09/10/18 -- Safe Zone Siren Editorial

SAFE ZONE SIREN EDITORIAL
September 10, 2018
By Quentin Frady

A decade ago when I looked out the window of my Brooklyn apartment, I saw the revitalization of New York City in the aftermath of the bomb. It took no more than two short years to start rebuilding, and when I look at what Brooklyn (and I will always call it that, not the so-called “Safe Zone”) has become and what it could yet be, I’m left longing for the days of Mayor Sonny Bianco. Yes, while I am a renowned conspiracy theorist and Libertarian, I am also capable of wistfully remembering the way New Yorkers came together to rebuild. The way we bounced back from 9/11, from the first 11/8, from all the tragedies the world could throw at us until suddenly… we couldn’t.

Some will point to the Second American Civil War as the moment this country stopped being what it once was. Others, however, will point to the investment of foreign interests on American soil. Yes, I’m talking about the walled garden on Brooklyn’s south shore: Yamagato Industries. Ever since this Japanese megacorporation came to the US with promises of reconstruction, the people of New York have all but rolled over and let Yamagato take a stranglehold on the city. It has been three years since the Safe Zone’s establishment, and Yamagato has made little progress in revitalizing and rebuilding the city. How many overcrowded schools do we have operational? How many neighborhoods lack necessities like running water or regular electricity?

That last one should sting, readers. Especially in light of the catastrophic collapse of the city’s power grid over the last few weeks. The Siren’s offices are located in Ferrymen’s Bay, where rolling blackouts are the norm. In fact, I wrote much of this article while hooked up to a reserve solar battery (though in a just world I would have been writing on a typewriter by candle-light, but even in the post-apocalypse, we’re still in a digital world).

Yamagato Industries maintains an iron grip on the Safe Zone, and has done everything in their power to push out competition. But the free market thrives on competition! Without competition, there is no innovation and improvement, and the hand of the free market is stymied by sluggish and selfish corporations like Yamagato setting down their poisonous roots and sucking the life out of what remains of our once great borough.

The bottom line is this: New York City used to have multiple power sources. Yes, the Vanguard destroyed the Ravenswood Con-Ed plant, but we had backups. Why hasn’t Yamagato Industries done anything to repair those stations? Why is their localized power plant kept a secret from the public? Why do they insist on only supplying the Safe Zone with power generated in what amounts to a foreign country?

I’ll tell you why: control.

Yamagato Industries wants to control the Safe Zone’s power grid, and by extension the entire city. By keeping the sole source of power within their own little fiefdom, they do not need to abide by United States regulations and oversight. We don’t even know what kind of reactor they have, or how dangerous it could be to our families!

In my mind, the path forward is clear. We need an alternative to Yamagato Industries and their government-sanctioned monopoly, and we need it now.

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