About forty years ago, people began to complain about the pollution in the Cuyahoga River that runs through Cleveland, Ohio, and into Lake Erie. For years, powerful persons and organizations had been profiting from polluting the ground, air, streams, rivers, and lakes of our state and nation.
Those who first called out to clean up the sources of pollution were slandered and discredited. The special interests run by greed and the intoxication of power continued to pollute and profit in Ohio, as elsewhere. They used intimidation, slander, lies, bribery, influence buying, cronyism, and all types of underhanded techniques to preserve their power and profit.
Eventually, Lake Erie became so polluted that we were told not to eat the fish. Soon this was not a problem because the fish were virtually extinct in Lake Erie. Finally, the Cuyahoga River CAUGHT FIRE!
Although everyone had known about the pollution, no one had been able to stand up to the powerful individuals and organizations that acted with impunity. Finally, after decades of effort by ordinary citizens and massive attention to and from the highest levels of government responding only when pressure from the people exceeded the power of the special interests, the cleanup began.
Now, decades later, fish have returned to Lake Erie. Pollution related diseases are still under study and treatment. The Cuyahoga runs much cleaner. Still, constant monitoring from the highest levels of government remains necessary to keep the profiteers at bay. Those who would pollute and destroy the lifeblood of our water are always seeking to profit and grow at the expense of our nation and society.
So too have our courts, law enforcement, and Bar Associations become such a source of destructive pollution to our society. Like the polluters of our environment, they will stand by and watch their fellow Barristers and allies work evil in the very society they need for their own sustenance. They, like the industrial polluters, have shown themselves totally incapable of controlling themselves, much less cleaning up the dastardly work they have been doing for years.
What does it take to turn around this situation? Can not these people see the destruction they work in the land where they hope to have grandchildren prosper?
They decry the lack of respect and the increase in crime. Yet, do they not foster this? As the polluters killed the fish in the rivers and Lake Erie, so the Bar, Law Enforcement, and the Judges (especially) foster the death of respect for our laws and society.
Perhaps they, like the salmon fishermen, wish to keep and grow a spawning ground for their profession. Keeping a growing disrespect for the law and courts grows their industry and their personal wealth. Think of the recession in their industry if people actually saw a reason to respect the rule of law and the courts! No wonder they cannot break their addiction to unethical and illegal abuse of their power.
Copyright 2001 by Robert Durrstein