irit (font of cursed discourse)
@irit.bsky.social
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Actor, artist, (ex-)academic Here for friends, not networking or transactional engagement Sci-fi. Fantasy. Games. Human rights. KDramas. Shitposting Millennial. Older and younger friends welcome Terves, swerves, minors, bigots, & "A.I." fans unwelcome
![politicians from all three Compact states, as well as the nuclear utility lobbyists whom they hold responsible for arranging things this way, several of the Vermonters in the audience stood up and apologized.
During the following week, the West Texans joined an anti-nuclear weapons march from Montpelier to Springfield, sponsored by the Unitarian Church and the American Friends Service Committee. The marchers from Vermont were careful to restrain the West Texans from protesting aloud on any platform occupied by Bernie Sanders, Vermont's independent Socialist candidate for re-election to the U.S. House. Sanders' campaign committee had warned march planners that Bernie wouldn't show if the West Texans were on the platform.
Nonetheless, spirits were high on Thursday morning, August 20, as the West Texans, along with about twenty Vermonters, trudged up and down the lush green hills on their way to a Springfield rally, where Bernie was scheduled to speak. They'd driven two thousand miles and walked nearly a hundred, and they'd had a wonderful time, meeting Vermonters, talking with them about the Sierra Blanca dump, and changing quite a few minds. Gary Oliver explained some of the group dynamics this way: "There'd been all this tension on the walk, because it's been planned since February, and we just got invited two weeks ago. But the issues [nuclear power and nuclear weapons] are two warts on the same hog."
Before the rally Sanders invited the three West Texans to meet with him privately, and the Texans eagerly agreed. The meeting was no longer than Sanders' attention span — when it comes to Sierra Blanca. "He didn't listen," Curry said. "He had his mind made up.' Afterward, Bernie was giving his pro forma campaign speech, never mentioning nuclear power or nuclear waste. Sierra Blanca activist Bill Addington, who'd arrived just that morning to join the march, along with his neighbor María Méndez, had had enough, and he yelled from the crowd,](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:i4bgf22q36y4hyubcpzghoca/bafkreiaiefm7bytkoub6iksbdibn7zzb43x3t3rhryiacd7egy7slrukoe)
