If anybody wants to disagree with me I'm over there----->

"Highlander-Datsuns are Forever" (jamesbowland)
10/06/2018 at 11:37 • Filed to: I commented critically about elon musk now I'm paying the price.

“Point of use treatment is a lousy solution in the long run. I would like to see him invest the millions needed to upgrade the root of the problem, the aging infrastructure in flint.”

My point being a bunch of $50 water filters is better than giving Puerto Rico paper towels but it is only a temporary fix that will likely not last very long and there will be a very low chance of follow up when the filters are spent. Public health is still at risk and the local/state/federal government is not going to go 100% into this issue to fix it as the cost of a new distribution system is astronomical .

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DISCUSSION (34)

ttyymmnn > Highlander-Datsuns are Forever
10/06/2018 at 11:45

It’s a PR band aid. Buy one less F-35 and rebuild the system. But it’s for the poors, so it won’t happen.

Svend > Highlander-Datsuns are Forever
10/06/2018 at 11:46

It’s been while but how did the Flint water system get into such a bad state?

Some of ours in the U.K. are nearly as older as yje U.S. so what went so wrong with their system? Wrong pipes? Poll utants introduced into the system due to error or lack of maintenance?

Spanfeller is a twat > Highlander-Datsuns are Forever
10/06/2018 at 11:50

This is a public sector issue. Elon Musk, or any millionaire for that matter, shouldn’t be trying to fix it. It lower s people’s expectations of their government and that’s not very practical.

Like, I understand charity. I really do, but governments are meant to do basic functions like, I don’t know, making sure their populations aren’t ingesting lead? The US government should be fixing Flint, or at least forcing the Michigan government into fixing it. These kinds of situations are what HUD is made for! Shame they put a completely incompetent man in charge of it.

The pressure has to be on the government. Honestly, whatever Elon Musk spent on those filters would’ve probably been spent better paying the ACLU to sue Michigan and the Feds.

djmt1 > Svend
10/06/2018 at 11:53

Somewhere important was poisoned in our case. Probably be a different tune if Washington had no tap water.

Highlander-Datsuns are Forever > Svend
10/06/2018 at 11:53

The distribution system (pipes) are made of metal that contains lead (in small amounts). The city switched to a different water supply that was very corrosive and didn’t treat the water correctly. The corrosive water started leaching lead out of the pipes and boom, crisis.

vondon302 > Svend
10/06/2018 at 11:54

City went broke. Was being run by a fianancial manager at the time. To save money switched from Detroit water system and started pulling from the river. During the process of switching over pipes got damaged and tainted.

There is a lot more to the story but that's pretty much it.

Spanfeller is a twat > Svend
10/06/2018 at 11:54

iirc Flint switched to a cheaper source of water, which was a river contaminated by car-manufacturer chemicals. Those chemicals stripped lead off the pipes.

Or maybe it was only the chemicals? I could be wrong.

Highlander-Datsuns are Forever > ttyymmnn
10/06/2018 at 11:56

EXACTLY.

Spanfeller is a twat > ttyymmnn
10/06/2018 at 11:56

bUt wHaT aBoUt tHe mIliTaRy iNdUsTrIaL cOmPlEx?

Svend > vondon302
10/06/2018 at 12:02

How the hell could they just switch it from Detroit system to pulling it from a river? How could they guarantee the river wasn’t bringing in pollutants? It just seems like such a clusterfuck and that person who did it should be charged with manslaughter at best.

Svend > Spanfeller is a twat
10/06/2018 at 12:03

That’s crazy. Flint is in a 1st world country one of very few super power countries, how was it allowed to happen?

Spanfeller is a twat > Svend
10/06/2018 at 12:09

The reason Flint’s water is allowed to be that bad is because of classism, impunity, and a toxic culture.

huh, I think Flint had a small case of Mexico-itis.

facw > Spanfeller is a twat
10/06/2018 at 12:14

No you are right. The contamination comes from the old pipes. They were previously receiving water from Detroit, which actually has high quality water. When they switched to river water, that water was safe to drink, but more corrosive, which caused lead from the pipes to start leaching into the water. There was a simple treatment they could have done to make the water much less destructive, but didn’t because it would have cost a tiny bit more.

DipodomysDeserti > Svend
10/06/2018 at 12:30

Runaway capitalism. We are a nation built on exploitation

Native Americans in the northern part of my state have been being poisoned by uranium for half a century. The feds let mining companies abandon open pit mines around the Grand Canyon causing uranium to enter the watershed. The land responsible for making America a superpower can’t even give it’s people clean water.

ranwhenparked > Svend
10/06/2018 at 12:32

I believe what happened was that when Flint first switched from pumping and treating their own water from the river to buying from Detroit, they retained their old pumping station as a backup and were able to upgrade it and put it back into operation at minimal cost when Detroit became unaffordable. It was supposed to be a temporary stopgap until a new regional pipeline from Lake Michigan could be completed, which was/is to serve Flint and a number of other communities that were customers of Detroit.

Svend > DipodomysDeserti
10/06/2018 at 12:39

That’s simply insane.

