She’s gone but not forgotten.

Or is she forever forsaken?

I’ve asked several local Dunmore and state elected officials to help me locate our frightened 11-year-old after federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents on Oct. 29 apprehended the undocumented sixth grader and her father.

Did federal agents deport her and her father back to Honduras? Are they still locked up somewhere in the United States? Are they together?

An ICE spokesman won’t say. And not one local or state elected official, all Democrats, has helped answer my questions. None of these public servants seems to care.

Because the Dunmore Borough website does not list email addresses for the seven council members. I asked my now former Facebook “friend” and councilman William “Trip” O’Malley in a message to provide email addresses for the other council members. I wanted to ask them for help trying to contact our desperate immigrant child.

O’Malley failed to respond.

Trying to prick family man O’Malley’s conscience, I asked in another message if he, like the child, is a descendant of immigrants. I, too, share DNA with an immigrant, my Irish grandfather who dug coal for 45 years in underground Scranton.

O’Malley ignored that message, too.

I wanted to let the child know people in her old hometown still think and care about what happens to her. But now I’m not so sure about their thinking or caring. And I now worry any contact from “home” might upset this child more than make her feel loved and wanted.

Dunmore Mayor Max Conway failed to answer written questions. So did state Sen. Marty Flynn. Other elected state officials who made pious public statements about the Dunmore ICE raid moved on to other business. Dunmore Police Chief Sal Marchese hung up on me when I called and asked him questions.

Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro remained my last hope.

Drew Popish works as Shapiro’s Northeast Regional Director. In the aftermath of the troubling ICE incident, Popish posted a heartfelt essay on his Facebook page below a photo of an overturned bike the child’s undocumented father reportedly rode before running from ICE. I saw the story when one of Popish’s Facebook friends shared his post.

This is what Shapiro’s Northeast Regional Director wrote:

“This bike breaks my heart. This photo haunts me.

A dad in our community dropped his daughter off at school, got on this bike, and rode to work. ICE stopped him on the street over a missed immigration hearing. No criminal history. No threat. Just a hardworking father.

His sixth-grade daughter found out at school. Instead of going home to her friends and her life, she was taken and deported with him. A child. Taken from her school. A family erased from our community in the middle of an ordinary day.

And who did this? Armored agents showing up like they were storming a battlefield, flexing like they were heroes. That is not toughness. That is insecurity hiding behind body armor. Real strength protects kids and families. It does not traumatize them.

Kids in America are going hungry. Families are losing healthcare. Schools are stretched to the breaking point. People cannot afford housing or mental health care. Yet this is where we send resources? To rip parents off bicycles on their way to work?

This is not safety. This is not justice. It is cruelty pretending to be law and order.

If you are not angry, check your pulse. We can be better than this. We have to be.

#AbolishICE #TrumpIsANationalDisgrace #TrumpAdministration”

It’s a pity Shapiro didn’t write and post what his Northeast Regional Director wrote and posted.

Popish failed to return messages to his cellphone and the governor’s office.

Shapiro press spokeswoman Rosie Lapowski also failed to respond to my emailed question, “Does Gov. Shapiro agree with the post Popish wrote and published?”

“Rebecca,” a “constituent services” representative in the governor’s office who refused to give her last name, said she would not provide an email address for Popish. Rebecca also said no outside phone number exists for Popish but that she would contact him on my behalf. After I told Rebecca why I wanted to talk with Popish, she informed me that “immigration” is a federal issue.

Maybe Rebecca doesn’t know Shapiro holds significant power to help control ICE abuse of local resources. Shapiro has the power to take administrative action, such as ending database access with ICE, ending collaboration between the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections and ICE, strengthening the Pennsylvania State Police ICE policy, protecting information in public benefit programs from ICE, prohibiting immigration enforcement arrests in state facilities and never leasing a state facility to ICE.

Democrat Shapiro also wields powerful political influence with local Democratic officials. Dunmore borough council members and the mayor can stop Dunmore police cooperation with ICE. Dunmore police removed the child from her elementary school and turned her over to ICE. The superintendent of schools described the law enforcement apprehension as “scary” and the child as “upset.”

This act cost Dunmore taxpayers public money better used for true community development. ICE cooperation also cost borough leaders credibility they might never and should not regain.   

Have state and local Democratic Party officials abandoned our lost immigrant child? Have these political pretenders shown their deeply tarnished mettle that lacks courage and resilience during increasingly difficult times?

Of course they have.

Will these opportunists turn their backs on other undocumented children who need their help the way they have cast off our lost immigrant child?

Of course they will.

This story is not over. ICE still threatens Northeastern Pennsylvania. Dunmore now endures as a bleak shadow of the town that once took pride in looking out for its own.

