"When Did You Stop Beating Your Wife?"

[HUGGY]

In an effort to lower the bar in the catagory of humor the spokesperson for the Upper Big Branch Coal Mine said today..."The air quality of the mine was ""No worse than usual"" the day before the explosion". This is clear evidense that there is something wrong with the water in West Virginia. When asked by a representative of the press "When did you stop beating your wife" the spokesperson sheepishly stammered and quipped..."you are trying to catch me in one of those no win statements aren't you?" Efeyone had a gut busting laugh and the moonshine was passed all around.

 

[HUGGY]

Well...... I guess it's just my ironic sense of humor to point out that after over 1000 recent violations of the safety variety "nothing unusual" obviously meant to any rational human being that the mine was a powder keg and very predictably would blow up killing any in it. The spokesperson contradictly believed that playing with dynomite was standard proceedure and foresaw no undo reason for concern. To make sense of the spokespersons take on the situation we must go back to the Bush administration and run it by another gifted statement craftsman...qoute Donald Rumsfeld.."WHO knew?"

 

[midcan5]

I have often wondered given all these mines what happens to all of them as you dig this way and that? Do they fill with water, collapse, just grow larger? Why not mine coal as they mine stone. Large pits rather than holes. Sorta reminds me of the cartoon character's head popping up in some yard someplace. I've read they blow up large holes sometimes and then work through the debris. Probably mine shafts are cheap and business is often about cheap - not safe.

 

[Old Rocks]

Midcan, they do mine coal that way. A couple of years ago I flew over the area where they are removing the mountain tops, and putting them in the valleys. Really, really ugly.

In Montana, they strip mine coal in massive quantities. It not only destroys the aquifers, but only 2% of the land involved has been reclaimed, in spite of laws and the claims of corperations involved in this type of mining.

In fact, from the mining of the coal, to the burning of it, to the fly ash that results from it, you see environmental degradation and poisoning of life.