What do we REALLY KNOW about Covid Vaccines… and other Treatments?

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Bret Weinstein, Dr. Robert Malone, Steve Kirsch

Note: Partway through blogging about this video, it was pulled from YouTube… so I got what I could… This one is currently still up (on the Informed consent and reproductive toxicity of vaccines); a portion of their 3-hour talk, now pulled (additional pieces linked below). I’ve also considered titling this blog: The Science Behind Vaccine Hesitancy.

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Three guys discussing the COVID-19 situation – a long discussion, so it was good to listen to their thorough consideration. Who are these guys? Two were vaccinated with Moderna and one on Prophylactic Ivermectin – simulating a ‘composite herd immunity’. Dr. Robert Malone is the inventor of mRNA Vaccine technology. Mr. Steve Kirsch is a serial entrepreneur who has been researching adverse reactions to COVID vaccines. Dr. Bret Weinstein is an evolutionary biologist (the Ivermectin user).

One could argue, that if everybody just took Ivermectin for a month, worldwide, we would end the pandemic.”

~Steve Kirsch “How to save the world, in three easy steps” @4:45 minutes

I got turned on to these guys by my buddy James Kunsler as a part of his recent blog:

Big Lie No. 1 is actually a whole bundle of lies surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic. The chief national health official, Dr. Anthony Fauci (a.k.a. “The Science”) can’t get his story straight about whether or not he funneled US taxpayer money to a lab associated with China’s People’s Liberation Army, to engineer a virus that was turned loose on the rest of the world. An email train of evidence shows that he did.

That was bad enough. Then Dr. Fauci (and most of the nation’s medical bureaucracy) worked hard to suppress cheap and effective treatments that defeated the virus and cured patients if used in the early stages of infection, namely, Ivermectin, Hydroxychloroquine, Vitamin D, and Fluoxetine. (Fluoxetine, or Prozac, used “off-label,” modulates brain inflammation.) The suppression actively continues to this day. Dr. Fauci & Company promoted the use of a PCR viral testing system run at excessive cycle thresholds that flooded the medical system with false positive tests. The test’s inventor, (Nobel Prize winner) the late Dr. Kary Mullis,said the test was never meant to be used as a diagnostic tool.

Dr. Fauci and the medical bureaucracy are promoting an experimental “gene therapy” as “vaccines,” or so says the man who invented the mRNA vaccine procedure, Dr. Robert Malone — and you can hear him say that in this three-hour-plus roundtable discussion on Bret Weinstein’s Dark Horse YouTube podcast (if it hasn’t been taken down by the time you read this, because to-date YouTube suppresses all mention of Ivermectin, etc.). You will learn in this detailed discussion that the three vaccines being used have produced more deaths and “adverse events” in aggregate than all the other vaccines medicine has developed over the past thirty years. Let that sink in. You will also hear Dr. Malone describe the spike protein, which is the chief mechanism activated by the vaccines, as a “toxic” agent.

This cannot be good news for the millions who gave their consent to be vaccinated. We have no idea what the long-term effects will be, but it’s apparently the case that the toxic spike protein does not behave the way it was supposed to. That is, it does not remain in the intramuscular vaccination site, but rather migrates all through the body, with a special affinity for causing cardiovascular mischief, neuromuscular disorders, and damage to reproductive organs. Stand by on how all this works out. And beware of fresh attempts by your government to coerce you into a vaccination, or a series of them.

This is a fast-developing story, obviously with many sub-plots, but the net effect for “Joe Biden” will be to badly erode whatever shreds of legitimacy still hang on him. News about vaccine deaths and “adverse events” has also been suppressed, but that effort appears to be falling apart now, even as the government ratchets-up pressure to jab the substantial number of the “vaccine hesitant.” (Count me as “vaccine fuggeddabowdit” on this one.)” 

The Three-Way Squeeze by James Kunsler 6/15/21

So what are the main pieces of info that struck me that struck me from the discussion at Dark Horse?

Steve Kirsh’s carpet cleaner got the Phizer vaccine and had a heart attack 2 minutes later. His wife also had hand trembling after being vaccinated. This triggered him onto questions on the safety of the vaccines. The guys then had a discussion of how the mRNA isn’t staying in the shoulder muscle, instead moving throughout the body after being injected. Though the FDA knew about the biodistribution, they determined the spike wasn’t biologically active. We know now, that spike is very dangerous.

The literature noted that, if the mRNA didn’t stay in the place where it is injected, the scientists knew it would be problematic, though they believed they have engineered it to “stay stuck”. Normally, before we would release this for human use, we would do animal studies but this was not fully understood before human vaccinations began with these emergency use products. Kirsch believes, “that’s the smoking gun.”

The group discussed the details of how this works in the body. The problem is NOT with mRNA vaccines but the issue is that, with the spike protein, the action of the body with this vaccine and the spike protein allows it to interact with the many places in the body. They claim that 200K vaccine users have died. And the issues is that voices on that have been censored while the “safe and effective” message has been promoted very widely.

Mr. Kirsch explained next about a woman with a miscarriage which was something never seen before. The baby was bloody, the brain was split in half – from a woman vaccinated at 25 weeks pregnant who’d been vaccinated a month earlier. The doctor assumed it was NOT the vaccine – because “it’s safe” – so the issue is reported as a genetic defect and not added to VAERS (Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System]. Dr. Malone calls this the Groupthink problem; relies on assuming something not necessarily true. They go on to discuss how we get to a place where we understand the real data.

Bret Weinstein astonished by the large number of stories he’s heard from the vaccinated – which could be sampling error and is surely anecdotal. How do we confirm? Older people seem to have less issues – again in his small sampling.

Dr. Malone, a regulatory professional who talked with folks at the FDA, reports that adverse events were occurring and were atypical for a vaccine trial. This gets to the core – a problem is seeing Coronavirus as “every other vaccine we’ve seen”.

[I’d ask, if we are assuming it is a natural evolution, and not lab made with splicing, then perhaps we missed very critical things in the trial development? I mean, how DO they explain that strange polybasic furin cleavage site in the SARS-CoV-2 sequence???]

Dr. Malone was alarmed by the very unusual findings he read. Noted first the absence of reproductive toxicology package, normally in the genotoxicity – toxicity to the genes of the test system (in this case, the Aims test largely) – level one of genotoxicity analysis in vaccine development. Peter Marks, director of SEVER(?) says that new data is now available from Phizer in last couple weeks and is currently in evaluation. Mr. Hirsch noted that the study was on rodents who lack the same ACE2 receptor reaction as humans. Dr. Malone says we can all agree “corners were cut… in an emergency situation”. Hirsch says, “They took a risk and they lost, basically.” Though they would have done the same things… this is Monday morning quarterbacking, for sure. However, the FDA cartoon indicated that there were no corners cut…

Bret says this is not even a large-scale human experiment as an experiment would require that we’re doing systematic collection of data for analysis on all of the recipients, which we are not. Hardly any tracking is happening and much of the data is being lost or not reported. Hirsch argued that “nobody knows about VAERS, they’re told to report to V-SAFE.” Doctors are told to not report to VAERS, reports from doctors have been reversed without their consent…

The hypothesis of “there is a problem with these vaccines” is supported by the flatline data over years in VAERS now suddenly showing a spike in reporting.

Well… Youtube removed the video… so… there’s that. Guess they saved me from three whole hours… so let’s jump to the new video… below. First a couple other links

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Medical journals, such as JAMA, Lancet, Nature and Chest are supported by pharmaceutical ads. They all rejected the largest, 600-patient prospective RCT from Egypt showing hospital rates with Ivermectin of 1 percent vs. 22 percent standard of care and mortality rates of 2 percent vs. 20 percent, respectively. These types of rejections are common.

Most of the world governments and institutions are acting like they have earned our trust. They have likely lost it. Patients want free flow of information with accountability.

Powers that be suppress the truth about COVID-19 by Richard Eggleston 6/13/21

Based on what I now know about the miniscule vaccine benefits (approximately a .3% reduction in absolute risk), side effects (including death), current COVID rates, and the success rate of early treatment protocols, the answer I would give today to anyone asking me for advice as to whether to take any of the current vaccines would be, “Just say NO.”

The current vaccines are particularly contraindicated if you have already been infected with COVID or are under age 20. For these people, I would say “NO! NO! NO!”

Should you get vaccinated? by Steve Hirsch 5/25/21

Should you get vaccinated? by Steve Hirsch 5/25/21

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Still up… the larger one was pulled.

Two kinds of harm are possible from the vaccines: Short Term and Long Term: Possibility for driving escape mutants, possibly responsive to the vaccine, and then risk of ADE (no signal for this thus far!).

Coagulation problems associated with the adnovector. Plausible there are complications from the spike protein of Covid-19. There is no more obvious more plausible hypothesis.

Novel lipids in humans, with little experience of them in animals, is a concern. There is currently a review of a new data package from Phizer in process. Peter Marks at the FDA is recognized as an authority. The data provided by Canadians, we see concentration in ovarian tissue of a novel lipid reagent, unfamiliar to us at this point.

The FDA response to thalidimide has guided their modern-day legislative structure with a concentration on reproduction and consequences for birth defects. Hopeful that Phizer’s new data includes reprotox and genotox-data (though done on rats) and though reproductive risks don’t often become clear in early studies.

However, there have been examples in the past of unanticipated female reproductive responses not revealed by animal testing. Going to the bioethics, we need full and open disclosure of all the data. The burden is on the government, not to tell us what to do, but to convince us with data on what we ought to be doing. Reproductive implications at present require transparency and reports such as dysmenorrhea, often not shared by those who suffer, must be encouraged when they occur.

Giving children ice cream to get vaccinated is wrong. Ethical lines have been crossed throughout history… internment camps in the U.S. during WWII… and judgment calls are made to compromise core ethical principles when people are “at war”… which we, in hindsight, often lead to calling “mistakes”.

Steve Hirsch notes that knowing what he knows now, he would NOT have vaccinated his three young daughters and would have encouraged them to not be vaccinated. [9:10] Experimenting on our children is frustrating him. [Understatement…]

He attempted to get information to Biden to no avail, instead was gaslighted with non sequiturs. There was no willingness to debate the data, only dismissal. So many are standing on the “academics” calling vaccines “safe”. Instead of reviewing the data, the reliance is on those promoting vaccination. Instead, those speaking against all the “experts” are called wrong. [Reminds of the Enbridge Line 3 narrative in Minnesota…]

The spike protein is not a harmless antigen.

