Watch What Trump Is Doing, Not Saying

12/27/2018

Migrant Worker Center and Day-Care Center, Downwind from Chemicals, Kern County, California

It is beginning to dawn on me that President Trump is not merely some bloated orange spectacle from a reality show.

He is consciously presiding over the demolition of health in the country.

The New York Times ran one of those special public-interest sections on Thursday, the kind they seem to produce regularly – a Pulitzer-worthy section of the week.

This one was on the environment – in many of the corners where I used to work as a news reporter, including the Kanawha River in Almost Heaven, West Virginia.

The lead article is by Eric Lipton and John Branch, a great reporter with whom I had the privilege of working for a few years. John is based in his home state of California, and he already won a Pulitzer for his work on the science of a murderous avalanche.

Branch is a member of the sports department but they rarely send him out to cover games; he’s part of the direction the Times is going – important journalism being committed on a daily basis. (Yes, I miss baseball box scores and daily Mets coverage, but would choose the vital journalism being produced by the Times these days.)

Branch and Lipton write about the farmlands of Kern County, Calif., one of the major agriculture centers in the country.

Since Trump was inaugurated in January of 2017, in front of those yooge crowds in Washington, he has facilitated dozens of downgrades of environmental practice. The Times documents them in this section.

The presidential approval of pesticides in the vegetable garden of America could be poisoning you, wherever you are, but it is certainly sickening the workers – many of them brown and Spanish-speaking – the braceros, the obreros, who pick your lettuce, when they are not fainting and vomiting from the poisons Trump has let loose. The children's day-care center is downwind from the sprays.

The pesticide, named Chlorpyrifos -- why, look here, it’s from our old friend Dow Chemical -- belongs to a class of chemicals developed as a nerve gas made by Nazi Germany, as Nicholas Kristof wrote in a Times column in 2017:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/10/28/opinion/sunday/chlorpyrifos-dow-environmental-protection-agency.html

Kristof added that the nerve gas is “now found in food, air and drinking water. Human and animal studies show that it damages the brain and reduces I.Q.s while causing tremors among children. It has also been linked to lung cancer and Parkinson’s disease in adults.”

This poison is now being sprayed all over Kern County, killing insects and sickening humans and also enriching the companies and the politicians that enable this toxic man.

Congratulations to the newspaper and web site that grow more serious and more invaluable all the time.

Here’s the on-line version of the article by John Branch and Eric Lipton:

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/12/26/us/politics/donald-trump-environmental-regulation.html

Brian Savin

12/28/2018 10:20:22 am

Merry Christmas, George. More Trump porn. This has been a very, very long-simmering dispute and it is important to note that it was not set to be banned until Obama was safely OUT OF OFFICE. So, I detect a bit of pandering and duplicity involved, don't you? What we technically have here is the continuation of the status quo and more work to be done in science and courts. Trump appointed Sec. Pruitt and he's now gone. We'll see what happens.

More important to me is the demise of the NYT sports department you recognize in this piece. They can't afford it. And I've dropped my subscription some time ago. My observation is that the Times exits now solely to produce Trump Porn for the very Swamp that threw nearly half of U.S. workers out of work. I agree with you that corporate greed is alive and well, but it is also living in places where maybe you're not looking yet. Keep looking.
.

George Vecsey

12/28/2018 02:35:00 pm

Brian, we have lots of time while Trump scientists and more scoundrels like Pruitt do their deeds.
How did you like the porn about Fred Trump's friendly neighborhood podiatrist and the phantom heel spur and the Vietnam War?
This guy learned his lessons well from his daddy. The cat's in the cradle, etc., Harry Chapin had it right.
GV

Brian Savin

12/28/2018 03:44:13 pm

Funny how with all the stuff slinging, nothing sticks. But you have inspired me to illustrate what I mean when I encourage you to keep looking for corporate greed: The Times is hardly in the vanguard of the environmental movement, now, is it?

https://dailycaller.com/2018/12/27/new-york-times-private-jets/

However, it certainly is in the vanguard of fostering and peddling Trump Porn on behalf of their corporate benefactors who, with Times management, can't find the money to fund a sports department any more, or anything else off script. The old Times died years ago. Too bad....but it never was as good as the Herald Tribune (with apologies to JFK).

