To prove that filtered Flint water is safe, Governor Rick Snyder pledged to drink it for one month, at work and at home. http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/rick-snyder-flint_us_57161cb0e4b0060ccda438e7
It is a cheap trick because the risk of lead in the water is not for adults but for small children and infants, whose brains are developing.
What is he doing for the children who drank toxic water as a result of his cost-cutting?
Diane Ravitch's blog 
More importantly, what will he do about his anti-democratic policy of appointing city “managers” whose authoritarian methods created this problem in the first place? Few democracies with vibrant debates would have allowed the birdbrain who made the switch to cheaper but deadly river water in the first place. Is this autocrat the new face of the Republican party?
JVK
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Reblogged this on Politicians Are Poody Heads and commented:
It’s a cheap trick, all right. And I’m sure that he’s not adding anything from the budget to take care of the kids who drank the toxic water. 😦
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OT Has anyone read Thomas Frank’s “Listen Liberal”?
It is all there. What and why of the attack on education. Unions, workers and have nots all targeted by the best most Liberal and well educated people in the world.
Changes the Paradigm forever.
He wrote What’s the Matter with Kansas book.
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Just finished reading. Really explicated a lot of what’s been going on the past three decades.
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Except that Snyder is a Tea Party conservative. Are you saying that Snyder doesn’t have any responsibility because “liberals do it, too?”
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Anonymous, I think they are called neo-liberals — there’s a huge difference between traditional liberals and neo-liberals.
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Put a funnel in his mouth and force him to drink as much of that water as all the children who were poisoned. If that means millions of gallons, then he has to swallow it all.
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Just how will we know that he will be honestly drinking FILTERED Flint water while he is in his posh home or upscale office?
Sure now that it’s filtered. How about the UNfiltered water?
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Mr Snyder has “volunteered” to drink the water from the Flint River.
A disgusting ploy…
He has committed a most sinister crime against the people of Flint. His “Houdini-esque” proposal is a cheap attempt to mock those who have suffered harm, both immediate and long term, and once again demonstrate the disgusting monster that he is.
Mr Snyder is symbolic of the depths that our country has sunk unto…he is one of the many faces of shame abusing the American system to benefit himself and his masters.
Imagine the United States…without the Snyders and Rauners…
…a nation of the people…for the people…by the people…
In essence, the American Dream remains a nightmare for our nation’s citizens…as long as they influence and execute policy in the United States.
It’s time for their removal from office…there is no place for bloodsuckers like them in our society.
Enough is enough already.
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If he has volunteered to drink their water, then he has been assured that the levels of lead will not affect his health. Adults can also be affected by lead exposure.
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From what I read, the lead was in the old pipes and the chemicals in the water leached that led into each house’s water supply. I don’t think the polluted water from the river has that much lead in it compared to the water supply in each house because of those old pipes.
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You are right that the lead was leaching out of old pipes. If he gets his water from a site where he doesn’t have to worry about lead solder joints, then he avoids the issue. He ought to be required to get water from a known contaminated site although his exposure still might not be great enough to cause significant issues. Notice they have been talking more about the effect on children than on adults.
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The immediate focus has been on the lead that leached out of the pipes, and its known effects on children in particular, but the Flint River is an industrial sewer and, though it may be more difficult to pinpoint directly, much harm was caused by its toxic combination of effluents.
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I am ignorant of the exact circumstances of this crisis, but I are you saying that the water that was sent to Flint was improperly filtered before it was released into the city pipes? This issue is entirely separate from the lead crisis.
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The long history of using the river as an industrial sink led to high bacteria counts, requiring heavy treatment with chlorides that produced trihalomethanes, some of which are solvents, and made the water corrosive.
If it was dissolving the lead in the pipes, after treatment, think of what it would do to living organisms.
Given the river’s use by the lumber, paper, chemical, carriage and finally the auto industry for many decades, it was institutional insanity, and criminal negligence, to use it as a water supply under anything but the most extreme emergency – real emergency, not banker-imposed Shock Doctrine “emergency” – conditions.
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Which makes me question under what conditions he will be drinking this water. Thanks for the background.
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“Holy Water”
It’s worthy of bail
The water from Flint
But water from Jail
Has Heavenly scent
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“Holy Water” (take 2)
‘Taint worthy of sale
The water from Flint
But water from jail
has Heavenly scent
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This post makes an excellent point: lead causes neurological and cognitive damage to children, and the risk for adults is low. In any case, in addition to his manifest immorality, Snyder is, arguably, already cognitively impaired.
Can you imagine the challenges of educating the generation of children upon whom this damage has been inflicted? This whole squalid episode is sad and infuriating beyond words.
