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Friday, August 16, 2013

Kentucky Democrat calls for a truce in 'war on coal,' suggests a possible deal

"The right is right: President Obama is waging a war on coal. But his fierce, regulatory-based offensive was an inevitable consequence of the GOP’s unrelenting war on the president and his climate policy. Unless the two sides sign a truce—and put meaningful energy into breakthrough cleaner coal technologies—not only will rural Appalachia be devastated in the crossfire, but our planet’s long-term health will suffer too."

That's the head note on a thoughtful essay by Jonathan Miller, former two-term Kentucky state treasurer, Democrat, critic of mountaintop-removal coal mining and publisher of the bipartisan site TheRecoveringPolitician.com. Writing for The Daily Beast, Miller argues for this deal: "The coal industry asks the president for a six-month moratorium on new regulations and for his promise to finally utilize an existing $8 billion fossil-fuel loan guarantee program to support cleaner coal. In turn, the industry makes a meaningful and substantial investment in Clean Coal 2.0 and helps fund efforts to diversify the Appalachian economy, preparing it for the inevitable post-coal world." (Read more)

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