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POLITICIANS AREN’T PROTECTING

  PEOPLE FROM MINING METHOD

By Woody Oakes

Strip mining in Appalachia is more accurately named mountaintop removal mining.  Rape of the land would be a better name.

Most citizens of coal mining states know how harmful mountaintop removal mining is to the environment, the people and everything else near this extremely destructive process.  This procedure is accomplished by blasting away the tops of mountains, sending rocks, dirt, trees and other debris down into the valleys and communities below.  Rocks have been known to break cemetery head stones.

Due to overly lenient and seldom enforced mining laws, the coal companies are scooping up seams of coal only one or two feet thick which would be too expensive to mine in the conventional manner.

This devastating procedure is so unbearable some communities have been totally abandoned.

The good citizens who do remain must endure earth shaking blasting, dust, dirt, cracks in walls, foundations and ceilings, well water contaminated an/or the well destroyed, land slides, flooding and threats of flooding of black, gooey sludge from slurry impoundment dams, creeks stopped up and/or rerouted, soil erosion, loss of wildlife and it’s habitat, overloaded coal trucks damaging existing roads while belching stifling diesel fumes, power lines down, lengthy water supply interruptions, litter, debris, mud, mud and more mud.

These are just some of the obvious hardships the downtrodden people of Appalachia are enduring everyday.  What is not so obvious is the fear, sleepless nights, high blood pressure, heart attacks, strokes and other stress induced ailments.

Two of our greatest freedoms are to be secure in our homes and to be left alone.

What have the Governors, Senators, and Representatives of eastern Kentucky and most of West Virginia done for these long suffering citizens?

Unless these current office holders have worked to do something specifically beneficial for these abused people, I strongly urge we vote them all out of office.

No more career politicians.  No more empty promises.  Vote them all out.

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