White House told EPA to lie after 9/11

Originally posted by Jakomo
Let me ask a simple question:

Do you blindly trust those in power SO MUCH that you let them make decisions FOR YOU based on information THEY DON'T TELL YOU?

Who are you directing this question at? Hell no, I don't! I don't see where you could possibly ever get that impression by anything I've ever posted. That's a ridiculous question, IMO.

Satyr: Mostly directed at the sheep goregrinder with his "Instead of making matters worse, they probably withheld info because of the terrible atrocitie that had just taken place. Think outside the box."

And Springer with his "WHAT, EXACTLY, would YOU have done? Told 13 million, already DEVISTATED people that after what they've been through, NOW THEY CAN'T BREATHE the air because it MIGHT be toxic?!"

That's actually EXACTLY what I would expect my government to do, anything less would be criminal. Maybe it's just me (and a few others) but I don't think that my government has the right to determine what I am to know and not know about a potentially dangerous biohazard.


j

Our elected representatives are not elected to office to lie to, or withhold information from, the electors.

Whether it is the Whitehouse in the US, or the Department of the Prime Minister and the Cabinet here in Australia, �in the public interest� or �national security� can no longer be used as an excuse to mislead, lie to, or simply not inform the people.

Too many people have died, too many unjustified wars have been waged, and our planet has all but been irrecoverably damaged by a successive string of deceit ridden rulers who have claimed such reasons in a futile attempt to cover up their own psychosis.

The notion that, if the people of NY were aware of all the relevant information it would be detrimental to their well being, is blatantly absurd.

The point is NOT one of "disclosing ALL information"... The POINT is they had NO solid eveidence the air was tainted anyhwere but ground zero, which, even that is still up for debate...

My point is, the city was in TOTAL Chaos, imagine the scene if they did come out and say, "By the wya, the air is probably poisinous" you had all better evacuate the city.

Who, exactly, would have overseen the evacuation? Who would have opened the roads and with what?

I would imagine, had they done this, someone like YOU would be typing things like "I can't beleive the US Government allowed that slaughter in NYC immediately after the WTC tragedy!" "Why would they start a mass exodus while the city was in such chaos already?"

"All those people who got trampled and run over died for nothing!"

Bottom line is IF the air was IN FACT (which has never been proven) tainted WHAT could they have done? You honestly think they could've evacuated NYC that day?

I don't. I think pandamonium would've ensued with MORE loss of life. THe city's resources were STRETCHED beyond breaking at ground zero and throughout the city trying to keep peace while the effects of what happened were sorted out.

This was a WORST CASE situation. That NOBODY was prepared for. To go back 2+ years later with hindsight and criticize the way the NYC officials handled this situation is crap IMO.

Somebody in this thread said they should've handed out gas masks! Wow... Yeah that'd have been possible. Everybody knows there is 13,000,000 gas masks laying around pre-distributed to each Burrow, it would've been a snap! sheesh!

PEACE...
m...

Springer: "Bottom line is IF the air was IN FACT (which has never been proven) tainted WHAT could they have done? You honestly think they could've evacuated NYC that day?

I don't. I think pandamonium would've ensued with MORE loss of life. THe city's resources were STRETCHED beyond breaking at ground zero and throughout the city trying to keep peace while the effects of what happened were sorted out.

This was a WORST CASE situation. That NOBODY was prepared for. To go back 2+ years later with hindsight and criticize the way the NYC officials handled this situation is crap IMO."

Did you even read the article? "At the White House�s direction, the Environmental Protection Agency gave New Yorkers misleading assurances that there was no health risk from the debris-laden air after the World Trade Center collapse, according to an internal inquiry."

I repeat, "gave New Yorkers misleading assurances that there was no health-risk". In other words, they were told there was no health risk but there actually was.

"For example, the inspector general found, EPA was convinced to omit guidance for cleaning indoor spaces and tips on potential health effects from airborne dust containing asbestos, lead, glass fibers and concrete."

Convinced to OMIT GUIDANCE. To LIE. However you want to spin it, your government TOLD the Environmental Protection Agency to LIE to you, to LIE to you about the health risks.

To lie to you at the cost of your health, your children's health, your friend's health, etc... It's BEYOND me how you can justify this and still think that you live in a free country! Because quite obviously you don't.



Jakomo

Originally posted by Springer
The point is NOT one of "disclosing ALL information"... The POINT is they had NO solid eveidence the air was tainted anyhwere but ground zero, which, even that is still up for debate...

So they removed any statement which could be questionable, and replaced it with BS disinfo stating it was safe, as if they knew for sure! You don't seem to see the blatant lie there. What exactly do you consider lying? They didn't just withhold the truth. They reassured people it was ok. And guess what! They're still lying.

This from the NYT:

Last week a quietly scathing report by the inspector general of the Environmental Protection Agency confirmed what some have long suspected: in the aftermath of the World Trade Center's collapse, the agency systematically misled New Yorkers about the risks the resulting air pollution posed to their health. And it did so under pressure from the White House.

