Bush Administration to West Virginia: Kiss Our Skinny Ass

So how's that working out for you, West Virginia, selling your priciples down the river to vote for George W. in 2000? You did it, we hear, because you believed Al Gore would take away your Bibles and your guns. You did it again in 2004 because El Presidente promised to unleash Big Coal. Unleashed it is!

Yesterday at a Senate hearing into the mine disaster that killed 12 West Virginians, the director of Bush's Mine Safety and Health Administration got asked some tough questions, about how his boss was over-seeing the dismantlement of safety inspections and regs that are supposed to protect miners, but the director got bored, looked at his watch, said he needed to be elsewhere, and got up and left the hearing with Sen. Arlen "No Balls" Specter more or less in mid-question.

"I can't recollect it ever happening before," Mr. Specter said of the departure. "We'll find a way to take appropriate note of it."

In this Senate, that amounts to a hissy fit.

But so what? This president does what he wants. West Virginia elected him, and West Virginia is apparently prepared to suffer a lot more death and dismemberment for the privilege of staying safe from "terrorists."