But Big Oil and Big Coal have always been as skilled at propaganda as they are at mining and drilling. Like the tobacco industry before them, their success depends on keeping Americans stupid.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
Nowhere has the political power of coal been more obvious than in presidential campaigns.
You can't turn on your television without seeing these advertisements about clean coal, clean tar sands and the claim that there's more jobs associated with fossil fuels than other industries. That's of course not true. But they're hammering that into the voters' heads.
The coal industry is an even larger part of the Australian economy than it is of the American, and it has an enormous amount of political power.
Even the biggest coal boosters have long admitted that coal is a dying industry - the fight has always been over how fast and how hard the industry will fall.
Coal companies have a lot of power in the media, and unfortunately a lot of information doesn't get out.
For decades the American people have had an addiction to oil and gas.
No one does a better, cleaner, or environmental friendlier, than the United States, when it comes to drilling for oil, gas, coal, oil refineries and fish friendly hydroelectric.
The greatest natural resource our country has is not oil. It's not gas. It's not coal. It's the genius of our children.
Americans thinking that America will continue to lead the world in innovation and quality of life without some quick and serious educational improvements are dangerously delusional.
America is the Saudi Arabia of coal.