Wonder Why the No-Smoking Campaign?

...because I still wonder why the chief litigant in the wannabe class action suit against Dow Chemical to monitor non-existent health problems decided dioxin is a chemical to be feared! The last time I saw her she was putting toxic chemicals directly into her lungs... puffing away on a cigarette! Doesn't she realize that, among hundreds of other toxins cigarettes contain at least three of the most toxic substances identified by the ATSDR?

Yesterday's Detroit Free Press featured a photo of Ms. Henry's pristine white kitchen being vacuumed by members of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality. Do you suppose their findings of dioxin included cigarette ash? Why could MDEQ search for dioxin in Ms. Henry's home and yard but not in mine? I've lived here much longer than she has! ...and she stood right up and complained at the Tittabawassee Township CAP meeting on dioxin that she feared the University of Michigan study would not include HER! My biggest fear is they will not choose me because I don't think dioxin is a problem.

But I digress... I naturally had to google a cigarette smokers lungs and ended up not blogging here. I hope mine don't look like that. I was finally able to quit in April 1993, and I'm healthier and happier for that tough struggle. It was a Dow product that gave me the help I needed, by the way... Nicoderm which was a prescription drug then. Below is a bit of information for you and your Dow-hating buddies, Ms. Henry. This chart was part of the presentation at the May 26 community meeting on dioxin in Midland. Find more recent updates here.


Click the chart to read it better.
I wonder how many environmental extremist activists smoke something... Anyway, onward. I also want to share a related article from the Midland Daily News. This was sent to my by my friend Bill Egerer who also responded to the article on line. Pollutants are closer than you might think is a 'must read.'

Recently I've been finding myself conflicted since my neighbors and I became the 'filling' for a Dow Chemical/MDEQ dioxin sandwich.

I am a member of the Hackert Lake Association, whose existence and goals require interaction and cooperation with the MDEQ. I will remain a member of the association but I quit as webmaster of the Hackert Lake website I developed. Somebody else can easily take over maintenance. I also turned over responsibility for the Hackert Lake Reflections newsletter to somebody else. I cannot in all good conscience support efforts of MDEQ at the lake when I feel personally threatened by that same agency. I don't need the paranoia I felt when I saw the MDEQ's 40 foot boat on our little lake, drawing core samples... searching for a reason to find fault with my retreat away from my situation as a 'facility' here at home.

Now I'm 'loaded for bear' and ready to go!

Cleanup on the river floodplain

Yard cleanup of this magnitude is still a family affair! #5 daughter and her husband volunteered this year. Where did all those trees come from? Mostly from upstream during the four springtime floods. Just an FYI for our 'advocates,' the litigators, and their buddies the DEQ bureaucrats: This is how most residents clean up after a flood on the Tittabawassee River floodplain. We've been doing this for 45 years! Golly, where are all the sick people?

"To our knowledge there is no biological acceptable cause-effect model where the disease precedes the exposure"

Taken from article titled: DIOXIN: COMPARING APPLES AND ORANGES
by Ralph R. Cook and Janice B. Cartmill
Chemtech 1984, 14, pages 534-537

addendum to my day...

Besides correcting a typo in the earlier post my best friend just told me he heard a bit on the news; according to some accountants Michigan property tax payers will be paying twelve months in advance in summer 2007... not just six! Not sure how this came about but I believe it!

On a lighter note, there's a surgery in my near future. If you think I'm a bit of a bitch now, wait until they try to keep me down!

...and how did YOUR day go?

Okay I give up! I don't want to play anymore. The world around me has become a sewer infested with greed, apathy and ambition, sometimes verging toward legalized thievery! Socialism has invaded my space and I feel helpless in it's shadow.

The City of Saginaw - dubbed a Cool City by the Queen of Michigan... Ms. Granholm - subsequently showed her how cool they really are. Beyond the normal everyday summertime gangland activity, city officials caused a scandal by firing an employee for no apparent reason... appearances suggest it was racially motivated.

Now some history...Years ago Saginaw was actually able to vote to make it illegal for their property taxes to be increased. Rationale was that people outside of the city working in the city should pay taxes so the trade-off was a city income tax.

