Posted by
Rich from NW Indiana on Thursday, August 30, 2007 2:44:45 AM
I was reading Paul Driessen article
here on Townhall about Romania problems with development of basic industry such as mining. I had noticed the similar problem Northwest Indiana has with environmentalists. Outsiders that know nothing about the needs of somewhere they don't live.
Granted Romania problems are much, much worse then Northwest Indiana's. But it shows the short view taken by environmentalists. Most environmentalist are wealthy, and don't care about folks less well off. Poor people cannot do anything to improve the environment. They will contiue to degrade it because they have to survive somehow. It isn't charming to be poor, in spite of all the tourists in New Orleans would say. It is blantly wrong to deny people the right to improve their economics.
BP has caved in, and has given up on increasing the pollution that it had gotten a permit for. It also means the expansion will most likely never be built. On the same day that BP gave up the right it has to pollute more, Chicago dumps millions of gallons of untreated sewage into Lake Michigan after a rainstorm. The district that "treats" the sewage of Chicago has a permit to dump nine times as much as BP could. The hypocrisy is so thick you could cut it with a knife. If this refinery was to be built in Illinois there would be no opposition from the environmentalists. The "environmentalists" in this case is the sleazy politicos of Illinois.
Illinois has butted into this project so much, it is sickening. Indiana is much more committed to economic development, when Illinois seems to be going the opposite direction. That why Indiana is getting these projects, you got to be business friendly to get new business. Northwest Indiana is in Indiana so the Illinois folks need to mind their own business.
I hope this project happens, but I think it is dead already. Environmentalists are so anti-people these days. They need a reality check. But they aren't going to get one anytime soon. Meanwhile we all will be paying too much for gas for a long time to come. Or not going to the beach because Chicago sewage is washing ashore. Illinois clean your own house before you try to clean Indiana's.