It’s obvious, Obama is delivering on his promise to bankrupt the coal industry and several government, corporate, and environmental allies are assisting his effort. To defend its rightful existence, the industry and its allies must recognize it is at war and return fire with all its resources. After all, “to the victor go the spoils.”

In our Republic, an inability to pass carbon control legislation should have been the end of government efforts to force fossil fuel prices higher. If only that were true.

What the President could not achieve through legislation, he is now advancing through the executive branch.

Once again, the [...]

While political battles and increases to mining taxes and royalties are not uncommon, the fact that one of these debates is occurring in Australia, which has a well developed economy where mining is a significant industry, is unusual and is, therefore, drawing a great deal of attention.

Other countries are also reexamining their mining tax/royalty regimes. Peru has elected a new president, Ollanta Humala, who was generally expected to support an increase in mining taxes, although he has yet to reveal his actual position now that he has been elected. Some wonder if he will go even further and propose nationalizing [...]

There are some, however, who have resolved to inhibit the production and use of coal and other hydrocarbons. Through burdensome and onerous regulations, they have waged a war on coal. Nowhere is this effort more evident than in the current Administration’s effort to rewrite current surface mining rules under the guise of the new “Stream Protection Rule.” The current “Stream Buffer Zone Rule” – now suspended by the Administration, was the result of years of environmental review, public comment and hearings, and responsible rulemaking. These new proposed regulations would supplant regulations that had been finalized in 2008 after a multi-year [...]