Normally, I wouldn’t cheer the death of a human being but the killing of master terrorist Osama bin Laden by a team of Navy SEALs Sunday was a well-deserved, justifiable homicide of the man who planned the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon.

Friends were among those killed at both the Pentagon and New York City on that sunny September morning. I spent two days straight shooting photos at the Pentagon. That day is seared into my memory like no other time in my life.

Like so many others, I found a lot of reasons to celebrate the death of a monster.

Related articles

• Osama bin Laden found, killed by U.S. forces (capitolhillblue.com)
• Full text of President’s statement (capitolhillblue.com)

I listened and went on a weight loss program that involved a complete change in lifestyle. Since then, I have dropped 55 pounds and my blood suger is well within normal range. I also feel a lot better.

At least I did until Anthem Blue Cross in Roanoke decided to lie about my medical history and use those lies as an excuse to try and cancel my health insurance.

In September, Amy and I applied for a new Blue Cross plan designed to lower our rates — a move prompted in part by my decision to retire early and go on Social Security. I’m not eligible for Medicare for another three years and Amy is still a long way from either Social Security or Medicare.

Anthem approved Amy for the new plan but rejected me, saying my “height to weight” ratio was beyond their norms. They based their decision not on what I weighed in September but used my weight in January — nine months earlier.

My doctor sent in a letter verifying that my weight in September was 40 pounds below what I weighed in January (I’ve lost 15 more pounds since then).

So Anthem came back with another denial, this time claiming that my doctor had diagnosed me as diabetic in January.

That was a lie. The medical record in January stated that my blood sugar in January was 127 — one point above the bottom level of 126 to signal a “danger of developing” diabetes.

Anthem refused to alter their stance, saying their “interpretation” of the medical record indicated that I was diabetic.

So my doctor ran a new blood sugar test and also a glucose test — an indicator of diabetes. The blood sugar came back normal and the glucose test was negative for diabetes. She sent a new report to Anthem.

That was 10 days ago. As of today, Anthem has not altered their position. I still am not eligible for the new plan. I recently passed a full physical for a new life insurance policy with another insurance company. They found no problems with my medical history or condition. In the past three months, I have passed a stress test, a heart test, x-rays of vital organs and a colonoscopy.

But Anthem makes up excuses to deny coverage. Even when you catch them in a lie they ignore the truth. My insurance agent says Anthem has denied other applicants with claims of non-existent medical conditions.

Translation: Anthem wants to cancel my health insurance because I turn 62 next month and they are willing to lie and distort my medical record to justify their immoral and illegal actions.

In the past five years, Amy and I have paid Anthem premiums that exceed what they have paid out in our behalf by 735 percent.

I continue to appeal their decision. I’m not giving in without a fight.

It won’t be easy. Anthem is a company that lies and cheats. They have the business ethics of a street whore.

No, that’s too harsh. At least a street whore gives you service for your money.

On my Harley, I’m removed from the mind-numbing tsunami of political propaganda of cable TV, Internet chatter and radio rancor.

While traversing winding roads through the Blue Ridge, I have neither the time nor the desire to deal with the mediocrity of partisanship and ponder why too many have lost the ability to display an outmoded concept of independent thought and rational political discourse.

At one time, I actually hoped we as a nation could rise above the partisan blather and put a nation’s soul ahead of political demagoguery. I had hoped we could place the interests of society ahead of narrow-focus political pandering.

Alas, I tilted at another windmill. Perhaps the average citizen, numb from a constant barrage of propaganda from both sides of the philosophical spectrum can no longer overcome the single-minded hypnotic state of partisan political posturing. Perhaps open-minded, rational debate is no longer possible in a nation controlled by anger and intolerance for differing viewpoints.

Political dogma demands one-sided, blind acceptance that one side must always be superior to the other. To the left, anything conservative is evil and a lie. To the right, the left lies and wants to ruin the country. Of course, neither extreme is true. To those who accept the broadcast half-truths of Glenn Beck on the right or Keith Olbermann on the left, there cannot be two sides to an issue.

In a world of political spin, truth becomes irrelevant, even arcane. In a partisan political world, compromise is a sign of weakness and coalitions cannot exist.

