U.S. Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg has been repeatedly criticized for transportation problems, including the holiday pile up at our ports that slowed delivery of goods in December. He was also criticized for his response to the recent airport shutdown. I have not joined in that criticism because I am not sure that he has direct responsibility for some of these problems. However, Buttigieg recently raised a legal claim to blame the Trump Administration for the train disaster in East Palestine, Ohio. The claim was not only manifestly false but Buttigieg knew or should have known it was false. The implications are deeply disturbing. When confronted with a disaster, Buttigieg not only made a false claim but attempted to weaponize a tragedy against political opponents. That is a serious problem for a public figure and worthy of condemnation.
Buttigieg was criticized for his delay in responding publicly to the Ohio disaster and his even longer delay in going to the site. Again, while a politically tone deaf, I was not one of those critics. It is possible to respond to a tragedy without being at the scene. However, the Administration (including the President) were clearly losing ground in its response with many noting the absence of both the President and Transportation Secretary in Ohio after the wreck.
When Buttigieg finally made it to the scene, significant time had passed and many of the details were known publicly on the cause. Buttigieg presumably had even earlier and better information, including the statements of the train crew on the cause.
The crew of the freight train received a warning about an overheating wheel bearing and tried to slow the train in response. According to the report of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), the wheel bearing was heating up for several miles before reaching 253 degrees Fahrenheit hotter than the air temperature. The train engineer employed the brakes and the automatic braking system also activated, but fifty of the train’s 149 cars derailed with 11 carrying toxic chemicals.
Given his delay in visiting the site, Buttigieg had more information on the cause of the derailment than just the initial accounts. However, he falsely claimed that “we’re constrained by law on some areas of rail regulation,” and cited “the braking rule withdrawn by the Trump administration in 2018 because of a law passed by Congress in 2015.”
This false claim was picked up by various pundits and politicians, including figures like Joy Behar on the The View. That included Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) who went to the Senate floor and declared that, in 2017,
“the Trump administration repealed requirements for an electronic braking system because, according to them, the safety benefits were not worth the cost. I think the people of East Palestine now know that analysis was wrong and that they’re suffering the consequences of rail companies putting profits over people.”
Yet, politicians and pundits often weaponize tragedy. A Secretary of Transportation is needed to establish the facts and assure the public that safety, not politics, is driving decisionmaking during a crisis. Buttigieg clearly failed that test in spectacular fashion.
National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) Chair Jennifer Homendy took the opposite approach and stated the facts dispassionately and without a political spin. She stated that the rule raised by Buttigieg would have applied only to trains classified as high-hazard flammable trains: “This means even if the rule had gone into effect, this train wouldn’t have had ECP brakes.”
Homendy sounded more like a cabinet member than Buttigieg when she declared “Enough with the politics on this. I don’t understand why this has gotten so political. This is a community that is suffering. This is not about politics.” Homendy added that anyone who says otherwise is “spreading misinformation.”
Given this Administration’s long use of disinformation and misinformation as rationales for censorship, the statement was particularly poignant. Would the Biden Administration demand that Buttigieg be censored by social media in making this claim as it has done with conservative speakers or posters? After all, this was a false claim made on a current public health emergency.
Of course, I would not censor Buttigieg. It is sufficient (as shown this week) that free speech allows for good speech to counter bad speech. However, it is another example of how subjective censorship can be when you go into the business of barring views deemed disinformation.
Even The Washington Post called out the claims of Buttigieg. In a Monday column, Glenn Kessler stated
“We decided to examine every possible regulatory change made under Trump that could be related to the accident and assess whether it could have made an impact. From our analysis, none of the regulatory changes made during the Trump administration at this point can be cited as contributing to the accident.”
At a time of tragedy, presidents ideally try to rally a nation to a common cause and shared suffering. They do not always succeed. However, cabinet members are expected to show complete detachment from politics in dealing with tragedies to assure the public that public safety is not being balanced against political expediencies. That is why this false claim is so serious. One of the first major statements made by Buttigieg at the scene was to attack the former president and the expected opponent to President Biden in 2024.
Buttigieg went off the tracks with this political spin. He should apologize.
Grand Bunk Railroad
The Biden Administration has been in charge for the past 3 years. They did absolutely nothing to prevent the disaster in East Palestine. The Biden Administration claims to have known about train safety issues in 2018 when another administration was in charge but have done nothing since they are in charge. Finger pointing by politicians seeking to use tragedy to further their political power trips.
While you are correct,
The FACT is that none of this had anything to do with this accident.
Despite the finger pointing – neither Trump, nor Biden are responsible for this accident.
No regulation under consideration would have had any effect.
I doubt there is any rational way to address this problem through regulation.
Hot Boxes, broken axles and derailments are extremely rare per million ton miles.
The problem is that the US has massive numbers of Ton Miles so there will be derailments.
Regardless we are still trying to control a very very very rare event. And that is very difficult or even impossible.
The ACTUAL issue is not what caused this – and nether the Biden nor Trump administration – or even Norfolk Southern have
real responsibility there.
It is how was this dealt with once it happened.
Trump scored a major political victory – by coming, bringing water, and connecting with people.
