Deception is a devious form of political corruption.
But that didn’t stop Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro from trying and failing to bamboozle the good people of Archbald when he showed up unannounced at State Rep. Kyle Mullins’ office for a secret, yet well-staged, meeting with a handful of timid so-called opponents of the borough’s planned siege of artificial intelligence (AI) factories.
No public meeting. No invitation extended to Tamara Misewicz-Healey who co-founded the Stop Archbald Data Centers group that will soon boast 10,000 members. No offer to stand strong with the majority of impacted people who oppose the hellish upheaval of life in their normally bucolic little town. No public accountability to the taxpayers who pay Shapiro’s salary and benefits.
Instead, Shapiro tried to snooker his limited audience into believing he is doing them a favor by offering tax breaks, fast-tracked permits and questionable regulation to shady real estate developers and massive AI corporations headed by profiteers who dismiss the hardworking people of Archbald and the surrounding communities as peons, collateral damage in their powerless battle against the data center invasion.
Shapiro pisses in the punch bowl and calls it champagne. To their credit, increasing numbers of Archbald residents refuse to drink Shapiro’s expensive golden cocktail and swallow his toxic trickery.
Thinking people know supersized AI data mills will do more harm than good, damage even worse than the brutal coal barons did when they ripped into the land and pillaged our dreams. What’s left of a one-time abundance of clean air, unpolluted water and pristine countryside is at stake. Public health is seriously jeopardized. Quality of life hangs precariously in the balance.
Wishy-washy regulation is suspect. Shapiro is suspect. Mullins is suspect. Former mixed martial numbskull State Sen. Marty Flynn is suspect. Not one of them has earned or deserves our trust or support. Grassroots community development means taking action to embarrass the masters, shaming the pampered political princes and making them uncomfortable.
Meek Mullins hosted this servile PR party at taxpayer expense, obediently standing by his high priest’s side during Wednesday’s show like a faithful altar boy. Basking in the scripted passion play of unamazing grace like his political overlord, Mullins acts like he’s doing God’s work. But instead of fighting the good fight to stop data center development, Mullins plans to introduce legislation that green-lights massive AI data factories few people want. Fewer people want lackluster Mullins, either, vowing not to vote for him and instead writing in Tamara Misewicz-Healey who is running against him.
Shapiro has heartily embraced data centers and related corporate donations, depending on huge infusions of business cash to fund his campaign for President of the United States. For months he overlooked mounting problems in Pennsylvania and barnstormed America groveling for handouts and support for his egotistical bid to win the 2028 Democratic Party nomination.
Transparency means nothing to Shapiro. His press office ignored my written questions about Shapiro’s sneak Archbald sideshow. I received no press release announcing the governor’s pop-up visit to Lackawanna County where I live, vote, pay taxes and where generations of my family are buried. Each day Shapiro’s press office inundates the press, including me, with his schedule. But not this time.
Shapiro kept his tightly controlled invitation-only soiree under the radar as a manipulative, manufactured public relations photo opportunity to use in his self-absorbed bid for higher office. Some fools fell for his amateur craftiness. But more and more people in Archbald and throughout the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania targeted by Shapiro and his data center hitmen see through this dangerous ruse.
Environmental, economic and public health risks loom too great no matter how much oversight Shapiro and the legislature impose on AI data centers run amok. Even one data center’s occasional use of one backup diesel generator pollutes the air, severely damages respiratory health and can potentially kill people including children whom Shapiro claims will benefit from his loyal support for the tech industry.
Archbald stands as ground zero in Pennsylvania in the fight against AI data mills. Archbald also stands as a beacon signaling the beginning of the end of Shapiro’s shameful grandiose political ambition.
This fight is bigger than just us. This fight is about justice from sea to soiled sea where merciless double-dealers sell out to the highest bidders and bottom-feeder Democrats and Republicans make and break the rules in all 50 states.
No data centers means no data centers.
We in Northeastern Pennsylvania long ago learned not to drink contaminated water that flows around abandoned hard coal mines. Now we know not to drink the Democratic Party punch, either.
So get mad.
Then get madder.
Anger is not only acceptable but advisable.
It’s better to be pissed off than pissed on.