The NIH is basically sandbagging effective treatments, that the CDC is going along for the ride, that the FDA is fooled, and that people in Congress think Tony Fauci – whose been called out as the creator of the coronavirus and caused this whole thing… and then screwed up – yet they haven’t even analyzed any of the cases.”

14:30 Steve Hirsch on Informed consent and reproductive toxicity of vaccines

Dr. Malone notes we’ve been thru multiple cycles of this… as with gastric ulcers where this kind of attack was prevalent also against truth tellers. The guts to continue to speak up, in spite of opposition, is important.

Here are a few other links from their longer talk that remain up:

Spike protein is very dangerous, it’s cytotoxic (Robert Malone, Steve Kirsch, Bret Weinstein) From early in their discussion…

“Don’t come back until your lips are blue” (Robert Malone, Steve Kirsch, Bret Weinstein) On people being turned away until their blood oxygen is low enough to be dangerous… and given no treatment whatsoever, though some are available. 5:00 Dr. Malone notes in the U.S. primary care docs have sought solutions, resorted to off-label Rx, after reading the pre-prints, and FOUND GOOD SUCCESS in INNOVATION. Innovation is coming from front-line docs, revealing the fundamentals of what makes this country great, which is often not large-centrally controlled enterprises but individual solutions.

Pfizer data REVEAL – Where do the lipid nanoparticles collect? (Robert Malone, Steve Kirsch, Bret W) It looks like mainly… the ovaries! {Though the CDC says it’s safe for pregnant women, it may not be safe for woman at all???) Bone marrow signals… reactivation of latent human retrovirus (like shingles)… and other data appear to show concerns. While data have been available to the regulators, the messaging has not made it clear to the public. Bret also concerned about auto-immune disease development, which Dr. Malone agrees is something that must be monitored for, in those who receive the vaccines. Animal models give us signals on what to investigate for human impacts.

So… alarming short term concerns with where the spike proteins and lipids are being found, the high uptick in harms in the system (which appear to be conservative), and long-term harms that might develop. Cannot un-vaccinate yourself… says Steve.

Dark Horse Podcast – Pfizer data REVEAL – Where do the lipid nanoparticles collect?

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Bret notes that Ivermectin is a good solution, yet the stigma against it continues, the censorship continues. And Flovoxamine, which may help with long-haul COVID as it can pass the blood/brain barrier, is similarly targeted.

All being driven by the financial interests of private corporations… who want to try experimental work… and thus avoiding the costs of TRUE studies on their drugs.

Safe range doses of Ivermectin, with a well-known safety profile, are being stymied by those who say Ivermectin needs to be PROVEN… (it has been). As there is no profit in doing this work (the drug is now 0.03 cents per dose!), trials haven’t happened.

Did you also hear that Merck (2/4/21) made claims against their OWN DRUG, Ivermectin? How crazy is that??? Well, what they didn’t tell you is they are working on a brand “new” (aka EXPENSIVE) drug that will work against SARS-CoV-2!! [Wondering if they just added some weird thing to their already proven formula… simply to be able to create a new stream of big dollars. And what the side effects of that might be…]

So… Good Luck, Everybody! And Keep Researching and Investigating… cause we’re all on our own now!!

Here’s Kuntsler’s latest blog… which brings up the point I’ve asked from the beginning… do vaccines have a possibility of making MORE variants… James blogs:

The leading government policy just now is to hector, browbeat, and coerce Americans to get vaxed-up with vaccines that appear to be pretty hazardous. The Moderna, AstraZeneca, and Johnson & Johnson vaccines so far (which is not very far) have produced more deaths and adverse events than all the other vaccines for all other diseases developed in the past thirty years, and we have no idea what the long-term effects will be of a spike protein that likes to damage blood vessels, brains, and reproductive organs. That’s another thing the news and social media don’t want the public to inform themselves about, not to mention the scientifically-based opinion that vaccinating a populace in the middle of an epidemic is pretty certain to provoke the evolution of new and more dangerous variants of the disease agent.”

Free at Last – James Kuntsler 6/18/21 (my emphasis)

Meanwhile, Bret wrestles with why vaccines are being pushed for everyone. Me too, Bret. Me too.

Awaiting a Reprieve…

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Jessica Intermill, Line 3, MN PUC, Treaty People Gathering

If you ever wondered what it’s like, to live as an abutter to the Line 3 project in Northern Minnesota, here’s my take.

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It feels every day as if I awaken on Death Row awaiting an answer. However, the answer is not for my own execution nor for something quick and (hopefully) painless.

No, the waiting I have is to see if we will be given a reprieve to the continued building of a Tar Sands Pipeline at the End of the World.

A friend that encourages… by Heidi

There was an injection of hope in a recent piece by Jessica Intermill entitled “When the Public Interest Isn’t: Minnesota’s approval of a new Line 3“. This week, I’ll dive into her piece and a bit of other good news.

Published in Bench & Bar of Minnesota, the official publication of the Minnesota State Bar Association, the piece lays out exactly how the Minnesota Public Utilities Commission FAILED to heed the public voice – even stifled it to the greatest degree it could, despite huge public outcry on the Line 3 project’s risks.

This is only Part 1 in a 2-part series so I anxiously await the second half of her critique. From the article: “This is the first installment of a two-part article exploring structural bias and racism within the law in the context of the Line 3 oil pipeline expansion. Part 1 examines the agency approval process and the role of the public in that process. Part 2 explores the racialized impact of that facially neutral approval in the context of Minnesota’s legal history.“

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Enbridge has a history of trouble with their pipelines – from the Alberta Clipper (here’s a more detailed piece) to the current long-time opposition on Line 3. [Not to mention all those pesky spills…]

Now, it seems the entire world may be pushing back as we see global decisions in opposition to the continuation of Big Oil’s consumption of our carbon budget. And that could spur their many opponents across the U.S., especially across the Northern Midwest as Enbridge faces pushback from Minnesota through Wisconsin to Michigan. Citizens are speaking up across the region… on a national platform.

The tides seem to be turning as, just this past week, we saw Exxon get slapped with reality…

Market reality has finally collided with the most important U.S. energy company. Yesterday, Exxon Mobil shareholders elected at least two of the dissident directors proposed by the activist hedge fund Engine No. 1. Investors have lost patience with the basic business assumption that oil and gas will rule forever. But investor confidence in corporate boards is eroding on other contentious public policies issues as well. Boards should take note.

Exxon’s Shareholder Revolt Is a Warning for Boards Everywhere by Heidi Welsh 5-27-21

…and Royal Dutch Shell lose their case in the Netherlands.

Royal Dutch Shell PLC must slash its greenhouse gas emissions 45% by 2030 from 2019 levels, The Hague District Court ruled in a decision that could reverberate around the world.

“This is a turning point in history,” Roger Cox, a lawyer for the nonprofit Friends of the Earth Netherlands, said in a statement after the decision. “This case is unique because it is the first time a judge has ordered a large polluting corporation to comply with the Paris Climate Agreement. This ruling may also have major consequences for other big polluters.”

Court Orders Shell to Slash Emissions in Historic Ruling By Maxine Joselow, E&E News on May 27, 2021

Among the most far-reaching aspects of this ruling is the court’s order for how Shell must account for its emissions, …(taking) account of what are known in climate parlance as Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions. Shell must consider the emissions of its parent company, all its global subsidiaries, all its suppliers, and all its customers across the entire chain of its enterprise everywhere that it operates throughout the globe.

That would include, for example, the climate-harming emissions released when it … builds a pipeline… and when its consumers burn its gasoline in their cars, trucks, or airplanes. When every one of these sources is considered, the court said, Shell’s global emissions must decline by nearly 50 percent over 2019 levels in just nine years. …

The ruling will also likely increase the risk calculation that investors, policymakers, financiers, and others apply to fossil-fuel activities… The individual responsibility component, argues lawyer Roger Cox, may also increase the likelihood that individual corporate executives and board members are held liable for a company’s harmful activities, further increasing the risks associated with fossil fuels.

Others see a clear pathway to U.S. climate litigation. Calling the court’s decision “earth-shaking”, Kathy Mulvey of the Union of Concerned Scientists notes… The essence of the Dutch court’s ruling, she says, is that “if you dig it up and sell it and profit from it, you’re responsible for it.”

Dr. Geoffrey Supran, research fellow at Harvard University, agrees. In an email, he called the “individual responsibility” aspect of the ruling “a game-changer,” which “legally and rhetorically inverts Big Oil’s decades-long propaganda campaign” to switch responsibility for the climate crisis from themselves to individual consumers.

“It is precisely this sort of corporate accountability, for the climate damages caused by Big Oil’s products, that dozens of cities, counties, and states are seeking in U.S. climate litigation. So, in my view, this Shell verdict provides powerful precedent,” Supran argues.

The Shell case now joins a burgeoning international body of law conferring the basic and fundamental human right to survive the climate crisis and hold fossil-fuel companies accountable for causing it. Critical to this broad and increasingly successful movement was the decades-long struggle of Indigenous peoples to secure the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which confirms rights not only to their lands but also the natural resources found on and within it.

A Court Ruled Shell Is Liable for Its Contributions to Climate Change. What Happens Now? by Antonia Juhasz 5/27/21

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So let’s hope those globally turning tides will bring us a verdict soon that stop the Line 3 project from any further devastation. I’m especially concerned as we see evidence of high Covid cases in Alberta pipeliners and we watch anxiously as the India variant makes its way around the world. That, however, is a topic for another day.

The Intermill piece rekindles hope that at least some in the Minnesota judiciary comprehend the reasons why the Enbridge project is such a gross negligence of the public. She opens with an overview of perhaps the most horrific of days in this process – the “gun to our head” day, as is how the Minnesota Public Utilities Commissioners explained their fear causing them to support granting Enbridge’s order.

Jessica then goes on to explain the history of the Public Utilities Commission:

Since its beginning, the PUC’s predecessor agencies prioritized expansion of cheap utilities—often over public opposition. 

One of the earliest “public interests” that Minnesota courts identified was railroad expansion. That interest was so strong that it displaced otherwise ordinary landowner remedies like ejectment.⁹ 

The PUC traces its origin to this interest. Its ancestral predecessor was established by 1871 legislation that began with rail safety inspections, but just three years later turned to railroad-rate oversight. An 1885 law continued to focus on rate discrimination without any countervailing concern that utility expansion could undermine other public interests. But even then, contemporary critics noted that expansion of utilities like railroads prioritized the interests of capital over people. A 1907 political cartoon showed railroad baron J. J. Hill demur at the “timid creature” while the railroad industry knocked “the public” off its feet.

