Oh, wait--that was 2003. See, in 2003, Governor Romney thought regulation of pollution-producing coal plants was a fine idea. Nowadays, though, maybe not so much:
“Your success and your hard work helps you and your families but it also helps America. I salute you,” he said. “I appreciate the work you’re doing, and if I’m president of the United States I will do everything in my power to make sure you keep good jobs and good wages.”
But much of the event was devoted to energy policy, an issue in which some of Obama’s stances have caused displeasure in the region, evident in signs nearby that said, “Save Eastern Ohio. Fire Obama," and GOP Senate candidate Josh Mandel’s remarks to the crowd.
Mandel said that liberals, Obama and other Democrats “think coal is a four-letter word. I tell you this afternoon, for any of these folks trying to stand between us and affordable, reliable energy, we have four words for them: 'Over our dead bodies!'”
Now, the story at the link goes on to point out that employment in the coal industry has risen under the Obama Administration. He hasn't killed those jobs at all.
Now, I'm one of those liberals who is very skeptical of the safety and good sense of maintaining coal as an energy alternative. I don't think you can ever make it particularly clean, and I deplore the damage to the environment done in the name of eking out one of nature's dirtier fossil fuels--and I especially don't approve of an industry that often thinks so little of the workers who mine and produce their energy product but rewards the executives and owners of those energy companies with riches for risking the lives of others.
So, if former one-term governor Romney wants to criticize how the coal industry is treated in this country and ask questions about why, after all these years, we would maybe consider not relying on coal just so much, I would say--you feel free to ask those questions, because you know what? I do, too. But I'd ask him to go holler those questions from a razed mountaintop while viewing the actual conditions of the people who do it--and think about how this industry should continue, if it does. As cleanly and safely as possible? Or in such a way as profits Mitt's big donors, at the expense of the environment and the people who do get those mining jobs?
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Now, I'm one of those liberals who is very skeptical of the safety and good sense of maintaining coal as an energy alternative
Building a bridge to the 19th century! I look at fossil fuels as "startup capital", something that we use until we can transition to renewables. The problem is, we're burning through the startup capital without making investments for a sustainable future.
Come to think of it, it's kinda like the Bain approach... a leveraged buyout, followed by a liquidation of assets, with disastrous consequences.
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