Imagine our lost immigrant child’s fear as the 11-year-old sixth grader realized no adult would save her. Dunmore police arrived Wednesday, Oct. 29, to take her away from teachers, friends and the safety of her elementary school.

Within minutes local police rushed her into the police station and turned her over to federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents who prepared her and her father for deportation to Honduras.

“She was upset,” Dunmore School District Superintendent John Marichak said Monday.

To try to ease her fear, Marichak said the school guidance counselor, an assistant principal and a teacher went along as police drove the child to the police station and handed her over to government agents who now controlled her future.

“ICE never showed here (at the school),” Marichak said.

Still, he said, “it was scary.”

Marichak explained that school officials followed a new policy that refuses to allow ICE agents or other immigration officials to remove a child from school without a warrant. The new school policy wasn’t official at the time because school board members had not yet voted on it, he said, but the policy is “up for review” and will be passed.

The policy says “the Dunmore School District is committed to serving as a welcoming environment for all students regardless of immigration status” and “that all children have a constitutional right to an education.”

“We won’t release a child without a warrant,” Marichak said.

Marichak said he doesn’t know if ICE had an administrative or judicial warrant for the girl. The superintendent said he didn’t see the warrant but trusted Dunmore Police Chief Sal Marchese who confirmed the warrant was valid. Before hanging up on me last week, Marchese said it was his “understanding” ICE agents possessed a warrant.

Marichak said Marchese called school officials early Wednesday to tell them about the ICE warrant for the child. Police Chief Marchese curtly told me last week that Dunmore police helped “facilitate” the child’s seizure as a “humanitarian” gesture, a loaded word clearly open to interpretation.

“We were on alert in the morning,” Marichak said, for the “end-of-day” handover.

Word had spread quickly among teachers and maybe even some students by the time Dunmore police arrived at the school, Marichak said. When the child realized police were coming for her is unclear. The girl’s undocumented father was already in custody for missing a federal immigration hearing, and deportation orders were in effect for him and his daughter since 2023 according to a recent ICE press release.

Exactly when teachers talked with their grade-school students about what had happened also is unclear. So is what teachers told their students about why police picked up their classmate and what her future might hold. Had she done something bad? Could her friends call or write her? Would they ever know where she now lives? Is she still alive?

The school guidance counselor stood by to talk with students, Marichak said.

I have not named this child in the four columns I’ve written about her ordeal. She is one of countless nameless, numbered children ICE agents have captured and continue to hunt to send into the darkness of panic and despair.

Dunmore parents should expect ICE to show up again. Increasing numbers of immigrants who are undocumented live in Dunmore, Scranton and elsewhere in Northeastern Pennsylvania. Their children, some of whom are undocumented, count on us to help them learn to live in America. In many ways our future as a nation depends on these families to thrive.

Are parents already afraid to send their children to school? How will Dunmore children feel the next time they see police wearing guns especially at their schools? What will you do if police arrive at school for your child?

“It’s a scary thing,” Marichak said. “It’s scary.”

Townspeople must trust their local police.

We need to know local law enforcement uses good judgment.

Dunmore Police Chief Salvatore Marchese came up short on the wisdom beat Wednesday when I called to ask about his department’s role in a recent high-profile arrest in his town. Officers in this Northeastern Pennsylvania borough adjacent to Scranton recently assisted federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents. ICE apprehended an undocumented Honduran immigrant and his 11-year-old daughter.

The man had missed an immigration hearing.

The child embodies pure innocence.

Dunmore Mayor Max Conway has ignored my emailed questions about whether Dunmore officials ever established a written agreement to cooperate with ICE. So I called Marchese and asked, “Do Dunmore police have a written agreement with ICE?”

“No,” the police chief said.

“So why did Dunmore police pick up the sixth grader at her school?”

“We helped facilitate,” Marchese said.

“What does facilitate mean?” I asked.

Marchese said Dunmore police went to the school to pick up the child “as humanely as possible” and reunite her with her father whom ICE had earlier arrested in the borough. He did not offer his definition of “humanely.”

“Did ICE have a warrant for the child?” I asked.

“That was my understanding,” Marchese said, implying he did not actually see a warrant for the child.

I asked Marchese who told him ICE had warrants.

“I don’t want to talk to you right now to be honest,” Marchese said.

 “Why is that?” I asked.

Marchese hung up on me.

I followed up the next day with an email.

“Chief Marchese, right before you hung up on me yesterday during our brief telephone conversation I asked why you said ‘I don’t want to talk to you right now to be honest.’ Why did you fear answering legitimate questions about your role and the role Dunmore police played in seizing a child from her Dunmore elementary school at the request of federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents?

