Annually, the Southern Poverty Law Center publishes its year in hate report. This includes their list of hate groups in each state that they are following. Nationally the number that they followed in 2024 is 1,371. This is down from 1,430 in 2023. Adjusting these numbers for population they were following 4.27 groups per million […]

The 3rd most read post of 2023 was on the group Mom’s for Liberty working to ban books and bully school boards in the area. A group opposing them has sprung up that is simply called STOP Mom’s for Liberty. I spoke with the head of the group Liz Mikitarian. The group was also founded […]

This site focuses on events in and around the Alleghenies. Why Gaza matters to us? Before I get to that I will discuss this. The video above is from Al Jazeera plus’s YouTube page. It discusses the one sided coverage the U.S. media gives to Israel. It gives the example of media figures taking the […]

This week (Sept. 18-24) has been declared banned books week by the American Library Association. Above is a graphic from them detailing the complaints to local libraries, schools and other institutions about certain books, signings by authors, and films. This Friday I will be at the Cambria County Library to give a reading from my […]

This week I received this message from Google about my blog:  Dear Publisher, Due to the war in Ukraine, we will pause monetization of content that exploits, dismisses, or condones the war. Please note, we have already been enforcing on claims related to the war in Ukraine when they violated existing policies (for instance, the Dangerous or Derogatory […]

Maus by Art Spiegelman was the first graphic novel to win a Pulitzer prize.  It tells the story of the Holocaust with the Jews depicted as mice and the Nazis depicted as cats.  The news that a school board in Tennessee has banned the book  (summarized by David Corn in MotherJones) has made me think of my […]