大象传媒

Great article. Pity about the misspelling in the headline "Wasted scenary" ...

JefFromRome are you just being smallminded and tediously pedantic or has the headline been changed???

Yes, the title was changed. But talking of pedantic: what's 'an eight-generation West Virginian'? Is Julian 200 years old? :)

"...artefacts of coalfield life: pith helmets and shovels..." Colonial mine was it??

Mountain Top Removal is the most devastating form of mining ever devised. The impacts to the environment are devastating, beyond anything a civilized people should allow. The effects upon the society of Appalachia has been to reduce these people in the worlds richest nation to 3rd world conditions. The worlds oldest mountains with the richest biodiversity in the northern hemisphere is being reduced to rubble. It is a crime against humanity and future generations.

I live across the border in Kentucky, where this also goes on. Harlan County, which has always been ruled by coal, is still Kentucky's poorest county. The wealth of coal has never trickled down and it never will.

Meanwhile, the heritage of land-- in one of the few regions in the US where people truly identify with land-- is being destroyed. Not to mention that real alternative fuels are being postponed.

I'd recommend two sources about this: first, Sludge, an Appalshop film about an environmental disaster caused by poor regulation of coal mining companies. (It was the worst environmental disaster in the US since the Exxon Valdez, but went largely unreported.)



Second, Lost Mountain by Erik Reece. It's a book of reportage on mountaintop removal, and is a masterpiece.

Back in the late '60s a songwriter named John Prine wrote a song about a Kentucky town called "Paradise". The chorus says "Mr. Peabody's coal train has hauled it away."

Mr. Peabody's still at it in the Powder River Basin of Wyoming, and the Black Mesa of Northern Arizona.

A description of Powder River can be found in John Mc Phee's "Annals of the Former World"

Edward Abbey wrote about Black Mesa in "The Monkey Wrench Gang."

John Sayles' movie "Matewan" describes an labor conflict that preceded the Battle of Blair Mountain.

I've seen first hand the devestation brought on West Virginia by mountain top removal, and it's one of the most tragic environmental issues I have ever witnessed. The giant holes where there used to be mountains are almost incomprehensibly big, making giant mining equipment look like miniature toys, and there is practically no chance for the ecosystem to recover. They dispose of the rock that is blasted out by dumping into the vally, where dangerous heavy metals like arsenic and mercury leach out of the rocks and is contaminating rivers in many rural communities all over West Virginia, making it as much a social injustice as an environmental one. The parallels to 3rd world conditions are all too evident when you examine the open pit mines for gold and copper that have many of the same effects in South America, displacing communities, contaminating water and destroying some very important pristine ecosystems.

If we were able to:

1. Build nuclear plants.

2. Drill for gas where abundantly available.

3. Dam rivers for hydro.

4. Drill for oil where abundantly available.

5. Install more windmills, even within sight of the estates of liberals like Teddy Kennedy,

There would be less pressure to engage in this sort of mining.

Problem is, the 'environmentalists--those heros of CultureLeft'--have 1-4 for decades, and won't allow 5 unless it's well out of their backyards.

You see, the 'environmentalists' are happy for West Virginia to be despoiled--just a bunch of hillbillies there, you know.

Or let the Arabian desert suffer--just a bunch of Bedouins there, you know.

Or let vast portions of South America, Africa, Asia, Russia, Siberia suffer--just little brown/black/tribal sorts there, you know.

After all, they are the guardians of 'the environment'--the people living in 'the envrionment' are just a nuisance.

It's interesting how large scale open cast mining occurs all across Southern Scotland (which is about the size of WV) yet the environmental laws in place manage to minimize the damage.

When I read this blog I'm always intrigued by the lack of comparisons.

The problems facing now defunct coal mining communities of Southern Scotland and Northern England have much in common those of Appalachia - whereas these communities in the UK have moved on, those in Appalachia are still stuck in the past.

Capitalism destroys everything worth saving - and gives the quick-and-dirty profits to the super-rich. No mysteries: the USA has consistently been run by robber-barons; the mining bosses have been some of the most vicious in USA history. The past few weeks of USA "high finance" and the ensuing IMF 'meltdown' put the writing on the wall for anybody who is willing to read it: capitalism DOESN'T WORK! It is all about destruction and not about sustainabiliity or cooperation, period.

