Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: The US Coal Industry

June 21, 2017 5:26 PM - Season 4, Episode 16

So recently you may have heard these things happening....

• The mistrial in Bill Cosby's sexual assault case, the result of which prompted Cosby to exclaim Fat Albert's catchphrase "Hey hey hey!" while exiting the courtroom, further soiling all of our memories.
• The incredibly unpopular AHCA Take Two, accompanied by a fitting graphic of the GOP logo with a blue skull superimposed with stars for eyes. Of the version passed by the House, Trump (who held a presentation where he celebrated its passing) was quoted as saying it was "mean," the irony entirely lost on him. Its very existence is causing problems in insurance markets, as companies decide if they want to pull out of the current markets or not.
• And Now: Things People's Fathers Used To Say
• Main Story: Coal, coal mining jobs, coal executives, coal mining companies, executives of coal companies, and Donald Trump's fixation on the mineral, discussed divorced of its (tremendous) ecological toll. Eventually the story comes around to involving a giant squirrel.... YouTube (24m)

The things people's fathers used to say:

• Secretary Wilbur Ross: "There are three things you'll never change people's minds on: politics, baseball and sex."
• Rep. Mark Sanford: "At times in life it's important to call an ace, 'an ace.'"
• Former Gov. Mike Huckabee: "Son, don't look too far up the family tree. There's some stuff up there you don't need to see." (Personal aside: any time someone says "you don't need to see" something, you probably need to see it.)
• (unnamed on Fox News) "If you draw a circle and shut me out, I'm going to draw a bigger circle and shut you in."
• Rep. Alcee Hastings: "'It's Wednesday all day long unless it rains.' I never knew what would happen if it rained. I guess it would just be Rainy Wednesday."
• Rebecca Hagelin: "Them are the rules."
• Rep. Buddy Carter (the representative of my district, Savannah, Brunswick, Waycross): "You gon' have that. You gon' have that."
• Sen. Angus King: "You can't tell the players without a program."
• Sen. Angus King: "Congress is always in session."
• "Mr. King": "There lies the body of Jonathan Gray, who died defending his right of way."
• (unnamed on Fox News): "Dogs don't bark at parked cars." (unnamed respondant) "That is very profound."

Coal: "Cocaine for Thomas the Tank Engine."
Bob Murray: "I'm not going to say he looks like a geriatric Dr. Evil, even though he clearly does."

Ah, and now we get to the material on coal....

• Scott Pruitt, Trump's EPA Administrator, claims on Meet The Press that his administration has added 50,000 jobs in the "coal sector," and in the month of May alone, "almost 7,000 jobs." The statement was made on June 4. Politifact rated it Mostly False.
• The show notes that the coal industry employs 76,000 people, while struggling retailer JC Penny employs 114,000. The size of the US Work Force is is about 159,784,000, so coal jobs are 0.0048% of that. (Source: US Bureau of Labor Statistics)
• Coal exec Bob Murray, of Murray Energy, on Obama (all quotes from Fox News): "Barack Obama and his Democrat follwers are destroying entire segments of America." "Mr. Obama is an outlaw." "I pray every day that this man's incompetence will be overcome. That his evil agenda will be overcome." "When you have a 52-year-old coal miner in your office crying, because you were forced to lay him off" ... "that's what Obama has never seen, because he's never had a job." (That statement is false, at the very least he was a law professor.) LWT cited a paper from the Center on Global Energy Policy published a paper, "Can Coal Make A Comeback," in determining that coal's decline is largely due to other factors including competition from natural gas and renewable sources.
• "Alpha Natural Resources seeks to cut health and life insurance benefits to retirees," Casper Star Tribune, Nov 5 2015. US Bankruptcy Court, opinion from Alpha Natural Resources bankruptcy trial (PDF)
• Don Blankenship, formerly of Massey Energy, has a good amount of video decrying him on YouTube. There are clips that have his speech at the "Friends of America Rally" presented on the show, which can be found on the YouTube user page for FriendsofAmericaR. For more information on Don Blankenship, there's the Mother Jones article The Epic Rise and Fall of America's Most Notorious Coal Baron.
• Coal CEOs Trump is close to: Wilbur Ross of International Coal Group, Inc. (his Secretary of Commerce) who oversaw the Sago Mine Disaster (WIKIPEDIA), and Bob Massey.
• "A Rare Libel Suit Against The Times" (NYTIMES), filed by Murray Energy against the newspaper of record. Other suits filed include one against a contributor to the Huffington Post and two Ohio newspapers. (both Columbia Journalism Review)
• Oliver: "As we have been explictly told to Cease and Desist, let us do neither of those things, and let's talk about Bob Murray!" Charleston Gazette-Mail: "Bob Murray: MSHA inspections 'total harassment'" - Persistent black lung, old scourge of coal, found in autopsies of most Massey miners - Charleston Gazette-Mail: Appeals court upholds MSHA dust rule - MSHA website: Mining deaths, respirable dust samples drop to historic lows in FY 2016 - National Labor Relations Board: Administrative law decision involving Murray American Energy (PDF -- this is the case with the check returned labeled "VOID" and "kiss my ass Bob") - US Department of Labor: Crandall Canyon Accident Investigation - US Department of Labor: Independent Review of MSHA's Actions at Crandall Canyon Mine - I tried finding the article "Promises Made, Promises Broken Exposing the Real Robert Murray" but Google turned up empty, and a DailyKos article with what may have been a link to it now leads to a 404 - BitSource: From Coal to Code - Filthy Media: Donald Trump's 1990 interview with Playboy Magazine (NSFW images at end)

