Urgent zombie fungus fly update

Sometimes I think natural selection, to the extent it can be personified, sniffs glue or ingests some other kind of trippy substance.

Witness this New York Times story about a fungus that takes over the body of a fly, turns it into some kind of zombie, makes it act erratically, kills it but causes it to land in an opportune place and in an opportune position, continues to grow inside the dead fly's body, and then shoots out spores "as if from microscopic cannons" to infect more flies.

How cool is that? I mean, unless you were a fly...

It should be noted, however, that zombie flies, unlike human zombies in movies, don't eat living flies, although would be pretty awesome.

If that isn't enough to get your week off to a good start, scroll down the Times article to access another article about a fungus that turns ants into zombies and causes their bodies to explode.

Holy Nature Red in Tooth and Claw, Batman! And zombies.

MEANWHILE, BACK IN WV, the Gazette-Mail's Phil Kabler had a great column on the myth of the "war on coal" and Trump's revival of the industry.

STOP THE PRESSES! It doesn't happen very often, but I agree with conservative commentator Hoppy Kercheval about the need for congress to keep its promise to retired coal miners.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

The best gift of 2018

As 2018 winds to a close, I'm thankful for a lesson it taught me: that unexpected good fortune can come when things seem pretty dark. I'm thinking particularly of the great and victorious WV 2018 Teachers' Strike (technically the teachers' and school support workers' work stoppage, but let's not be  picky).

That historic struggle inspired other successful strikes in several states and gave hope to those who believe in the labor movement and public education. And it just resulted in another victory of sorts, a year of coverage under the Public Employees Insurance Agency without benefit cuts or premium increases. This wasn't a perfect or even a long term solution but it was a clear win.

Charleston Gazette-Mail statehouse reporter Phil Kabler, who has been doing his kind of work for about as long as I've been doing mine, summed it up beautifully:

...What was most remarkable was that this was a grassroots effort. It wasn’t, as critics unsuccessfully tried to portray it, as labor bosses directing their minions. It was teachers fed up with low pay and benefits and a general sense of being unappreciated banding together to let leaders in Charleston know they weren’t going to take it anymore.

Also remarkable was the spirit. Despite the seriousness of the issues at hand, the rallies at the Capitol were joyous affairs, with singing, chanting, dancing, and featuring colorful (and clever) signs. This was a celebration....

Wearing red, teachers in 2018 paid homage to the state’s proud labor heritage, and when the governor and legislative leadership tried to use the strategy of divide and conquer, trying to pit school boards against teachers, then parents against teachers, and then state employees against teachers, the teachers stood united.

Early on, when leadership contended that students would suffer, particularly those needy students who depend on school lunches, teachers and others did the noble thing, rising before dawn each day to pack lunches for their students before heading to Charleston, not only putting their students first, but assuming the moral high ground in the fight.

Most importantly, West Virginia teachers started a movement that spread, so far, to Arizona, Colorado, Oklahoma, and Kentucky, showing that while organized labor may be a shadow of its former self, the ability of working people to fight for their rights may not be lost.

I can still see plenty of hard fights on the horizon in the coming year--including further assaults on public education in the legislature--but these will take place on a completely different landscape.

So thanks, teachers and school workers, for many things, including reminding me that we live in an open universe in which all kinds of wild and unexpected things can occur, some of which may be better than anyone could have expected.

Leftovers

Well, the legislative session is finally over. Some bad stuff happened. We didn't get all we wanted and got a good bit of what we didn't. On the other hand, we had a huge successful nonviolent uprising. I guess you can't have everything.

Speaking of which, we discussed the lessons of the teachers' strike on the latest edition of The Front Porch. It's great to watch the ripples spread out around the country.

I had trouble getting published in the Gazette this year, with only one op-ed on the dangers of oligarchy getting printed.

Here's the last edition of Wonk's World, which we produced on the day before the session ended.

Speaking of the Gazette, we got the good news that the paper was bought by HD Media, a non-evil locally owned newspaper group. For a long while it looked like it would be bought by Ogden, which seems to specialize in producing not-too-readable reactionary stuff. That would have been for WV what Bedford Falls would have been if Mr. Potter took over in the movie It's a Wonderful Life.

Last word (for now) goes to Gazette-Mail political columnist Phil Kabler (who just dodged a likely bullet, as the above paragraph explains), who summed up the session pretty well here.

Three for the road

If you're trying to make sense of WV Governor Jim Justice's high profile party switch and what that means for WV, good luck--and you're in good company. Here's some basic reporting by Brad McEllhenny of WV MetroNews. And I think the Gazette-Mail's Phil Kabler hit most of the right notes with his column.

If you are up for some more amusing WV related news, check out this item from Vanity Fair that talks about the WV ACLU's hilarious brief about coal baron Bob Murray,  who made good on his threat to sue Comedy Central's John Oliver after somewhat less than reverent treatment on the tube. Giant Squirrel fans, you're going to love it.

Finally, it looks like Christianity minus the whole Jesus thing is alive and well in the USA. Sad.

You really can't make this **** up

The website WalletHub recently came up with a list of the best and worst places for millennials to live. It's no surprise that West Virginia came out on the bottom. But, as my friend Stephen Smith wrote with Pastor Mason Ballard, it's the best state to come to if you want to make a difference. And God knows we need that.

