Paul Wesslund digs into the license-plate catch-phrase “Coal keeps the lights on,” and shows why it’s not exactly true – or helpful.
Excerpt
I often puzzle over all the “Coal Keeps the Lights On!” license plates I see around Louisville.
Because it doesn’t.
It’s the most popular of our state’s specialty plates, with more than 24,000 of them riding around the Commonwealth. Nearly 1,400 of those are in Jefferson County, where they’re actually a distant second to the 4,500 UofL plates.
There are simple ways to explain what’s wrong with that catchy phrase, and more complicated ways. The implications of those inaccuracies go beyond just words. They reach into legislative policy in Frankfort where lawmakers craft ways to burn more coal despite its now higher costs and its devastating effects on the environment. I believe that sloganeering even plays a part in the broader social divisions we see these days in our public, and sometimes personal, lives.
The simplest flaw of those five words is that an honest slogan would be “Coal keeps some of the lights on.”
