A Bible Quote for Everything

I came across this article on mountaintop removal (MTR) and was absolutely stupefied by this tidbit, as reported:

What could possibly justify mountaintop removal? In this region of Bible-believing Christians, some mining company representatives quote Scripture in their own defense: “Every valley shall be filled in, every mountain and hill shall be made low; the rugged land shall be made a plain, the rough country, a broad valley” (Is 40:4).

I don't know where to start. I did read the rest of Isaiah 40, and I'm pretty sure it isn't about MTR.

Deep Down

In my draft essay "Ethics Beyond Sentience," I discuss mountaintop removal in Appalachia. The new film Deep Down does a very nice job getting into the complexities of the issue for the people who live in Appalachia, and the film actually has a happy ending, insofar as the people in the town/holler targeted for mining got a legal decision that de facto made mining there economically unfeasible. I also just caught wind of an article in Science highly critical of MTR. Another good piece is here. In a way, it's too bad that we need the article in Science magazine to make the practical case against MTR, since although the ecological impact surely matters to the people in those hollers, too, that doesn't seem to be the deeper (or deepest) reason to leave the mountains alone.