One of the reasons WV is unattractive to newcomers is the fact that it's kind of falling apart and the Republican majority in the legislature wants to pass a poverty budget that keeps things that way. Gazette-Mail reporter Phil Kabler had a great riff on that theme in the first part of this column.

One thing that could make things better is a budget that invests in people and infrastructure, as Gov. Jim Justice has proposed. Some of us were hoping he would veto the  legislature's proposed budget. And some of us, including me, sounded the  alarm and urged people to contact the governor in support of a veto.

I guess that's something to scratch off the list. And that's no (metaphorical) BS.

Two last thoughts:

*first, this really is the year of political props; and

*second, as I've argued before, we really should change the state motto from "Mountaineers are always free" to "You can't make this **** up" At least until we deserve the old motto again.

Interesting times. Unfortunately.

Sad to say, WV has been politically interesting lately. One thing we talked about on this week's Front Porch podcast is Hillary Clinton's apparent fall from favor since 2008. Gazette-Mail political columnist Phil Kabler relates some of the other weirdness here. And, while we're on the topic of interesting things, this lawsuit by labor groups against WV's new right to work for less law could be as well, especially in light of this week's state supreme court race.

If you read this blog regularly or listen to the Front Porch, you may recall this segment on transgender rights (and the loopy bathroom predator myth). Here's more coverage on that by the Gazette-Mail's Erin Beck.

O what a falling off was there

Once upon a time, the office of West Virginia's Attorney General was one devoted to things like consumer protection. When, for example, my elderly mother was preyed upon by predatory marketers, they tended to crawl back under their rocks when I mentioned the name of Darrell McGraw.

Those days are gone since the current occupant of that office, Patrick Morrisey, was elected mostly due to money from West Virginia's colonial masters out of state. As the Charleston Gazette noted in a recent editorial, the consumer protection division of that office has pretty much been gutted.

Gazette political columnist Phil Kabler summed it up nicely:

Should anyone be surprised that Pactrick Morrisey is pursuing a right-wing agenda, including investigation abortion clinics, and dismantling his office's consumer protection division? Not if they were paying attention.

Many voters were so focused on retiring longtime Attorney General Darrell McGraw that they didn't think through the consequences of electing Morrissey.

A quick glance of campaign contributors makes clear those donors weren't banking on Morrisey to continue McGraw's legacy of strong consumer protection and willingness to take on big pharmaceutical companies for price-fixing.

Gazette investigative reporter Eric Eyre noted today that

A special fund established to pay for Attorney General Patrick Morrisey's inaugural party received a $2,500 contribution from Cardinal Health in late February, the same company Morrisey's office has a pending lawsuit against for allegedly fueling West Virginia's problem with prescription drug abuse. 

Morrisey's wife, Denise Henry, is a lobbyist for Cardinal Health in Washington D.C. 

Cardinal Health, the nations second largest drug distributor, paid her lobbying firm $100,000 last year, according to Henry's lobbying disclosure form.

I wouldn't hold out much hope on that lawsuit. Follow the money.

Or maybe it has nothing to do with money at all (he wrote with irony). Maybe there are more important things for Morrisey to do...Like holding abortion witch hunts. Or opposing Medicaid expansion for hard working West Virginians when around 4 state residents die prematurely every week because they lack health insurance (uhhh...what happened to the whole pro-life thing?) Or holding forums on how we could make the state more business friendly?

Recently, Delegate Don Perdue, chair of the House Health Committee suggested Morrisey actually do something useful, like investigating WV's meth problems. I'm not holding my breath on that one either.

Servicing the ruling class is a full time job.

Back on track?

Yesterday, Feb. 26, marked the 40th anniversary of the Buffalo Creek disaster, when a coal waste dam owned by Pittston Coal broke collapsed, killing 125 people, wiping out several communities and leaving thousands homeless.

In other coal news, it looks like the mine safety bill under consideration in the WV legislature may be back on track despite efforts by coal industry lobbyists. You can find two different takes on it at the Gazette website. Statehouse columnist Phil Kabler sees it as a sign of the weakening power of the coal lobby as other major power players emerge:

How times have changed: After being moved to the inactive House calendar last week over objections from coal industry lobbyists, Gov.Earl Ray Tomblin's coal safety legislation (HB4351) is back on the active calendar and will be on amendment stage on the House floor this morning, after all sides worked out an agreement Friday.

Actually, not so much a compromise as the Tomblin administration and House leadership, under Speaker Rick Thompson, D-Wayne, drawing a line in the sand telling the industry no further concessions would be granted.

It wasn't too long ago that the process was the other way around. However, with competition from gambling interests, big Pharma and, increasingly, the gas/petrochemical industry, coal is not the predominant lobbying force at the Legislature anymore.

Meanwhile, Ken Ward at Coal Tattoo questions whether the legislation does all it could to protect miners.

I have mixed feelings. Far be it from me to question Ward's analysis of its weaknesses. But I am glad that mine safety is on the agenda at all and that  the original bill as proposed by the governor was improved by pressure from the House. And I think it is a significant victory that everyone didn't just, pardon the expression, cave in to the coal industry as has all too frequently happened in the past.

It's still not a done deal until it passes the full House and completes the process on the Senate side, so there is plenty of room for more surprises.