By telling me you “understand” ICE possessed a warrant you imply you did not actually see a warrant for either the child or her father. Why would you allow Dunmore police to snatch a child from her school without making sure officers were acting legally?

Why would you cooperate with ICE in the first place?

I’ll be happy to again give you the opportunity to explain your side of the story on the phone. Or would you prefer a video interview?”

Marchese did not respond to my questions.

Scranton Times-Tribune columnist Chris Kelly had previously reported, “The local officers handled the ugly situation professionally and as quietly and compassionately as possible.”

Kelly failed to tell readers how or even if he confirmed his statement about the Dunmore cops’ purported skills. Pulling a child from the safety of her elementary school to be deported is as far from compassion as the Honduran capital Tegucigalpa is from Dunmore. And, if “professionally and quietly” means the chief of police covering his tracks with bullet-proof silence about what exactly happened when ICE tore into town, Dunmore police need serious additional training.

Why should local cops help federal agents seize defenseless hometown residents in the first place? Some police departments do partner with ICE through formal policies called the 287(g) program run by ICE and the Department of Homeland Security. The best police departments, however, simply refuse to cooperate with ICE. No federal law requires local police to assist ICE. No local police should.

Atlantic Magazine recently reported ICE receives $175 billion, more funding than any law enforcement agency in the United States. ICE eating up local resources costs Dunmore taxpayers money that is increasingly difficult to obtain. Dunmore officials must value hard-working residents who depend on local resources to pay for true public safety and ensure a secure quality of life for themselves and their children.

Will Dunmore parents grow increasingly fearful of sending their children to school? Will Dunmore police continue to do ICE dirty work? Nobody with the power to decide Dunmore police policy is talking publicly. After all the initial public concern elected officials showed over the local ICE arrests, in a little over a week none of them seems willing to even help find out where federal officials banished our lost immigrant child.

When Chief Marchese treats me or any member of the local press the way he did when I asked simple questions, how will he treat any local borough resident bold enough to ask questions about the public service he is well paid to perform?

Marchese misunderstands the heart of his protect and serve mission.

Protecting children is a holy crusade.

Serving unjust masters is surrender.

Dunmore High School supporters regularly chant “Beat ‘em Bucks” as a rallying cry against any and all opponents. Once known as Bucktown because of the abundant deer population, the community comprises a tight-knit tribe that supports and defends its own. A high school baton twirler known as Miss Buck has dressed for generations as a sequined antlered Buck to perform for the football crowd and instill pride in her community and school.

So what action will Dunmore Mayor Max Conway take to decrease the odds of United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents seizing another vulnerable child and her father as ICE did in Dunmore last week? How much does Conway really care about the Honduran father and his 11-year-old daughter deported to uncertainty after living productive lives in Dunmore for years? How much empathy does Conway truly feel for this father and child, a sixth grader who learned from dear friends and neighbors what it means to live in America and love her hometown?

To their credit many Dunmore residents exhibit great empathy, compassion and even anger at the ICE cold-blooded move to disrupt the lives of this targeted family. Good citizens flooded Facebook with messages of mercy for their neighbors under siege. Good people offered to help any way they could but didn’t know how.

That’s where elected public officials come in. Immigration enforcement is a federal responsibility. But conscientious elected officials can and must apply pressure on everyone involved in immigration enforcement. That includes Gov. Josh Shapiro, state and national Republican and Democratic Party leadership, public school officials, borough council members, local and state police and others. Demanding fair immigration policies, especially for children, requires aggressive political advocates to promote liberty and justice for all.

Four Democratic Northeastern Pennsylvania public servants including Conway quickly expressed pious public dismay in well-prepared statements about the Dunmore ICE apprehension. State Sen. Marty Flynn, a father who lives in Dunmore, state Rep. Kyle Mullins, a father who represents Dunmore, and state Rep. Kyle Donahue, another father, quickly posted statements expressing their concerns for compassion and common sense. But other than publicly displaying supposedly heartfelt emotions, what will these flatulent bureaucrats actually do to help prevent subsequent ICE incursions into our communities?  

Dunmore Mayor Max Conway initially did not respond to my questions in two emails asking about what happened in the town he represents. On Monday I sent Conway a follow-up email.

I wrote:

“I’m writing another of a series of Dunmore-based columns about the recent ICE arrest and the community consequences of this law enforcement action.

Have you tried to find out where the father and child are now living? Have you heard from the father or anyone representing his interests? Are you taking action to make sure this does not happen to other Dunmore children and their parents?

Does Dunmore Police Department have a formal written agreement with ICE?”

A Dunmore borough employee told me Conway doesn’t have an office at the borough building. The employee did not have a phone number for him. Conway has another job but maintains an office at the police station, according to the employee who didn’t know if Conway uses that office but said I could leave a message there.