OldSouth:
Your generalizations and misconceptions regarding environmentalists is abhorrent. First off, most environmentalists I know (myself included) do not advocate for nuclear due to it's long term storage and disposal problems which pose a significant environmental and human health hazards; we care about people just as much as the rest of life. As for gas and oil, you have heard of climate change, no? It's a consensus. Proposing further exploitation of fossil fuels is like taking the last 30 years of climate research and tossing it out the window. And the ecosystem services we all depend so much upon. Hydro, while clean, has its impacts on aquatic habitats and the fishing industry alike.
Now as for the wind turbines, you're onto something. By now we should all know that coal, oil and natural gas are fuels we should be weaning off of and instead exploiting the various alternative fuels and design implementations that reduce our energy requirements. Which, by the way, should be the first step. The people that depend on coal mining for their livelihoods could be educated in alternative energy production to provide a valuable workforce in building and implementing these sources. Environmentalists would love that.
But the coal industry would hate it, and that's the core of the issue here. We are finding third world environmental conditions in the United States because industries have lobbyists who persuade politicians that the environmental impacts are worth the energy independence (read: national security) and thus negligible. Energy corporations keep profiting, the CO2 keeps emitting, the mountains keep crumbling, and the communities keep suffering.
Most environmentalists I know are either a) privileged people who have the time and energy to put their lives and resources towards a cause they are compassionate for, or b) radical young people who have grown in an environment where they must fight for what they believe in, because the global economic interests will maintain business-as-usual unless someone throws in a monkeywrench (or a spanner for y'all UK folks) to get some attention and action. In either case, they acknowledge that environmental problems cannot be addressed without first addressing the underlying social conditions that allow them. This entails reciprocity between environmentalists and affected communities, it does not entail a "we know what's best" approach. Please check yo self 'fore you wreck yo self, OldSouth. Your credibility is at stake. So is ours. So check out the environmental justice movement and stop blaming us, comrade!

Dear laurencmiller: I knew I could draw one of your ilk out, and bless you, out you crawled from your hole....

We live in a world inhabited by people, ordinary normal people, not the privileged few or the radical young. They work, raise children, and generally make civil society possible.

Their interests trump that of the snail darter, for instance, which was the itty-bitty blind fish whose discovery (by our environmentalist friends) killed off the development of a much-needed hydro project here in Tennessee. Other initiatives were similarly killed off, which makes us rely upon (drumroll please!!!) coal-fired electrical generation. The coal comes from places like (three guesses here, girl) West Virginia.
The line between the snail-darter fiasco and the destruction of West Virginia runs right through the heart of the Environmental Left.

In addition, the industries that generate jobs (again, those nasty people keep intruding) can't locate in places where jobs are are direly needed because of the lack of hydro, or nuclear, or natural gas generation.

Even in the Tennessee Valley, electrical rates are beginning to climb at a healthy pace. My friend on the local power board reports that the customers are increasingly having trouble meeting their bills--these people with children and jobs, and no leisure time to be members of the 'environmental justice movement'. There I go again, those nasty people getting in the way, mucking about with the 'environment'.... We could really have used that hydro generation, and the 'aquatic habitat' of our hydro-created lakes is just fine, thanks. It takes care of itself, without you.

Behind this 'environmental justice movement' , or whatever it is called this year, is an assumption that people can't be trusted to live their own lives, make their own decisions, without the top-down direction of their lives by the unelected 'environmentalists'. And, it seems you and yours reserve the right to sabotage the systems we do have in place, which keep our lights on, and our businesses operating.

No one, beginning with this old boy, wants to see the mountains of West Virginia leveled. I grew up hunting, fishing, and camping the pristine woods and streams of the South. I love it with all my heart, and spend some of my time and dollars trying to keep it from being despoiled.

My principal refuge now is a golf course, where I share the joys of the game with the turkey, deer, beaver, skunks(!), coveys of quail, flocks of duck, geese, dove, and more songbirds that I can count, singing from the trees and grasslands. The course's next-door neighbor is (gasp!) a limestone quarry, busily at work, employing people(arggh, those nasty people again) and promoting the growth and prosperity of the local economy.
The creek shared between the two properties runs clear, and harbors the woodland creatures that share the course with the golfers. Little fishies swim around the balls victimized by my pull hook. I hear the equipment dig the limestone, and I know that this part of the state is still humming. It makes me happy to hear that sound, every time I tee it up on the eighth and fourteenth holes.

So glad you and yours don't live here--we'd never have the course, the critters wouldn't have the home they thrive in, and we would be buying drainage rock from sixty miles away--hauled to us by diesel trucks, burning that nasty fuel, driven by those nasty people, whose jobs would be located in another county.

We need energy in America, and we face real, concrete dangers from the importation of most of our oil supply--like petrodollars and modern weaponry in the hands of the Iranian mullahs, Chavez, Ghadaffi, Putin, and a breathtakingly corrupt Mexican government.
Then there is the financial instability created by sending 700 billion overseas every year. And how safe is it to ship all that oil over the high seas in ships under Liberian registry?

