Diane Sawyer: Meet Teri Blanton at NY Loves Mountains Festival

Listen here, Diane Sawyer: You need to meet Kentuckian hero Teri Blanton at the New York Loves Mountains Festival this weekend, which is co-sponsored by the Alliance for Appalachia.

In the same eastern Kentucky counties that Diane Sawyer visited for her special on poverty this spring, "A Hidden America: Children of the Mountains," Teri Blanton has watched coal mining employment--which has maintained a stranglehold on the region and kept out any other attempts at a sustainable and diversified economy--plummeted by nearly 70 percent in some areas, thanks largely to the highly mechanized and devastating use of mountaintop removal strip mining.

As Blanton's Kentuckians for the Commonwealth organization have shown, mountaintop removal and strip mining, in general, have led to massive unemployment in the coal mining region, depopulated many of the rural communities, and polluted the watersheds.

Here is a chart outlining the quality of life indicators vs. coal production statistics in the last 20 years in these coal counties: http://www.kftc.org/our-work/canary-project/campaigns/mtr/county-profiles

Instead of wringing their hands in sadness and powerlessness, the Kentuckians for the Commonwealth are some of the real heroes in region, working to bring economic and social justice to the coalfields. Sawyer should have taken the time to check out their work:

http://www.kftc.org/our-work/canary-project/campaigns/mtr/MTR-generalinfo

While poverty certainly exists in a scandalous way in Appalachia, it's too bad Sawyer didn't talk to some of the writers and artists and activists who have shattered the hillbilly stereotype, fought against the injustices of the coal companies, and shaped the way the America lives today.

Some of these great heroes include author Silas House, whose novels and plays are some of the most compelling and fearless literary work today.  Silas House will appear at the NY Loves Mountains Festival this weekend, as well.

Silas House should be a household name in America. http://www.ket.org/muse/novelapproach/silas.htm

If Diane Sawyer and New York wants to understand the children of the mountains, she needs to meet Teri and Silas at New York Loves Mountains Festival.  In the meantime, here's a clip of Teri at the I Love Mountains 2008 Fest: