ‘House of Lords’ here in America as they had in England, while everyone else was relegated to the ‘House of Commons’ – but Our Forefathers saw it differently by giving each State regardless of size two-votes in the U.S. Senate, and establishing representatives in the House of Representatives in proportion to the size of population!

But now thanks to the stacked U.S. Supreme Court in  ‘CITIZENS UNITED v. FEC’, 21 January 2010, ANY CORPORATIONS CAN SPEND AS MUCH AS THEY LIKE TO CONTROL THE GOVERNMENT!  And buying up CONGRESS is what has been happening since 2010, and now includes buying up as many STATES as possible that still have Natural Resources – including West Virginia!  The late/great Senator Robert C. Byrd would rollover in his grave if he knew that Joe Manchin was the FIRST DEMOCRAT TO SELL HIS SOUL TO THE KOCH BROTHERS in favor of making them richer with the Keystone XL Pipeline!  But then again, dear-ole Joe never did put any  COMMON FOLKS before HIMSELF – Joe never placed THE COMMON GOOD BEFORE SELF OR ANY SPECIAL INTERESTS – for after all, Joe spent 16 years running for governor all the while on the payroll of Massey Coal to the tune in EXCESS OF $50-MILLION – until he started getting funds from the Kansas Koch Brothers!  And then we wonder what is wrong with this country these days!

COMPARE our current corrupt system to that found within the European Union whereby NO PRIVATE FUNDS can be used in any political campaign!  That’s right, no matter how rich anyone is, they are not allowed to spend $1 for either themselves as a candidate or anyone else as a candidate!  ALL ELECTIONS ARE PUBLICLY-FUNDED meaning that a specific amount of public-funds are allocated for each position of government requiring a person to be elected by the general population!  Then each candidate is given THE SAME AMOUNT of public-funds for whatever position they are seeking – and each candidate only has THREE-MONTHS to campaign!  In this manner, persons are elected on their MERITS & EXPERIENCE and are beholden ONLY to the VOTERS – not to private-corporations or foreign-interests!  But here in America, foreign-interests are also allowed to influence our elections whereby for example, Israelis are allowed to vote while living anywhere in the world since all persons born of a so-called ‘jewish-woman’ is considered an ‘Israeli’ citizen.  Thus in large metropolitan areas the so-called ‘jewish-block-vote’ can sway American elections!  And then we wonder why America is bogged-down in foreign entanglements in the middle-east…in direct violation of the Farewell Address of George Washington!

LOCALLY – it’s getting worse also!

Wherever we look, thanks to the never-ending-wars, it seems that government claims it does not have enough money to function – so therefore more ‘taxes’ and/or ‘add-on-fees’, etc, are needed, ad nauseam!  And the same is happening to the PRIVATE-CORPORATIONS that already have a MONOPOLY over various public-services!  Look at these examples:

1.     Thanks to self-serving parasites such as former county commissioner, Reta Griffith, the cursed Frontier Communications continues its monopoly over Pocahontas County in which it DOUBLE-CHARGES us for land-line services, and after two-years of haggling still will not allow any other communications company to use the very lines & polls that public-funds have paid for!  So THANK RETA for the LOUSY-SERVICE, POOR CONNECTIONS, and SLOW, VERY SLOW INTERNET SPEED!  The good news is that finally a lawsuit has been filed against Frontier for all the above & then some – and now we wait some more!

2.    For WHO KNOWS HOW LONG – the PRIVATE-ELECTRIC PROVIDER has been ‘ESTIMATING’ everyone’s monthly use of electricity and making sure that every bill is between $100 - $160 or more a month!  Then upon thousands of complaints, the PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION (PSC) required MON-POWER to actually read every house-meter each month!  What happened?  The monthly electric bills FELL TO LESS THAN $50 per/month for each household, many to even less than $40 per/month!  After a couple of months, MON–POWER requested a ‘RATE-INCREASE’ and true to form, the PSC gave it to them – so NOW ALL MONTHLY BILLS ARE AGAIN BETWEEN $100 - $160 or more a month!  Does anyone remember when water, gas, electric & such were PUBLIC CORPORATIONS interested in low-cost-SERVICE – instead of PRIVATE-CORPORATIONS that PLACE PROFIT BEFORE PEOPLE? 