I’ve been a player in this game for more than four decades — both as a journalist and as a political operative. In those 40 years, I’ve watched America become more divided, more partisan and less willing to put love of country above petty political interests. I’ve watched rich special interests become the ruling class because they, and they alone, have the money, resources and power to control our elected officials.

I’ve learned that a society that places unearned importance on party labels and identification is a society headed for destruction. America today is not progressive, but regressive, retreating into fears and stereotypes of the past that, unfortunately, will drive the anger and intolerance of the future.

I stopped at an overlook on the Blue Ridge Parkway and chatted with a couple from New Zealand who are nearing the end four months of touring our country on a BMW 1200 RS bike.

“You know, yours is a nation of passionate beliefs and each of you wants that belief to be dominant and controlling,” said Alex Case. “We learned early on in our tour not to disagree.”

He looked at a small sticker on the back of my helmet. It says: “I’m not a Democrat. I’m not a Republican. I’m an American. There is a difference.”

“Didn’t meet many who would agree with that sticker,” he said.

Deidre Case said they ran into a lot of people over the past four months who proudly and passionately told she and her husband that they were a Democrat or a Republican but very, very few who displayed any similar passion as simply an American.

As they rode off, I looked out over the panoramic beauty of the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, a pastoral scene that seems so calm and serene from 3,000 plus feet.

As I fired up the Harley and headed down the mountain and back into the reality of America, I found myself humming the tune of an old Joni Mitchell song, Big Yellow Taxi:

They took all the trees
Put ‘em in a tree museum
And they charged the people
A dollar and a half just to see ‘em
Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got
Till it’s gone
They paved paradise
And put up a parking lot

Neither Bath County’s Creigh Deeds or Northern Virginia’s Bob McDonnell gave an informed viewer any reason to put either one in the governor’s mansion for the next four years.

If these two are the best that Virginia’s Republican and Democratic parties have to offer then the Commonwealth is headed for a lot of trouble.

Assuming, of course, that any team is willing to sign the convicted felon who ran a dogfighting ring while playing for both Tech and the Atlanta Falcons NFL franchise. Somebody probably will but some teams, like The Washington Redskins, actually show some moral courage and say “no way.”

In most circumstances, I believe a person who served their time for a crime deserves a chance at redemption but Vick got off with an incredibly light sentence and has not shown any real remorse for his crimes.

Like his criminally-delinquent brother Marcus , Michael Vick is just another example of Tech football coach Frank Beamer’s willingness to recruit thugs and misfits in order to produce winning football teams for the school’s grandiose, but unnecessary, football program.

Testimony during his trial showed Vick ran in dogfighting circles while at Tech. An investigation into Vick’s involvement in dogfighting rings in Southwestern Virginia was quashed after Tech officials intervened. Blacksburg and Montgomery County police officers tell me their departments were too often forced to cover up Vick’s run-ins with the law because of pressure from Tech officials. The school also threw its weight around when other athletes got into trouble. Sources within the area’s law enforcement agencies tell me much of this would have come out in trial if Vick had not copped a plea which makes me wonder what role Tech played in Vick’s deal with the government.

Comments Norfolk-area resident Kevin Soule on Reuters Blog:

Apparently most people just don’t get it. Michael Vick is a thug, his whole life people have been sweeping his troubles under the rug. I live in Norfolk, VA and am well aware of the cover up of his problems starting when he was in junior high school, through Virginia Tech and now the National Football League.

Techsideline.Com columnist Will Stewart says Beamer gets too close to his players and their families and this hurts Tech:

He gets so close to his players and their families that he can’t hand out the harsh discipline required to reel the kids in. Beamer and his staff have noted for years that when they recruit these players, they promise their families that they’ll take care of them. So when the kids step out of line, often repeatedly, the coaching staff treats them like you would your own son, giving them second chances, and more.

This approach is a kind, caring approach. It works well on the recruiting trail, because it creates a family atmosphere at Virginia Tech, and recruits and their families respond positively to it. They trust Frank Beamer and his staff to care for their sons. But when athletes embarrass the university, it angers the fan base and reflects poorly on Virginia Tech — and lately, Frank Beamer himself.

