Back in Hillbilly land

 

Kadizzle's Journey Back Into the Hills

Kadizzle took a strange journey yesterday into the hills of Ritchie County, West Virginia. One thing kept catching the eye over and over again—the trees.

West Virginia is slowly becoming what it was when the first settlers arrived. For nearly a century, the forests have been reclaiming the land. Fields that once grew corn, hay, and cattle are now swallowed by towering hardwoods. Nature has quietly taken back what man once cleared.

Kadizzle stopped at the old farm where so many summer days were spent growing up. It sat a hundred miles from our home in Wheeling, yet it felt like a second home. Trees that we planted as tiny seedlings are now giants—seventy feet tall and nearly two feet in diameter. In many places the forest has become so thick it rivals a jungle, hiding old roads, fence lines, and memories beneath a blanket of green.

But the drive down the Ohio River brought another surprise.

Contrary to the image many people have of West Virginia, the communities along the river did not appear trapped in poverty. The chemical plants were operating, coal country still showed signs of life, and what struck Kadizzle most were the homes. Yards were neatly trimmed. Houses were well cared for. The towns looked cleaner and more orderly than they did decades ago.

It was a mystery.

What had changed? Had people simply taken greater pride in their communities? Or perhaps those endless forests were hiding the abandoned places that once seemed to dot every hillside. Whatever the reason, it wasn't the West Virginia Kadizzle remembered.

While waiting in Harrisville for the rest of the family to catch up, Kadizzle wandered into the Ritchie County Courthouse to look up old mineral rights records. Walking through the courthouse felt like stepping back in time. Very little has changed since the building was completed in the 1920s. While browsing through historical displays, Kadizzle stumbled onto an unexpected fact—the courthouse was designed by architects from Wheeling. It's a small reminder of how connected the communities of West Virginia once were.

Then it was on to Hazel Green.

The old country store now stands abandoned, another casualty of changing times. But just up the hollow, the Bird family was sitting on the porch.

That stopped Kadizzle in his tracks.

His nephew Kevin mentioned that Roger Bird wanted to talk. Suddenly decades melted away. Roger remembered playing ball with Kadizzle and his brother. Kadizzle couldn't recall those games, but Roger could.

Back then, we were the city kids from Wheeling, and to the Bird family we must have seemed as out of place as visitors from another planet.

The Birds are living pieces of Appalachian history. Roger and his brother grew up in the old house high in the hollow, without electricity and largely cut off from the outside world. Somehow, someone eventually managed to gravel the road to their home. Beyond that point, however, the road to our old farm has surrendered to time. Today it is little more than a rugged trail. Unless you have a capable four-wheel-drive vehicle—or better yet, a side-by-side—you aren't making it very far.

Standing there, surrounded by towering timber and old memories, Kadizzle couldn't help but feel that he had traveled much farther than one hundred miles.

He had traveled back in time.

More later...

I want to wake up in the morning where the rhododendron grows.

 

Whistledicks and Conniption Fits

Old Kadizzle will soon be heading back to the hills of West Virginia, and it has me thinking about the colorful characters and even more colorful language I grew up with.

My brother and I spent many hot summer days putting up hay for an old hill farmer named Lutrel Davis. Lutrel owned the kind of country store you hardly see anymore. There was a pot-bellied stove where the old-timers gathered to swap stories, solve the world's problems, and invent a few new ones. If you wanted to learn the mountain vocabulary, all you had to do was pull up a chair.

Lutrel had a favorite word that always made me laugh.

"Whistledick."

He used it to describe someone who wasn't exactly blessed with an abundance of common sense. Nobody seems to know where the word came from, but folks in the hills always knew exactly what it meant.

That sent Kadizzle down the rabbit hole looking up old Appalachian expressions. Along the way I stumbled across another classic: conniption fit—a dramatic outburst of anger when someone doesn't get their way.

Then it hit me.

Those two old mountain expressions came together perfectly at the last Payson Town Council meeting.

Councilman Jim Ferris threw what can only be described as a first-class conniption fit after his latest attempt to defund the library went nowhere. When the votes didn't go his way, he stormed out of the meeting and slammed the door behind him.

Back in Lutrel Davis's country store, the old-timers would have smiled, nodded, and said, "Looks like that whistledick just had himself a conniption fit."

Some words never go out of style.

Ferris Explodes

Ferris Storms Out

Last night's Payson Town Council meeting ended with an unexpected bit of political theater.

Councilman Jim Ferris didn't just lose the vote—he lost his temper. After seeing it become clear that the council was rejecting another effort aimed at the library, Ferris stormed out of the meeting and slammed the door behind him. It was a dramatic ending to a campaign that has repeatedly failed to gain support.

The strategy has become familiar. First came claims that the library contained "pornography." That accusation went nowhere because the facts didn't support it. Rather than moving on, Ferris and his allies shifted to a new controversy, raising fears about drag queen story hours and suggesting the library should be punished financially because of positions taken by national library organizations.

