Under the baobab: Biden showed courage, integrity and love for our country

Thank you, President Biden, for your courage, integrity and love for our country, which you chose over personal ambition. You did what you believed was right for our nation. Centre County’s Democratic Chair, Margie Swoboda, wrote, “…thank you President Biden for leading us out of the darkness, for standing in the breach against Trump’s ‘big lie’, for all that you have done and will continue to do at this critical moment in the life of our nation.”

Biden’s support of Vice President Kamala Harris as the Democratic nominee for president should be applauded. She is thoroughly prepared to be president having served as a district attorney, the attorney general for California, (the most populous state in the country), and vice president/wing woman for President Biden. Her prospective candidacy has energized the Democratic Party.

As previously written, I met VP Harris once. Her mother, Shyamala, was pushing her around in a baby buggy at a demonstration in Oakland. We were protesting the local newspaper’s racist hiring policies. From a picket line to the possibility that she will become the President of the United States, you’ve got to love this country.

While we are thanking folks, let’s include Jeff and Anne Marie Fox, who donated $20 million — the largest bequest ever — to the grad school. Hereafter the graduate school will be known as the J. Jeffrey and Ann Marie Fox Graduate School at Penn State.

Elsewhere in the community

The Next Stage Theatre Company presents “The Importance of Being Ernest” through Aug. 4, directed by Jason Zanitsch and featuring: Nate Schierman, Laura Waldhier, Drew Pirrone-Brusse, Elizabeth Baptista, Alexa Krepps, Mike Waldhier and Priscilla McFerren in the Attic at The State Theatre. Sock and Buskin Theatre Company presents “Beginnings, A Short Play Showcase” on Friday and Saturday at Sundman Hall at the American Philatelic Society. The production features: “The Ripple Effect” by Arianna Rose, “Unreasonable” by David L. Williams, “Page One,” by Amanda Minchin, “Gamma Girls to the Rescue” by Julie Zaffarano, “The Benefits of Murder” by Andi Stout and Phillip Zapkin, “For the Record” by F.J. Hartland, “Tea with Her Majesty” by Barbara Pease Weber, “The Next Thing” by TK Tansey. Plays were directed by Tom McClary, Melissa Brannen, Heidi Cole, Michelle Rodino-Colocino and Phillip Zapkin.

Sadly, Prof. Wilson Jeremiah Moses, our friend and colleague, recently joined the ancestors. He was 82 and a professor emeritus of history at PSU. Jackie Hook presided over his memorial service.

Over 200 people poured into Judge Jonathan Grine’s Centre County courtroom in Bellefonte for a procedural hearing for Subramanyam Vedam. Most were in support of Vedam, who has been imprisoned for over 41 years. He was twice convicted by all white juries of the murder of 19-year old Thomas Kinser in 1980. Subu, as Vedam is known to his friends and supporters, was 18 at the time.

Through his very able defense attorney, Gopal Balachandran, Subu is asking for a new trial based on information that had been withheld during his previous trials that might prove his innocence. Balachandran, a local State College Borough Council member, is fighting for that opportunity.

One of the seemingly contradictory evidentiary items is that some experts surmise that Kinser was killed by a 22-caliber bullet, but only a larger 25 caliber gun has been linked to Subu. Centre County District Attorney Bernie Cantorna, who was not involved in the original trials, maintains that the evidence supports the Vedam convictions. Nevertheless, in 2021 he voluntarily gave the defense team access to 3,000 pages of documents. Now all await Judge Grine’s ruling on the prosecution’s attempt to dismiss the defense’s motion for a new trial.

And there are less than a hundred days to Election Day, still plenty of time to roll up our sleeves to do what we can to save our republic.