No wonder California and other states have again taken-over these services as ‘Public-Corporations’!  But the real treachery of MON-POWER is that they know that after 01 November they cannot turn off anyone’s electric since the ‘winter-season’ is upon us – so now before the end of the month – they are demanding full payment from everyone – regardless of amount or those on payment-plans – or they will turn off your electric before 01 November!  And if MON-POWER turns your electric off – then the only way to get it back on is to PAY-IN-FULL everything owed to this point!  THAT’S WHAT IS CALLED ‘PREDATORY-CAPITALISM’ AT ITS WORST WITHIN ‘CORPORATE-FASCISM’!  Remember when they taught that also in History class?  Dictatorship via CORPORATIONS!  This is the end result of what is being called ‘privatization’ – of schools, hospitals, prisons, utilities, and national & natural resources, etc.!  No National or Natural Resource should ever be allowed in the hands of any individual, family, private-corporation or cartel – THOSE RESOURCES ARE THE ‘SOVEREIGN PROPERTY’ BELONGING TO ALL THE PEOPLE AT ALL TIMES…and should be held in ‘PUBLIC-CORPORATIONS’ answerable to the Public at all times!!

3.    And let us not forget that the town of Durbin & Marlinton want to CUT-OFF WATER to any household which has fallen behind pursuant to all the other financial pressures facing everyone these days!  Yet the United Nations has recently declared WATER IS A HUMAN RIGHT – like the Right to Breath Air – therefore to cutoff water, or deny clean water to anyone is a HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATION!  The folks in Detroit received that ruling from the UN since their water-rates are twice the national average, and their poverty rate is 40%!  Sound familiar, what’s the ‘POVERTY-RATE’ of this county with only seasonal-employment at Minimum-Wage…and folks on SS, SSD & such?  Meanwhile over 27,000 households in Detroit have been cutoff – but the UN has ORDERED their water turned-on – especially since two-thirds of those households have children, and the children CAN BE TAKEN AWAY BY THE OXYMORON SO-CALLED ‘FAMILY SERVICES’ if the home has no water!  Now while ‘child-protective-services’ generally does good work protecting children – we all know stories right here in this county whereby children have been taken from their parents & grandparents BECAUSE ‘FAMILY SERVICES’ THEN GETS PAID about $35,000 a year PER/CHILD under their control – making the stealing of children a self-serving ‘business’ instead of a ‘SOCIAL SERVICE’ – and let’s not forget the ‘business’ of the ‘foster-homes’!  Thankfully the UN has required the water turned back on for everyone – and if not done so – then those responsible for the CUTOFF may very well find themselves CHARGED WITH CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY and brought before THE HAGUE, the International Criminal Court in the Netherlands for Trial!    

As clueless as the buffoons in charge of Durbin & Marlinton are these days – let’s hope they employ a local attorney to represent them at THE HAGUE!  This county would then be ‘cleansed’ of its ‘IDIOTA’ almost overnight indeed!

For a full synopsis of the water-problem in Detroit, see <

http://www.democracynow.org/blog/2014/10/21/video_detroit_residents_meet_with_united >

THAT’S WHY, as important as this mid-term election is, ordinarily we’d say VOTE STRAIGHT DEMOCRAT to keep the SOCIAL SAFETY NET & MEET the SOCIAL NEEDS of everyone – but since the two Democrat candidates for County Commission are so inept by lacking the knowledge and skills necessary to govern a county –

COMPARED TO THE TWO EXPERIENCED REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES FOR COUNTY COMMISSION – we say

Vote Democrat at every level EXCEPT for County Commission…

For COUNTY COMMISSION:  VOTE FOR…

Charles Wilfong who is perhaps the most experienced and successful farmer this county has ever seen – besides working for all farmers in this state in the leadership of the West Virginia State Farm Bureau…

And,

Norman Lee Alderman who has never stopped trying to benefit the folks of this county in all his various efforts as a school teacher, pastor, former county commissioner, and editor of his powerful non-subscription Website –

< www.pocahontascommentatorplus@blogspot.com >

THAT’S WHY…

On 04 NOVEMBER…there’s no excuse…

 IT’S YOUR CHOICE…

TO CHANGE THINGS FOR THE BETTER!

Just say ‘NO’ to those who want to keep this county in Poverty & Pauperism

– and –

Just say ‘YES’ to real Progress & Prosperity for the future!

On Election Day – YOU have a chance to elect two persons that will always put YOU first!  They know that:

THE GREATER COMMON GOOD ALWAYS COMES BEFORE SELF OR ANY SELF-SERVING SPECIAL INTERESTS!