No one answered the police department phone when I pressed “0” for the “receptionist” and the directory menu did not include an extension for Conway. Conway did not answer the phone at his real estate office. His voice mailbox was full. On Monday, though, he did respond to my third email.

Conway wrote, “I appreciate you reaching out. I’ve already made my public statement on this matter and don’t have anything further to add at this time. Thank you.”

He appreciates me reaching out.

He’s already made his public statement.

He doesn’t have anything further to add at this time.

If I ever talk with our lost immigrant child wherever she might be, I’ll make sure not to share Conway’s chilly sentiments. His cold-hearted demeanor might break more of this little girl’s already broken heart.

The day before issuing his Oct. 30 public statement, Conway wrote in a Facebook post, “I’m disgusted by what I’m hearing about ICE in Dunmore this morning. I’m on the phone trying to get real answers right now. This is not something we’ll accept here in Dunmore.”

Good citizens are trying to get real answers, too. The difference between us and Conway is we’re really trying. Conway, a 33-year-old father of two with political aspirations who just this week got re-elected to another term in office, has ineptly accepted the icy grip of iron fist government overreach into his warm little town. Self-absorbed and aloof, his ice-capped conscience has frozen over.

Holding public servants accountable is crucial for any community that hopes to progress. Leadership, even for a small town mayor, is urgent and vital.

“Once a Buck always a Buck” is also a common Dunmore battle cry.

In Conway’s case his frigid detachment inexcusably highlights his penchant to pass the buck.

Where is our scared Dunmore sixth grader who has disappeared from her hometown after armed U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents took away her daddy? Will anybody representing liberty and justice in America offer this child mercy and compassion? Will anyone treat her as we would like others to treat us and our children?

On Friday I got the ICE side of the story even though the official ICE press release got the name of the town wrong.

In response to my request, Jason P. Koontz, Public Affairs Officer for the Philadelphia Field Office Homeland Security Investigations/Enforcement and Removal Operations, provided this statement about what happened:

“ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations Philadelphia field office arrested Concepción Castro-Delcid, 44, a Honduran illegal alien with a final order of removal, during a targeted enforcement operation in Scranton, Pennsylvania on Oct. 29.

As officers approached and identified themselves as federal law enforcement, Castro-Delcid abruptly fled on foot, weaving through neighborhood yards and attempting to vault a backyard fence, actions that placed both the pursuing officers and nearby residents at unnecessary risk. In keeping with the ICE Use-of-Force Policy, agents applied only necessary, hands-on control techniques to stop his escape and secure him. No intermediate weapons or chemical agents were used. Castro-Delcid incurred two minor scrapes and received on-scene treatment. As has been previously reported in the local media, all personnel were clearly marked as federal officers, and the incident was fully documented and is subject to routine supervisory review.

An immigration judge ordered Castro-Delcid removed in absentia on Feb. 23, 2023, after he failed to appear for immigration proceedings stemming from a 2019 border apprehension in Hidalgo, Texas.

During processing at the Pike County ERO office, Castro-Delcid informed officers that he is the primary caregiver of his minor daughter, who also has a final removal order. ICE’s Juvenile and Family Management Unit immediately initiated re-unification protocols to maintain family unity, coordinating with the Dunmore Police Department, the Dunmore School District, and contracted transport specialists. The family was re-united and will be returned to Honduras expeditiously.”

Yet the story of our little one-time neighbor and her daddy doesn’t end there.

Did ICE, Dunmore police or both seize this child at her elementary school? Does the Dunmore School District have a written policy that protects children from being detained by federal, state or local police? Does the Dunmore Police Department have a written policy that establishes independence between them and ICE so the federal government does not use Dunmore police as pawns for such controversial law enforcement tactics?

These and other grim questions remain unanswered. We still don’t know where Dunmore’s young grade schooler is imprisoned. This child is still one of us, a child who needs all the support she can get.

Dunmore Mayor Max Conway issued a statement Thursday on his Facebook page about the ICE operation in his town. Conway’s words provided a good start but his sentiment didn’t go far enough.

Pennsylvania State Sen. Marty Flynn, who lives in Dunmore, also issued a statement. Another good start but not nearly enough.

Other than publicly beating their breasts about ICE professionalism, logic, fairness and understanding, what will these two elected officials, both fathers, and others sworn to uphold the public trust do to help us learn details about what exactly happened to this vulnerable child?

Conway failed to answer the two emails I sent him. He also failed to return a Friday phone call to his office. An assistant who answered the phone said she would make sure Conway knew I wanted to talk with him. Flynn also failed to respond to a Friday phone call to his office asking what he will do to help us find out more about Dunmore’s lost child.