The PUC’s interest in utilities – Jessica Intermill 5/26/21

In turning to Line 3, Intermill notes several reasons for denying the project including, 1) the greenhouse gas concerns for the project, 2) the infringement on Indigenous population in Minnesota, and 3) even the Minnesota Department of Commerce’s own opposition to the project, which concluded:

“in light of the serious risks and effects on the natural and socioeconomic environments of the existing Line 3 and the limited benefit that the existing Line 3 provides to Minnesota refineries, it is reasonable to conclude that Minnesota would be better off if Enbridge proposed to cease operations of the existing Line 3, without any new pipeline being built.”

Minnesota Department of Commerce opinion 9/11/2017

Not only did the PUC FAIL to recognize the Department of Commerce (currently suing the PUC in the Minnesota Court of Appeals, alongside other opposition parties), they also failed to heed the Administrative Law Judge assigned to oversee and review the public input on the project.

[The ALJ] conducted 16 hearings across the state attended by about 5,500 people, building a record of public comment from 724 speakers that was over 2,600 pages long. In each city, she held separate hearings in the afternoons and evenings to accommodate the schedules of people who work both days and nights. After the three-month process, she completed a 300-plus-page report that included more than 40 pages summarizing public comments concerning the new Line 3. …

“The importance of these economic benefits to northern Minnesota are not insubstantial,” the ALJ found, but rather “would exist with respect to any infrastructure project of this magnitude.”¹⁶ Thinking past Line 3 to build a renewable-energy infrastructure with union-protected prevailing-wage jobs would satisfy the public interest in economic development and water quality. But only Line 3 was on the table.

Of 72,249 written public comments submitted, 68,244 opposed a new Line 3.¹⁷ The ALJ recommended against Enbridge’s request because it did not “minimize[] the impacts on human settlement, the natural environment, the economics within the route, the State’s natural resources, and the cumulative potential effects of future pipeline construction.” She favored a “true replacement” in the existing trench.

The public’s interest in Line 3 – Jessica Intermill 5/26/21 (my emphasis)

While ALJ O’Reilly noted there was public interest in construction, it didn’t equal an endorsement of Line 3. YES, people up here are desperate for jobs but could we get some for the 21st century instead of the 19th? It’s time to END investment in the energy of the past, especially as more investment there simply hastens our demise!

Jessica next explains how the PUC denied the public a voice, as had previously been done historically in rural Minnesota.

The PUC’s embedded bias toward utility expansion has long blinded it to the interests of any larger public. In the 1970s, electrical co-ops sought to build a 430-mile-long high-voltage line through 476 farm properties in west-central Minnesota. Powerline opposition, described in scholarship by the late U.S. Sen. Paul Wellstone, was broad.¹⁹ 

The law was, conceivably, in the farmers’ favor. The 1971 Minnesota Environmental Rights Act applied to the project and declared the state’s policy “to promote efforts that will prevent or eliminate damage to the environment and biosphere and stimulate the health and welfare of human beings[.]”²⁰ A law requiring that the agency’s power plant and transmission siting decisions consider and “comport with the public interest” also applied to the project.²¹

More than 60 percent of all Minnesotans and 70 percent of rural Minnesotans opposed the line.²² The Minnesota Energy Agency, the agency then designated to review applications for certificates of need, approved it anyway.  

So it was for the new Line 3. 

…The PUC staff took (the ALJ’s) 400-page report and ground it—and 55 other documents—into 46 pages of “staff briefing papers” that recommended granting Enbridge the certificate of need and its preferred expansion route.²³ 

The staff briefing did not include any discussion of the extensive public comment on the case. But it did note that “the Commission need not engage in the exercise of reviewing the ALJ Report” itself since “[t]he Commission traditionally leaves it to staff to ensure that the final written order identifies the parts of an ALJ Report that have been adopted, with or without modification, and the parts [that] have not been adopted.”²⁴ 

That filtered record moved forward to the five PUC commissioners who sat on the dais in June 2018 to decide whether to grant the certificate of need and route permit. 

The PUC’s interest in the public – Jessica Intermill 5/26/21 (my emphasis)

While the PUC voted 5-0 that day in favor, their oppression of the public voice was more than clear:

1. The PUC, despite large public interest, failed to secure a large-enough venue, “leaving only around 70 “general admission” seats for the public who had submitted tens of thousands of comments.”
2. These seats, available on a first-come, first-serve basis, required earlier and earlier arrivals for anyone interested in securing one. [You can guess who this favors… those of means and those paid to be there.]
3. Rules for the seats were ever-changing with some allowing restroom breaks, while, for others, a restroom break meant forfeiting your seat.
4. The prohibitions on water bottles for these meetings, “which would often stretch for hours and sometimes the whole day”, were especially frustrating. [And remind one of newly enacted (though not likely to stand constitutional review?) voter laws in Georgia that prohibit one from bringing water or food to those in line awaiting a chance to vote. I’m sensing a pattern…]
5. Of notable interest was the fact that Enbridge was allowed 10 tickets while to “Red Lake Band of Chippewa Indians and White Earth Nation—two different parties, both of whom the ALJ had allowed to intervene to defend their separate interests—a total of five tickets to share between the two.”
6. As the public clamored to be let into the meeting, “seats reserved for the parties went unoccupied.”

Though the public didn’t really have a voice anyway. In fact, the attendance enforcement by the PUC got so bad that at one point the intervening parties could not get into the meeting themselves!

After opening statements, though, the commissioners directed the hearing, posing their own questions to the parties they wanted to hear from, and making their own statements into the record. The public could not comment at the hearing and parties could not rebut or cross-examine the testimony of other parties. …

Tensions escalated when, at PUC staff direction, St. Paul police removed two individuals with party badges from the building “because they were holding more than one ticket at a time.”³⁰ Here too, the “rule” purportedly violated was not contained in any notice. PUC staff nonetheless refused to let the party representatives return. 

Unsure who to contact to get their clients back into the building, the affected parties docketed a letter addressing the commissioners they appeared before.³¹ When the chair reopened the meeting the following day, she acknowledged the filing but said the commission would not address it because it was not the subject of the hearing. One intervenor responded with “an irregular oral objection[.]”³² When the chair began to call the docket, counsel for the Sierra Club interrupted, pleading, “I am in this room as a contract attorney without a client.”³³ The meeting recessed.

The PUC’s interest in the public – Jessica Intermill 5/26/21

Throughout all this time and up unto this unanimous decision, the public had still NEVER HAD THE DIRECT RIGHT OF CONFRONTING THE PUBLIC UTILITIES COMMISSIONERS.

The fight was not over. In fact, it was becoming clearer all the time how egregious the Public Utilities Commission had been in dismissing the public.

Minnesota’s Office of the Legislative Auditor issued a report detailing the PUC’s public-participation processes in general, and the Line 3 processes in particular.³⁹ It wasn’t pretty. …

The legislative auditor concluded its report with a punch list of concrete recommendations to improve the PUC’s public-participation process.⁴² 

Reviewing courts, too, must also be alert to biases that can hide behind, and skew, agency decisionmaking. “PUC officials told [the legislative auditor] the Line 3 case was an anomaly and that the agency’s practices, which they believe generally work well, should not be judged on this one case alone.”⁴³ Various courts, though, are reviewing this case.⁴⁴ A self-confessed anomaly can all too easily cross into an abuse of discretion.

Last year, the PUC revisited its approval of Line 3 to consider a revised EIS. It held the first—and only—public hearing that allowed citizens to speak directly to the commissioners about whether to approve Line 3. Again, most public commenters opposed the project.”

Toward a broader public interest – by Jessica Intermill 5/26/21 (my emphasis)

FINALLY! The public was given a voice. And once they were given that voice, CHANGE HAPPENED.

The Public Utilities Commission’s vote this time was NOT Unanimous. While he stood alone, Commissioner Matt Schuerger HAD listened to the people… and likely read more of the record that newest Commissioner Valerie Means claimed to have read – though she claimed to have read the whole thing! [FFS]

Commissioner Schuerger voted against Line 3 three times, concluding that the revised EIS was inadequate, that Enbridge had not proven its case for a certificate of need, and that Enbridge’s preferred route was not in Minnesota’s interest.”

Our Friend Commissioner Matt Schuerger!!

We’ll see what Ms. Intermill brings with Part 2. Meanwhile…

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Advocacy groups have also requested intervention from the Biden administration to prevent construction from moving forward.

“We’ve tried everything up to this point, now we’re calling on the people to stand with us because the process failed us,” said Dawn Goodwin, co-founder of the Resilient Indigenous Sisters Engaging (RISE) coalition and a member of the Indigenous Environmental Network. “We’ve discovered that the process was never made to work in our favor. … We’ve called on people to come and stand and learn what it means to be treaty people.”

Protests expected in northern Minnesota as Enbridge presses to complete Line 3 by Dana Ferguson 5/28/21

Perhaps you will find your voice? Maybe you will answer Gaagigeyaashiik’s call and join the Treaty People’s Gathering June 5th through 8th?

It’s gonna take more than just a few of us… to bring the change needed to save our species.

[Though I’d argue perhaps we aren’t worth saving… if this is how we manage things.]

A silent spring?

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Inequality, reciprocity

With all the Enbridge work in the wetlands behind our home, we’ve been concerned about how our many relatives have been affected.

We watched as the trees were clearcut with speed.

We witnessed the lumber matting thudding into place to create a road behind our home closer than the road in front of our home.

We watched as the dozers ran over the land cutting the scrub remaining from the slaughter and the grabbers snatched up the dead, piling them into giant brush piles to burn and pollute the air.

We listened to the fires crackling in the woods for hours, filling the Mississippi River Valley, and the scenic drive along County 2 from US Highway 2 to Itasca State Park, with smoke.

Now we wait. To hear the frogs return. To listen to the sandhills breeding in the water-rich land.

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More than just the Enbridge destruction of recent weeks is affecting whether or not we’ll hear sandhills return to our swamp.

This time of year, the yard is typically full of water with our little man-made pondlet overflowing into the yard. The melting of winter usually disappears our little pond into a lakelet that has remained in recent years until May or June.

This year, the small plastic pond liner is the only thing holding any water. Looks like severe drought is in order as we watch ditches, usually flowing steady, trickle by along the county road out front… another product of the changing climate, in large part brought by the fossil fuel industry that Enbridge serves.

So quiet in the swamp.

We did hear a few sandhills flying over in the last week, but the throng we typically hear has not yet populated our backyard wetlands. We’ve heard nothing of the peepers. All I can think is that the dozers crushed them all in their hibernation.

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Time will tell if we’ve gone too far to save ourselves.

