>

There’s a farm not far from the area (I’m sure there are more but see this one every time I go to the area. There’s always horses in the field).
Burning vinyl chloride creates Phosgene gas. It’s heavier than air, so it fills basements, and valleys and trenches. It was used in WWI for trench warfare. Get out of the area. This stuff can kill. >

Crazy how 500 refused. >

Leave it to Americans to refuse to evacuate a fucking WWI gas attack on their suburb >

"OK well if you're not going to leave at least take these gas masks."
Did you say MASKS? >

Hate to say it, but this made me smile >

Not to be punny but, it’s like watching a train wreck.
Except I stopped feeling bad for watching, and I’m rooting for the train instead of the people. >

r/bitchimatrain >

I love Reddit for tiny communities like that, lol, what a sub. >

A glance at the title with “Gov. Mike DeWine”, “East Palestine”, and “deploys National Guard” had me real confused for a moment. >

Hah! I grew up around here. 
You could also visit East Liverpool, Calcutta, Lisbon, Poland, North Lima, Vienna, and Mecca within maybe an hour’s drive from East Palestine. 
As a kid, I remember being confused by some of those names. Also, if I recall, the “i” sound in Lima and Vienna sounds like “eye.” >

There's also a Paris, London, and Dublin in ohio. >

Just to the south~~east~~west of Dallas, Texas - and far enough for Dallas to be a weekend trip, rather than a quick stop into town at that - is Dublin, Texas.  It is remarkable in only two ways.  One is that it is one of the rare towns in Texas that doesn't feel as if it is navigating one of the tightest turns of a terminal decline that has lasted so long that no one living there remembers the supposed good old days.  The other is that they make and bottle Dr. Pepper.  Well, a variant of the stuff made with cane sugar rather than HFCS.
-Edit-
I've been informed that Dublin Doctor Pepper is no longer a thing and also reminded that left on the the average map is west rather than east.  That leaves me with only one other thing.  The first time I attended a Ren Faire, my wife and I got to talking with the purveyors of some costume shop or another, and after a congenial, meandering discussion, they told us that they'd be moving to Dublin.  This fact was allowed to stand while we processed the monumental move in store from them, and then they threw in that crucial additional detail that it was Dublin, Texas. >

Just to the Northeast of Dallas is Paris. Pretty sure there is a London somewhere. >

There is indeed a London.  I've passed through it a total of three times.  It is west of Austin, just north of I-10.  It is tiny.  I think the sign indicated it had a population under 200.  Passing through revealed a corner store, a stop sign, and...maybe a few houses?  All I can say is that repeating this line and then laughing about it took more time than crossing the entire village. >

Now that's an old frontier town!  
Seems there are some splitters though. >

This is your reminder that train companies want to reduce break periods between shifts, put all yard/engineer employees to an on-call only schedule, cut train crews from 2 to 1 person, and otherwise grind a labor force that is NOT "walk on jobs" into dust.
Oh, and has lobbied against infrastructure & capital investment requirements/upgrades for decades.
Trains are efficient, but they are not magic. They require a healthy, trained labor force and well-maintained equipment. Without those two, incidents like this are even more frequent than they already are. >

And that the federal government stepped in to prevent a strike that was attempting to address some of this insanity. >

They were right to prevent a strike; the railway unions are in a unique position that a strike would crush the entire economy. Congress was wrong in implementing a solution that didn't give significant concessions to the workers. >


They were right to prevent a strike; the railway unions are in a unique position that a strike would crush the entire economy.

