Dear Editor: Doesn’t anyone see the irony of this morning’s headline in the Local edition of the <i>Charleston Gazette</i>? "Spirited Away to Louisiana! The sternwheeler ‘Spirit of WV’ sold and relocated to Louisianna" <p align="JUSTIFY">It’s the West Virginia story.</p> <p align="JUSTIFY">Seems like most of WV resources are being Spirited away to somewhere else;</p> <p align="JUSTIFY">Coal to Japan and China;</p> <p align="JUSTIFY">Trees to Asian countries;</p> <p align="JUSTIFY">Mountaintops to the valley floor;</p> <p align="JUSTIFY">Clean water to polluted drilling slurry to be processed in Ohio or injected into the deep;</p> <p align="JUSTIFY">Our talented kids to another place where they can possibly find a job;</p> <p align="JUSTIFY">Our financial resources dwindled by poor economy and reliance on out of state companies to ship our extracted resources to another more profitable location.</p> <p align="JUSTIFY">When will this departure end...</p> <p align="JUSTIFY">We need to focus on renewable resources and sustainable agriculture. We need to nurture tourism and work to create new and creative cultures to change the course of old and bring forth a new era in WV.</p> <p align="JUSTIFY">It take a change in the political will and the foresight to change direction. If we allow the current powers that keep pushing us towards the brink, we will all be going downstream like that sternwheeler.</p> <p align="JUSTIFY">There is hope with insight and will to make that hard turn astern against the ill fated winds towards a cleaner and healthier future.</p> <p align="RIGHT"><em>Mark Blumenstein</em></p> <p align="RIGHT"><em>Alderson</em></p> <p align="RIGHT"><em>www.markblumenstein.com</em></p>