Do we not realize… if the birds and insects disappear, eventually we will too?

How long can we keep up the charade of living as if reciprocity to the land is something with which we need not concern ourselves?

Have we actually bypassed all our opportunities to save the planet on which we reside… for our own long-term habitation?

What will the pandemic, and emerging drought, bring for the humans of the USA in 2021?

We watch as the rich gather up their stock market returns of 60-70%, remembering days when an 8% ROI was a good thing. We wonder how they can feel happy about money made in a system of so much corruption.

Meanwhile, homeless encampments – the only option for many who are now over year from their last paying job – are overrun with bulldozers as police remove the unwanted residents. Similar to how we eradicated the mosquitoes, mice, beaver, fox, wolf… who interfered with OUR management of the land?

How soon until that revolution I’ve been predicting for decades becomes a reality? How soon until so many feel they have no option but to process through their frustration and overwhelm with suicide? Or homicide?

As mass shootings continue… and people mindlessly travel without considering COVID risks… and many hope for the world to “go back to normal”, I believe we will never again go back to where we were before 2020.

And I wonder if we will continue to spiral down the drain to our own extinction… or if we will find many and myriad small communities gathering to help each other as we weather this largest storm we’ve ever seen coming at us.

I hope for love to win. For us to come together and feed, clothe, protect those not provided as much in our unequal system of sharing of the resources we have. For those who win most to realize this doesn’t bring happiness… when so many suffer for our winning. For all of us to find the goal of our common happiness and security as the most worthy of them all.

While it may be naive… I believe voting still matters. But the rest of this… let’s get going!

What’s Happening in Pennington County?

Tags

#StopLine3, Enbridge, Line 3, Minnesota Department of Health, MPR

Enbridge Corridor of Death ~ March 8th Update

For those who may not be aware, I do a daily FB update on the Covid situation here in northern Minnesota along the Enbridge Tar Sands pipeline project proposed corridor.

In case you missed it… February had a closure of the Thief River Fall’s Walmart for Valentine’s Day weekend because they couldn’t staff the store… even with support from other locations.

At that time, MPR reported: “There’s been an uptick in cases in northwestern Minnesota recently, though it’s unclear why just yet. All other regions of the state have been seeing cases decline.” [2/16/21]

You can see how their coverage changed over time… with little concern or investigation…

• On February 16th, warning of “Something worth watching”
• Letting us know again on the 17th there’s an uptick…
• And then apparently changing their minds by the 18th and removing the graphic entirely.
• While the graphic did re-appear in their coverage, no further news until the 27th, when it was noted Dan Huff of Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) sharing “concern”.
• Two day’s later, concerns disappear and then, as MPR again dropped any level of concern for NW MN from their reporting yesterday… On the same day…MDH noted the area as a COVID-19 hotspot!

• 

  2-16-21 MPR Something to Watch

• 

  2-17-21 MPR Uptick in NW MN “Unclear”

• 

  2-18-21 MPR Graphic gone… nothing to see!

• 

  2-27-21 MPR Huff from MDH notes concern.

• 

  3-1-21 MPR Two days later, concerns disappear.

• 

  3-7-21 MDH Pennington COVID-19 Hotspot

~ MPR Misses the boat on investigating what would become our current COVID-19 hotspot 2/16/21 to 3/7/21 Timeline

For days, this MPR notice went uninvestigated. In my daily COVID updates, I noted the unmasked Enbridge workers throughout the project corridor, the WalMart closure, the upticks in cases… and Pennington County went unaddressed. Tagging the MDH got me nowhere. Emailing the MDH got no direct meaningful response, and certainly not engagement.

While Pipeliners for the Enbridge Line 3 project camp in big numbers in Thief River Falls, rates of infections have been on the rise in the county. We certainly know that pipeliners are circulating in our communities as we saw a couple recently busted for trying to solicit sex, with one carrying an unregistered firearm.

Seven Charged In Itasca County Sex Sting Operation – Youtube – InewzTV

Now, a few weeks later, we see an even more critical sounding situation and I continue to wonder…

Pennington County – 5X the rate of Minnesota at large, 6X the rate of Hennepin County – JHU CRC

Will SOMEONE in the Minnesota State Government POSSIBLY CONSIDER that it might be a result of Enbridge Pipeliners from all over the country? Will ANYONE???

You know, those guys who swing home for a quick weekend if they can get an extra day off to see the kids… and bring back to Minnesota whatever is going on in Texas, or Oklahoma, or North Dakota, Covid-wise? Maybe?

Maybe that holiday trip is what caused this spike for the last month?

Enbridge Coviding our Communities?

Will anything be done? As Enbridge races across our state in hopes to install a pipeline before the Courts can determine that, in fact, there is NO NEED FOR A TAR SANDS PIPELINE.

Let’s suppose, for sake of argument, that it isn’t pipeliners spreading COVID-19. With Tar Sands being described – even in industry news – on a DAILY NOW, as “stranded assets”, we see Shell and Exxon divesting these assets from their books. Climate science dictates these oil sands resources cannot be extracted… at least, not if we want to keep humanity living on this third rock from the sun. This alone is reason enough to halt construction – at least until the court cases can be heard.

The Line 3 Relocation and Expansion Tar Sands Pipeline is NOT an ESSENTIAL project during a Pandemic!

While Covid feels to many to be less of a concern every day as we hear of increasing vaccination levels, there is still so much we do not yet know.

• What level of protection is offered by each vaccine? {We know none are boasting 100% protection.}
• How long does the immunity from each vaccine last? {When will one need a booster shot to re-immunize?}
• How much of that immunity applies to scary new strains like the UK’s B.1.1.7? {Which reportedly is doubling in the U.S. every 10 days.}
• How will complacency among the vaccinated affect community spread?

OK, so you can see there are still lots of questions…

As we’re already seeing upticks in many counties along Enbridge’s proposed Line 3 corridor.

Counties like Norman and Polk saw early but seemingly controlled spikes. Of late, larger spikes in places where typically very few cases are seen is bringing more concern. Counties like Roseau, Red Lake, and Marshall have also seen jumps. Becker and Beltrami have seen spikes. And Clearwater County already had National Guard in late last year, when staffing was unable to keep up at the Cornerstone Rehabilitation and Nursing Home in Bagley.

With few still comprehending the dangers of this steadily mutating virus, let’s hope we see a stop to this fossil fool madness… and soon. #StopLine3

In these Revealing Times…

Tags

climate change, Climate Chaos, Coronavirus, Covid, COVID-19, Human Extinction, Line 3, Tar Sands

As humans race with track-hoes to pretend they can keep doing what they’ve always done…
And the world floods and burns and withers from drought.

As engines beep in movement all around me, building a pipeline for the dirtiest of crude – Tar Sands…
it’s hard to pretend we have any notion of saving ourselves.

As we cut down the very beings that provide us oxygen to breathe.

As many grow excited for schools to open… ready to go back to a “normal” economy…
[Normal? Are we psychopaths? Apparently so.]
… we see the numbers in cases and infections beginning to surge again.

We watch millions focus on dollars and economics… giving not a thought to the water, trees, plants, and bees that make everyday life possible.  Will we soon realize how dependent we have become on systems that do not support life but instead bring death?

The fossil fuel industry is taking itself out… as the climate chaos we saw in Texas – and throughout the middle of the country – was a result of the burning we’ve done for centuries now.

And for decades now – longer for those selling the fossil fuels – while we knew exactly what they were delivering… we did nearly nothing?  Simply burning fossil fuels faster and faster?

How will our children forgive us? Or rather, will they?

In addition to the fuels and plastics, the oil industry brings death and extinction for life of all kinds. 
And now – are we realizing… that “life” is ours?

As loads of freight remain in place, unmovable with no electricity to fill tanks with gas, ratios of loads to drivers go to astronomical figures… Indy shoots from 7 loads per driver to 37… while in Cincy reefer trucks, normally around the mid-30s, report their status as not available… with over 200 loads and zero drivers to move them.  Watch those store shelves as we “catch up” from the backlog caused by the polar vortex we created?

Or will we get to watch as production lines slow… because there is no shipment of already done freight…
and before you can make more, you need to move out what you have?

And will we again have loads of milks and potatoes dumped and buried as we have no way to move food in the massive system we’ve created… so un-localized and heavily reliant on fuels?

Can many of us foresee how much worse 2021 will be in comparison to 2020? Even with the vaccinations… and the talk of environmental justice… and green paths going forward… from the all-hands-on-deck portrayed administration that is calming and encouraging so many?

The new managers don’t calm us.  Not those of us who’ve seen that already [!!!] we’re headed for 5-6° warming…
with 1.5° being a dream scenario that we lost in decades past.

It’s been 875 days since the IPCC 1.5° report was issued giving us a dozen years.
And I heard this past week that the UN is now giving us 10 months to get it together?
Anyone noticed the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) slowing?
Faster than many can predict? [Well, than many are realizing…
The scientists always have someone quietly saying, “You might want to consider this…”]

As we watch a Tar Sands pipeline project proceed across the state of Minnesota…
just outside the living room window.

As if we can all just…
Go back to “normal”.

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The worst of the 1918 Spanish Flu were the deaths in the Spring of 1920. Does this still await?

While some caw about vaccines, we also watch as these quick-whip cures kill with cytokine storm jump starts via injection.  I see why some aren’t ready… even if they aren’t on the list… of those who can get the magic elixers.

Every day, we watch… as it seems we lose ground…
sacrificing the trees and wetlands of Northern Minnesota…
to a Canadian corporation treating this place like it’s their colony.

Bought and paid for agencies beholden to their regulatory captors got us into this mess. 
Will they have the courage to save us?
If not, will the courts? 

If not, we will simply keep trudging toward extinction…
like the elephants seeking water in African deserts…
or polar bears seeking another ice island on which to take a breather?

Or will we be running from the flood as it wipes our house away?

Or from the flames that race to devour us?

As the world burns…

Water Protectors – Speaking up with so few listening. Perhaps they’ll listen now?

If only…

I could just disappear.

Pause 4 Pandemic – Delay Line 3

Tags

#DelayLine3, #StopLine3, Delay Line 3, Enbridge Line 3, Line 3, Pause4Pandemic

Before it’s 2 late. I don’t want to be the last 1 alive. Sorry, couldn’t help continue the countdown, which is what it feels like here every day.

How many days until we see massive health care breakdown? We’re losing a Minnesotan an hour and then some to Covid. Yet Governor Walz STILL will not speak about delaying the project.

Even on Almanac, he talked COVID, but not that pipeline project. But you know who did? Winona LaDuke. And she had a lot of good things to say.

