To the Editor:

I wrote this letter to Congressman Chuck Edwards and thought it might be of interest to some others.

First of all, let me say that I am writing you because I am appalled at the killing of another American citizen on American streets by members of federal ICE and/or Border Patrol forces in Minnesota. This does not represent any sort of “immigration enforcement” I voted for. 

To the Editor:

The attitude of “I get up in the morning and go to work, come home tired and hope for the best” just isn’t going to work anymore. Especially if you are a three-time Trump voter.

This country is being ripped apart by a man who has intentionally divided the American people for his own gain and that of his wealthy friends. Take a close look at the Big Beautiful Bill and who it favors.

The first thing is to tame the rage so that you do not live in it all the time. Or worse, repressing it so often and so much that it calcifies into all-consuming despair. That won’t do. 

The next thing is to cultivate joy stubbornly and aggressively. You know, that “pursuit of happiness” business. It is not easy to do it in our madhouse of a country. You know it and I know it. 

Ron Rash has never been to an opera. But later this month, he’ll sit down to enjoy an opus based on stories and poems he wrote about the Southern Appalachian mountains he calls home. 

“Shelton Laurel: An Appalachian Opera” takes place over a few years around the Civil War. The opera, which will see its world premiere later this month, tells the tale of farmers in Madison County’s Shelton Laurel, not far from Western Carolina University’s Bardo Arts Center in Cullowhee where the work will be performed. 

Editor’s Note: This is the transcript of a recent voice memo Garret left for a friend of his on Thursday, Jan. 8, in the aftermath of the incident in Minneapolis, Minnesota, between a protester and an ICE agent. To note, both Garret’s father (U.S. Immigration) and grandfather (U.S. Customs) were career officers for the federal government (now retired). In 2003, Immigration and Customs combined to form ICE due to the Homeland Security Act of 2002.

Good afternoon. You’re probably slaving away at your [office] desk doing your favorite thing, which is working inside under fluorescent lighting, I would assume. [Laughs]. Oh, man, I don’t know where this message is going to go, but I just was wanting to vent about…[well], it’s almost hard to vent anymore, because it’s like every day is just this chaotic frustration of things outside of my [front] door and things across the country and things around the world. 

To the Editor:

On Memorial Day — a holiday that originally honored Union soldiers who died defending the principles enshrined in our Constitution and Declaration of Independence, and now encompasses all who have served these United States — my wife and I revisited my childhood haunts in Western North Carolina.

U.S. District Judge Max O. Cogburn, Jr. sentenced Brandon Tyler Buchanan to 30 years in prison for second degree murder, announced Russ Ferguson, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of North Carolina. 

Ernest D. Pheasant, Sr., has received a sentence of life in prison for the murder of his ex-wife, Marie Walkingstick Pheasant. 

In 2013, Marie’s body was found in a vehicle that investigators later determined was intentionally set on fire. An autopsy revealed that she died from stab wounds to the neck and abdomen.

Approximately 20,000 murders occurred in the United States in 2023. These killings ranged in scope from gang battles to domestic violence. 

Over a decade after Marie Walkingstick Pheasant’s body was found in a burned-out vehicle in Cherokee, the community has finally received a modicum of closure as her husband, Ernest Dwayne Pheasant, has pleaded guilty to committing the murder.