Chronicle publisher Chad Taylor should know that people in Russia and many other despotic countries get a ballot. Getting a ballot is no guarantee of freedom.
Women in Washington are free to do many things that women in red states such as Texas are not free to do. Much like the white southern males of the 1850s sought to make slavery the law of the land, the white males in charge of Texas seek to export their brand of “democracy” to all the states. Recently, the extremist “Christian” Missouri legislature ordered female members to cover their arms as apparently the sight of naked female arm skin was too arousing for them to focus on their work.
Whatever level of “middle class” Lewis County rises to has four main sources of support. It is certainly not upper middle class as 71% of Lewis County residents are eligible for SNAP programs as compared to 48% for the state as a whole.
The Chehalis Walmart is one of the highest sales volume stores in the global chain. Lewis County depends heavily on the cheap imported products sold at Walmart, Home Depot, Harbor Freight and everywhere else. Trump’s tariffs are a bonehead attempt to reorder global manufacturing. Whatever manufacturing returns to the United States will be dominated by A/I and robotics. The assembly lines of the 1950’s are history.
Whatever remnants of agriculture left in the county are almost entirely dependent on immigrant Hispanic labor. Documented or otherwise. Trump is making racist war on them. Undocumented and documented.
Lewis County benefits tremendously from the revenue sent to Olympia by the blue counties. Most recently, King County gets about 80 cents back from every dollar it sends to Olympia. Lewis County gets about $1.40 back for every dollar we send to Olympia.
Lewis County has an aging population heavily supported by Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security. Yeah, the Democrats did that to you. Blame them. If it were up to Republicans none of those programs would exist.
Chad Taylor’s diatribe is a sign of the times. It shades every story written in The Chronicle to the extremist right.
Marty Ansley
Cinebar
