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by seemslikeadream » Fri Jan 22, 2016 1:53 pm
by Karmamatterz » Fri Jan 22, 2016 2:21 pm
Chivalry is largely dead and no longer needed in our culture anyhow.
by seemslikeadream » Fri Jan 22, 2016 2:25 pm
Karmamatterz » Fri Jan 22, 2016 1:21 pm wrote:What I figured, you would not rise to the occasion. Funny how Jack Riddler never had a problem with sharing what he does with activism. RI does not have to be a political action site to share actions, or be rational. Who says it has to be political? One could easily characterize much of RI as just a copy/paste site. Maybe a little action would actually spark some life into the echo chamber.
Sorry slad, I don't let bullies dictate my behavior. You're being a bully, and not even a very good one. My earlier sarcasm was not being a bully. One could be much more clever about it.
I have family that live in that general area of Flint. I also have colleagues and friends that live in Flint. To even make an asinine assumption that I believe lead poisoning is acceptable is IRRATIONAL.
Thanks Burnt, I am a man and very sensitive to misandrist commentary. But if I were a woman I might be sensitive to misogynist comments.
by seemslikeadream » Fri Jan 22, 2016 2:55 pm
How Republican Gov. Rick Snyder's 'Emergency Manager' Tyranny Doomed the City of Flint, MI:
'BradCast' 1/21/2016
GUEST: Novelist, father, Flint resident Connor Coyne
By BRAD FRIEDMAN on 1/21/2016, 5:11pm PT
Today on The BradCast: The national media is still missing the disturbing anti-democratic problem at the center of the Flint, MI lead-poisoning disaster; New, kind of amazing, poll numbers out of Iowa for both Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders; The GOP establishment continues to warm up to Trump...and much more.
First up, we're joined by Connor Coyne, Flint resident, father and novelist, to discuss his detailed article at Vox on "what the national media got wrong" in their coverage of the city's disastrous and continuing water crisis.
Coyne, who is a stay-at-home dad, says that while his two young daughters appear to be fine at the moment, "Nothing is definitive. And, in a way, that is part of what makes this such a scary experience for all of us. We don't know now, and really will not know for quite some time, how extensive the damage is."
"Flint now has hundreds, possibly thousands, of kids who are going to be dealing with the consequences of this crisis for the rest of their lives," he tells me. "They could live to be 90 years old, they could move anywhere in the world, they're going to be dealing with lead poisoning their entire lives." He adds: "If there is one organization I'd like to give a boost to it's FlintKids.org," a local organization collecting funds to help with medical support that the children of Flint are going to need for a very long time.
Coyne then goes on to explain how this disaster came about, thanks directly to Michigan's appalling, undemocratic "Emergency Manager" system that allows Governor Rick Snyder (R), to unilaterally appoint anyone of his choosing to completely replace local democratically-elected officials, including the Mayor and the entire City Council, in any city he likes, for whatever reason he determines.
It was, in fact, one of Snyder's hand-selected Emergency Managers who switched the city's water supply from the clean Lake Huron to the corrosive Flint River without bothering to put the appropriate filtering system first. As he notes at Vox, it's "inconceivable" that this problem would have occurred or, at least, gone this horribly wrong, "had Flint residents been able to threaten incumbents at the ballot box." But with the Emergency Manager system, there is no such accountability.
"Flint may be the most dramatic example of that system having gone wrong," he tells me. "But I think about all of the cities that have been under Emergency Managers --- Pontiac, Detroit [also Highland Park, Benton Harbor and elsewhere] --- it hasn't really gone right anywhere. Emergency Management doesn't work ethically, but it also doesn't work practically. It just flat out does not work."
Coyne explains how voter turnout has been getting "worse and worse and worse since" Flint's Emergency Manager was installed and, of course, why shouldn't it? Elected officials are stripped of all power under Snyder's tyrannical system. We also discuss how voters, state-wide, voted to do away with the Emergency Manager law in a statewide referendum back in 2012, only to see it immediately re-implemented by state Republicans in an almost identical form --- though with an added provision that legally bars the law from repeal by voter referendum.
Where are the "Tea Partiers" and "Patriot Movement" and "Militiamen" now? And how can it be that even the Washington Post, who reported on this story in December after well over a year of poisonous drinking and cooking and bathing water in Flint, didn't even bother to use the words "Emergency Manager" in their coverage? Unfortunately, WaPo wasn't alone either, as we discuss in our enlightening, if disturbing, interview today.
Also on today's show: The GOP establishment continues to warm up to Donald Trump (because, in no small part, they despise Ted Cruz even more); New polling numbers out of Iowa show fairly remarkable surges for both Trump and Bernie Sanders (though the poll's specific type of sampling may be key in both cases here); Vets blast Sarah Palin for blaming her son's domestic violence arrest and PTSD on President Obama; And Desi Doyen joins us for the Green News Report on the hottest year ever recorded on Planet Earth and much more...