Whom among our elected and appointed public servants will you pressure to fight ongoing ICE enforcement that demonizes immigrant families including children? How hard are you willing to work to help this child Conway described in his statement as “that little girl in her Dunmore Bucks sweatshirt with her name on the back?”

Countless residents who live in what long ago was called Bucktown once stuck yard signs in the grass outside their homes proclaiming deep pride in “God, Family and Dunmore Bucks,” the longtime antlered school mascot. Although many people have spoken out in support of this father and daughter, good citizens must do more than accept this tragedy as business as usual.

Good citizens fight back.

Armed agents have snared one of Dunmore’s own, a little lost Buck who might desperately want to come home.

Forget Dick Clark, Wolfman Jack and Casey Kasem.

Saturday Night Live at the Oldies with Shadoe Steele makes these long gone disc jockey legends look like nerdy crew cut-wearing clerks peddling Beach Boys albums in a ‘60s record store.

In today’s high-tech broadcast business Shadoe Steele remains alive, well and invincible.

Celebrating 45 years on the air, you can hear the iconic show on iHeartRadio and other internet radio platforms such as Audilous Radio (www.audilous.com) during its Saturday night broadcast from 7 p.m. to midnight ET on The Cube that replays the entire show Wednesday night at 7.

Nobody knows life’s vintage soundtrack better than 69-year-old Shadoe Steele who stepped behind the mic in 1973 but took over the Oldies show in 1986. With his mother Lucille’s Aqua Net sprayed on his hairdo to keep the straight part razor sharp and Aqua Velva Redwood splashed on his innocent baby face, he started spinning records when he was 15 and a half with “working papers” his parents signed to give the underage boy wonder a clear runway for takeoff.

During a decades-long coast-to-coast career as a Renaissance man, including working for NASA and as an engineer for major television networks in New York and Los Angeles, America’s astronaut of the airwaves blasted off early and often. He interviewed and befriended some of the greats in the pop music industry. As a radio personality’s personality and a beloved fixture on local Northeastern Pennsylvania radio he drew countless listeners to shows to which they would normally never tune in.

Like the song says, Shadoe Steele did it his way. Casually cruising in a blue button-down shirt, blue jeans and white sneakers, America’s avant-guardian of airplay takes to revved-up 21^st Century internet transmission the way Ronny and the Daytonas took to their little GTO looking fine with three deuces and a four-speed and a 389.

Playing neglected hits like “Convoy” by CW McCall and obscure teen tragedy songs like “Run Joey Run” by David Geddes, Shadoe Steele spins songs so  surprisingly familiar you’ll be tempted to disturb the peace by throwing open the window and warbling the lyrics to your neighbors whether they like it or not. Drawing tunes mostly from the ‘60s and ‘70s, Shadow Steele plays good old AM radio music that jumpstarts your brainstem, restarts your soul and hotwires your heart strings.

Young hip listeners will equally enjoy blasts from the past to spark their auditory DNA with cool refrains that made their rocking grandparents and parents part of a unique and vocal into-nation, energizing new generations with what they missed as they tune in to flash back and make up for lost time.

Shadoe Steele’s exhaustive knowledge of hits strikes nostalgic chords that reverberate in our psyches making everyday people’s heptatonic scale go peptatonic as we sing and dance to the music.

I’m part of the show, too.

Every other Saturday night (for now) the Corbett’s Corner show segment highlights my personal reflections on oldies “records” that played a rocking and rolling part in my life. To my Boomer comrades these songs likewise comprise the background music to your life and times, Shadoephonic sounds that still make us feel better when life sometimes seems to get worse. We’ll hang together on Corbett’s Corner as I tell you my personal stories that go with the songs you already know so well.

Music helped save my life when I wore Cuban heels on my Flagg Brothers shoes, slicked back my greaser hair with Vaseline petroleum jelly and smoked my first cigarette as a 12-year-old in 1963 listening to Louie Louie at the VFW dance. Music planted harmonic seeds in my head that took root, grew and blossomed into rhythmic strains of flower power, peace and love. Music still soothes the savage Corbett. But I stopped chain-smoking cigarettes 35 years ago and even stopped oiling my locks when I decided to let my mane grow. Here baby, there mama, everywhere, daddy daddy hair!

So you better listen to the beat that keeps on beating, the pulse that keeps on pulsing, keeping time to music that molded our lives and still provides the shape of things to come.

“Thanks for dialing by,” as Shadoe Steele says, “They don’t make records like that anymore.”

We stood with about a thousand people outside the Lackawanna County Courthouse Saturday when a “No Kings” protestor commented on the “WHAT ABOUT GAZA?” sign my political scientist activist wife held.

With a knotted American flag bandana twisted jauntily around his neck like an America’s Cup yacht captain, an obedient cellphone-photo-taking wife by his side and what looked like a pampered grandkid he led by the hand, the anti-Trumper looked derisively at Stephanie’s sign and snapped, “Not Today.”

