Saturday, October 6, 2012

A-Hole boss of the month: Robert Murray of Murray Energy


The New Republic has an article profiling one of the GOP's leading donors and Mitt's favorite job creator in Ohio..   A hothead, narcissist greedy old boss-man who forces his employees to contribute part of their pay to his right wing political causes and blames mining deaths on earthquakes rather than poor safety practices and runs his mouth around town because he knows everyone is afraid of him.   He probably pumps Fox News Channel 24/7 into the employee lunch room (if they have one) and has a toadie walk around the parking lot putting Tea Party bumper stickers on every car.   What a dick.  This is Mitt Romney's kind of guy. 


BOB MURRAY, WHO is 72, is a legendary figure in Appalachian coal country...
Like a lot of mining executives, Murray’s a ferocious critic of federal mining regulations—even after the 2007 collapse at his Crandall Canyon mine in Utah, where nine people died. He also knows how to throw his weight around. In 2001, he sued the Akron Beacon Journal for $1 billion after a critical profile; that same year, he was acquitted of assault charges after allegedly throwing an environmental activist against a wall. In 2002, local media reported that he warned off mine safety inspectors with this line: “Mitch McConnell calls me one of the five finest men in America, and the last I checked, he was sleeping with your boss,” referring to Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, the senator’s wife. (Murray denied the account.) Murray’s fiery streak was on full display after the Crandall Canyon collapse. Wearing his trademark sweater-vest, he angrily insisted to reporters that the collapse had been caused by an earthquake—scientists disagreed—and railed against efforts to curb carbon emissions.
In August, Romney used Murray’s Century Mine in the town of Beallsville for a speech attacking Barack Obama as anti-coal. This fall, scenes from that event—several dozen coal-smudged Murray miners standing behind the candidate in a tableau framed by a giant American flag and a COAL COUNTRY STANDS WITH MITT placard—have shown up in a Romney ad.
The ads aired even after Ohio papers reported what I was told by several miners at the event, a bit of news that an internal memo confirms:  The crowd was not there of its own accord. Murray had suspended Century’s operations and made clear to workers that they were expected to attend, without pay. “I tell ya, you’ve got a great boss,” Romney said in acknowledging Robert Murray from the stage. “He runs a great operation here.”
I just snipped a few excerpts, you should read the whole thing.. 

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