Download MP3 or listen to complete show online below...
by Iamwhomiam » Fri Jan 22, 2016 3:02 pm
by seemslikeadream » Fri Jan 22, 2016 3:04 pm
by Burnt Hill » Fri Jan 22, 2016 3:30 pm
Iamwhomiam » Fri Jan 22, 2016 3:02 pm wrote:Far better to argue nonsense than to offer one single word of concern for the thousands poisoned in Hoosick Falls, New York.
Not one word.
by seemslikeadream » Fri Jan 22, 2016 3:52 pm
by seemslikeadream » Fri Jan 22, 2016 3:54 pm
The Case for a Quantum Revolution: Flint, Michigan, American Fascism, and Domestic Terrorism
81wBzBcSclLIn Michael Lewis’ book “The Big Short,” about the financial collapse of 2008, and which recently became a movie – and I talked about the movie in my article “You Say You Want a Revolution” – one of the main characters in the book is a man named Steve Eisman, who in the movie goes by the name of Mark Baum.
Eisman is a financial guy, who at the time was working as an analyst and running a hedge fund called FrontPoint Partners, which was an autonomous group owned by Morgan Stanley. He is one of the few who saw the dark side of the financial world and the corrupt and incompetent nature of the mortgage bond industry, an industry in which all players were making money head over heels.
At one point, as Eisman sees how the system is set up and rigged, he has an epiphany and says, “I decided the system was really, ‘Fuck the poor.’ “
He also said, as he saw the social implications of fucking the poor, that, “That’s where I started to see the social implications. If you are going to start a regulatory regime from scratch, you’d design it to protect the middle- and lower-middle-income people, because the opportunity for them to get ripped off was so high. Instead, what we had was a regime where those were the people who were protected the least.”
Enter Flint, Michigan, a city of 100,000, mostly poor and black, a city where 40% of the residents
live below the poverty line, a city without a grocery store, and a city where 15% of the homes are boarded up and abandoned. Flint is now a victim of American fascism and domestic terrorism, and is an example of why this country needs a new type of Revolution – a Quantum Revolution.
American fascism is predicated on fucking the poor, and panders to its master, the corporatocracy. The problem with this form of fascism is that it victimizes millions of people, injuring more people than ISIS, Al Qaeda or any other terrorist group could ever do. This form of fascism is truly a domestic form of terrorism.
You may have seen or heard about it: the people of Flint have been poisoned by their water supply, with high levels of lead found in the water. Currently 10 people have died in Flint from the toxic water and 87 people have been diagnosed with Legionnaires Disease – and that’s just the tip of the iceberg that will be coming down the pike in Flint, as every single child in Flint has been poisoned with lead-filled water.
Water_quality_issues_in_Flint_3465500000_24408778_ver1.0_640_480Lead poisoning is irreversible. “If you were to put something in a population to keep children down for generation and generations to come, it would be lead,” Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha, a Flint pediatrician, said. “It’s a well-known, potent neurotoxin. There’s tons of evidence on what lead does to a child, and it is one of the most damning things that you can do to a population. It drops your IQ, it affects your behavior, it’s been linked to criminality, it has multigenerational impacts. There is no safe level of lead in a child.”
And the sad part of this story is this never had to happen if American fascism hadn’t taken hold. The chief fascist in this is the Republican governor of Michigan, Rick Snyder, who decided to bring the corporatocracy approach to Michigan and have the state start turning a profit, or at least cut costs, and to do whatever it took to achieve it.
Numerous cities and school districts in the state are now run by single, state-appointed technocrats, as permitted under an emergency financial manager law pushed through by Snyder, who has positioned himself as the king of austerity. This legislation not only strips residents of their local voting rights, but gives Snyder’s appointee the power to do just about anything, including dissolving the city itself—all (no matter how disastrous) in the name of “fiscal responsibility.”
And so, the emergency manager for Flint decided to cut costs by switching where Flint got its water. Instead of getting its water from Detroit, the emergency manager decided, by fiat, that Flint would get its water from the polluted Flint River, at a savings of $12 million a year. That was two years ago.
To residents, the change was immediately noticeable, as the water started to look, smell and taste funny. Residents said it often looked dirty. Tests detected E. coli and fecal bacteria in the water, as well as high levels of trihalomethanes, a carcinogenic chemical cocktail known as THMs.
For months, the city concealed the presence of THMs, which over years can lead to increased rates of cancer, kidney failure, and birth defects. Still, it was obvious to local residents that something was up. Some of them were breaking out in mysterious rashes or experiencing bouts of severe diarrhea, while others watched as their eyelashes and hair began to fall out.