Ed Martin

12/28/2018 04:15:05 pm

When I was pursuing graduate studies at Pitt an eon ago, B.F. Skinner was reporting research on reinforcing desired behavior and extinguishing undesired behavior. It turns out that while rewards increase behavior, punishment does not extinguish negative behavior, it is, somehow, a reinforcer. Instead, not responding, not commenting, i.e., ignoring the behavior, is the most effective way to reduce or eliminate undesirable behavior. Knowing your gentle and humane qualities, you may not wish to follow this path with Brian. Happy New Year.

Brian Savin

12/28/2018 06:00:37 pm

Ed,
“Gentle and humane” are hardly the qualities to ascribe to abject hate, which is exactly what I object to in George’s posts on Trump. He knows better, but he does it anyway. It is good you are on a good man’s side, but ignorance of reality is cause for examination, not celebration. Trump is serving us, not himself. And, he knows exactly what he is doing, and so do I. Respect that maybe you don’t have all the answers. Ask questions.
Happy New Year.
Best
Brian

Randolph

12/29/2018 09:55:47 am

George,

Spot on!
Donald Trump is a truly brilliant con man. Much like a great magician, he keeps people focused on emotionally charged topics, while he robs them of their freedoms and future .

The two articles below come from the New York Times. They outline the Environmental genocide he is committing on the planet:
78 Environmental Rules on
the Way Out Under Trump and New E.P.A. Plan Could Free Coal Plants to Release More Mercury Into the Air

More mercury in the air. Yes my friend, the term Mad Hatter is back in style.

Randy

PS In a few minutes, I will go on a 4 mile run along the Kanawha River in West Virginia. My run is in close proximity to a coal fired power plant.
Several years ago, my wife’s cousin woke up to find that every plant, hundreds, in his large garden had wilted and died overnight. An unusual wind had carried the emissions from the power plant to his land. Every vegetable, every flower was dead .
Reversing the current environmental standards is more than unethical. It is criminal.

Hansen Alexander link

12/29/2018 02:02:32 pm

George, a great overview of the poisoning of America by the powerful chemical industry. Trump's frenzied effort to ignore every rule that goes with the EPA is obviously deliberate and destructive. There is no delicate balancing of environment against employment such as in Checkov's "Cherry Orchard" with Trump. There is only a Freudian and sadistic desire to strike out and destroy all before him. A misguided Sampson who is going to pull the entire country down upon his head and the head of every American. He is truly a Monster for the ages, particularly for a ruler in a democratic society.

bruce

1/1/2019 02:34:18 pm

hansen,

just read your piece with george.

enjoyed it immensely.

bruce

bruce

12/30/2018 09:21:41 am

george,

in trump's defence, i just read that mercury being dumped into water is going to be ok.

if his environmental 'folks' say mercury is ok, well, who could argue with their opinion?

as for mr savin, more condescension and craziness about the evil, lying slimeball your country managed to foist on itself and, even more unfortunately, planet earth.

bruce

Gene Palumbo

12/30/2018 03:43:25 pm

Here's a jaw-dropper for the ages, courtesy of Brian, who assures us that "Trump is serving us, not himself."

What can one say in the face of a statement like that, and in the face of all the evidence to the contrary?