Mismanagement... whatever... current state of affairs brought about solutions! People moved out of the city into surrounding townships... make them pay the city's expenses. Last year they added the former Civic Center to the townships' list of expenses. Then Dow Chemical had too much money, what with cutting the payscale for longtime employees and all, so they donate an equal amount of money per year to the center... and all the center had to do was change the name! Where's our rebate?

But golly! The city STILL doesn't have enough money so they decided to rob the rest of Saginaw County one more time by charging double for the water supply in surrounding townships. A compromise solution exists... now the city decides maybe they can collect taxes from some of the surrounding communities... but aw shucks... probably only for a few years. Quote from The Saginaw News article:

"Kischnick, Nelson and Bayne have argued that the city should work with outlying areas on water supply to help promote development for the entire region. Council members, especially Andy Coulouris and Daniel G. Soza Jr., have answered that cheap water for locations such as Freeland and Birch Run would compound the so-called "urban sprawl" that already harms inner areas."

Urban sprawl!

...and then enter our State government. Our elected representatives have decided to keep charging more and more of our property taxes in the summertime so that in effect by 2007 we will be paying the state our total tax payment a whole six months earlier than previously!!! In our area only John Moolenaar did not turn on us. Thank you sir!

Top all this off with a small band of weirdos running around with a skull & crossbones across their chests - defaming the integrity of surrounding townships... trying to put one of the biggest employers in our area out of business on some superficial false charges... all in the name of environment.

I love this beautiful state... don't want to move but what do we have to do to get away from the idiocy... become hermits?

What's Up in the Extremist Activist World?

When they are not trying to intimidate and create fear in the public, they tend to lie... or at least it sounds like lies. For instance, to quote in their "meetings" list...

"Cancelled 07/27/04 The Dr. Linda Birnbaum meeting has been cancelled, reasons "unknown". Evidently, "someone" does not want her to visit the area. Dr. Birnbaum is a world renowned expert on dioxin and it's effects on humans and the environment. The MDEQ says they wil try again for this fall."

Exact quote... I know how to spell! Why if they respect Ms. Birnbaum, did LoneTree so quickly jump to a newly invigorated campaign after they learned she is a member of the Scientific Advisory Board for the University of Michigan study of the correlation between dioxin in the enivronment versus dioxin in the human body, using real people that really live where the dioxin exists? (Nobody has every checked my backyard!)

Are they afraid the results will confirm what I've been repeating here almost daily... that we are not sick!!!??? Are they afraid they can't maintain control over the Michigan Dept. of Environmental Quality if their (sounds like) science is proven as bad as real scientists say it is?

I would bet real money that the cigarettes will get you before the dioxin does! The best thing you can do for yourself is quit trying to get something for nothing... quit LoneTree and quit smoking! You will be happier, healthier and richer for your efforts.

A flipflop is a flipflop is a flipflop...

Hmmmm! Sound familiar?
Click for a bigger pic!

Immerman Park Clutter

Immerman Park... first time I've ever really walked in this lovely park so close to my home.
To view bigger images, click the photo.

The last time I came here to take pictures we were not allowed in... it was partially flooded and the environutz didn't want us there because we might contaminate ourselves... so we went home where the Tittabawassee River had invaded our own backyard!

This time the first thing we saw was a small group of individuals dressed in black & white with skull & crossbones across their chests... they had just completed a press conference. After they left we remained and hiked through the park. It was a perfect photo op day, cluttered only by paraphanalia demanded by environutz who had just left.

No, they didn't throw their papers and cigarette butts around; their clutter is more permanent. See the photo here? That big washing machine-looking thing is a 'cleanup station' - accompanied by a garbage can and an ugly yellow sign reminding people to wash their hands! There were yellow signs everywhere... different messages depending on where you stood! I have heard the nutz want more of those 'stations' - more of those ugly yellow signs - at all of our parks along the Tittabawassee! (Their lovely Skull & Crossbones sign added by yours truly. They would love for you to put one of those signs in your front yard!) God forgive them for they know not what they do.

ABC12.com: Talks ongoing with Dow Chemical, state

ABC12.com: Talks ongoing with Dow Chemical, state - If you missed it, here's Terry Camp's report of today's dioxin-related meeting down by the riverside! The film will self-destruct in 7 days, so view it now!