Walz said on Friday the 13th’s Almanac that it will be 3 weeks until we hit 300K dead in the US. I’m guessing he might be underestimating that – what with exponential growth. Yet he STILL refuses to DELAY Line 3.

It’s not hard, you know. Just clarifying Executive Order 20-20, which was put into place way back in March – the early days of the pandemic – and accurately NOT MENTIONING Petroleum Pipeline Construction as part of the Essential Worker staff.

Governor Walz could add some simple clarification verbiage like this:

Whereas, Northern Minnesota has minimal and rudimentary Health Care facilities and trained COVID-19 care professionals,

Whereas, tar sands as a commodity has a current 400,000 barrel/day excess of pipeline capacity for current demand making a new tar sands pipeline that would carry only 370,000 bpd unnecessary at this time, and

Whereas, an influx of 3600 out-of-area pipeline construction workers would create an undue risk for COVID-19 community spread with their need for housing, food, and entertainment off the work-site, and

Whereas, Enbridge has been clear in their calls with local officials that they can only enforce social distancing rules on their own worksites, not offsite or in community, where COVID-19 is likely to be spread to local populations and worker families, and

Whereas, the health and care of the People of Minnesota is my paramount concern and responsibility, and

Whereas, Minnesota is currently seeing an exponential rise in COVID-19 cases and deaths which is becoming difficult to even monitor, let alone treat, 

Now, therefore, as Governor, I declare that a postponement of the Line 3 project until the pandemic can be brought under control, is necessary and prudent.”

Here’s the verbiage that could help us the DELAY Line 3 project to save lives in Minnesota.

But, I’m not holding my breath… though I am staying home. And masking up if I do venture anywhere.

Minnesota Public Broadcasting’s Almanac program (sponsored by Enbridge) hosted Governor Walz (7:30-17:58) and Winona LaDuke (33:30-40:09; including the Enbridge disclaimer… and Winona snagging an extra 10 seconds of messaging!!), though only ONE of them had the courage to speak of the risks the Line 3 project brings to Minnesota.

In addition to some interested political maneuvers by Republicans, they’ve appointed a Democrat as the Senate Leader (this is how corrupted Dems are to Republican corporate support here in MN?).

What did Governor Walz have to say?

• It took 7 months to hit 100K dead, 7 weeks to hit 200K dead, and he predicts we will reach 300K dead within about next three weeks. [That’s December 6th, in case anyone wants to keep track.]
• 71% of cases in last 8 weeks are from gatherings, bars & restaurants. In other words, Community Spread. Guidance this week is 10 ppl max, 3 families max. More than 1 person or family is a chance for spread.
• Upper Midwest is about 120 cases/100K; 150+/100K in the Dakotas and… no health care system can sustain that. MUST Stop the Spread.
• Almanac’s Eric Eskola asks a good question at 11:12 and Tim answers: “If this saves one Minnesotan’s life, I’ll make those hard decisions.”
• “I will continue to do all I can, as I said from the beginning of this, to protect the safety, uh, the health, and the well-being of Minnesotans.” (11:51)

THEN WHY WILL YOU NOT DELAY THIS TAR SAND PIPELINE PROJECT? THAT alone could save HUNDREDS or THOUSANDS of lives in the long run. Sadly, you seem NOT to have the courage to do it. Perhaps you are unwilling to risk political capital to save Northern Minnesota lives? Is is just cause we’re a bunch of rocks and cows up here? And a few Indians we haven’t yet managed to slaughter off with our white supremacy colonizing culture? Yes, this IS how FUCKING PISSED I am about your diffidence.

You know, Tim, bringing thousands of out-of-area workers into MN – from ND, OK, TX, WI – all hot spots – makes it certain that you’ll definitely be bringing increased risk to rural MN where we do NOT HAVE THE HOSPITAL and HEALTH CARE WORKERS to support this influx of population. Especially not when we’re already facing shortages on housing – which will only be exacerbated by Enbridge workers coming in with bigger paychecks than many have here and gobbling up housing? How many Minnesotans will freeze to death in their vehicles as Enbridge workers are housed in places they might have otherwise stayed?

11:19 – Walz: “…if this saved one Minnesotan’s life, I’ll make those hard decisions” – well I call BS. You could ANY MOMENT say that Minnesota is going to PAUSE 4 PANDEMIC on an UNNECESSARY pipeline project. And you have YET to do so. And another 31 dead Sunday in Minnesota. We only had 12 new dead today, which is typical for Mondays, typically our lowest day of the week for reporting. [Last Sunday, Monday, Tuesday was 31, 19, 23… then 56 on 11/11, if that portends anything.]

Walz gets the updates at 9PM for the day – wish I could have that data then… I get the massaged 7-day rolling average… that disguises the exponentiality of these growing numbers.

Duluth Mayor, Emily Larson, in St. Louis County, was asked about emergency rotation on the police department due to rolling outages of personnel. The Mayor noted:

• 43% of ppl testing are 15-29. [Uh, because we’re not seeing cooperation from older people for GETTING tested? Or because they are the ones doing much of the community work? What with likely older professionals working from home?]
• All schooling is going to digital… where many children do not have technology broadband connectivity – creating disproportionate learning for those with less resources – “yet bars are still open”. (19:59) [Yeah, we’re sacrificing our children to hedonism.]
• Restarted weekly updates to keep citizens updated and share information. (21:30) [Weekly often enough?]
• And finally, noting ~180 staff in Duluth PD w/157 sworn officers, they’ve had 26 cases in the department to date, with quarantines also. 23 since October. Indicative of what we’re seeing across MN. Alt work schedule taking people off investigations to patrol, working 5-days on, 10-days off. Trying to keep up with investigations. Process kept cases low when pandemic started. [Uh, so, we’re seeing our public safety personnel being taken out of commission as WELL as our health care professionals?]

Next up was Dr. Rahul Koranne (head of MN Hospital Assn) on staffing. We have beds… but concern is number of professionals getting exposed to the virus. (26:30) A spot check Wednesday showed over 6000 heroes out of service in our hospitals. Everyone is looking for same agency nurses so no relief is to be found outside the state. Control of spread is key. A discussion on rationing of care (27:42) found Dr. Koranne saying, “A patient, a Minnesotan that needs a hospital care is getting it.” He also noted that 1 in 4 ICU beds is COVID. 16% of medical surgical has COVID. Heart attacks, strokes, cancers still being managed. [As I consider exponential growth, I foresee a real ripping out of the rug any moment. Did you see Texas is starting with the refrigerated trailers for the dead? Lucky it’s cold in Minnesota?] “Trying to coordinate across the state. … Some patients have to be transported great distances and that’s what a pandemic will do.” I am not feeling confident. Are you?

Even the funny part of Almanac wasn’t funny to me. Sheletta Brundidge did her best and, if it weren’t for the way adults CONTINUE to IGNORE the CLIMATE CRISIS as if we can just keep going on with life as we’ve known it… I might have laughed. But I couldn’t… as she spoke about “kids day” and assumed her child would ask for less “chores, ice creams instead of veggies, and unlimited piggy back rides.” I’m guessing she’d rather have you save the planet’s ability to support human life.

Then we go to Winona. And she talks some REAL TRUTH.

• Enbridge has cut the EQUIVALENT of a NEW Line 3 and has NO NEED with 400K barrels/day excess capacity at present. (34:06) [And likely forever?] Enbridge doesn’t need this pipeline and oil production is down.
• Nowhere else are pipeline projects getting approved. Keystone problems, Constitution never got approved, and Michigan’s Governor Whitmer just withdrew the easement for Enbridge’s Line 5. (35:00)
• And, when challenged by (again, idiot) Eric on the politics of it all, turning the tables to this being a Challenge of Enlightenment. World, and even MN has a commitment to cutting greenhouse gasses and moving to renewables… this makes no sense.
• Regarding Covid (36:30): “The GOVENOR is APPROVING TO BRING 4200 out-of-state workers into northern Minnesota from Louisiana, Texas, Wyoming, and all around the country, during a Pandemic. [Like FKN Seriously, Tim Walz?] Into the poorest counties in the state of Minnesota already struggling – like Aitkin County where we have 5600 at-risk people who are older – with 4 ICU beds? Why import 4200 pipeliners, “who are already social prospecting for dates on social media and wandering through the stores in northern Minnesota without masks on?” Yeah, Walzy, WTF?
• Line 3 didn’t make sense then, why now, with oil at $-38/barrel? “Why would you do that to Minnesota… to us?” (37:30)
• Carol Wurzer asks if massive protests are expected (37:37) and Winona assured her the project will be met with resistance [YEP] and that people will be masked up. She further explains that SHE is “not in charge of the resistance”. “Librarians that chained themselves and closed down… the pipelines up in Clearbrook” and “Catholics closed it down after that”.
• In a time of climate disaster, after noting 70K people testified against this pipeline, she says, “Nobody thinks this is a good idea except for, apparently Governor Walz and Enbridge.” (38:05) and she say Whitmer has the right idea, “Don’t let risky Canadian corporations, you know, put a gun to your head and say that we need a new pipeline. Instead, say, “Close your stuff down. Let’s move on.” [Yes, Ma’am!]
• She further explains how Red Lake Nation is implementing solar and her tribe is putting up another 200 kW of solar. (38:30) So why is Minnesota’s SINGLE LARGEST ENERGY CONSUMER… ENBRIDGE? Because it takes a lot of energy to move sludge. If we don’t have unnecessary pipelines, we can also quit putting up unnecessary electricity and focus on doing what IS necessary for PEOPLE, eh?
• The final question (38:55) on economics is addressed with perhaps my favorite analogy (I always go to drug dealers for mine – kinda feel like Enbridge is just a dealer for addicts):

The fact is that we’ve got the poorest counties and Enbridge is slathering out a hundred million dollars worth of money, and you know they should have slathered that out a long time ago cause they got six pipelines across the north and all kinds of leaks. The single largest leak was actually in Grand Rapids.

So, you know, there’s some people that are… that are up there trying to get some money because it’s a really difficult time in the north. But, you know what? It’s kinda like getting a job in the gas chamber. That’s a great job to have but it’s really not the job you wanna have over the long term. And that’s what this pipeline is like. It’s like… the ecological equivalent to Auswitz. That’s what this pipeline is.”

Winona LaDuke 11-13-2020 Almanac (39:10)

Winona closes noting that she wants water, wild rice, and a future without conflict in it. Enbridge’s pipeline is just gonna bring conflict to our state.

If you agree with any of these points made by Winona, perhaps you can voice them to Almanac at 651-229-1430?

