MOUNTAINTOP REMOVAL, GREED AND DESTRUCTION

By Lou K.

Johnson City Mic Check!

Debt and Corporate Profits vs. Human Needs: What Kind of Future Do We Want?
by Dennis Prater
In these times, its no secret that the wealth gap between the super-rich and the rest of us is higher than at any time since the Great Depression. Along with economic inequality comes political inequality, which the rich manipulate to obtain terms and conditions favorable to themselves, such as the bank bailouts. Against a wave of public outcry, the bailouts got pushed through quickly, with the politicians agreeing that the public would shoulder mountains of bad corporate debt. But, even in a situation where it could provide a needed stimulus to the economy, when it comes to debt forgiveness for the rest of us, or a program to provide decent, living-wage jobs that would make it possible to pay off debt, the politicians and their corporate puppeteers have nothing to say. If you are part of the 99%, you probably have personal experience with debt. As CNN Money reports, In 1983, the bottom 95% had 62 cents of debt for every dollar they earned. ... But by 2007, the ratio had soared to $1.48 of debt for every $1 in earnings. ... And during the same period, from 76 cents of debt for every dollar earned in 1983, to just 64 cents in 2007, (Debt inequality is the new income inequality, 5/2/2012). Why the debt increase? Economist Richard Wolff explains it this way: Key to the crisis was real wage stagnation since the mid-1970s. As the cost of the American Dream kept rising while real wages did not, households borrowed (mortgages, credit cards, student and car loans). Debts accumulated on the basis of stagnant real wages. That unsustainable credit bubble blew in 2007. Nothing since has significantly relieved or alleviated that basic contradiction. With high unemployment, total wage incomes have fallen and little extra credit will flow to already over-indebted workers. The crisis deepens as US demand remains hobbled, (Deficits, Debts, and Deepening Crisis, 8/18/2011). Massive extensions of consumer credit pushing sub-prime mortgages, but also giving out credit cards like candy became a way to paper over the gap between McJob wages and the level of consumption that was needed to spur the economy. Consumer spending, making up around 70% of economic activity in the U.S., is a key part of the U.S. and world economies. Over the preceding economic period, extending credit was the economic elites attempt to have it both ways: They could keep wages low by outsourcing and destroying good union jobs and, at the same time, they could continue to reap profits on credit-driven purchases. Later, they could collect interest. It could appear that the American Dream was doing fine, as everyday people continued to own nice things, but what seemed owned was often closer to loaned. Now, the economic elites of the U.S., Europe, and worldwide are telling us that we have to pay for the economic crisis through austerity budgets, cuts in social services - which we need now more than ever - drastic increases in the price of a college education, and other attacks on our quality of living and our future. Possibly the most popular way to pursue ones dreams of a better life in America has been through education. However, with steeply rising tuition costs and a lack of jobs for new graduates, there is talk of a student loan debt bubble that bears witness to the instability of an economic situation where the basic problems remain unsolved. Student loan debt has now topped $1 trillion, exceeding credit card debt, which was around $790 billion in May 2011 (www.creditcards.com). Cutbacks in state allocations to education funding have sent tuition rising steadily over the past several years, with no end in sight. As estimated by www.universities.com, average in-state tuition at ETSU rose from $4,887 in 2007-08 to $5,823 in 2010-11. And when students graduate, the good jobs they need to pay off their debt are just not there. In this situation, there is no shame in student loan holders taking a cue from the people of Greece and saying, Cant pay, wont pay! Our communities, our friends and neighbors, are more important than debt payments to the financiers, who should be paying for the economic crisis. The 1% are sitting on top of societys wealth like a dragon on its treasure hoard. All wealth that is not given freely by nature is produced by labor. Yet a person can work hard all of her life at a job that actually produces something and still die poor, while a financier, who produces nothing of value, not only has more wealth than anyone can ever use but also calls the shots of what happens in the world. We need a decent future. And we can have it if the resources of society are used for decent purposes and not for profiteering on other peoples misery. People are willing to work for a good life, but when people can work all their lives and still suffer, somethings got to give. Lets reverse the trends of the past years. Those currently in power in society the corporate elites and their politicians will not offer a way out. They have decided to make the rest of us pay, to make the environment pay, to make the future pay. It is up to the determined action of the 99%, organizing in our communities, to turn the situation around. We should demand debt forgiveness for all who need it, as a measure to stimulate the economy. We should demand a green jobs program with living wages to provide productive work for all who want it: repairing the infrastructure, transitioning to green energy, building up our children and our communities. Another world is possible!
The number of students who have to go into debt to get a bachelors degree has risen from 45% in 1993 to 94% today. There is now more than $1 trillion in outstanding student loan debt in the United States. Over the last 10 years, tuition and fees at state schools have increased 72%. During the late 1970s, Ohio spent 17% of their budget on higher education and 4% on prisons. Today, Ohio spends 11% on higher education and 8% on prisons. This year national, state, and local spending on higher education reached a 25-year low. (Source: The New York Times)

