If someone is genuinely intent on ruining the great State of Wyoming, they don’t need to resort to earthquakes, plagues, or the usual Biblical catastrophes. With determination and a good dose of backward thinking, the task can be accomplished with far simpler tools.
History shows us that many kingdoms have fallen not by the sword, but by the arrogance of their own legislatures. Here’s a ten-step plan to effectively dismantle our beloved state – and it concerns me several legislators are advancing the plan of destruction.
The first step in wrecking the state is to starve it. Slash the tax base, preferably until it disappears entirely. A person can't work if you take away their boots, and a government cannot function if you strip it of the very revenue that keeps the lights on.
Make it your mission to lower taxes so aggressively that even the ghosts in the old territorial jail stop paying tax. Then, proclaim victory while roads disintegrate into gravel and school roofs begin to leak like tissue paper in a shower.
Second, deplete every bit of savings. If a rainy-day fund exists, and Wyoming has refined the art of saving for storms, spend it all while the sun is shining and the grass is green. Remember: savings are for those who plan for the future, and planning is the enemy of state destruction.
Third, drive our children out of the state. Exporting young people is one of the most effective ways to destroy a state. Ensure schools are underfunded, activities are unsupported, and career prospects are dismal. Before long, they’ll flee to places where the lights shine late into the night, and communities welcome new employees trying to support a family.
For those who manage to stay, make it increasingly difficult for them to have babies. Enact laws that criminalize the provision of obstetric services. Fill the state with obstetrical deserts, where care rendered on the old Oregon Trail seems a luxury. Every child not born in Wyoming means one fewer future resident to grow up loving this place and voting against ignorance.
The fifth step – similar to the fourth? Drive away healthcare providers. Discourage doctors, insult nurses, and underpay everyone with a stethoscope. Cut healthcare services in favor of tax reduction. Folks will leave faster than antelope fleeing from a wolf. Once they’re gone, erode emergency services as well. Nothing screams “failed state” like a 120-minute ambulance response time.
Sixth, drive skilled labor away. Make skilled workers feel as unwelcome as a skunk at a church picnic. Underpay them, overwork them, and remind them that any idea not generated by a select few is simply an attempt to disrupt the Wyoming Way. Make sure no new industry that employs skilled workers is welcome.
Seventh, sell off public lands to the wealthy. Wyomingites cherish their public lands—and if you want to destroy this state, sell them off quickly, preferably to affluent outsiders who see hunting easements as opportunities for profit. Nothing breeds resentment faster than fencing off a beloved mountain.
Next, manipulate the voting laws. Make it harder to vote than for a farsighted lawyer threading a needle. Ensure that only a select few can participate in elections, all in the name of election integrity, masking your true objectives.
Ninth, use social issues as a smokescreen to obscure your destruction. Make sure the legislature looks like it is doing something important by squabbling over issues that yield no jobs, no investment, and no future. Hide behind a subterfuge of name calling. Proclaim yourself a social issue hero, while watching the state’s future burn. Economic development is hard; culture-war posturing is easy. Always take the easy route.
Tenth, evade accountability. Send out covert text messages each morning from unseen masterminds lurking in hidden caves, directing your followers on how to vote.
Muddy the issues with dishonest or misleading social media campaigns that hide your true motives of destruction.
Then, thoroughly weaken civic education so what’s left of the electorate casts ballots like rolling dice—by chance and with no understanding of the odds. A poorly informed electorate completes your state-wrecking blueprint.
If you care about this state, consider this guide a crucial warning: recognize it, resist it, and absolutely do not follow it. Wyoming deserves better.
Tom Lubnau served in the Wyoming Legislature from 2004 - 2015 and is a former Speaker of the House. He can be reached at: YourInputAppreciated@gmail.com