PotHole Pete and our Demented President failed. They made it clear – that the people of east palestine – and the rest of “fly over country” does not matter to them.
There are also separate issues such as whether the specific responses to the disaster were the correct responses.
As skeptical as I am of government – indications are that they likely were correct. This stuff was inevitably going to catch fire and expode,
and better to do so deliberately.
That does not mean the results were good. Just the best possible.
Actually I intended what I wrote to be somewhat tongue in cheek. I do understand that technically, whatever the Trump administration failed to implement (note: the Biden administration failed too) wouldn’t have had any effect on what actually happened. I just get tired of people saying it’s the previous administration’s fault when they did nothing themselves. People trying to point back to a time in 2018 when the previous administration didn’t act is not an excuse for the current administration failure to act for the past 3 years. This is what I mean by politicization. Trying to fool people (and they succeed as evidenced in comments here) into thinking “it’s someone else’s fault”. When I look at the quality of people in the Administration as well as elected office, I can only say we aren’t sending the nation’s best to run this country.
I suspected you were writing tongue in cheek.
While I agree with much of what you are saying.
I have been pushing two related but different points.
Perfection is not achievable – and quite often not even desirable.
Often doing nothing IS the best choice.
It is possible – even probable that because of the nationwide attention the East Palestine accident attained that some brilliant person may derive some efficient means to reduce the frequency of hot box driven derailments,.
And I would encourage brainstorming to that end.
But an answer is NOT coming from government regulation.
Detecting and addressing hot boxes in some fashion that is worth the cost would require some kind of very creative solution.
Every single freight car has atleast 8 wheel bearings, There is no power on a rail car, batter powered solutions will fail just because of problems with batteries. While monitoring wheel bearing temperatures is not difficult. Multiply that by 8 or more bearings per car, times 100+ cars per train and you have a gargantuan task.
Next consider that your monitoring solution is itself going to have errors – false positives, and the cost to prevent these types of problems could be enormous.
I have actually developed computer systems to detect overtorquing axles to near failure for farm equipment.
While the problem is the same, the cost benefit analysis is completely different.
Modern farm equipment is all fully powered – along with a CAN communications and control network.
And the equipment I was working with there was a financial benefit to operating it at very close to its failure point,
so long as failure was prevented. Completing a harvest a few days fast can be worth enormous amounts of money.
While the cost of an axle failure if you run close to the limits without sensors is also very large.
None of this is true on a train. Rail undercarraiges are massively overdesigned and do not normally operate anywhere close to limits. Rolling stock is designed to go hundreds of thousands of miles with ZERO maintance – and they are very successful at that.
That frequency of failures in relation to the miles traveled is miniscule.
And NORMALLY the cost of a failure is sufficiently low that it is not worth the cost of prevention.
Further you can not just decide to project high value or high risk cargo – because a failure on a low value car can still result in the derailment of a high risk car several cars back.
Put more simply – this is not likely a preventable problem.
I can think of a few ways to significantly reduce the frequency – strategically placed scanners at the sides of the track where there is power could look for hot boxes on trains as that pass, as an example. but that will not eliminate this problem only reduce its frequency.
Like Kamala Harris, Mayor Pete Buttigieg is a historic choice for a senior role in the Biden administration. Cut the guy some slack. You racist. You homophobe. You racist homophobe.
@ killer…
Was that your attempt at sarcasm.
Joe Biden is the worst POTUS in the history of this country.
Jimmy Carter can now die with that knowledge he’s no longer the worst.
Obama? He’d be cheering this news except that there’s the rumor Biden is a proxy agent for him.
Like Kamala Harris Buttigieg is a FAILURE in his role.
Almost no one gives a Schiff about the “historic” nature of their appointments.
The problem is their lack of competence.
There are no participation Trophy’s for failure in crucial roles.
Unfortunately there are trophies. These incompetents will write (or have ghostwritten for them) books and they’ll go on the lecture circuit like James Comey. It’s disgusting.
The Trump Years:
A Total List Of Environmental Rollbacks
Over four years, the Trump administration dismantled major climate policies and rolled back many more rules governing clean air, water, wildlife and toxic chemicals.
In all, a New York Times analysis, based on research from Harvard Law School, Columbia Law School and other sources, counts nearly 100 environmental rules officially reversed, revoked or otherwise rolled back under Mr. Trump. More than a dozen other potential rollbacks remained in progress by the end but were not finalized by the end of the administration’s term.
The bulk of the rollbacks identified by the Times were carried out by the Environmental Protection Agency, which weakened Obama-era limits on planet-warming carbon dioxide emissions from power plants and from cars and trucks; removed protections from more than half the nation’s wetlands; and withdrew the legal justification for restricting mercury emissions from power plants.
At the same time, the Interior Department worked to open up more land for oil and gas leasing by limiting wildlife protections and weakening environmental requirements for projects. The Department of Energy loosened efficiency standards for a wide range of products.
Edited From:
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/climate/trump-environment-rollbacks-list.html#:~:text=In%20all%2C%20a%20New%20York,rolled%20back%20under%20Mr.%20Trump.
…………………………………………………..