Meanwhile, if you want more TV from today, this is perhaps the most well-done non-violent direct action I have ever seen for Climate Justice. Londoners apparently have an abundance of creativity as they anticipate Extinction. So many good messages in this, my nominee for Best NonViolent Direct Action 2020 – Black Humor category, aka The Real Truth.

Good luck, Everybody. Especially if you live in a community where government leaders are aligned with the oil interests more than they are their human constituents. [Is that all of us?]

Good luck, especially to Northern Minnesota as you are inundated with unnecessary pipeline construction workers. Stay inside, because Enbridge (and many local law enforcement officers up here, best I can tell by the non-enforcement of mask mandates and other concerns) aren’t willing and/or able to control these itinerant workers off the job-site. And a most prayerful wish for all the women and girls along the pipeline corridor, and all the relatives young and old, to be protected.

My best hope is for a Pause4Pandemic on the Line 3 project. The MPCA may say they are “protecting our environment”…

Seriously, they NEVER SAY THAT in their memo to Enbridge issuing the 401 certification that they “protect the water”. [That’s just the BS they try to tell US that they do.] Indeed, “water quality” only occurs 12 times in the document but they did say once “protect the buried pipeline from corrosion”. Though they do say “protect the environment” (again only once) in this lovely paragraph that truly explains how TOTALLY UNNECESSARY this project is in light of EVERYTHING we KNOW about Climate Change, needing to move away from fossil fuels, especially the dirtiest in the world, tar sands oils.

Oh, and we get one “protect aquatic life during sensitive periods” (but not all the time, apparently…). Here we learn that most of the pipeline destruction of our environment will occur in winter? While everyone is tucked away and not paying attention?

… while sacrificing our health care workers… and really all of us. Approving this pipeline project, on the assumption of Need provided by the PUC – now facing so many court battles, I’m losing count on this project, though most recently regarding Enbridge’s lies during testimony for the project – is truly negligent.

MEQB Still Broken…

Tags

Governor Walz, Kevin Pranis, LIUNA, MEQB

So, the latest addition to the Minnesota plan for how to protect our citizens and our natural environment will be examined this Wednesday, the 21st. The Minnesota Environmental Quality Board will be presenting the newly appointed Governor’s CLIMATE CHANGE SUBCABINET!!!

I encourage you to join in from 1-2:30 pm as the MEQB will offer a reflection period for citizens to “reflect on a question related to climate change and, if they choose, share their reflections on the online platform”. [If it’s anything like previous allowances for public input, my guess is they will be limited and managed to assure nothing objectionable to the MPCA Commissioner’s agenda – as we witnessed at the LAST MEQB meeting. Though, perhaps I will be surprised?]

After an introduction of the cabinet and structure, it appears we will have time to ask questions too! So… let’s think about what we might want to ask…

Perhaps we could ask Kevin Pranis, LIUNA rep and constant advocate for the Line 3 project at the PUC, how he sees a tar sands pipeline project alleviating climate change in Minnesota and globally? [He thinks pipelines are “beneficial or sort of neutral in terms of … environmental impact” and praised the Dakota Access Pipeline which is STILL facing legal challenges.]

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As a part of this work, the MEQB is asking Minnesotans to complete a survey stating their concerns. I’d suggest that you complete it. Feel free to review the questions I’ve provided below in case you would like to consider some of my inputs as you offer your own.

The survey begins with a long list of climate concerns on which you can pick your top three… and you can respond as I did, if you like, asking what the intentions were behind this question when all these things are so interconnected that to pick only three seems like not solving the whole complex problem. Then the survey asks about how you want to be involved – as if they will ever REALLY let us be involved in any meaningful way. I referenced the recent OLA report on PUC Public Engagement which literally explained that the PUC failed to FOLLOW THE LAW. Come on, man!

I made a point of my concern that the Governor’s Subcabinet on Climate Change is full of appointees whose voices that have long been heard in Minnesota. Where are the citizens like me being heard? [I didn’t even get a call on my application to the council. It’s like they didn’t even begin looking at names until the list skyrocketed, from about 34 when I applied, to over 200 or more in the end, as I recall.] Will be interesting to see WHO they introduce and how I feel once I learn more about their appointees.

I went into a bit more of my concerns on their final page of the survey, refusing to offer any MORE ideas to them until they actually acknowledge the inputs I’ve already provided. [FFS]

I’m hopeful that many Minnesotans will come into the MEQB at 1PM this Thursday to ask good questions about how this Climate Change Subcabinet plans to make effective change for our citizens. I think we topped out about 100 last meeting. Not sure they’ve allocated enough time to hear citizens… but that’s been an ongoing issue for some time now. [Did I mention they seem loathe to actually HEAR citizen inputs?]

See you there?

Let’s Not Get Caught Doin’ Nothin’

Tags

Indigenous Environmental Network, Minnesota, NECESSITY, RISE Coalition, Valve Turners

The ideas are flying fast and furious these days. So much seems to be happening so fast… with no certainty as to where we are going or how we will get there.

As the Old World continues to hold sway, we see a NEW WORLD opening…

• Increasingly, many are working from home… and most don’t want to go back to the office.
• Homeschooling on the rise as parents want to minimize the risk of children bringing home the virus.
• Consumer spending is down… but the Stock Market is up?
• Businesses not necessary to LIFE are folding… though some still work to prop them up… [in denial and desperation?]
• Social unrest continues to grow… worldwide.
• Mother Earth is bringing much big change in the form of fires, floods, drought, a pandemic (FFS), and… Her simple inability to support the number of people currently residing here is becoming quite clear.

As business works to try to get people back into offices, smart companies are realizing the benefit of NOT continuing with Old Ways… the overhead of big office buildings, salespeople flying all over the world, and the like are being recognized for the HUGE waste they create. [And people are enjoying not having to wear pants to work. I could have told you about this LONG AGO – working from home was a pretty amazing several years back in the early 2000s.] I can attest to the cost savings working from home brings to a family. As well as the connectivity.

Connectivity is what I believe will save us. If we, in fact, retain enough time to save humanity from itself. [For the record, I don’t believe we’re worth saving if we are gonna continue with Old World ways.]

As families face hardship from lost income or jobs, death or sickness of loved ones, difficulties finding enough fresh food, and other calamities, the WORLD is awakening to the understanding that some few have managed to amass great wealth and privilege… pretty much on the backs of the larger populations who are mainly being pillaged for their work, children, land… until they are left without enough to survive. These oppressed have lost more and more political power in the past decades and it seems a time when governments worldwide are failing to account to their people and… the world is UPRISING in response.

Here in the US, it’s time to clean house, re-evaluate priorities, and find a new way forward. One that works for the masses, not just billionaire oligarchs. And good news! There’s (almost) NOWHERE TO GO!

There are a limited number of places to go for US citizens… and most of those look like destinations where you’re going to see first hand the crises the planet is facing? Albania, Belarus, Brazil, Dominican Republic, Mexico, North Macedonia, Serbia, Turkey, Zambia. Looks like anywhere you want to go, there might be a chance to see war?

Limited choices for US travellers 9-26-20

So what is to be done?

I’d suggest finding a place that needs care and attention and giving it.

My efforts of late are to support local Indigenous groups that are focusing on Treaty Rights and the Rights of Nature. Groups like Indigenous Environmental Network have been successfully doing this work since the 90s. Even more locally (since IEN is pretty local in some big ways), RISE Coalition is a group of Resilient Indigenous Sisters Engaging to bring education and understanding to all people on how to support Treaty Rights for the Indigenous, which in itself offers protections for us all.

We stand in solidarity to protect the land, water, fire, and air for the next seven generations. We do this by educating, empowering, and inspiring our neighbors, friends, and allies.”

RISE Coalition FB page

And just now, a new film is emerging that speaks to the issues particular to Northern Minnesota. NECESSITY is bringing awareness to the crises our planet faces… and what each of us can do to help resolve them. I’d encourage each of us in Minnesota watching to learn more about what is happening in our state, and how it is affecting the Indigenous… and us all.

NECESSITY traces the fight in Minnesota against the expansion of pipelines carrying highly toxic tar sands oil through Native lands and essential waterways in North America. Front line communities–Native Peoples and communities of color–suffer the most immediate and severe consequences of the climate crisis: impacts on physical and mental health as well as territorial desecration and displacement. Yet with painful histories have come deep insights, forms of resilience and modes of resistance. This feature-length documentary follows indigenous leaders and white allies, using direct action to protect the sacred and demand justice. Legal experts discuss the record of disparate treatment in the justice system and the legal strategy of the necessity defense, which makes a moral case for acts of civil disobedience, while medical and scientific experts address the health effects of fossil fuels and dangers of pipeline and refinery infrastructure. Capturing the natural beauty of the region as well as the vulnerability of local habitats, aesthetic and stylistic elements drive the action forward, including animated maps with illustrations. The filmmaking team builds collectively on their training in psychology and anthropology.”

Necessitythemovie.com summary

Find your path forward to solutions… it’s literally the fight for our very lives.

The MEQB is Broken…

Tags

Laura Bishop, MDNR, MEQB, MPCA, Public Engagement, Treaty Rights, Water Rights, Winter's Doctrine

Following the 9/9/20 Minnesota Environmental Quality Board meeting, I decided I needed to speak out about the travesty I witnessed.

Here’s what I have to say.

I find the MEQB’s lack of public engagement disturbing and sickening. 

Where was the accountability of the MEQB Citizen Board Members in assuring a public voice was heard on the 2020 Water Plan?  As public appointees are they not beholden to assure the PUBLIC has a chance to share our concerns before a vote is made? Did they not see the raised hands in the WebEx? Did they feel no urgency to stop the vote so the public concerns could be addressed? In the end, only Ben Yawakie seemed to hear and heed the public outcry that day.

I have provided time stamps [h:mm:ss format] for referenced happenings in the partial MEQB recording of the meeting. 

I will grant that the MEQB allowed public comment on the 2020 Water Plan.  However, the meeting’s disabled Chat function allowed no interaction from the public.  In fact, after my Raised Hand was ignored for some time, I emailed their tech guy – who I know – to ask for help with being able to comment. The derailing of the MEQB process during the meeting gave clear evidence to how little time and consideration was truly being offered by the MEQB for public input. 

I’d like to highlight two speakers in particular from the day as they each raise issues pertinent to the way the process derailed in not allowing for true public engagement.  

In the 2020 State Water Plan, you recognize treaties with the Anishinaabe people, stating ‘the ability to exercise those treaty rights depends on clean water and healthy ecosystems.’ What is omitted is how you are going to ensure the health of ecosystems and clean water. 

