Discussion for article #242107
And remember, this IS Obama’s fault.
Stop running that picture as the rivers no longer look like that. While heavy metals are still contaminating the section of the river closest to the mine, little of that made it that far down stream precisely because they are relatively heavy sediment.
I can’t believe how this story is playing out! The mining industry gets rich by planting hundreds of thousands of environmental bombs all over the country over decades. And it’s a scandal when the EPA steps in and tries to defuse one??
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That photo summarizes PRECISELY the color of the river in front of my home in August, and the remaining high water mud ooze now. It is iconic, and shows the extent of the damage. It also, interestingly, represents less than 1% of poisons discharged into this watershed yearly by the mines upstream (well over 300 million gallons per year). So, while the river may not look as dramatic now, it’s long term health is just as impaired, year in, year out. It’s time money was putting into a river that feeds and waters hundreds of thousands of people.
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“And remember, this IS Obama’s fault.”
Uh, other than “The Buck stops here”, how, exactly. is it “Obama’s fault”?
Why not actually READ the independent assessment board report?
If you did that, you’d become aware of the CONTEXT, being the history underlying the decision to attempt to address the toxic nature of the (presumably sealed) mine’s contents.
You’d learn that the EPA was not just AWARE of the risk of the blow-out that occurred, in fact the EPA FULLY INFORMED the local and state authorities and RECOMMENDED that the risk of blow-out potential was so high that the local environmental authorities SHOULD make a pro forma request for Superfund designation, to seal off the area for full assessment of the extent of the identified risk - which the EPA noted that it would NOT BE ABLE to assess without.
IOW the REASON the EPA was put into the position of having to GUESS at the extent of risk, and, critically, whether any plan to address the problem would be complicated and the risk of blow-out EXACERBATED by the SOURCE already-existing toxic leak being fed by MORE THAN ONE CLOSED MINE was because the local authority DECIDED to to turn down the EPA’s recommendation to request Superfund status out of concern for … wait for it … effects on the local tourism industry.
AND if you’d read that report you’d find also that the additional feed risk for the mine was itself a closed mine that COULD NOT BE ASSESSED by the EPA for the very same reason - that is, without the Superfund designation, the EPA had no authority, including it lack court-enforceable authority, to assess whether and to what exptent the other mine was feeding acidic mining op waste into the mine that ended up in blow out.
AND if you’d read that report you’d find that the MAIN SOURCE OF LOCAL COMPLAINT upheld by the independent assessor was tht the EPA failed to inform local and state land control authorities that, following and connected to the EPA’s efforts to deal with the already-existing hazard, a blow-out happened, for just over 24 hours after the blow-out occurred.
AND you’d have learned that even the authors of the independent report express lack of certainty as to what, IF ANYTHING, local and state authorities could have done to alleviate the situation from earler notice.
BUT MOST IMPORTANTLY, you’d learn that the real focus of the criticsm on the EPA is that the EPA was criticized for failing to REITERATE its recommendation that the local authority seek Superfund status prior to EPA’s beginning any remedial action, once the EPA had decided on the course of action it undertook to address the problem - a problem, again, that the EPA was DENIED the ability to perform a full risk assessment on by the very local authorities that declined to follow the EPA’s recommendation.
There’s lots of blame to go around for this one. But heaping it on Obama is just ignorant and wrong.
You’d discover, for example, that the independent report reflects therat th
He was being sarcastic. Chill.
I was joking as that’s the answer for everything that doesn’t have the best possible results, even though the right would just as soon get rid of the EPA.