For two years, Flint residents have been drinking this; meanwhile the Governor and the state Department of Environmental Quality assured residents that the water was safe.
But what residents couldn’t see was far worse. About half of the service lines to homes in Flint are made of lead and because the water, which was highly corrosive, wasn’t properly treated, lead began leaching into the water supply – hence the lead poisoning in a high number of Flint adults and children.
00-03a-democracy-not-corporatocracyAnd a sadder part of this is that if the state had added an anti-corrosive agent to the water, the water wouldn’t have corroded the pipes and the lead poisoning would not have occurred. The governor knew that the river contained many toxins. He ignored that.
Why didn’t the state add the anti-corrosive agent? Because it would have cost $100 a day for three months, and the American fascist governor was all about saving money.
And now, thanks to saving all that money, it is estimated that to repair the damaged water system in Flint it will cost at least $1.5 billion.
Ironically, in the spring of 2015, before Flint’s water situation became more widely known, Governor Snyder launched his own national tour to sell “the Michigan story to the rest of the country.” His trip was funded by a nonprofit (fed, naturally, by undisclosed donations) named “Making Government Accountable: The Michigan Story.” His goal was self-serving, to show America what a visionary leader he was.
Some say Hitler was a visionary leader too.
In other words, he was selling American fascism to the general populace, telling people “see, this is how we fix problems” – and by the way, we also fuck the poor in the process.
If ISIS or Al Qaeda did something like this to our water supply, we would be ready to go to war and bomb the stuffings out of them. What ISIS and Al Qaeda does is reprehensible enough, but the number of victims with this far surpasses anything those foreign terrorist groups could do. This is domestic terrorism at its worst – and we have the American fascists to blame for inflicting this terror upon us.
The documentary filmmaker Michael Moore is a Flint native and is calling for Governor Rick Snyder to be arrested. I wholeheartedly agree with that – he should be sent to Guantanamo.
Incidentally, Steve Eisman, the hedge fund manager from “The Big Short” who realized the nature of the financial industry, began his career on Wall Street as a dyed in the wool Republican conservative. Over the years, his perspective has changed 180 degrees and he now considers himself a progressive, because he has been sickened by what he has seen the financial markets do when they have free rein. Who can blame him? He has seen American fascism up front and personal.
And so, what do we do about this? How do we stop American fascism? My friends, it’s going to take a Revolution – a Quantum, or Consciousness Revolution. This kind of behavior, where politicians and corporate leaders engage in actions that benefit only themselves and their companies, is the lowest, basest and most malevolent form of human behavior.
In a more enlightened society, the emphasis is on what serves the greater good, even if what serves the greater good goes against what serves the individual.
To create this Revolution will mean taking the simple step away from self-interest towards enlightened self-interest, where the greater good is integrated into the decision making process. That actually isn’t hard to do, if we change the story of how American society operates.
bankers-go-to-jailThe first step in changing the story is by jailing people like Governor Snyder, or the bankers at the forefront of the 2008 financial collapse, or corporate leaders who cheat and defraud and injure the public – they are all domestic terrorists – because it lets it be known that that kind of behavior is not acceptable. And there can be no ifs, ands or buts about it – you mess with the public and commit acts of domestic terrorism and your ass gets thrown in jail for quite awhile.
This is the beginning step towards this new Revolution and how we can move away from American fascism and the domestic terrorism that it causes.
Karmamatterz » Mon Dec 14, 2015 12:59 pm wrote:I mostly LURK (my BAD for the brainfart wrong choice of words in OP) on this site and have for many years.
I had to laugh at this thread. What a joke. I thought people on this board were much more intelligent than this. Why is it it seems only a few get it? Nordic and Wombaticus seem to on different levels.
Nordic wrote:
Well I see your point but those sentiments are already there. He's just giving voice to them. I don't think he's any more dangerous than any other reality-show blowhards like most of the folks at Faux News.
Thank you Nordic.
Tell me all you Trump haters, just which elected official really gives a rats ass about you, freedom, the U.S. constitution, justice etc...? Is anybody dumb enough to really think they care? Please, one of you Obama supporters stick your neck out and say Obama cares. So want to hear you explain how much he fucking cares while he is greenlighting drones killing children. Fucking idiots
Another comment from someone:
Why does Donald Trump want to be president anyway?
Does he want power for the simple pleasure of wielding it?
If so, it's frightening.
LOL??? REALLY???? What fairytale universe do you live in? More like LMFAO!
Jesus h-Christ......who the hell thinks power is NOT what rules the world? Who lives their lives not understanding that power is a constant force in our humanity? Doesn't mean it's used for good, but it exists and always exists in humans. Many wealthy people accumulate money to gain more power. Who needs to be a billionaire if you have got the world's most powerful military at your fingertips? It's not about money, it's all about power.
