I knew there was going to be a large crowd at the coal rally Saturday. It was pretty obvious as it took about 10 minutes to even pull off of Ky. 80 and onto the road taking you to the Knott County Sportsplex. I suppose I was a bit surprised to hear that an estimated 15,000 people were there during the course of the day.

There was plenty of reason to be there if one believes this cap and trade bill will be the final nail in the coffin of the coal industry. What was really surprising was the lack of a certain group of people that declined to show up: the media.

Now granted, all of the local papers and WYMT/WKYT were there to document this event. But where were the media outlets like the Lexington Herald-Leader (which circulates in this region), the Courier-Journal, or the television stations out of Lexington? The Herald-Leader had staff at the I Love Mountains Rally in Frankfort in February, which they should have, but I have yet to see any of their own coverage on Saturday’s rally. On the H-L website Monday, the only mention of the rally I could find was a small Associated Press story, which gleaned its information from WYMT-TV in Hazard, and there were no photographs to accompany the story. The Courier-Journal included the same AP story on their website, and a quick search on WLEX and WTVQ’s sites turned up nothing.

Certainly I’m not one to talk, and I’ve made my fair share of mistakes since being with this paper and I’ll make more, but I truly fail to see how a gathering of thousands on a controversial issue doesn’t warrant some sort of coverage in which a reporter or photographer is present. Is there so much news out there for the city crowds that such an event is no news? Apparently.

But while the media outlets were mum on this rally, I did, while surfing through the blogs I visit daily, find mention of the event. Cyberhillbilly, a blogger out of Eastern Kentucky, provided a wide range of commentary on the subject. Page One out of central Kentucky didn’t provide anything major on the rally, but there was at least interest in how it went and a mention of it Monday. Apparently there weren’t any news outlets in that part of the state that provided any coverage.

So I wonder if people in other areas of the state will have any coverage of the rally that these coal supporters are currently planning to take to Washington, D.C.? Will a rally of thousands of Eastern Kentuckians descending on the nation’s capital make news then, or will it be ignored once again?

Pressing questions to be sure, and I’m sure we’ll get some answers post haste.