Keep up to Date – Stay tuned to these Websites:

www.pocahontascommentatorplus@blogspot.com

www.crier88.blogspot.com

   On 04 NOVEMBER it doesn’t matter how you are registered – YOU CAN VOTE for:

CHARLES WILFONG – ND

&

NORMAN LEE ALDERMAN - SD

The Pocahontas Crier is an independent Internet News Service that has now endorsed

two candidates for County Commission

–      CHARLES WILFONG & NORMAN LEE ALDERMAN   –

in addition to providing in depth news reporting on important issues directly affecting the Citizens of Pocahontas County!

Email comments & suggestions to: pocahontascrier88@gmail.com  

The Pocahontas Crier is a free, non-subscription, Internet News Service meant for entertainment in the true ‘muckraking’ & iconoclast tradition of questioning authority, challenging corruption, exposing impropriety and the appearance of impropriety, and offering Common Sense Alternatives for The Greater Common Good before Self or any Special Interests! 

We fight for Social Justice on all fronts and are an integral part of The Crier Coalition of Internet News Services comprised of  The Pocahontas Commentator, The Pocahontas Crier, Signal Fires of WV, & Rolling Thunder in association with Echoes from the Holl’r.   

THE UNFAIR SCHOOL-TAX-LEVY!

19 October 2014, Vol.1, No.70 > THE UNFAIR SCHOOL-TAX-LEVY!

The POCAHONTAS CRIER

‘When the Righteous succeed the people rejoice,

But when the bad govern, men groan!’ – Proverbs 29:2

[New Email address: pocahontascrier88@gmail.com]

THE UNFAIR SCHOOL-

TAX-LEVY!

The disparity of trying to force another school-tax-levy upon Pocahontas County at this point in time is really appalling & then some!  And the placing of SELF-PITY articles in the local ‘Pokey-Times’ is equally appalling!  All anyone has to do is apply a LITTLE COMMON SENSE to understand the UNFAIRNESS of asking folks on FIXED-INCOMES, or those receiving MINIMUM-WAGES, or those unemployed, or those about to have their water-turned-off in Durbin & Marlinton pursuant to EXISTING FINANCIAL PRESSURES, etc., and all the other Common Sense Reasons surrounding folks on fixed-low-incomes to PLACE YET ANOTHER FINANCIAL BURDEN UPON THEMSELVES is more of an INSULT to the People of this County than a necessity!  WHO CAN REALLY AFFORD YET ANOTHER FINANCIAL LOSS OF INCOME IN THIS COUNTY?

THE HIGH COST OF FINANCIAL BURDENS: 

(1)            The State of West Virginia takes 35¢ for EVERY GALLON OF GASOLINE and the Federal-Tax is close to 20¢ PER/GALLON of fuel regardless of how much gasoline anyone puts in their vehicle.  So for every 10-gallons that’s $5.50 IN TAXES for what it once cost to fill-up the entire gas-tank! 

(2)          Currently we have the county solid waste authority forcing a ‘mandatory-fee’ upon every household in this county whether you bury trash in their open-dump or not – to the point that upwards to ONE-THIRD of the approximate 3400 households left in this county have judgments against them for not paying the ‘fee’ that is SUPPOSED TO BE EXEMPT FOR SENIOR CITIZENS and anyone else on a ‘FIXED-INCOME’!  Meanwhile Ed Riley has controlled all the PCSWA funds for 25 years – instead of the Office of the Sheriff by law – and Riley has in excess of $2.5 MILLION in CDs (Certificate of Deposits) – not to mention the $800,000+ that seems to be currently missing or ‘misplaced’!

(3)          Then we have a few unfortunate households in Durbin & Marlinton that have had or will have their water turned off because of existing financial burdens – in which folks have to choose between the BASIC NECESSITIES of Food, Clothing & Shelter – or choose to pay for heat, water, taxes, or MEDICINE or MEDICAL COPAYS…but not for everything since there is not enough money each month to go around! 

(4)          Now comes the School-Tax-Levy request in which the ‘sob-stories’ are meant to make each of us feel sorry for the po’-School Administrators – EACH RECEIVING SALARIES of $80,000 - $125,000+ PER YEAR – while almost 80% of the county is on SS, SSD, or MINIMUM-WAGE!  Remember dear-ole self-serving Alice Irvine, she held as many as THREE administrative positions at the same time and received a salary for each putting her around $100+K per/year, and she even was in charge of the Federal Grant money – until $500,000 of a $4-Million grant could not be accounted for, even after a half-dozen accountants & accounting firms keep trying to find those ‘misplaced’ funds on the ‘official-books’!  Now Alice is in retirement!

