Bob Murray, Who Fought Regulations as a Coal Operator, Files for Lung Benefits | Hacker News Reader

Bob Murray, Who Fought Regulations as a Coal Operator, Files for Lung Benefits

wvpublic.org

119 pointsevo_927 comments

> But Murray told NPR in October 2019 that he had a lung disease that was not caused by working underground in mines.

> “It's idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. IPF, and it is not related to my work in the industry. They've checked for that,” Murray told NPR. “And it's not — has anything to do with working in the coal mines, which I did for 17 years underground every day. And until I was 76, I went underground twice a week.”

How could they have "checked for that," given that IPF seems to be a diagnosis of exclusion (someone more knowledgeable than I can correct me if I'm wrong).

Idiopathic means we looked at the things we know how to diagnose and it wasn’t those. The exclusion process is an elimination process.

Test for all the plausible causes, and if there’s nothing left you shrug and call it idiopathic. So either he was tested, or the doctors thought his symptoms were very atypical and didn’t run the test.

(I know two people and a pet with idiopathic something or other. In the cat’s case, the treatment was the same as the least invasive treatments for the common cause. The humans are just SOL.)

They could have excluded that specific cause, perhaps? Odd, though, since "idiopathic" means "we don't know why this happened".

If he attested in October 2019 that his disease was unrelated to working in coal mines, it's curious that he's a black lung claimant under a statute that requires the miner to have or have had pneuomoconiosis and for some causal link to exist between that and their work as a miner.

Seems he wants to have it both ways. Jeopardizing the safety of his employees with his opposition to regulations is justified - except when it affects him personally. Then, he should be entitled to benefits and remedies under the law.

You're correct. In fact, it seems odd to me that a doctor would have diagnosed IPF in someone who had worked in coal mines for that long. As far as I know, the symptoms of black lung are basically indistinguishable from IPF. I'm not a doctor, but my father died of IPF, and his father died from black lung (steel industry, not coal, but they have the same risks).

If you haven't already seen them, John Oliver's Last Week Tonight episodes on Murray are great watches.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aw6RsUhw1Q8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UN8bJb8biZU

He really doesn't come off as a good guy here.

He is not a good guy. He doesn’t believe in climate change (and actively funded campaigns against it while his company speeded towards bankruptcy [1]), and is deeply committed to coal [2]. This article humorously demonstrates his hypocrisy, and his life’s work (as a coal company executive and ardent champion of the fuel) and beliefs backfiring on him in spectacular fashion.

[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/17/climate/murray-energy-cli...

[2] https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/a-coal-executives...

I have friends and acquaintances that have worked jobs like this and it absolutely destroys your health in the long term.

It’s a shame that the both the government and industry have not pursued a better path forward.

I've spoken to Congressional representatives about possible paths for coal miners to bridge them from coal mining to social security or the pension benefit guarantee corp (essentially buyouts, very inexpensive for the number of folks we're talking about), and quite literally have been laughed at. I have no sympathy anymore for anyone in the coal industry except front line workers who are being hung out to dry. It's Bob's turn to be hung out to dry. He's a terrible person (based on his actions, not just in the case of trying to prevent worker health claims but also wiping out pensioners of his company), and the evidence is very public.

I’m sorry for your friends and acquaintances. People care, it’s just always an uphill battle.

I'm always completely puzzled when people talk in positive terms about opening coal mines back up and revitalizing that industry. I get that there are areas where the economy was destroyed due to coal mines being shut down, but there has to be a better way to address it than putting people's lives at risk.

People are hard. Who you are as a person (ego, purpose, identity, and belief systems) are at play and at the core of these issues. It’d be a lot easier if this was just about cutting checks to folks every month for the rest of their lives.

Yeah, I get it. In some places it's part of the cultural identity. It just feels like giving them hope is a bad idea.

These are informative too. I had no idea that Murray was so publicly visible and involved in politics during the last two presidencies.

I kinda feel like the Department of Labor should respond to Bob's request by telling him to eat something.

The people who endangered miners really shouldn't be entitled to benefits for miners, especially when that person, via bankruptcy, has guaranteed that the government is going to end up on the hook for providing that.

I see Bob Murray is personifying the old tycoon motto: socialism for me, rugged capitalism for thee.

Why is this being downvoted? Murray is scum. For decades he tried to discredit black lung as a valid disease. His claim for black lung disease benefits should be denied on principle, for all the pain and suffering he has caused to date.

He may not justly deserve the benefits. But do you want to act on the same level as him? Or do you want to be better?

Better is for saints and prophets. I’m human, so I’ll settle for getting even and creating a strong deterrent to dissuade others like him.

You call him scum. And you'll settle for getting even, rather than being better. Sure you don't want to re-think that?

Oh please, save your sanctimony. We have laws for good reason. If I really wanted to get even, he’d be dead (capital punishment). He deserves it. He fought hard against the well-being of his employees just save some money and boost his own compensation.

Now I’m against capital punishment, so I don’t want him dead, nor do I want treatment withheld for the disease he’s suffering, even if he did the same for many others. But I’ll be damned if I see him get a penny of that money before he spends his own first. That’s justice enough, and I think that’s downright generous, far more generous than he deserves. And that, my friend, is what makes me the better man.

So, should we release all the kidnappers from jail because we want to be better than them?

I want the best for society, not some moral high ground, so I definitely would deny the benefits and if he does want to obtain them, he should at least do some public apologies.

We also live in a time where people people get fired for saying the wrong thing due to public outrage on twitter. He can say what he wants. We can be outraged as we want.

it's not lowering ourselves to the same level, it's simply fairness. have him exhaust his personal wealth first, as happens to the rest of us, and then he can go on the public dole and get help if need be. why should he get special treatment?

old? seems to be the case with current tycoons, too!

Well said. Seems to me that he's going to set a precedent that will screw over workers' attempts to even file a claim by muddying the water.

I don’t buy it.

He had paid taxes all his life, all he is asking for is to get something out of these taxes back.

Is he a bad person? Does he not deserve his share? I don’t know. If he does not, then our legal system is broken - he paid for a service he is denied. If he gets his share, then what about the workers he denied their share to? But his denial was enabled by the law, what are we going to do about this?

And if his pledge is denied, I am going to see this as a petty retaliation against a sick old guy.

If you want to fix something, fix the system that enabled him to fight the regulations in first place. Don’t fight his cruelty with your own just because you think he deserves it and he cannot punch back anymore.

(throwaway because I am afraid of expressing my views due to socialist culture prevailing. Call it self-censorship if you like)

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