The Context of Making Contact

Rarely in the consolidated media world in which we live is an important news story fully placed into context. It just takes too much time. Too expensive. Gotta fit those commercials in.

When it comes to the extreme drought we are experiencing in the High Country, context becomes pretty darn important. So we'll give it a try.

A bill, called the Water Resources Development Act of 2007 has been designed to "provide for the conservation and development of water and related resources, to authorize the Secretary of the Army to construct various projects for improvements to rivers and harbors of the United States, and for other purposes."

November 2, 2007: President Bush vetoes the Water Resources Development Act of 2007.
November 6, 2007: The U.S. House of Representatives votes to override the Bush veto. The bill now goes to the U.S. Senate, where it remains to be seen if they can muster the votes to override the Bush veto.

Why would Bush veto the bill knowing full well that our area (and most of the rest of the country) is facing severe water supply problems? In a word, PRIVATIZATION.

Our water supply represents one of the last money-making frontiers for supporters of the privatization agenda. Simply put, there's money to be made by getting local governments to sell off their water supplies to private companies--and even bigger money to be made by those private companies when they turn around and start selling that water back to the citizenry. You'll find a way to pay when you are thirsty.

Access to clean water has long been considered a basic human right--a part of the public commons. Well, no more. Right alongside our privatized military (Blackwater USA, Triple Canopy, Halliburton), you can add water. And you can count on big media not to cover the story.

There are some small voices out there covering the important issue of water supply privatization--but you won't hear them on the radio here in the High Country--the High Country media titans must not think this type of programming is profitable. Following their logic, if isn't profitable, then it must not be all that important.

You'll have to go here to tune in to Making Contact. When you listen, ask yourself why we can't have this sort of programming carried on High Country radio. Having local radio offer programming like Making Contact would indeed be "the pause that refreshes."