The coal industry — what’s left of it — wants American taxpayers to cover more of the cost of treating black lung disease and cleaning up abandoned mines, according to The Washington Post. This is precisely the kind of corporate money grab that free market apologist who call themselves conservatives celebrate.
It’s a heads we win, tails you lose strategy that glorifies corporate profits, demonizes Big Government, then sticks taxpayers with the bill. It’s called privatizing the profits that industries earn while piling the costs of the harm they do onto the backs of ordinary citizens. It is the bedrock of modern conservatism that everyone from the alleged president on down glorifies and is the distillation of the maniacal preachings of Charles Koch for the past 50 years.
