Why Governor Justice's Most Famous Metaphor Is Snapping At Him Like An Ohio County Poodle

“We have a patient laying there and blood is shooting to the ceiling. All in the world we can do is trim the toenails. Blood is shooting to the ceiling. We’ve got to do something.”

Governor Jim Justice

If the metaphors Governor Jim Justice unleashes on his political detractors were supposed to turn and come yapping and snapping back at him like an Ohio County poodle, this classic by West Virginia’s Metaphorist In Chief would be perfect. West Virginia is depicted as a hemorrhaging patient whose doctors (Justice’s detractors) prepare the soon-to-be corpse for burial instead of stopping the bleeding and saving the patient’s life. This metaphor would be very effective not for the fact that its creator, Jim Justice, is offering only cosmetic improvements – better roads - instead of suturing the wound.

West Virginia is not hemorrhaging jobs and population because our roads are bad. West Virginia is losing jobs and people because the “outside investment” that would infuse our state with life-saving jobs and tax revenue will not come here until we have the STEM-educated, 21^st century workforce they need. This is a fact. How do I know? I know it is a fact because governors and legislators have said so on talk radio shows for years yet all of them are acting more like morticians than doctors.

Governor Justice, we all enjoy your vivid metaphors about raccoons and poodles and patients whose blood is spurting to the ceiling, but the next time you send one of your metaphors out to bite your political opponents, make sure the metaphor can tell the difference between you and your intended targets.

Governor Justice, I sent you a plan that gives “outside investment” the STEM-educated workforce that will attract that outside investment. If you haven’t read it, here it is again:

1. Make the Promise Scholarship a STEM scholarship. Companies won’t come here for our English majors, political science majors and communications majors, but they will come here to gain access to our mathematicians, software engineers, chemists and other STEM grads if we produce them in large numbers.

2. Require Promise Scholarship recipients to sign a contract with West Virginia obligating them to stay in West Virginia for, say, 5 years after graduation. Too many of West Virginia’s college grads are leaving with their degrees and making some other state’s workforce magnetic to outside investment. If they give us five years, they’ll marry, have children, build houses, and make friends. Most will never leave. Maybe along the way they’ll invent things and, who knows, maybe some of them will start the next Apple or the next Google.

3. Expand the Promise Scholarship to fund tens of thousands of students’ annually instead of the current 3,000 to 3,500 annually. At its current size, the Promise Scholarship is the right medicine in a dosage insufficient to heal the West Virginia economy.

4. Double the per-student annual scholarship award from its current $4,750 to around $9,000 or $10,000 so students can carry full loads and finish in 4 years.

5. Pay the college debt of STEM grads who want to come to West Virginia and are willing to sign a contract requiring them to become part of West Virginia’s workforce for at least five years.

6. Pay for the above with a severance tax, an excise tax or the proceeds from the state lottery or some combination of the aforementioned. For example, the Tennessee Promise program provides 2 years of free technical or community college to Tennessee high school grads at a cost of about $35 million annually and is paid for by the state lottery.

7. Finally, remove The Promise Scholarship from the Education department and put it under Commerce where an economic development/workforce development tool belongs.  

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Higginbotham At Large neither reads nor publishes comments from pseudonymous or anonymous commenters. No Ring of Gyges for you. I’ll be happy to publish opposing views from clearly-identified submitters.  

About Joseph Higginbotham:

Joseph Higginbotham is a former member of the West Virginia Region III Workforce Development Board, a former executive and technical search consultant, a former general manager and a former columnist and writer for newspapers, magazines and journals such as Business Lexington, Rx HomeCare, Leadership, Drug Store News, Campus Career Counselor, Home Health Care Dealer and more. Higginbotham has spoken professionally at over 40 venues, served as an “expert panelist” at jobseeker workshops and a guest on numerous talk radio shows.


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Mitch Carmichael, Tim Armstead, Senator Mike Hall, Corey Palumbo, Hoppy Kercheval, Mayor Danny Jones, Tom Roten, Jake Jarvis, Ashton Marra, Scott Finn, #StruggleToStay, Butch Antolini, Grant Herring, Nick Casey, Dave Hardy, Booth Goodwin, Ryan Ferns, Mike Hall  

House Bill 2568: Fiddling While West Virginia Burns

11 legislators want to make the Bible the official state book of West Virginia. This in a year when 10,000 people per year are leaving our state, businesses are closing and our legislators haven't done anything to fix the workforce and  the economy.

