Has the Wheeling Intelligencer editorial page reached an all-time low?

Using old and no longer relevant editorials, the local paper reveals (once again) its disdain for its readership

Does the editor of the Intelligencer follow the news?

Today’s editorial is about WV Senator Shelley Moore Capito’s efforts to get action on the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment program. This editorial was first published on May 9 -- probably in Ogden’s Martinsburg Journal. It begins:

U.S. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., and Kelly Workman, director of West Virginia’s Office of Broadband, are right to keep up the pressure on federal officials over the pace of their review of grant funding for high-speed broadband. . . .

The program to which Capito refers is the Broadband Equity, Access and Deployment program, which was supposed to provide “$42.45 billion to expand high-speed Internet access by funding planning, infrastructure deployment and adoption programs,” according to the National Telecommunications and Information Administration.

Unfortunately for rural West Virginians (and millions without internet service elsewhere), President Donald Trump killed the legislation the day before the editorial was published:

🚨President Trump is ending the Digital Equity Act pic.twitter.com/Fi9AB6esJL
— Red Line News (@RedLineNewsUSA) May 8, 2025

Trump apparently was upset with the word “equity” in the title and so he ended the program. (See two posts down.) This was not an obscure action on Trump’s part, it received plenty of coverage. So why would the Intelligencer run an editorial three weeks later praising Capito for urging faster deployment? While it is tempting to suggest that the editor didn’t know any better, I think that, more likely, it didn’t matter – old and irrelevant editorials still fill up space.

Tuesday: more old editorials

Yesterday’s hard-hitting, lead editorial was “Improve Dental Health in W.Va..” The editorial is a slightly shortened version of an editorial first published in Ogden’s Martinsburg paper almost three months ago. Citing a Wallethub survey that lists WV at or near the bottom in most dental health categories, the editorial does find a bright spot – that the state was “third for the percentage of adolescents who visited a dentist in the past year.” From that statistic, the editorial draws a totally irrelevant conclusion:

Perhaps that is a sign that at least some policymakers have been working toward making a difference for upcoming generations.

Huh? I give up: how did WV’s policymakers increase dental visits? For the Intelligencer, it doesn’t matter; it’s all filler.

Yesterday’s second editorial dealt with Ohio’s affordable housing legislation and looks to have been first published in Ogden’s Marietta paper ten weeks ago. The editorial reminded me of the Intelligencer editorial run last July that described an ongoing Ohio legislative battle over the state’s budget. Of course, it didn’t matter to the Intelligencer that the budget fight had already ended, and the governor had already signed it into law; the editorial was still published. In this year’s case, the bill has yet to be voted upon. Okay, so has the bill died, been changed, or merged with another bill? Who knows and the Intelligencer certainly doesn't tell us. Additionally, there is no attempt to explain why West Virginians should care about an Ohio housing bill. It’s just more filler.