It's nauseating to think any president is a righteous do-gooder. Trump is a populist, big fucking deal. He probably read a few tomes about Father Coughlin or listened to Rushbo for a few months to learn his craft. He is speaking for millions of Americans though who believe the stuff he says. Doesn't mean he is right or wrong, he mirrors their sentiments. Won't matter anyhow who gets elected, the machine gears will keep turning. Step in it's way and you will get spit out of the meat grinder.
by Iamwhomiam » Fri Jan 22, 2016 5:08 pm
Why the snide post Iamwhomiam?
I mean sure, join in the fun, pick a side if you must.
But why confuse caring about one issue with not caring about another?
That is the type of conflation I spoke of elsewhere.
I mean how can you say anything when you haven't said anything about the Dry Cleaners that dumped toxic waste in my local near pristine village? How can you bring up Hoosick Falls when you haven't mentioned LP gas storage in Watkins Glen NY?
See what I mean?
I respect you Iam, but you really confuse me with these arguments.
by seemslikeadream » Fri Jan 22, 2016 7:27 pm
New crisis for Flint residents: Cost of home damage caused by city water
The controversial case over dangerous lead in water in a Michigan city
Anger over the levels of lead in the water in Flint has led the mayor to declare a state of emergency.
By Mark Guarino January 22 at 5:56 PM
If a lead-laced water supply wasn’t enough to deal with, many residents of Flint, Mich., face a new crisis: Replacing the water heaters, pipes and even the service lines to their homes that may have been destroyed by the city’s water .
And for now, it’s unclear whether they will receive any help in covering those costs.
“I hope and pray they start releasing some money,” said homeowner Arthur Woodson, a disabled veteran who lives in a house like many in Flint: built with lead plumbing that, until the city switched to a new water source in 2014, was considered safe.
For residents who already fear their health has been compromised by the water, the emerging related costs are adding to the anxiety, especially considering Flint, a city of 100,000, is among the poorest of its size in the country. The city has for years been dealing with unemployment rates that exceed the national average. With the water crisis now filling daily headlines, many in Flint say banks are refusing to offer refinancing that could free up money to pay for the retrofitting, and that the costs are not covered by insurance.
The crisis has created a perfect storm to strip their houses of their remaining value, they say.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/flin ... y-36439601
"They would never do this to Bloomfield. They would never do this to Ann Arbor. They would never do this to Farmington Hills," filmmaker and Flint native Michael Moore said, referring to much wealthier Michigan communities. He called for Snyder's ouster and arrest.
Moore also cited deaths from Legionnaires' disease recorded in the Flint area over the past two years and only announced publicly last week by Snyder. The state has not linked them to Flint's waters, but others disagree.
"Let's call this what it is," Moore said. "It's not just a water crisis. It's a racial crisis. It's a poverty crisis. That's what this is, and that's what created this."
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2015/1 ... terrorism/
Daryl Johnson, who was lead analyst for domestic terrorism at the Department of Homeland Security from 2004 to 2010 and the primary author of the report, told ThinkProgress that the federal government, for the past several years, has been hesitant to label acts of domestic terrorism as such. “There seems to be a disconnect as to what constitutes terrorism within government, particularly if it’s of the non-Muslim variety,”
But David S. Cohen, a professor of law at Drexel University, told ThinkProgress that while the Department of Justice under President Obama has been working diligently to prosecute clinic violence, the terrorism designation could still help them do the job even better. If a clinic attack is officially classified as domestic terrorism, he noted, “it can be treated different by the federal government and more resources might be available.” In addition to the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, which handles abortion clinic attacks, the designation would mean that the domestic terrorism unit would also become involved. And that could bring “an additional way of thinking about it, tracking, and understanding of information,” he added.
Alesha E. Doan, who chairs the Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Department at the University of Kansas, pointed to another reason why calling it domestic terrorism matters: framing.
“The importance to framing [anti-abortion attacks] as political violence, acts of violence that exist in the political conversation, has material outcomes in terms of policy,” she said. “Traditionally, in the last four decades, these acts of violence have largely been framed [by abortion opponents as] a mentally disturbed individual, a lone wolf,” she added, though these violent extremists exist within the anti-abortion movement.
by seemslikeadream » Fri Jan 22, 2016 7:56 pm
"WE HAD TO MAKE SOME CUTS": FLINT WATER CATASTROPHE A MATTER OF BUSINESS
FRI, 1/22/2016 - BY DAVE JOHNSON
THIS ARTICLE ORIGINALLY APPEARED ON CAMPAIGN FOR AMERICA'S FUTURE
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFCt-U7Tbhw
You might have heard that there is lead in Flint’s water. You’re not going to believe how much. And you’re not going to believe how bad lead exposure is for people. But you’ll probably believe it happened because government-hating Republicans set aside democracy so Flint’s residents couldn’t stop them from running government “like a business” and cutting government spending.
