The New School Nazis: It's Your Actions that Define You

New School Nazis – CHIPPING AWAY AT BUREAUCRACY

If you have ever tried to question a policy decision, stop bias legislation, or just find out what’s going on in your local government; you’ve probably come up against a formidable array of bureaucratic barriers.

The following is a list of the most common defenses, and the order in which they are usually applied:

          1. Discredit the Person

          2. Discredit the Facts

          3. Discredit the Situation

          4. It’s Legal Anyway

In our government’s protective reflex to swat away any annoyance, its first response to any buzzing is to discredit the source that’s causing problems.

It’s an action that I’m familiar with. After being engulfed in a cloud of Roundup from an agricultural boom sprayer while mowing my lawn [on a gusty and windy day] and waking up vomiting up my stomach all over the bathroom floor that night: I made a complaint to the NYSDEC with the following result:

Their investigation – that required a FOIL request for me to access – claimed that I was “politically active against farming” even though I had leased the field being sprayed to a farmer for more than 25 years, and found my actions suspicious – leaving it open that I was lying or somehow at fault myself. None of the incident’s factual data, such as the wind speed and direction on the day of the spraying, or any of the herbicide application regulations, were ever addressed. [Local NOAA records show a wind of 16-17 mph, gusting to 23 mph.] The report ended with: “case closed!”

When it comes to discrediting facts that conflict with and undermine government policy making decisions; authorities can choose from a number of passive and proactive methods. A bureaucratic favorite is to present the public with background information that deliberately misrepresents, and even omits key facts; in order to validate their chosen course of action.

Harmful Algal Blooms (HABs): In its public document; the NYSDEC never once mentioned agriculture as a source of nutrient pollution, although it contributes more than four times the nutrient pollution to the waters of the Finger Lakes than all other sources combined – and employs terms like “exactly predict” and “fully understand” to bureaucratically justify their deliberate omission.

They do mention that “the amount of nutrients can be decreased by: Limiting lawn fertilization” and “Maintaining septic tanks” – sources that contribute less than 1% to the nutrient pollution total.

If getting government authorities to admit the facts is difficult; getting them to accurately report a situation and make appropriate policy decisions is almost impossible. Not only do they occupy an autocratic “high ground” that allows them to cite everything from jobs to jurisprudence as an excuse; they can change the ground rules to suit their objectives.

A good example can be found in New York’s Finger Lakes, where the region’s most powerful interests are allowed to do almost all of the polluting. Since cleaning up the lakes would restrict the operations and profits of these interests; authorities have decided to pursue an environmental policy that merely maintains the pollution at a profitable level – a level that eliminates traditional rural uses of these lakes. A Total Daily Maximum Load [TMDL] of pollution will be decided, and then divided among these interests, who will “try” to meet the target goals. [Cornell: one of the larger polluters, and the most heavily tied to agricultural interests, will establish the TDML – so all the “pollution-reduction” planning will be kept “in-house.”]

This policy will cause many rural people to lose the lakes and aquifers as a source of drinking water, but all the politically important residents [and decision makers] are on municipal water anyway.

[A detailed examination of New York State’s “Agricultural Disclosure Form” – a deliberately fraudulent suppression of facts – will be presented later.]

An important part of today’s regulatory process is how well it works to protect the interests of those who are regulated. Our government continually legislates ineffectual environmental regulations that effectively protect these polluters.

The following court decision concerns an incident took place only a few miles from my house:

The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit [Mather v. Willet Dairy] in finding against plaintiffs suffering from the effects of manure off-gassing that included brain damage in one child and required surgical removal of eyelids in an adult commented that the laws “may be inadequate for ensuring the safety of our environment and for protecting citizens from serious injury. But that is the remedy that Congress has provided and to which we are bound.”

Willet Dairy was shielded by its “permit shield” from any citizen suits – the rural victims were shielded by nothing.

When power is highly concentrated in rural areas, like it is in Tompkins County, it stands untouchable. No matter how much evidence is gathered, no matter how much misconduct is involved, the County’s elite can slam the door shut. They refuse to investigate, they refuse to enforce the law, they refuse acknowledge, they refuse to start, they refuse to stop; they just refuse — and what can you do about that?

These are classic bureaucratic tools for frustrating any troublemaker who upsets the smooth flow of government routine. It’s their job, and they’re being paid for every minute they delay, equivocate, or redirect. It’s not surprising if you keep leaving unanswered voicemails, texts, and emails and that they are “out of the office until. . .” or “in a meeting” — a bureaucrat who does nothing is doing nothing wrong. And when you have finally caught up with the fugitive functionary; all your efforts may only lead to “The Referral.”

It takes only a few seconds and a few words to send you off to fill out additional forms, lobby higher-ups for their approval, or to track down someone in some other department who is even more inaccessible and difficult to get in touch with – the energy-sapping frustration of being passed around in an inescapable circle of non-productive referrals: back to the same office and the same person you started with weeks before.

“The Referral” can be the most difficult of all obstacles to overcome.