38 Comments

GETAJOBHIPPIE.

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Merle Travis' "Dark as a Dungeon" is my favorite and has been covered by about everyone. Coal mining has a long history of protest songs: <a href="http:\/\/www.encyclopediaofappalachi...\/entry.php\?rec=55" target="_blank">" rel="nofollow noopener" title="http://www.encyclopediaofappalachia.com/entry.php...">http://www.encyclopediaofap...

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<a href="http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch\?v=1n57WBtvtC4" target="_blank">This</a>? There are a number of songs. Billy Edd Wheeler's <a href="" target="_blank">The Coal Tattoo</a>. This sounds like the 60's version, I think Wheeler is still alive, got a CMA a few years back, but cannot find a more recent version.

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But how does it get up to Alaska? Heeennennegghh?

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Do they still use nasty chemicals when they spray huge amounts of water to wash away gold?

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The Harlan County link lead me to Patty Loveless' wonderful "You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive".

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Good heavens. That may displace McGonagall's Tay Bridge Disaster as the the worst poem ever written in English. Ms. Rinehart has featured here before, I think; I hope the Editrix thinks this is worth giving her another outing.

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Oh, for fuck's sake, why did I click that article?

Seriously, if we don't, globally, enact a 100% tax on inheritance above, say $50M (I'm generous, and there may be multiple kids), we are fucking doomed.

I actually have little problem with people that got rich by themselves, even when they may be adolescent assholes. I know a few, some assholes, some not. But I detest the ones who were born on third base and think they hit a triple. This is like a de-evolutionary corrective, perhaps to ensure that we won't pollute the universe.

So, BTW, we're doomed. Sometimes I hope I never have grandkids.

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Hydrocarbon reflux?

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What? There are jobs in Detroit? Even jobs involving air pollution might have short-term value. Which way is the prevailing wind?

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You know, I've read this comment stream several times in the last seven hours, and only now has it occurred to me to ask: where are these coat mines? Burlington? ;>)

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A Jamaican Jerk Baby?

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Thanks again. Up here in Groveland, it may be a while.

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I grew up in Milwaukee. Despite forty years in the suburban wilds of Silicon Valley, I still remember "downtown". And -- I think you know this -- I wasn't trying to diss Detroit. Rather, suggesting that it's not dead yet, although seriously wounded by decades of mismanagement of its principal industry.

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Or not.

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Glue some macaroni around the edge and spray paint the whole thing gold. Art!

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