[Ari]

Billionaire king of coal Chris Cline dead in helicopter crash.

Knowing nothing about him and hearing the governor of West Virginia gush all over him and his generous philanthropy I was immediately skeptical.

Such a philanthropist, the wikipedia page listed two philanthropic donations in 2011 totalling 10 million, wow a whole whopping 0.5% of his estimated net worth, what a generous guy! I’m sure he even gave tours to the less rich on his mega yacht complete with submarine, and private island.

Again knowing only what the little wikipedia blurb said about him, it listed a ‘cute’ story where his Dad tasked him with filling bags of dirt for a penny as a kid and he managed to collapse their deck by destroying the foundation. Which feels damn fitting for a ‘king of coal’ but apparently his Father found this a sound business education and gave him the company where his political contributions allowed him to turn it into billions.

Now of course, I could be wrong and he could have actually been a good guy, but I’m immediately skeptical of any billionaire who is highly praised by politicians as being ‘generous.’ Especially one who views the cheap cost of coal as the best reason to keep using it. Basically anyone who has over a billion, a mega yacht and their own private island, that philanthropy list better be long and diverse for me to assume they were anything but an engorged leach.