With all these rollbacks under his belt, Trump actually had the audacity to show up at the derailment site claiming he would have prevented such accidents.
This article, by the way, gives a complete breakdown of all the environmental rules the Trump administration discarded. It appears that Trump’s main concern was pleasing corporate donors.
Anonymous Green Body.. the ‘rollbacks’ you outline, whether accurate or not, have Nothing to do with the Accident in East Palestine… ergo your logic saying Trump should not show up and also not say he would work to prevent such Accidents to happen is illogical and a silly stab in the back….
.
Anonymous knows nothing. His comments are Trump bad which is a sure sign of one who doesn’t think.
They have nothing to do with anything at all.
There are virtually no business recycling laws in the US – Why ?
Because no impetus is necessary for businesses to recycle. Businesses that produce large amounts of waste must pay to dispose of that waste. If they can turn that waste into a product that someone else will buy – even at a loss, it is still cheaper than paying to remove the waste.
Conversely residential recycling laws have been a disaster – the net environmental impact of residential recycling has been NEGATIVE
More oil is consumed recycling plastic than is saved – and most recycling collected today ends up either in landfills or being burnt anyway.
The higher our standard of living the greater the value we place on life, the more we do in our personal and business lives to increase our safety. Businesses have not paid much attention to OSHA in decades – because their own workplace safety standards are higher.
Not only is the value of labor sufficient to care more about safety, but the negative impact of safety problems on production drive better workplace safety. Shutting a production line down for a few minutes is expensive.
REPEATING – the higher our standard of living is the more that all these things the left worries about take care of themselves.
This is not merely true in the US but throughout the world.
Nations at the same standard of living as the US in the past, generally have identical conditions in terms of cleanliness, environment, and safety. That is not accuident and it has nothing to do with laws.
Norfolk and Southern and the entire rail industry will get a black eye from this, and likely see numerous lawsuits – that they will lose.
You can pretty much guarantee that they will do better in the future.
The cause of this accident was a “hot box” – an overheating wheel bearing. That resulted in an axle breaking.
I have no idea what the fix for this is – neither do regulators.
The bearings on rail cars are the results of more than a century of development – they work incredibly well, they last far longer than bearings in cars and with far less maintanence. Rail cars travel millions of miles without bearing failures.
The problem is that they really do travel millions of miles. So even though such failures are very rare, the number of cars and the miles traveled is high enough that ever rare events happen – about a thousand times a year.
Trains are relatively simple devices. There is no electronics, no sensors, no electricty in the hundreds of cars that make up a train.
It is almost pure luck to discover a “hot box”.
I do not know how the railroads will resolve this. The average railcar has 8 of these bearings. That means there were over 800 on the NS train that derailed. Only ONE failed – probably after millions of miles.
I can come up with solutions – but all my ideas have problems – sensors require power, and there is no power in trains, and sensors themselves fail. Even a 1% failure rate would mean 8 failures on every train trip with 100 cars.
But despite my inability to figure out how the railroads will solve this problem – I will bet heavily that they will find a simple and cost effective means to do so. They do not want disasters like this – they are expensive and bad for business.
“planet-warming carbon dioxide emissions”
Ha ha ha. Thank you for making me laugh. The incessant, infantile, political, and NOT scientific, screaming and yabbering about “planet-warming carbon dioxide emissions” is the most hilarious modern version of the “the sky is falling” rooster malarkey.
Oh yes, the whole “Covid is going to kill us all” crapshow was rather funny too – except for the damage it caused.
Great We should be reversing stupid environmental rules – particularly Climate ones that have no benefit and significant harm.
I doubt this had a Damn thing to do with “corporate donors” and likely far more to do with improving our standard of living.
Can you name a single claim of impending environmental doom that has actually occurred ?
The reality – in the US and throughout the world is that humans have been getting “Cleaner and Greener” pretty much forever.
Contra left wing nuts past humans – even “native americans” were incredibly dirty and destructive of the environment.
They were not “dangerous” because they were tiny in number.
But all this should be obvious from more modern history.
Humans throughout the world have changed from burning dung ($hit) and peat and wood, to burning coal, and then to oil, and then to gas.
They have done so without govenrment impetus, or laws.
They have done so often where the new form of energy was more costly.
They have done so because of convenience and because of cost.
Little is worse for health and environment that burning dung or wood.
Coal was once sold as clean energy – because it is much cleaner and healthier than wood or dung. Oil was sold as cleaner than coal, and gas as cleaner than oil.
Cleaner is also healthier. We have radically reduced the rate of childhood death in the US.
The largest single factor in that has been by heating our homes more cleanly.
Again Government had nothing to do with that.
I can go on and on.
The FACT is that Government regulations have NEVER had an actual positive impact on much of anything.
As our standard of living rises humans automatically start slowly living better cleaner, safer, more efficient less wasteful lives.
Whether it is safety rules, environmental rules. or …. government is unnecescry.
Can you find ANYTHING, where the govenrment imposed a rule and there was a clear change in trend that followed imposing that rule ?
ANYTHING ?
The US forced people to use Safety Belts in cars, and car seats for kids – but there is no evidence in automobile safety trends of either of these and myriads of other rules. Travel has slowly become safer – because as we have a higher standard of living we have more to spend on safety.