The problem is that this argument attempts to solve an issue that doesn't exist in Payson. It's a political formula seen often in recent years: create a controversy, amplify public outrage, and then present yourself as the person who will fix it. When the controversy falls apart, simply move on to the next one.

Fortunately, a majority of the Town Council refused to take the bait. They voted against the proposal, choosing to focus on the actual operation of Payson's library rather than national political talking points.

Ferris frequently presents himself as a man guided by Christian values. Every voter is free to decide whether his conduct at the meeting reflected those values. Storming out of a public meeting after failing to persuade your colleagues does not strike many people as an example of patience, humility, or respectful leadership.

In the end, the loudest statement of the evening wasn't made from the council dais. It was the sound of the council chamber door slamming shut behind a frustrated councilman.

Mayor Steve Otto, and Gary Morris. Two world class liars.

 To the Editor:

One of the most troubling developments in today's political climate is the normalization of dishonesty. Too often, facts are replaced by rumor, distortion, and outright falsehoods. That style of politics has become closely associated with the MAGA movement, where loyalty sometimes appears to matter more than truth.

I have personally experienced this. Two well-known local individuals repeatedly spread false statements about me. When I confronted each of them directly with evidence showing their claims were untrue, neither acknowledged the facts or apologized. Instead, they portrayed being confronted with the truth as if they were the victims.

One example illustrates the problem. A local rumor-monger searched public records until he found someone in another state who happened to have the same name as mine. That unrelated individual had assault charges. Despite knowing—or having every reason to know—that it was a different person, he circulated the story as though it referred to me. Another individual repeated the same falsehood. Even after the deception was exposed, neither corrected the record or apologized.

The irony is that the truth is not difficult to discover. Anyone can examine the public records and determine what is true and what is false. But doing that spoils the game. Falsehoods are far more useful to those who rely on character assassination than verified facts. Once a lie is repeated often enough, some people begin to accept it without ever checking the evidence for themselves.

Healthy political debate depends on honest disagreement, not fabricated accusations. We can disagree about policies, candidates, and priorities, but we should never accept lying as a legitimate political strategy. Our community deserves better.

The clouds lifted for Doug

 Here's a tighter, more polished version that keeps your satirical voice while improving flow and readability. I've softened a couple of statements that could otherwise read as assertions of criminal conduct rather than opinion.

Trump's Greatest Grift?

Donald Trump may be the greatest political grifter of our time.

Reading the New York Times this morning, columnist Thomas Friedman highlighted just how profitable Trump's cryptocurrency ventures have been—not for the people who bought into them, but for Trump himself.

As Friedman noted:

"Nearly 1 million people who bought President Trump's memecoin have lost money through the end of June... Their losses total $3.81 billion... Trump signed a financial disclosure revealing that the same crypto bet dealt him a $636 million payout. In all, his business ventures brought him at least $2.2 billion in 2025."

Think about that. According to those figures, nearly a million supporters collectively lost billions while Trump personally walked away with hundreds of millions.

That's quite a business model.

Then Doug stopped by the Kadizzle house yesterday.

Doug has been one of those folks who swallowed nearly every conspiracy theory and every Trump talking point, hook, line, and sinker. But yesterday something had changed.

Even Doug finally said, "Enough is enough."

Then came the real surprise.

Doug told Kadizzle he had realized that the Three Stooges running for town council are nothing more than Trump-style followers trying to imitate the same brand of politics right here in our own town.

Kadizzle nearly fell out of his chair.

If the clouds can part for Doug, maybe there's still hope for the rest of America.

If you're aiming for maximum political punch, I can also rewrite it in your sharper "Kadizzle" satirical style, with more humor and bite.

We Need aah. Does Payson have a plan?

Does Payson Have a Master Plan?

Great communities are not built by accident. Rome had a plan. Washington, D.C. had a plan. The question is: Does Payson have a plan?

Too often, Payson appears to operate under what might be called the "We Needa" approach to government. We need a pool. We need an RV park. We need a water line. One project after another is proposed without first asking how it fits into a long-term vision for the community.

A master plan is more than a collection of projects. It is a roadmap that guides growth, protects valuable land, saves taxpayers money, and ensures that today's decisions do not become tomorrow's regrets. Good planning identifies where parks, recreational facilities, public buildings, roads, utilities, and future expansion should occur before development pressures force hasty decisions.

Without a master plan, communities often make short-term choices that limit future opportunities. Land that could serve generations of residents may be committed to uses that provide only temporary benefits. Facilities become scattered rather than centralized, increasing costs and reducing efficiency.

The debate over town-owned property near the police department highlights the issue. Before deciding what to do with valuable public land, shouldn't Payson determine how that land fits into a long-term vision for the town? Someday that property could be needed for a recreation center, a swimming pool, public safety facilities, or other civic purposes. Once it is committed to another use, that opportunity may be gone forever.

The real question is not whether Payson needs an RV park, a pool, or any other individual project. The real question is whether those projects fit into a comprehensive plan for the future.

