On the snowy evening of January 3, 2005, Easton resident and Billy Bytes publicationss’ founder Billy Givens, accompanied by his friend John Todaro of Palmer Township, attended the year’s first meeting of Northampton County Council.

The meeting was held in the county seat of historic Easton’s Jacob Bachmann Publick House.

John and I attended the meeting for the express purpose of asking council to conduct public hearings on the Las Vegas Sands/BethWorks Now slot machine gambling casino rumored for construction on the former Bethlehem Steel site in Bethlehem’s South Side neighborhood.

For more than a year now Givens has escorted his friend John, who is legally blind, to county council meetings whose proceedings and debates both have actively participated.

I also reminded everyone I could of the astonishing and inspring accomplishments of Helen Keller, a native, I’m proud to say, of my home state of Alabama.

So well versed in county issues was John that on February 2, 2005, “Ground Hog Day,” he announced his candidacy for Northampton County Excutive challenging Incumbent Glenn Reibman in the May 17 Democratic primary.

John’s candidacy was brief, cut short by the barrage of harassing phone calls to his home at 9 Westgate Avenue. John did not wither in this onslaught by his political enemies.

But the offensive calls were disturbing to his wife Rosena and their children. Out of concern for their distress, John ended his candidacy.

I encouraged this candidacy of John, whom I described publicly at every opportunity that he was not disabled, but differently abled.

Desperate, I attempted an unsuccessful write-in candidacy as John’s surrogate, in an effort to keep his issues alive in the public’s eyes.

A year later, I announced my candidacy for Pennsylvania Governor as an independent candidate challenging incumbent Governor Ed Rendell.

I had planned to use the Internet to gather the number of signatures on nominating papers for the November 2006 general election.

The main plank of my platform was to be the repeal of Pennsylvania’s Act 71, “legalized gambling,” and its corollary, the equally specious Act 72, school property tax reform through “back-end” voter referenda.

On April 10, 2006, I was admitted to a Veterans Administration Medical Center hospital where I was diagnosed with colon cancer with serious major complications.

Thus my candidacy for Governor, like John’s for Northampton County executive, was suddenly cut short.

Since my candidacy is doomed, and the threat of legalized gambling looms as a threat to the health, safety, and welfare of Pennsylvania - as the malignancy in my cecum now threatens my life and the welfare of my family - I urge Pennsylvania voters to support the gubernatorial candidacy of Republican candidate Lynn Swann.

Lynn Swann opposes casino gambling, a major first step toward the repeal of Act 71 and with it Act 72, a possiblity alluded to in today’s edition of The Morning Call article titled “Slots not paying off so far in Pennsylvania, Swann says.”