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April 7, 1997 - Art Bell

01:52:00

Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell - And the Waters Turned to Blood - Rodney Barker

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42:27

rodney barker

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art bell ▲ ● ▼		From the high desert in the great American Southwest, I bid you all good evening or good morning, as the case may be, and welcome to another edition of the radio program Heard from the Hawaiian and Asian Island chains in the west, all the way east to the Caribbean and the U.S. Virgin Islands, south into South America, north to the Pole, and worldwide on the internet.
		This is Coast Coast Bam, and I'm Mark Bell.
		great to be with you and i have got something very special for you tonight his name is rodney parker and he is author of off His book is called, And the Waters Turned to Blood.
		I repeat, And the Waters Turned to Blood.
		It's not fiction.
		It's real.
		It involves something going on off the coast of North Carolina, and maybe, way beyond that, something changing in our ocean.
		It'll scare the hell out of you.
		It did me.
		And when Linda Moulton Howe finished her report on Dreamland Sunday, I said, oh my God, I've got to get this guy on the air.
		And so he's going to be on the air here in a few minutes.
		I've got a couple of things I've got to take care of.
		For example, pleasurable duties like welcoming new affiliates, K-E-E-L-A-M, in Shreveport, Louisiana.
		A biggie, 5 kilowatts, non-directional, regional on 710.
		A welcome in Shreveport, Louisiana.
		I'm telling you, you are in for quite a ride, folks.
		This is a very different kind of radio program, as you will find out.
		Welcome to KHJJ AM 1380 in Lancaster, California.
		Great to have you on board.
		And that fills in a nice little hole there in Lancaster.
		And welcome to KAAA.
		Now, these are people who, when they picked their call letters, wanted to be in front of the phone book, I think.
		No, that wouldn't get you there.
		You're still a K. Anyway, K-A-A-A in Kingdom, Arizona, 1,300 on the AM dial.
		Welcome.
		All right, my other big announcement is today is the release date for my book.
		It is called The Quickening.
		It's hardcover only.
		It's big.
		it's three hundred and thirty six pages it is probably It's the definitive work that I will ever do on this subject, certainly.
		I think it may be the best work ever done on a subject of this sort, but that's my, you know, big-headed view.
unidentified		Today is the release date.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Now, they were absolutely mobbed beyond redemption today already with people wanting to order the book.
		So I'm going to give you some advice with what I'm going to tell you.
		The Quickening is just an absolutely beautiful book.
		To give you an idea, Daniel Brinkley said, a vast amount of information and research is in this book.
		The Quickening will help you either control your destiny or be swept away by it.
		Daniel Brinkley.
		Brad Steiger said, prepare to be enlightened and frightened.
		Art Bell astutely illuminates the challenges and promises of the 21st century.
		Whitley Streeber says, finally, someone has the guts and courage to just state it plainly.
		The world is blowing up in our faces.
		Wow, what a read, Whitley Striber.
		So it's out.
		I know a lot of you have been waiting a long time for it.
		I'm going to give out one number only, and I'm going to tell you that number is going to be in gridlock, and your best shot to get a copy of the...
		Until I can't handle it anymore, I'm going to be signing autographed copies.
		First edition autographed copies.
		Not as we did last time with stickers, but really signing it.
		So all I can tell you is, if you want an autographed copy, order now.
		And I will let you know when it ends.
		In other words, when I've signed so much, I can't sign anymore.
		And then there will be no more autographed copies.
		So if you want a first edition autographed copy, here's the number.
		I'm going to give it to you right now.
		You can try it, but the odds are pretty good you're not going to get through.
		Your best chance is after 8 o'clock in the morning Eastern time, after 8 a.m. Eastern time, the quickening is here.
		And by the way, it will ship immediately.
		You know, you'll have it within 10 days.
		The number is 1-800-864-7991.
		That's 1-800-864-7991.
		Now, if you want to see what the book looks like, the cover of the book is on the website as of now at www.artbell.com.
		www.artbell.com.
		And if you just want to send in a check, it's $24.95 plus $5 shipping and handling.
		It's just like my last book.
		I will give you an address.
		If you want to order by check or money order, the address is are you ready?
		Paper Chase Press 8175 South Virginia Street That's 8175 South Virginia Street Suite 850 D. That's 850 D is in Denmark in Reno, Nevada, Reno, Nevada, zip code 89511 89511.
		As a matter of fact, they will ship it to you now in five to ten working days.
		If you want priority shipping, they can even arrange that.
		And I'm not going to go into right now what the quickening is about because tonight's show is part of it.
		Is part of it.
		And I will go into a more detailed trip here in the next hour about the book.
		Now to Los Angeles and Rodney Barker.
		Rodney, are you there?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I am, Art.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Thank you for coming on the program with such short notice.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I'm pleased to be here.
		And let me say congratulations.
		I think we both know the personal investment that goes into writing a book.
		And to be your guest on the publication date of your own book is an honor for me.
unidentified		I equate it to giving birth.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		It's coming.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		As close as we can come to knowing that.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, as we'll never know.
		That's right.
		So thank you.
		Yeah, I'm very excited about it all.
		And I'm very excited about your book as well.
		It's called And the Waters Turn to Blood.
		And we're going to get to why that title in a moment.
		But first, tell me something about yourself.
		Who is Rodney Barker?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, thanks for asking.
		My home is Santa Fe, New Mexico, but I am a former newspaper editor, magazine writer, and nonfiction author of four books who really goes where my stories take me.
		And the first book took me to Japan.
		Second book set me in the Southwest.
		The third book took me to Moscow.
		And if you're interested, I can tell you how it led to my fourth book, which is And the Waters Turn to Blood.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, I am.
		I was in Moscow not long ago.
		It's a strange...
		Anyway, what's the Moscow connection?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, my previous book was called Dancing with the Devil, and what I did was revisit the Marine spy scandal of the late 80s when Marines were being seduced by KGB beauties and allowing them into the Moscow embassy.
		Oh, yes.
		And yet, after all the pronouncements by Cap Weinberger of this being this great breach in security, there was only one prosecution, and it was a fellow named Clayton Lone Tree.
		There was some interesting sort of irregularities about that whole court-martial, and with the end of the Cold War, I thought, here's a tremendous research opportunity.
		So I went over to the old Soviet Union and actually almost put together my own operation.
		I hired some disgruntled ex-KGB people to learn what happened over there on the Soviet side, how many secrets were compromised, and the whole sort of seduction of Westerners that was part of the sexual recruitment.
