Just heard an interview with John Raese, Republican candidate to replace Byrd in the US Senate.

In an almost astounding case of, “Fuck you, I’ve got mine!” Rease said he wants to get rid of the minimum wage. “Asked if the federally mandated minimum wage should be abolished, Raese answered, ‘absolutely.'”

A couple of notes here, the minimum wage is $7.25 an hour. If an employee worked 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year (which never happens mind you) they would have an income of $15,080.00 a year. The median income in WV in 2008 was $37,528. For the US as a whole it was $52,029, and in that same year, 17% of West Virginians had income below the poverty level.

Raese believes that West Virginians should be at the mercy of their employers in determine what is a “living wage” (Let me tell you, the minimum wage ain’t it)

He also doesn’t like regulation of industry, so not only does he believe that businesses can pay you as little as they want, he also seems to believe that industry can do whatever they want to the environment, their employees, their customers–that they answer only to their investors.

Yeah, we saw how well that‘s worked out.

And Raese’s record on safety speaks for itself as does his record on government spending.