The Blog of toussaint

There is something deeply wrong in this country and i can't think of what is going to change it.  i was watching P.O.V., a show that highlights excellent independent films and documentaries on P.B.S.  This week they told the incredibly sad story of Libby, Montana.  In the '40's they discovered a mineral there that was great for insulation dubbed Zonolite.  It is actually a composite of many minerals, the largest part being Asbestos.  You might think great, small town corners market on a great product, plenty of jobs and a dying little rural town will now survive, as long as they take precautions.  But what actually happened is an old story of greed and selfishness that we have all heard before.  In short, this is what happened.

In '45 the mine was started and the company and the town had the glory days.  Then the workers started getting sick with black lung.  There was so much asbestos dust in the air at the mine that it would clog a mask in 10 min. So, the workers stop wearing them because the company told them that the dust was just as safe as the farm dust these cow pokes were used to breathing all there lives.  Only problem is they had internal and state studies that told them otherwise.  They even started keeping records of how many people had black lung and how many were dying starting in the late 50's.  The Union found out in '79 and started the ball rolling on trying to get safety concerns met but everyone fought them, including the miners who believed that the company would never lie to them.  The US gov put pressure on the union to shut up, starting under Reagan, but all the other Presidents since him have known about the problem and did nothing. Republican and Democrat.  You see, if they were to admit the problem with this insulation they would have a serious problem on there hands because the stuff was in an estimated 70 million homes at its height.   In fact the home you are sitting in right now may still have that crap in it because of some EPA wrangling under the current president that did not allow for clean up outside of Libby. Would you believe the company was saying this stuff was so safe that you could make cookies out of it and add vitamins to your diet? Turns out it was safer to eat those cookies that they gave to children than to work in the mine for a week.  The town finally wakes up and fights to get the mine shut down and to get the gov. to make Grace mines clean up its mess.  But the mine files bankruptcy and we get stuck with the bill for clean up even though the Feds caught them funneling 5 billion dollars to dummy corporations.  The Gonzales Justice Dept. settled the case out of court for 1 billion,  and the people still lost there health insurance, pensions and any chance t sue those bastards.  The only good part of this story is that the man running the mine died of black lung along with 3 other members of his family because the dust on his clothes killed them.  There are still an est. 35 million homes in this great country with that crap in their roofs slowly leaking out and killing you and me.  There are a bunch more awful facts about this story i could tell you, like how the Governor of Montana tried to stop the clean up process, but it would take too long and break your heart. This story never hit the national news.

And this week, we mark the anniversary of another death of a great American city, New Orleans.  Bush says we don't need new taxes to pay for our crumbling bridges, we just need to change our priorities.  So, he goes down for a photo op. knowing that most of the money allocated for Katrina relief (150 billion) has yet to be spent were it is needed most.  Some people in New Orleans have gone 2 years without electricity.  In America!!!! Sounds more like Iraq.  And in the next few weeks the Democrats are going to give this pres. another free pass on Iraq and allocate another 50 billion for the war, bringing this year's total to just over 300 billion.  Change our priorities indeed.

The saddest thing of all for me is that these few outrageous things i have mentioned don't seem to be outraging anyone but a few dedicated bloggers and activists that know one listens to. About 10-15 people a day will read this blog and i truly do appreciate you.  You all keep me from losing my mind.  But lately, i gotta tell you, i don't know if i am outraged or just out of rage.