Word: crockers
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...centralized energy grid is a plague to dairy farmers of west central Minnesota. As George Crocker of the General Assembly to Stop the Power Line (GASP) puts it, "Starting almost a decade ago, the industry started to get ideas about the western coal front. As soon as the plans materialized, the people started fighting a struggle, which has taken many forms for almost eight years...
...North American Coal Company is the second largest independent (not owned by oil companies) mining company in the United States, a leader in eastern underground coal mines," Crocker continues." So the company began looking for a way to get into western coal land, talking to the United Power Association and the Cooperative Power Association, two small utilities based in Minnesota. An agreement was made--the North American Coal Company would produce the coal and the utilities would transport and distribute the electricity...
...that nausea, abnormal rashes, migraine headaches and nosebleeds were endemic to all communities. "The government and the companies tell the people along the direct current line that the direct current line is the safest, and along the alternating current line that the alternating current line is the safest," says Crocker. Meanwhile, says Gloria Woida, a dairy farmer in GASP, "The companies came out and told us to put grounding wires on our tractors and equipment to prohibit shock and other side effects." Cows have died from shock and crop yield is down in the Four Corners area, where high-voltage...
...necessary, the people of Minnesota will stop the power lines with their bodies. GASP's Crocker explains, "All administrative and legal remedies have consistently been tried by the people resisting the lines--hearings, court cases-- we're always looking for new legal remedies. We have also engaged in civil disobedience, and many arrests have taken place for interfering with construction and trespassing. We take it to the jury to decide, and by and large, we have won in the courts. Of 42 misdemeanor charges, we have won 35. In 70 misdemeanor charges where the people were indicted by a grand...
...Crocker summarizes the feelings of the dairy farmers in words that apply to many more of us: "This is a giant corporate laboratory of a very ill-conceived experiment, and we are the guinea pigs...