SCRANTON, Pa – Ask a restaurant owner how difficult the COVID era has been, and the list of struggles is lengthy – loss of customers, supply chain problems, doubling and sometimes tripling of food costs, utility costs, and the ability to find or keep …
Author: Salena Zito, DC Examiner
American Decimation: The Tearing of Our Social Fabric
PITTSBURGH – When the Hampton Battery was dedicated here in 1871 to a young Civil War soldier who lost his life protecting the Union at Chancellorsville, Virginia, the granite monument was a point of pride for residents of this neighborhood. They woul…
Vestiges of Americana Fading Before Our Eyes
HOLLIDAYSBURG, Pennsylvania – In truth, the last Howard Johnson’s restaurant closed long before the one in Lake George, New York, did last week. The only thing that particular location had in common with the fried clams and 28 flavors of ice cream the…
The Conservative Populist Coalition Has Grown in PA
FANNETTSBURG, Pennsylvania – The first time I accidentally stumbled onto the cracked Back Road street sign in this Franklin County unincorporated town years ago, while covering the 2012 presidential race between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, I knew I …
In PA, It’s Anybody’s Guess in the Republican Primary
LANCASTER – Julie, Anne and Heather are all Republicans with similar backgrounds; they are all voting in Pennsylvania’s primary Tuesday and are all voting splitting their vote between three candidates in that race.
Appalachia Gets a Voice in J.D. Vance’s Win in Ohio
YOUNGSTOWN, Ohio – One week after packing the Mahoning County Republican Party storefront headquarters, to the point that people were spilling out the door to get a chance to hear what he had to say, J.D. Vance squeaked out a victory in the crowded Oh…
The Tea Leaves in Wisconsin Look Promising for GOP
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) has long recognized that the message of the conservative populist movement in his state will never reach people or persuade them in a meaningful way if Republicans don’t run for local offices in Democratic-dominated localities …
Pennsylvania’s Dramatic Shift Rightward Is a Warning Sign
JOHNSTOWN, Pennsylvania – When Ken Miller changed his party registration from Democrat to Republican in September 2020, he said he wasn’t doing it for Donald Trump. He had not voted for Trump or Hillary Clinton in 2016. Rather, he said, he was doing i…
In Pursuit of the Normal
RIDGWAY, Pennsylvania – While outsiders like to say there are more elk than people here in Elk County because of the abundance of the former and the sparse population of the latter, today is a different day as thousands of people from across Pennsylva…
Biden Admin Didn’t Anticipate the Great Awakening
INDEPENDENCE, Missouri – The half-circle of 13 chairs that framed the statue of President Harry Truman in the heart of the historic Independence Square this past fall was placed there in the days after 13 American soldiers were killed in the attack on…