Sean Hannity "exposes" Congress created dust bowl

What some powerful people are saying about California water

By Nikki Schlaishunt

On my drive back up the California valley after Thanksgiving, I noticed lots of signs about the "congress created dust bowl." They were in the fields along Highway 5, the same route as the canal that moves water from northern California to central and southern California. When I got back, I decided to see if I could find out more so I Googled "congress created dust bowl" and found the website of Poverty and Hunger in America and a video clip of Shawn Hannity.

In watching the clip, it becomes clear that the complex and multi-layered issues involved in water and farming and fishing in California are being painted as black and white People vs. Fish, with people losing. For example:

• They claim that the central valley is the "…richest and most productive farm land in the nation" without talking about the amounts of petro-chemicals needed to get this sort of production, nor do they talk about the selenium toxic waste that results from mono-crop style farming of the land in the valley because it is all old seabed.
• They claim that the ruling that stopped irrigation water from being readily available for agriculture is only hurting local jobs, without acknowledging that drinking water continues to be available locally, nor do they acknowledge that the ruling was designed to protect the drinking water of 23 million people in the Bay Area.
• They claim that Congress is starving the bread basket of the world, without recognizing that California consists of a complex overlay of ecosystems and watersheds, and that we must take care of the whole if we want to be able to reap the benefits of its parts.

To check out this video clip, go to: http://www.povertyandhunger.org/PovertyinAmerica.html

Too often these isolated, simplistic arguments get the attention and win the hearts of the public, and too often they are the tools that rich and powerful people use to keep their money, power and resources. It is this system, this propaganda that BEC tries to take on every single day. We work to educate people about how our environment works and the value of healthy land, air and water. We work to advocate for the protection and preservation of the environment, and -- as a small nonprofit with limited resources -- often find ourselves up against overwhelming odds. We do this work because we know that without a healthy environment, we cannot have a healthy community.

From the Fall/Winter 2010 issue of the Environmental News.