This is what I have to fight against in doing my small part to educate my fellow West Virginians about politics, current events and reality. Yes, it is an uphill battle.

There are 70,000 people slated to show up in the Ground Zero of deep Appalachia coal country of Logan County, West Virginia on Labor Day for the Friends of America Rally. The Hatfields of the Hatifield-McCoy days were mostly from Logan County. Blair Mountain, the site of the only attack by the U.S. Army against our own citizens occurred in 1921 with World War I bombers.

 Sean Hannity has been promoting the Rally all week and he will attend as the keynote speaker.

The Rally's primary sponsor is Massey Energy. For all you need to know about the good citizen practices of Massey Energy and its president Donald Blankenship see here:

  http://blogs.wvgazette.com/coaltattoo/2009/09/03/caperton-vs-massey-redux/   

Providing musical entertainment will be those paragons of virtue Hank Williams, Jr. :

http://www.wvgazette.com/Entertainment/200909021040?page=1&build=cache 

and Ted "Don't Touch My Guns" Nugent.  There are way too many deer running around for Ted not to be seriously tempted for some out of season deer hunting.  

 I will be listening to Sean next week to see what he says about all the mountaintops (make that "mountains") removed for the sake of profits to the out of state owners. I can't wait to hear about what nice people all those coal operators are.

If Sean flies into Charleston and travels by ground to Logan, he will miss getting to see the devastation for himself.  If he goes by helicoptor, he will miss it only if he has his eyes closed the whole trip. I am betting that he does the latter because I think he is a closet chickenshit  

Did I mention that the other primary sponsor was Walker Machinery, the local Caterpillar franchise that sells the big earthmovers that mountaintop removal and strip mining operations require?? (fortunately corporate lawyer Beth Walker, who's husband is president of Walker Machinery, did not get elected to our WV State Supreme Court of Appeals in 2008).

The greatest ironies of the event are its name and that it is being held on Labor Day.  Massey is not only non-union, its mountaintop removal practices are highly mechanized and need only a few heavy equipment operators, so it employs very few people at much lesser wages than paid to even non-union deep miners. Since Massey and another large coal conglomerate, International Coal Group (anyone remember Sago?), are non union, the deep mine coal miners they utilize are paid much less in wages and benefits than other union companies with very good safety records like Consolidated Coal. Yes, Massey and ICG have poor safety records. Go to www.wvgazette.com and run a quick search.   How is that for tribute to America's labor??

Thank God that West Virginia only has three electoral votes to squander on Republican candidates every four years. I would not complain if Congress took away one or two of those votes.  

Y'all have a nice Labor Day!!

This is what I have to fight against in doing my small part to educate my fellow West Virginians about politics, current events and reality. Yes, it is an uphill battle.

There are 70,000 people slated to show up in the Ground Zero of deep Appalachia coal country of Logan County, West Virginia on Labor Day for the Friends of America Rally. The Hatfields of the Hatifield-McCoy days were mostly from Logan County. Blair Mountain, the site of the only attack by the U.S. Army against our own citizens occurred in 1921 with World War I bombers during a dispute between Coal and the unions.

 Sean Hannity has been promoting the Rally all week and he will attend as the keynote speaker.

The Rally's primary sponsor is Massey Energy. For all you need to know about the good citizen practices of Massey Energy and its president Donald Blankenship see here:

  http://blogs.wvgazette.com/coaltattoo/2009/09/03/caperton-vs-massey-redux/   

Providing musical entertainment will be those paragons of virtue Hank Williams, Jr. :

http://www.wvgazette.com/Entertainment/200909021040?page=1&build=cache 

and Ted "Don't Touch My Guns" Nugent.  There are way too many deer running around for Ted not to be seriously tempted for some out of season deer hunting.  

 I will be listening to Sean next week to see what he says about all the mountaintops (make that "mountains") removed for the sake of profits to the out of state owners. I can't wait to hear about what nice people all those coal operators are.

If Sean flies into Charleston and travels by ground to Logan, he will miss getting to see the devastation for himself.  If he goes by helicoptor, he will miss it only if he has his eyes closed the whole trip. I am betting that he does the latter because I think he is a closet chickenshit  

Did I mention that the other primary sponsor was Walker Machinery, the local Caterpillar franchise that sells the big earthmovers that mountaintop removal and strip mining operations require?? (fortunately corporate lawyer Beth Walker, who's husband is president of Walker Machinery, did not get elected to our WV State Supreme Court of Appeals in 2008).

The greatest ironies of the event are its name and that it is being held on Labor Day.  Massey is not only non-union, its mountaintop removal practices are highly mechanized and need only a few heavy equipment operators, so it employs very few people at much lesser wages than paid to even non-union deep miners. Since Massey and another large coal conglomerate, International Coal Group (anyone remember Sago?), are non union, the deep mine coal miners they utilize are paid much less in wages and benefits than other union companies with very good safety records like Consolidated Coal. Yes, Massey and ICG have poor safety records. Go to www.wvgazette.com and run a quick search.   How is that for tribute to America's labor??

Thank God that West Virginia only has three electoral votes to squander on Republican candidates every four years. I would not complain if Congress took away one or two of those votes.  

Y'all have a nice Labor Day!!

As an attorney over the years I have examined and cross examined hundreds of people under oath  in court and out of court, in settings of stress and otherwise. My criminal clients were never guilty - first interviews with them were always challenging and sometimes fun. Most experienced attorneys will agree that sometimes it seems that all clients lie, even if only about insginificant things.

I first learned about lying, outside of interaction with my siblings, when I was a teenager attending our local version of summer Boy's State. The boy who ended up elected Sheriff of the camp fooled the real life Deputy Sheriff giving us a "scared straight" demonstration of a lie detector machine. That boy lied on the Deputy's first five questions and passed the machine. Made the Deputy look like a fool.

Some people are great liars and can fool any machine. Most of us would probably fail if we tried to lie about something that concerned  us.

Some people are obvious liars. I've seen the look, the glance aways, and the rapidly batting eyelids many, many times, under many conditions. I watched Tom Ridge on Rachel last night and the replays tonight. I am pretty sure that I saw the look. 

I was so mesmerized this morning watching and listening to Joe Scarborough, Mort Zuckerman, Mike Barnicle and the others wringing their hands over Obama's War in Afghanistan (I guess it did not start until Janauary 21, 2009) and expected increased troop numbers that my wife thought there was something wrong with me.

The whole conversation on TV  was as if Viet Nam protesters had invaded Mort, Joe and Mike's bodies.

For once, they made a whole lot of sense.

How can these folks even look themselves in the mirror knowing that the Media was part and parcel of getting us there and into Iraq ?