“Now this is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. But it is, perhaps, the end of the beginning.” – Winston Churchill, Nov. 10, 1942
The Allied victory over Rommel in North Africa was, indeed, a turning point in World War II, but Churchill was determined that his countrymen should be realistic about it. Yes, it was a triumph, a great triumph, but it was one of many triumphs that would be necessary to defeat the enemy once and for all.
This is something we need to bear in mind as we celebrate a triumph of our own, possibly a turning point in our resistance to President Obama's War on Coal.
Just last week, a federal judge ruled that Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy can be deposed in a lawsuit challenging the capricious regulations that her agency has promulgated in an avowed effort to destroy the coal industry in America.
Murray Energy Corp. and affiliated companies filed the lawsuit last year in District Court for the Northern District of West Virginia, charging that the EPA ignores its obligation to consider the job impact of its regulations before issuing them.
Not surprisingly, the EPA has sought to block McCarthy's deposition, worried that its actions cannot be defended and that the administrator's inept efforts to do so are likely to make matters worse.
Plaintiffs claim that McCarthy has enforced the Clean Air Act “in a manner that is causing coal mines to close, costing hard-working Americans their jobs, and shifting employment away from areas rich in coal resources to areas with energy resources preferred by the Agency.”
They seek an injunction barring McCarthy from “promulgating new regulations impacting the coal industry before completing the acts required by the CAA.”
By ensuring that McCarthy is held accountable for the outrages of her agency, we've won a battle, but not the war. Still, this could be the end of the beginning.