[And this is the same Alice once married to the late-Dolan Irvine, the self-serving County Assessor of three-decades+ who NEVER RAISED ANY TAXES ON HIS OWN LANDS – while raising every other county landowner between 20% - 30% while he was county assessor!]

(5)           Now consider this:  the total number of students attending all three schools in this county is around 1100 or less, yet the School Board is receiving funds for 1400 students – via a ‘cap’ that Walt Helmick provided when he was a state senator – so that’s over 300 students that DO NOT EXIST, yet the School Board is being paid by both the federal & state for those empty seats every day!

(6)          And let’s consider a $100,000 salary, for example:

$100,000 divided by 52 weeks = $1923 per/week;

          Divided by a 5-day working week = $385 per/day;

          Divided by a 7-day week = $275 EVERY DAY OF

          THE YEAR!  These amounts are NOT for the school

          teachers – but for the school administrators!  They

          already make more in a single day than those

          working @ Minimum-Wage make in a week!

[These facts are not an ‘attack’ against the current school administrators or the teachers – all their salaries are set by the State Legislature – but these facts are being presented to show THE DISPARITY of income between so-called ‘PUBLIC SERVANTS’ and the average-income of those of us who make up the ‘PUBLIC’!  The irony of the timing of this request is that as a county we currently have the BEST SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION that this county has seen in the past half-century – BUT NO ONE HAS SHOWN HOW THE RANK & FILE CITIZEN IS SUPPOSED TO AFFORD SUCH ‘LUXURIES’ as another ‘TAX’ – Usually affording ‘LUXURIES’ occurs during times-of-plenty, not lean-years!]

(7)           Let’s further consider that the school administrators receive a ‘severance-tax’ for each gallon of oil, each cubic-foot of natural gas, every tree cut in the forest, and each ton of coal extracted from West Virginia!  THOSE FUNDS are supposed to go to offset any additional expenses the school may require – but how many remember that EACH school administrator received an 8% - 10% PAY RAISE FOR THEMSELVES while 10 teachers & 10 staff-members were laid off just a couple of years back?  The disparity is much worse as a reality than the necessity of yet another ‘TAX’ upon ourselves!

(8)          Consider also that once the new WASTE-

TREATMENT PLANT is completed at the base of Snowshoe, all homeowners on the mountain and all those in the Public Service District, such as Durbin, etc., will see a dramatic INCREASE in their monthly sewage bills!  Do they really need an ADDITIONAL SCHOOL-TAX-LEVY that is supposed to exist in 5-YEAR INCREMENTS?  And aren’t our current county commissioners currently contemplating ANOTHER NEW ‘TAX’ upon each household under the pretense of ‘fire-protection’?  What’s next – a new fire-engine every year for each substation?  Or new armored-Hummers for the Sheriff & each Deputy?

(9)          And consider that BOTH Durbin & Marlinton need

          new drinking-water facilities – so do those folks

          really need an ADDITIONAL SCHOOL-TAX-LEVY

          that once implemented can be RENEWED EVERY

          5-YEARs?

(10)     Don’t we all have to live within our current means –

     regardless of income – don’t we all just have to do

     the best we can?  Unlike school administrators,

     government workers, or business-owners – the rank

     & file Citizen DOES NOT GET AUTOMATIC PAY-

     RAISES!  When was the last time SS, SSD,

     unemployment, or the Minimum-Wage was raised

     to meet the current COST-OF-LIVING (COL) as the

     Congress & State Legislature VOTED TO RAISE for

     themselves?  THE DISPARITY IS TOO GREAT!

Let’s face the realities of the current situation – the total population of full-time residents is now down to about 8400 Citizens – the majority of which are on ‘fixed-incomes’ in one form or another and at the bottom-end of the economic -scale – so WHO REALLY CAN AFFORD YET ANOTHER TAX TO TAKE FOOD & BASIC NECESSITIES AWAY FROM THE TABLE?  The straight answer is – NO ONE!  You can’t beat a dead-horse, you can’t get blood from a stone, and you can’t collect TAXES in a WAR-WEARY-ECONOMY from folks on fixed-incomes, being paid minimum-wages, or being unemployed!  MAYBE IF WE HAD ‘UNIVERSAL HEALTH CARE’ – as those in Congress – and no more Medical 20% Co-payments for doctor, hospital, Medicare & Medicaid, etc. there would be some bread left-over on the table in the form of crumbs – but that will only occur IF the DEMOCRATS win a majority in both houses of Congress!  Until then… let the school administrators place ‘collection-cans’ at local stores & gas stations & Snowshoe & Silver Creek so folks can drop in some loose change!  And it’s shamefully ironic isn’t it, that some of the very same folks pushing for a school-tax-levy upon every household & property-owner in this county are the very ones living on the property of the NRAO so THEY DO NOT HAVE TO PAY ANY PROPERTY TAXES – or solid waste ‘fees’!  Hypocrites indeed!

