Why don't they just dump the debris in some rich Republican subdivision? Oh that's right, the poor hillbillies won't know any better and they'll just be thankful for the strip mining jobs...

The new rule would allow the practice to continue and expand, providing only that mine operators minimize the debris and cause the least environmental harm

Ya'll be careful won't you? Good, well off you go.

I saw this somewhere earlier today and have been busy, so thanks for blogging about it. This is pretty outrageous. Another Bush "legacy". It will take a generation or two to undo them all.

That was one ugly picture. What could have been splendid and a habitat for so many species has now become a scar.

Bush has been so damaging to the environment it could decades (maybe eons) to repair all he has done.

I flew over eastern KY for several years and I have to tell you, pictures do not do the damage justice. You have to see it from the air to believe it. I cannot understand how there are still those who can argue in favor of the practice.

Their idea of reclaiming the land is planting some grass and putting rocks in the gulleys. The mountain does not even remotely resemble anything like it's previous state.

Here are some organizations who have been fighting this for years and have lots of good background info:

http://www.appvoices.org/

http://www.socm.org/

http://www.southernenvironment.org/cases/tn_mining/factsheet.htm

http://www.ohvec.org/galleries/mountaintop_removal/007/index.html

Their idea of reclaiming the land is planting some grass and putting rocks in the gulleys.

They do sometimes build golf courses which I think is supposed to somehow be less horribly bad.

There was some big coal Bushie who argued (I believe aired on NPR a few weeks back) that mountain top removal was a good thing because it made new land that could be used to build schools!

u must admit that the repubs r atlast being "honest" about their environmental intentions!!