As you acknowledge in the Water Plan, the Ojibwe word, ‘nibi’, means life-giving force. You follow that with, ‘This worldview contrasts with economic and political systems that value private property and often view land and water as commodities to buy, sell, and use.’ That is exactly what Enbridge is doing with Line 3–a climate change and water disaster that falls disproportionately on Indiginous people. How is it possible that this Water Plan talks about climate change but makes no mention of fossil fuel infrastructure, a major contributor to climate change and a threat to our water? 

In the wake of George Floyd’s murder, it is our time of awakening to the trifecta of race, pandemic and climate injustice. There is no denying the privilege that is represented in the, primarily white, EQB staff, appointees and agency leaders. No one gets a pass–we are all responsible for upholding treaties. 

Have white courage, use your privilege! Take this opportunity to put treaties at the forefront and create a State Water Plan that is, like our water, a life-giving force to ensure healthy ecosystems and clean water for all!”

Jaci Christenson (18:30)

Jaci was followed by Joe. 

Commend all of your work on a bold vision… yet I feel the cognitive dissonance I think we all feel in this plan where we address half of the problem, where we want to prepare MN waters for climate change but not prevent Climate Change or interrupt the fossil fuel infrastructure that is causing climate change that means the end of wild rice as we know it.” [This is critical when it comes to later concerns raised.]

Joe couldn’t help but feel “…in writing this aspirational plan that we’re running out of time to defend the waters that we claim to protect. … With decisions like Line 3, Commissioner Bishop, I’d just just ask the simple question of, “What is your plan in Fall 2020 with the 401 permit for Line 3 to stand up with these aspirations, particularly as we just held a Contested Case Hearing that refused to look at climate change or Treaty rights, which are both so important to this Water Plan?” 

Joe Meinholz (21:54)

Chair Bishop: “Thank you.” [Note:  To this point in the meeting, each speaker received a simple “thank you” from Chair Bishop after they spoke.  No dialogue and certainly no response to the questions asked.]

Nine (9) additional speakers were to follow (mind you, some of us had still not been recognized for our wish to speak at that time).  However, following the next speaker, Keegan Robinson, Commissioner Bishop noted: 

We should stick to the Water Plan and not the individual actions and projects. But I appreciate the comments from everybody here, certainly understand and hear your concerns about protection of water and certainly that is the intention with the Water Plan is to outline ways to protect our waters and how we go forwards.  So I appreciate all of you raising this but I do think that specific right now to a specific project and outlining that in the Water Report as well as the comments that we’re receiving on Line 3 seem to be a bit beyond the Water Plan itself as it is pertaining to a specific project.”

MEQB Chair Laura Bishop (25:53)

She then asked Katie how to move forward noting, “With any of the public comments, I would like to keep it on the Water Plan itself.” Katie Pratt (MEQB Executive Director) noted “several other agenda items” and that “we have a clear message” (as her phone rings in the background – someone calling to get their voice heard?) and she finishes saying, “I think we could consider moving on to our next agenda items and leaving time at the end for additional public comment.” [Remember this promise…] (27:25) Chair Bishop agreed, noting the Board would do that “unless there is a comment beyond Line 3 that we’ve missed. I appreciate this is an opportunity to talk about water protection and certainly that is the intention of any permits that are reviewed by the agency, it is with the intention to protect water as well. I’d suggest that we move on to the next agenda item.”

[At this point we still have multiple people remaining to speak. I was unable to get access to speak because the Chat in the Webex was disabled. My Raised Hand in the WebEx went ignored, as did the Raised Hands of others online.]

Nookomis joins from the phone (27:57) asking to say a few words.  Chair Bishop eventually (28:18) recognizes Nookomis for comment asking for a restatement of name for the record.  

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Before I go on,  let’s be clear: Comments from the public recognized valid concerns ~ concerns that went unanswered, over and over, as Chair Bishop was asked about where the mitigation for the causes of climate change were captured, specifically with regard to fossil fuel infrastructure, in the 2020 Water Plan. 

Minnesotans care deeply about their water as evidenced by the recent Statewide Resident Survey Report from the University of Minnesota. While that report focused on agricultural concerns, the strong opposition to major infrastructure projects like mining and pipelines has been expressed at the MEQB for many, many months now. Even later in this meeting, similar concerns were raised on the Silica Sand Mine in Fillmore County.

Many Minnesotans also value wild rice. And many of those Indigenous to this land rely on it, some for their very survival. Yet by mid-2018 the MPCA had “withdrawn its proposal to change the water quality standard designed to protect wild rice from adverse impacts due to sulfate pollution. The Timberjay reported 18 months ago that the Minnesota Legislature was taking back steps on protecting wild rice.

As Willis Mattison noted during the meeting, public comment is not engagement.  Engagement entails dialogue.  As was reported in previous work, public engagement is CRITICAL to reaching to effective solutions that protect environmental and human health. 

Summary of Input from May 1, 2019 Environmental Quality Board Meeting

Our asks continue to go unheeded. Year after year. As water quality continues to deteriorate. In fact, as the recent PUC Public Engagement Report from the Office of Legislative Auditor clarified, the agencies are not following the law in their work.

July 2020 Summary of the OLA report on PUC’s Public Participation Processes, pg. S-3

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As Nookomis began (28:25), she introduced herself in Ojibwemowin first and then translated to English.  Nookomis Debra Topping – an enrolled and recognized Fond du Lac Band Member ~ Fog Woman from Eagle Clan – called to hold the Board responsible for and accountable to their Treaty obligations.  She first asked about the Winter’s Doctrine and if there is any Indigenous membership on the Board.  

In Winters, the Supreme Court examined tribal rights to water associated with the Fort Belknap Reservation located in what would later become Montana. The Fort Belknap Reservation was created by an agreement in 1888 between tribal parties and the U.S. government. At the time, the government had a policy seeking to transform Native Americans from “a nomadic and uncivilized people … to become a pastoral and civilized people” by providing them lands to develop for such purposes. 

By 1905, the area experienced water shortages that ultimately resulted in the Winters lawsuit being filed to enforce tribal rights to water against non-Indian water users who had been diverting water from the region. In announcing its decision, the Court explained that the lands provided under the agreement for the purpose of developing an agrarian society “were arid and, without irrigation, were practically valueless.” The Court also noted that ambiguities in the agreement, such as the status of the water rights related to the land, are to be “resolved from the standpoint of the Indians,” as a rule of interpretation. The Court held that:

The power of the Government to reserve the waters and exempt them from appropriation under the state laws is not denied, and could not be. That the Government did reserve them we have decided, and for a use which would be necessarily continued through the years.

The Court has continued to recognize the principle derived from Winters in both Indian and nonIndian contexts. In 1976, the Court noted that it “has long held that when the Federal Government withdraws its land from the public domain and reserves it for a federal purpose, the Government, by implication, reserves appurtenant water then unappropriated to the extent needed to accomplish the purpose of the reservation.” 

The Winters Doctrine of Reserved Water Rights

(29:58) Ben Yawakie, 3rd Congressional District Citizen Board Member, noted he is an enrolled citizen of the Pueblo Zuni and also a descendant of Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa and he later clarified that he was not familiar with the Winter’s Doctrine. 

Nookomis continued, inquiring if there had been any Tribal consultation, noting both MN Statutes 103B.151 Coordinating Water Resource Planning and 103A.43 as making no specific mention of Tribal Consultation.  She asked if that meant it will not happen, even if it’s in the Plan. She said, “When you’re asking for the resolution to be approved, it does not say anywhere that you have to have Tribal consultation.”  The third statute she noted – 103A.204 Groundwater Policy – gave her hope for Tribal consultation as it included a list of those specifically responsible for Groundwater Policy.  

Maybe this is it! Maybe this is where we come in… number 4 is the Board of Water and Soil Resources, in there it says ‘local government officials’ so… maybe there’s where I come in at? … Nowhere does it say … that you have to do Tribal consultation.  I understand that you have done it… it’s in the 2020 Water Plan.  I do not see… anything in there about the Winter’s Doctrine.” 

Nookomis (31:30)

Nookomis ended asking if Mr. Yawakie knew about the Winter’s Doctrine. (33:35) Citizen Board Member Ben Yawakie, answered: “Nookomis… I personally do not.”

Commissioner Bishop mentioned Erik Cedarleaf Dahl, an Indigenous MEQB staff member, as well, though he did not respond.  Nookomis then asked if anyone on the Board knew of the Winter’s Doctrine, as knowing it would help them understand where they stand with her water on her reservation.  She spoke also of the smell and taste of gas and oil in the rice from Sandy Lake. (34:50) At this point, Commissioner Bishop talked over Nookomis for a full twenty seconds, expressing thanks as Nookomis continued speaking in the background. Then Nookomis finished with thanks.  [I was astonished at how humble Nookomis remained, after being so summarily and disrespectfully dismissed.]

There ensued a back and forth between Ms. Bishop and Ms. Pratt regarding the concerns Nookomis brought forth. Ms. Pratt mentioned both that the Water Plan is a “starting point, not ending point” and that Executive Order 19-24 directs state agencies to recognize and properly interact with the Sovereign Nations in MN. [However, this document makes no mention of the MEQB.] She also noted that the Water Plan actions are recommendations which will be implemented and that will include appropriate tribal engagement.  [Recommendations implies no requirements for action? This is not making me feel confident at all…]

(37:00) Chair Bishop then noted some necessary minor adoptions on Goals 5 & 3 to wrap up the work on adopting the plan. … Fisheries mgmt clarification and inclusion of insurance in the role of risk mitigation for climate change, with staff discretion to make these corrections. Then (37:50) she asked for a motion to adopt with these changes, which was moved by Thom Peterson and seconded by Al Forsberg.  

This is the point (38:38) at which Willis Mattison objected to the proceedings, asking to file a formal objection, pointing out the Staff and Board had obviously not allocated sufficient time for public participation during the last MEQB meeting or this meeting regarding the Plan and its deficiencies. He said he “understands expediency… nevertheless, the public is important.” He noted this appears to be a railroad job, disrespectful to the engagement policy when dialogue is not allowed.  He filed a major objection.  (40:08) Ms. Bishop allowed him to speak once he assured her his comments were not for Line 3 but the Plan.

NOTE: The fact that a formal public objection – to the Water Plan vote being taken – was simply dismissed by MEQB Chair Bishop – with NO Board discussion – was perhaps our second best indicator during the meeting that the public voice was not truly wanted.