Trade Policies Sent The Jobs Away
Michigan is one state that has been hard hit by our country’s trade policies. Once considered the center of the automobile industry, factories and jobs were sent out of the country to places where people are exploited and barely paid, and the environment is not protected. (Yes, we let them do that.)
The result has been absolutely devastating (see “ruin porn“) to Michigan cities like Detroit and Flint as jobs disappeared and people who could afford to move to try to find jobs did just that. The rest of the city’s residents are left in poverty amidst miles of boarded-up, abandoned and falling-down buildings and homes, empty storefronts, and absolutely overwhelmed and underfunded public services. Help from the state and federal governments is not forthcoming.
Run Government Like A Business
Rick Snyder is a businessman (CEO, venture capitalist) who in 2010 campaigned for governor on running government like a business, promising to be the CEO governor who would create jobs. Michigan was starved for jobs, first from Wall-Street-sponsored deindustrialization, then from the Wall-Street-caused crash and recession/depression. So any promise of jobs went a long way. Maybe it was time to try turning government over to someone wealthy from outside government who said he knew better than government how to run government. Daily Beast noted at the time, “there is a more than a hint of plutocrats-know-best in Rick Snyder’s campaign pitch.”
But government in a democracy is nothing like a business. It is supposed to organize itself to deliver services and make people’s lives better, not profit off the people. Managing government and business requires entirely different skill sets and mindsets. (Also, that thing about businesses “creating jobs?” That’s not what businesses strive to do; they strive to cut costs and eliminate jobs. According to the Daily Beast, “While Snyder was on the board of Gateway [a U.S.-based computer company that had its heyday in the 1990s but ceased independent operations in 2007], the company’s workforce contracted from 21,000 American workers in 2000 to 7,400 workers in 2003.”)
Emergency Manager Law, Setting Aside Democracy
In 2011, Republicans passed a controversial law allowing the governor to run government like a business and appoint a CEO-style “emergency manager” when a city is considered to be financially irresponsible (i.e., too black). Under the law, it does not matter that the people of the city already elected a mayor, council and other leaders. The governor sets the election aside, brings in an emergency manager to take control of the local government, reduce its size and cost, and privatize public property, no matter the effect on the people there.
Like a turnaround CEO brought in from another company, the emergency manager has few connections to the community. Cut services, cut costs, strip, streamline, just like a business would do. (Such cities are typically surrounded by well-off “white-flight” suburban areas that are not required to financially or otherwise participate in solving the problems.)
The affected communities didn’t like that, and, unlike a business, could still do something about it. Michigan’s emergency manager law was repealed by referendum in 2012. So Republicans re-passed it in a lame duck legislative session. But this time they included a small appropriation, which under Michigan law meant it cannot be subject to a voter referendum. That’s that; the board has spoken, everybody get in line, all row in the same direction, play on the same team, run the ball down the field, just like in a business, or get out. Except unlike in a business there is no “get out” – you still live there.
Public Health Emergency
Flint’s public health emergency started when the city’s emergency manager “saved money” ($8.5 million over 5 years) by switching the city’s water source from Detroit via a pipeline to drawing water from the polluted Flint River. People involved in water systems will tell you that river water is acidic, which leaches lead and other metals from pipes, but they were not asked. The emergency managers could have added corrosion control chemicals to the water, but that would be more “government spending,” and they didn’t.
This happened in April 2014. Immediately people started complaining about the taste and smell of the now-brown water that was coming into their homes. For 18 months people complained. They started getting rashes. People’s hair was falling out. The government, run like a business, did what businesses do: they entered “damage-control mode,” denied there was a problem, blamed the messengers and tried to spin things their way. City and state officials said the water was OK. But there were growing concerns that there was a problem.
A Flint pediatrician, Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha of Hurley Children’s Hospital, compared blood test results for 1,746 children in Flint before and after April 2014 and discovered an increase in lead levels. “But when we announced the results, the state called me ‘an unfortunate researcher causing near hysteria,’ an ‘irresponsible researcher.’”
Then, in September, 2015, a study from Virginia Tech‘s Marc Edwards was released showing dangerous levels of lead in the water. Then in October city officials finally said, yes, something is wrong with the water and people should not drink it.
What was happening? Lead and other metals were “leaching” into the water as corrosion affected old pipes. From April 2014 until October 2015 the people of Flint were forced to drink contaminated water, filled with toxic amounts of lead and other metals.
How Much Lead Are We Talking About?
