STEVE PIECZENIK TALKS

American Water: The Foundations for Environmental Racism [Michigan] and Class Warfare [Florida]!

I recently attended a local town meeting on the disproportionate power of public companies like Plum Creek [from Washington State]  and  other mega-corporations usurping the power and privileges of local county governments. I have never been involved in local politics; nor have I ever witnessed the relentless insurgencies of paid operatives who work on behalf of multi-billion dollar public companies like Plum Creek. Basically, this company is a real estate investment trust which buys up cheap lands and rezones them so that they can be ‘flipped’ to another buyer at a higher price.

In principle, ‘flipping’ is not illegal. However, when a public company like Plum Creek asserts that it will “create a new town over millions of acres” ---the  connotation is quite clear. Their past history in Montana and other parts of the country have demonstrated that Plum Creek, a combination of Weyerhaeuser and Georgia Pacific, have had very little to do with any form of business enhancement in the promised areas of acquisition; and instead have pilfered the local land and water rights as a way of enticing future builders to buy their “rezoned lands”. 

What a company like Plum Creek really does on the local level is to create class warfare; wherein the middle class ends up fighting with a disenfranchised minority class to prevent the mega-corporation from usurping the wetlands and unimproved lands from being used as a “pawn” for the rezoning of millions of acres that were never going to be developed in the first place.  In the lingo of the intelligence world, Plum Creek, and other companies like it, use “Agitation Propaganda” [Agit Prop.] to stir up a frightening division between people in a local community who should be working with each other rather than fighting each other.

In neo-Marxist terms, this is called, “class warfare” in the guise of crony-capitalism where the use of public funds from the IPO are transformed into a powerful political weapon brandished against any and all caring opposition; be it a concerned citizen or a dutiful commissioner. 

Similarly, Michigan has evidenced another form of environmental usurpation which has been accurately entitled “environmental racism”. The recent failures and incompetent management by Michigan Governor Rick Snyder over the disastrous water pollution problem in Flint, Michigan evidences a clear pattern of discrimination against the African-American community whose water was highly contaminated with lead and other corrosive foul metals. Snyder was and still is unwilling to assume responsibility for his inept performance as a Chief-Manager of Michigan. Instead, like Governor Rick Scott of Florida, he is willing to spend whatever funds are necessary to hire a private consulting firm to manage “his optics”[translated CYA].

I have not turned into a commie sympathizer. Yet, I have warned all you good people for over twenty five years when I first wrote State of Emergency that our federal, state and local officials will inevitably enter into a conflict regarding our most precious limited resource in the world: WATER!  At the time I wrote the novel, I was derided for attempting to portray an episode between federal and state officials in the southwest that would eventually lead to a Second Civil War.

Now let me state categorically that if the governors and officials of every state of the union do not heed the wishes of their citizenry and instead bow to the imperatives of mega-corporations; then conflict will arise, once the tainted rational processes abate.

I hope that my prediction is wrong!
I am leery of “crony capitalism” which is neither capitalism nor invested with the desire to impart fairness into any arena of their endeavor. Be it “environmental  racism”or “class warfare”, I warn my fellow citizens to become active in their respective communities and stop the destruction of our land/water resources by the rapacious greed of those companies and individuals whom we have funded with our public acquiescence [an IPO or election].

American land and water belongs to no one person or company. It is an asset which belongs in principle and deed to those who nurture and care for its future. A public company like Plum Creek can be easily dissolved by a stockholder lawsuit; SEC investigations for illicit bribes and intimidation; or even a hostile takeover.

However, our waters and wetlands are not impervious to man’s follies. They are the legacy that we give to the future generations.
I will end with a quote from the famous Dean William R. Inge of Cambridge University [UK]:

“It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favor of vegetarianism while the wolf remains of a different opinion.”