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Denton fracking ban: Media takes the Jim Crow bait

By

TakeTheBait
To all the media who thought the sketchy press release from the oil and gas industry and an anecdotal rumor from one student was news, here is your assignment —–>

The industry’s typical plan of attack–bullying, scare mongering and burying the city with misinformation–backfired, so they are looking for some way to explain away the millions they wasted. And they want to accomplish this by putting out even more misinformation rather than the truth that they have too long ignored the serious impacts from their operations.

I think Denton Councilman Kevin Roden can set the record straight about the vote.

As Roden pointed out:

Their data is wildly inaccurate, claiming to cite voting data that doesn’t even exist such as supposed distinctions between “permanent residents” and non-permanent residents.

Does anyone else detect essence of Jim Crow in the industry’s over-the-top, inaccurate response? There was a time when only white males who owned property could vote. And the Tea Party would like to see the U.S. slip back into those days.

Number 3 from the 8 ways blacks and poor whites were kept from voting during the Jim Crow days:

3) Property tests: In the South one hundred years ago, many states allowed only property owners to vote.  Many blacks and whites had no property and could not vote.

I have anecdotal stories about voters from two weeks spent poll sitting during early voting and 12 hours doing the same on November 4th. Elderly voters voted for the ban, people with Greg Abbott stickers on their pickup trucks voted for the ban, industry workers voted for the ban saying they don’t think their industry should operate in neighborhoods.

The fact is that Denton is a predominately Republican city with about a decade of experience in trying to find a way to live with fracking. The people who know fracking best have learned that it’s not currently possible to live with it. So they crossed party lines and voted to keep it out of their backyards.

It is disappointing that more students didn’t vote. The legacy we are leaving them is not a pretty one. They have a vested interest and every right to cast a vote for their future.

It’ is even more disappointing that some are suggesting that the vote of a young person is somehow worth less than the vote of an elderly person.

Susan B. Anthony’s grave on November 4, 2014susan-b-anthony-grave

 

About Sharon Wilson

Sharon Wilson is considered a leading citizen expert on the impacts of shale oil and gas extraction. She is the go-to person whether it’s top EPA officials from D.C., national and international news networks, or residents facing the shock of eminent domain and the devastating environmental effects of natural gas development in their backyards.

Comments

  1. Larry says

    There is also this specious statement of the Texas Royalty Council press release, which I’m sure is in part what Rep. Roden was referring to.:

    “Based on returns from the precincts overlapping and near the college campuses, students bloc voted 90% FOR the drilling ban measure …”

    The question should be raised, “How overlapping and how near were these precincts that the TRC claims were students”? Let’s see your full set of data TRC.

    The pro-fracking zealots seem oblivious of the critical thinking errors they make nearly every time they open their mouths and apparently hope that their opponents have none at all

  2. Tim Ruggiero says

    Industry Pimps Energy In Depth are also doing the same thing; splitting hairs over who voted from what precinct. As if any of that makes a damn bit of difference. Neither does the fact that Industry and their Fan Clubs spent over a $1 MILLION trying to defeat the ban initiative.

    I’ll be honest-If I spent a million bucks and this was the result I got, I think the last thing I’d be doing is blaming it on a handful of college kids. Try placing the blame squarely where it’s deserved-On Industry themselves.

    What the TRRC, TCEQ, Phil King, Myra Crownover, Bobby “I Don’t Know” Jones, et. al., do not seem to comprehend is the simple fact no one wants a goddamn drill rig or any of it’s components, infrastructure or hazards in their backyard, schoolyard, parks and playgrounds.

    Since Paid Protectors like Christi Craddick seem to think they failed us on properly educating the people on the virtues of fracking, perhaps we should invite her to Denton, and she can come explain why certain Texans need to sacrifice their health, the health of their children, their home’s value and use and enjoyment of their property so a handful of mineral right owners can buy a condo on the beach.

  3. meamous says

    Good work up there in Denton. Good that you have your gubment on your side. Totally unlike here in Booger County, where the locals are all Bought off by the Gas Holes & and now the Oil Holes.