That was the good news.
A few days later, while teachers were still celebrating and students
were returning to their classrooms, lawmakers also passed and sent to the
governor a bill that dismantles the West Virginia Department of Education and
the Arts, proving once again that Republicans can giveth and Republicans can taketh
away.
By eliminating the entire department, lawmakers plan to spin
off its programs into other state agencies, such as the departments of
Education and Commerce. I’m sure it’s just a coincidence that the bill would
also put Gayle Manchin, wife of Democratic Senator Joe Manchin and current Secretary
of Education and the Arts, out of a job.
“This is going to destroy arts in West Virginia,” said Delegate
Larry Rowe, D-Kanawha, who argued against the bill. “Always, always the first
thing to be cut is the arts.”
Also dying was a bill to provide free tuition to in-state
community and technical colleges, which was sacrificed at the last minute to
help pay for teacher pay raises. It sounded good on the surface but wasn’t all
that clean. It included a number of hoops that students would have to jump
through in order to receive the benefit, including a requirement to pay for and
pass a drug test before each semester to receive the full tuition. The bill
would also have required students to repay all or part of the tuition if they
moved out of state within two years of graduation.
Here are some other notable bills that were introduced but
not approved:
* Two proposed Constitutional amendments to enable lawmakers to
amend or reject policies of the state Board of Education. Can’t they do that
anyway through legislation?
* A Senate bill to require all “public, private, parochial and
denominational” high schools to offer an elective social studies course on the
Christian Bible. Strangely, it did not mention the holy books of any other
religions, but seemingly would have required a private Muslim school to teach Bible
classes...if such a school existed.
* A House bill to allow teachers, students and others with
permits to carry concealed guns on the campuses of state colleges and
universities, including inside school buildings and at sporting events. The
legislation was basically written by the NRA, which provided the “model” for
it, according to its sponsor, Delegate Jim Butler (R) of Mason County. Like
we really needed a state law written by the NRA.
* In that regard, among the bills passed and sent to the
governor was one that will make it easier for individuals to possess guns on
school property and at school-sponsored events as long as they are locked
inside a vehicle. So let’s say the governor signs this bill and next fall, a
fight breaks out at a football game where 30 guys have guns locked inside their
trucks. What could possibly go wrong?
* Another bill would impose a 20-hour per week work
requirement on certain able-bodied adults without dependents in order to
receive benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. It
doesn’t say how we’re supposed to find jobs for all of these people.
* And, of course, there’s the proposed Constitutional
amendment that would take away a woman’s right to have an abortion. The exact
wording says, “Nothing in this Constitution secures or protects a right to
abortion or requires the funding of abortion.” It will be on the ballot in
November.
There’s a lot more I could mention, but I’m just trying to
make a point. This is what happens when there are more than twice as many
registered Democrats and Independents as Republicans in the state, but a lot of
people either don’t bother to vote or they turned from blue to red during the
presidency of Barack Obama. Either way it allowed Republicans to take over most
of the state’s seats in Congress plus the governor’s mansion and both houses of
the Legislature.
Back in October 2016, just a few weeks before the election
of that year, I sent a letter to the editors of all of the state’s major
newspapers, pointing out how West Virginia’s transition from blue to red was
working out for the people of the state. This is what I wrote:
Remember how we elected
Republicans (in 2014) and gave them control of the West Virginia Legislature? Remember
what they did?
• They passed right-to-work
legislation that hurts unions and repealed the prevailing wage law so they
could take money away from working people and give it to their employers.
• They introduced
education bills that were opposed by state teachers and education leaders and
would set education back several years.
• They introduced at
least 13 anti-abortion bills that either were not supported by science or
doctors or were opposed by women as unwanted intrusion into their lives and
bodies.
• They passed a bill to
drug test recipients of government benefits, which was clearly aimed at the
state’s poor and minorities, many of whom need government assistance to
survive.
• They tried to
legalize discrimination based on sexual orientation or gender identity –
another step backward into the past.
• They also tried to
make it illegal for anyone to provide health care services under the Affordable
Care Act, which would have denied health insurance to about 10% of the state’s
population and their families.
In other words, they
advanced an agenda that was anti-worker, anti-union, anti-education,
anti-woman, anti-poor, anti-minority, anti-LGBT and anti-health. There was
virtually no group of voters they didn’t try to harm, except wealthy
Republicans and their out-of-state financiers.
With
another election coming up soon, I strongly urge West Virginia’s women, miners,
union members, teachers, students, minorities, the economically challenged and
everyone concerned about their health to band together with me to vote these
people out of office and back into the Stone Age where they belong.
You
know there’s a saying that goes, “Remember in November.” Well, it’s almost
time.
Then we went out in 2016 and
re-elected the same guys. It was déjà vu all over again.
Fast-forward to 2018 and what do you
know? Things haven’t gotten a whole lot better down in Charleston. The
Republican-dominated legislature is still trying to screw the little guy in
virtually every way possible, like they have since winning the last two elections.
But hey, we have another election coming up this year, which means we have one
more chance to vote these people out of office and bring back the wild,
wonderful West Virginia that cares about its people.
In conclusion, there’s an old saying
that goes, “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.” Well I’d
like to add one more line to that adage that goes, “And if you can fool me
three times, that makes me a real slow learner, and I’ll be getting exactly
what I deserve.”
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