F.37 "Gratia Spermus" FATHER'S DAY

posted by JHarris (12 comments total)

Correction, "Bob Massey" should probably be "Bob Murray" in the Wilbur Ross bulletpoint.
posted by JHarris at 5:38 PM on June 21, 2017

It's a terrible idea for the subject of one of Last Week Tonight's segments to try to tell John Oliver not to make fun of or criticize them. It's inadvisable in a "pouring gasoline on a tire fire" kind of way.
posted by orange swan at 7:35 PM on June 21, 2017 [7 favorites]

I think this is the "Promises Made, Promises Broken" article you were looking for: "Promises Made, Promises Broken: Exposing the Real Robert Murray"
posted by joethefob at 7:53 PM on June 21, 2017 [1 favorite]

Ah! Internet Archive, I should have checked there, thanks.
posted by JHarris at 8:18 PM on June 21, 2017

at the very least he was a law professor
A lot of those jackasses think unless you are making loads of money or making someone else loads of money, it's not a "real job".

Also, HBO has been served. Considering HBO are with Maher occasionally running his mouth for 15 years, yeah, good luck with that.
posted by lmfsilva at 7:57 AM on June 22, 2017 [4 favorites]

The Daily Beast hosts the text of Murray's suit, although frustratingly it only allows for online viewing unless one wants to copy-and-paste each page of badly OCR'd text out of it. But still, the beginning of it at least it makes for fine reading. Most of page 2 is a sob story claiming that Murray needs an oxygen tank to live and doesn't expect to live to see the end of the case. Page 5 begins a tirade against Hillary Clinton and the defendants' "anti-coal agenda." Murray's cease-and-desist is framed as them helpfully pointing LWT towards studies backing up their worldview.
posted by JHarris at 8:54 AM on June 22, 2017

I went ahead and copied out the text (which as I said is badly OCR'd and thus full of misspellings) and put it into a text file here.
posted by JHarris at 12:10 PM on June 22, 2017 [1 favorite]

Only just caught up on this (LWT broadcasts late Monday evenings in the UK, so Mrs Clanger and I usually watch it on catch-up on Tuesdays, but for various reasons have only just got around to doing so this week.)

Gosh. That'll be John Oliver's version of the Reply in Arkell v Pressdram, which I previously explained here.
posted by Major Clanger at 2:03 PM on June 22, 2017

Interesting that West Virginia doesn't have a SLAPP statute.
posted by snuffleupagus at 9:24 AM on June 23, 2017 [1 favorite]

Here is the PDF of the complaint. Had to dig around on The Daily Beast's site to find it.
posted by DJWeezy at 9:32 AM on June 23, 2017 [2 favorites]

Could I just say I deeply and totally support Trumps obsession with the mining industry, because just imagine if he seriously decide to mix it up in world affairs and gets a few nice wars going in the south china sea, Philippines (send marines to kill drug dealers?), or other regions. Basically a relatively small distraction that's going away anyway via market forces and it could be SO MUCH WORSE.
posted by sammyo at 9:24 AM on June 24, 2017

The ACLU's brief on the lawsuit has been posted to the blue.
posted by JHarris at 1:43 AM on August 3, 2017 [1 favorite]