In 'Nineteen Eighty-Four,' protagonist Winston Smith works at a propaganda department for the state called the 'Ministry of Truth,' where inconvenient news can be discarded down a 'memory hole.' Orwell was fixated on the idea that under certain governments, the past can be altered or documents rewritten.

Buckhannon, population 5,639, is a deeply conservative town and long has been. While coal is its past, oil and gas are its likely future. It's a town where guns are sold at yard sales, where Pentecostal churches are nearly as common as restaurants, and where distrust of Hillary Clinton is visceral and deep-seated.

Leftist, anti-fascist activists known as Antifa, whose stated goals are to stamp out racism, white supremacy and authoritarianism, sometimes do use violence.

Americans don't know the Constitution. More than half of those surveyed can't name any of the rights guaranteed under the First Amendment. Only a quarter can name all three branches of government.

Republicans - well, we're all part of the same family. We need to have some good disagreements with each other; we need to debate, but in the end, it's all about uniting, not dividing.

I really got the 'Rhoda' flavor from studying my stepmother, Angela, who's Italian, not Jewish. There's really so little difference between the speech patterns and family attitudes of Jews and Italians in the New York area, anyway.

America is a place where the freedom to be who you are shouldn't be a barrier to your ability to get a job and provide for your family.

Once I have children, the kids come first. One thing at a time for me.