The 11 legislators who introduced or sponsored this bill are Jeff Eldridge, Ralph Rodigherio, Zach Maynard, Rodney Miller, Justin Marcum, Brad White, Kenneth Hicks, Erikka Storch, Steve Westfall, Mark Dean and Bill Hamilton.

This just in: After I posted this, I got an email from Delegate Rodney Miller telling me he has removed his name from the Bible bill. 

These 11 legislators showed up at  the 2017 session without a plan to fix the workforce or the economy but they have time to introduce silly, unnecessary legislation? Please, if you live in one of these legislators' districts, call or write them and tell them that you will remember how they fiddled as West Virginia burns down.

And since our legislators still haven't submitted a plan to get Wes Virginia working, let me remind these 11 legislators that I have introduced a plan (below) that I welcome them to steal.

1. Make the Promise Scholarship a STEM scholarship. Companies won’t come here for our English majors, political science majors and communications majors, but they will come here to gain access to our mathematicians, software engineers, chemists and other STEM grads if we produce them in large numbers.

2. Require Promise Scholarship recipients to sign a contract with West Virginia obligating them to stay in West Virginia for, say, 5 years after graduation. Too many of West Virginia’s college grads are leaving with their degrees and making some other state’s workforce magnetic to outside investment. If they give us five years, they’ll marry, have children, build houses, make friends. Most will never leave. Maybe along the way they’ll invent things and, who knows, maybe some of them will start the next Apple or the next Google.

3. Expand the Promise Scholarship to fund tens of thousands of students’ annually instead of the current 3,000 to 3,500 annually. At its current size, the Promise Scholarship is the right medicine in a dosage insufficient to heal the West Virginia economy.

4. Double the per-student annual scholarship award from its current $4,750 to around $9,000 or $10,000 so students can carry full loads and finish in 4 years.

5. Pay the college debt of STEM grads who want to come to West Virginia and are willing to sign a contract requiring them to become part of West Virginia’s workforce for at least five years.

6. Pay for the above with a severance tax, an excise tax or the proceeds from the state lottery or some combination of the aforementioned. For example, the Tennessee Promise program provides 2 years of free technical or community college to Tennessee high school grads at a cost of about $35 million annually and is paid for by the state lottery.

About Joseph Higginbotham:

Joseph Higginbotham is a former member of the West Virginia Region III Workforce Investment Board, a former executive and technical search consultant, a former general manager and a former columnist and writer for newspapers, magazines and journals such as Business Lexington, Rx HomeCare, Leadership, Drug Store News, Campus Career Counselor, Home Health Care Dealer and more. Higginbotham has spoken professionally at over 40 venues, served as an “expert panelist” at jobseeker workshops and a guest on numerous talk radio shows.


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Higginbotham At Large neither reads nor publishes comments from pseudonymous or anonymous commenters. No Ring of Gyges for you.


Mitch Carmichael, Tim Armstead, Senator Mike Hall, Corey Palumbo, Hoppy Kercheval, Mayor Danny Jones, Tom Roten, Jake Jarvis, Ashton Marra, Scott Finn, #StruggleToStay,

The Question I'm Waiting For Hoppy Kercheval Or Danny Jones To Ask Our Legislators

One of these days when a state legislator goes on the Hoppy Kercheval show or the Danny Jones show and correctly identifies West Virginia's lack of an educated workforce as our number one constraint on economic prosperity and population growth, the radio host will ask the following question: "So what are you doing to give West Virginia the thousands of new college-educated workers we need to attract investment and jobs?"

One of these days.

But until the media asks the logical follow-up question, here's my plan:

1. Make the Promise Scholarship a STEM scholarship. Companies won’t come here for our English majors, political science majors and communications majors, but they will come here to gain access to our mathematicians, software engineers, chemists and other STEM grads if we produce them in large numbers.

2. Require Promise Scholarship recipients to sign a contract with West Virginia obligating them to stay in West Virginia for, say, 5 years after graduation. Too many of West Virginia’s college grads are leaving with their degrees and making some other state’s workforce magnetic to outside investment. If they give us five years, they’ll marry, have children, build houses, make friends. Most will never leave. Maybe along the way they’ll invent things and, who knows, maybe some of them will start the next Apple or the next Google.

3. Expand the Promise Scholarship to fund tens of thousands of students’ annually instead of the current 3,000 to 3,500 annually. At its current size, the Promise Scholarship is the right medicine in a dosage insufficient to heal the West Virginia economy.

