Coal: GOP Says "War", Democrats Say "Myopia"

Sen. Mitch McConnell says the
President is waging a "War on Coal"

1 - It's a War
 "The Senate voted on Tuesday to block President Obama's tough new climate change regulations, hoping to undermine his negotiating authority before a major international climate summit meeting in Paris this month...

...Proponents believe their defiance will have diplomatic repercussions...The strength of the American position at the talks lies in the enactment of the emission-curbing E.P.A. rule--the first major climate change policy put forth by the United States...

...(Senate Majority Leader) McConnell has urged states not to comply with the rules."

eye'm thynkin':  Because nothing says "Patriot" like stabbing your democratically elected leader--the man the people chose to lead the country--in the back.  But, please, you go right ahead and put your own ideology first because the people don't count when there is Koch brothers' money to be had.

Read more at The New York Times


2 - It's Myopia

Eye Recommend:

THE G.O.P.'S MYOPIA ON COAL, by Raul Grijalva (D-Arizona), ranking member of the House Natural Resources Committee

(Any underlines are mine.)

It's no secret that American coal companies are facing tough times... 

...Republicans in Congress like to blame what they call President Obama's "war on coal."  In particular, they single out for scorn the president's Clean Power Plan, which will set first-time emissions standards for carbon dioxide on coal-fired power plants by 2022... 

...The industry's self described defenders seem to assume that without these rules, American coal would be financially sound into the foreseeable future...If a hypothetical Republican president forgoes carbon regulations, they believe, the industry's problems will be solved and we can get back to business as usual.

When did the Grimm brothers take over the U.S. Congress?  We need intelligent leaders, not believers in fairy tales, no matter how self-serving. Even if you were a coal miner, would you want to wake up and find out you'd been kissed by Mitch McConnell? (Okay, I admit, that last was a cheap shot...but ewwwwww!)

It's not that simple, and my colleagues help no one by pretending otherwise. Coal companies are struggling largely because domestic coal is not economically competitive with the country's cheap and abundant natural gas.  That would be true no matter who was president or what climate quality standards we had in place... 

...Coal's would be friends in Washington have decided to bash the administration and defend the status quo rather than offer a way forward.  They've also largely ignored legislative attempts to help the industry comply with incoming climate standards... 

...For all their sound and fury on the importance of American coal mining, some of my colleagues have boxed themselves in so tightly by denying the science of climate change that any solution is impossible for them to support... 

...Endorsing federal funding for pilot projects for carbon capture, which the industry wants...would qualify as caving in to the environmental lobby... (This) has become the biggest obstacle to the industry's getting what it wants most: assistance in meeting the new standards... 

...By adopting a post-Obama political vision of lax federal regulation and a return to pre-Obama profit margins, some of my colleagues have made themselves irrelevant to serious discussions about the coal industry's future.  Those of us who want to see coal company employees successfully navigate the rough waters ahead are more interested in providing economic opportunities than in posturing.  But we can't have that discussion as long as climate change is treated as a hoax.

It's time for the Republican Party to man-up and admit that climate change exists.  

The GOP can either go home and admit they've been lying to their constituents (yeah, that will pretty much suck, but they made their choice and now it's time to pay for it), or they can continue on the same Koch-paved road while the world sails on leaving the U.S. alone at the dock and the American coal worker floundering in the undertow.

You can read Mr. Grijalva's entire article here