'Coal River Mountain will not be moved'

by: Carnacki

Mon Dec 07, 2009 at 09:11:19 AM EST

Appalachian author and Huffington Post blogger Jeff Biggers nails it in a column in today's Charleston Gazette:

CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- From Copenhagen to Charleston, the world will be watching Gov. Joe Manchin closely today.

This week at the Copenhagen Climate Summit, Google Earth will take world leaders on a virtual flyover of Coal River Mountain, selected as one of a handful of "global crisis hotspots," accompanied by the narration of coal miner widow and Coal River Mountain resident Lorelei Scarbro.

World leaders will see the two choices for Gov. Manchin:

An inspiring range of hardwood forests in the carbon sink of Appalachia, adorned by wind turbines capable of providing energy for thousands of households, millions of dollars in tax revenues, and hundreds of long-term jobs that could also create a sustainable manufacturing sector, surrounded by historic settlements - or, a devastating 6,600-acre mountaintop removal operation, a limited number of short-term jobs and the life-threatening endangerment of blasting near the weakened Class "C" Brushy Fork coal slurry impoundment.

World leaders will ask: In the exploding market of clean-energy jobs and investment, how could any governor disregard sustainable economic initiatives and allow his own citizens to live in a state of fear of blasting, fly rock, and a potential catastrophe from an impoundment break?

Del. Nancy Guthrie also has a column at the Charleston Gazette that is fairly good for a Kanawha County politician. But when she writes that the issue of MTR pits environmentalists against working men and women she overlooks the fact that many of those opposed to MTR are also working men and women. Her framing the issue the way she has shows how deeply ingrained the Charleston mindset is of coal equals jobs. If coal is so great for the economy, why are so many of the poorest counties in the nation all located where coal is extracted?