4. Double the per-student annual scholarship award from its current $4,750 to around $9,000 or $10,000 so students can carry full loads and finish in 4 years.

5. Pay the college debt of STEM grads who want to come to West Virginia and are willing to sign a contract requiring them to become part of West Virginia’s workforce for at least five years.

6. Pay for the above with a severance tax, an excise tax or the proceeds from the state lottery or some combination of the aforementioned. For example, the Tennessee Promise program provides 2 years of free technical or community college to Tennessee high school grads at a cost of about $35 million annually and is paid for by the state lottery.

About Joseph Higginbotham:

Joseph Higginbotham is a former member of the West Virginia Region III Workforce Investment Board, a former executive and technical search consultant, a former general manager and a former columnist and writer for newspapers, magazines and journals such as Business Lexington, Rx HomeCare, Leadership, Drug Store News, Campus Career Counselor, Home Health Care Dealer and more. Higginbotham has spoken professionally at over 40 venues, served as an “expert panelist” at jobseeker workshops and a guest on numerous talk radio shows.

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Higginbotham At Large neither reads nor publishes comments from pseudonymous or anonymous commenters. No Ring of Gyges for you.

Mitch Carmichael, Tim Armstead, Senator Mike Hall, Corey Palumbo, Hoppy Kercheval, Mayor Danny Jones, Tom Roten, Jake Jarvis, Ashton Marra, Scott Finn, #StruggleToStay,

Update: Revenue Secretary, Dave Hardy, Invites Radio Listeners To Submit Budget Plans

On Friday talk radio, Governor Jim Justice's Revenue Secretary, Dave Hardy, invited listeners to submit budget plans since, you know, our feckless legislators hated the governor's plan and still don't have a plan of their own.

Here's my "Higginbotham Plan" which I've been sharing with lobbyists and red-faced legislators for weeks. My plan is more of an economic development plan since West Virginia's elected leaders haven't dealt with West Virginia's constraint on prosperity, our poorly-educated workforce.

1. Make the Promise Scholarship a STEM scholarship. Companies won’t come here for our English majors, political science majors and communications majors, but they will come here to gain access to our mathematicians, software engineers, chemists and other STEM grads if we produce them in large numbers.

2. Require Promise Scholarship recipients to sign a contract with West Virginia obligating them to stay in West Virginia for, say, 5 years after graduation. Too many of West Virginia’s college grads are leaving with their degrees and making some other state’s workforce magnetic to outside investment. If they give us five years, they’ll marry, have children, build houses, make friends. Most will never leave. Maybe along the way they’ll invent things and, who knows, maybe some of them will start the next Apple or the next Google.

3. Expand the Promise Scholarship to fund tens of thousands of students’ annually instead of the current 3,000 to 3,500 annually. At its current size, the Promise Scholarship is the right medicine in a dosage insufficient to heal the West Virginia economy.

4. Double the per-student annual scholarship award from its current $4,750 to around $9,000 or $10,000 so students can carry full loads and finish in 4 years.

5. Pay the college debt of STEM grads who want to come to West Virginia and are willing to sign a contract requiring them to become part of West Virginia’s workforce for at least five years.

6. Pay for the above with a severance tax, an excise tax or the proceeds from the state lottery or some combination of the aforementioned. For example, the Tennessee Promise program provides 2 years of free technical or community college to Tennessee high school grads at a cost of about $35 million annually and is paid for by the state lottery.

About Joseph Higginbotham:

Joseph Higginbotham is a former member of the West Virginia Region III Workforce Investment Board, a former executive and technical search consultant, a former general manager and a former columnist and writer for newspapers, magazines and journals such as Business Lexington, Rx HomeCare, Leadership, Drug Store News, Campus Career Counselor, Home Health Care Dealer and more. Higginbotham has spoken professionally at over 40 venues, served as an “expert panelist” at jobseeker workshops and a guest on numerous talk radio shows.

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Higginbotham At Large neither reads nor publishes comments from pseudonymous or anonymous commenters. No Ring of Gyges for you.

Mitch Carmichael, Tim Armstead, Senator Mike Hall, Corey Palumbo, Hoppy Kercheval, Mayor Danny Jones, Tom Roten, Jake Jarvis, Ashton Marra, Scott Finn, #StruggleToStay,

Open Letter To West Virginia's Legislators Re: West Virginia's Economy

With your powers of policy and purse, West Virginia's legislators are not only responsible for the budget, you are the de facto Chief Economic Development Officers for the state.

