Climate Deniers Backed Violence and Spread Pro-Insurrection Messages Before, During, and After January 6
Feb 16, 2021 @ 14:35
On the evening of January 6, 2021, the day of the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, former coal mining executive Don Blankenship, who ran against Donald Trump as a third-party candidate in the 2020 election, began an all-caps Twitter thread.
“Why is it that American politicians and the American media support citizen uprisings in China, Poland, South Africa, and throughout the world, but when an American citizen is killed during an uprising against a corrupt American government the citizens are at fault?” @DonBlankenship posted on Twitter.
“Members of the media and the government are all saying what we saw today doesn’t work but that is only because they don’t want it to work,” the thread continues. “What we saw today is what freed Americans from King George and England.”
Mine Disaster Gets Mining Company 369 Citations!
A Brief History
On April 5, 2010, the Upper Big Branch coal mine in West Virginia suffered a collapse, killing 29 of the 31 men working at the site. The tragedy was the worst US mine disaster since 1970, and resulted in the Massey Energy Company being issued 369 citations for failing to follow proper mine safety laws.
Digging Deeper
Coal mining is hard, dirty work, and the miners are always at risk for catastrophic accidents and cave ins, especially when safety regulations are not followed exactly. Even without spectacular accidents, the long term effects of coal dust in the lungs has killed many thousands of miners. In this particular case, it was Alpha Natural Resources that paid the $10.8 million fine and settled the lawsuits from the families of victims for $209 million since Alpha had bought out Massey a year after the tragedy. Massey had been a large coal mining company, controlling about a third of all the coal resou
Climate deniers backed violence and spread pro-insurrection messages before, during, and after January 6
As the mass radicalization wave surged, some individual opponents of climate action may have been swept along by its broad rightward push, propelling them closer to endorsing political violence.
On the evening of January 6, 2021, the day of the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, former coal mining executive Don Blankenship, who ran against Donald Trump as a third-party candidate in the 2020 election, began an all-caps Twitter thread.
“Why is it that American politicians and the American media support citizen uprisings in China, Poland, South Africa, and throughout the world, but when an American citizen is killed during an uprising against a corrupt American government the citizens are at fault?” @DonBlankenship posted on Twitter.
Climate Deniers Backed Violence and Spread Pro-Insurrection Messages Before, During, and After January 6 desmogblog.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from desmogblog.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Dick Brass: We mistook a gangster for a businessman
20 Jan, 2021 04:00 PM
5 minutes to read
Joe Biden will be sworn in as the 46th President of the United States about 6am Thursday morning (NZT). Video / Itv
Joe Biden will be sworn in as the 46th President of the United States about 6am Thursday morning (NZT). Video / Itv
OPINION:
Many Americans who voted for Trump thought he was a smart businessman with razor sharp elbows. As he exits today, some are now surprised to learn he was more of a gangster. Any reasonable doubts about his nature were swept away this month when he incited an armed attack on the US Capitol. And just a few weeks ago, his supporters heard him threaten and cajole Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger to apparently rig the election Trump was falsely claiming as rigged.