The improvement in human life has nothing to do with government – that is self evident because all aspects of human life have been improving long before government took the slightest interest.
I have absolutely nothing against “environmentalism” – I have everything against giving government more power.
“The FACT is that Government regulations have NEVER had an actual positive impact on much of anything.” Indeed, John.
The passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) is a prime example. I opposed the ADA from this standpoint – it has always been good business practice to attract everyone – regardless of race, color, physical mobility, etc. – who wants to buy your product or service. Businesses had already begun the switch, making their buildings friendlier to their less mobile customers because it was attracting more new and return business. Unfortunately, the ADA only ensured smaller business, renting space in buildings that would not or could not afford renovations, failed. Some small businesses were able to move, others folded and didn’t come back. There’s no record of how many people lost their livelihoods to the ADA mandate. But a new industry did crop up almost overnight: lawsuits against the remaining businesses accused of not meeting the new facilities standards. As someone else mention in another connect section, “the Process is the Punishment” – innocent people being sued into bankruptcy by professional ‘citizen litigants’ who use court awards to sue more unsuspecting, innocent business owners.
At the start you noted that it is good business practice to attract everyone – minorities, disabled, …
Milton Friedman noted that decades ago.
But I can go back much farther.
Jim Crow – was a series of LAWS that FORCED businesses to discriminate.
The fact that LAWS were necescary in the south to target blacks is the proof that without those laws most businesses would not discriminate.
Obviously then as now – some people will choose to discriminate. And those people will put themselves at a competitive advantage.
For 22 years I managed a family owned architectural practice. We regularly hired women – often in preference to men.
The were cheaper, more cooperative, better workers.
Today we hear idiots rant that businesses strive to pay employees as little as possible.
Of course they do.
Do you seek to pay as much as possible for your car or hamburger ?
This employer/employee thing is nonsense.
The world is mad of people buying and selling.
Buying services or selling services. Buying products or selling products.
Today I work for myself – that is a misnomer – all of us work for someone.
I work for clients, not employers.
Regardless, standard of living is raised in only one way – producing more of what humans value with less human effort.
i.e. by paying as little as possible to get as much as possible.
My clients want the best possible service from me at the lowest possible price.
If I hire someone – I expect the same.
I do not give a $hit if you are black, Trans, Disabled, …. So long as you do not make your choices a problem for me.
What I care about is how much value do you deliver and how little does it cost me.
Anonymous, and now what we have due to regulations is higher food and fuel prices. Poor people are now not able to afford to heat their homes in New England because of the cost of fuel oil has more than doubled. Your all in on environmental regulations as long as your warm and you have a full belly. Then you tell us of your compassion for the poor. You never consider the effect of environmental regulations on those who do not enjoy your station in life. Thank you for another let them eat cake moment.
Every elected official in Washington (except maybe Kirsten Synema) has as their main conner pleasing corporate donors. They’re all sell outs. It’s our system.
At 9:47 a.m. Svelaz posted a responsive comment:
“Iowan2, I’m actually certified in hazardous material handling. So yes I’m actually an expert…The train had 20 hazard placarded cars. (does not denote which of dozens of hazards where in how many cars. ONLY 20 total.)…The threshold for requiring an ECB is a train or consist that has 20 or more highly flammable class 3 placarded cars. Any train that has 20 or more is supposed to be classified as a high hazard flammable train. A train that is classified as such requires an ECB. The railroad classified the train as a freight consist which didn’t require an ECB…You’re the ignorant one here.”
The subject regulation defines a high hazard flammable train (HHFT) as a train “comprised of 20 or more loaded tank cars of a Class 3 flammable liquid in a continuous block or 35 or more loaded tank cars of a Class 3 flammable liquid across the entire train.” https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2015-05-08/pdf/2015-10670.pdf
It is possible that Svelaz might have inadvertently missed the part that the 20 cars must be “in a continuous block.” From the NTSB report, that does not appear to be the case. https://response.epa.gov/sites/15933/files/TRAIN%2032N%20-%20EAST%20PALESTINE%20-%20derail%20list%20Norfolk%20Southern%20document.pdf
” From the NTSB report, that does not appear to be the case.”
Lin, after providing Svelaz with the correct information so many times in the past only to be ignored or told I didn’t document it when I did, I stopped providing him with the answers.
Instead, I now ask him questions, like what in the NTSB proves your case since you quoted it? That leads to a short discussion because Svelaz cannot find something that is not there. As an added pleasure, it confuses him.
He never answered my question this morning, but you answered it for him this evening. He will remain confused, deservedly so, because he doesn’t act ethically or morally.
S. Meyer: Understood. thanks.
I meant to add that “For the purposes of advanced braking systems, this rule also defines a
‘‘high-hazard flammable unit train’’ (HHFUT) as a train comprised of 70 or more loaded tank cars containing Class
3 flammable liquids traveling speeds at greater than 30 mph.” https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2015-05-08/pdf/2015-10670.pdf
(I qualify my comment by noting what appears to be “semolina flour” in Car#37 and I also do not know if “hoppers” qualify as “tank cars,” among other things.
