They finally reached the remaining miners in West Virginia and the outcome was not good. Last night they finally reached the final four missing miners and all were dead. This now makes the disaster at Big Branch the worst mining accident in nearly 4 decades, and one that could have been adverted.

We have heard a lot this week about the countless safety violations that have piled up against Massey Energy, including in the days and hours leading up to the disaster. Massey boss Don Blankenship was a strong opponent of safety regulations and even thought he could pick and choose what laws to follow.

As much as I hate to politicize a disaster like this, it must be done to hopefully prevent repeat incidents in the future.

Don Blankenship was the epitome of right wing beliefs, so much that he was a big donor to the Tea Party. He was totally against government regulation and 29 innocent workers have paid the ultimate price for that ignorance.

This is the second time this year that we have been given a disastrous reminder that government regulations save lives. I posted the first last month:

This year we have seen two serious earthquakes rock our hemisphere. The Haiti earthquake has claimed nearly 1/4 million lives. Last weeks earthquake in Chile, which was 500 times more powerful than the one in Haiti, has claimed less than 300 lives.

Wait! How can an earthquake that is about 500 times less in power claim almost 1,000 times more lives? Well the answer is simple.

Haiti is a Republican Mecca – a nation with no pesky regulations. That means no rules for people, like construction workers, to follow. Compare that to Chile, a nation accredited with being one of the toughest on building regulations, and you quickly see how the big GOP enemy of regulation lead to a lot of lives being saved.

The Republicans have always believed that industry should regulate itself. Don Blankenship also believed and tried to follow this core Republican principal and look what the result was.

There is, however, another angle to this that goes against core Republican beliefs. All the major mining accidents happen at non-unionized mines. Here’s a clip from Rachel Maddow talking about this fact.

Unions have safety people and the power of negotiation to make sure its members are working in safe conditions. Once again we have something Republicans have opposed for years – organized labor.

I know Democrats don’t like using horrible incidents like this as a political tool, but when it is so encompassed in fact than the Democrats are every bit as guilty if they don’t remind people how government regulation and organized labor are keys to working in a safe environment. Hopefully Democrats will remind voters of this on the campaign trail when Republicans go on their “no regulations, no organized labor” stump. It’s not about winning elections, it’s about saving lives.