{Kentucky}...The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has rejected 19 mountaintop mine permits in Kentucky. The EPA notified the Beshear administration of its decision by letter on Friday, citing concerns about impacts on water quality. Beshear had recently met with Obama at the Cincinnati-Northern Kentucky Airport and urged him to change federal policies that are costing jobs in Kentucky's mining industry. Governor Beshear followed that meeting with a letter this week in which he said the EPA has unduly delayed mining permits that could create high-paying jobs at a time when the nation is struggling to pull out of an economic recession.