The best indicator was when Chair Bishop entertained a motion to adjourn (2:35:47) at the end of the meeting, giving NO ALLOWANCE for those in the public who, earlier in the meeting, were promised a chance to speak at the end. [I was one of many who remained online awaiting a chance to be heard.]

The MEQB is Badly Broken

Mr. Mattison, a retired ecologist from the MPCA, made an excellent point that the 2020 Water Plan, while it “had much to compliment in its ecological wisdom”, was clearly and simply another example, similar to previously passed aspirational plans, that lack metrics for true accountability, and which have gotten us to where we are today.  Today, where we face a continued loss of quality waters and wetlands and where an insect apocalypse portends humanity’s own fragile state on the planet. These are things we citizens have discussed many times with the MEQB in recent years. Mr. Mattison notes that, without incorporation of these concerns, the Water Plan is “flawed and useless”.  A strategic plan is worthless unless there are metrics for accountability to the achievements.  He asked if the MEQB had willingness to expand plans where citizens can hold agencies accountable.

(45:40) Chair Bishop responded but allowed no dialogue, saying to Mr. Mattison, “Your three minutes is up.” 

I was stunned by this dismissal of a retiree from Commissioner Bishop’s own department, the MPCA, a department that itself is under great scrutiny, including consideration for investigation this very year by the Office for Legislative Auditor.  This was the detail on that suggested investigation:

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While the Chair did allow for two additional comments (41:20) on the Water Plan after this additional urging that citizens be heard, I still awaited even recognition of my desire to speak. [I began to re-write my comments… which eventually led to this blog.]

(46:05) Lori Cox explained that the Water Plan’s words “ensure and manage mean something is going to be done. In agriculture we have a tough time saying that those things are going to be managed or ensured.”  “We continually see the words “voluntary” in agriculture. And that has been used repeatedly… the stakeholders have been loud about that, however we still… with MPCA numbers and very great coordination and statistics by state agencies, have shown that we’re not really moving the line there.”  She asked, noting these are almost promises using the words “manage and ensure about water quality”, that the Board take a look at the wording in Agriculture, and expressed concern that, if approved today, the plan would not bring change.

I’m not positive that there would be much more change, with all of the great recommendations, suggestions, programs that are already there and have been for years, that we’re really gonna move the needle.”

Lori Cox (48:16)

(49:06) Gearhardt Robinson, recent U of MN grad with a BS in sustainable systems management with an emphasis on energy systems, expressed that there was very comprehensive information in the Plan. However, for the Plan to be meaningful, it must not only mitigate the effects of climate change, but target the root causes of it… something well within our capabilities and authorities to do.  (51:28) He congratulated the work of Commissioner Kelley of the DOC in re-filing the Appeal for Line 3 and urged ALL Commissioners to do what they could to file suits, deny permits, and do all the things in their power to protect Minnesotans and our water quality.

“To me it seems this plan isn’t really much of a plan, it’s kind of just abstract goals that really don’t have tangible ways to achieve them.”

Gearhardt Robinson (50:41)

(51:40) Gearhardt also noted that the use of the word “attack” [by Margaret Anderson Kelliher] in regard to the commenters asking for MPCA Commissioner Bishop to uphold her accountability to the public, was an interesting choice of words – one that implied some sort of violence.  He noted that what the citizens speaking up today are doing is not “violent”, but simply “help you make the right decision that will prevent violence against Indigenous Peoples, against land, and against all future generations.”  

52:05/52:12) Chair Bishop then cut him off saying, “Thank you. Mr. Robinson, I appreciate that and … you talk about climate resilience and we do have another inter-agency group, the Climate Subcabinet that is working on larger plans that address climate.”  [To my knowledge, that Climate Subcabinet has yet to be populated with membership or take any actions. I’ve never been contacted on my own submission… though it looks like there are 231 applications now, so perhaps I’m on the list yet to be contacted?]

Each agenda item in the meeting – not only the 2020 Water Plan, but also the Minnesota Sands, LLC project and the 2020 State Agency Pollinator Report –  showed that the MEQB and its agencies are NOT fulfilling their missions. This brought me deja vu to the May 1st, 2019   MEQB where Chuck Dayton, co-founder of this work, remonstrated that the original intentions for the MEQB were not being upheld these many decades later.  He indicated that the MEQB needed to re-evaluate their work to figure out why they were failing. He noted a lack of effective Environmental Review, with very few EIS, and an apparent inability to connect scientific dots to make decisions to prevent water quality deterioration.

As we watch water quality deteriorate and agencies make decisions based on checksheets that do not represent the complexity of the decisions being made, we see our young people standing up more and more – screaming for those in power to heed their cries to save the planet.  They are watching as groups like the MEQB make decisions that wipe away their futures. 

So, rather than push the vote to the end of the meeting, when ALL Water Plan commenters could be heard, Chair Bishop pushed through the vote before hearing the full public voice, making no response to the questions asked, and then closing the meeting asking for a motion to adjourn before she returned to those still awaiting their chance to speak on the Water Plan. [Note: (2:36:10) Gerald Van Amberg, Board of Water and Soil Resources Chair, moved to adjourn and Kristen Eide-Tollefson seconded.]

The only Board member to speak to Nookomis’ concerns was Kristen Eide-Tollefson, 2nd Congressional District Citizen Board Member.  She asked (53:11) if an addition could be made for Tribal consultation to the necessary discrete section. Erik Cedarleaf Dahl noted the section on Page 23 of the Plan which explained how the Tribal Consultation would occur. The fact that this Board is working on Minnesota issues but IGNORING their obligations to Federal Law, as explained by Nookomis in her questions on the Winter’s Doctrine, seemed a good reason to stop the vote… though it did not.

And how disturbing was that vote?  Unanimous… save ONE LONE vote of NAY from Ben Yawakie, an Indigenous Member of the Board.  The only response from the Board was to ask him to re-state his vote. [As if in disbelief that he’d voted “nay”?] A short silence followed as no one asked for more clarity from Ben on his vote and then… business moved on to the next agenda item.  There has not been a more CLEAR example in all my MEQB experience of the Native voice being summarily ignored as I bore witness to in the 9/9/20 meeting. 

The MEQB might want to ask themselves what the ramifications are for ignoring a US Supreme Court decision.  I’ve often thought, this Line 3 fight ~ and perhaps Polymet too, could end up being quite costly for the state of Minnesota, as its agencies collude with foreign corporations to push unnecessary pipeline and mining projects throughout Northern Minnesota Indian Country, all in violation of Federal Law.  

Perhaps Commissioner Kelley could have saved Minnesota taxpayers a lot of money in winning the case in State Court that there is No Need for Line 3… before the project goes on to Federal Court? Senate Republicans may end up regretting “executing” him – to use the Republican House Leader Daudt’s word – by not confirming him to his Commission at the Department of Commerce.  I am hopeful the Department is strong enough to continue their good work, though they’ve experienced an unconscionable dismissal of their wonderfully effective and caring leader, something harder and harder to find these days. 

As I indicated in my last note to MEQB Project Coordinator Giuseppe Tumminello, on their Environmental Review Data Mgmt Program, it seems that agencies and governments move too slow to keep pace with the changing planet. Gardhardt’s testimony at the meeting – that more of California was on fire than EVER in our recorded history – was alarming.  And we’re only now at the start of the fire season.  We have almost contiguous fire along the West Coast of our country from Canada to Mexico, but the MEQB, MPCA & MDNR seemed geared to go full steam ahead on their failing programs and plans that will dramatically increase climate effects in our state and for our planet as a whole. 

If we are to have a hope to save our natural environment for continued human support, the MQEB and ALL Minnesota agencies, politicians, and citizens are gonna have to get a lot more serious about solutions. 

And, as I have assured Giuseppe in recent emails, it may well be that, in the end, we resolve this with pitchforks. It seems to be the only way in America these days.

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Update 9-16-2020:

Interviewing Nookomis subsequent to the meetings about her testimony allowed me to better understand her points:

• There were 15 speakers at MEQB and all expressed concerns about theWater Plan.  
• At one time there were 96 attendees in the meeting.
• The Board voted with only one vote heeding the speakers.  
• Changes are being seen in the manoomin (wild rice), which is a product of its environment – like us all.  Rice from Sandy Lake smells of gas and oil. Rice from Fond du Lac doesn’t smell or taste oily.
• Understanding the Winter’s Doctrine allows the MEQB to comprehend their MORAL AND LEGAL obligations to Fond du Lac reservation, its Members, and the waters that serve them. These are Federal obligations to assure water rights for the Indigenous, as upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States.
• If Manoomin (wild rice) is not protected, it will not thrive.  Once Manoomin is gone, so is Anishinaabeg.  THAT is the genocide ~ a systematic and purposeful elimination of a Culture and and a People.

What she said while Laura spoke over her was this: 

What I wanted to say is that I’m done being invisible.  I don’t care if you try to over talk me, I’m done being invisible!  You can come here any time.  You will hear me and you will see me for as long as I live.  And you need to be able to say what I’m doing, seeing. Yes. I appreciate you listening. Thank you. Thank you very much.”

When asked of the discussion on personal “attack” during the meeting, Nookomis shared that these words resonated with her.  These agencies and boards are responsible to protect the water.  NOT protecting her WATER is a PERSONAL ATTACK!  It is also a violation of Treaty Law, the highest law of the land.   Nookomis said, “My legal rights are not dependent on your personal feelings. You are personally attacking me by poisoning my water.”

She wondered aloud how the schooling of these Commissioners had failed them as they seemed to not be able to comprehend simple concepts like water, soil, and food being connected to human health… let alone the larger connections to the climate of the planet as a whole.  

Nookomis further expressed that “Commissioner Bishop is in over her head and does not understand all she needs to know, in order to do her job to PROTECT MINNESOTA’S WATER.  THAT is her only job.  Water quality indicates she is derelict in her duties.  This is not just on the reservation but affects every single Minnesotan. 5.6 Million people. The 15 people on the call represented that concern.  300 written comments seemed acceptable to the MPCA.  “That’s how many people I have in my immediate family!”, she said.

She also noted that there was no explanation of the 1837, 1854, & 1855 ceded territories in the Plan.  She offered to walk the line (proposed route) with anyone, any time, any day. She said you might want to pack a big lunch!

She noted as well that there was no mention of Tribal Fisheries in the discussion of modifications needed.  The list of things left unsaid was long, she lamented.

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We have a long way to go to solutions, indeed. But Let’s Get to BETTER!*

* “Met” Chrysta Casteneda today at a talk that could help that MEQB comprehend what major issues they are not seeing… as the landscape on oil and gas becomes very fluid.