Editorial Roundup: West Virginia

Editorial Roundup: West Virginia

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Sept. 22

The Journal on the death of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg:

The Notorious RBG, as some admirers referred to her, is gone. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died Friday, at 87, of cancer.

She was an icon to Americans with certain political positions - a scourge to others. Already, the battle over a successor has become heated, with ideology at the heart of the controversy.

It says something about Ginsburg, however, that during the hours after her death, leaders from throughout the political spectrum poured forth praise freely and with no reservations.

Her written opinions as a justice “have inspired all Americans and generations of great legal minds,” said President Donald Trump.

Ginsburg “never failed in the fierce and unflinching defense of liberty and freedom,” said Democratic Party presidential candidate Joe Biden.

Former President George W. Bush put his finger on an important aspect of her legacy. Ginsburg “inspired more than one generation of women and girls,” he wrote.

Indeed she did. At a time when glass ceilings remain a concern for many women and girls, Ginsburg showed that it is possible for a female to ascend - through dedication, skill and hard work - to the very pinnacle of political power in our nation. We often think of presidents in that role, but in some of her votes and opinions as a justice, Ginsburg wielded more real power than any president.

Her courage and dedication to what she believed was right stood out. At an age when most people feel they have contributed enough and are entitled to the joys of retirement, Ginsburg fought on. Simply because she feared that if she retired, her successor would not hold similar ideals, she refused to retire, even as she battled cancer.

Whether we agree or disagree with her positions, Ginsburg provided a model of standing up for what one believes to be right.

And, it has been pointed out, she disagreed without rancor. Among her closest friends while one the court was the late Justice Antonin Scalia.

That, too, is a model to which many Americans ought to look.

Her decisions as a justice will not be missed by a significant number of people. Her way of pursuing what she saw as right and of serving as a role model - for men as well as women - will be missed sorely.

Online: https://www.journal-news.net

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Sept. 22

The Charleston Gazette-Mail on testing for COVID-19 in West Virginia:

Gov. Jim Justice is right that absolutely as many West Virginians as are able should be getting tested for COVID-19. It’s not only important for your own health and the health of those around you in the face of a global pandemic, but it also gives public health officials crucial data for dealing with outbreaks and analyzing the spread of the virus.

The governor’s theory that more testing will lead to lower positivity percentages and somehow allow things to return to some form of normal is less scientifically sound, and more along the lines of wishful thinking.

Indeed, even as the governor touted percentages of positive tests dipping on Monday to below 3%, the number jumped up to nearly 5% a day later, according to the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources. And most of the trends regarding COVID-19 in the state continue to move in the wrong direction.

While it took more than four months for the state to surpass 100 COVID-19 deaths, West Virginia has now passed the 300 mark in half that time. The transmission rate in the state remains among the highest in the nation. It took about four months for positive coronavirus cases in West Virginia to top 3,000. Two months later, there have been more than 14,000 recorded cases. While more testing certainly has led to some of those jumps, so have relaxed guidelines on travel and businesses reopening.

Gov. Justice seems determined that a testing blitz will reopen schools to in-person classes and get athletes back on the gridiron on Friday nights. As the numbers have gone against this, Justice has continuously bent the metrics to try and make this pandemic fit the narrative he wants.

We commend his administration’s efforts for more testing, as it pertains to public health. However, the numbers need to be viewed in the proper context. West Virginians should be wary of the governor further trying to make the science match a desired result, rather than allowing it to determine prudent action.

Online: https://www.wvgazettemail.com

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Sept. 19

The Register-Herald on U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell vowing to bring to a vote whoever President Donald Trump nominates for the vacancy on the U.S. Supreme Court:

Out of common decency and respect for Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died Friday night from complications associated with metastatic cancer of the pancreas, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell could have deflected all political game board questions and considerations about filling the court vacancy for a day or two – if not until after the Nov. 3 general election.

He could have said that our country would leave that conversation for another day – and, in this time of sorrow and crises for many Americans, our nation’s thoughts and support are with the Ginsburg family.

You want to make America great again? Start there – with a simple, heartfelt, everyday courtesy.

But McConnell did not, instead saying, only hours after Ginsburg’s death was announced, “President Trump’s nominee will receive a vote on the floor of the United States Senate.”

It was nauseating.

Yes, here we are, America, in an acrimonious and divisive era where poisonous politics pokes its nose into every last conversation and calculation, where politicians draw up battle plans to divide and conquer, set one citizen against another, not focused on the pain of the populace, but on strengthening their hold on power and advancing their particular dogma by whatever means necessary.

McConnell couldn’t care less about a pandemic that will have killed – before this weekend is over – 200,000 people, that the West Coast is ablaze, that gulf shores are under water, that many Americans have lost their homes, that millions are out of work, that too many are hungry, that too few have access to quality health care, that our immigration system is a dark blot on our nation’s moral DNA, that racial injustice is kneeling on the neck of Black America.

The Senate, apparently, can race ahead and fill a vacancy on the Supreme Court in record time but cannot seem to find the time, resources or interest to come to the aid of an ailing nation. And that is all you need to know when looking for proof as to whom Mitch and his minions are most interested in serving – themselves and their wealthy puppet masters. You do not matter. Not really.

Quite frankly, we are sick of it.

Our country should have been allowed time to take stock and appreciate all of what Ginsburg did in her remarkable life. The demure and diminutive legal giant made her mark especially in matters of women’s rights.

NPR called Ginsburg the “architect of the legal fight for women’s rights in the 1970s,” and indeed, she was, leading the fight in the courts for gender equality. Before she won five cases at the high court, women were treated, by law, differently than men. After, she had affected a legal revolution.

And then she put on her high court robes.

Nominated by President Bill Clinton in 1993, she went on to serve 27 years on the nation’s highest court, dying in office, becoming not only its most prominent member but also a cultural icon – the Notorious RGB.

Writing for the majority in 1996 that declared that the Virginia Military Institute could no longer remain an all-male institution, she argued that most women – and most men, too – would not and could not measure up to the rigorous demands of VMI. But, she wrote, the state could not exclude women who could meet those demands.

She wrote: “Reliance on overbroad generalizations … estimates about the way most men or most women are, will not suffice to deny opportunity to women whose talent and capacity place them outside the average description.”

As the court announced her death on Friday, as citizens gathered in front of the court to pay their respects, conservative Chief Justice John Roberts had this to say about his liberal colleague: “Our nation has lost a justice of historic stature. We at the Supreme Court have lost a cherished colleague. Today we mourn but with confidence that future generations will remember Ruth Bader Ginsburg as we knew her, a tireless and resolute champion of justice.”

A few days before her death, knowing the fractious political battles her death would precipitate, Ginsburg dictated a statement to her granddaughter. It read: “My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed.”

She wrote this as she was dying, knowing her end was at hand. She wrote it for her country that she served resolutely and with the highest distinction.

America ought to honor the last request of a citizen who gave it her all and, in doing so, made life better for millions of women – and men, too.

Certainly, we still have the capacity to act as such, to say thank you.

Out of respect.

Out of common decency.

Online: https://www.register-herald.com