I have to admit I am happy they are catching people with fentanyl so much because it’s killing people and they don’t get charged with the death. It’s sad but true. Hopefully they can get that stuff off the street. We have kids and they can’t go out on the street because of all the needles ly…

Good-bye to West Virginia’s good public schools.

If you are reading this, that means you are currently living in a time that will go down in recorded history as a period that most future generations will look back upon and likely describe as an occasion of suffering, just as we now can reflect upon the 1918 Spanish flu epidemic that took m…

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell believes changes are coming to the American economy, but not everyone will benefit right away.

Each week I try to write about something that I hope is worth reading. And, although I mostly like to feature writings of some historical value, sometimes I get a little left of center, so to speak, and today just might be one of those days. Let’s just refer to it as a “throw it against the …

Miscellaneous musings.

West Virginians are like people in any of the other 49 states. They would like to get by with paying less in taxes. This year Gov. Jim Justice and the Legislature are trying to oblige them, but not in the most responsible way.

The counties of Logan, Mingo and Wyoming have more in common than one may realize. Besides containing mountains of coal and many families who depend upon it, each was given an Indian name, unlike neighboring Boone County, which we know was named for a great frontiersman, Daniel Boone.

Whatever happened to maintaining and improving secondary roads?

Digital photography provides near-instant gratification, but it comes at a cost, and not just in terms of taking pictures.

Last week, West Virginia-NPR’s evening news aired interviews with a divergent group of adolescents on how the pandemic has affected them. Their hopeful and insightful comments were encouraging. Essentially, they said that living through COVID-19 with extreme health, school, family and interp…

Today is a special day for many people, especially in Ireland, where St. Patrick’s Day is annually celebrated as both a cultural and religious holiday. For the Irish, it marks the anniversary of Saint Patrick’s death in the fifth century and the arrival of Christianity in Ireland.

This is written by someone who spent a good chunk of the previous decade commuting from Huntington to Charleston daily.

The Herald-Dispatch published this editorial on March 10 regarding COVID-19 effects on higher education:

The following is a revised version of a column from eight years ago. The subject is ever relevant.

I sometimes forget that at the tender age of 67 I now fit into the category that many people like to refer to as “old.” And, as always, I find myself wondering how a person would act if he or she didn’t know how old they were. The brain being the key to all human abilities, could we not tric…

Well, we’re now just about 10 days from Daylight Savings Time as we spring forward in time from a winter I’ll never forget. With just 17 days left until the advent of springtime, I realize the unpredictability of the March winds — rain, snow, sleet, and sunshine — all possible on any one giv…

West Virginians can’t deny it; it’s not new or a secret. The state has an education problem. Recently, I received an email from WalletHub.com, which used 18 metrics to determine the 50 states’ educational attainment and quality of education. West Virginia ranked last in educational attainmen…

There are just some things in history, especially local history, that simply cannot be allowed to be forgotten. So, as we approach the March 8 anniversary of one of the worst coal mining disasters in Logan County history that occurred 61 years ago at Holden, we must also acknowledge the Feb.…

Toyota Motor Manufacturing West Virginia is investing another $210 million in its engine and transmission assembly plant in Putnam County. That’s good news for several reasons.

Straight through the blustery winds, snow and cold rains of February, the pandemic known as the coronavirus and its disease, COVID-19, keeps building toward an expected half million U.S. deaths by a calendar turn into March 2021.

“I take my job seriously but I don’t take myself seriously.” — Reply of my friend and retired Judge David Pancake when I said he worked hard on his cases. I think this is a healthy way of approaching life. It gives you relief from the weight of your job. We all need that.

