Afflicting the Comfortable: Journalism and Politics in West Virginia

by Thomas Stafford and Thomas F. Stafford

Book Overview

In 1990, the New York Times wrote, "Government corruption was not invented in West Virginia. But there are people who contend that West Virginia officials have done more than their share over the years to develop state-of-the-art techniques in vote theft, contract kickbacks, influence peddling and good old-fashioned bribery, extortion, fraud, tax evasion and outright stealing." While investigating such events as the Invest Right scandal,...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1933202041
• ISBN13: 9781933202044
• Release Date: November 2005
• Publisher: West Virginia University Press
• Length: 331 Pages
• Weight: 1.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.3" x 9.4"

Customer Reviews

Finally, an incisive look at West Virginia politics

This well-written and well-documented 2005 volume is everything that last year's "West Virginia Tough Boys" by Davis wasn't -- a hard look at West Virginia politics by a reporter who followed the game for years and conveys to the average reader how political life has been lived for decades in a corrupt state. Where Davis focused on political shenanigans by powerful sheriffs and courthouse rings in southern West Virginia's coal counties, Stafford takes a broader, more holistic view, following, in chronological order, the state administrations of various governors from the 1930s through the 1990s. Stafford's work is a lot easier to follow, doesn't rely so much on long, rambling passages from oral histories, and brings the practiced eye of a veteran statehouse political reporter to his subject. It's a valuable addition to the literature, however neither Davis nor Stafford really manages to satisfactorily answer the fundamental question: why has political corruption and malfeasance been permitted to persist for so long in America's poorest, neediest state?