The Bush administration has misled the public on many issues, from the budget outlook to the Iraqi threat. But this particular deception seems, at first sight, not just callous but gratuitous. It's only when you look back at budget politics in 2001 that you see the method in the administration's mendacity.

A draft E.P.A. report released last December conceded that 9/11 had led to huge emissions of pollutants. In particular, releases of dioxins � which are carcinogens and can also damage the nervous system and cause birth defects � created "likely the highest ambient concentrations that have ever been reported," up to 1,500 times normal levels. But the report concluded that because the outdoor air cleared after a couple of months, little harm had been done.

In fact, the main danger comes from toxic dust that seeped into buildings and remains in carpets, furniture and air ducts. According to a recent report in Salon, businesses that did environmental assessments of their own premises found alarming levels not just of dioxins but also of asbestos and other dangerous pollutants. So the most shocking revelation from the new report is that under White House direction, the E.P.A. suppressed warnings about indoor pollution. Scattered evidence suggests that as a result, hundreds of cleaning workers and thousands of residents may be suffering chronic health problems.

[Edited on 27-8-2003 by Satyr]

Bottom line is IF the air was IN FACT (which has never been proven) tainted WHAT could they have done? You honestly think they could've evacuated NYC that day?

Um.Springer, they had ALREADY evacuated most of the city, if your remeber correctly, Mayor Guilliani had already evacuated everything south of Canal street.

Evacuating the rest of the city was little problem, really, a simple matter of hey guys, the air is unbreathable (which anyone could have told you, since alot of asbestos still in the WTC alone made it a hazard.)

And i said distribute dust masks, not gas masks, you need to read closer. Dust masks are cheap and plentiful, and would have been a good defense against much of the lrager particles and toxins floatin around.

And as to, um.....it not being proven that the air was unbrewathable,. I think the #loads of New Yorkers who got sick and had respitory ailments, plus the large number of unersized babies born around that area says all. It doesnt take a rocket scientist to figure that, two humoungous towers of glass and steel, fire, burning jet fuel, fiber glass and asbestos, and the collapse of it all in a huge cloud of dust and ash that blanketed the city makes air a little less than breathable.

People didn trample each other when the towers collapse, people didnt trample each other when they evacuated over the brooklyn bridge. They would not have trampled each other when they were informed that the air at ground zero was nasty to breathe and bad for your health.

After what they had been through, being bad enough, now they have a future of lung ailments to look forward to.

The govornment was criminally negligent in not simply telling the people: stay out of city till we can make air breathable. Since the whole friggin town was virtually shut down for quite a few days, most people already traumatized and not returning to work, that wouldnt have been a problem for them. Those who absolutely needed to go in, could have been given a dust mask to minimize the risk associated with airborne particles.

Biut once again, the govornment, who doesnt care, simply failed to inform people, which they damn well knew, that the air was hazardous.

After having investigated this some more, now that there is MORE "about it" available, (when this thread started there was one lousy story about it) I'll concede the point that the administration BLEW IT.

I say this ONLY if the "reports" coming out are proven TRUE.

This REALLY SUCKS. I would think that they would've warned the people working right around ground zero at a minimum. They had the equipment available to them to offset the potential damage.

Bottom line is I have to beleive they "thought" they were doing the sensible thing. I won't buy off on some idea that they had a malevolent desire to poison a bunch of New Yorkers. It's ludicrous.

Next question is who is going DOWN for this? Again, if this proves to be TRUE, somebody needs to go to JAIL.

PEACE...
m...

Oh, it was no diabolical plot to to poison new yorkers. It was simply incompetance, and perhaps, greed.

I think they didnt tell the New Yorkers because after the devestation, they wanted those wage slaves back at thier desks and back at work making thier overlods money. I think it was a matter of money before public safety and health, thats all.

They sure as hell didn't want to shut down one of the nations biggest money cities for longer than they had to! What would that do to the stock market? Remember, they urged people to go shopping. Back to work, slaves!

Originally posted by Skadi_the_Evil_Elf
Oh, it was no diabolical plot to to poison new yorkers. It was simply incompetance, and perhaps, greed.

I can only agree with this statement... that is how most city governments work...

I don't think it was any massive conspiracy to poison New Yorkers either. I think it was incompetence mixed with a total disregard for public safety (at the expense of "security").

I would like to know what went through their minds however, when they decided to tell the EPA to hush up about any health problems. (Who was it in the Administration and what the hell did they use to justify it?)

And what a bunch of idiots, EVERYONE knows you shouldn't mess with a New Yorker. Never mind messing with ALL OF THEM!

I don't know about you, but this really concerns me. This is the kind of thing that happens in a Police State.

Creepy. I hope someone takes the fall but I doubt anyone will, unfortunately.



jakomo

I doubt there was a specific order to not tell the public about the airborne contamination, but if there was, it was simply to prevent A, public panic (in my experience, even a minor concern will be blown all out of proportion once it finds its way to the media), and B, to prevent the lawsuits for negligence (again, they just tend to explode when such information reaches the media.)

Although the latter only tends to make the litigation much worse, but being a government entity... *shrug*... Of course they cannot do the right thing...