After reading about the plight of West Virginia in regard to counties being unable to pay their regional jail bills and the Legislature faced with trying to help fix that problem, as well as many others, I began to wonder just how places like Logan County — with its dwindling population — co…

Last week, the Congressional Budget Office released its analysis of what President Joe Biden’s proposal of a $15-an-hour minimum wage — up from the current national minimum of $7.25 — would do to the nation’s economy. It would raise 900,000 people out of poverty while at the same time puttin…

If it looks like there are more locomotives parked at the Huntington CSX shops, it’s because there are. CSX is reducing the size of its active locomotive fleet as it adapts to how it runs trains and to customer demand.

One doesn’t have to be in downtown Logan to understand that the past is something that should not only be understood, but also appreciated for what transpired decades ago that could have changed all of what we identify with today. Sound confusing? Allow me to simplify the statement in an example.

What happens when an emergency drags on for weeks and months until it becomes, for lack of a better word, normal?

Here we are in the midst of winter with sickness and death all around us, and even though the Super Bowl game should temporarily alleviate some of the forces of darkness that makes one wonder if society will ever get back to normal, I just can’t ignore the losses of so many friends and acqua…

Many of us of a “certain” age remember civics classes from our middle and high school years. They were rarely exciting but provided basics on our government’s functioning and the rights and privileges of American citizenship. At least 26 states, including West Virginia, currently have some r…

This year’s regular session of the West Virginia Legislature will be unlike most others for at least two reasons. One is that it will have the first Republican supermajority in both houses in the lifetimes of most voters. The second is the series of steps the legislative leadership is implem…

County boards of education in West Virginia have been reluctant to take the necessary steps to reopen schools fully, but now they have no choice.

Since his election, President Joe Biden has made unity a theme of his speeches. In his inaugural address last week, Biden used the word “unity” at least eight times:

There is not a single building in the town of Logan that is not historically connected to the annals of times past where the names of many civic, business, and political leaders strived and even thrived in what was an ever-growing city full of vigor and vision — most of which occurred in the…

Among the many lessons from 2020 is this one: People need people.

The original mountaineers of this part of what became West Virginia brought with them many skills; one of which was the art of making their own corn liquor known as moonshine. Even after the coal industry started booming in the county, there were many residents who made a decent living makin…

Barring a last-minute intervention by a court, West Virginia’s children enrolled in public schools will be heading back to the classroom this week.

President Donald Trump claims to love his country and wants to defend its Constitution. Yet, his recent behaviors and comments, especially instigating his followers to violently attack Congress on Jan. 6, counteracts that. The president’s mental functioning has long troubled many people and …

Agree? Disagree? Respond to this Letter to the Editor here: https://www.herald-dispatch.com/site/forms/online_services/letter_editor/

Other than a few employees inside doing routine maintenance chores and construction workers outsize rebuilding a plaza, the Mountain Health Arena in downtown Huntington has been a lonely place for nearly a year.

COVID-19 ruined 2020 for most of the world; the only way out of the disaster was a vaccine. Thankfully, in less than one year, scientists produced effective vaccines, that previously required multiple years.

A short tour of Logan will reveal from its mostly brick structures that much of its glamourous but notorious past occurred from around 1908 through the 1940s, although events of interest certainly didn’t end following World War II. It’s just that the early decades of the 1900’s are more rive…

For the second time in my life, I’m a Nielsen family. I’ve been asked to keep a diary for a week of all the shows I watch on television to help determine shows’ ratings.

So, here I sit on New Year’s Eve, just hours before 2020 will finally come to a dead end, and I can only reflect on the worst year of my lifetime — a lifetime that spans over six and one-half decades. I am convinced that 2020 is in fact the year of the Devil. And no matter what transpires in…

Recently revised federal regulations concerning coal-fired power plants could mean another one will shut down by the end of the decade.

President-elect Joe Biden is three weeks away from taking the oath of office, and West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice is getting ready to take his oath for the second time.

I have been blessed with good health for all of my life, and I thank God for that. I have never had to deal with such things as diabetes, heart disease, obesity, or other health-related problems that plague many of my friends and acquaintances. Regular check-ups have continuously, however, r…