Obama's War on Coal Attacks All of Us

Published:

Obama’s War on Coal Attacks All of Us

Friday, July 5, 2013
 

 

This is  not a green jobs story. There are no soirees, no socialites running across the  veranda drinking mojitos to hear about the latest, Obama electric car  boondoggle.

This is  not a story of families sharing their latest trip to Martha’s Vineyard. This  story is a story about Morgantown, West Virginia and cities like Morgantown all  across the United States.

This is  a story about coal miners, hard-working people who mostly inherited their way  of life from their fathers and grandfathers. Every day they go to work and  every day the dangers they face could make it their last.

Their  workplace has no windows. There are no “Alfred Jacob Miller” prints hanging on  the walls. What there is, is hard work, darkness and dust and at the end of the  week an income to support their families. The same as it has been for  generations.

There  are an estimated 174,000 blue-collar, full-time, permanent jobs related to coal  in the U.S., including mining (83,000), transportation (31,000), and power  plant employment (60,000).

Coal is  used extensively for electricity around the country. Without coal electricity  prices will rise and even now they already started to.

Data  from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics show a steady climb in the kilowatt  hour rate since Obama took office: Price per KWH in May 2009:12.6 cents, May  2010:12.7 May 2011: 12.9, May 2012:12.9, May 2013:13.01.

Not  since 1993 has the price of Per KWH been as high as it was in May according to  the BLS. This translates to higher electricity prices.

The coal industry produces about 40% of the electricity used in  the US and without it coal consumers will feel the brunt of Obama’s new national climate action  plan. His goal is to reduce carbon dioxide emissions to fight  alleged “global warming”. Globally, the US produces 13% of the  world’s coal. Our abundant coal resources are one reason our electricity has  remained reasonably priced compared to Europe. If Obama’s new climate change  edict lower the our production of coal it will increase the cost of electricity  as much as 40% to 60%. But that is part of his game plan to force more of  America to rely on unworkable alternative sources of energy such as wind (kills  lots of birds) and solar (the sun don’t always shine on it.) Why get rid of  coal when it actually burns cleaner today that it ever has.

According  to the EPA and other sources, coal-fueled power plants are capable of reducing  up to 98 percent of sulfur dioxide emissions, 90 percent of nitrogen oxide  emissions and 90 percent of mercury emissions in some instances.

Bottom  line: U.S. coal is more than 90% cleaner than it used to be.

Not so for our friends in  and India each produce a lion’s share of  global coal.

The coalmines  in Morgantown are miles from the plastic smiles, Armani suites and Bentleys  driven by fat cats and lobbyists. In Morgantown, Washington D.C. is a place on  the news, not a place that has much to do with their lives in West Virginia.

That was until 2008 when Obama declared his war  on coal.

Obama’s EPA cap and trade policy was designed to intentionally  squeeze the coal industry out of business. Exorbitant fines have been designed  to bankrupt the US coal industry, just as he promised he’d do in 2008. (See his speech and video  of same below.)

Obama knows Congress would never allow him to hurt this many  American workers. Republicans and Democrats alike from coal mining states are  outraged that he would use the EPA to do his bidding.

Senator Joe Manchin, West Virginia Democrat, called Obama’s  recent Climate Change Speech, “A  War on America“. If this policy stands families who for  generations relied on coal for their life support will be forced to try and  find other work.

Who  will win this war is anybody’s guess: The first shot was fired in 2008 and the  artillery was stepped up last week. Will the miners fight back?

The  is great irony:

A man reportedly  “of the people”  fired another shot at the miners from an elite ivy league school in Washington  D.C. To an audience filled with upper-class rich kids, Obama said he  would oversee the end of coal mining. In doing so this will also bring an end  to the only income thousands of mining families have across our nation.

The  rich kids cheered the end of coal mining and by doing so also cheered the  future hardship of thousands of miners and their families across the nation.

There  are few rich kids in Morgantown and there were no cheers.

 

The  general public won’t be cheering either when our electricity bills increase  this winter due to an executive decision, not  to utilize coal.

Presidential  talking points from the day of the speech urged staffers not to talk of the  coming electricity rate hikes.

I have  included a transcript of the President’s 2008 interview with the San Francisco  Chronicle. There is also a link to a Youtube video of the speech as well.

We  would like to know what you think, so please vote in the poll below and we always  read your remarks so please feel free to respond. The investment information I  promised is below:

Obama interview to the San  Francisco Chronicle:  January 2008 Barak Obama:

“What I  said was that we will put out a cap and trade policy that is more aggressive  than anybody else’s out there. I was the first to call for 100% option on the  cap and trade which means:

Every unit of carbon greenhouse gas admitted  would be charged to the polluter: Whatever power plant was out there, whatever  plant that is being built they would have to meet the rigors of that market and  the ratcheted down caps that would be imposed every year!

So, if somebody wants to build  a coal plant they can but it’s just that it will bankrupt them because  they are going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that’s  being admitted.”

From the same interview:

“When I was asked earlier about coal, you know  under my plan the electricity rate would necessarily sky rocket.”

You Tube  Video 

Obama’s War on Coal
Has coal as an energy source outlived its usefulness to the nation?

 

Entry #603

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