Down by the riverside

There was a meeting down by the river this morning...
...not highly publicized but when I heard about it I had to be there. Got there as soon as I could after a 10:00 a.m. medical appointment in Midland. Despite the fact that one person confronted me and asked me what sort of nasty thing I was going to write about her today, I met several very pleasant people. No time for more on this right now; I'd rather find out what the news media says about the meeting first anyway. Be sure to read The Saginaw News and Midland Daily News to find out all about it. Terry Camp from Channel 12 TV was there, so you should hear about it from him as well. Will be back to ramble later.
click the photo for a bigger view

Musing:

Musing: Answers to a few questions I've been asked on occasion.

1. When/If the dioxin issue is resolved, what will become of the divided community? Are we divided? I think not. My neighbor is a Democrat; I am a Republican. Same with some family members... we get along just fine! We accept our differences just like other areas of our lives!
2. Don't you know dioxin is a seriously toxic chemical? Of course dioxin is toxic... but in what quantities? Now that we finally have a study begun by the University of Michigan to find a correlation between dioxin in the soil and that in our bodies, let's get it done. Then, if there is a problem it will be defined and the culprit (Dow Chemical) should do whatever has to be done to fix the problem, if any.
3. Aren't you worried about how your backyard dioxin will affect your health in the future? What!???!! I've been around for 68 years, 43 of them in this house situated on the Tittabawassee River floodplain. We've experienced anywhere from one to four floods every single year, including the 100 year flood in 1986 that invaded the lower level of our home reaching a height of five feet! Before it got that high we waded in knee-deep river water to retrieve as many items as we could even as the river was rising! Our water pump was under water so we flushed our toilet with river water, scooping it up in pails from our back deck - which is located on the upper level of the house. We were without electricity throughout the event but didn't have to shut off power from the pole because the river finally quit rising just below the meter.
   
   The river stayed for two weeks before we could even go downstairs and walk in it. We encountered snakes and frogs, but strangely enough saw no fish as the river receded and slowly began to leave our home. When it was over, family members joined us in removing all the destroyed furniture, photographs and documents that were all in a jumble in various corners of the first floor where they had floated during the invasion. We scrubbed and cleaned and tore down paneling and floors and replaced it with new... all at our own expense of course, although the government and our former place of employment gave us loans with no interest.
   
   Even IRS documents were destroyed, which brought on another type of invasion... by federal government bureaucrats that charged us taxes we had already paid... just because they could... and further tortured us for the next two years! Did I mention this was our first year of retirement?
   
   Oooops! Forgot the question... no I'm not worried about my health in the future. If dioxin was gonna kill me it would have done it by now! Even with all the stress of a major flood we washed our hands before cooking or eating. I doubt we ingested any dioxin. However, if it could enter our bodies through the skin we must have been full of it!
4. Don't you think Dow should clean up their mess? Of course I do. I'm just not sure how bad that mess really is! It seems there are people who have taken a situation and bent it all out of proportion. I do not understand their rationale because such behavior is not within my scope of understanding. I cannot understand why... no matter what that company proposes to do, it is not enough for a certain segment of our society.
5. Why don't you want to be included in a class action lawsuit against Dow? Hmmm! Beyond reasons already discussed I would have to say... because I have no desire to fatten the pocketbooks of tort lawyers.
   
   I believe because of those lawyers our society has become overly litigious. I think it's a pretty sorry state of affairs where, for instance, a person can clumsily spill hot coffee in their lap and say it was the restaurant's fault for serving hot coffee! Wouldn't they be equally complaining if the coffee was NOT hot enough?

Now for the commercial...

When you are asked to participate in the University of Michigan study on the correlation between dioxin in your body and your surrounding environment, please do so. This is a very important study... well planned and set up with all sorts of oversight (see who is on the Scientific Advisory Board) to make sure it's done correctly.

I wrote a totally different set of 'Musing' yesterday but decided to mail it in as a letter to the editor. I sent it to all three local newspapers... The Saginaw News, Midland Daily News, and The Bay City Times. Let us see if they print it. If/after it is printed, I will publish a copy of it here... actually on our Links page.
P.S. I have a few more news articles to post as well. Soon, I promise!