They are on my local stations in Fairmont. They show
biologists working on streams and with wildlife radio antennas making sure the
power lines don’t damage the environment. They brag that their
towers are darkened steel so they blend in, etc.
From: Mary Wimmer
[mailto:monwimmer@gmail.com]
Sent: Monday, October 06, 2008 7:49 PM
To: Grubb, Karen
Subject: Re: Walker Machinery AD
I have not seen PATH
advertisements.
On 10/5/08, Grubb, Karen <Karen.Grubb@fairmontstate.edu>
wrote:
So is PATH.
From: Mary Wimmer [mailto:monwimmer@gmail.com]
Sent: Sunday, October 05, 2008 8:16 PM
To: Jim Sconyers
Cc: Michael Price; william.depaulo@gmail.com; sallywilts@yahoo.com; regina1936@verizon.net;
matt_keller@tws.org;
Grubb, Karen; freesource@cheat.org;
jkotcon@wvu.edu; mdavis@hsc.wvu.edu; daves@labyrinth.net; bill.price@sierraclub.org;
blittle@citynet.net
Subject: Re: Walker Machinery AD
Coal surely is spending a lot on TV advertising these days -- fancy ads that
grab you at first until you realize where they are from -- turns my stomach!
On 10/5/08, Jim Sconyers <jim_scon@yahoo.com> wrote:
Bizarre would be an understatement! What are they smoking over there...???
Jim Sconyers
jim_scon@yahoo.com
603.969.6712
Remember: Mother Nature bats last.
----- Original Message ----
From: Michael Price <greyhawkwv@verizon.net>
To: william.depaulo@gmail.com;
sallywilts@yahoo.com;
regina1936@verizon.net;
matt_keller@tws.org; monwimmer@gmail.com; kgrubb@fairmontstate.edu;
freesource@cheat.org;
jim_scon@yahoo.com; jkotcon@wvu.edu; mdavis@hsc.wvu.edu; daves@labyrinth.net; bill.price@sierraclub.org;
blittle@citynet.net
Sent: Friday, October 3, 2008 8:39:52 PM
Subject: Walker Machinery AD
This is Walker Machinery's response to their
Yes, Coal Clean, Carbon Neutral Coal !
mike
Clean, carbon neutral coal.
Science and technology are reengineering coal to be clean and carbon neutral
for the 21st Century. This goal and commitment can put thousands of West
Virginians to WORK - meaningful and purposeful WORK that respects the
environment and strives to diminish and eliminate all types of emissions that
may be harmful.
This reengineering is well on the path to providing clean, carbon neutral coal
that provides meaningful WORK for researchers, scientists, utility technicians,
natural resource workers, computer engineers, and yes, coal production ... all
high-tech, high-wage WORK opportunities. This rising tide of clean coal will
unquestionably lift the quality of life and multiply meaningful, purposeful
WORK opportunities for ALL WEST VIRGINIANS irrespective of industry,
professional, or consumer economic sectors.
The evidence of this WORK commitment can be seen in the vast and urgent
research by colleges, universities, private research, think tanks, and
governmental entities. All are eager to make coal use clean and carbon neutral.
Institutions like Marshall University, West Virginia University, as well as our
neighbors at Virginia Tech, Penn State, and the University of Kentucky are
expanding opportunities in clean energy and environmental sciences to provide
purposeful WORK for their faculties and our students. Additionally, the
National Energy Technology Laboratory in Morgantown, W.Va., works tirelessly
and successfully to improve coal's continued viability.
The overwhelming need for clean, carbon neutral coal in the 21st century will
stimulate the migration of our sons and daughters back to West Virginia. That
influx of human treasure re-ignites WORK opportunities, reunites families, and
revives our state's economy causing a new revolution of infrastructure
development and social awareness.
While coal opponents selfishly ask West Virginians to "sit out" the
nation's greatest energy boom and WORK opportunity of our lifetime, we find
this unacceptable and unfair to working families. Furthermore, it is contrary
to our mountaineer spirit that seeks to share our resources and work for the
greater good of all our country.
Coal, which represents 52% of America's electricity production, cannot simply
be ignored. Going forward, it is imperative that West Virginians understand
that clean, carbon neutral coal is paramount to energy, economic, and national
security while providing a healthy and safe environment. Even the most rapid
pace of alternative energy development, which we must all support, cannot save
us from the present need for expanded and uninterrupted supply of our nation's
energy. Clean coal technologies, utilizing integrated gasification and carbon
capture and storage, provides honest WORK, a safe, healthy environment, and
must be enthusiastically supported by informed and caring West Virginians.
Building coal to liquid plants offer WORK of the highest purpose. By expanding
WORK into transportation solutions, like coal-to-liquids, West Virginians can
lead the nation to lower gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel prices. That puts money
in the family budget. This can lessen our dependence on foreign oil through
greater fuel diversity and competition ... hallmarks of a free market society.