Hoppers are not tank cars.
Thanks, David Benson, I was thinking that hoppers are like open bins (without a sealed top)?
as opposed to a sealed “tank.”
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4tsHYDQHY8I. Cutting regulations by Obama.
East Palestine, Ohio is mainly White
“The racial makeup of the city was 98.2% White, 0.2% African American, 0.1% Native American, 0.3% Asian, 0.4% from other races, and 0.7% from two or more races. Hispanic or Latino of any race were 0.9% of the population.”
– per Wikipedia
Now we know the rest of the story. Dilbert comic creator Scott Adams is right. Biden and the MSM are racists to the core
https://www.axios.com/2023/03/01/doj-denka-cancer-lawsuit
*** DOJ sues chemical manufacturer in Louisiana over high cancer risks ***
“The EPA and DOJ are seeking to compel Denka to drastically reduce the levels of chloroprene emitted into the air surrounding the community in St. John the Baptist Parish, which is 59% Black.”
From 6 Years Ago..
Trump Seeks To Abolish EPA
Donald Trump will work towards the abolition of the Environmental Protection Agency – and any employees cleaving to the Obama era should be “very worried” by the prospect of Scott Pruitt taking over the agency, a key aide of the president has told the Guardian.
In an exclusive interview, Myron Ebell – who headed up Trump’s EPA transition team, said that agency’s environmental research, reports and data would not be removed from its website, but climate education material might be changed or “withdrawn”.
A campaign stump pledge by Trump to scrap the EPA in its entirety was “an aspirational goal” that would be best achieved by incremental demolition rather than an executive order, according to Ebell.
“President Trump said during the campaign that he would like to abolish the EPA or ‘leave a little bit’. It is a goal he has and sometimes it takes a long time to achieve goals. You can’t abolish the EPA by waving a magic wand.”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/feb/02/donald-trump-plans-to-abolish-environmental-protection-agency
……………………………………………
In the aftermath of this train derailment, Republicans are pretending they have cared all along about the transportation of hazardous chemicals. What a joke!! For years the GOP has been openly contemptuous of the EPA and safety regulations.
“It’s the [courts], stupid!”
– James Carville
_____________
You got a problem?
Litigate.
The EPA is an entirely corrupt and profligate, communist redundancy.
Congress has the power to regulate ONLY money, commerce and land and naval Forces.
Coming from a true leftist.
“For years the GOP has been openly contemptuous of the EPA and safety regulations.”
No, they have been openly contemptuous of a corrupt and politically motivated EPA, as they should be. You changed the subject from the lying and mishandling of this tragedy by this administration to a gratuitous attack on the GOP. Typical Dem.
What president started the EPA?
Did Mayor Pete ever specifically say the Trump regulation caused the crash or something similar? The Pete tweet JT provides is quite general in terms of rail safety and was made on Feb. 14 not when visited the site on Feb 23 as JT suggests. JT should either update his post with a source that supports the false statement charge or revise the charge to something that is accurate.
@Concerned Citizen, yeah Mayor Pete did blame Trump.
Multiple times.
-G
Ian, Could you please provide a link to a statement by Pete that supports JT’s false statement charge?
I don’t think Buttigieg blamed Trump expressly. He is smart and so proceeded by implication. When commenting on the derailment in his initial tweets on the subject he pivoted to Trump’s regulatory changes, specifically on braking. When asked by Joy Reid what he thought about Trump’s visit given that Trump was “partly responsible” for the derailment, he characterised the visit as “ironic.” Without saying it in so many words he created the impression that Trump caused the accident. The media got the message, which is why the regulator made the statements Turley quotes. And it’s what led Glenn Kessler to do his comprehensive fact check.
JT as a lawyer and a professor should have chosen his words more carefully in this post just like Pete did and you just did.
and you should have chosen your words more carefully without double-checking the veracity of your own criticism
So the facts don’t matter, they are excused by your deflection into style points. Do you play dodgeball?
I think my comments about JT’s post have been appropriate and still believe he should update his post accordingly.
“. . . just like Pete did . . .”
Those are called “weasel words.” Those who mean what they say don’t use them. The intellectually dishonest, though, do. That way, when you try to pin them down, they can always weasel out. Like you’re doing.
Not offhand, sorry he’s not a priority for me.
Isn’t it nice to read differing opinions and decide for our self. Ah, free speech who would have thought.
Who are Americans going to believe: Pete Buttplug or Erin Brokovich? True the Left wing groomers will swallow all of Buttplug’s loads but look what it did to Svelaz, Costco Chicken, Gigi….blah blah blah
===
“Residents near Ohio chemical train derailment site urged to take tests amid ‘gaslighting’ fears”
Environmentalist Erin Brokovich told people living near the accident site to fight for recognition and trust their instincts
Residents of an Ohio town affected by a chemical train derailment have been urged to get blood and urine tests, despite officials telling them it was safe to return to their homes.
Erin Brokovich, the famed environmentalist, said there were attempts to “gaslight” residents of East Palestine as she warned of the long-term risks of the toxic spill.
She held a town hall in a packed high school auditorium on Friday night alongside lawyers and told the audience to fight for recognition and trust their instincts.
