The Texas Economic Miracle Is Killing People
Freshly indicted Governor Rick Perry of Texas, who is said to be so close to running for president again that the people covering him know not to mention the fact that he is freshly indicted, has spent a couple of years traveling the country, trying to poach industries to come to Texas, where they don’t regulate you or tax you, nor do they give a good two hoots about how many of your workers you might accidentally kill. Of course, neglect is the mother of all accidents, and there was that unpleasantness about the fertilizer plant in West, and that was sort of a glitch in the sales pitch. And now, it seems, the Invisible Hand has claimed another couple of victims.
Methyl mercaptan, a foul-smelling gas, overwhelmed five workers at the DuPont chemical plant in La Porte on Nov. 15, killing four - including two brothers - and sending another to the hospital. Such rapid deaths from toxic chemical exposure are rare, experts say. But dozens of times in the past two years, a Texas Tribune analysis shows, plants across Texas have reported accidentally releasing gases that can be deadly in relatively small amounts.
Texas has sold its soul, very willingly, to industries that produce products that kill people, and it has sold its soul to the idea that the average American corporation has a soul to sell Texas in return. Silly Texas. Dead workers are the cost of doing business to these people. Kill a few of them, write a check, craft the ironclad non-disclosure agreement, line up the SLAPP suit just in case, and off we go again.