Turning immediately to confront this smartass ignorance, Stephanie said, “Absolutely today.”

“And every other day,” I said facing our smug critic, firing responses in a litany of harsh truths about why American-taxpayer-sponsored Israeli genocide against Palestinian civilians in Gaza matters every moment of every day.

The self-appointed No Kings censor skittered away like an insect into the comfort of an overwhelmingly brainwashed crowd of mostly registered Democrats dressed in silly costumes carrying signs decorated with cutesy slogans, the same predictable cheerleaders who refuse to take responsibility for their party’s complicity in the ongoing Israeli slaughter.

Two or three times in the course of the afternoon I held above my head a small Palestinian flag taped to a piece of white cardboard. Turning in a circle like an outlaw biker facing numerous opponents in a barroom brawl, I provided easily confirmable facts as a longtime journalist with the word PRESS stenciled in big white letters on the front and back of my blue T-shirt.

I yelled.

“American-sponsored Israeli genocide has killed more than 200 Palestinian local journalists in Gaza.”

I barked.

“Democrats and Republicans together are united in the carnage.”

I roared.

“Free Palestine.”

I didn’t need a microphone, bullhorn or podium. And I didn’t ask the bourgeois special interest rally organizer for permission to speak. I respect my free speech American birthright much more than to ever bow to partisan political control freaks’ delusions of power.

But when I looked around the Scranton No Kings pompom rally, nobody else in the crowd was waving a Palestinian flag or holding a protest sign against the Israeli carnage that has killed more than 64,000 civilians in two years and poisoned the land, air and water upon which humans depend to survive. Only as we left the rally later that day did we meet Farouk, a Palestinian friend who wore a “Free Palestine” sweatshirt and lost family members including children in the ongoing Israeli massacres in Gaza.

Self-centered privileged Democrats abhor criticism of their political party. They still blame those of us who refused to vote for Vice President Kamala Harris for her loss in the 2024 presidential election. Rather than blame Harris herself and other blind faith Democrats like her boss and former President Joe Biden who first signed on to the Israeli genocide, they condemn others. If these whiny elitists ever hope to regain political power, they better soon admit and repair their dismal failings that gave birth to Trump and his band of white supremacists who value iron fist authoritarianism over soft core liberal democracy.

I’m not interested in compromising with or trying to persuade Democrats or Republicans who ignore the starvation and intentional extermination of innocent Palestinian men, women and children. They all need to know I fight on the other side. I’m not going away. And I refuse to remain silent about anybody’s approval of a bastard nation’s America-financed war crimes.

Northeastern Pennsylvania Palestinian rights activists have assembled for the past two years to raise awareness to America’s role in Israel’s genocide in Gaza. We zeroed in on the General Dynamics plant in Scranton and the for-profit national defense contractor’s role in the international corporate bomb-making business. United States Army spokespersons have refused to answer my written questions about whether shell casings made at the Scranton Army Ammunition Plant mostly for Ukraine are also later packed with explosives and shipped to Israel where they are used to kill Palestinian civilians.

In September 2024 Scranton Mayor Paige Cognetti, the mother of two children, gleefully visited the Scranton Army Ammunition Plant in a cold-blooded celebration closed to the media to autograph a 155mm artillery shell that might have eventually killed mothers and children in Gaza. At a 2023 “Stand With Israel” event at the Scranton Jewish Community Center, Cognetti made clear her alliance and allegiance with Israeli supremacy and militant Zionism.

Since then Cognetti has refused to answer my written questions about whether she still stands with Israel. Now a Democratic congressional candidate while at the same time running for re-election as mayor, Scranton’s warmonger mayor has promised if elected to Congress to help create more work for Scranton bomb makers who help ensure more death and destruction among unarmed civilians.

That’s why NEPA human rights activist Austin Sopko’s surprise disruption of Thursday’s Scranton mayoral debate carries such powerful significance. When Cognetti began a robotic recitation of success as mayor, one of Sopko’s comrades, a Palestinian woman, stood and quietly interrupted to ask Cognetti about her continuing support for Israeli genocide.

As Cognetti smirked and the moderator asked for no more interruptions, Sopko stood, waving a Palestinian flag in one hand and verbally lambasting Cognetti whose politically technocratic mind froze during Sopko’s rapid-fire political diatribe. Sopko clearly rattled Cognetti, exposing her lack of political leadership as she offered no response to legitimate criticism. Before security escorted Sopko from the auditorium, a second woman activist stood to address Cognetti’s racist embrace of Israel’s Palestinian slaughter. All three protestors live and vote in the 8^th Congressional District where Cognetti is a candidate.

