Candidate 1: “If you care about working folks and you care
about unions, (the other party) weakened unions by passing Right to Work in the
state of West Virginia. If you have someone that earns their living in the
construction industry, they have repealed a prevailing wage…to lower the
standard of living for those families. I work for you. I will never ever forget
where I came from, and you will always be my boss.”
Candidate 2: “I’m a veteran of the United States Army. I gave
an oath to my country and…I also gave an oath as a public servant to protect the
state constitution and the United States Constitution. That’s our responsibility.
We have a lot of health issues. We have women and children’s health issues. We have
a health care crisis in the state along with the opioid crisis. We’re setting
up plans” to deal with them.
Candidate 3: “I was taught
at a very young age about public service. I was taught that you help people…and
nothing could be more rewarding. I walked into the Soup Opera to deliver some
supplies and it was around lunchtime, and I was expecting to see four or five or
six people. The room was packed. There were families, children, seniors, and it
was heartbreaking because for most of those people that was going to be the
only meal of the day.”
Candidate 4: “I want to represent all West Virginians;
Democrats, Republicans, independents – I’m not running against any of these guys….
I also believe that partisan political gridlock is out of control and a majority
of people I talk to are kind of fed up with that. In order to fix this state,
we’ve got to have services to do it. We can’t expect people to stay in this
state, taxpayers to move into this state, unless we can provide them services.”
Candidate 5: “I’m the only candidate in the race to be
endorsed by the National Rifle Association. I’ve been endorsed by the West
Virginians for Life (and) the West Virginia Coal Association. I also support
the policies of President Donald Trump, which have made a big difference in our
nation, especially here in West Virginia.”
Candidate 6: “I’m pro-God, pro-life, pro-gun, pro-coal,
pro-jobs, and I was a Trump Delegate to the national convention. Unlike the
people that I’m running against, I didn’t vote against coal in 2009. I didn’t
vote against voter ID, I didn’t vote against mandatory drug testing for welfare
recipients. I never suggested that our state needed gun control, I never failed
to support your Second Amendment rights, and I’ve never ever supported
dismemberment abortion.”
If you guessed that Candidates 5 and 6 are Republicans,
congratulations. You are definitely not a low-information voter and you apparently
know how to read. You also have noticed, like I have, that Republicans can’t compose a sentence these days without the word “Trump” in it somewhere. I was waiting for one or both
of them to say, “A vote for me is a vote for Trump.” Neither one did, but that
message came through loud and clear.
While the Democrats and even the Independent were talking –
without notes, by the way – about real people and real problems, both Republican
candidates were reading from sheets of paper and tossing out lots of numbers
and questionable statistics of unknown origin that I can’t verify and won’t
repeat here. Let’s just say they were using these numbers to try and take
credit for every good thing that ever happened in West Virginia while claiming that
the Democrats controlled the state for 84 years and basically did nothing good
during that time.
So my takeaway from this event is clear: the Democrats (and the
independent) recognize and can identify the issues facing West Virginians –
income inequality, health care, poverty, drug addiction, women’s
rights, lack of opportunity, the need for economic diversification and the mass
exodus of citizens who have given up and moved elsewhere -- and they want to do something
about them. Collectively, they spoke about public
service for the public good.
The Republicans, on the other hand, like to read numbers out
loud and believe that because some businesses are making money again and revenue
estimates from our Republi-cratic governor have been manipulated upward, as
governors are wont to do in an election year, West Virginia is suddenly doing
well under Donald Trump and the GOP. Every time a Republican opened his mouth
last night, an economic talking point spilled out.
Every time I attend one of these events, I get to a point
where I just want to stand up and scream. I want to shout, “How dare you! How dare
you stand before me and extol the virtues of a man who has no virtue. How dare
you idolize the most vile, despicable, deplorable sub-human being who ever
crossed the threshold of the White House.
“How dare you adopt the president’s penchant for lying out
in public. How dare you come to a public forum and take credit for giving
school teachers a raise when last spring you told them there was no money, and
then tried to have them kicked out of the State Capitol when they went to
Charleston to protest.
“How dare you throw Trumpian word salads at intelligent
people who are doing their best to survive in a state where the major industry
is in decline, and how dare you continue to lie to them and tell them that coal
is coming back and everything is going to be okay. How dare you come here and
insult my intelligence, my morals and my sense of right and wrong.”
At one point Republican Candidate #5 was rambling on about
something no one could understand, so I turned to the woman on my right and
asked her, “What the hell is he talking about? Do you understand any of this?”
She said she didn’t. Neither did the man on my left. It was argle bargle of the
highest order, or as the woman beside me said, “Wah-wah-wah.”
When it was time for closing comments, I had had enough.
Closing comments started sounding a whole lot like opening comments, and hearing them
once was all I could take without hurling up my lunch, so I put on my jacket
and started to get up out of my chair when I heard one of the Republicans
telling us how good everything is now that they have control of the entire state.
I said, out loud, “Oh, yeah, everything’s great,” and the
people sitting beside me were all laughing as I walked out through the door.
No comments:
Post a Comment