Wednesday, August 04, 2010

Ground Control to EPA, your circuit's dead, there's something wrong...

So I stopped by the web's premiere source of kittens, butterflies, & sunshine last night to get my daily bowl of cold cheer and was suddenly overcome with a nearly overpowering urge to beat a bureaucrat to the floor with a lead pipe and hit him 'til he stopped whimpering. I mean, an even stronger urge than the one I usually have.

Why, you ask?

Well, let me tell you:
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is considering a crackdown on farm dust...
Wrap your head around that one, if you can.

How do these people think the world works? Wave a wand in DC and reality bends to your will from sea to shining sea? Declare "haud pulvis fiat!" and suddenly Farmer Frank's tractors don't kick up any dust getting the soybean harvest in? Hey, let's get π rounded to 3 while we're at it and watch our students' grades rocket past the rest of the globe because math will be easier!

34 comments:

Anonymous said...

The EPA didn't want Kevin Costner to us the cenrifugal oil reclame machines in the gulf because the units only remove 98% of the oil from water and that wasn't enough. So removal of 98% vs 0%. The EPA needs to be abandoned as a loon organization. Just dead weight holding back the whole country. Video of Costner testifying to congress is on you tube.

Anonymous said...

It's simple really; just make it a federal offense to do any farming activity when it isn't raining. The rain will keep the dust down.

Bram said...

Hey, the EPA along with OSHA and other agencies has successfully accomplished the outsourcing of nearly all U.S. manufacturing and energy production. Now it is time to apply their proven track record to the farming industry. Those bastards have been skating for decades.

perlhaqr said...

It's kind of like the overall career path of unions, really. When unions were all about making sure hired thugs for company towns didn't beat workers to death for daring to demand that they get paid enough to not become indentured slaves to the company store, and when the EPA was making sure that factories didn't pump megatons of industrial effluvient directly into rivers, they were doing a worthwhile job.

But these days, workers already have the upper hand over corporations, and most egregious and major sources of pollution have been dealt with. But since organizations are always concerned with the continuation of the organization, they have to find increasingly insane things to demand, leading to unions making it damn near impossible to fire workers who don't actually work, and the EPA regulating carbon dioxide and farm dust.

Midwest Chick said...

The base reason for this is those morons who move into the country from the city (we've seen it in our area) and then complain because there's dust and dandelions and it might take a while to get the road plowed..... And then they've got 'powerful' friends at the EPA... and then.....

BTW, my word verification: 'lessons'

BobG said...

Time to start reining in some of these alphabet agencies.

Anonymous said...

And the senators are the ones with common sense over this one? The world must be coming to an end.

Tam said...

"And the senators are the ones with common sense over this one?"

The senators are the ones with farm voters and agribusiness lobbyists.

theirritablearchitect said...

I'm sitting here, wringing my hands, an evil grin on my face at the boiling contempt you are so filled with.

Lead pipe. Where do you source yours?

Tam said...

You know you get bonus points if you use a lead pipe on an EPA type, right?

Sadly, it's hard to beat a man to a paste with a pipe made of DDT...

Anonymous said...

You could drown him in DDT, I suppose. (A funnel, some tubing dripping into the lungs. )

While you beat him to death with a lead pipe.

Then dry him and spread his dust on the wind.

A trifecta.

(For the humourless: this is an example of hyperbole.)

Anonymous said...

What perlhaqr said.

Self-perpetuation and job security; the raison d'être for so much and so many.

AT

DJ said...

Perhaps next they'll legislate a decrease in gravity so they can more easily carry their fat heads.

I was raised on a farm, which means I'm more than a bit familiar with farm dust. For many decades, the classic way to control it on roads was to coat the roads with waste oil. It worked, but the EPA put a stop to it. Maybe they'll try it again.

Bubblehead Les. said...

True Story Time: The town where I live runs a water treatment plant. Since it was placed by the river that separates the town that The World's Most Dangerous Librarian (Breda) works in from mine, we own half, her town owns half. The EPA came in a few months back and said we have to run a test to determine if it meets their new Federal Impossed Storm Water Runoff regs. The test will cost over $500,000. But here's the kicker: Both cities have to PAY for the TEST! NOT the Federales who ordered it, NOT some "Stimulus" fund grant, but the local cities involved. Due to a corruption scandal a few years back, my city is broke (yes, the bums got caught and were thrown out and sent to jail). So in 2 days, our city government we have a vote and will probably raise our water/sewer bills by over $5.00 a month to pay for the test. Don't know what Ms. Breda's city will do. Speculation has it that no matter how well the Plant does its job under the old regs, it won't meet whatever new standard is crammed down our throat, and we'll be forced to build a new plant.

Question: Since the EPA is a Federal Angency, and gets Billions of our Taxes to run itself, why are we being charged for a test that THEY want? Why don't they use the money they stole from us already?

Note to Obammy: $5.00 a month may not seem too much to you, but for the old retirees who live near me, that is way over the "Not one single dime in taxes for those who make under $250,000" you promised. But maybe Michelle My Bell needs the cash for her Summer Vacation in Spain, where she is probably co-ordinating Communist strategy with her Comrades from Cuba, Mexico, and Venezuala.

Anonymous said...

Ummm.... PI *is* equal to 3.0, where space is sufficiently curved. How do you get curved space? Well, there are several ways, but a large, massive object will warp space in its vicinity.

Thus, from the gov't point of view, PI is 3.

Samsam

Old NFO said...

WTF is right... sigh...

Stretch said...

I've always maintained Nixon should have been impeached for signing the EPA into existence.

Fuzzy Curmudgeon said...