The mantra used to be 'global warming', until the earth began to cool a bit, so now the mantra is 'climate change'. If it exists, it falls well down the list of problems that need confrontation. If it really IS urgent, then China, India, Malaysia and Russia can immediately cut back their economies to save the earth. Wonder why they don't, and yet expect us to? Hmm....

So, why don't you go smash windows in Shanghai, wonder what would become of you? (Take extra cash with you--the Chinese bill the families of dissidents for the ammo used to shoot them.)

Or...why don't you do something real, like go to college, become an engineer, and learn how to build a better turbine, or design a sewer system? Can't do math, too busy demonstrating to study?

I worry not a moment about my credibility, and not a moment about that of the 'Environmental Justice Movement', since it has none.

It contributes to the rape of the environment, defines justice only in terms of its own demands, and most definitely is not a movement, more a highly organized small group with money and time on its hands; smashing store windows, creating chaos, and harming the everyday lives of real people who are too busy raising families to share their particular obsessions.

Gotta' go...church early tomorrow, gotta make sure my eight-cylinder Dodge pickup is gassed up. I'll put the venison roast in the oven before I head out--couple of strips of corn-fed bacon always help the flavor out.

Extra prayers in the morning for West Virginia, that she be saved from both the coal companies and the 'environmental justice movement.'

OldSouth,

Couldn't resist throwing the bait?

It's okay, I couldn't resist biting.

You're a textbook example of the kind of middle class, middle American whose worn down, uninformed, short sighted politics I have no room for.

You'll have to excuse the termination of our exchange on my part, for no fruit will be born of it's continuation, unless you stop buying your news and politics (and oil and drainage rock) from the neocons and study up a bit.

Old South

Your Neo-Con, Fix News mentality is what is wrong in America. Fact; drill baby drill will not work we lack the reserves and unless we nationalize the oil companies (not an option) the oil goes on the open market in ten or fifteen years not to the U.S.. We have dammed almost all commercialy viable hydro areas, not enough left to make a dent in our energy needs. Nuclear has the potential to leave areas a wasteland for thousands of years if a mistake is made, and we still can not figure out permanent storage(Yucca is temporary) of the waste, because it is so long lived and toxic. The waste also makes a great terror weapon, less than a a half a kilo could render a city uninhabitable, without a mushroom cloud. So we are stuck with fossil fuels until we rethink our energy policy (check out the Picken's plan) and use the green options we have now and do the research and development to make renewables a way of life. This is my last response to Old South, his head is stuck in the sand among other places. Hope you avoided snakebite at church.

13 the right number for OLD SOUTHERN RACIST to post under.

glad to see people think your as much of a prat here as on the other blogs you write in to.

This same promise to the poor, that rape and pillage will produce wealth, is made by developers who come and clear cut forests in order to slap up pricey but shoddily made homes on every hilltop in the Blue Ridge. Homes are literally sliding off the mountain tops because they've not left enough trees to hold the clay when rains come. The developers know this when they build, but they sell to people who don't know or are unwilling to believe it could happen to them.

Incredibly, people one town over will watch their neighbours slide away yet buy the same sales pitch when it comes to them. Why? Partly it's greed and the desire to get rich quick (people are offered astonishing amounts for their land here), and partly it's because Appalachia has been one of the poorest areas of the country for most of America's history. The same thing happened in Ireland. When people reach a certain threshold of poverty, they'll give just about anything to escape it. They'll believe anything you tell them because they need to believe there's a way out. In Ireland, young people reared on American TV wanted American lifestyles. Its coming at the expense of their ancient heritage, landscape, and ultimately their culture -- the one thing that makes them truly Irish. Do they see it? It didn't seem so when I was there several years ago... And people in Appalachia don't see it now.

Of course corporations don't have a moral compass. They are not ruled by ethics but by profit. They are disinterested in preserving heritages. If poor people happen to be on desirable lands, they'll gladly tell them whatever they must to persuade them to sell out. But make no mistake, that is what is happening. The locals who think they're reviving the area are selling it out. In the end, the money will go with the developers and all the locals will have is their ruined landscape, some shabby shopping malls and decaying disposable homes, and rubble where the beautiful mountains used to be. In short, they will have nothing that anyone wants and nothing with which to keep people in the area. When the ask for help, the government and their fellow citizens will tell them that they should have invested more wisely. That they had their chance at the American dream.

This is a repeating cycle. It's happening all over America. It's a hidden blight, but even if it were blatantly obvious the pace of American life means that most people will feel only a passing regret as they past on their ways to earn more money, to run even faster on the hamster wheel...

Ireland currently has a similar GDP to the USA - but with a much more even distribution of wealth.

