It seems a day cannot go by without another story about contaminated wells, explosions, or spills. I'm not going to waste my time providing links to stories you can find on your own. They're out there; go look.
What I will tell you is we may, no, we WILL soon see the emergence of civil disobedience unlike anything we've seen since the 60's.
Our own government of the people, by the people and for the people is not listening to the people.
And that, my brothers and sisters, is a problem that needs immediate fixing.
The authority of government, even such as I am willing to submit to — for I will cheerfully obey those who know and can do better than I, and in many things even those who neither know nor can do so well — is still an impure one: to be strictly just, it must have the sanction and consent of the governed. It can have no pure right over my person and property but what I concede to it. The progress from an absolute to a limited monarchy, from a limited monarchy to a democracy, is a progress toward a true respect for the individual. Even the Chinese philosopher was wise enough to regard the individual as the basis of the empire. Is a democracy, such as we know it, the last improvement possible in government? Is it not possible to take a step further towards recognizing and organizing the rights of man? There will never be a really free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly. - HENRY DAVID THOREAU