Beamer should have lost his job over his cover-ups of the criminal acts of both Michael and Marcus Vick but Tech has become a school more interested in big-time college football glory than education. It’s a shame that an educational institution once known more for its world-class engineering school and agriculture programs is now the poster child for pampered athletes and deranged students that go on murder rampages or decapitate their ex- lovers.

Vick does not deserve to ever play again in the NFL and, if there was any real justice in this whole despicable mess, Beamer would be fired and banned from college football. But if that happened, he’d probably get hired as an NFL coach and sign Michael Vick as his quarterback.

(Updated Aug. 1, 1009, to include new material)

So where’s the quiet? Where’s the laid-back, peaceful lifestyle?

The sound of jackhammers ripped through the town of Floyd this week. A new crosswalk is under construction. Workers continue to put the finishing touches on The Station on South Locust. Tomorrow night will bring throngs to downtown for the Friday Night Jamboree, music at Cafe del Sol and Oddfellas and dinner at any of several eateries. Even with a new municipal parking lot, finding a place to park on a Friday night, Saturdays and some days during the week can be difficult.

Trying to turn left out of the parking lot at the Village Green on Main Street after 3 p.m. can try one’s patience. Traffic headed for Fandango backed up 20 deep or more at the stoplight last weekend.

Over at the County Administration Building on Oxford Street, officials are rushing to put the final details on a “major announcement” of a new business in the town’s industrial park that, we are told, will bring a significant number of new jobs to the county (which we need) along with increases in traffic and demands on the infrastructure (which we may not be able to handle).

My Blackberry chimed with reminders for five appointments and events for today — three of them conflicting with another.

Last night, while attending a wedding reception, somebody remarked: “Remember when there was nothing to do in Floyd? I’m starting to miss the old days.”

Yet Floyd County government faces these times of growth with a budget stretched so tight it could snap at any time. The Sheriff’s Department is laying off deputies because of budget cuts. Other county departments will have to curtail services in the coming year. The Virginia Department of Transportation is running out of money for road maintenance and has no funds for new construction. The Department of Social Services could not fund every request it had for assistance last year.

Growth does not always translate into prosperity nor does it necessarily improve the quality of life. It comes at a price. While changes that bring new business and opportunities to town should be welcome, can they succeed when the town and county governments lack both the planning and resources to handle that growth?

There’s talk of an English pub at the Station on South Locust and an Italian restaurant on Webbs Mill Road but has anyone conducted a demographic study to see if Floyd can support two more restaurants? I doubt it.

Floyd County is awash in grand plans but we are a desert when it comes to strategic planning and focus. No one, to my knowledge, has yet come up with the answer some simple questions: What is it that Floyd wants to be? What’s the goal? What’s the theme? Where’s the focus?

A lot of good people have put their own money on the line to bring change and prosperity to Floyd but they put all of that at risk with government leaders who wander aimlessly in the dark without a road map to the future.

Can Floyd succeed in spite of itself or are we just cooking up a recipe for disaster?

Our Founding Fathers would not recognize America today: They would emerge from their graves to find an over-governed nation lacking in unity, purpose or hope.

The America we once knew and revered is gone, lost amid discord, lingering hate and political agendas that put greed and control above what is best for the nation and its people.

The notion of a government of the people, for the people and by the people died long ago. America today is controlled by fatcat lobbyists, powerful communications moguls and politicians who personal ambitions outweigh their love of country.

We’ve become a nation where the President of the United States decides who runs the nation’s largest automobile company, a nation where phone calls are monitored and our every move in captured by an ever-growing army of video cameras and monitoring equipment. Every day, the government monitors our finances, our travels and our habits. The government feels it has a right to know our health information, our gun-buying habits and whether or not we watch porno movies on DirecTV.

We laughingly try to export democracy to other countries when, in reality, we do not have true democracy here at home.  We should be charged with false advertising.

In many ways, we did it to ourselves. In the primary elections last month, just 3.5 percent of Floyd County’s eligible voters turned out to vote. A public hearing on the county’s budget brought out only a handful of people.

Maybe we no longer care what happens to a once-great nation called America. For the first time in my life, I’m wondering if I do. On this 4th of July, I’ll probably climb on my motorcycle and find a lonely back road to ride for the day.

Tonight, some will gather at the high school to watch the fireworks. Others will climb a hilltop on Thunderstruck Road to watch more.

