The war on common sense
My favorite Senator (don't get me wrong, I can't stand either of them, but Rand Paul is absolutely @#$%^& nuts) has taken a bold, creative approach as he pretends to "fight the good fight" and "save coal." He's decided to paint it as a "state's rights" issue. Mitch is a master politician, I've always given him credit for that, and he definitely understands the importance of good marketing. Framing this as "don't let the big scary Federal government boss you around, governor!" allows him to divert attention from the facts surrounding the issue, namely:
I know the GOP these days is fiercely anti-science, but let's review some quick facts. When you burn coal in a power plant, that's what's called a "chemical reaction" and it creates these wacky things called "by-products." Specifically, you end up spewing hydrogen sulfide, CO2, Mercury, and Arsenic into the air. These things are each bad on their own, because they either poison people or the atmosphere or both. There's a reason you don't walk into a bar and say "I'd like an Arsenic and Mercury on the rocks, please."
The courts have ruled that the federal government can regulate air pollution because it's a matter of interstate commerce. New Jersey can't just throw whatever pollution it wants into the air, knowing it will fall on New York, and claim "state's rights!" If you've ever worked in a cubicle and had to smell someone else's nasty lunch leftovers they're eating at their desk, you understand this concept (and how unpleasant it can be). Well, pretty much anything that crosses state borders is in the domain of the federal government, and that includes air. So the EPA has limited how much CO2, Arsenic, and Mercury you can spew because otherwise some states would be the asshole office mates that stink up the whole place.
Mitch isn't denying that coal is being killed by market forces. He's not denying that coal pollution is bad for people and for the environment. What he's pitching to various governors is that they should ignore the EPA rules (and even giving them a legal framework for how to make that case) because big bad tyrant Obama is trampling on states rights by trying to regulate interstate commerce, something the constitution explicitly authorizes the federal government to do. Basically, he's saying who cares if there's an actual health and environmental hazard here, we need to make a stand for state's rights. Idiot.
- Presidents don't control energy markets. There are actually 9,000 more coal miners working in the US today than the day Obama took office, they're just not working in Kentucky.
- Coal has been a dying industry in Kentucky for all 30 years that Mitch has been in office, so apparently the "war on coal" started with Reagan.
- The biggest reasons we have a dying coal industry are a) the coal in Kentucky is harder to extract than in other states, so it's not price competitive on the open market b) fracking has dramatically dropped the price of natural gas, which I can use to run power plants that are MUCH cleaner than coal plants.
- Coal fired power plants actually do pollute the air
- Wind tends to not respect state borders - pollution made in one state will carry to whatever neighboring state the prevailing winds blow towards.
I know the GOP these days is fiercely anti-science, but let's review some quick facts. When you burn coal in a power plant, that's what's called a "chemical reaction" and it creates these wacky things called "by-products." Specifically, you end up spewing hydrogen sulfide, CO2, Mercury, and Arsenic into the air. These things are each bad on their own, because they either poison people or the atmosphere or both. There's a reason you don't walk into a bar and say "I'd like an Arsenic and Mercury on the rocks, please."
The courts have ruled that the federal government can regulate air pollution because it's a matter of interstate commerce. New Jersey can't just throw whatever pollution it wants into the air, knowing it will fall on New York, and claim "state's rights!" If you've ever worked in a cubicle and had to smell someone else's nasty lunch leftovers they're eating at their desk, you understand this concept (and how unpleasant it can be). Well, pretty much anything that crosses state borders is in the domain of the federal government, and that includes air. So the EPA has limited how much CO2, Arsenic, and Mercury you can spew because otherwise some states would be the asshole office mates that stink up the whole place.Mitch isn't denying that coal is being killed by market forces. He's not denying that coal pollution is bad for people and for the environment. What he's pitching to various governors is that they should ignore the EPA rules (and even giving them a legal framework for how to make that case) because big bad tyrant Obama is trampling on states rights by trying to regulate interstate commerce, something the constitution explicitly authorizes the federal government to do. Basically, he's saying who cares if there's an actual health and environmental hazard here, we need to make a stand for state's rights. Idiot.
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