Crossposted at West Virginia Blue.
Via Ken Ward Jr. at Coal Tattoo, there is a moving piece on NPR about the ongoing grief of those killed because they were Upper Big Branch miners:
But Gene Jones believes speaking out is critical, especially as public memory of the tragedy fades. Jones, 50, lost his identical twin Dean in the explosion.
"We're just going to be forgotten," Jones says, while mine disasters are "going to continue and continue and continue to go on. We need it fixed."
snip
Gene and Dean Jones were so close in their mother's womb doctors detected just a single heartbeat.
"I was 10 minutes older than Dean," Gene said. "It's like part of me is gone."
"I think about him every day," Gene said from a conference room at Appalachian Power in Beckley, where he works as an electrical engineer. His hazel eyes welled with tears. "So I work a lot not to think about it."
An obituary Gene wrote for his brother that includes an image of Dean, broadly smiling, sits on the table. If it wasn't for Dean's mustache, the twins would look exactly alike.
Still, when Gene looks in the mirror he sees his brother. "When people see me they see me and Dean," Gene adds, referring to Dean's widow Gina and their now 14-year-old son Kyle. "When Kyle sees me he sees his daddy some and when he listens to me talk, he probably thinks, 'Whoa, that's my dad!'"
Nick Rahall voted in support of the Robert C. Byrd Mine Safety Protection Act. Alan Mollohan did not show up to vote on it. Shelley Moore Capito voted against it. The bill after all, would close loopholes that allow mines repeatedly in violation to continue to operate unsafely. The lives of the miners have less value than the profits of the mine owners and their shareholder dividends.
Ward reprints an excerpt from the moving obituary Gene wrote for his brother that highlighted the relationship Dean had with Dean's son Kyle.
His beautiful son, whom he loves with every fiber of his being, is also waiting. They will have dinner together and then they will spend the evening together. They love "The Andy Griffith Show." He has purchased his son all the episodes on DVD, and they watch them over and over. They love watching old westerns, the kind that he grew up watching as a boy. They love the Steelers. He has filled his son’s whole room with Steelers’ memorabilia. They love WVU football and basketball. They love to wrestle and play and their beautiful golden retriever joins in the play. They are constant companions, bonded in a way that most do not know. His son is sick. His son has cystic fibrosis, a progressive and debilitating illness, for which there is no cure. He has spent many sleepless days and nights pleading for his son’s life and health. He adores him and wants to be there for him. He wants to comfort him in hard times and laugh and play with him in good times. He wants his son’s life to be full and blessed. He will lead him safely to manhood. They will blow out the candles together on his May 1st 14th birthday; since last year his son was too ill to have a birthday cake. They are best buddies. His greatest ambition was to be a good father.
His greatest ambition was to be a good father. There's little I can think of more important or that has more value than being a good father.
As Gene points out, the more than $12 million that Massey CEO Don Blankenship will receive for simply retiring from the company is four times more than the settlement offered by Massey to the families of the dead. Blankenship's putting profits over the lives of the people was more valuable to Massey than the lives of the miners.
In a way, it's really the story of America in the 21st century. From the tax cuts for the wealthy that will lead to a budgetary trap down the road that will lead to cuts in Social Security and Medicare to the telecom immunity supported by Sen. Jay Rockefeller that allowed Bush administration officials and telecom executives immunity for breaking the law to spy on all of us, Americans are losing out to the powerful. The wealthiest get away with crimes of such scope that it is hard to fathom. The rest of us are losing our financial security, our hope and our liberties and many are cheering on our collapse because they cannot comprehend how they have been swindled.
"We're just going to be forgotten," Gene Jones says, while mine disasters are "going to continue and continue and continue to go on. We need it fixed."
Jones could just as well be talking in general about the middleclass and the poor as well as about miners.
The current system is about propping up the wealthiest and making sure the scales of justice are tilted in their favor to the point there is no justice.
Dean Jones was a good human being. But if the people in power truly respected him and the other 28 miners, the Robert C. Byrd Miner Protection Act would have passed unanimously so that no other teenage sons would have to miss their fathers because the mining company put profits over people and those responsible for doing so would be given jail sentences instead of tax cuts and millions in bonuses.
The American Dream still exists for those fortunate enough to be in the wealthiest 2 percent who control half of all the nation's wealth. For the rest of us, the disasters are going to continue and continue, but it's not going to get fixed.
Activist icon Mother Jones once said pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living.
Peace be with the Jones family and all those who died to provide higher profits to cover Blankenship's exit bonus.
But the fight is rigged against the living.