Ripples of Hope

[malthaussen]

1. Oh, hot off the presses! Let me rec first and then read.:)

I had a fun time yesterday, I actually had a couple of good conversations and even learned something. Who would have thought that people who honestly think themselves Democrats believe that, between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, the "lesser of evils" is the latter?

Now, as to your post:

Collateral damage. I would gently disagree with one nuance, that the frackers want to make money by poisoning us. That suggests they are more evil than they really are. What they want is to make money by whatever means are expedient, and if you and I and others are poisoned in the process, then it sucks to be us, doesn't it? (Rather the same attitude can be found among those who propose killing this terrorist or that, or indeed, raiding this or that house for drugs: if a few dishes are broken in the process, well, too bad. "Too bad," incidentally, does not rhyme with "I'm sorry.&quot

M. Voltaire suggested that ignorance was the mother of cruelty. May I suggest that indifference is its father? And I note, contra the good philosophe, that when ignorance is informed and enlightened, it is no guarantee that the cruelty will cease. This or that specific outrage may be corrected, as those who are responsible strive to cover their asses, but the pattern continues. A stream is poisoned in West Virginia, another in North Carolina. Drinking water is poisoned in one city, and another stream poisoned in West Virginia. And so it goes. Meanwhile, a community which is, actually, ignorant, or a farmer, or what have you, "decides" to allow fracking for the cash it will bring, which if one agrees with Mrs Clinton, is perfectly all right. It raises a philosophical question: at what point of consequences does "caveat emptor" cease to be operative?

As for fracking, the problem is compounded when, as in Pennsylvania for example, the state government has enacted a law giving communities no say in the question at all, when they have no recourse to keep the frackers from spoiling their lands and polluting and consuming their water (that self-same Susquehanna about which you wrote so lyrically the other day). This is Eminent Domain taken to new heights of absurdity, alienating the property not just of this individual or that neighborhood, but an entire community. Which, presumably, is also perfectly fine by Mrs Clinton's standards.



-- Mal