The announcement by President Trump with his intent to visit East Palestine next Wednesday, followed moments later by a reversal announcement from FEMA stating they will now offer support to East Palestine, do not seem coincidental.

The Biden administration, including the EPA, FEMA and Transporation Secretary, was likely very worried about the optics of getting blasted by President Trump very visibly next week for their lack of urgency and concern.   Moments after Trump announces his visit, FEMA reverses their prior denial of aid. lol

According to Fox News President Trump is planning a visit to East Palestine, Ohio, next week to show support for the community in the aftermath of a massive toxic chemical spill, the result of a Norfolk Southern railroad derailment.

The East Palestine community and surrounding region are very concerned about the toxic chemicals that were leaked into the environment as a result of the decision to detonate the toxic cargo, and intentionally burn off the chemicals as a form of containment.

Despite state and federal assurances, small streams and rivers have shown major wildlife impacts including dead fish, frogs and other aquatic creatures. In turn, this raises alarms about water and air quality from the chemical release.  “Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine requested HHS and CDC assistance on Feb. 16, after being denied aid from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. FEMA told DeWine Ohio isn’t eligible for disaster assistance, even amid the derailment.”

OHIO – Former President Trump will travel to East Palestine, Ohio next week to visit the area and members of the community as they grapple with the aftermath of the train derailment that led to a large release of toxic chemicals, Fox News has learned.

A source familiar with the former president’s plans told Fox News that Trump plans to travel to East Palestine on Wednesday to meet with members of the community. The source said Trump, who announced his 2024 presidential campaign in November, has a strong relationship with the people of Ohio.

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When Ohio Senator JD Vance was briefing the press earlier today, he was asked about East Palestine residents being required to sign indemnity waivers, releasing Norfolk Southern Railway from legal liability, as a requirement of having their water/air tests conducted on their property.

Senator Vance said he talked to a resident about it, then reviewed the contract and confirmed the indemnity demand.  Vance then immediately called Norfolk Southern Railroad officials and asked them about it.  According to Vance, the response from Norfolk Southern Railway was that the liability waiver was accidentally presented.  WATCH (@24:54 Prompted):

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Does anyone really believe the contingency waivers were “accidentally” presented to the residents?

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Ohio Senator JD Vance is visiting East Palestine today, meeting with residents, local leaders, as well as state and federal officials following the Norfolk Southern train derailment and subsequent toxic chemical release.  Video prompted to 10:37 when press conference begins. WATCH:

Additionally, Senator Vance showed an example of chemicals in a creek in the affected area (video below).

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Credit where credit is due. Fox News Jesse Waters has been holding the spotlight on the government and railroad officials who have been downplaying the issues after the toxic chemical spill and explosions in the town of East Palestine, Ohio. {Direct Rumble Link}

The residents of the community are reporting several ongoing health issues and a community townhall was scheduled today.  However, executives with Norfolk Southern Railroad cancelled their attendance, leaving the citizens of the community frustrated.  Additionally, the railway contracted air and water testing with a company well known for minimizing the effects of environmental disasters to satisfy its corporate employers {Go Deep}.

Residents are being asked to sign liability waivers indemnifying the railroad, prior to the private testing of air and water quality.  This just seems very sketchy, all things considered and raises additional questions from the residents.  The federal EPA is not providing any assurances or answers.  Jesse Waters outlines some of the issues tonight during an interview with Ohio Congressman Bill Johnson.  WATCH:

The opening monologue from both Jesse Waters and Tucker Carlson stayed on this issue tonight. Given the nature of the effort to downplay the concern of the residents from both federal and state officials, it is good to see Carlson and Waters keeping the attention on this impacted community.

Someone on the Twitter brought up a good point…  It would be nice to see Ohio congressman Jim Jordan get involved to support Bill Johnson in this district.  Jim Jordan has a lot of power in Washington DC.  Perhaps together they could pressure FEMA to engage.

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I took notes during the Ohio government update on the East Palestine train derailment and toxic chemical spill response.  The full press briefing is below. The media present was a mix of uncurious stenographers and some inquisitive journalists.

After about 20 minutes of generally obtuse outlines intended to downplay the seriousness of the crisis, which included a game and fish commissioner saying 3,500 fish were killed by the chemical pollutants – yet never actually saying *what* about the chemicals killed the fish, suddenly the Ohio EPA official admitted something important.