“You want to be heard, but you’re going to be told it’s safe, you’re going to be told not to worry,” Ms Brockovich said. “That’s just rubbish.”
“It’s very obvious something’s really gone wrong out here,” she later told Fox News, noting that schools have shuttered drinking fountains and some private wells have locks on them.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2023/02/25/residents-near-ohio-chemical-train-derailment-site-urged-take/
From 5 Years Ago:
Trump Discarding Safety Rules
An Associated Press review of the department’s rulemaking activities in Trump’s first year in office shows at least a dozen safety rules that were under development or already adopted have been repealed, withdrawn, delayed or put on the back burner. In most cases, those rules are opposed by powerful industries. And the political appointees running the agencies that write the rules often come from the industries they regulate.
Meanwhile, there have been no significant new safety rules adopted over the same period.
The sidelined rules would have, among other things, required states to conduct annual inspections of commercial bus operators, railroads to operate trains with at least two crew members and automakers to equip future cars and light trucks with vehicle-to-vehicle communications to prevent collisions. Many of the rules were prompted by tragic events.
Trump has made reducing regulations a priority, seeing many rules as an unnecessary burden on industry. Last month he tweeted that his administration “has terminated more UNNECESSARY Regulations, in just 12 months, than any other Administration has terminated during their full term in office…”
“The good news is,” he wrote, “THERE IS MUCH MORE TO COME!”
Edited From:
https://apnews.com/article/north-america-donald-trump-us-news-ap-top-news-transportation-1936e77a11924c909880f1ef014c7ca7
Groomers gonna groom
REGARDING ABOVE:
That’s Estovir, the Q’Anon Blog St**ge.
“It’s the [wheel bearing], stupid!”
– James Carville
_____________
It wasn’t unconstitutional regulation that failed, it was an overheated wheel bearing and/or a sensor.
Most certainly and by law, industries must self-regulate for enhancement of the consumer experience and to avoid insolvency resulting from litigation in courts of law.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The operators of a Norfolk Southern train carrying hazardous chemicals near East Palestine, Ohio, earlier this month tried to stop the train after a wheel bearing overheated to a dangerous degree, the National Transportation Safety Board said.
But by the time an alarm rang to alert the crew of the danger, the bearing was already so compromised that it failed as the train was still coming to a stop, officials said — a revelation that raised questions about whether Norfolk Southern’s safety sensors and procedures were sufficient to prevent a catastrophic failure.
“Roller bearings fail. But it’s absolutely critical for problems to be identified and addressed early so these aren’t run until failure,” said NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy at a Thursday press conference.
– Becky Sullivan
And here you have it.
Another example of trying to blame Trump for something that he had no part in it.
Mayor Pete was supposed to be the next up and comer since Kamel Toe burned out and was proven to be a joke.
But so far he’s done nothing and has also shown to be a complete failure. Rumor was that Joe would run and Pete would be VP.
(Still ticking those demographic boxes. )
But the reality is this was human error.
The sensors tripped, engineers didn’t react in a timely manner.
There are other issues. Like routine preventative maintenance and using proactive analytics to determine a potential failure.
The problem is that there’s the railroad and then the use of private cars for transporting goods and services.
So the railroad gets flagged, and they’ll sue the owner of the car that failed citing a lack of proper maintenance.
That still won’t cover the costs and this could bankrupt the railroad.
The other issue is that the railroad has been reducing employee head count. Lots of things that played a part in this.
What’s sadder still is the fact that Biden and company ignored the town. Just played lip service and went thru the motions. Those at the EPA should be shown the door. So far the only agency to act professionally was the NTSB.
Mayor Pete? He should resign and go back to being a ‘mommy’ to his adopted kid(s).
-G
Perhaps had Portugal Pete spent more time on the job than he spent chestfeeding, he’d have reversed the Trump ruling and expanded it to include the type of train that derailed.
Trump’s ruling was correct in that it reduced a bit of the nightmare Obama created.
And if you’ve been paying attention… Trump’s ruling had nothing to do with this.
The train in question wouldn’t qualify as a toxic train because it didn’t have enough cars hauling toxic material.
Ooops!
The NTSB has been professional. Everyone else? Not so much.
Pete? Biden? fugit about it.
-G
Jonathan: “Weaponization” is going on all over the place. Even the Speech and Debate clause of the Constitution. GOP Rep. Scott Perry tried, unsuccessfully, to use it to protect what he was trying to do to overturn the 2020 election. Six months ago the FBI seized Perry’s cell phone because there was probable cause it contained many emails, text messages and other communications relevant to the criminal investigation of Jan. 6. Perry went to court to protect his phone records. So instead of looking at the contents of the phone the DOJ turned the phone over to Judge Beryl Howell, who was supervising the grand jury investigation of Jan. 6, and asked her to look at the contents to see if any communications were covered by Speech and Debate privileges as Perry claimed. In a 68 page ruling released last Friday Judge Howell found more then 90% of the records on Perry’s phone were not covered by the S&D Clause–and ordered 2,055 text messages, emails, etc. be turned over to federal prosecutors. This means Special Counsel Jack Smith will get his hands on more possible crimes committed before, during and after the Jan. 6 insurrection.
