Posted on 10/28/2013 12:40:21 PM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
".........Why? “Honestly, because everybody in this county hates Barack Obama. That is the biggest reason,” Mitchell said.
Animosity toward President Obama runs high here. He lost Wyoming County by nearly 56 percentage points last year, despite the fact that registered Democrats outnumber Republicans by 3 to 1.
But as Mitchell and her friends talked more about it, their conversation turned to fears and anxieties that had little to do with party or politics. They discussed the well-paying jobs that had vanished with the coal industry; the crime and drugs that followed; the changing culture that mocks what they hold sacred.
“This county has seen the need for God. We can’t control what’s going on out there in the world, but on this small little corner of our small little town, we can,” said one woman, who gave her name only as Megan.
Ordinary West Virginians used to look to Washington with something close to reverence. It was a partner in good times, a lifeline in bad ones, a powerful ally against the big corporations that came for its coal and timber. By some measures, West Virginia relies more on federal money than any other state.
But increasingly, it also has become an extreme example of the hostility that shows up in every national poll when people are asked how they feel about the federal government. Many here now speak of Washington as an enemy that threatens their economy and their way of life, that traps them into dependency.
“Washington’s 100 percent against us,” said M.E. Walker, a retired road builder who lives in Pence Springs in Summers County. “They don’t like our jobs. They don’t like our attitudes.”...................
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Interesting article. Maybe a trend away from solid Democrat can happen inother states too??? WV was once reliably Democrat. One of only 6 states to stick with Jimmy Carter in 1980.
Obama would call them “Bitter clingers”
I’m in Kentucky, and a lot of what that article says about West Virginia applies to us, too. Both states are full of people who cherish traditional values and gun rights, and are coping with a coal industry in trouble. And Barack Obama isn’t popular, either. When the presidential primaries were held last year, in both states about 41% of Democrats cast ballots for anyone but Obama. Moreover, we know Obama doesn’t care about us, by how often he has been here. In the past six years, he only visited Kentucky twice. The first visit was a campaign stop in Louisville, just before the May 2008 primary. The second visit was to Fort Campbell in May 2011, to meet the Navy SEALs that bagged Osama bin Laden. Both visits lasted two or three hours, so he could not have gotten a good look at the state. As for visiting West Virginia, I haven’t heard of Obama going there since he attended the funeral of Robert “Sheets” Byrd.
Poor Appalachian whites were always treated like blacks by the Democrats. They blew smoke at them and kept on getting their votes without any improvement in their lot.
Now these whites have gotten smart, and have rejected the Democrats.
Too bad the blacks haven’t gotten as smart and start to see just how the Democrats have exploited them and their votes while keeping them in their perpetual state of poverty.
With Virginia, from which West Virginia was carved during the Civil War, now turning from Red to Blue due to the large number of illegal aliens (who vote) and federal government union workers (who vote Democrat), maybe all those jokes about ignorant, incestuous West Virginians will be turned around and applied to Virginians.
West Virginians seemed to love the Government when Klan Man Byrd was building a bunch of new roads for them and sending the bills out to all the rest of us. Or moving tens of thousands of pointless Federal jobs to their state.
bookmark
Fun comment read.
“Those waaaycist West Virginians! They vote against their own interests!”
Yes, because West Virginia’s interests definitely lie in destroying coal.
Whenever I drive through West Virginia, I look for roads, buildings, etc., named after the late Senator Byrd. I haven’t seen them yet, though I know they exist. What I have found are a chain of gas stations & convenience stores named after him = Sheetz.
No general trend. Just state specific stuff. Next door here in Virginia, the state is trending blue.
Good one!
Sounds like West Virginians are going racist. I was made to understand that Clown Prince nobama and his commie minions could do no wrong.
However, I DO think that WV is going to turn red next election.
Hell the democrat governor is further to the right than John McCain.
Then again, that's not hard to accomplish.
Hopefully West Virginia won’t suffer the same fate at the hands of Virginia as Massachusetts inflicted upon New Hampshire, with all the liberals trickling in .
Man, these people are like plagues of locusts. They destroy one place, then move on to virgin territory to defile.
Thanks Berosus.
That same argument was said in the 1850 about slaveholders from the Carolinas moving to LA and TX. Now it's not chattel slavery per se but totalitarianism.
Next election? WV went for both McPantsStain and RobMe. How many elections do they have to go (R) before you’re willing to start counting? Or are you referring to Congressional (where I admit their record is not as good)?
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