Highlander-Datsuns are Forever > Svend
10/06/2018 at 12:43

The auto industry abandoned flint starting in the late 1970's, finally gone for good by the 1990's. All that could afford to leave, have left. It’s down to lower poverty level families and the elderly. It is not a 1st world area like it was from the 1940's to the 1960's.

vondon302 > Svend
10/06/2018 at 12:45

There is a low level drain commissioner getting charged I believe but he’s just a sacrificial lamb in my opinion.

I was actually born in Flint. So glad my parents got out of there when I was a little guy.

Svend > ranwhenparked
10/06/2018 at 12:47

Thanks, that sort of makes sense but stop gaps when it c omes to drinking water needs to be checked, rechecked and checked again.

I mean a common question asked by foreigners to the U.K. is why does all but recent baths and sinks have two taps, a hot and a cold. It’s because the cold water tap is drinkable, potable water where hot water may of been cold water sat in a water tank in the attic, etc... ready to be heated by the boiler and so can’t be guaranteed to be drinkable nor can cold if it’s gone through a tap where hot water from a boiler has gone through.

Svend > Highlander-Datsuns are Forever
10/06/2018 at 12:53

That’s just a awful shame and tragic that it’s taken so long to do anything about it.

Svend > vondon302
10/06/2018 at 12:55

Anyone that had anything to do with it and had any knowledge of the situation should be charged.

I would of hoped that with how long since it’s been found to be an issue that it would be in some sort of way completed and people could go about their lives.

Highlander-Datsuns are Forever > Svend
10/06/2018 at 12:59

https://money.cnn.com/2016/02/11/real_estate/cities-with-most-vacancies/index.html

Highlander-Datsuns are Forever > Svend
10/06/2018 at 12:59

There areas around Detroit in particular that are modern day ghost towns.

Svend > Highlander-Datsuns are Forever
10/06/2018 at 13:02

I thought that was the case for the last 15-20+ years.

vondon302 > Svend
10/06/2018 at 13:10

I hear ya. Attorney general said he couldn’t charge the governor and guess who’s running for governor now.

Yup the attorney general.

America is sinking fast.

Svend > vondon302
10/06/2018 at 13:28

Bloody hell. That’s, I’m going to have to use the word again, insane.

Is there a competition of who can screw over the most people or kill the most people without having to go to jail but going even further up the ladder?

I’ve said it too often, America scares the crap out of me and I lived in Saudi Arabia when the North and South Yemenese were at war and the south started trying to intimidate Saudi into not siding with the north by bombing foreign bases in the region.

I know that’s going to invite some butthurt from some readers because I’m a fo reigner, etc... but seriously, come on.

Ye’, we have a lot of laws, they are there for a reason.

ranwhenparked > Highlander-Datsuns are Forever
10/06/2018 at 14:27

And that was a contributing factor to the problem with their water system, as I recall. It was scaled to serve a giant industrial base and a much larger population, and as factories closed and people moved out, it created a situation where water moved through the system much more slowly and sat in pipes for longer; combined with the financial strain of maintaining such an oversized infrastructure with a smaller revenue base.

ranwhenparked > ttyymmnn
10/06/2018 at 14:33

Eh, let’s not pretend government spending has any relationship with revenue. If they wanted to fix Flint, they wouldn’t have to cut anything else, just borrow some more money, like they do for everything they buy.

vondon302 > Svend
10/06/2018 at 17:58

It’s becoming increasingly clear that the laws are only for little people not the Elites. Especially after this last week. Our partisan politics is getting really ugly and I’m scared too.

I'm going to Amsterdam for New years Eve. Thinking of taking my Canadian hat and saying I'm Canadian. Never thought I'd be embarrassed to be an American.

Svend > vondon302
10/06/2018 at 18:34

Lol. You wouldn’t be the first one.

Only kidding.

Leave the hat at home and just be yourself.

Leave religion and politics behind and just be.

Also don’t compare anything you see to anything back home in the way of ‘........................ is bigger back home in America’, that one gets old fast. Lol.

I hope you have fun in Amsterdam.

vondon302 > Svend
10/06/2018 at 19:49

Lol.

Me and the wife did 25 days in 2016 in Germany, Czechoslovakia, and the Netherlands. Loved it. I was like wow functional public transportation! Trump came up a lot of then so I’m getting ready this time. Actually the conversations I had with locals is one of the things that sticks with me so yeah I probably won’t.

How small Europe is hard to explain to most Americans. Especially in a state that you can drive 8 hours north and never leave your state.

Cheers

merged-5876237249235911857-hrw8uc > ranwhenparked
10/06/2018 at 21:22

This is correct. But they neglected to properly add the necessary chemical treatment regimes to combat the flint river water and the protective coating in the pipes that had been there from years of proper treatment had started to get eaten away by the improperly treated water.

And the kicker is the proper chemical treatment was relatively cheap to run. So sad.

ranwhenparked > merged-5876237249235911857-hrw8uc
10/06/2018 at 22:48

Yep, I remember that now. The leaching metals also caused bacterial growth in the water - which shouldn’t have happened anyway, high acidity or not; except that they weren’t maintaining the proper chlorine level.

I know how tricky chlorine can be in water, but, still, you’d figure a municipal agency could get it right.

Brickfoot Ginger > Svend
10/07/2018 at 21:13

Nestle.