They are wealthier than Americans.

Things have moved on since you were in Ireland.

The rest of your post I agree with.

This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the house rules. Explain.

No US history book I have EVER read (and I literally read every one in my library during my youth) has mentioned this Battle of Blair Mountain, what a surprise. Personally I don't think the problem with our poor knowledge of history has so much to do with schools as much as people deliberately forgetting. I've also found that reminding them tends to get one lectured by teachers, priests, and everyone else who should know better.

laurencmiller: To be fair though with nuclear power, there are designs for reactors in which they consume and reuse 90% of the waste and there is even a design for a reactor that reuses all of the nuclear waste it produces meaning that there basically is no waste that needs to be stored. The problem is that we have not been able to implement these nuclear reactor designs because they are considered too risky.



As for climate change, there is a consensus that it is happening. The question is whether or not mankind caused it vs. nature or is accelerating a natural thing, it is now known that the Earth goes through a 1,500 year cycle of temperature swings, or in simpler terms earth goes through a 1,500 climate change cycle.

I'm a lifelong West Virginian. I love my state more than anything in this world or the next, with the notable exceptions of God and my family. I get angry when people misrepresent it and angry when people continue to exploit our resources and people for their own greedy interests.
First, I would like to gently correct a misconception that has found its way into this discussion. Yes, WV has one of the lowest median incomes in the country. HOWEVER, the vast majority of West Virgians are middle class--we have one of the highest proportions of middle class people in the country. The reason our median income is dragged down is because we don't have a great number of upper middle class and middle class people and a decent, but not outrageous, number of very poor people. In other areas, these are average out. We just don't have that here. I myself am from a very poor family and am a first generation college grad and medical student (I can't believe how blessed I've been!!) but my case is by no means the norm.
Second, let me say this: coal has NEVER done anything good for this state, for the following reasons 1)It has destroyed vast tracts of incredible habitat 2)It continues to impact sites of inactive mines, due to Acid Mine Drainage, which destroys riparian ecosystems and, very notably, 3)the overwhelmingly, disgustingly, vast majority of coal company profits have been pumped outside of the state. Only about 2% of profits in the entire history of the industry have been kept in state. What is kept in state is often funneled towards the campaigns of corrupt politicians. The state very rarely benefits from the profits of coal, because the company owners live out of state and take their profits with them.
Coal also is not doing anything for the job market. Strip mining employs bulldozers and dynamite, not workers. Underground mining is switching towards using machinery, and the human involvement is minimal--something which we should be thankful for, considering the continually unsafe conditions in mines.
Additionally, coal companies have a long history of obtaining mineral rights and property by methods that can be described as nothing but thievery. The extractive industries in this state also played a crucial role in building and perpetuating the stereotypes that many Americans still find acceptable today, the main one being that us West Virginians are poverty-stricken simpletons crying out for the more affluent citizens of this country to save us from our backward culture. Please. We don't want your pity. Your respect is much more valued.
Coal companies exploit state's resources, exploit people with few job opportunities and the fewest resources, and destroys our environment. This is colonialism at home, and transcends any debates about the "left" versus "right". NEITHER side has ever done anything major to improve the state of West Virginia. Coal barons have come from both parties. A lot of us are very cynical and distrustful of new politicians as a result.
In summary, coal does not offer new jobs, does not give the state vast amounts of desperately needed money, and destroys the environment. It's destroying our water and our scenery, which are the two biggest attractions to our main industry these days, tourism.
I could write pages about this topic. I'm so happy that the 大象传媒 is covering it--it's nice to see people paying attention to what is going on here. I do have a book to recommend to anyone who really wants to grasp West Virginia in a way that you really can't get unless you've lived here. John O'Brien, a fellow West Virginian, wrote an incredible book called At Home in the Heart of Appalachia. It's a quick read and covers everything from the birth of stereotypes to todays economic woes in West Virginia.
Have a great evening, everyone.

Oh, and one last thought: I am TERRIFIED by the talk flying around about the possibility of liquefying coal for fuel. If this happens, you might as well kiss the state goodbye. The rest of the country has never cared for us, and things like like several hundred years of rich culture and history and some of the last remaining tracts of forest won't stop coal companies from ripping up our mountains in pursuit of new fuels. One last soapbox comment: FOSSIL FUELS ARE NOT THE ANSWER. Come on!

replying to mmccart7

You do your state proud. West Virginia is not always easy on her sons and daughters, but G%% do they love her.


reply to Old South-

Sir, I suggest you drive down the Tennessee River Valley, stop in a small town, a real small town and ask the old folks how they really feel about the TVA that took their land and farms...

Louise having a cranky day