Tam: Just fill the lead pipe with DDT before applying upside EPA head.

Jenny said...

Lead pipe not poetic enough. Six months in Africa during mosquito season. Without antimalarials.

Crucis said...

In the fields! I've seen dust 6" to 8" deep inside some barns. It's like walking through dirty snow.

Pointy hooves and dirt floors equals dust. A lot of dust. Not all barns have nice, clean concrete floors.

Anonymous said...

"Wrap your head around that one, if you can."

You're not really surprised, are you?

This is a beast, driven by envy, that hates the human race. Think North Korea. Nothing they could do should surprise anyone. We've seen it all before, over and over and over. In every case, the people lived (and then died) in stunned disbelief at the total lack of reason. Don't be one of those people. We know exactly where this beast is trying to take us, even if most of its operatives don't. -- Lyle

Joel said...

If we squeezed all the stupid in Washington into a sufficiently small mass, would it bend space enough to cause pi to equal 3?

Since it's not possible to actually squeeze stupid, could we try the experiment with the bureaucrats themselves? And politicians, of course, because we mustn't make them feel left out.

Barrett B. said...

Well, I may regret this, but please allow me to play devil's advocate for a moment. The house where I grew up was surrounded on all four sides by fields, usually cotton but sometimes beans, corn, or wheat. In that time, I've seen most of the windrows between fields cut down in efforts by farmers to squeeze out every last square inch of growing space they could get. Without those windrows to provide a break, there's nothing in that part of the state to give any relief from the wind. Every year, we got wind that drove clouds of dust hard enough that one could easily mistake it for rain and sometimes without a single tractor in the fields. That was on my parents' two acres that had over forty trees surrounding the house, shop, and barn. The school I went to constantly had a patina of dust on the shelves and in the nooks and crannies.

I'm not saying that the EPA could fix this or even that they should try. I figure if/when they go through with it, they'll manage to turn it into a massive mess like they do most things. But at the same time, I can see why some folks would believe that there's a need to "do something". My father's one of those folks. I always just figured it was one of the prices we had to pay for living outside of any city limits and just hoped the farmers would eventually realize they were spending a dollar to get a dime...

Tam said...

"...just hoped the farmers would eventually realize they were spending a dollar to get a dime..."

Do you only do this with farmers? Or do you also tell doctors, jet engine mechanics, butchers, accountants, and baseball pitchers how to do their jobs better?

Ancient Woodsman said...

"How do these people think the world works? Wave a wand in DC and reality bends to your will from sea to shining sea?"

Yes, I think that there is part of the problem.

Our state air quality regulations refer to this sort of thing as "fugitive dust". No joke.

I'm still not sure what business a federal agency has with (as described , anyway) is a state or local issue. If 'they' want ot protect Missouri from Iowa dust that is one thing, but to protect me from my neighbor's dust is not a federal job.

Pathfinder said...

Maybe the EPA - and other .gov entities - are all peopled by wankers what never heard of King Kanute?



Just wondering . . . .

Anonymous said...

There's a difference between discouraging bad farming practices (eliminating windrows, abandoning terraces, farming slopes that really should be left for pasture, overwatering, intentionally letting manure pollute streams) and bureaucratic foolishness. I think the EPA rule falls under the latter, much like Missouri threatening to sue Kansas' ranchers because on a few days in spring, in years when the wind is from the west, smoke from pasture burning trips the EPA air quality meters in K.C.
LittleRed1

Weetabix said...

Tell it to the Marines:

Rhino Snot helps Marines combat damaging dust in Iraq

And, Anonymous? People from KC don't count as being from Missouri. Just sayin'.

- Hinterbix

WV: snadjet - what an Afrikaner calls a rhino's sneeze

Crucis said...

**Grin**
Weetabix, that's why I say I'm from "just south of KC." In another county altogether.

BTW, the EPA hasn't budged from its office in the KC Federal building in over a decade. They installed some "sensors" on the roof in the early 90s. Now all they measure is pigeon crap.

Barrett B. said...

Do you only do this with farmers? Or do you also tell doctors, jet engine mechanics, butchers, accountants, and baseball pitchers how to do their jobs better?

I honestly can't see how you got that I'm trying to tell people how to do their jobs better. I simply pointed out what is in my opinion a drawback to certain practices. Seems to me there's no difference between my armchair quarterbacking the farmers and you ripping into a police department that breaks rule 3 as a matter of policy.

Perhaps you'd care to explain the difference? Actually, never mind. Knew I'd regret this.

Tam said...

Barrett B.,

"Seems to me there's no difference between my armchair quarterbacking the farmers and you ripping into a police department that breaks rule 3 as a matter of policy."

Heh.

Fair enough. :)

Tam said...

(...although Rules 2 or 4 would made a better analogy. I'm scratching my head and can't think of a valid tactical or departmental policy reason for a Rule 3 violation.)

Brad K. said...

I hope they don't crack down on dust from dirt and gravel roads. That would be dangerous. Without dust, how could you tell which neighbor is approaching the intersection ahead, or that a car driving on the road in front of the house - stopped and turned in?

Will the EPA include dust when stirred by runaway feral hogs or deer? or tornadoes or dust devils? What about control burns for weed control?

What about dust from EPA vehicles searching farms and dirt and gravel roads for sources of dust?

Crucis said...

The Sierra Club of Kansas is all upset about the annual burn-off in the Flint Hills area. This is the last open range in Kansas. The annual burns simulate the range fires of previous centuries and needed to allow fresh grass to grow.

The Sierra Club, however, is more concerned about the small animals and birds they claim are kill enmass during the burns contrary to studies done to determine if any mass killing actually occurred. They don't.