You wake up one morning and begin to prepare for your day. You put on the coffee. Maybe you have kids to prepare breakfast for or, if you are fortunate enough, a job to go to. Jobs are scarce, especially since the mine has been closed and so many people have been laid off or lost their jobs. Suddenly, you hear a rumbling unlike any thunder you've ever heard. You realize it isn't thunder at all. It is the sound of explosions. You go outside and look upwards toward the mountainside to see the trees that remain shaking and falling while toxic dust spews into the air. You've only heard about it but now you know. Mountaintop Removal Mining has arrived in your community. -LK What is Mountaintop Removal Mining (MTR)? Mountaintop removal mining (also known as mountaintop mining) is a particularly destructive coal-mining practice that has been used with increasing frequency since the 1970s in Appalachia and a few other coal-rich regions of the United States. Instead of tunneling into the mountain and sending miners underground to locate, dig and extract the coal, mountaintop mining removes the tops of mountains to expose the coal underneath and to make it easier and less expensive to mine. Huge shovels clear the rubble, often dumping it into adjacent valleys where it buries streams, destroys more habitats, and sometimes contaminates community drinking water with heavy metals and toxic chemicals. Giant machines called draglinessome 20 stories high and weighing 8 million poundsdig into the rock to expose the coal. Other machines scoop out the coal and dump millions of additional tons of rock and soil called 'overburden' into the surrounding valleys. Does the Land Ever Recover After Mountaintop Removal Mining?

Top Three Financiers of MTR: PNC, Citi, UBS (in first, second and third place respectively) Number of Deals in 2010 Between Banks and MTR Operators: Since January 2010, the ten banks examined ... have provided financing for 16 loan and bond underwriting deals to companies practicing mountaintop removal coal mining. This represents more than $2.5billion. (Source: Rainforest Action Network) Bank of America is also a big financer of MTR. Pending Legislation in Tennessee: The Scenic Vistas Protection Act, a bill to end mountaintop removal coal mining in Tennessee, was killed by a state House subcommittee after the bill was heard by the states Senate this March. The vote was shelved pending a "summer study" which appears to be a stall tactic due to the past five years of research by the Sierra Club, EPA, and other organizations and their findings on the impact of the destructive and unconscionable MTR Mining. Continued on page 2
Thanks to Mountaintop Removal Mining the Clarks drove all the way from Arizona to the mountains of Tennessee only to find.

The Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 requires mining companies to reclaim all areas disturbed by mountaintop removal mining operations in one of several postmining land-use options. The core requirement is for mining companies to return the land to its 'approximate original contour.'
The law allows variances for development projects that would benefit the local community, such as housing, schools or shopping centers. In most cases, however, the proposed projects never materialize, and paving mountaintops after the mining is over does nothing to help the environment or to restore what is lost. (Source: Larry West, about.com)

Hands off Appalachia!

There was no way that this house of cards could stand forever. The real economy had to reassert itself. Credit put the problem of declining living standards off for the future, but now the future is here. Capitalism has always been a system bent on the short-term maximization of profit. The big CEOs are still doing fine, even after the world economy has been rocked by the effects of the last round of corporate schemes.