Well, we made it to our Bed & Breakfast in Somerset: The Somerset County Inn. It was dark when we arrived, but I could see a McCain-Palin sign sort of in front of the building; not sure if our hosts: Joyce and Dan Jones put it there or not. He is a minister and she is the daughter of one. Nice polite people. I'm keeping quiet about why we are here. Just visiting my old stomping grounds.
The ride here was informative. It's a good six hours plus stops to get all the way to SW PA.
First stop for lunch was off the turnpike in a small town East of Harrisburg, something like Charlesburg or whatever. Just a one street little burg. We ate at the Hoag's Hotel, where I had the first meal that reminded me of why people have such huge derrieres here. It was billed as Pennsylvania Dutch cooking. I had a "bowl" which was delicious meatloaf inside bread, with potato stuffing (included potatoes and bread stuffing) covered, absolutely covered with oodles of gravy. Not for the faint of heart (no pun intended). I even took a photo of it but have to learn how to put photos on my blog.
A McCain poster and flags were evident in front of one of the houses in the modest town. Redjeb started to read the local paper (berksmontnews.com) and also the Bethel Bulletin & Pine Grove Examiner. They were eye openers. In one a guy wrote a letter to the editor saying there were a lot of unanswered questions about Obama and his judgment and associations, such as: Who did he hang out with in high school? Who paid for his trip to Pakistan when he went with his college roommate to visit his friend's family there? Now he hangs out with Ayers, he must be a "sleeper", i.e. a spy who was trained as a young man and waiting these years to get into an important post.
Another article said that Obama was responsible for our latest drop in the stock market and our current financial crisis as he keeps saying that there are things going wrong in our country. Also he is for regulation..... I'll try to figure out how to attach copies of these articles to this blog, if I can. Really mind boggling.
I was beginning to feel that my work here was going to be even more difficult than I had imagined.
We stopped for a brief visit with my old friend Mary Louise (we were in first grade together and went all the way through school together, even both played the "bells" in the marching band.) She lives outside of Harrisburg (Camp Hill) and said that that area is all Republican and her friend down the street is convinced the Obama is a Muslim. We only saw one Obama sign outside a home; the rest were for you know who.
Later I would get a call from Joan (Kutchman, Kay's sister) who also lives in central Penna. She said no one dares to say that they are Democrats; they feel intimidated, and this has been written about in the papers. People who are interviewed for the paper will not give their names for fear of reprisals from the neighbors.
Now today one of the headlines in the local papers features the Representative John Murtha (who is usually revered by here). He has had to "retract" a statement he made yesterday about Western PA being "racist." So he took it back and said that the people weren't racist, it was only that they didn't like blacks and didn't like the idea of a black person and family in the White House.
I guess that is why the cal it the "white" house.
So, it is now Friday morning. I have called Lisa, our Obama contact here in Somerset. We are soon walking down to her office, which is a desk in the Democratic Headquarters on the second floor of the VFW building.
Redjeb has just come back from a walk in town. This is supposed to be the county seat, so is a sort of city. But no one is on the quiet streets. The air is crisp and quite cool. Fall is here and the leaves are turning beautiful colors.
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