But are they attending a celebration or a wake?

I wonder.

Over the past two weeks, the spam filter for Muse has caught more than 50 comments from locals who have used racial epithets to describe Obama and those who support him.

At Blue Ridge Restaurant recently, a customer left a waitress a one-cent tip. He then pointed to her Obama button and said “if you want a bigger tip, learn how to vote.”

I’ve received more than 100 emails in the past two weeks calling me a “n—– lover” and similar names. All were anonymous but a backtrace of IP addresses shows that 70 percent came from swva.net email locations. An anonymous note taped to the front door of Muse told me I should “go back to Washington (DC). They’ve got lots of n—— up there. You’ll feel right at home.”

At the Floyd Country Store not long ago, a woman looked at a local black man dancing with a white partner and said: “You know, it just makes my blood boil to see one of them black boys dancing with a white woman.”

I looked at her and replied: “I know just what you mean. It makes my blood boil whenever I encounter a racist and bigot.”

I’ve heard the “n-word” used more in conversation the last four weeks than in the remainder of the four years we have lived here.

Sadly, the candidacy of Barack Obama has fueled the racism that still lingers in too many residents of our area. It is fed by racist politicians like Virgil Goode and Republican activists like Bobby May. It thrives on historical revision by right-wing authors and thrives on the fear of the ignorant and the paranoia of the weak.

Local residents circulate emails calling Obama a “Muslim” or warning of a coming race war.

While not all supporters of John McCain or opponents of Barack Obama are racists, recent studies show that too many voters are letting racial prejudices guide how they will vote in November.

It is telling that not one racist diatribe that someone attempted to post on this web site or that came in the email was signed. Just as the Ku Klux Klan hid under white sheets, racists usually spew their hate anonymously. They live in fear, their cowardice fed by their stupidity and feelings of inadequacy.

It’s sad that such people still walk among us.

It’s not the first time I’ve run into racism here or elsewhere in this country. I’m sure it won’t be the last. His next comment was, sadly, also something I’ve heard too often..

“John McCain is a real American,” he said. “He loves America. Obama hates America. He and his liberal buddies aren’t patriots.”

Listen to the partisan propaganda from both sides of the political spectrum and you find that each think they have a monopoly on patriotism and love of country.

But partisans, be they Republicans or Democrats, aren’t patriots. They don’t love their country. They love their party, their narrow piece of life through a slanted political bias, their hatred and disregard for anything and anyone that doesn’t agree with their myopic view of the world.

This is not a new phenomenon. Author Horatio King warned that partisanship overshadowed patriotism in his book, Patriotism vs. Partisanship, published in 1900 — 108 years ago.

In 1796, George Washington, in his Presidential farewell address, warned the country about the danger of political parties:

I have already intimated to you the danger of parties in the state, with particular reference to the founding of them on geographical discriminations. Let me now take a more comprehensive view, and warn you in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party, generally.

This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human mind. It exists under different shapes in all governments, more or less stifled, controlled, or repressed; but, in those of the popular form, it is seen in its greatest rankness, and is truly their worst enemy.

The alternate domination of one faction over another, sharpened by the spirit of revenge, natural to party dissension, which in different ages and countries has perpetrated the most horrid enormities, is itself a frightful despotism. But this leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries, which result, gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of Public Liberty.

Without looking forward to an extremity of this kind, (which nevertheless ought not to be entirely out of sight,) the common and continual mischiefs of the spirit of party are sufficient to make it the interest and duty of a wise people to discourage and restrain it.

Like too many lessons of history, Americans ignored Washington’s wise advice. Now we have a party-dominated electoral system where the interests of the powerful special interest groups that control each party’s agenda are placed ahead of the interests of the nation. Political partisans base their beliefs on the fantasy that their views are superior to others and the only views worth considering. In such an atmosphere, unity and elected officials with a true love of country are impossible dreams.

I have a sticker on one of my motorcycle helmets. It reads:

I’m not a Democrat.

I’m not a Republican.

I’m an American.

There is a difference.

Damn right there is a difference. And, by the way, I’ve not decided who, if anyone, I support in the 2008 Presidential circus.

If John McCain is as serious as he says about running a “respectful” campaign against an opponent he considers “a decent person,” word hasn’t yet trickled down to his newly opened storefront field office in Gainesville, Virginia.

