Sunday, February 8, 2015

THE MYTH OF 'TOURISM'...especially with a PIPELINE!



08 FEBRUARY 2015, Vol.2, No.5 > THE MYTH OF ‘TOURISM’…especially with a PIPELINE!

The POCAHONTAS CRIER
‘When the Righteous succeed the people rejoice,
But when the bad govern, men groan!’ – Proverbs 29:2


  
THE MYTH OF ‘TOURISM’… especially with a PIPELINE!


One of the greatest ‘myths’ spread within Pocahontas County is the ‘idea’ that ‘tourism’ helps the local rank & file Citizen when in reality the only thing ‘tourism’ helps is a few self-serving types as the disparity and difference between ‘Predator’ & ‘Prey’ continues to grow throughout the county!  Never has there been a time when the GAP between the ‘HAVES’ from the ‘HAVE-NOTS’ ever been greater!  The false-idea that money from ‘tourism’ trickles down and benefits everyone is as BOGUS as the ‘zombie-economics’ of believing that by not taxing the rich that the rich will share their wealth with everyone else!  For anyone to believe that ‘TRICKLEDOWN-ECONOMICS’ helps anyone but the rich & infamous is like giving a hot-dog or hamburger to three ‘bear-dogs’ and expecting the one who gets the hotdog or hamburger to share it with the other two!  The fallacy in such misplaced beliefs in seen in the fact that no matter how financially successful the Dollar General, IGA (former Foodland), Trents or Snowshoe / Silver Creek have been or become – THEY STILL PAY MINIMUM-WAGES TO THEIR EMPLOYEES AND NEVER PASS ON ANY BONUSES OR BENEFITS FOR ANY JOBS WELL DONE!

The rank & file Citizen is left in the middle between the greedy PROFITEERS & MONEYLENDERS on the one hand and the local THREE-STOOGES on the county commission on the other who instead of always putting the rank & file Citizen First and THE GREATER COMMON GOOD BEFORE SELF…or any Special Interests – continually put themselves first & foremost along with special interests!  It’s plain stupidity & then some!


The simple fact of the matter is that the current THREE-STOOGES on the county commission DON’T HAVE ANY REAL CLUE AS TO EXACTLY WHAT THEIR JOB RESPONSIBILITIES ARE SUPPOSED TO BE ALL ABOUT!  They EACH simply come to every meeting to pick up their public-welfare-check of $1700 EACH MEETING…or $3400 each month = $10,200 per/month we Citizens have to pay for such stupidity!  IF THESE THREE-STOOGES had any COMMON SENSE then they would think like the rest of us that allowing a PIPELINE to be built right down the middle, or across any part of Pocahontas County DESTROYS THE SCENIC VALUE OF THE COUNTY – THE VERY REASON FOR ANY KIND OF ‘TOURISM’ to even occur!  And in case anyone has forgotten – the very fact that Pocahontas, Randolph & Pendleton counties have been DENIED INDUSTRY is for the sole purpose of ATTRACTING TOURISM – so our respective mountain scenery remains ‘pristine’!

Yet we currently have the three most UNEDUCATED county commissioners in the history of this county – two who have spent the better part of their lives chasing after the collective derrière of cattle, and the third who would rather be chasing the collective derrière of inbred-bear-dogs whose only purpose is to track and kill bears!  What do they know about putting the PEOPLE FIRST?  Instead of them using their positions to PROTECT the Citizens & NATURAL RESOURCES of this county, these three buffoons are willing to give everything away to an out-of-state ‘foreign’ corporation!  This is no different for all of us on the local level for Dominion Gas to SOLELY PROFIT than it is on a national scale to let two brothers in Kansas, the Koch Brothers, make over $100 BILLION EACH at the expense of tens-of-thousands of Citizens who face certain DEATH at the hands of the worst polluters on record in America – if the Keystone XL Pipeline is built!  Thank Our Creator that Obama is at least threatening to VETO this most dangerous pollution threat!  Would that the THREE STOOGES would have enough ‘guts’ to also, JUST SAY, ‘NO’!    

But just imagine a GIANT SWATH ACROSS THIS COUNTY almost as WIDE as a Football field so a trench can be cut and roads built for vehicles on both sides of the trench!  ALL TREES CUT FIRST IN THE SWATH – just like the power & telephone companies do when installing new wires to any given building.  Wouldn’t THAT be nice for the Tourists to come see?  And as for ‘tourist attractions’ – WHAT has Pocahontas County really got left for any given attractions, that folks cannot find elsewhere?  How much longer, if at all, will the trains be available at Cass now that the State has sold it to private-profiteers?  And how much longer will the NRAO operate now that their secret is out that NO NOISE is heard by us here on earth as new stars are born or old-ones explode?  And what if no one cares!

