The Chicago Pipeline Connection
Back from Standing Rock and already thinking about returning. There was some great news out of Morton County yesterday. A judge tossed out the "riot" charges against Democracy Now's Amy Goodman. Standing Rock friends tell me this morning that all the other felony cases have also been dropped.
But still, almost everywhere I turn, racist symbols abound. Watching Cleveland vs. Toronto in the ALCS, the racist Indian insignia is constantly in your face. If you Google Cleveland Indians you won't find the symbol on their page. Too embarrassing? But watching the game itself, it's displayed prominently.
I'm trying to write something for the MSM about the Chicago connections with Standing Rock and the pipeline protests. There's plenty of connections to write about. That's for certain.
For one thing, IL is on the asshole end of the 1,134-mile-long Black Snake that transports fracking oil from the Bakken region of ND down through IA, crossing about 40 rivers, threatening the drinking water of millions of people, before dumping it all out in our state.
Environmental racism is another connection. Remember, the pipeline was originally supposed to run through predominantly-white Bismark until residents protested and pushed it down to Lakota Sioux territory. In Chicago, isolated, poor black and Latino neighborhoods have Mike Klonsky's SmallTalk Blog: The Chicago Pipeline Connection: