Editorial: Are West Virginians Easily Impressed?
Governor Joe Manchin has a popularity rating going that any
statewide politician would have to envy. His ratings have been
hovering around 70 percent for over a year now, and this phenomenon
has prompted some of us to ask: Why?
Sure, Manchin is an affable fellow, and his love for the state seems genuine. But why the stratospheric numbers? What has he done to earn them?
Some point to his success in passing the Workers' Compensation Reform in his first year in office. Certainly, that was a victory for the business community in West Virginia and showed that Manchin played well with a legislature that was cautious about such reforms. But we have not yet seen the promised results of that reform, the thousands of new jobs promised.
Could it be that West Virginia's economic doldrums are more complicated than a single issue like Workers' Comp, important though that issue may be? Workers Comp reform and new highway welcome signs that say -- twenty years too late -- "Open for Business" do not an economic policy make.
Meanwhile, thousands of West Virginia high school and college graduates leave for the sunny south in droves, continuing to people the colony of West Virginians known as "Charlotte, North Carolina." Nobody expected Joe Manchin to turn this brain drain around in a couple of years. But what really has he done about it?
Some have suggested that Manchin benefits, as any new Governor might, by simply not being under indictment in a state that has seen two Governors, one from each party, shuffled off to prison after their term expired. In short, West Virginians are simply relieved not to have someone scandalizing us nationally. As long as the current office holder at least doesn't embarrass us and possessed a modicum of decent conduct while in office, that's enough for many.
Seventeen flat-screened televisions in a $3.5 million renovation of the Governor's Mansion apparently isn't scandalous enough for most West Virginians, even while their state's economic life's blood is ebbing, year after year.
We wish Governor Mansion, er, Manchin good luck--West Virginia could use a lucky Governor again, one whose luck extends to the whole state. And we salute his Workers Comp reform efforts. But that was two legislative sessions ago, and we need a lot more out of a man with a 70 percent approval rating.
We need more than slogans, Joe. We need a shoulder to the wheel.