Arizona has the nation's 16th highest poverty rate ...

… Legislators respond by allowing guns to be taken into bars, and trying to restrict the ability of women to have abortions. From the PBJ:

In Arizona, the poverty rate was 14.1 percent, the 16th highest level in the U.S.
[…]
Mississippi, Louisiana, New Mexico, Arkansas and Kentucky led the nation in poverty levels, ranging from 20.7 percent to 17.2 percent. New Hampshire, Connecticut, Maryland, Hawaii and New Jersey experienced the lowest levels, ranging from 7.3 percent to 8.5 percent.

Add this to the number of societal indicators that see Arizona have more in common with the Deep South than with states that actually drive the country’s economy and social progress.

While the new gun laws, aside from the danger of more shootings, are political sops to gun fetishists, the abortion restrictions can create real harm: They are designed to terrorize young girls in need and beyond that further deplete the state’s finances as the inevitable court battles ensue.

But in both cases, we see legislators continuing the debilitating scab-scratching of the culture wars rather than working on issues to make life better for their most vulnerable charges. The most sobering statistic in the Biz Journal story: 20 percent of the state’s kids are living in poverty.