A new poll released yesterday of likely voters in Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia shows widespread opposition to mountaintop removal (MTR) coal mining and overwhelming support for enforcement of the Clean Water Act to better protect rivers and streams from the impacts of MTR. In a statement that accompanies the release, the pollsters said: [...]
Continue reading...Wednesday, July 20, 2011
I love the smell of direct action in the morning. Last week, I was part of Earth First! and Northern Rockies Rising Tide taking over the governor of Montana’s offices in protest of tar sands development, and this morning, the RAMPS Campaign put a couple of tree-sitters up on Coal River Mountain to stop mountaintop [...]
Continue reading...Thursday, June 30, 2011
“When you decide to be something, you can be it. That’s what they don’t tell you in the church. When I was your age they would say we can become cops, or criminals. Today, what I’m saying to you is this: when you’re facing a loaded gun, what’s the difference?” -Frank Costello, The Departed What [...]
Continue reading...Thursday, June 16, 2011
A new must-see movie is out about the anti-mountaintop removal movement. Featuring Robert F. Kennedy Jr., “The Last Mountain” focuses on the issues of mountaintop removal and hard work of many people inside and outside the coalfields of Appalachia fighting to end it. The film has gotten a lot of attention, to the point where [...]
Continue reading...Tuesday, June 14, 2011
“The corporations take advantage of people in Appalachia, and this is happening all over Appalachia, not just West Virginia… We have to save one mountain at a time.” -Psera Newman, Lexington KY Billy Bragg sings about there being power in a union. But after the past week, I see that there is power not just [...]
Continue reading...Monday, June 6, 2011
Despite threats and intimidation by King Coal’s supporters, 600 courageous marchers kicked off a five-day march from Marmet, WV to Blair Mountain. Blair Mountain was the site of the second largest armed insurrection (after the Civil War) in U.S. history when, in 1921, 8,000-10,000 miners fighting for union rights took up arms against hired coal [...]
Continue reading...Thursday, May 26, 2011
This is like a John Grisham thriller put onto a reality show for all of us to see. Months ago, it was announced that Alpha Natural Resources began the process of acquiring coal criminal Massey Energy. Massey, long known for destroying Appalachia’s mountains with mountaintop removal (MTR) coal mining and responsible for killing 29 of [...]
Continue reading...Friday, May 20, 2011
On April 5, 2010, Massey Energy’s Upper Big Branch Mining disaster claimed the lives of 29 miners. Now an independent investigator, former MSHA head David McAteer, has found that Massey Energy operated in a “profoundly reckless manner and 29 coal miners paid with their lives for the corporate risk-taking.” The report found that poor ventilation [...]
Continue reading...Tuesday, April 26, 2011
I hold no illusions about how much political power in the U.S. lies in corporate hands. That’s why, a few years ago, I started to acquire a portfolio of shares in a number of banking and energy companies. As a shareholder, I’m entitled to one opportunity each year to question CEOs and senior executives about [...]
Continue reading...Sunday, January 30, 2011
After months of speculation, Massey Energy, the most controversial coal mining company in the USA, is no more. On Saturday Alpha Natural Resources announced that it had bought out the company in a deal worth $8.5 billion. That’s a high price for the stock – metallurgical coal looks lucrative to short-sighted investors as the competing [...]
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Wednesday, August 17, 2011
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