		I learned about that strategy and to meet the women who were involved in that too.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		You actually interviewed the women?
		Must not.
		Was that a hard duty?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I kept waiting for one of them to sort of run at me.
		No, it was interesting because certainly the KGB people I worked with, one of the strategies that I use in my investigative research art is to look for disgruntled ex-employees.
		And that can be true for anything.
		And I mean, the people living on pensions over there with the KGB are disgruntled.
		The women were extremely expendable.
		They were used on the service of the state at a certain time, and I've been dropped, and so they have disillusioned in a lot of ways.
		Some of them actually got involved in that because they were hoping that their seduction of Westerners would lead for a ticket out of the Soviet Union.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, listen, there's a lot of groups now in Russia, as I'm sure you're aware, that are inviting American men over to meet, marry, and take away Russian women.
		There's a big trade in that right now.
		You bet, yeah.
		I do remember the scandal you talked about, and I remember the networks showing a photograph of one particularly, incredibly, strikingly beautiful Russian woman.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I believe her name was Violeta, and I got to learn about Violeta and her background and what it was like to grow up in that society.
		I became very close with her mother and sister.
		She was very guarded and wary, and she had what they look for when they are looking to recruit people to work for the security services over there.
		And it was described, interestingly enough, as Judas properties.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Judas Properties.
		That's appropriate, I guess.
		All right, so anyway.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		So anyway, how that leads to this book is that there was a retired intelligence officer who was involved in that investigation who said to me, listen, when this book is done, I'd like you to come down and visit with me in North Carolina and go fishing.
		And he had a boat.
		And this was in the fall of 1995, in October.
		And I went down to North Carolina to go fishing, fully expecting to have an enjoyable fishing trip.
		And we canceled that because it was the end of a season of fish kills in which they say some 40 million fish were dying in the estuaries of North Carolina.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		What?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		40 million?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		40 million over the course of that summer.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		and I didn't know much about this, and so instead of going 40 million.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		When was that, please?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		This was the summer of 1995.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		95.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		So we're talking just about a year and a half ago, coming up on almost two years ago.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I mean, that by itself should have been a world-class headline story.
		40 million fish dying in the estuaries there in North Carolina.
		North Carolinians, prepare yourself.
		What you're going to hear is going to scare the hell out of you.
		But why wasn't that major world-class news in 95?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, actually, CNN covered it.
		A lot of the national media covered it.
		It was fragmentary.
		And North Carolina, understandably, did not want to have a lot of publicity out on it.
		But it was reported.
		There have been fish kills in our coastal waters for quite some time, but certainly nothing like this before.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		What was killing them?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, that was what I didn't know until I went over to a meeting instead of going fishing, and it was a meeting of state officials, and there were angry fishermen and crabbers, and there were some scientists there.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		And that's where I first learned about what has been called the cell from hell.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		The cell from hell.
		The cell from hell.
		Good name when you hear, folks, what this thing is.
		When I listened to the interview yesterday, Linda said this cell is part animal, part plant.
		Is that true?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, actually, not exactly.
		It comes from the family called a dinoflagellate.
		And a dinoflagellate can be part plant, part animal.
		And in its animal form, it is responsible for things like the red tides we've heard about.
		As far as the animal form, there's been nothing before known like the creature that causes the kills in the North Carolina estuaries, again, which is not a plant, it is an animal.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		It's an animal.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		it's an animal then it's Well, I mean, it is a unique creature that lives in the sediment on the bottom of the estuaries that they believe has been around for millions of years, lying dormant, and has only been in the past few years that this thing has emerged and is releasing this incredible toxin.
		This thing is like the character out of the figure out of an alien.
		It's a shape-changing little organism that enlarges in size and releases a very, very powerful neurotoxin.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		We are talking, are we not, about a microorganism?
unidentified		We are.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		We are.
		And yet, when you see pictures of it as it goes through its changes, I mean, it looks like something from outer space.
		I mean, it is almost like a science fiction story.
		This little organism enlarges, goes through these different changes, and turns into a powerful, really mini-sea monster.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		May I ask this?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Do you have microscopic photographs of this thing?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, there are pictures in the book.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Not a lot of pictures, but there's a picture of the organism, not only as it's seen enlarged, but also, as we'll get to, I'm sure, a little later, feeding on human blood.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Feeding on human blood.
		All right, Rodney, so everybody knows your work is not fiction, and everything you're telling us is dead true fact.
		And actually, you wrote about the botanist, I guess, who discovered all this.
		Is that correct?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I certainly do.
		It's mainly told through her eyes.
		It's her story and her discovery.
		And it's been confirmed in prestigious scientific journals around the world.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Stay right where you are, Rodney, and we'll be back to you.
		Rodney Barker and the Waters Turn to Blood is my guest.
		Stand by, North Carolina.
unidentified		This is the CBC Radio Network.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Now, back to Los Angeles and Rodney Barker.
		Rodney, all right.
		You said something just prior to the break about human blood.
		What does this new horrible little thing killing fish have to do with human blood?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, what happened, