As Hillary Clinton — President Barack Obama’s chief apologist — follows Obama’s scorched earth policy against fossil fuels; she announced that if elected president she would provide $30 billion for people suffering from the decline of the coal industry.
The irony, of course, is that these communities need the aid because President Obama made good on his promise to drive every coal company out of business. And Hillary has eagerly followed suit.
Her sudden embrace of coal country is not lost on the coal industry which naturally sees this as the height of hypocrisy.
The National Mining Association told Politico “It’s made-for-campaign rhetoric. The administration has systemically eviscerated a high-wage industry, coal … and then offers welfare money. And rather than see opportunity to distance herself, she now appears to embrace those policies.”
Ed Yankovich, the United Mine Workers vice president for the district covering Pennsylvania and the Northeast, noted that “people look at these folks and say, 'they’ve completely abandoned us, it’s like we don’t live in America.' There’s a distinct bitterness about it.”
Pennsylvania Congressman Mike Kelly agreed, telling the Made in America radio show that at a time when America is awash with coal — plentiful, clean and accessible — the administration has turned its back on supporting the clean coal technology that would have revitalized the coal industry.
He maintained that as a result of Obama’s policies, Obama has ruined generations of families and destroyed their economy and that of the country. In fact, Congressman Kelly believes that every candidate should disqualify themselves for president if they attack coal and coal mining families.
“I’d like to see some Democrats actually visit coal mining communities, go down in the mine, and then look into the eyes of miners and tell them that they are out of a job,” proposed Congressman Kelly.
It is estimated that more than one in five coal-related jobs have disappeared during Obama’s presidency, and several major U.S. coal mining companies have announced this year that they would or may soon seek bankruptcy protection, including Arch Coal, Patriot Coal, Alpha Natural Resources, Walter Energy and James River Coal.
We can all remember Obama’s boast that if somebody wants to build a coal-fired power plant, they can. It’s just that it will bankrupt them.
Even before the mines started closing, children who grew up in Appalachia were often told to get out if they wanted stable jobs. One-third of the region lives in poverty. In one eastern Kentucky County in 2009, government benefits accounted for more than half of the county’s personal income.
Hillary Clinton has embraced this idea, recently proclaiming she wants to move away from using coal as an energy source — even if it means eliminating jobs in the process. She recently paraphrased Obama’s boast by proclaiming: “We’re gonna put a lot of coal miners and coal companies outta business.”
So now Hillary will ostensibly ride to the rescue of coal mining communities that she has worked hard to destroy. Her pomposity plays well with the liberal elites on each coast that are the core of her donors. To them coal country is flyover country and its residents are collateral damage in their ideological war against an American way-of-life that deserves our respect.
And that brings us to her guilt-ridden $30 billion bonanza that has many downsides.
The first is that congress will not be in any mood for another $30 billion bailout that is totally unnecessary if we embraced a sensible energy policy that includes coal.
Second, is that only a small part of the $30 billion bailout is going to retraining and healthcare. It will not come close to revitalizing the communities that support coal. The restaurants, beauty parlors, banks, and other small businesses that rely on the coal economy will go bankrupt. They will never recover.
The Hillary $30 billion program is a mirage. It hides a consuming hatred for anything related to fossil fuels and the people that depend on it for their livelihoods.
We should take a small portion of those funds and invest on advancing American clean coal technology that we can export to the world, including China and India. Besides, improving the environment both at home and abroad, we will create millions of good paying jobs, build esteem and vitality among hard pressed communities, deliver cheap and clean energy, and make America less dependent on foreign energy.
It will also be a boon to American manufacturing as we have an abundant supply of affordable energy giving us a tremendous competitive advantage.
Hillary can’t buy votes or the loyalty of the fossil fuel industry with her $30 billion “gift.”
It is time for all Americans to see through this latest ruse in an election year.
Neal Asbury is chief executive of The Legacy Companies.