Our high schools are telling our teenagers that they must plan to leave West Virginia after high school or college because our elected leaders aren't going to do what it takes to give our youth a fighting chance to succeed here. You must stop wringing your hands and clucking about Governor Jim Justice's plan to make Woody Thrasher richer and come up with a plan of your own. You can't fix West Virginia's economy without spending some money. I'm sorry that previous governors and previous legislatures have neglected economic development for decades leaving you with an economic and population emergency but that's what you signed up for when you ran for your seat as a de facto Economic Development Chief. Now do your job. You should have already had an economic plan when you filed for office. 

Below, is my plan. Don't criticize my plan if you don't have one.   

1. Make the Promise Scholarship a STEM scholarship. Companies won’t come here for our English majors, political science majors and communications majors, but they will come here to gain access to our mathematicians, software engineers, chemists and other STEM grads if we produce them in large numbers.

2. Require Promise Scholarship recipients to sign a contract with West Virginia obligating them to stay in West Virginia for, say, 5 years after graduation. Too many of West Virginia’s college grads are leaving with their degrees and making some other state’s workforce magnetic to outside investment. If they give us five years, they’ll marry, have children, build houses, make friends. Most will never leave. Maybe along the way they’ll invent things and, who knows, maybe some of them will start the next Apple or the next Google.

3. Expand the Promise Scholarship to fund tens of thousands of students’ annually instead of the current 3,000 to 3,500 annually. At its current size, the Promise Scholarship is the right medicine in a dosage insufficient to heal the West Virginia economy.

4. Double the per-student annual scholarship award from its current $4,750 to around $9,000 or $10,000 so students can carry full loads and finish in 4 years.

5. Pay the college debt of STEM grads who want to come to West Virginia and are willing to sign a contract requiring them to become part of West Virginia’s workforce for at least five years.

6. Pay for the above with a severance tax, an excise tax or the proceeds from the state lottery or some combination of the aforementioned.

About Joseph Higginbotham:

Joseph Higginbotham is a former member of the West Virginia Region III Workforce Investment Board, a former executive and technical search consultant, a former general manager and a former columnist and writer for newspapers, magazines and journals such as Business Lexington, Rx HomeCare, Leadership, Drug Store News, Campus Career Counselor, Home Health Care Dealer and more. Higginbotham has spoken professionally at over 40 venues, served as an “expert panelist” at jobseeker workshops and a guest on numerous talk radio shows.

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Higginbotham At Large neither reads nor publishes comments from pseudonymous or anonymous commenters. No Ring of Gyges for you.

Mitch Carmichael, Tim Armstead, Senator Mike Hall, Corey Palumbo, Hoppy Kercheval, Mayor Danny Jones, Tom Roten, Jake Jarvis, Ashton Marra, Scott Finn, #StruggleToStay,

Don't Increase The Amount Of Tax Taxpayers Pay, Increase The Number Of People Who Pay Tax

Our current taxation system is an artifact of a time when people had jobs, which meant they had employers who could deduct income tax from their paychecks.

This system doesn’t work anymore. Many people no longer have employers. They have gigs. They have 1099s, not w-2s and w-4s. “Self-employment” is the new unemployment.

With no payroll person to deduct taxes from their pay, there are a lot of people who are essentially on the honor system. Many people are dishonorable.

I’m calling upon our legislature to collect more taxes by changing the way taxes are collected, not by raising taxes on the few honorable people who pay and from the shrinking numbers of people who have a job where a payroll person deducts taxes from their paychecks.

There are two ways the West Virginia legislature can collect more taxes. The first way is to increase taxes on the few who pay them. The second way is to collect taxes at point-of-purchase where everybody will have to pay the tax when they buy food, services, cars, clothing, gasoline or anything else.

Did you ever wonder how a drug dealer pays taxes? He probably doesn’t. It’s a cash business and even if he wanted to pay taxes he really can’t report income without incriminating himself.

Does it make you mad that drug dealers, prostitutes and others in cash businesses benefit from the things government provides but they don’t help pay for it like you do?

The legislature can right that injustice by dropping the income tax that only a few pay and imposing a sales or consumption tax that everybody pays.

West Virginia legislature, don’t increase taxes on the few who pay them, impose a tax that tax evaders can’t evade. Don’t increase the amount of tax each person pays, increase the number of people who pay tax.