A Vietnam War veteran and former Virginia state senator is at the center of a new battle: pushing back on domestic communism in the United States. After 16 years in the Virginia House of Delegates and Virginia Senate, Sen. Richard Hayden Black withdrew from the office in 2020, but not the community. On June 22, he spoke at a school board meeting in his county of residence, Loudoun County. The county is west of Washington, D.C., where liberal-leaning northern Virginia and the more conservative parts of the state meet. It has become ground zero for the fight against critical race theory (CRT), a variation of Marxism that interprets society through the lens of racial class struggle and sees inherent racism in the foundations of Western societies. Black’s self-introduction caused a stir in the crowd. A sense of respect and anticipation arose in the air. People knew him and burst into louder and louder …