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Obama's speech for the public memorial to those miners lost at the Upper Big Branch mine near Beckley, W.Va., promised changes to an industry that remains a source of many jobs in once-thriving mine country and a needed source of energy.
"We cannot bring back the 29 men we lost. They are with the Lord now," Obama said in excerpts released early Sunday in North Carolina, where he and first lady Michelle Obama spent the weekend.
"Our task, here on Earth, is to save lives from being lost in another such tragedy. To do what must be done, individually and collectively, to assure safe conditions underground. To treat our miners the way they treat each other - like family. For we are all family. We are Americans."
The afternoon memorial service also was to include remarks from West Virginia Gov. Joe Manchin and Vice President Joe Biden. Obama talked of the sacrifices miners make in their efforts to build a better life for their families.
"All the hard work. All the hardship. All the time spent underground. It was all for their families," Obama said. "For a car in the driveway. For a roof overhead. For a chance to give their kids opportunities they never knew; and enjoy retirement with their wives. It was all in the hopes of something better.
"These miners lived - as they died - in pursuit of the American dream."
In his remarks, Obama said letters had poured into the White House after the April 5 disaster.
"Postmarked from different places, they often begin the same way: 'I am proud to be from a family of miners,' 'I am the son of a coal miner,' 'I am proud to be a coal miner's daughter,'" Obama said.
"They ask me to keep our miners in my thoughts. Never forget, they say, miners keep America's lights on. Then, they make a simple plea: don't let this happen again."
David A. Fahrenthold and Michael D. Shear at the Washington Post do a nice job of putting Obama's visit in a larger context in As Obama visits coal country, many are wary of his environmental policies. I highly recommend this article for a review of the complicated nature of Obama's relationship with coal, there's too much here to excerpt.
Coal has helped divide Barack Obama from the people of this heavily Democratic state. On Sunday, it will bring the president and West Virginians together, at least briefly.
[snip]
Obama's political rise, first as a senator from a coal-producing state and then as leader of a party with deep roots in Appalachia, has coincided with coal's emergence as an environmental boogeyman. Old gaps between Democrats in West Virginia and those in Washington, between miners and environmentalists, widened just as he sought to straddle them.
As president, Obama has devoted billions to developing technology aimed at reducing coal's greenhouse-gas emissions, often referred to as "clean coal," which the industry also supports. Despite that, many here focus on his policies on climate change and "mountaintop removal" mining, believing they unfairly target the industry.
On Sunday, in this little city chiseled into valleys and hilltops, Obama will convey the country's grief and its resolve to prevent future mining accidents, aides say. For once, everyone associated with West Virginia's most contentious and necessary rock might concur.
John D. Humphrey, a Democratic county commissioner here in Raleigh County, said he couldn't recall a president as unpopular in southern West Virginia -- and he himself sees signs of a "war on coal" in Washington. But he said, "Even what I guess you'd call the anti-Obama people . . . they feel good that he's coming to the county."
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