Earlier: Martin C. Rojas 1992-2022: Grace and Grit in Southern West Virginia
West Virginia has gone through an extraordinary political transformation over the last generation. Celebrated by VDARE.com and as far as I can see by no one else.
Most recently in Mass Deportation Opinion Map Explains Rep Jared Golden’s (ME-2) Vote Stunt: Immigration Is Turning Maine Red. I noted:
I may have been right to ask: Maine Democrats Accelerate State’s Browning. Afraid Of West Virginia Effect?
West Virginia was one of only 5 states (not including Maine) Reagan did not carry in 1980. In 2020 it voted 68.62% for Trump.
Perhaps this has provoked the NeoCons who took total control of The Wall Street Journal following 2003 death of Robert Bartley to order a serf to write Desperate for Workers but Dead Set Against Migrant Labor: The West Virginia Dilemma.by Paul Kiernan,May 8,2024[Archive link].
Here's a Tweet about it by Douglas Rivlin of the pro-illegal immigration organization known, paradoxically, as "America's Voice":
The West Virginia Dilemma:
— Douglas Rivlin 🇺🇲 (@douglasrivlin) May 9, 2024
West Virginia politicians support the GOP nativist politics and sent National Guard to support Gov. Abbott fight against federal policies in Texas, but the state faces a decline in population which is hurting the economy. https://t.co/NpcXsNeTEo
Significantly this was boosted by a tag in the (now tediously Leftist) Drudge Report.
In essence, this is the old Crops Rotting In The Field canard, modified for West Virginia:
In the five years that Lantz has run the Pendleton County Senior Center, the number of direct-care workers has declined to 12, from 30. Such workers help old people get out of bed, bathe and prepare meals…
Few locals are drawn by the pay of $10 to $12 an hour, though. As a result, about 15 people are on the wait list for at-home care—almost as many as the senior center serves, Lantz said. Around five people on the list have died in recent years.
In many places, eldercare is performed disproportionately by immigrants. They make up 14% of the U.S. population but 32% of home-care workers, according to PHI, a nonprofit that advocates for such services.
The obvious response to this: RAISE WAGES.
The WSJ has a particularly ludicrous quote:
…said Steve Roberts, president of the West Virginia Chamber of Commerce. The state doesn’t need only doctors and engineers, he said, but manual laborers to “do the work that some of us have just gotten too old to do.”
This is absurd. As the WSJ itself says of West Virginia:
Its labor-force participation rate—the share of the 16-and-older population either working or looking for work—was 55.2% in March, the second-lowest in the country.
There are two simple reasons for this. West Virginia has a very low cost of living so the various Federal labor subsidies go further.
In addition:
“West Virginians don’t want immigration—of any kind,” said Stephen Smoot[Tweet him], editor of the Pendleton Times newspaper.
[VDARE.com link]
Voters picked “Wild and Wonderful” as the state official slogan in 2007. Wildlife officials have reintroduced elk, locally extinct for more than a century. For many residents who fish, hunt or simply seek solitude in the hills and hollows, fewer humans is a plus.
“There’s a quality of life that comes from living in a sparsely populated area,” said Smoot. “You don’t have the irritations of constant human contact.”
This is a factor which has to be witnessed to be credited. West Virginia is a different place. The natives have other things to do than work.
Ask Steve Roberts does he care about actual West Virginians: sroberts@wvchamber.com
A point the WSJ did not consider in its sneer:
the portion of its population that is foreign-born is 1.8%, the lowest of any state
is that the burden of multilingual education is also the least in any state.
The question is, why does the Wall Street Journal think that West Virginia should be wrenched from the path it has quietly chosen:
Trump carried 68% of West Virginia’s votes in 2020, his highest share of any state
Republicans outnumber Democrats 31-3 in the Senate and 89-11 in the House of Delegates
Alarm that this could be evidence of the preferences of White voters nationally is no doubt a factor.
But the WSJ comment thread in my opinion reveals the truth: ethnic animosity:
Dave K 5 hours ago
The few remaining residents are unintelligent. Then the state loosens standards for teachers, which means children will get a lower quality of education. That leads to more unintelligent residents.
It's a vicious cycle. Their stubbornness and ignorance is the cause of their own downfall. Pretty soon WV will be a giant empty wilderness that no one wants to touch.
Donald Garner
10 hours ago
Why no mention of the famous ignorance and laziness of the worn out English in West Virginia. This state is very backward because the people are very backward. Its really very simple.
Wake up America. They hate us.
