One of the great American fears is that one day terrorists, perhaps brown Muslim men with huge beards, robes and fake Syrian passports, will poison our water supply and kill us by the millions. It turns out that the fear was partly accurate — the water supply in an important American city has been poisoned, but not by ISIS. Instead, the culprits are conservative white men who look much more like “Mad Men” cast members.
That’s kind of how we roll in the United States. Our politicians scared the hell out of people in a rushed attempt to ban Syrian refugees from entering our country while real threats, with staggering implications, happen right under our nose.
The public water in Flint, Mich., is so bad, so toxic, so dangerous, that tests confirmed it had over 900 times the EPA limit for lead particles. Taps have been shut off at schools, residents are being urged not to take showers or drink from faucets, bottled water is being shipped in by the truck load, but the damage already done is massive.
As far back as 2014, residents — complaining that hundreds of children were growing ill, getting awful rashes, and that the water supply smelled horrific — were basically ignored by state officials. People were complaining of hair loss and mood changes. The water was frequently the color of rust. Businesses, including General Motors, just flat out stopped using water from Flint because it was rusting their parts and machines. Tests on children throughout Flint showed that the levels of lead in their bodies doubled and tripled during this time.
Rushing to improve the problems, the state dumped insane levels of chlorine into the water supply — which was so dangerous that it began eating through and corroding the pipes — and actually elevated the lead levels even more. To fix this, the chlorine levels were then taken down too low, which allowed horrific bacterial strains to grow.
To say that the predominantly white state government failed to take this problem seriously in a timely manner is a gross understatement. Flint, a predominantly black city of nearly 100,000 residents, was basically left on its own for more than a year.
Conservative Republican Gov. Rick Snyder, who came into power on the reputation of getting hard work done, didn’t treat the water supply like it was an emergency in 2014, or in 2015. Instead, in January of 2016, with the eyes of the world on him, and an outrageous amount of damage already done, he finally broke down and declared a state of emergency.
It’s been an emergency though. Lead poisoning causes irreversible brain damage. TTHM, which was released in the water, can cause liver/kidney damage and increases the likelihood of cancer.
Emails and documents reveal that state officials knew this was a full-blown crisis at least as far back as the summer of 2015, if not earlier.
Six months ago, Dennis Muchmore, then chief of staff to Gov. Snyder, wrote an email to a top health department official:
“I’m frustrated by the water issue in Flint,” he wrote. “I really don’t think people are getting the benefit of the doubt. Now they are concerned and rightfully so about the lead level studies they are receiving. These folks are scared and worried about the health impacts and they are basically getting blown off by us (as a state we’re just not sympathizing with their plight).”
He retired a month after sending that email. Now multiple state health employees have resigned in shame.
None of it is enough.
What we have here is a horrific clash of race, class, politics and public health.
In his 2014 re-election bid, Gov. Snyder won 70 out of 83 Michigan counties. He was only blown out in a few of the remaining 13 — with Genesee County, home of Flint, being one of them. Not only that, but African-Americans voted for his opponent en masse. Consequently, when he started his second term, it’s not a leap to say that Gov. Snyder didn’t feel like he owed Flint or black voters much of anything. That would sound like an awful generalization if the reality of the water crisis in Flint didn’t actually prove it.
The actions of Gov. Snyder and his administration from 2014 until now suggest that they really didn’t gave a crap. Leading health experts are now saying that it is all but guaranteed that thousands of children there will now experience severe health, cognitive and behavioral problems as a result of this negligence.
See, here’s the thing — if it had been a Muslim immigrant with a fake Syrian passport who did this to the children of Flint, instead of a bunch of conservatives in business suits, the problem would’ve likely been fixed a long time ago.
