TooLong4Change

  WV Guards Shot in DC I pray for the families who will spend this holiday season with a loved one, in hospital or planning their funeral. No member of the United States military should face death at home, particularly if as alleged by a former ally of our Armed Forces. It has been reported that during the deployment of the WV National Guard into Washington, DC two of our neighbors were critically wounded after being shot by an Afghani man who previously assisted members of our military in their missions in Afghanistan. No Motive for the shooting is confirmed. Our original promise to our Afghani allies, was to create a democratic republic with a stable government, then it was to provide them a path to safe refuge within our nation. Unfortunately, we failed at both, as the Taliban advanced we fled, leaving many Afghanis in harm's way. We have since scrambled to get some of our Afghani allies to the United States, and one of them is who apparently shot two national guard members, so ...

Press Release For Immediate Release WV Lobbying needs Reform and Accountability Recently the media has been reporting on a story regarding a man who was simultaneously working for the WV State Auditor, and served as President of a lobbying firm. This, of course, is incredibly dubious and unethical, but it took people pointing out that the situation may have been illegal for this individual to leave his position being paid $25/hour of taxpayer money. Due to loopholes in the laws of West Virginia, it is not clear whether this individual did actually violate state law, though I stand firm in saying that investigations into several potential violations should occur. Regardless of the legality of the actions taken by the State Auditor and his employee/campaign contributor, West Virginia must close any of the potential loopholes in the lobbying laws of West Virginia. If you are a lobbyist, I have little sympathy for you. I will listen to everyday people, and the grassroots organizations that...

Since I was a young teenager, I have openly expressed my desire to run for political office as a means of improving the world. Due to struggles with anxiety, depression, and financial difficulties over the years many of these runs never occurred. But in the background of life I've continued to develop policies for a better economy, keeping and improving our state's Wild and Wonderful environment, and how to appropriately approach these policies within the context of a government budget. A few weeks ago my voter registration was updated to allow me to seek the Democratic nomination for state House in district 51 in 2026. Despite this, I will always note my intention is to serve as an effective independent without caucusing with either major political party due to the expectation of caucus members to vote in line with party leadership. I am releasing this post, alongside a press release given to local media stations following approval as an official pre-candidate for State House ...

Congress has passed a rescission bill for the first time in a few decades, something that could certainly benefit the American taxpayer if such was formulated correctly. For starters, on the scale of the federal government's budget and debts $9-billion is not worth the time nor political capital needed to achieve such a bill's passage. A fiscally responsible approach to the budget would involve a larger overall cut to government spending, alongside either keeping tax rates steady or increasing tax rates and closing loopholes (preferably for those most capable of paying a larger portion). This $9-billion in cuts targets the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB), as well as foreign aid. The vast majority of the 9-billion figure does come from foreign aid programs rather than from the CPB, which while is a tough decision to be made is not the worst source for spending cuts. While the United States is capable of assisting international partners and the impoverished worldwide, I...

The state government of West Virginia has established a 'flood resiliency fund' which sounds great and proactive. However, for the past few years  our government has failed to place a single dollar into the fund, this despite the fact that individual members have proposed measures to put funds into the account including a recent attempt to transfer $50-million from our 'rainy day fund' that currently sits at $1.35- B illion. These proposals have consistently been rejected by many of the same people who decided to create the empty fund. As we have seen from our flash floods in the past decade (including in just the past few days/weeks), and recently in Texas' "flash flood alley" it is important that governments at the local, state, and federal levels do all that they can when it comes to extreme weather events. They must in order to prevent death, injury, and millions in property damages. Scientists, including meteorologists, predict increased and more seve...

Recently, my partner and I have attended two conventions. It took months of savings to do so and admittedly more debt than I would like as a result of some unfortunate financial situations I got into. A few months ago we attended Tsubasacon in Charleston, WV. Here my beautiful partner, Samara, was able to cosplay (or dress up as various characters) and looked wonderful while doing it. I got to meet many of her friends, fellow cosplayers, and a local small artist/craft maker and their partner. I am very happy to be able to consider them friends or acquaintances of mine to some degree or another. My partner and her friends being able to join together a couple of times to do panels where they could in effect do a little improv show in character. They are very talented individuals, which if you ever get the chance you should attend a panel of theirs or in the very least get a selfie with, in their cosplays.  During one of the panels at Tsubasacon, a meme/semi-inside joke was born with ...