No joke. The tweetappears to have been taken down, but the Washington Post was able to capture an image of the former half-term governor's endorsement.
She caught her mistake and decided that she should also encourage residents of West Virginia to vote for John Raese.
This would be funnier if it also weren't so sad. I grew up in West Virginia and politicians have been saying this for decades: The only way you can have jobs and prosper is if you continue destroying the environment. West Virginia cannot have any industry that is friendly to the environment. To be fair, many West Virginia Democrats--including Gov. Joe Manchin--make this argument.
I have long feared that this campaign tactic, well, this state policy, of fighting policies designed to encourage the development of clean energy technologies would become a self-fulfilling prophesy, depriving West Virginia of the jobs of the future as the jobs of 20th century continue to dwindle. At the same time politicians (Democrats included) point fingers at environmentalists and immigrants to blame for West Virginia's problems, they all decry the "brain drain" as talented young college graduates leave the state to find good jobs.
Every time I go home, I drive past a steel mill that once provided thousands of jobs, but has since ceased production. My parents joking point at "cafes" with machine gambling and new restaurants and say, "Look, the government is creating new jobs." The only new jobs coming to the area (at least where I grew up) are retail and other minimum wage service jobs, jobs for companies that John Raese believes should not be forced to pay a minimum wage. John Raese and Sarah Palin aren't interested in addressing the problems facing West Virginia. All they want are votes and book sales, respectively. This ad by Joe Manchin really nailed it.