I suppose I ran for office because I couldn't stand the lies, bigotry and stupidity we were getting from our elected officials in West Virginia. I was told I didn't "understand" West Virginia. During the campaign, I met a group of old (my age) hippies, brainy college professors, and the smarter class of college students and recent grads, most either from here or who have resided here for decades. Not knowing many people in town, not having the strength to go door-to-door, not advertising on the radio or in the newspaper, I still got twenty-five percent of the Democratic votes in our primary. The final tab was 3,971 for me. People, even those who warned me against running, now say I should consider running again in two years. I might.
Many people in West Virginia have health insurance through the Affordable Care Act. West Virginians For Affordable Health Care points out that "more than two dozen hospitals saved $265 million" by treating people who now have health insurance. Before the ACA, the hospitals had to write this money off as a loss. And yet our Republican Junior Senator, Shelley Moore Capito, has voted a few dozen times to repeal the ACA. Why? Our recent "non-partisan" election for a state Supreme Court justice was won by Beth Walker, with half a million dollars in ads from the Republican Governor's Association and Blue Cross/Blue Shield. For some reason, our nation's largest private healthcare provider supports Republicans. Los Angeles School District pays for my Medicare supplement and for Joe's insurance through Blue Cross. We don't have a choice, living outside of California, unless we lay out quite a bit of money for other insurance. I'm thinking about it.
Chris Regan, Vice Chair of West Virginia's Democratic Party, has a blog called "Home Yesterday" (www.homeyesterday.com) In an April 13 post, he wonders how Peabody Coal, following in the steps of other coal companies, has declared bankruptcy, gotten out of its pension and health care obligations, and given their CEO, who already makes ten million dollars annual salary, a bonus of several more million. He calls it "the looting of West Virginia."
Meanwhile, our state Attorney General, Patrick Morrisey, is fighting the Obama administration''s attempts to shield gender non-conforming and trans students from being forced to use a bathroom not appropriate to their appearance or identity. He and many so-called religious conservatives are up in arms, not about bathrooms, apparently, but the fact that there are trans students at schools.
What is the relationship between coal bankruptcies, the Affordable Health Care Act ( Obamacare) and trans people in the bathroom? This: Theft is against the Bible. A CEO, receiving millions of dollars for his work, who takes away pensions and health insurance from people who have worked- worked hard and at great risk in the case of coal miners- and gives himself and other executives millions more in bonuses, is a thief. He should be in prison. Where is the outrage among religious conservatives about this? And why are people not outraged that healthcare is considered a privilege for those who can afford it, and not a right for everyone? The ACA was a compromise to let everyone buy insurance.
The outrage is in the presidential campaigns of Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders. The important difference is that Trump is a phony and Sanders is the real deal. The outrage is why the favorite of the Republican elite, Jeb Bush, couldn't get traction, and why Hillary Clinton, despite her traditional liberal credentials, is having such a hard time winning the Democratic nomination. Trump says he will put coal miners back to work (at lower pay and with no benefits, no doubt, if he can even do that). Sanders will try to limit executive compensation, find new work for miners and protect workers' benefits. The anti-Bernie people say "He can't do it." Maybe, but no one else will even try.
Here in West Virginia, there is no state budget for July 1. By law, the budget must be balanced. Governor Tomblin called the legislature back into session this week. As of Thursday morning, they have done nothing. Most of our Republicans have signed Grover Norquist's "No New Taxes" pledge.
Meanwhile, the coal moguls, including Bob Murray, who doesn't live in West Virginia, are demanding a cut in the coal severance tax. He and another coal mogul, the lately jailed Don Blankenship, are supporters of many of our Republican delegates. One might be tempted to say that our Congressperson David McKinley, is a whole owned subsidiary of the coal companies.
Meanwhile, the state is bleeding money and population. We will likely lose a congressman in the next census due to the state's declining population. Even in our temple, we will lose four families this summer. The state has a scholarship for in-state students, called "Promise." With no guarantee that these scholarships will be available in the fall, our smartest students are making plans to go elsewhere. Most will not be back.
My own life now is good. Joe and I have friends here. We are both popular teachers at Life-Long Learning, all our students over fifty and most past seventy.. Joe's current six-week class was oversubscribed and people had to get on a waiting list. We like it here. "Going back" is not an option. Still, should Tree of Life close, or get tired of Rabbi Joe, should we find ourselves victims of discrimination, we have the option of leaving. What happens a generation from now should not be our problem, but I, like Bernie Sanders, eight years my senior, want the world and West Virginia to be a more just, equitable and free place. I'll be out working for Mike Manypenny for Congress and Doug Reynolds for Attorney General this year, attending West Virginia's Democratic Convention in Charleston in a few weeks as a Sanders vote, and supporting my fellow Democrats for Delegate and State Senator. I'm not done yet.
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