Miners’ insurance about to expire

[Rose Siding]

snip>
Then on Aug. 31, a Lexington, Ky., bankruptcy court dashed those expectations. Judge William Howard approved the bankruptcy filing of Horizon Natural Resources, the company then operating the Cannelton mines.
Howard canceled all of Horizon’s obligations under the United Mine Workers contract. That meant Horizon could sell its mines free of any obligation to provide health care to retirees and any obligation to retain people already working in the mines.

Massey Energy then bought the Cannelton complex and changed its name to Mammoth Coal. Massey wants to resume full production using only nonunion workers.
...
“I think it is wrong that a judge could take away our insurance. I worked all my life for that. We gave up wages and other benefits so that we would have heath coverage....", Leake said.
...
Today, it would cost the Leakes between $1,000 and $1,500 a month to buy health insurance. They simply don’t have that kind of money.

“Who would insure us anyway?” Leake asked. “They want to know if you had cancer. So that would exclude us. Our government doesn’t seem like they care about the people in this country.”

http://wvgazette.com/section/News/2005031927?pt=14

[lastknowngood]

1. Welcome to republican land.. Vote repug get what you voted for

n/t

[sasquatch]

2. What a bunch of assholes

This is why we need single payer health care in this country.

[leftchick]

3. wrong...

the chimpass** government doesn’t seem like they care about the people in this country! I wonder who you voted for???

[salin]

4. possibly Byrd and Rockerfeller?

Some of these folks are in We Va.

[leftchick]

5. I would like to think anyone in a union would vote Dem...

but do you remember chimpy8s photo op with the rescued miners in PA? I saw an awful lot of repukes cheering him. :(

[salin]

6. and didn't some go to protest him in new york

after he cut safety funds to mines shortly after the incident in PA?

[Judi Lynn]

7. Here are some of the Congresspeople trying to help....

from page three of the link above:

Cecil Roberts, president of the United Mine Workers, praised new legislation in the House of Representatives on Friday to help miners whose companies go bankrupt.

Introduced by Rep. Rick Boucher, D-Va., the bill is strongly backed by Reps. Nick J. Rahall, D-W.Va., Jerry Costello, D-Ill., and Ted Strickland, D-Ohio.

“This is an excellent piece of legislation that targets bankruptcy reform only for the coal industry,” Roberts said. “It would prohibit coal operators from being able to use the ‘sale of assets’ process to shed their collective bargaining and labor law obligations.”

Boucher’s bill would give union miners who worked for bankrupt companies at least a year to bargain with new company owners.

Byrd praised a new Senate bill introduced by Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., and backed by Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., that would disallow judges from overruling the Coal Act in regard to mines operating in 1994 or earlier.

Byrd urged the Senate Judiciary Committee to hold hearings to “listen to the plight of those coal miners and their families affected by Horizon’s bankruptcy. This is an issue that affects not just the Horizon coal miners, but workers across the nation who have seen their pension and health benefits taken from them.
(snip)

Industrialists and their Republican stooges don't seem to believe it's possible to run out of people to work in their labor forces, so it really doesn't matter just what the hell happens to them.

Bogus, but loud pious Washington politicians, eager to be seen as "compassionate," aren't they? They echo the WRONG parts of their Bibles: Am I my brother's keeper? (Cain, after murdering Abel. Exodus.)