Opinion

Future at stake in this election

An editorial from The Charleston Gazette

CHARLESTON, W.Va. — In Tuesday’s midterm election, here’s a major question: Why do multitudes of modest-income West Virginians — struggling families who need America’s safety net — embrace the GOP, which serves the rich and tries to slash the safety net? West Virginia’s growing switch to a “red state” makes little sense.

Some political analysts predict that the Mountain State’s 14-year swing into the Republican camp will continue when votes are counted Tuesday night.

“Goodbye West Virginia” is the title of a Slate magazine report saying the state’s longtime Democratic identity seems doomed.

“It’s almost guaranteed that the state will send a Republican to the U.S. Senate for the first time since 1958,” the analysis says. “There’s also a realistic chance that all three of West Virginia’s congressional seats will be filled by Republicans. In 2012, it elected its first Republican attorney general in almost 100 years. And it’s voted for the Republican presidential nominee in every election of this millennium. West Virginia used to be blue. It’s not anymore.”

The report says the GOP may gain control of the Legislature’s House of Delegates for the first time in more than 80 years, then begin drafting right-to-work laws to break labor unions.

 “West Virginia: Almost a Republican Heaven” is the headline of a USA Today analysis that says Rep. Shelley Capito is poised to “be the first Republican senator elected from West Virginia in 56 years…

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