Moore writes: "The people of my hometown, Flint, Mich., are being poisoned.
Let me not mince words: This is a racial crime. If it were happening in
another country, we'd call it an ethnic cleansing. Flint is a very poor,
majority African-American city, and the Republican governor of Michigan,
Rick Snyder, knows they have no political power, no lobbyists, no money."
Michael Moore. (photo: Michael Moore/Facebook)
Flint Poisoning Is a 'Racial Crime'
By Michael Moore, TIME
23 January 16
The people of my hometown are being poisoned
The people of my hometown, Flint, Mich., are being poisoned. Let me not
mince words: This is a racial crime. If it were happening in another
country, we'd call it an ethnic cleansing. Flint is a very poor, majority
African-American city, and the Republican governor of Michigan, Rick Snyder,
knows they have no political power, no lobbyists, no money. And they didn't
vote for him. So when the residents of Flint, many of whom work two or three
jobs for minimum wage, complained about the levels of lead in their water
and told the governor their children were getting sick-two years ago!-he
didn't have to listen.
Everybody knows that this would not have happened in predominantly white
Michigan cities like West Bloomfield, or Grosse Pointe, or Ann Arbor.
Everybody knows that if there had been two years of taxpayer complaints, and
then a year of warnings from scientists and doctors, this would have been
fixed in those towns.
This started when the governor turned Flint's authority over to an
"emergency manager," ostensibly to fix the city's finances. In order to save
a few million dollars, the manager and the governor's office came up with
the bright idea to unhook the city's water supply from Lake Huron and tap
into the Flint River.
In the 20th century, General Motors made Flint the ultimate company town,
and over the next 100 years the Flint River was turned into a sewer.
Environmental experts warned the political leaders of the dangers of using
the Flint River as a water source. They didn't listen.
So here we are. People need to stop saying that Flint was using Detroit's
water. It was pure water from Lake Huron, the third largest body of
freshwater in the world. A toxic water crisis is the last thing that should
happen here.
The American middle class was built in Flint. Our grandparents knew that if
they worked hard and the company prospered, they prospered. That was the
American Dream, and it spread from Flint to the rest of the nation. Then
around 1980, General Motors, a company that was making billions, figured out
that it could make even more money by sending jobs to the nonunion South or
overseas. This halved Flint's population and brought along unemployment,
poverty, alcoholism, broken families and other ills. The crime rate
skyrocketed. Wall Street came in and cut Flint's credit rating, making it
impossible for Flint to recover, to attract jobs, to fix its infrastructure
and schools. Flint went through a three-decade economic and social assault.
Those who could get off the sinking ship-myself included-escaped. And those
who were abandoned and left behind? They got their water poisoned. And when
the governor found out, he kept quiet and let the poor of Flint continue
drinking the poison. Marie Antoinette would've been proud. Except this time,
no one offered any cake. "Let them drink the Flint River" has such a nice
ring.
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Michael Moore. (photo: Michael Moore/Facebook)
http://time.com/4188323/michael-moore-flint-racial-crime/?xid=homepagehttp:/
/time.com/4188323/michael-moore-flint-racial-crime/?xid=homepage
Flint Poisoning Is a 'Racial Crime'
By Michael Moore, TIME
23 January 16
The people of my hometown are being poisoned
he people of my hometown, Flint, Mich., are being poisoned. Let me not
mince words: This is a racial crime. If it were happening in another
country, we'd call it an ethnic cleansing. Flint is a very poor, majority
African-American city, and the Republican governor of Michigan, Rick Snyder,
knows they have no political power, no lobbyists, no money. And they didn't
vote for him. So when the residents of Flint, many of whom work two or three
jobs for minimum wage, complained about the levels of lead in their water
and told the governor their children were getting sick-two years ago!-he
didn't have to listen.
Everybody knows that this would not have happened in predominantly white
Michigan cities like West Bloomfield, or Grosse Pointe, or Ann Arbor.
Everybody knows that if there had been two years of taxpayer complaints, and
then a year of warnings from scientists and doctors, this would have been
fixed in those towns.
This started when the governor turned Flint's authority over to an
"emergency manager," ostensibly to fix the city's finances. In order to save
a few million dollars, the manager and the governor's office came up with
the bright idea to unhook the city's water supply from Lake Huron and tap
into the Flint River.
In the 20th century, General Motors made Flint the ultimate company town,
and over the next 100 years the Flint River was turned into a sewer.
Environmental experts warned the political leaders of the dangers of using
the Flint River as a water source. They didn't listen.
So here we are. People need to stop saying that Flint was using Detroit's
water. It was pure water from Lake Huron, the third largest body of
freshwater in the world. A toxic water crisis is the last thing that should
happen here.
The American middle class was built in Flint. Our grandparents knew that if
they worked hard and the company prospered, they prospered. That was the
American Dream, and it spread from Flint to the rest of the nation. Then
around 1980, General Motors, a company that was making billions, figured out
that it could make even more money by sending jobs to the nonunion South or
overseas. This halved Flint's population and brought along unemployment,
poverty, alcoholism, broken families and other ills. The crime rate
skyrocketed. Wall Street came in and cut Flint's credit rating, making it
impossible for Flint to recover, to attract jobs, to fix its infrastructure
and schools. Flint went through a three-decade economic and social assault.
Those who could get off the sinking ship-myself included-escaped. And those
who were abandoned and left behind? They got their water poisoned. And when
the governor found out, he kept quiet and let the poor of Flint continue
drinking the poison. Marie Antoinette would've been proud. Except this time,
no one offered any cake. "Let them drink the Flint River" has such a nice
ring.
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
http://e-max.it/posizionamento-siti-web/socialize