Our sweet land of liberty must continue to reject symbolic kings, queens, princes and political princesses. No more Trump. No more “Genocide Joe” Biden and “Bombala” Kamala Harris. No more former U.S. Sen. Bob Casey and his former dull congressional sidekick Matt Cartwright. No more phony “Paige against the Machine” Cognetti and her ignoble court of bootlicker jesters.

No more royal pains in the ass who help kill humanity and murder the dreams of children.

Kenny “Duff” Duffin died in 2023 without knowing he gave me the long-ago gift of his example to create a fictitious character in one of my novels, a Black hero who resists prejudice and fights for social justice. Duff’s strong spirit helps guide me as a writer to breathe resistance into America’s continuing struggle against injustice.

The story of our friendship needs telling now as much as ever.

In my 2020 novel Paddy’s Day in Trump Town  make-believe man of integrity and champion of principle Paddy “Duff” Duffin keeps on pushing with the heartfelt pulse of a soulful Curtis Mayfield anthem. In Paddy’s Day in Trump Town Revisited, the updated 2025 reissue Avventura Press released this summer, Duff drives the story as one of my book’s bold leaders. A difficult read, the book is loaded with harsh satire, dark humor and graphic brutality.

As a biracial Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania police detective searching Luzerne County hard coal country for his father, Duff represents goodness, courage and integrity in a disturbing contemporary story of racism, misogyny, violence, Irish American white supremacy and severe societal dysfunction. Duff’s mission makes clear how and why we must stand for what’s right in the increasingly wrong world of Donald Trump’s presidency, a system fueled by political corruption, discrimination and hate. 

I pondered my fictitious character’s personality for a long time before naming him. I decided on his surname “Duffin” and his nickname “Duff” to proclaim his white Irish roots yet remain true to his Blackness. Many Black people in the United States carry Irish surnames for a variety of reasons. My fictitious character’s single mother gave her son her last name when he was born. She named her baby boy “Paddy” for a very different reason you’ll have to read the book to find out.

Kenny Duffin and I worked as drug and alcohol counselors at a Pennsylvania state prison re-entry facility at Third and Herr in Harrisburg in the late 1970s. Unlike the real Duff, who graduated from John Harris High School, I attended an all-white high school in Perry County. I met my first two Black acquaintances when I was 18 and attended Penn State in 1969.

Not long after I moved to the University Park campus I recognized a Black teenager from Harrisburg who the year before had sucker-punched me from behind at a dance that turned into a Black vs. white free-for-all in the aftermath of the Martin Luther King Jr. assassination. Heavily outnumbered the night my attacker threw his punch, I swallowed my urge to mix it up and headed for the door.

I still wonder if Duff knew the guy who hit me. Back then I decided not to ask. Let it go, I told myself, so I did. As the years went by I matured slowly but surely, got smarter and learned to control my own temper. During the almost four years I worked for the State Correctional Institution at Camp Hill as a full-time counselor and part-time boxing instructor I made several Black friends from whom I learned lifelong lessons about race and class.

In addition to Duff, Corrections Officer Dickie Green, Robbie Lewis at the Police Athletic League gym, co-workers Dave Stockton, Jimmy Polite, June M. and stand-up peacemaker Norman “Bo” Wilson helped me understand my role in a nasty white society that rigged the system against Black people. I also learned from Butch at the Broad Street Market and Guff who owned the Zodiac Lounge across the street and eventually got murdered. I even forgave the young brother who blindsided me.

Equally important, Black inmates like Delbert Hodge, Jeff Smith and Boo Boo Lark, complex men raised in what can seem like a perpetual underclass with whom elite white America does not want to share the American Dream, helped me grow. Working for the “Bureau of Corrections” planted seeds in my psyche that took root decades later and provoked me to write Paddy’s Day in Trump Town, a flashpoint narrative about our time in America when white-hot bigotry elected a white racist president.

In 2024 mean-spirited mostly white American male voters did it again.

In my mind I see Kenny Duffin leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, taking a long drag off his cigarette, paying close attention before speaking in the inmate therapy groups we ran. Working 24/7 shifts in the musty four-story inner-city apartment building, we did what we could to help convicts re-enter society without depending on guns, heroin or other drugs and alcohol.

Whenever Duff spoke in his soft tones, Black B-Ward gang members from Philly, Pittsburgh rapists, and pimps, killers, Harrisburg junkies, athletes, Vietnam combat veterans and Black Muslims sat in respectful silence. Rough rural white rednecks paid attention, too. A smattering of Puerto Ricans nodded, tuning into Duff’s advice. Those who embraced his guidance had a better chance of making it on the street when they got paroled. Duff’s words and attitude carried weight. We won some and we lost some — both inmates and staff.

