Dear Friends,
(01:12) “Miracles in El Salvador,” with Rev. Bob Cook
(18:32) Gov. Landry sides with Big Oil in Cancer Alley fight, with Dr. MarkAlain Dery
(37:01) Climate Update
(54:28) The new USDA Ag Census: Who’s growing what, with Kathy Byrnes Fallon
Bob and Ed with their walking sticks.
“MIRACLES IN EL SALVADOR.” My first guest is long-time friend, Bob Cook. I’ve known Bob since 1987, when he pastored a nearby church and we worked together in the peace movement and for criminal justice reform. In 2014, Bob joined me on the Great March for Climate Action.
Bob’s most prominent commitment over the past three decades has been his ministry in El Salvador. The stories he shares from that experience in his book, “Miracles in El Salvador,” are powerful and inspiring.
During our conversation on this week’s program, Bob shares two stories, including his tragic encounter with Reyna Marisol, a young mother who darted in front of Bob’s car and was killed.
Although all agreed that Bob was not at fault, the law required Bob to spend 3 days in jail and pay the family for their loss. During emotional yet amicable negotiations, an amount of $5,000 was settled upon. That payment covered Reyna’s funeral expenses, but not much more.
As Bob writes in his book, “The trauma of having killed Reyna gave rise to a heavy weight of responsibility in my heart. I could not get out of my mind the wish by the family to build for the two children, now orphaned, a humble hone with water and electricity.”
Dr. MarkAlain Dery
With the help of Iowa churches, Bob was able raise the funds to build that home. Delegations from Iowa churches travelled to El Salvador to help with the construction. Bob and Reyna’s family remain close to this day.
CANCER ALLEY. Dr. MarkAlain Dery joins me this week to talk about the latest injustice in that sacrifice zone known as Cancer Alley — an 85-mile stretch along the Mississippi River between New Orleans and Baton Rouge plagued by 200 fossil fuel and petrochemical companies.
Last month, Human Rights Watch published a report documenting how “residents of Cancer Alley suffer the effects of extreme pollution from the fossil fuel and petrochemical industry, facing elevated rates and risks of maternal, reproductive, and newborn health harms, cancer, and respiratory ailments.”
In 2022, the EPA responded to the crisis by initiating an investigation. But in June, 2023, the agency suddenly dropped the investigation without announcing any findings. Nor did it require Louisiana or the corporations operating along Cancer Alley to address any of the documented problems.
You’d think that would have made big-oil buddy Governor Landry happy. Instead, Landry filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) for all communications between the EPA and Cancer Alley residents, environmental groups, and journalists.
As MarkAlain points out, it’s rare for a FOIA to be issued by one level of government against another. Normally, FOIAs help protect the public against corporate or government wrong doing. In this case, Landry’s FOIA is being used to protect corporate polluters and against his constituents and the organizations and reporters working to help them.
A story in The Guardian summed it up pretty well: “We are deeply concerned by what appears to be an attempt to intimidate journalists and interfere with their ability to report on alarming matters of environmental injustice – in particular, the dangerous toxicity of air in predominantly Black areas of Louisiana.”
Thanks for reading, listening, and taking action.
Ed Fallon
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Ed Fallon