Successful towns don't simply react to today's needs. They plan for tomorrow's opportunities. Payson deserves a master plan that looks beyond the next project and toward the next generation.

The Explosive Question

 Was "Did You Vote for Trump?" a Fair Question?

At the Donuts with Democrats meeting last Saturday, candidates for Town Council were taking questions from the audience. Then came a question that seemed to catch everyone off guard:

"Did you vote for Trump?"

Two of the candidates openly identified themselves as Republicans. A third claimed to be an independent. The room full of Democrats seemed surprised that such a direct question had been asked.

One candidate openly admitted that he voted for Trump the first time, but would not do so again. Another Republican candidate danced around the question and never really provided a direct answer. The independent candidate also avoided giving a clear response.

Afterward, some people questioned whether the woman should have asked the question at all. I disagree. In fact, I think it was one of the most revealing questions of the entire meeting.

Why?

Because elections are about more than smiling faces and campaign slogans. Voters are trying to determine how candidates think, what values they hold, and how they are likely to govern once they take office.

Donald Trump is not just another politician. He is one of the most influential and controversial political figures in modern American history. Whether a person supported him, opposed him, or supported him once and later changed their mind tells voters something about that person's judgment, priorities, and political philosophy.

The answers themselves proved why the question was legitimate.

One candidate candidly admitted he voted for Trump the first time but would not do so again. Whether voters agree with that position or not, they learned something meaningful about him. They learned that he was willing to answer honestly and that his views may have evolved over time.

Another candidate apparently preferred not to answer directly. The independent candidate also chose not to give a clear response. That reluctance was revealing in its own way. Voters can draw their own conclusions.

The important point is that there was no wrong answer. A candidate could have proudly said yes. A candidate could have proudly said no. A candidate could have said they voted for Trump once and regretted it. What matters is that voters receive honest information.

Some argue that Town Council races are nonpartisan and that national politics should stay out of local elections. That sounds good in theory, but in reality political beliefs influence how elected officials view taxes, development, public spending, law enforcement, libraries, parks, and dozens of other local issues.

Political philosophy does not disappear simply because the office is local.

The woman who asked the question was not being rude. She was doing exactly what citizens are supposed to do in a democracy: gathering information about the people asking for her vote.

Democracy is not strengthened when candidates avoid difficult questions. Democracy is strengthened when citizens ask them.

If candidates want the public's trust, they should be willing to answer the public's questions. The voters can then decide for themselves what those answers mean.

That is not unfair.

That is accountability.

The Grey Ghetto

The Three Stooges and the Grey Ghetto Mentality

There is nothing wrong with being old. In fact, many of Payson's retirees built successful businesses, raised families, served in the military, and helped create the community we enjoy today. Age is not the problem.

The problem is that Councilmen Otto, Bell, and Ferris seem to govern as if nobody in Payson has a pulse. Their vision of the future appears to be a town frozen in time, where nothing changes, nothing grows, and every new idea is treated as a threat.

Some residents jokingly call Payson a "Grey Ghetto." While that description is unfair to many retirees, it captures the mindset the Three Stooges seem determined to promote. Their political base often consists of people living on the financial edge, worried about every penny of government spending and terrified that any change might somehow destroy the community.

What makes this especially strange is that Payson is no longer a poor little mountain town. This is a community where homes routinely sell for a million dollars or more. At any given time there can be dozens of homes on the market priced above two million dollars. Wealthy retirees, professionals, and successful business owners have chosen to live here because Payson offers beauty, recreation, and a high quality of life.

Yet the Three Stooges continue to act as though Payson is one step away from becoming a ghost town if the library buys a new book or the town invests in a park.

Their political playbook is predictable. If there is a problem, blame immigrants. If someone disagrees with them, accuse them of being radical. If the library acquires a controversial book, declare that civilization is collapsing because of pornography. If all else fails, dust off the latest Tea Party conspiracy theory and present it as settled fact.

Meanwhile, the real issues facing Payson receive far less attention. How do we attract younger families? How do we create amenities that increase property values? How do we make the town attractive to professionals, entrepreneurs, and visitors? How do we plan for the next twenty years instead of reliving the last twenty?

Instead of discussing those questions, the public is treated to endless culture-war theater. Residents hear more about imaginary threats than actual opportunities.

The irony is that the people pushing this fearful message benefit enormously from the prosperity of Payson. They enjoy the roads, parks, police services, medical facilities, and property values that come from a growing and successful community. Yet they often oppose the very investments that would make the town even better.

A healthy community requires vision. It requires leaders willing to think beyond the next election and beyond the latest outrage circulating on social media. It requires leaders who see Payson as a place with a future, not merely a retirement community waiting for the clock to run out.

Payson deserves leadership that believes the town can grow, improve, and thrive. The Three Stooges seem content to manage decline while blaming outsiders for every problem.

That may be good politics for the Tea Party crowd, but it is a poor strategy for the future of Payson.