This is part of a series on the parallels of misinformation locally and nationally that led me to write Systems out of Balance.
I only bet for pizzas; even if I lose I then get a rebate. I do not lose many bets, though, because I usually have some insider’s knowledge that gives me an edge. Early on in 2003 I bet my scholarly friend in cancer research (mentioned in the previous entry) that we would not invade Iraq without some type of collaboration from the Arab League. My “insider’s knowledge” was basically news you don’t get from corporate media. I already mentioned WAMC as a source. The BBC and even the Israeli paper, Haaretz, reported different assessments of the Iraq threat than our own beloved cable news networks. In the case of Haaretz, they are located in a country that cannot afford to be misinformed. We were not going to invade Iraq because I knew that the evidence being presented was false or tentative at best. Our administration must have been talking tough just as a means of strong-armed persuasion.
Well, I lost my bet, though my former classmate and I are from different parts of the country and I have yet to pay up. Soon after we invaded I sent an email conceding defeat, while begrudgingly pointing out that we had not and would not find WMDs over there. My friend emailed back that he thought the war was going well, we just liberated a country, and when we do find WMDs over there that would just be the icing on the cake. I then emailed back that we would not know whether the war went well or not until at least a year later. Perhaps I came across as a sore loser then, but that last email proved to be more than prophetic.
We think of misinformation mainly as distorted information. There certainly was enough of that being spread by corporate media before, during and after the Iraq invasion. Yet what really stuck in my craw then, and still does now, was the misinformation that consists of omitted information. The Bush II administration never mentioned securing Iraqi oil as an objective, the candidates in both the 2004 and 2008 elections did not bring up oil as an objective, the Obama administration makes no reference to oil even now.
Think about that. Throughout the twentieth century securing Middle East oil was essential to economic and military strength. The Bush II administration tossed out a hodge podge of reasons for being over there, yet they omitted the reason with the most solid evidence and logic behind it. They even looked to the courts to keep Dick Cheney’s energy meetings secret (this would have made the Illuminati guy proud, perhaps he was involved). Even corporate media found it ironic that we secured the oil ministry upon invasion, while weapon dumps were being looted.
Information is omitted when the perpetrators suspect you would not back their cause if you knew the whole picture. We might rally to a cause to preemptively protect ourselves, as cowardly as that might be in the case of a third world threat from another hemisphere. We might rally to a noble cause of helping the oppressed or downtrodden. Would we rally to a cause of further enhancing our already solid position of being the wealthiest and strongest nation on earth? Omitted information can be a serious form of misinformation, indeed.
Which brings me to the Yale Farm Golf Course application phase that began in 2003. Something was missing from their application: the 61 luxury estates that were prominently featured in their publicity materials. This raised some eyebrows. The town noted as the “Icebox of Connecticut” was not going to compete well with Arizona or Florida for attracting world class golfers to our hilly, chilly region. Without the housing component very few people, if any, thought the project was financially viable. Why was the housing component omitted from the applications?
The applicants gave two reasons, depending on the situation. The pat answer was that only the golf course was certain, there may or may not be housing in the future. If pressed further on why they would not include proposed housing right now just to be on the safe side–after all, they could decide not to build houses even if they were approved–they responded that the housing component took longer to arrange and they were ready to proceed with the golf course now.
By omitting the housing component from the application, the Yale Farm developers could charge town commissions to only consider the impacts of a golf course on hydrology, and refrain from projections on what impacts might be caused by future developments down the road. The 780 acres that belonged to the Yale Farm developers consisted of multiple parcels. Multiple applications for single housing units down the road would not need to go through the same special use permitting as the golf course. Whether or not that occurred to the applicants has the same probability as whether or not the topic of Iraqi oil ever came up during Cheney’s secret energy meetings.
Planning 101 recommends that developers present their plans holistically in order to best meet all their combined objectives. Not only did the applicants omit the housing from their application, they applied separately to the town commissions of North Canaan and Norfolk. The application sailed through the Inland/Wetland and Planning and Zoning commissions of North Canaan, the town that people thought was the most receptive to the proposed development. They came to Norfolk in late spring.
Two opposition groups formed as intervenors in the application process. The Coalition of Sound Growth was based in Norfolk, the Canaan Conservation Coalition in North Canaan. My organization, the Housatonic Valley Association, assisted the CSG group with becoming a nonprofit entity. That reason, plus the fact that the golf course was proposed for a headwaters region, drew HVA into the fray. Elaine LaBella, our land protection director, was to be our voice at commission meetings. I would be chiming in only as a resident of Norfolk.
I was not entirely comfortable with this strategy, since I knew I was more passionate about this issue than Elaine. To her this was an environmental issue with the deck stacked against us. Betts had pull with the federal agencies through Bush II, the engineering firm Milone & MacBroom had connections with the state DEP, and their public relations person was a former 1st selectman for Norfolk. They brought in people that were famous in their fields, including the conservation development field. They made it well known that they had deep pockets and were in this for the long haul. Elaine felt that at best we could get them to tweak a few things.
To me this was a misinformation issue. High powered folks were trying to pull a fast one on us country hicks. Coupled with all the BS going on with the Iraq invasion, I was stoked for battle against those who would misinform the many for their own personal gain. They had much greater resources than us to be sure, but I kept in mind Karl Popper’s falsification principle for science. They needed a lot of resources to convince people the information they provided was valid and reliable. I needed far less resources to prove that at least some of their information was false.
Unfortunately, I did not have much to battle Goliath with at first, not anything that amounted to the proverbial sling. I missed the North Canaan hearings completely, and only commented during the Norfolk Inland/Wetlands commission. I got one good zinger in during that hearing. I said that on 780 acres of property the applicants should be able to locate a 100 acre golf course without overlaying so many watercourses and wetlands. Yet they appeared not to have the competency to adjust the golf course away from these resources and more towards where their housing units were originally planned, the housing units that were not to be considered as part of the application. I offered my services as a volunteer looking out for the best interests of the town to layout the golf course for them, free of charge. They never took me up on my offer.
The Inlands/Wetlands public hearing for the application was contentious. Everyone was given their say, and people on both sides of the issue said plenty. In my work I have to attend town commisssion meetings occasionally, but this was my first experience with the beauty of the active “town hall meeting.” Yes, the meetings run on forever. I used to bring a puzzle magazine to keep my mind occupied when issues were being drawn out. But you just can’t beat the town hall meeting for real democracy in action.
The Inland/Wetlands commission responded to this varied and passionate input accordingly. They approved the golf course but attached over 100 conditions to the approval. To me that was a verification of the active, democratic process drawing out the wisdom of all sides. Opponents of the golf course were not happy with that decision, but the Inlands/Wetlands commission made a point of saying that no prudent and feasible alternative to the golf course layout had been presented to them. A prudent and feasible alternative would, in fact, be crucial to turning the tide later on.
One rather strange event occurred during the Inland/Wetland hearings. Don Ferlow, hired consultant for the town of Norfolk, gave a presentation on behalf of the developers explaining their proposal concept to the commission. Let me rephrase that. Norfolk hired a consultant for reviewing the proposal that gave a presentation for the proposal. Hey! The developers were bragging how deep their pockets were, let them hire their own presenter! Having a town consultant present a development proposal to the town would be sort of like having a well-regarded State Department diplomat present a case for war to the United Nations.
Elaine’s concerns appeared to be well-founded. For the opponents of the Yale Farm Golf Course, things were about to get even worse.
