Wednesday, October 08, 2014

MSNBC explores the politics of coal, five times

On his nightly "All In" show on MSNBC, Chris Hayes is doing a five-part series on the politics of coal. The first one took a close look at the decline of the industry in one of its iconic places, Harlan County, Kentucky, and featured a long and lively interview with Cecil Roberts, newly re-elected president of the United Mine Workers of America.

The second segment looked at coal's environmental and human impact, from mountaintop removal in Central Appalachia to the recent coal-ash spill in North Carolina, and featured an interview with one of the most controversial coal operators, Don Blankenship.

Hayes said the threatened coal industry is "using a few pages out of Big Tobacco's playbook. . . . It took almost 40 years" for scientific research on smoking to have an impact. John Cheves of the Lexington Herald-Leader told him that the industry's influence lasted 12 to 15 more years more because of its contributions to political campaigns.

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