Friends of Coal (FOC) is a front group created by the West Virginia Coal Association. Its mission is to “inform and educate West Virginia citizens about the coal industry” and “provide a united voice” for the industry. To make dirty coal seem appealing, FOC has sponsored or initiated license plates, football games, basketball practices, plane jumps, fishing events, and scholarships.

FOC is now selling coal to children. ThinkProgress obtained the “Let’s Learn About Coal” coloring book, which asks children to unscramble statements about the “advantages” of coal, such as “Than coal other cheaper is fuels” (“Coal is cheaper than other fuels”). Kids also learn that coal is “important” and “provides jobs for lots of people!”:

The FOC Ladies Auxiliary has been handing the coloring book out to children around West Virginia as part of a “Coal in the Classroom” campaign. Coal officials go into schools and give presentations about the importance of coal. “We’d really like this to be statewide, that it be mandatory in the schools that they learn about coal,” said FOC ladies auxiliary president Regina Fairchild in January. The ladies auxiliary is also recruiting members for its “junior” FOC group, open to “girls and boys ages 8 to 16.”

Additionally, FOC ladies auxiliary members have visited children in West Virginia hospitals to give them a “special present“: Mr. Coal, “a small, black Labrador stuffed puppy meant to bring a smile to kids’ faces during hospital stays.” (Coal pollution kills 24,000 Americans each year.)

Last year, American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity (ACCCE), another industry front group, also tried to make coal seem warm and fuzzy by creating the “coal carolers” — illustrated lumps of coal singing Christmas carols whose altered lyrics praised coal power. After widespread scorn, ACCCE took down the carolers. Find out more on what coal is really doing to Appalachia at Appalachian Voices.

Opponents of the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) like to portray themselves as the great defenders of democracy, protecting the “secret ballot” for workers everywhere. “There are sacred principles that epitomize American democracy,” wrote Rep. John Kline (R-MN), the ranking member on the House Ed. and Labor committee, while attacking EFCA. “They have private ballots in America, but not in other countries where there are tyrannies and socialism,” agreed Mark McKinnon of the Workforce Fairness Institute (WFI).

But now that the National Mediation Board (NMB) — which oversees labor-management relations for the airline and railroad industries under the Railway Labor Act (RLA) — wants to issue a rule change making unionization elections in those two industries more democratic, Kline and WFI are singing a different tune.

Currently, under the RLA, employees who choose not to vote in a union election are counted as “no” votes, while under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA), employees who don’t vote simply aren’t counted at all. So, in practice, this means that employees under RLA must get a majority of employees to vote affirmatively, while those under NLRA must get a majority of voting members to do so, just like in an election for a political office.

The NMB wants to change the RLA’s rules, to equalize the two processes. Kline and WFI reacted like this:

Republican Reps. John Kline (Minn.) and John Mica (Fla.) issued a release that called it a radical proposal that adds “to a troubling perception that federal agencies have embraced a culture of union favoritism.” [...] The Workforce Fairness Institute issued a press release titled “Forced Unionization” in response to the proposed rule change, and criticized the NMB for providing a “bailout” to the AFL-CIO.

The NMB has opened its proposed change up to a 60-day comment period, and with their respective responses, Kline and WFI reveal that their opposition has nothing to do with democracy. It’s about preventing unions from gaining more members, at all costs. After all, in what other election do people who don’t vote get counted for one side or the other?

Much like the push in Congress to bring truck drivers for FedEx under the NLRA, this rule change would eliminate an odd inequity in the system that is the product of the antiquated RLA, which was written in 1934. There is no reason to have the deck stacked against railway and airline workers, simply because they are pulled under an older law. But to Kline and WFI, it seems, whichever rules make it harder to form a union are those that epitomize democracy.

Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D-PA) has turned some heads by proposing legislation that would give the federal government authority to break up any large financial institution that poses a systemic threat to the economy. According to Bloomberg News, Kanjorski is “coordinating with the European Union, which is forcing asset sales by state-aided banks to limit their advantage.” “Nowhere in the world in the future will there be gigantic tsunamis coming out of nowhere and striking the entire world’s economy,” Kanjorski said.

Under Kanjorski’s proposal, “the power to restructure a company could go to the systemic-risk council and involve the Treasury secretary, with a final decision made by the president.” This goes much further than the legislation proposed by either the administration or House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank (D-MA).

The bill has already “set off alarms across K Street.” “That was a little unexpected,” one bank lobbyist told The New Republic’s Noam Scheiber. “It sort of…threw people for a loop.” However, Kanjorski has at least piqued the interest of one prominent player in the regulatory reform debate: Senate Banking Committee ranking member Richard Shelby (R-AL):

Senator Richard Shelby, the top Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, said today he liked the idea. “I don’t think anything is too-big-to-fail,” said Shelby, of Alabama. “We ought to be looking at legislation to deal with a bank beforehand if we can, or an institution that would cause systemic risk, to make it stronger, or make it smaller.”

Now, Shelby has already toyed with the Democrats, saying that he might be able to support creating a Consumer Financial Protection Agency (CFPA), only to characterize such a move as “folly and dangerous” when legislation started to move.

However, back in 1999, Shelby was the only Republican who voted against the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act, which separated investment banking from traditional banking. And with the UK beginning to break up large, bailed-out financial institutions and more and more people talking about enacting some sort of wall between depository and investment banking, this seems like an issue that is not going to go away. For his part, Kanjorski said that he’s “getting some good feedback” on his measure. “Most people are coming up to me and saying we should have done this originally, why didn’t we?” he said.

It’s too soon to tell how this will all shake out, especially since Senate Banking Chairman Chris Dodd (D-CT) has yet to release his version of regulatory reform legislation. But Dodd is already planning to deviate from the House and the administration’s reform vision in significant ways. Will Shelby’s willingness to at least talk about breaking up the big banks push Dodd to go even further? And if he does, will Shelby be able to bring any other Republicans along?