Take a look at the chart below!  While the ‘state-law’ currently requires 50% of all ‘hotel-motel-tax’ given to the ‘Convention & Visitors Bureau’ (CVB)!  Does anyone really believe that this group requires three-quarters- of-million-dollars?  Just where are the ‘conventions’ held in this county, other than Snowshoe or Silver Creek, privately-owned enterprises, in which any group can hold a meeting?  For the money that the CVB extorts, all of us could be taken on BOTH a land & sea-cruise TOUR OF ALASKA – just like Cara Rose took a few years back all paid for by public-funds as welfare for public employees!  HAS ANYONE SEEN ONE SINGLE ESKIMO VISITING THIS COUNTY since Cara’s trip to promote-tourism?  Better yet, why doesn’t the CVB take all of us to Hawaii during the winter?  For the amount the CVB gets, we could rent an entire hotel on a white-beach and wait for winter to blow over here in these mountains!      

AND it doesn’t take a rocket-scientist to realize that the recent ‘FIRE-FEE’ proposal to extort funds from the po’-folks of Pocahontas County was really a SCAM since BY STATE LAW the amount allocated to Medical, EMS & FIRE organizations are limited to a maximum of $200,000!  If so, then our THREE-STOOGES cannot count since the total they have already given to EMS & the FIRE-ASSOCIATION, now EXCEEDS $225,000!  Even so, that’s why fire-equipment can be donated TO us FROM large-metropolitan areas as well as federal surplus equipment!  Heck, the WV National Guard LEFT IN IRAQ more equipment than this county and a half-dozen other counties would ever need in a lifetime!    

 http://pocahontastimes.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/01/HMTaxChart1.jpg

When you look at the above-chart, you have to wonder just WHY some of these self-serving ‘groups’ get any funding at all!  How exactly is Pocahontas County BEING ‘PRESERVED’ when predatory-profiteers want to extract gas by FRACKING when it is now a known fact that FRACKING IS CAUSING EARTHQUAKES as hit Pocahontas a couple years back from Fracking in Virginia – let alone POLLUTE OUR NATURAL WATER RESOURCES!  At least the former county commission publicly took a stand AGAINST FRACKING even though the late Dolan Irvine was secretly trying to sign up folks to PRIVATELY allow Fracking on their lands!  Yeah, it’s the same Dolan Irvine who never raised his own taxes as County Assessor, or that of certain ‘lodge-bros’ or those that rented their land to him for his livestock! 

And how about the so-called ‘Historic Landmarks Commission’ which just had ONE OF ITS LANDMARKS torn-up  & removed in Green Bank in regards to one of the oldest known trees in this county that was several HUNDREDS-OF-YEARS old?  Where were they when their landmark was bulldozed down?

WHY isn’t their a local referendum or other PUBLIC VOTE, such as a petition FOR or AGAINST the tearing up of this county for a PIPELINE to benefit folks in North Carolina instead of in this county?  Wouldn’t that be more DEMOCRATIC than relying upon THREE (uneducated) STOOGES to make a PERMANENT DECISION that would DESTROY THIS COUNTY on its surface – let alone not know just how much damage would be done to our NATURAL WATER RESOURCES?

And as for ‘TOURISM’ – has anyone started a tourism-business by driving folks around the county to SHOW OFF our POVERTY & PAUPERISM on a grand scale?  What about the once picturesque Marlinton until the late ‘stupid’ Mayor Dunbrack decided to cut down all the once magnificent TREES in front of the three-story homes & buildings and then replace them with ‘bushes’ that grow no higher than ten-feet!  Ah, but he pocketed a PROFIT at the time so the hell with Marlinton – money came first!  At least the recent FIRE tried to set the record straight and level a large portion of the town until the next BIG FLOOD finishes the job!  Just look around us in other parts of the country as the massive rains & water take their toll – and it’s only a matter of time till Marlinton reaps what it has sown!

IF THE THREE STOOGES VOTE FOR THE PIPELINE – AND DONALD TRUMP GETS HIS FOUR-LANE FROM I-64 TO CORRIDOR-H…right down the valley of Route 92 as part of the Route 219 Project…THEN WE CAN ALL KISS POCAHONTAS COUNTY – GOODBYE!


ONE WAY OR ANOTHER…WE ALL REAP WHAT WE HAVE SOWN…& then some!

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The Pocahontas Crier is an independent, free, non-subscription, Internet News Service providing in depth reporting on important issues directly affecting the Citizens
of Pocahontas County, West Virginia, and meant for entertainment in the true ‘muckraking’ & ‘iconoclast’ tradition of questioning authority, challenging corruption, exposing impropriety and the appearance of impropriety, and offering Common Sense Alternatives for
THE GREATER COMMON GOOD BEFORE SELF…
or any Special Interests! 
We fight for Social Justice on all fronts and are an integral part of The Crier Coalition of Internet News Services comprised of  The Pocahontas Commentator, The Pocahontas Crier,
Signal Fires of WV, & Rolling Thunder in association with Echoes from the Holl’r.  

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