China - Nehlen remark unwise

Charleston Gazette, Monday Jan. 20, 2003

DON NEHLEN should stick with football. He is well on the way toward embarrassing himself as King Coals new spokesman.

Nehlen is to be chief spokesman for a massive public relations campaign paid for by "Friends of Coal." At his inaugural effort, a speech before the West Virginia Coal Associations annual symposium, the former Mountaineers coach sounded like a caricature of himself.

"The best defense is a good offense," he said of the PR effort. "You guys are 10 or 11 and 0, and everyone talks like youre 5 and 6. When youre winning, weve got to let people know."

Well, at least he said nothing about giving 110 percent to the effort.

But the worst came when he essentially suggested that West Virginia follow Chinas regulatory model.

"Lets get some of these doggone regulations eliminated or at least made sound, so guys can mine coal," he said. "I dont exactly know the regulations, but Im smart enough to know that in China, they mine for six bucks a ton, and we have got to be able to compete with them."

China may mine coal for "six bucks a ton," but the cost in lives and environmental devastation is enormous. China kills almost as many miners every year as West Virginia employs. Experts say that 10,000 Chinese miners die every year.

Those "doggone regulations" that Nehlen complains about help make West Virginia mines safer. Six-dollar-a-ton coal may be worth the price for the coal companies Nehlen is shilling for, but the human toll would be too horrible for most rational people to consider.

(Winds of Change Ed. note: Thanks to OVECs Viv Stockman for digging up the China mining deaths information which the Gazette used so well.)

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