How much lead is in Flint’s water? Brace yourself.
The Washington Post provided a way to understand just how much lead, in “This is how toxic Flint’s water really is“:
In the spring of 2015, city officials tested water in the home of LeeAnne Walters, a stay-at-home mother of four and a Navy wife. They got a reading of 397 ppb, an alarmingly high number.
But it was even worse than that. Virginia Tech’s team went to Walters’ house to verify those numbers later in the year. They were concerned that the city tested water in a way that was almost guaranteed to minimize lead readings: They flushed the water for several minutes before taking a sample, which often washes away a percentage of lead contaminants. They also made residents collect water at a very low flow rate, which they knew also tended to be associated with lower readings.
So the Virginia Tech researchers took 30 different readings at various flow levels. What they found shocked them: The lowest reading they obtained was around 200 ppb, already ridiculously high. But more than half of the readings came in at more than 1,000 ppb. Some came in above 5,000 — the level at which EPA considers the water to be “toxic waste.”
The highest reading registered at 13,000 ppb.
Five parts per billion of lead are a concern. When lead reaches 15 parts per billion, the EPA says you are in trouble. 5,000 parts per billion is considered “toxic waste.”
From April 2014 until October 2015 (and later, and still) the people of Flint were drinking water with up to 13,000 parts per billion of lead in it.
What Lead Does To Health, Especially Children
Lead has terrible and irreversible effects on people’s health, especially children. Even low levels – 5 parts per billion – of exposure have been shown to have many subtle health effects.
According to the CDC, short-term exposure can cause people to feel: ● Abdominal pain ● Constipated ● Tired ● Headaches ● Irritable ● Loss of appetite ● Memory loss ● Pain or tingling in the hands and/or feet ● Weak
But if a pregnant woman is exposed, it can damage a developing baby’s nervous system. “Even low-level lead exposures in developing babies have been found to affect behavior and intelligence. Lead exposure can cause miscarriage, stillbirths, and infertility (in both men and women).”
In children lead exposure has “lasting neurological and behavioral damage.” It leads to intellectual disabilities, serious difficulty controlling impulses, retaining information and learning in school. It is difficult or impossible for them to later have thought-intensive jobs.
Lead can also keep the body from getting nutrients required for cell development and the growth of strong teeth and bones. (One way it does this is to “inhibit or mimic the actions of calcium.”)
According to the Natural Resources Defense Council’s (NRDC) “How Lead Poisons the Human Body,” “The lead builds up in soft tissue — kidneys, bone marrow, liver, and brain — as well as bones and teeth. … Some scientists believe that low-level chronic lead exposure in childhood can alter secretion of the human growth hormone, stunting growth and promoting obesity.”
The NRDC document has a warning for the future: “Unfortunately, most children do not present overt symptoms of poisoning. Because their symptoms (ranging from irritability to stomach upset) may not be immediately recognizable as lead-related the majority of cases go undetected.”
Cover Up?
Between April 2014 and October 2015, when studies confirmed that the water was poisoning people in Flint, people fought to get the city and state to do something. The water smelled, was brown, tasted bad and people were experiencing symptoms from it. And doctors were warning that people were showing signs of lead poisoning but could not yet confirm from where it was coming. All along the state kept saying this was not the result of the emergency manager’s decision to switch Flint’s water source to cut government spending, business-style.
It’s not as if people around the country were not trying to sound the alarm.
In May 2014, just a month after the water switch, the city learned that trihalomethanes ( TTHMs) were above levels allowed in the Clean Water Act, but did not inform residents until January 2015, and did not switch back to safe water.
In October 2014, GM noticed that the water was corroding engines and started trucking water in from elsewhere.
In March 2015, The New York Times reported:
"After Flint changed the source of its drinking water last spring, Ms. Mays said, she noticed a change in the water’s color and odor. Then she started having rashes, and clumps of her hair fell out. When the city issued a boil order, she stopped using the water for drinking and cooking. Now her family spends roughly $400 a month on bottled water.
"… Flint officials insist that the city’s water is safe. They say that the issues of odor and color are separate from the question of whether the water meets federal standards, and that no link to health problems has been proved.
"…“I don’t feel hopeful,” Mr. Palladeno said. “At one time, I loved this town. I still love it. There’s good people here. But the governing is killing us. I think we need a federal intervention.”
The Atlantic wrote in July 2015:
"Melissa Mays looks around the emergency room at a frail, elderly man in a wheelchair and a woman with a hacking cough and can’t quite believe she’s here. Until a few months ago, she was healthy—an active mother of three boys who found time to go to the gym while holding down a job as a media consultant and doing publicity for bands.
"But lately, she’s been feeling sluggish. She’s developed a rash on her leg, and clumps of her hair are falling out. She ended up in the emergency room last week after feeling “like [her] brain exploded,” hearing pops, and experiencing severe pain in one side of her head.
