MNN - Mother Nature Network

The Competitive Enterprise Institute, the extremist rightwing think-tank funded by the energy industry and friend to all things coal and oil (and the geniuses behind last years laughable "CO2: W Call It Life" campaign), hosted a counter rally to the Capitol Climate Action protests yesterday in Washington, D.C., in support of coal and cheap, dirty, polluting energy generation. I'm not going to throw any link juice their way, but if you want to read the press release, paste this into your browser and delete the spaces: http:// cei.org / celebrate-coal

I contacted Myron Ebells at CEI to get the inside scoop on how their event went. He said that they had 25 people (***UPDATE: Bill McKibben saw about four people at the pro-coal rally. Mr. Ebells may have erred on the high side with his estimate at 25. Either way, a sad little party) at the peak of their rally and went out of his way to emphasize that meant they had a way smaller carbon footprint than the thousands-strong Capital Climate Action protest. I should point out that, according to CEI's Christine Hall, CEI employs "around 30" people in their DC office.

I guess a few people had to stay behind at the office to answer the phones.

By all accounts, the real protests yesterday in D.C. went great. You can read about the protest and blockade of the Capitol Power Plant and check out photos and videos at the Capitol Climate Action website. Kate Sheppard at Gristmill posted some great photos, including a few showing the entirety of the pro-coal "protesters" (4-5 people at most), one who isn't aware that you don't actually drill for coal.