Donald Trump’s election as president shocked and electrified America. But what does his election signify for America’s wildlands?
Environmentalists predict disasterous consequences for public lands and beyond. But outdoor sports groups are surprisingly optimistic.
When the billionaire entered the primary, longtime politicos scoffed. He had no political experience, had switched parties repeatedly over the previous decades, and had a spotty track record in business. Yet he vanquished his establishment candidates in the primary and headed into the general election running an unorthodox campaign based around his personality.
It’s not Donald Trump, of course, but Jim Justice, West Virginia’s only billionaire and owner of the Greenbrier Resort and the largest privately held coal company east of the Mississippi River. Justice stands as a figure simultaneously beloved—he coaches high-school basketball and bailed out the historic Greenbrier when it faced potential closure—and reviled, as his coal company has developed a reputation for not paying debts, taxes or environmental obligations.
Growing up 20 minutes from Lexington, Va., and its numerous links to Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson, I’ve always had a fascination for the mutable meaning of the Confederate battle flag and its convergence of ancestry, race, history, politics & more.
That meaning has shifted again in the year since Charleston, those right on the edge of the flag debate have escalated the conflict, heightening contradictions and putting the flag back in the news on numerous occasions around the South & the rest of the country.
In this story for Politico Magazine, I tried to take a meaningful look at how the past year has changed the fight over the rebel flag, as well as how that all slots into an already crazy election year.
The May 2016 election marked the end of an era in Roanoke politics, and the start of something new.
I wrote about the election for Blue Ridge Outdoors within the context of Roanoke’s transformation over the last couple of decades, from a deteriorating industrial center into the next great outdoors city.
As Super Tuesday approached, voters prepared to cast their votes in presidential primaries around the South as analysts struggled to understand the appeal of Republican frontrunner Donald J. Trump.
My story for Politico Magazine, “Why the South Is Rebelling Again,” examined the role of globalization and the loss of factory jobs in generating small-town and rural anger that has propelled Trump’s rise. It features John Bassett III (hero of the upcoming HBO series “Factory Man”), Beth Macy (who authored the book that inspired it), former Virginia Gov. Douglas Wilder, former Southside Virginia Congressman Virgil Goode and more.
Last fall Roanoke Mayor David Bowers went viral when he cited Japanese internment camps during World War II as a reason why the city shouldn’t accept Syrian refugees.
The discordant statement not only flew in the face of Roanoke’s status as a destination for refugees, but it also disregarded the contributions of the many Syrians who migrated to the city in the last decade of the 19th century and the first decade of the 20th.
In those days, “Syrian” meant something far different than it does today. Before World War I, the Ottoman Empire incorporated not just Syria as we know it today, but the bulk of the Middle East, North Africa and southeast Europe. Between 1880 and 1920, about 150,000 people left the Ottoman Empire—and many landed in Roanoke.
I and photographer Suzie Kelly explored Roanoke’s rich (and tasty!) history of Syrian and Lebanese cuisine from the early 1900s to today in this story for Munchies.
Presidents can shift the direction of art and culture by providing an inspiration, sometimes as a hostile response to whoever inhabits in the White House.
At the dawn of the Iowa Caucuses—and thus the start of the 2016 camapign in earnest—I charted the future of music under 15 different potential presidents.
Yes, former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore is there.
Read my story at Noisey.
I spent much of 2015 tracking the criminal trial of former Massey CEO Don Blankenship, who was indicted on criminal charges relating to West Virginia’s Upper Big Branch mine, the site of a 2010 explosion that killed 29 miners.
None of the three felony charges directly accused Blankenship of causing the disaster at Upper Big Branch mine, which happened when a spark from a longwall shearer ignited a fireball that hit accumulated coal dust, triggering a massive explosion.
Yet, the explosion overshadowed and informed every bit of the trial.
On Thursday, Blankenship was convicted of misdemeanor consipiracy to willfully violate mine safety regulations.
Read my story at Grist covering the trial and its outcome.
The October 2015 issue of Roanoke Business features a pair of my stories:
– The cover leader looks at international investment in the Roanoke and New River valleys. Volvo, Korona Candles, Red Sun Farms — why are these companies locating here, and what does it mean for the region?
– I also examined the impact of a new EPA regulation on a Floyd County wood stove dealer.
Read more, either online or in the print edition, which is available free this month on racks in Roanoke & NRV grocery stores.
The September 2015 issue of Roanoke Business magazine features three of my stories:
– The changing fortunes of farming, the cover feature, which examines southwest Virginia ag in 2015 through the five-year USDA Census of Agriculture and interviews with key players.
– “About as high-tech as it gets”: Red Sun Farms may be agriculture’s future under glass, a sidebar that looks at the hydroponic tomato grower’s 18-acre — and growing — operation in Pulaski County.
– Power in balance: The region’s races could determine which party controls the Virginia Senate, a round-up of issues and candidates in the three-way races in the 19th and 21st districts, which encompass most of the Roanoke and New River valleys.