The Virginia State legislature needs to move forward with investigations to all the allegations in regard to the Governor and the Lt. Governor. They are obviously not going to leave voluntarily.

It is the duty of the legislature to keep the government honest. It is time they did that. This should not be a political issue. It is far too serious for games.

February 8, 2019
By Jonathan Martin and Alexander Burns

...That state history on race and politics (click here) is now under intense scrutiny. Gov. Ralph Northam and Attorney General Mark Herring, both Democrats, are facing calls to resign for wearing blackface in separate incidents as young men. The most powerful Republican state senator, Thomas K. Norment Jr., is defending himself for his role decades ago editing a college yearbook that contained racist photos and slurs. Meanwhile, Lt. Gov. Justin E. Fairfax, the state’s second black politician to win statewide office, is facing an allegation of sexual assault that has imperiled his job....

There is something to this and it crosses political lines. The very uncomfortable process of confronting racism has to begin and come to a clear conclusion that erases it from Virginia forever.

I am assuming the photo of the yearbook indicating a person in blackface and a KKK robe was validated and not some sort of cyber manipulation of that yearbook page.

In regard to the Lt. Governor, the allegations are taking on a typical pattern. One woman comes forward, then another and then another. He is claiming this is some sort of political attack. The women and their lawyers can appear before an investigative committee to validate the allegations.

Civil rights have always been a struggle. In 2019, the landscape still is dotted by reminders of such bigotry. The history is always that the powerful don't want to give up power and the victims continue to struggle to change the course their lives have taken. That is the case with minorities and women, including minority women. We must persist. It is the remedy and that has been the case for more than a century.