Ken SchreinerUtah’s Environment Gets Worse- Without Even Trying
Meeting air quality standards is obviously easier on paper than in reality. Despite the inversion we just survived and a persistent haze visible more often, Utah has been in compliance with most federal air standards. But that will all change today. New, tougher standards go into effect that make it difficult for Utah’s worst pollution zones to comply. The new standards crack down on PM 2.5 particles, the kind of particulate produced by vehicles and coal-fired power plants. Environmentalists argue the standards aren’t tough enough. And in Utah’s case, they might as well be tougher because we’re not going to be able to make the new ones anyway. At the same time, there’s the news that another 14 sites in Utah have fish that contain higher than safe levels of mercury. But our legislators continue to argue about what kind of T-shirt a kid can wear to school and other “pressing” issues, and aren’t even thinking about how Utah will meet the new air standards or how to save our precious tourism industry from the ravages of industrial pollution and global warming. To their credit, they decided not to cut the Department of Environmental Quality’s budget. But they’re still not dealing with the environmental mess they’ve helped put us in through their inaction and distraction. And while our clueless legislators argue about abortion and video game violence, issues that most people don’t care about as much as health, Utah’s environmental problem keeps getting worse- without even trying.
February 4th, 2007 at 2:45 pm
Oh Beautiful for Spacious Skies
Purple Mountains Majesty..
I’m 44, I killed fish en masse for money in my younger days, they are gone much now, and I saw the Valdez spill, and have sailed around its results, now exxon has the biggest corporate profits in recorded human history..
…the world is dying, we only do not know, as most live in cities, and as short lived pea brains have no context to measure what is lost with the passing generations. We are the Enzymes of Entropy, I say. We have no control over this apparent part of our nature, at least not modern industrialized man. It’s going to be a short run this time out for man.
We aren’t going to change, the world will change,asphyxiate us, and move on to the next species to be granted dominance.
Unless everyone woke up tomorrow and had a “revelation” do you imagine walking to work won’t make available an extra gallon of gas for a Chinaman to run his new 2 stroke moped? We;re going to burn it all, unless we don’t.
This is hardly worth discussing anymore, you wake up and breath it. The essence of the pollutive molecules drawn into your very body, to be incorporated into the personal corporeal. The brown cloud made for you, is soon, and ever to actually BECOME you. The fiber of your being so to speak. Save your breaths.
You are going to need them.
February 4th, 2007 at 3:31 pm
Hi Ken; I grew up in Vermont, lived in Burlington through school. State was growing like a weed last time I visited. More pavement than ever.
My best friend and I lamented on the advisement that people should eat no fish out of Vermont waters, due to the mercury contamination. We used to dream of living off the land in Vermont if we had to. fish were the biggest part of the survival strategy.
As kids we caught and ate many fish, probably not a good idea. The contamination came from the mid-west, good democrats those people, but the coal burned, the steel and energy created, and the mercury rained on us. Our lakes died due to the acid, that recovered, but the mercury remained.
So where are we headed now?, vehicles bigger than ever, and per person calorie usage increasing every year, brown clouds composed of God knows what, drifting the expanses of ocean to make landfall, a continent away. Fall out entering the oceans.
The oil drip from your car, the can of trash, or “recycle” resources. Who cares? It all translate into energy, especially the trucks that come to pick it up.
We are not thinking
The world she be stinking
corporations with a green seal, they be winking
I stare at the smog, sometimes blinking
Clouds that have no natural source
tear my eyes, make me hoarse
I need all this crap, of course, of course
we buy it all, and not by force.
February 4th, 2007 at 6:14 pm
A poem maketh a poet snot
But don’t stop trying
February 4th, 2007 at 6:19 pm
Good God, the sky in that photograph even looks toxic. This is what we collectively get when for becoming a nation of sheep — a collection of “consumers,” not real people.
February 4th, 2007 at 8:23 pm
It isn’t poetry, it’s rap. The sky you see, she look like crap!
February 5th, 2007 at 12:10 am
Transmission third world war third round
A decade of the weapon of sound above ground
No shelter if you’re lookin’ for shade
I lick shots at the brutal charade
As the polls close like a casket
On truth devoured
A Silent play in the shadow of power
A spectacle monopolized
The camera’s eyes on choice disguised
***Was it cast for the mass who burn and toil?
***Or for the vultures who thirst for blood and oil?
****Yes a spectacle
****monopolized
****They hold the reins
****and stole your eyes
Or the fistagons
The bullets and bombs
Who stuff the banks
Who staff the party ranks
More for Gore or the son of a Drug Lord
None of the above
fuck it cut the cord
~Rage Against the Machine, Guerilla Radio
February 5th, 2007 at 8:43 am
as baby on maternity board
mam, waste no time, and cut the cord
breathe new life, a new generation
protect precious mind, from mal infestation
somethin has to give
or we aren’t going to live
our future mirrors oddly mutation
an unnatural whim of creation
through the seething horrible fog
trudge the faithless through material bog
gather their pennies, service the hog
crack of the whip, continue the slog
take a deepening, poisonous breath
draw them continuous, unto our death
to what end between our health
unto our treasure and any wealth
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE!!!!!
February 5th, 2007 at 5:27 pm
Man, I love the RATM stuff but I’m a sucker for original material. We ex-Vermonters are such a sensitive lot. Thanks, everybody! Also, if you want to see what the Brown Shroud looks like on a daily basis, go to my SaltCam site: http://schreinervideo.com/SaltCam.html
February 5th, 2007 at 7:30 pm
That stuff under my name is mine Ken. Thank you and Cliff for the forum.
February 6th, 2007 at 9:42 am
Glenn: I’m sorry, I didn’t make my response clear. By saying “original material,” I was referring to yours.