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I’ve been waiting for Kathleen Parker’s column on the destruction of Hurricane Helene.

She, like me, comes from the Carolinas. She, like me — like everybody — grew up knowing somebody who lives “in the mountains,” plus visiting plenty herself. And we both understood the Blue Ridge Mountains as “chill,” both in temperature and mien.

No longer in Asheville, Kathleen writes, the mountain town that until last week was “a flannel-and-flip-flops mecca for hikers, mountain bikers, foodies and culture connoisseurs.”

She surveys the devastation of the Southeast’s sanctuary, or at least weekend getaway. A son of hers lives there now, and he reports that the place looks bomb-devastated and now smells like mildew, not Christmas trees.

It’s a blow to the very spirit of the Blue Ridge, Kathleen writes: “Something about the mountains nourishes the soul.” That’s what makes this act of God all the more painful.

Elsewhere in North Carolina — an act of Satan?

The archfiend is afoot all over the place, to hear Michele Morrow tell it. She is the Republican candidate for North Carolina superintendent of public instruction, who believes that celebrities harvest........

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