Read it and weep.

bruce

12/30/2018 03:54:12 pm

gene,

brian never loses the ability to surprise--and dumbfound--us.

nor does his hero.

bruce

Brian Savin

12/30/2018 08:57:56 pm

In my long experience I have found that ad hominem is the exclusive domain of the ignorant, the schemers and the defamers. No person of learning, breeding or intellectual confidence trades in that coin.

bruce

12/30/2018 09:12:57 pm

brian,

this from a man who called a fellow troll a f***ing a*****e on this site.

good you know what ad hominem means.

now look up irony.

hope 2019 isn't too stressful for you after the guy investigating your boy releases his report.

bruce

John McDermott

12/31/2018 11:49:54 am

And we all know that Donald Trump, a man of such obvious great “learning, breeding and intellectual confidence” would never stoop to making ad hominem attacks on anyone...oh, wait a minute...cancel that. I like Lebron’s very succinct but so on-point summing up of Trump: “He’s a bum.”

Brian Savin

12/31/2018 08:05:27 pm

Donald Trump is our President, John. He is under constant ad hominem attack, including your added ad hominem. I don’t seecan intelligent responsive comment in response in this thread, or in George’s post. If you guys aren’t embarrassed, you should be. You have nothing to offer anyone except to take solace in collective ignorance. Ignorance seems to be bliss in this blog. I miss intelligent discussion, which I had with George for many years. Maybe I’ve been wrong. Send in the clowns, George.

bruce

12/31/2018 08:20:37 pm

brian,

to quote that great American, john McEnroe, 'you cannot be serious'.

fortunately, trump's not my president, nor my PM.

trump's specialities are lying, bullying and ad hominen attacks.

and I have been on the receiving of this site's resident trump troll's (that's you) ad hominem attacks.

some self analysis might be in order before you throw that out there again.

and, of course, I say this with the utmost love and respect.

bruce

ps--did your boy have anything to do with the shellacking in the November elections?

Brian Savin

12/31/2018 08:32:21 pm

Fuck off, troll. George, I quit. You are now presiding over a completely intellectually dishonest propaganda blog of ad hominem attacks on our President and anyone who offers contrarian views to your own. Shame on you. If you have any honesty left in you, save it for advice to your family to dissociate from from your old propaganda machine.
I wish you well.
Best
Brian

bruce

12/31/2018 08:38:48 pm

george,

you're welcome.

you can buy me dinner.

if you don't mind, i'd like to choose maxim's en paris.

however, i'm going to miss my fellow troll who, it might be added, has never indulged in those ad thingy attacks he was always on about.

bruce

George

12/31/2018 08:52:58 pm

Wait. Was that a New Year’s resolution i heard?
They never last.
Thank goodness.
GV

Randolph

1/1/2019 09:23:57 am

Hansen and George,

Thanks for the nice interview. Well done!
Happy new year to you young fellows.
Randy

George Vecsey

1/1/2019 09:59:20 am

Randy, thanks for looking at it. It was a fun exercise to go back over some parts of career. My college life looms large....in retrospect. Was in a great place and time, for me. You were running along the Kanawha? How did that work out? Worst run I ever took was in Chapultepec Park in Mexico, a day after arriving for 1986 World Cup. Inhaled some of the worst air in the world....at altitude....and was messed up for weeks...until the air conditioning went on in the plane heading back to NYC. I love Mexico for people and culture...but inhaled too much, too soon, upon arrival.Be well, GV

John McDermott

1/3/2019 01:01:06 am

George we must have passed each other gasping for air that day in Chapultepec Park! Weeks later, and presumably better acclimated, I played in a Europe vs. Rest of the World media game, which actually included a number of ex-pros who were working for papers or TV. 90 minutes of sucking for air and more or less jogging around in a large, mostly empty stadium in the midfle of Mexico City. It felt like an out-of-body experience. But we did win-on penalties!

Gene Palumbo

1/2/2019 01:12:36 am

I almost missed something very fine. And maybe I'm not the only one. When I saw Bruce's and Randolph's comments about a Hansen/George piece, I couldn't figure out what they were talking about. I was about to send George an email, asking "What did I miss?" when, finally, I saw, in the upper righthand corner of the page, the reference to the interview. I could easily have missed it altogether, which would have been a shame. Hansen, what excellent questions. And George, what fine responses.

