So we're all struck speechless!

But that brokedick jadrool of a nabob governor there made some remarks (I can no longer find DAMMIT) to the effect that not only were the people of WVA getting the profits from being the coal supplier to the country but that USEFUL RECLAMATION (like the golf course) could only add to the revenues and pleasure of its citizens.

Is he for fuckin' real?

He forgot to mention the carnage and rape of the land and wildlife or the fact that the ground water continues to get worse and worse in shades of gray to black. There's a lot he forgot to mention.......

Its another page in the dichotomous history of coal but this latest destruction and those who support it are just out beyond the pale. I fear for what atrocities may be on the horizon.....Whe I was a kid we would go out on a Sunday to see the great stripping shovel, the "Gem of Egypt," later replaced by the "Silver Spade." Nobody liked strip mining but the technology was impressive as it was later when the world's largest dragline, "Big Muskie".........a brute of an earth mover with a freeway sized bucket. Why did we do that?

In other parts of the Appalachians, deep mines were killing men in any number of ways and stealing the land right out from under what had once been the rightful owners. And yet we were all told that that what would save the region was coal, Appalachia's greatest natural resource. So we fought for the rights of miners to earn a living when we should have fought for the government programs that went everywhere else.

Christ almighty.........I wanna' kill somebody just thinking about it. I hate myself for ever looking with anything but disdain on that vile black rock. How much land gone? How many dead and dying of horrid diseases? What was the cost........and can we ever measure it against the gain, no matter how much it may be?