JUST VOTE ‘NO’ ON THE SCHOOL BOND LEVY!

Also Just VOTE ‘NO’ on the Boy Scout question! LET’S NOT CHANGE THE STATE CONSTITUTION TO BENEFIT the Boy Scouts of America in Fayette County – above and beyond everyone else – the ramifications are too far-reaching!

LASTLY, LET’S NOT FORGET THAT THE INCESSANT WARS OF THE LAST THREE-DECADES HAS ALL BUT DRAINED THIS COUNTY DRY…let alone killed, maimed & wounded untold numbers of American Youth…who need long-term care!  Meanwhile the ruling-regime now proclaims the National Debt is $18 TRILLION = $1,000,000 PER/PERSON! 

Well, at least THAT SOLUTION is simple: LET’s REPUDIATE THE DEBT – Nationalize all banks – and reinstitute the UNITED STATES TREASURY BANKING system and issue U.S Notes as ‘debt-free-currency’, instead of paying ‘usury’ for the privately-owned Federal Reserve Notes (FRNs) that causes the national debt – as was planned by President John F. Kennedy right up to the moment the BULLETS took his life!  We still have lots of work to do to restore a proper balance – don’t we?

This is Pocahontas County – NOT ‘SHERWOOD FOREST’ IN NOTTINGHAM, ENGLAND – so

 NO NEW TAXES!

THAT’S WHY, as important as this mid-term election is, ordinarily we’d say VOTE STRAIGHT DEMOCRAT to keep the SOCIAL SAFETY NET & MEET the SOCIAL NEEDS of everyone – but since the two Democrat candidates for County Commission are so inept by lacking the knowledge and skills necessary to govern a county –

COMPARED TO THE TWO EXPERIENCED REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES FOR COUNTY COMMISSION – we say

Vote Democrat at every level EXCEPT for County Commission…

For COUNTY COMMISSION:  VOTE FOR…

Charles Wilfong who is perhaps the most experienced and successful farmer this county has ever seen – besides working for all farmers in this state in the leadership of the West Virginia State Farm Bureau…

And,

Norman Lee Alderman who has never stopped trying to benefit the folks of this county in all his various efforts as a school teacher, pastor, former county commissioner, and editor of his powerful Website –

< www.pocahontascommentatorplus@blogspot.com >

THAT’S WHY…

On 04 NOVEMBER…there’s no excuse…

 IT’S YOUR CHOICE…

TO CHANGE THINGS FOR THE BETTER!

Just say ‘NO’ to those who want to keep this county in Poverty & Pauperism

– and –

Just say ‘YES’ to real Progress & Prosperity for the future!

On Election Day – YOU have a chance to elect two persons that will always put YOU first!  They know that:

THE GREATER COMMON GOOD ALWAYS COMES BEFORE SELF OR ANY SELF-SERVING SPECIAL INTERESTS!

Keep up to Date – Stay tuned to these Websites:

www.pocahontascommentatorplus@blogspot.com

www.crier88.blogspot.com

   On 04 NOVEMBER it doesn’t matter how you are registered – YOU CAN VOTE for:

CHARLES WILFONG – ND

&

NORMAN LEE ALDERMAN - SD

The Pocahontas Crier is an independent Internet News Service that has now endorsed

two candidates for County Commission

–      CHARLES WILFONG & NORMAN LEE ALDERMAN   –

in addition to providing in depth news reporting on important issues directly affecting the Citizens of Pocahontas County!

Email comments & suggestions to: pocahontascrier88@gmail.com  

► The Pocahontas Crier is a free, non-subscription, Internet News Service meant for entertainment in the true ‘muckraking’ tradition of questioning authority, challenging corruption, exposing impropriety and the appearance of impropriety, and offering Common Sense Alternatives for The Greater Common Good before Self or any Special Interests!  We struggle for Social Justice on all fronts and are an integral part of The Crier Coalition of Internet News Services comprised of 

The Pocahontas Commentator, The Pocahontas Crier, 

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