"A GREAT DEAL OF INTELLIGENCE CAN BE INVESTED IN IGNORANCE WHEN THE NEED FOR ILLUSION IS DEEP"

The quote above was in last Saturday's Waterloo Region Record. The author is Saul Bellows. Talk about a moment when you felt that the author was speaking directly to you. I learned a long time ago that when intelligent and educated people appear incapable of following direct lines of evidence to an obvious conclusion that there is a reason for it. They actually are more willing to appear dense or stupid than to admit the obvious. Obvious, oddly enough, to anyone and everyone who does not have a financial stake in the quite clear conclusion. The expression that I have long used is INTENTIONALLY OBTUSE. ................................................................................................................. Water flows downhill. Sure seems both simple and obvious to CPAC members and honest TAG members. However seven full years after I and CPAC presented the staggering information, twenty-five years after the start of the 1989 Elmira Water Crisis, that there was an ongoing surface flow of water running parallel to the Uniroyal/Stroh property line and within ten metres of it, we still have blind (?) refusals to honestly and fully investigate. ..................................................................................................................... "A great deal of intelligence...". Not every single Woolwich Councillor is mentally challenged. Most unlikely that every single Lanxess Canada employee/spokespersons are stupid. Same thing goes for consultants GHD and for the Ontario Ministry of Environment (MOE/MECP). In fact I'm now going to insult many of those persons to the quick. I believe that many of them are of above average intelligence. How is that insulting? Because the alternative is that they are intentionally obtuse. They are corrupt. ......................................................................................................................................... "...invested in ignorance...". It is one thing to stick to a lie when you have carefully manipulated laws and rules to the point that no one else has a fraction of the information that you have. i.e. knowledge is power. But when your monopoly on information has been even partially broken whether through good luck or an error then it is time to readjust your lies and disinformation. At least for normal, professional liars. ............................................................................................................. "...when the need for illusion is deep.". Well this gets to the heart of it. It's now progressed way beyond money. Money and the normal corporate desire to externalize costs onto the public as much as possible may have been the initial reason. Externalizing costs can mean actual taxpayers subsidys via direct public expenditure on cleanup such as 50% of the pump and treat costs for the Elmira Aquifers. It can also mean ongoing mobilization of DDT and dioxins/furans originally from Uniroyal Chemical that cause both environmental and human health costs downstream. ..................................................................................................... Politicians are deeply involved. Careers and credibility are now on the line. Woolwich Township have generally been extremely supportive of Uniroyal/Crompton/Chemtura and Lanxess Canada even to the point of manipulating public consultation and promoting pro status quo citizens while intentionally undermining honest citizen volunteers more interested in the truth. Woolwich politicians may also have made immoral promises to local developers or others with a financial interest in developing the east side of Elmira, even above contaminated soils and waters that should be remediated first with the costs going directly to the appropriate corporate entity. This is Elmira and THE NEED FOR ILLUSION IS VERY DEEP.