The Daily Times doubles down on its lavish praise of the do-gooderism of the Chester Girls and Boys Club for collecting 170 cases of bottled water and chauffeuring them out to Flint, Mich, a 1,300-mile, 19-hour drive, back and forth.
Are the Daily Times and the Chester GBC under the impression that there is no-bottled water available in Flint, or that it is being sold at predatory prices? Because if they are, they're quite wrong.
For instance, the Sam's Club in Flint has lots of water and at very reasonable prices. A 32-pack of Dasanti 16-ounce bottles is currently selling for $4.98. Hardly price gouging.
To the extent that fine the folks of Chester want to help the less fortunate of Flint get free bottled water, sending a check - not driving it there - would have been much more efficient.
But when it comes to some people and charity, it's the show that seems to impress more than the need or the effectiveness of the donation.
Again, this isn't to take anything away from the father-son team who took the time and made the effort to go on this water-run. Too bad they were so misinformed about the need for it.
Thursday, March 3, 2016
Wednesday, March 2, 2016
To Chester, With Love: Get a Grip!
What a heart-warming story. (Until you think for a minute.)
This is, of course, ridiculous. The residents of Flint no more need 170 cases of bottled water from Chester, Pa. than they need more Democratic politicians to misgovern their city.
The water crisis, such as it was, is over. And it was much overblown by the media. Kevin Drum at the ultra liberal Mother Jones admits as much.
There is no bottled-water shortage in Flint. City residents there can get - and are getting - all the bottled-water they want from much closer by than Chester, Pa.
And here is the ultimate - and sad - irony. When it comes to lead exposure - which is what everyone was so concerned about in Flint - Chester's children are at much greater risk.
Wrote Vox's Sarah Frostenson on Feb 3:
Compare Flint's 6.3 exposure rate at the height of the crisis to Chester's 13.73. Granted, it isn't contaminated water but lead-paint dust that explains the difference but still. Maybe the kids of Flint should be sending surgical masks to the children of Chester.
No doubt Brian Warren and his father are good, well-meaning people. But Chester has enough of its own problems. Its citizens don't need to go looking for non-problems to solve elsewhere.
This strike us as one of those stories published by the Daily Times to wade off the old criticism "You never print any positive stories about Chester."
The good news is that Chester, one of the poorest cities in the state, didn't make the list of having a higher percentage of kids with unacceptable lead levels in their bodies. The bad news is that nearby Philadelphia did. Flint, Schmint.
This is what happens when you don't dig a little deeper into the facts behind the news.
At 3:30 last Sunday morning, while most of the city slept, Brian Warren and his father, James, boarded a van supplied by the Boys and Girls Club of Chester and drove more than 640 miles to Flint, Mich., with a precious cargo.
They delivered 170 cases of bottled water that had been collected from the residents of Chester to the Boys and Girls Club of Greater Flint, Mich. — and then turned around and were back home by 11:30 Sunday night.
As far as the people of Flint were concerned, the 1,300-mile mission of mercy was accomplished just in the nick of time.
The water crisis, such as it was, is over. And it was much overblown by the media. Kevin Drum at the ultra liberal Mother Jones admits as much.
There is no bottled-water shortage in Flint. City residents there can get - and are getting - all the bottled-water they want from much closer by than Chester, Pa.
And here is the ultimate - and sad - irony. When it comes to lead exposure - which is what everyone was so concerned about in Flint - Chester's children are at much greater risk.
Wrote Vox's Sarah Frostenson on Feb 3:
I spent the past week looking at these cities, and came away with three main findings. The first is that the rate of lead exposure in Pennsylvania is incredibly alarming. Nearly 10 percent of the more than 140,000 kids tested had levels of 5 or more micrograms per deciliter of lead in the blood (5 µg/dL) — this is the threshold the government uses to identify children with dangerously elevated blood lead levels. One percent tested positive for blood lead levels greater than 10 µg/dL.
3.21 percent6.3 percentHere's the chart:
Compare Flint's 6.3 exposure rate at the height of the crisis to Chester's 13.73. Granted, it isn't contaminated water but lead-paint dust that explains the difference but still. Maybe the kids of Flint should be sending surgical masks to the children of Chester.
No doubt Brian Warren and his father are good, well-meaning people. But Chester has enough of its own problems. Its citizens don't need to go looking for non-problems to solve elsewhere.
This strike us as one of those stories published by the Daily Times to wade off the old criticism "You never print any positive stories about Chester."
The good news is that Chester, one of the poorest cities in the state, didn't make the list of having a higher percentage of kids with unacceptable lead levels in their bodies. The bad news is that nearby Philadelphia did. Flint, Schmint.
This is what happens when you don't dig a little deeper into the facts behind the news.
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