And what incriminating evidence might be found on Perry’s phone? We know Perry is a key figure in the insurrection. He tried to get the Trump administration to replace the AG with Jeffrey Clark who promised to reverse a DOJ finding that Joe Biden had been elected fairly. After the insurrection failed Perry sought a pardon because he knew his criminal responsibility. That’s why he is now referred to as Scott “Pardon me” Perry. Perry is now appealing Judge Howell’s order–trying to “slow walk” the ligation. It’s his version of “derailment”. But it’s unlikely the DC Court of Appeals will reverse–not even if Perry appeals all the way to the SC. Perry claims he is not a Jack Smith target. That may soon change.
And remember Richard Barnett–the guy photographed sitting in Nancy Pelosi’s chair during the insurrection? He was just convicted on 8 criminal counts–including 4 felonies. Barnett is going to do some serious prison time. The DOJ has not lost one case against the Jan. 6 insurrectionists. Pretty good record. Why is this important? Well, because justice does matter.
So says the overzealous Biden campaign manager as he preps for ’24.
I mean, what else would he say, the truth – there’s no there there, and certainly no insurrection?
Who opened the gates, doors and windows for the rioters, allowing them inside?
105 common folks sent to jail, basically for being misled – DOJ.
How many Antifa, Black Lies Matter, etc., foreign career-criminal thugs and real bad guys should be in prison for life, a million, two?
________________________________________________________________________________________________________
“Approximately 351 federal defendants have had their cases adjudicated and received sentences for their criminal activity on January 6. Approximately 192 have been sentenced to periods of incarceration. Approximately 87 defendants have been sentenced to a period of home detention, including approximately 14 who also were sentenced to a period of incarceration.”
– DOJ
https://youtu.be/C4whHYpmJyw
January 6th was a college panty raid, a “real” inserrecution looks like this: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/sep/11/declassified-documents-show-australia-assisted-cia-in-coup-against-chiles-salvador-allende
“We know Perry is a key figure in the insurrection.” There was no insurrection. What we know is a protest was turned into a media event by Pelosi to use as a weapon against Trump. The whole thing could have been avoided if she and mayor Bowser had approved more National Guard troops, like Trump requested. But that wouldn’t have provided the media event they used to justify another phony impeachment.
It will be interesting to see what all the video shows now that it has been turned over to Tucker Carlson. One thing we will see is video confirmation of capitol police unlocking and opening doors to let in protestors. Insurrection by invitation?
However, he falsely claimed that “we’re constrained by law on some areas of rail regulation,” and cited “the braking rule withdrawn by the Trump administration in 2018 because of a law passed by Congress in 2015.”
(…)
“This false claim was picked up by various pundits and politicians, including figures like Joy Behar on the The View. That included Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) who went to the Senate floor ….”
**************************
Pro Tip: Don’t be surprised when a Dimocrat lies. In fact, just assume it and save the time. It’s their nature.
Oh and when you lookup “she-devil” in the dictionary, I bet you’ll see Joy-less Joy’s pic there.
From August, 2020
Trump Scaling Back OSHA Regulations
The Trump administration has scaled back OSHA inspections, which research has shown to lower injury rates. The agency conducted slightly fewer safety inspections during the first three years of Trump’s presidency than during a comparable period at the end of President Barack Obama’s second term, even though the labor force grew by 16 percent, according to a Center for Public Integrity analysis of the agency’s inspection data.
Amid the Covid-19 pandemic, OSHA has been cutting back even more, conducting only 5,127 inspections since March 13, when Trump declared the coronavirus a national emergency. That’s a drop of about two-thirds compared to the same period last year.
The slowdown in inspections could prove dangerous for millions of workers: A Public Integrity analysis shows the vast majority of deaths and catastrophes have occurred at workplaces that weren’t inspected by OSHA.
The lax scrutiny comes as Trump continues to trim the regulatory powers of federal agencies. Under his watch, the Labor Department has systematically weakened rules meant to protect workers’ pay, retirement, and safety. The department, for example, scaled back a rule to extend overtime pay for millions of workers. It also tried to change pay rules to let employers pocket workers’ tips — a move later undone by Congress.
The department also has been slow to hire and replace inspectors at OSHA; their number fell from 952 in 2016 to 862 in January, the lowest number of inspectors in the agency’s history, according to the National Employment Law Project.
Staffing has since gone down to 761 inspectors, according to the Labor Department.
Edited From:
https://www.vox.com/2020/8/18/21366388/osha-worker-safety-trump
Poor Anon,
Perhaps you failed to find the reports that say that this train didn’t even qualify to be considered a hazardous train in the first place, so that Trump’s roll back had no effect on this event.
Seems you’re a day late and a dollar short when it comes to this issue.
Let me break it down for you.
1) Mayor Pete is still an idjit.
2) The NTSB professionals have investigated what happened.
They are coming to the conclusion that it was human error because the train engineers were alerted to the over heating of the bearing long before they took action.
The issue is that were they to have taken action earlier, the train wouldn’t have derailed. But it would have meant stopping the train, doing an inspection, and then starting back up.