Unlike me Duff had nothing to prove. My big white ego did more to intimidate than heal. I did okay with most inmates, but Duff’s calm heart spoke with far more power than my macho attitude. Duff carried himself with confidence and class. He, too, had studied at Penn State’s main campus, could play some serious basketball and radiated a solid handsome bearing with smooth dark brown skin and a disarming smile. Duff could sing, too, having spent time on stage with one of the best ’60s soul groups to ever come out of the Burg, even better than the Emperors and the lead singer for the Magnificent Men as far as I was concerned.

Most of all, Duff was fair. That’s the moral of this story. Be fair. It’s nice to be nice. Equity makes us stronger people. Respecting ourselves and others provides power to escape prisons of weakness and insecurity.

I wish Duff had read my book. If people who knew and loved him do read my new paperback, they should quickly recognize Duff’s gentle spirit and embrace his vibrant energy in a sincere quest to improve their own and other people’s lives.

Kenny “Duff” Duffin sparked the pure sense of hope required for progress.

So does Paddy “Duff” Duffin, a main character in my novel.

We must continue to fight the power.

America needs all the help we can get.

A long time ago some smart-ass started telling what came to be known as Pat and Mike jokes, slurs meant to mock the Irish.

Irish Americans eventually laughed loudest. Countless descendants of the old sod even embraced the monkey-faced Notre Dame leprechaun as one of us, a mean-spirited caricature that proves a sad irony at the core of these stereotypic jokes. Laughing at ourselves is one thing. Helping our enemies laugh at us is an entirely different pot of Irish stew. Joining racists in mocking who we are goes beyond the emerald pale.

Yet some truth exists in stereotypes.

Some unexpected brilliance does, too.

That’s why I’m writing two-page Pat and Mike stories, two-man dialogues I’m packing into a collection called Pat and Mike Rule the World. I’ll post each new story on my website at https://theoutlawcorbett.com/ and on my Facebook page. Maybe in a year or so we’ll load the words into a book. Or maybe not. Like always, I’ll figure it out.

Our ethnic neighborhoods are nowadays changing and not necessarily for the better. Pat and Mike? They’re trying. For better or worse, their personal conversations could take place in Boston, Wilkes-Barre, Philadelphia, New York, Chicago or any other once vibrant Irish American sanctuary. But make no mistake about locale. Pat and Mike live in Scranton, Pennsylvania, birthplace of former president Joe Biden. Not surprisingly, Pat and Mike are ashamed to admit Biden is as homegrown as they are.

Writing Pat and Mike stories inspires edgy fun. Like peppering a jab into a heavyweight boxing opponent’s puss, punchy dialogue provokes backlash and emotion. Sacrilegious and incendiary, Pat and Mike exist as purebred star-spangled white men. Their stories tell truths not often publicly shared. No problem is too big to solve or too intellectual for the lads to address. Pat and Mike think and talk like bigots although they say they don’t do it on purpose. They’re just trying to understand a changing world. Fairness isn’t always as easy as you think. Taking sides is easier. Pat and Mike take sides, sometimes turning up on both sides at the same time.

So after you read each Pat and Mike story make sure to look in the mirror. Do you agree with Pat or Mike or both? Do you know somebody like them?  Are you like them? Do you want to be even more like them?

If you don’t know, ask me.

I’ll ask Pat and Mike.

They’ll tell us even if we really don’t want to know.

“Go with the flow,” Harry whispered to us a few weeks before he died.

Harry shared this same mantra with me and his first cousin Stephanie Bressler when we stayed at the Lark in May. Stephanie and Harry grew up together as children in the ‘50s living a block away from each other in Tower City, Pennsylvania.

Smiling and poised in our second-floor room for a few minutes that day, Harry’s aura glowed brighter than the vivid red, white and blue neon sign outside the classic Stone Harbor, New Jersey, family motel where he lived and worked for about 50 years. A stellar prophet with all the right numbers plugged into the cosmos, each day Harry saw astrological truth in the stars and planets as his beatific vision enlightened many people blessed to know him over many years.

Countless co-workers, vacationers and neighbors who loved Harry listened and learned from his clear perception and often silly charm. A solitary mountain yogi living by the sea, Harry’s intellect, gentle spirit and good humor simply helped us feel good.

Our happiness mattered to Harry.

So the next time you look to the morning sky from the beach or anywhere else in this world, let your heart hear Harry playing one of his beloved Broadway show tunes on the piano. Take those few sacred moments to bask in the warmth of the rising sun and give thanks for nature’s way. Next time you think of Harry think of riding the wind forever like a majestic monarch butterfly gliding high above white sand on the softest summer day.

Above all, take Harry’s advice.

Go with the flow.

Just go with the flow.