"Mays blames her sudden spate of health problems on the water in her hometown of Flint. She says it has a blue tint when it comes out of her faucet, and lab results indicate it has high amounts of copper and lead. Her family hasn’t been drinking the water for some months, but they have been bathing in it, since they have no alternative."
The State of Michigan, under the direction of Governor Rick Snyder, tried to keep the story under wraps, and deny there was a problem, apparently even after they knew there was a serious problem. As late as September the state was still denying there was a problem with the water from the Flint river, and taking issue with the studies saying otherwise. Michigan Live wrote, “State says data shows no link to Flint River, elevated lead in blood“:
"Angela Minicuci, a spokeswoman for the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services, said blood lead levels in Flint have remained fairly steady for children under 16 years old since the city switched from Lake Huron water to the river."
However, while denying there was a problem, the governor’s office was secretly ordering filters be supplied to Flint.
Professor Marc Edwards from Virginia Tech University says the reason the state was still denying the link could be that they altered data from samples. CNN reports in “Did Michigan officials hide the truth about lead in Flint?“
"Documents and emails show discrepancies between two reports detailing the toxicity of lead samples collected by the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality and the city of Flint between January and June 2015, Professor Marc Edwards from Virginia Tech University said.
"… According to Edwards, the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality and the city of Flint collected 71 lead level samples from homes when they were required to collect 100. The final report from the Department of Environmental Quality however, only accounted for 69 of those 71 samples.
"Edwards said those two discarded samples were “high-lead” and would have lifted the “action level” above 15 parts per billion."
But wait, there’s more,
Edwards said the samples should have been taken from homes with lead pipes. The reports say they were, but Michael Glasgow, then-assistant supervisor of the Flint water plant, said this is not true. Glasgow told CNN the records were not complete, and the sampling teams did not know which homes had lead pipes.
“In essence, the state took an ‘F-grade’ for Flint water’s report on lead and made it into an ‘A-grade,'” Edwards told CNN.
But wait, there’s more,
The memo notes that residents were instructed to “pre-flush” taps before samples were taken, a practice that has been shown “to result in the minimization of lead capture and significant underestimation of lead levels.”
Michigan’s Department of Environmental Quality notified the city on June 25, 2015 that they had found high lead levels in some of the samples. It was after that notification that the samples changed, and showed no more lead.
Now Legionnaire’s Disease, Too
On top of the lead crisis, Legionnaire’s disease is breaking out in Flint, also apparently a consequence of the problems with Flint’s water. So far 87 cases of Legionnaire’s Disease, 10 of them fatal, have turned up.
Federal Emergency
Saturday President Obama declared a federal emergency in Flint. This means the federal government, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and other agencies can start to help the people there. FEMA will provide water, filters and cartridges and other items, up to $5 million. However, he did not declare Flint and its county, Genesee, to be disaster areas, which would bring additional funds and assistance, because that status has always been used for natural disasters rather than man-made (in this case we should say Republican-made) ones.
This crisis is terrible news for Flint. It comes as Flint was entering a period of revival. The University of Michigan had opened dormitories for its Flint campus and the result was new restaurants and shops springing up. Housing prices were finally stabilizing and increasing.
What Must Be Done
Michael Moore wrote a public letter to President Obama asking for President Obama to provide federal assistance:
● The CDC here at once to truly assess all of the disease and damage that has been forced upon the people of Flint.
● FEMA has to supply large water containers in every home in Flint — and they must be filled by water trucks until the new infrastructure is resolved.
● The EPA must take over matters from the State (can the governor be removed and replaced like he did to the mayor of Flint?). Immediately.
● You must send in the Army Corps of Engineers to build that new water infrastructure. Otherwise, you might as well just evacuate all the people from Flint and move them to a white city that has clean drinking water — and where this would never happen.
The people in Flint are going to need complete health evaluations and care for any problems that show up. But this is also a long-term public health crisis. People will need evaluation and care for years.
Flint’s children that have been affected are going to need special teaching and other assistance, as well as other help for the rest of their lives.
One more thing. Like a business, Flint is telling customers they still owe for the poisoned water. They are sending shut-off notices to residents telling them they will be cut off if they do not pay up.
Government is not a business. It shouldn’t be thought of as a business and especially not run like a business. Government is supposed to represent us, We the People, and help us have better lives. It should serve us, not profit off of us and disregard our lives.
Boycott Michigan! Jail Snyder, cronies for Flint lead poisoning, domestic terrorism, racism
January 22, 2016
by Diane Bukowski
Detroit – The deliberate lead poisoning of the people of Flint, especially its children, babies and those still in their mothers’ wombs, likely ranks among the greatest genocidal crimes in the U.S. in the 21st century, an act of domestic terrorism comparable only to the thousands of murders of unarmed Blacks, Latinos and poor people by law enforcement since 2000.