BTW, indications were that the bearing that failed wasn’t on a car carrying toxic materials.
-G
Ian Michael Gumby,
G, oh! Dang! Facts! Say it is not so!
Poor Anon is right!
Costco Chicken wants to hire unqualified people as long as they fit certain demographics. The unqualified hired are maintaining and equipment and other unqualified are inspecting it. That is a recipe for disaster. If Costco does the same Costco Chicken would be burned to a crisp.
Great, lawyers discussing the finer points of the law.
Let me explain to you the finer points of the law: they exist in order to protect rich people and keep them rich. Poor people would manage just fine with only the laws that have existed since forever, forbidding murder, violence, theft, and the other basics.
Surprise, surprise, the finer points of the law wouldn’t have protected the residents of East Palestine anyway. Of course not. They are a small place. The finer points of the law don’t protect the needs of small places, almost ever.
And now you want to discuss how partisan or otherwise the issue is. Sorry, but the very use of the word “partisan” (or “bipartisan” for that matter) implies that you work for rich people wanting to screw poor people by making them vote and therefore legitimizing rich people continuing to make laws that screw poor people. Sorry, but you have already defined yourself as part of the problem.
If you so loved your Second Amendment rights as much as you say, you might use them to credibly threaten those Congress people into doing the right thing. Of course, if somebody did that, they would almost certainly end up in jail and not succeed in the slightest in their aim of defending the rights of the little people. So the whole Second Amendment idea is hopeless anyway, and has been for a long time.
In summary, that train derailed because American law stopped working for little people a long time ago. Stop pretending that it does, or that it could sometime soon.
Not that it matters to anyone here but Dems have been trying to clamp down on RR unsafe operations for a long time and Republicans have been getting in the way. They have allowed the RR to play Russian roulette with health and safety for a very long time.
Actually it is the Unions, or should I say, the Union bosses.
The Union members have been pointing out safety and work hazards for a long time.
The Union bosses look out for the companies interest more so than the union members.
A good friend of mine works at a Union company. He says the same.
I have an idea.
Sue the —- out of the railroads for “play[ing] Russian roulette with health and safety for a very long time.”
After a while, the industry will get the memo and freely and harshly self-regulate.
What’s better than an unconstitutional dictatorship?
A livid jury of one’s peers in East Palestine, Ohio.
MOST DID NOT GET THE MEMO
The Department of Transportation is unconstitutional. The American thesis is Freedom and Self-Reliance. The Constitution enumerates the power of Congress to regulate ONLY the value of money, commerce among the States to preclude bias, and land and naval Forces. The Constitution severely limits and restricts government, while providing maximal freedom to individuals. Industries must self-regulate to maximize the experience of consumers in order to avoid insolvency through litigation in the American system of courts. Redress of grievances is not superior to, and may not nullify, the Constitution and Bill of Rights.
Exactly when and where did America “derail?” Answer: The White House in 1860. Secession was fully constitutional and slavery must have been legally abrogated. The Civil War, Lincoln’s “Reign of Terror,” Karl Marx’s “RECONSTRUCTION Amendments” and all subsequent acts to incrementally implement the principles of communism in the U.S. were and remain illicit, illegal, unconstitutional, invalid and illegitimate to this day. The entire communist American welfare state is unconstitutional including, but not limited to, matriculation affirmative action, grade-inflation affirmative action, employment affirmative action, quotas, welfare, food stamps, minimum wage, rent control, social services, forced busing, public housing, utility subsidies, WIC, SNAP, TANF, HAMP, HARP, TARP, HHS, HUD, EPA, Agriculture, Commerce, Education, Labor, Energy, Obamacare, Social Security, Social Security Disability, Social Security Supplemental Income, Medicare, Medicaid, “Fair Housing” laws, “Non-Discrimination” laws, etc.
The Supreme Court recently acted retroactively by 50 years to correct the corrupt, illegal and unconstitutional Roe v. Wade decision. The Supreme Court, by the same logic and jurisprudence, must act retroactively by as many as 150 years to correct the corrupt, illegal and unconstitutional seizure of power, nullification of the Constitution and implementation of laws, programs and structures which nullify the Constitution and implement any form or degree of central planning, control of the means of production (i.e. unconstitutional regulation), redistribution of wealth and social engineering.
People must adapt to the outcomes of freedom.
The outcomes of freedom do not adapt to people.
Dictatorship does.
In America, it has.
If this wasn’t Trumps fault, then it must be white racism.
Even when The Washington Post says that there is no connection between Trump policies and the train wreck the leftist in Washington and the leftist on this blog still find a way to blame it on Trump. From the Post. “We decided to examine every possible regulatory change made under Trump that could be related to the accident and assess whether it could have made an impact. From our analysis, none of the regulatory changes made during the Trump administration at this point can be cited as contributing to the accident.” One would think that after reading the findings from a leftist newspaper that they might reassess their position. Instead they just double down. It’s like facts don’t matter. It’s more important that they rig the game. There’s not a con artist in history who wouldn’t be in envy.
TiT,
Their playbook is misinformation, disinformation, and when those fail, outright lie.
We have seen it on gross display today.