It will strengthen national security.
It is important that West Virginians loudly sound the alarm to their leaders at
local, state, and national levels to aggressively and generously fund Clean,
Carbon Neutral Coal technologies that will KEEP WEST VIRGINIA WORKING. We must
say it loud, proud, and often.
Especially now, as our economy grows more fragile, West Virginia can ill-afford
coal's opponents to deny us our honest day's WORK. It is troubling that coal's
opponents, using our courts, have placed benthic macro-invertebrates (bugs) at
a higher moral standing than the citizens of West Virginia who need lucrative,
dependable WORK. In a desperate attempt to stop coal mining, coal's opponents have
artfully and guilefully turned to the judiciary via utilizing the complexities
and ambiguities of the Clean Water Act to present a very technical
representation of our ecosystem. They present an argument that is extremely
debatable among experts yet really defies common sense. It defies science and
common sense, in that we are expected to believe, that as rock and dirt are
moved to the dry ditches near the tops of mountains, that the benthic
macro-invertebrates (bugs) will be destroyed, thus impacting the entire
ecosystem and all life as we know it. The mining community, more than any
other, is keenly aware of the ecological science involved in the benthic
communities' importance in determining the health, structure, and function of
streams including headwater. By law and regulation, they protect these
relationships through mining design and mitigation. The rains fall and the
rainwater flows over and throughout the mining areas perpetually and naturally
as always. It is important to note that these creatures have lived and adapted
here for millions and millions of years before man. They inhabit almost every
square foot of the watersheds across this great globe, within and outside mined
areas. This is hardly criteria for extinction or endangered species. Although
metamorphosis times vary, (a lifecycle of an egg, nymph, and adult most often
lasts less than a year, perhaps more, depending on the insect order), they
quickly breed and die naturally sometimes within a day or two. They do not have
house payments, car payments or student loans. In truth they quickly re-inhabit
the reclaimed and often mined lands to repeat their biological destiny and
breed in large quantities we can't imagine. If this logic of coal's opponents
would carry forward by the courts, human beings could not build roads, homes,
hospitals, schools, cities, or communities for fear of such an ecological
Armageddon. As if it mattered, more bugs are killed overwhelmingly by car
windshields or "bug spray" than mine sites. Are we on such a destructive
path that a human being's right to WORK and moral standing is subordinate to a
bug or anything we wish to relate as nature? Is man not part of nature and
higher moral standing? Is this judicial perseverance by coal's opponents and
subsequent manipulation what it has come to? As any truly informed person
knows, an industry that is accused of covering streams that are not streams,
with waste that is not waste, in valleys that are not valleys, with bugs having
the moral equivalency of human beings in our court system, is distressing and
disappointing. It appears that coal's opponents don't really want the public to
know they have placed "bug" welfare above that of working West
Virginians in Judge Chambers' court, just to stop mining and perpetuate an
anti-corporate agenda. Amazingly, the judge agreed with coal's opponents.
Sometimes it must be difficult to separate the twists and turns of flawed logic
or judicial eloquence from just good common sense. It further makes no sense
whatsoever to repeat this judicial "Groundhog Day" movie on mining
over and over and over.
That's why the Walker Machinery "bug" ads are causing such stir among
the anti-coal crowd. It's so ridiculous that it required a "bug
character" to do so. Hopefully, a curious public will search beyond the
bug character to find out the truth, which has not been fully vetted in the
media or by our silent government. The grim consequences and full gravity of
this situation has yet to play out. If this case is not overturned on appeal,
this state hasn't really seen hard times yet. It's a cruel blow to good people
just wishing to WORK ... feeding their families, providing electricity, and
national security for our country. Attacking the workers or their employers as
enemies of the planet makes no sense at all. Anti-coal forces don't really
care. Do you think coal's opponents will support clean carbon neutral coal? No,
the anti-coal, anti-growth, anti-business, anti-work crowd won't do that
either. They simply ask us to forfeit our paychecks.
The coal industry seemingly gets no credit at all for the beautiful reclamation
and the truly small footprint of mining across West Virginia's 15 million
acres. Reclaiming the land with bushes, grasses, and now hardwood seedlings
that will gobble up more carbon dioxide is actually a step toward becoming
carbon neutral. Again, no credit. To learn more watch the History Channel's,
"Life After People" or search www.history.com to get a sense of how nature rapidly reclaims
her own. Though not meant to trivialize the industry's need for stewardship in
any way, this media shows that man's activities are but a blip on a dynamic and
ever-changing planet. Our mining activities and all other may become
indistinguishable one day. But for now ... coal ... YES, COAL ...clean carbon
neutral coal will WORK for West Virginia. Please support this meaningful and
purposeful WORK as if our state depended on it ... because it does.
Comments may be sent to: comments@walker-cat.com