The left enjoys this moment and chuckles as residents of nearby East Palestine, Ohio, are gripped by fear following a toxic train crash. To liberal America, these people deserve to live in fear, and no doubt some hope that a few of them will die.
‘This is what they voted for.” — is the mantra to explain the woefully inadequate response of the Biden administration, which dithered for nearly three weeks before making federal funds available to the area. It is no coincidence that Biden’s authorization to deploy the Federal Emergency Management Agency here followed Donald Trump’s announcement that he would visit the city. Eastern Palestine is Trump country, as is neighboring Darlington, Pennsylvania, located just across the border, less than 10 miles from the crash site. Despite recent political leanings, Darlington is part of Beaver County, which has more registered Democrats than Republicans.
Pete Buttigieg finally showed up after spending some “personal time” wandering around DC. He and the rest of the administration were neither willing nor prepared to deal with what could be a major environmental fiasco. And yet liberals, to no one’s surprise, mock the disaster, making speeches about how these rednecks got what they deserved, peppered with jokes about how Trump supporters now care about the environment. The accident happened on Biden’s watch, and if so adultsthey would have done something about it, but the gross incompetence that has been eating away at this government like a cancer has made itself felt again.
“I don’t want to take anything away from the people of East Palestine… but that cloud didn’t stay there,” said Sherry Strozza, who lives three miles from the crash site.
Strozza failed to investigate the residue covering parts of her soil despite repeated requests from the Environmental Protection Agency.
— NBC News (@NBCNews) March 2, 2023
“Wherever the wind blew that day [of the derailment]all these people are secondary,” says Leah Renee Markovitz, who lives 40 km from East Palestine and has experienced contaminated water seeping into her well.
— NBC News (@NBCNews) March 2, 2023
“I live less than a mile from ground zero,” Barber says.
“Our entire way of life has been threatened and no one understands it.” https://t.co/aIoiWzkFYV
— NBC News (@NBCNews) March 2, 2023
Children get sick, suffer from headaches, and there is a noticeable lack of birds in the area. The leaves and grass in the area have withered, thousands of fish have died, and residents feel abandoned to their fate. The administration says water and air quality are safe, but updates on this vital information are rare; no one knows who to trust. The lives of entire communities have been turned upside down, and Joe Biden and his band of overeducated, white, pompous progressives would instead give these people the middle finger (via NBC News):
On Tuesday, the administrator of the federal Environmental Protection Agency, Michael Regan, returned to East Palestine to visit the site of the spill and told NBC News that the agency “will stay here and we will not leave until the job is done.”
But Pennsylvanians say they are frustrated by the lack of information about the lasting dangers from the disaster and are demanding more transparency from state and federal leaders, who they say are focusing too narrowly on recovery efforts within a 2-mile radius of the derailment, a designation set by the EPA .
“Nobody is doing anything to help us,” said Patty Barber, who lives in Darlington, Pennsylvania, less than one mile from the spill site. “Pennsylvania is being left out.”
[…]
As of Monday, East Palestine’s municipal water is unthreatening to drink, according to the EPA. Indoor air quality tests in more than 550 homes did not exceed safety standards, and community air quality remains “normal,” the EPA said.
But residents living outside the immediate area say crucial information is hard to obtain, even as people complain of a variety of ailments, including bronchitis, headaches and other symptoms related to chemical exposure.
Many thousands of fish died and community members talked about finding infirmed pets and wildlife.
[…]
“I don’t want to take anything away from the people of East Palestine – they’ve been through the worst of it – but that cloud didn’t stay there,” said Sherry Strozza, who lives about 5 miles away in Lawrence County, Pennsylvania.
Strozza said she has had headaches since the chemical spill and is concerned about the safety of her dog and three horses. Yellow-white sediment now covers part of her soil, which Strozza has been unable to test despite repeated calls to state and federal environmental agencies and local testing companies.
[…]
Leah Renee Markovitz, who lives 25 miles from East Palestine in Clinton, Pennsylvania, said she was most concerned about the health of her children, who in recent weeks have experienced cold-like symptoms and contaminated water entering her well.
“Wherever the wind blew that day [of the derailment]all these people are an afterthought,” she said.
Many of her concerns were highlighted Feb. 17 during a five-hour Pennsylvania Senate committee hearing. Eight community members shared their worries and frustrations, with most saying they felt like Pennsylvania had been abandoned.
[…]
In Darlington, Barber said she still didn’t know if her home was unthreatening. She and her family didn’t see birds flying over their rural home for about a week after the train derailment, and the deer that usually drink from her ponds still haven’t returned, she added. The stream her family likes to swim in is full of dead fish.
“Is my house safe? “I don’t know,” she said. “I grew up here. Where else would I go?”
This is a punishment for supporting Republicans – this is the basis of Biden’s passivity. Either that or ineptitude, maybe a little of both, but the Democrats only care about their side. I’m not saying it’s bad, but be sincere. There are two Americas, two sides, two camps and we hate each other. We don’t have much in common. That much came to featherlight when Pete donned Brooks Brothers-esque disaster gear in one of the most brutally clear photo shoots in recent years. The Department of Transportation was responsible for this accident, and this guy would rather be walking around Washington, D.C., not doing his job.
