If You Don't Like Coal You Are A Commie! Atheist! Enemy!

Obviously a paragon of conservative thought, a staunch defender of the administration, and a complete a**hole. There. Now I'm a communist terrorist...

Environmentalists have had to soften their rhetoric in the last few years, owing to post Sept-11 sensitivities to strong language. It's about time the rightnuts do the same?

Yeah! I'm a communist/terrorist! Wait, help my history, but didn't the communist fight against Al Qida? I'm confused again. Where is my credit card, I think I need to buy something.

More like scared to the point of utter paranoia, and ignorant to the point of blaming everyone but himself for his own failings.

It's pretty sad to watch, actually.

Is this the equivalent of being a racist if you did not vote for Obama?

Actually I am an atheist and a communist. Very intuitive on his part I'd say.

Coal produces the majority of electric power in North America (in the world actually).Every time an alternate was attempted, esp nuke plants, the companies are swarmed with lawsuits.

I would hate to think that this 'lawsuit mentality' would force electric generation out of the CONUS, as it has dome for oil production, and in many cases, large industrial operations like smelting and steel manufacturing. All you end up with is a horrible pollution source just outside the reach of US lawyers with even more pollution that before.

Examples? External borders - Smelter in Mexico replaced one near Douglas Az. (Shuttered in '87) The smoke from the NACOZARI DE GARCIA plant still fouls the air, the smelter complex in the US is gone.

Internal borders - Lawsuits in CA forced the LA Water and power to 'move' their coal operations to, among other places, Delta Utah. There the power generated by burning Utah coal, using up Utah water, goes mostly (90%+) to SoCal. The plant has produced some jobs, but I don't know if those replaced the ones lost in farming.

You might force them out of your neighborhood/state or even the country - but they go someplace. And they pollute the same air we breath - but you now have no say in how the plants are operated.

The first eight seconds of the second video puts into question the validity of Mr. Blakenships whole argument. Of course, I guess we are all "crazy if we don't speak out about" Mr. Blakenship's stance. At least he gets pleasure in such activities.

Hate is a great motivator... Classic fallback when there is nothing of merit to use. (The other time is a consequence/result of ... someone like Bush.)

Don,

Not to be pedantic, but coal produces the plurality of electric power in North America and worldwide, not the majority (worldwide it's only about 40%, according to IEA).

A pretty good amount of coal burned in the US is imported because it is often cheaper to do so. Much of that has to do with the quality of the coal, though, which is determined not by lawyers or mining companies, but by Mother Nature. Short of building a global network of superconducting power cables, importing significant amounts of electric power to the US from far-away third-world countries is technically impossible, so your fears about the generation being shipped overseas are unfounded. And when it comes to jobs, coal employs fewer people per MW than any other generation technology -- so replacing it should create jobs, not eliminate them.

Don - this wouldn't be a problem if we had more enforcable international environmental agreements. If Mexico pollutes, for example, we penalize them in trade.

In honor of your prescient contribution, I will start advocating more strongly for that. And everyone else on the board is likely to join me. Thanks for speaking up!

Since when has atheism had anything to do with not wanting to burn coal?! Does that mean if you do want to burn coal and don't care about climate change, you are automatically branded as religious?! There is no link! This guy is an idiot!