WATER QUALITY – After the Ohio EPA spent several minutes saying the released chemicals are *CURRENTLY* dissipating to “non traceable levels” at various points in the downstream waterways, suddenly she admits the “initial slack” of chemicals did reach the Ohio River. [Prompted 19:34, WATCH]  The “Contamination Plume” is travelling down the Ohio River at approximately 1 mph, providing the various municipal water systems the ability to disconnect from the Ohio River intake as the toxins pass by.

Top men: “we are pretty confident the low levels of toxins are not being passed on to the customers“….  So, there’s that.

AIR QUALITY – Well, the next soundbite below tells you a lot about the situation, TEN DAYS after the initial crisis…

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The Bureau of Labor and Statistics released the January consumer price index today [DATA HERE] reflecting what you already know.  The overall inflation rate stands at 6.4%, after the anniversaries of the first two waves of price increases have now tolled.

Inflation is the measure of price increases over time.  Following two years of massive jumps in price, we are now cycling through and comparing current prices to the previous period when prices had already skyrocketed.

This gives a false impression of price moderation (hindsight inflation); however, the price of goods and services is significantly higher, and those prices will not drop. The higher prices are now embedded in the economy.

After a brief respite, a plateau, in energy price increases over Nov (0.5%) and December (0.4%), the January energy prices began climbing again (0.6%).  This is what we have all noticed in the past three months.

Additionally, “shelter” costs, rent and housing, continue to increase in price (0.8%, January). Overall shelter costs now +7.9% for the 12 months preceding January, 2023, with rents up 8.6% for the period [Table-1].

We have also cycled through the anniversary of the first two waves of massive food price increases, ending January 2022.  Despite that cycle, food prices still show an increase of 10.1% for the preceding 12 months. Cereals +15.6%, dairy +14.0%.  These food price increases are on top of similar jumps in the period that preceded January ’22.  Most of these volatile food price increases are attributable to the overall scale of energy and transportation costs.  These prices will never reverse.

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An interesting 10 minute video showing the timeline of local media reports and citizen reports of the train derailment and subsequent chemical disaster in/around East Palestine, Ohio.

The video takes the viewer through the initial train derailment, then shows citizens raw footage video of the next several days, including the impacts from the decision of the authorities to detonate and “burn off” the destabilizing and toxic chemicals.  WATCH:  

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U.K. pundit Neil Oliver used his weekend monologue to outline the great pretending being deliberately pushed by the groups of western leaders who attend meetings at the World Economic Forum.

The pretending outlined in the context used by Oliver is the classic ‘bait and switch.’  The people are baited into believing the purpose of policy or advocacy is one thing, but the true goal is something completely different.  What Oliver encapsulates as the ‘bait and switch’ is the underline for the modern ‘pretending’, where government officials pretend the end goal is something completely different than it is.

Oliver walks through examples of the ‘bait and switch’ as it is currently being deployed, and using those examples he culminates the discussion with the reality hidden behind the digital identity.  Once everyone can be assigned a digital id, then government can transfer income to a digital currency; then that same government can start introducing the restrictions on what may be purchased in order to ‘save the planet’, which is to say the real goal of total control surfaces.  WATCH:

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There is a pending energy issue looming just beyond the horizon that is going to become a major issue very soon.   Electricity rates, natural gas costs and home heating oil prices increased massively due to Joe Biden energy policy.  However, things are likely to get much worse in a few months.

On the issue of oil and gasoline prices, the U.S. Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) has dropped 40% since Joe Biden began using it to offset massive global prices increases in oil.  However, Biden is doing nothing to increase production and has not engaged energy producers in conversation to expand domestic production. Non pretending warning HERE.

Ultimately what this means is another wave of sicky price increases for gasoline are coming fast.

Additionally, Mark Wolfe, director of the National Energy Assistance Directors Association (NEADA), is warning that continued pressure on natural gas supplies by exporting U.S. production to Europe is going to make our electricity rates go even higher as more than 40% of U.S. electricity generated comes from the use of natural gas.  Wolfe wrote a letter in October to Energy Secretary Granholm [SEE HERE], and the situation is unfolding exactly as he warned.

Electricity rates have jumped massively in the past year, and it looks like they are going to continue to rise.  The spring and summer of 2023 looks to deliver another round of higher oil prices, higher natural gas prices, higher electricity prices and higher gasoline prices.   Which brings me to the question…

It is challenging to find solid data (without noise) on regional electricity, home heating and natural gas prices. However, Treehouse readers consistently provide the most accurate assessments of reality on the ground.  You guys are the experts in checkbook economics. So, I ask you the question:

How much have your electricity, natural gas and/or home heating costs increased in the past year?

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