Flint’s dirty water gushes from a fire hydrant.
No matter what promises Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder made in his Jan. 19 State of the State address, no matter how many planeloads and truckloads of bottled water are brought into the city now, no matter how much is spent to restructure water systems, no matter how many speeches are given, rallies held and class action lawsuits filed, the damage done is “irreversible,” according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
by Iamwhomiam » Fri Jan 22, 2016 8:21 pm
by seemslikeadream » Fri Jan 22, 2016 10:25 pm
by Burnt Hill » Fri Jan 22, 2016 10:43 pm
Iamwhomiam » Fri Jan 22, 2016 5:08 pm wrote:That's nice to know, slad, and I appreciate you sharing this tragic news with others. But they too have been seriously harmed by a mayor's co-option by the polluter who advised the populace to ignore warnings while he knew the public water well supply had been contaminated with PFOA, Perfluorooctanoic acid.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfluorooctanoic_acid#Health_concerns
Anyone still using teflon?
I see another has posted, so I'll answer you, Burnt Hill.Why the snide post Iamwhomiam?
I mean sure, join in the fun, pick a side if you must.
But why confuse caring about one issue with not caring about another?
That is the type of conflation I spoke of elsewhere.
I mean how can you say anything when you haven't said anything about the Dry Cleaners that dumped toxic waste in my local near pristine village? How can you bring up Hoosick Falls when you haven't mentioned LP gas storage in Watkins Glen NY?
See what I mean?
I respect you Iam, but you really confuse me with these arguments.
And I respect you Burnt Hill, more than you appreciate.
If you feel my remark was snide, BH, you're mistaken. Irony it was, my friend, to read an argument about someone's alleged lack of concern for victims of deliberate poisoning and to have seen no concern for a similar situation elsewhere.
I pasted an article about the Hoosick Falls poisoning in this thread for discussion and no one has chosen to discuss it, so I commented upon the absence of response, while the same argument was occurring between two in this very thread about Flint. Seems you feel obligated to only criticize my comment, while giving others a free pass. So be it.
I haven't seen anything offered by you to raise awareness of any potential dangers in your area that you found interesting enough to share that's worthy of discussion here. If I come across news that I feel is of interest, or that I want to raise concern for, I share it. Why should I post anything at all here if no one comments on something as tragic as this public poisoning? This is a discussion board. I share what I think would be on topic and of concern to our members in order to evoke discussion of the issue. Please don't expect me to alert the world of some pollutant spill in your backyard - that's your job, not mine. You're welcome for the Toxics Targeting link, btw, unless of course, you learned of the underground toxic plume from a local dry cleaners from your local paper, which is entirely possible.
I already said in my initial offering that public poisoning is far more prevalent than is commonly known. For example, every water source on earth is now polluted with plastic micro-beads. They are everywhere and unavoidable. 8 Trillion more each day are added. google for more. And they are all but impossible to filter. Thank you once again, Chemicals and Plastics.
regarding the Watkins Glen LNG storage facility proposed and others now in use: Considering my distance to Watkins Glen and your closer proximity, you could have submitted some news, if you felt it worthy of discussion. Perhaps I was wondering whether you felt the salt mine workers being trapped 1Km below ground was newsworthy, but nada. The proposed Compressed LNG facility will be a salt mine, unless people speak up and actually oppose the project in writing to the appropriate venue. Anyone, anywhere around the world can comment - so how's this for conflation - If you haven't opposed the proposal in writing, you're in favor of it being approved.
I did offer you and everyone else living in NYS, a map to locate every known toxic spill in their community. Really, you want me to do more, to do your work protecting your family for you? Please!
Finally, do you have anything to offer on topic? Or is your concern some absurd imagining I'm "choosing sides"? Or is it simply your overwhelming desire to continually criticize me?
I do think it is a shame no one has here has yet chosen to show any concern for people living in Hoosick Falls who were poisoned through no fault of their own.
Hoosick Falls is a shitty little town, but the poor people living there all all poisoned, and I am furious with lax regulators being afraid to step on corporate toes, even after they have learned the extent of the damages done, but even more, my anger focuses squarely upon those locally in power who disregard appropriate warning and decide against prudence. The Precautionary Principle.
And all my environmental protection work was all voluntary and locally focused. That it grew into an international movement that has brought about tremendous protections for people everywhere should not be forgotten. From little effort great things are possible.
Such things can only become possible only through showing a concern for the well being of others, which usually happens after learning nothing can be done to help to loved ones who have already been negatively environmentally impacted.
edited typo
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