Fuck it.  
Maybe that's what we need.  
Show the country what it really means to be an essential worker, and how fucked these people that keep our country are running.  
Maybe at that point, if we all go down with it, people will start to wake up and make change.  Nothing but an extreme measure will cause people to stop supporting these big companies and the scummy shit they do. >

The only people who say shit like this are the types that don’t understand what “crash the entire economy” actually means. >

If these people could crash the entire economy, maybe they should be treated better? So I still think they should strike. Give them four weeks time to find a solution and a strike date right afterwards. Let them find out who actually supports the country. I do not see stock brokers going on strike being a threat to anyone. >

Democrats tried to treat them better. Gave a nice, easy win for everyone. Not too big, not too small. Set it right there for the Republicans.
42 Senate Republicans (and Manchin) refused, and almost the entire Republican side of the House. And those 42 are enough to make it impossible. >

But again, this wasn't something congress had to step in about. This was a dispute between a corporation and their workers, the workers were legally unionized, and could legally strike. 
Congress should have been hands-off, and if asked, should have said they supported the workers, and urged the rail corporations to deal in good faith. >

Let me list all potential options here.
Option 1: hands off. Result: Death and economic devastation. The rail owners are 100% willing to sacrifice the country to keep their power. Railways shut down. Coal doesn't get delivered. Water treatment supplies don't get delivered. Food doesn't get delivered. Chaos ensues as people die. Democrats get blamed for not stepping in. Public support for the strike craters in a matter of days. It's not long before they're back at the negotiating table with an even weaker position. The owners, who have enough stored wealth to not give a fuck about the economic disruptions, keep on keeping on. Long term result: Republicans take full power next election, no one wins, fascism rises.
Option 2: Put forth only one bill demanding both the end of the strike and the sick day amendment in one package. It fails. See strike results above.
Option 3: Only the strikebreak bill is voted on, no sick day amendment. Serious possibility of striking anyway, legal or not. Either way, Dems get blamed and lose power next election, with the added potential for all the worst parts of option 1.
Option 4: See reality. Main bill plus amendment. Republicans voted against amendment, but supported strike break. No strike. A clear indication that Republicans were the ones causing the issue. No economic catastrophe. But it doesn't look good.
Take your pick. Of those available, I'll take option 4. >

You didn't finish option 4. Destroying Union Power means more power for oligarchs and a quicker rise to fascism. 
The only way this would have worked is option 1, and strong messaging that rail companies are to blame. >

They're playing it off that you should leave due to the chance of an explosion. It's pretty obvious they're evacuating because of toxic fumes but don't want to say that.. >

Yep. It's fairly standard for them to first say that it's because of fear of one or more explosions. They don't start admitting to the fumes until later, and usually as news spreads or a lot of people continue to refuse to leave. >

Remember folks, the US railroad system is run by executives who don’t think employees contribute to the bottom line. 
I guarantee you there’s not one C-suite member or shareholder risking their ass out there each day under cost-cutting measures and safety shortcuts. >

But hey, they posted record profits immediately after congress forced the workers to stop striking.
Think of how happy the people profiting off of this are, don't be selfish. >

Just wait for the proletarian revolt >

Why wait when you can actively organize or sabotage your work place today? >

It needs to be coordinated or it will get squashed in isolated pockets. I predict it will happen once the fascists take over and people protest, leading to police massacres and more public outrage escalating to something like we’re seeing in Iran. >

I completely agree that the more people willing to simultaneously act, the less likely capital can retaliate without suffering unsustainable losses to their own profits. 
However, I also think that perpetually waiting for “the moment” is part of how we’ve become so inured to continuing labor abuse. Spontaneous worker right activity does eventually snowball into movements, as we’ve seen with Starbucks and Amazon, and while everyone’s own case is unique, I’m hopeful that real labor movements that include the majority of middle and lower class occupations is close if we advocate for it. >

I went through a town evacuation after a train derailment a few years ago because of toxic fumes. I lived in an apartment with two levels and two doors in the same building as a business. 
The landlord refused to put a number for the apartment on the door downstairs. That said, I was later told that emergency services was required to knock on every door and they failed miserably. They admitted that they only knocked on the doors for the business. 
The only reason I knew to evacuate was because an elderly friend at the time who insisted that we communicate via FB sent me a message asking if I was okay. It was such a mess. The company paid everyone in town money afterward, but it took a long time for them to fix the land where the damage was done. 
And, yeah, there were people who absolutely refused to leave their homes. They feared their pets or farm animals, rural area, would die without them. They feared someone would steal their property. The gas was toxic. I'm glad to see that Ohio police are willing to arrest parents who refuse with children in the home.
Edit: The derailment was from negligence.