No Democratic presidential candidate has carried Virginia since 1964, and most election years both campaigns pretty much ignore the state. This time, however, McCain is running behind Barack Obama in statewide polls, thanks in large part to the head start he got on the ground there. “We haven’t seen a race like this in Virginia — ever,” said state GOP Chairman Jeffrey M. Frederick. “The last time was 40 years ago, and they didn’t run races like this.”

Indeed, Frederick, a 33-year-old state legislator, hadn’t even been born yet. But earlier this year Frederick unseated a moderate 71-year-old former lieutenant governor (who also happens to be Jenna Bush’s father-in-law) to become head of the Virginia GOP, promising “bold new leadership” for a state party recently on the decline.

The McCain campaign invited me to visit Frederick and the Gainesville operation on Saturday morning, to get a first-hand glimpse of its ground game in Prince William County, Virginia, a fast-growing area about 30 miles from Washington, D.C.

With so much at stake, and time running short, Frederick did not feel he had the luxury of subtlety. He climbed atop a folding chair to give 30 campaign volunteers who were about to go canvassing door to door their talking points — for instance, the connection between Barack Obama and Osama bin Laden: “Both have friends that bombed the Pentagon,” he said. “That is scary.” It is also not exactly true — though that distorted reference to Obama’s controversial association with William Ayers, a former 60s radical, was enough to get the volunteers stoked. “And he won’t salute the flag,” one woman added, repeating another myth about Obama. She was quickly topped by a man who called out, “We don’t even know where Senator Obama was really born.” Actually, we do; it’s Hawaii.

This comes on the heels of a overtly racist column written by Bobby May, McCain’s chairman in nearby Buchanan County (where May was also County Treasurer). In the column, May says Obama’s platform includes:

Hire rapper Ludacris to paint (the White House) black. Taxes to be increased to by enough paint for the job plus spray-paint for graffiti.

Raise taxes to send $845 billion, most to Africa so the Obama family can skim off enough to allow them to free their goats and live the American dream.

May was forced to resign his post after the column appeared in The Voice, a Buchanan County newspaper. A McCain supporter, writing for Politico, called May’s attack just “one isolated piece from a low level party activist in a rural paper.”

Low level activist? According to The Richmond Times Dispatch:

May has been involved with dozens of Republican campaigns throughout Virginia, including former gubernatorial candidate and Attorney General Jerry Kilgore, Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling and Rep. Virgil H. Goode Jr., R-5th.

The McCain campaign may have dumped May but it  has not distanced itself from Fredrick’s comments and the state chairman is hardly “a low level activist.”

Writes Virginia blogger Lowell Feld:

Look, we all know that Jeff Frederick is a right-wing extremist nutcase, but he’s also the head of the Republican Party of Virginia (RPV).  That means, when Jeff Frederick utters one of his (many) crazy remarks, he’s representing the entire RPV.

What Jeff Frederick said in Time Magazine is stupid, hateful, and completely beyond the pale. It’s no better than the racist and anti-Muslim rantings of Bobby Lee May, who was forced to resign a few days ago as chairman of Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign in Buchanan County. So, when will the “leaders” of Virginia’s Republican Party – Bob McDonnell, Bill Bolling, etc. – demand Jeff Frederick’s resignation as chairman of the RPV?  When will John McCain and Sarah Palin repudiate Frederick’s remarks, just as John McCain grabbed the microphone away from a bigoted supporter who called Obama an “Arab” (as if there’s anything wrong with that)? If these people do NOT repudiate Frederick and force his resignation, can we conclude that they agree with his remarks?  What’s it gonna be, guys?

P.S. Remember, this wasn’t some offhand remark by Frederick; he said it knowing that a reporter from TIME MAGAZINE was in the room taking notes for a story! Imagine what he says when the media isn’t present?!?

All of this are old tricks of the GOP. I saw such tactics used often when I worked for the Republican Party in the 1980s.  A Republican friend who still works in the political game told me Bobby May’s racist diatribe is not an original work by him but was written by a staff member of the Republican National Committee in Washington and distributed to McCain campaign offices for whatever use they wanted to make of it.  It has been widely circulated in emails sent out by GOP activists.