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Flint and its people were abandoned long ago – “Roger and Me” appeared over twenty five years ago, and the process was well under way then – and now the only things being done are attempts to monetize the people’s misery and turn it into a profit center.
That’s how “economic growth” increasingly plays out in this country today, with so-called disruptive innovators looking for ways to extract wealth from public resources like the schools, or enrich themselves off the afflictions and tragedies of life.
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We are focused right now on the Flint water system, but the risk of exposure goes well beyond the water. Of course, I can’t remember where I read about it, but lead poisoning from paint is a real problem in the old buildings that poor people are likely to inhabit. Even rehabbing can contaminate an entire site because of the dust created with scraping and sanding painted surfaces.
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I rode my bicycle through Flint on a cross-country trip in 1986, and I was shocked at its condition then. Michael, do you think Michael Moore ridiculed people in Flint with “Roger and Me”? I saw the film in the theater when it was released, and I recall that was one complaint against it….
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That wasn’t my personal takeaway from the film, though I know many people felt that Moore was mocking some of the more defenseless people he featured; the “rabbit lady” comes to mind.
Whatever Moore’s treatment of some of his subjects in the film, I don’t think anyone can argue that Flint wasn’t literally abandoned – by GM, state and federal government, and other forms of private investment – long ago. It’s a sacrifice zone, like so much of the Great Lakes region, Appalachia and almost everywhere else in the country that is not in a few favored, hyper-gentrifying, enclosed-in-a-bubble coastal cities or regions.
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I agree; I grew up in Wisconsin, so I definitely know what you’re talking about in your assessment of the Upper Midwest. Thanks for responding….
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“The shape of things to come”
The shape of things to come
Is everywhere we look
To Appalachia from
The streets of Stony Brook
The shape of things to come
Is poverty and want
It’s water full of scum
And lead from drinking font
The shape of things to come
Is bridges falling down
It’s children in the slum
And homeless man in town
The shape of things to come
Is gated neighborhood
It”s poor folk under thumb
And “order” understood
The shape of things to come
Has stared us in the face
Though most of us are numb
And caught up in the race
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The segregation and abandonment of Flint started when GM and the manufacturing economy were at the absolute height of their powers and prosperity, during the two decades following the end of World War II. It was during this time that the government, elected officials, and social institutions, such as churches and community organizations, carefully and very intentionally divided the city by race
Click to access Highsmith&Erickson_AJE_2015.pdf
Roger and Me doesn’t mention the racism or white flight that annihilated Flint. Everything would have been great, with the black kids going to schools in trailers, if it weren’t for the capitalist fat cats and coastal technocrat elites!
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Interesting, and thank you Tim. I was entirely ignorant of this, and as you observe, Michael Moore failed to mention it in “Roger and Me.”
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This essay on segregation and white flight centered around a Catholic parish is also relevant and interesting reading: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20174112?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents
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“What is he doing for the children who drank toxic water…”
My “crystal ball” shows he is taking note of how often the timeworn illusions(myths)
enter the blog-talks on the relationship between “leader” and led. By keeping “tabs”
on the signal to noise ratio, he/power can see if the “seat” is at risk.
Myth is the genesis of “their” seat. The myth fabricators rest on the myth defenders-
repeaters.
Audre Lorde: The master’s tools (myths) will NEVER dismantle the master’s
house. AKA the “white” house…
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Three low level employees are now being charged in the Flint poisoning, essentially for trying to hide the problem.
It goes no higher than employees in Michigan Department of Environmental Quality
What a surprise.
You gotta ask: What possible motivation could low -level employees have for doing what they have been charged with?
Other than being told by a higher-up that they would lose their job if they did not do so, that is.
It appears that the water in Flint is not the only thing that stinks.
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Why did they switch to polluted water for Flint? Whose orders were they following?
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Flint was under receivership (aka creditor and state-imposed austerity) and it was a “money-saving” move.
It ultimately goes back to making sure bondholders, i.e. banks and insurance companies, get one hundred cents on the dollar for their bonds, even if people must drink poisoned water.
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Detroit Artists Face 4 Years Prison over “Free the Water” Graffiti (Democracy Now!)
because, you know, reading “Free the Water” can be very dangerous to public health, especially for young children.
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They have just indicted two lesser officials in the Flint lead poisoning water scandal. The people of Michigan should protest and make a lot of noise about Synder until he steps down. This guy is so unethical he is biding his time hoping the storm will blow over. He does not care about the residents. He cares about power and greed. http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2016/04/20/3771132/flint-criminal-charges/
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