For the future, here's a request to all of you: to help those of us who, with tunnel vision, look only at the blog entries themselves, and forget to look at the rest of the page: next time this happens, please do a very specific shout out, to alert us to "outside the box" items like this one. Thanks.

bruce

1/2/2019 01:27:18 am

gene,

I did miss it, but I emailed george to ask what i'd missed.

cheers,

bruce

Comments are closed.

QUOTES

Measuring Covid Deaths, by David Leonhardt. July 17, 2023. NYT online.
The United States has reached a milestone in the long struggle against Covid: The total number of Americans dying each day — from any cause — is no longer historically abnormal….

After three horrific years, in which Covid has killed more than one million Americans and transformed parts of daily life, the virus has turned into an ordinary illness.

The progress stems mostly from three factors:
First, about three-quarters of U.S. adults have received at least one vaccine shot.
Second, more than three-quarters of Americans have been infected with Covid, providing natural immunity from future symptoms. (About 97 percent of adults fall into at least one of those first two categories.)
Third, post-infection treatments like Paxlovid, which can reduce the severity of symptoms, became widely available last year.
“Nearly every death is preventable,” Dr. Ashish Jha, who was until recently President Biden’s top Covid adviser, told me. “We are at a point where almost everybody who’s up to date on their vaccines and gets treated if they have Covid, they rarely end up in the hospital, they almost never die.”

That is also true for most high-risk people, Jha pointed out, including older adults — like his parents, who are in their 80s — and people whose immune systems are compromised. “Even for most — not all but most —immuno-compromised people, vaccines are actually still quite effective at preventing against serious illness,” he said. “There has been a lot of bad information out there that somehow if you’re immuno-compromised that vaccines don’t work.”

That excess deaths have fallen close to zero helps make this point: If Covid were still a dire threat to large numbers of people, that would show up in the data.

One point of confusion, I think, has been the way that many Americans — including we in the media — have talked about the immuno-compromised. They are a more diverse group than casual discussion often imagines.

Most immuno-compromised people are at little additional risk from Covid — even people with serious conditions, such as multiple sclerosis or a history of many cancers. A much smaller group, such as people who have received kidney transplants or are undergoing active chemotherapy, face higher risks.

Covid’s toll, to be clear, has not fallen to zero. The C.D.C.’s main Covid webpage estimates that about 80 people per day have been dying from the virus in recent weeks, which is equal to about 1 percent of overall daily deaths.

The official number is probably an exaggeration because it includes some people who had virus when they died even though it was not the underlying cause of death. Other C.D.C. data suggests that almost one-third of official recent Covid deaths have fallen into this category. A study published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases came to similar conclusions.

Dr. Shira Doron, the chief infection control officer at Tufts Medicine in Massachusetts, told me that “age is clearly the most substantial risk factor.” Covid’s victims are both older and disproportionately unvaccinated. Given the politics of vaccination, the recent victims are also disproportionately
Republican and white.

Each of these deaths is a tragedy. The deaths that were preventable — because somebody had not received available vaccines and treatments — seem particularly tragic. (Here’s a Times guide to help you think about when to get your next booster shot.)
***

From the great Maureen Dowd:

As I write this, I’m in a deserted newsroom in The Times’s D.C. office. After working at home for two years during Covid, I was elated to get back, so I could wander around and pick up the latest scoop.
But in the last year, there has been only a smattering of people whenever I’m here, with row upon row of empty desks. Sometimes a larger group gets lured in for a meeting with a platter of bagels."

--- Dowd writes about the lost world of journalists clustered in newsrooms at all hours, smoking, drinking, gossipping, making phone calls, typing, editing.
***
"Putting out the paper," we called it.
Much more than nostalgia.
---https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/29/opinion/journalism-newsroom.html

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