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I don’t know why the “liberal media” missed this, but Bush’s pro-business policies have directly caused the deaths of miners this year. I only heard this story on NPR on January 27th. You see fires have always been killers of coal miners. In order to stop this, over 30 years ago Congress demanded that there be two mine shafts: One to provide air and one to remove the coal. Since the coal dust is very flamable, this would save miners’ lives because oxygen wouldn’t be forced down the single shaft and feed the fire. Clinton’s administration strengthened this demand. He passed a law that the conveyor belt that removes the coal be fire-proof.
Surprise surprise! Bush’s administration reversed both of these rules! His idea–let’s just put fire detectors in the one shaft. Great idea! Then the trapped miners will hear a warning before they are burned alive or killed in an explosion! BTW–Bush appointed a former mining executive to oversee mine safety. (Sound familiar?) I’m so sick of conservatives arguing that we should have fewer regulations so that the economy will prosper. It’s people first, not the economy! Unregulated businesses will put folks in danger if it saves money. Without regulations, ten year-old kids would still be working full-time. Of course, pro-business folks opposed the child labor laws too!
It makes me sick! When will folks get fed up with Bush’s disregard for people and the environment? I bet he does several speeches in front of his supporters explaining how 9/11 has made it necessary for us to sacrifice miners!
Would Jesus kill a few miners so that we can have cheaper coal?
And another thing. What else did Bush not “literally mean” in the State of the Union Address?
One day after President Bush vowed to reduce America’s dependence on Middle East oil by cutting imports from there 75 percent by 2025, his energy secretary and national economic adviser said Wednesday that the president didn’t mean it literally.
What the president meant, they said in a conference call with reporters, was that alternative fuels could displace an amount of oil imports equivalent to most of what America is expected to import from the Middle East in 2025.
But America still would import oil from the Middle East, because that’s where the greatest oil supplies are.
The president’s State of the Union reference to Mideast oil made headlines nationwide Wednesday because of his assertion that “America is addicted to oil” and his call to “break this addiction.”
Bush vowed to fund research into better batteries for hybrid vehicles and more production of the alternative fuel ethanol, setting a lofty goal of replacing “more than 75 percent of our oil imports from the Middle East by 2025.”
He pledged to “move beyond a petroleum-based economy and make our dependence on Middle Eastern oil a thing of the past.”
Not exactly, though, it turns out.
“This was purely an example,” Energy Secretary Samuel Bodman said.
He said the broad goal was to displace foreign oil imports, from anywhere, with domestic alternatives. He acknowledged that oil is a freely traded commodity bought and sold globally by private firms. Consequently, it would be very difficult to reduce imports from any single region, especially the most oil-rich region on Earth.
Asked why the president used the words “the Middle East” when he didn’t really mean them, one administration official said Bush wanted to dramatize the issue in a way that “every American sitting out there listening to the speech understands.” The official spoke only on condition of anonymity because he feared that his remarks might get him in trouble.
You know, where I come from (East Texas) what Bush did here is called a lie! Of course, Jesus said many things that aren’t to be taken literally either.
I know the war hasn’t convinced conservatives that Bush only cares about big business and will lie to Americans and his policies will kill folks, but what about the examples above? Don’t you care? Are you really that ignorant of the evil that has been done by this administration? I guess as long as it’s not your children dying, you’re OK with this.
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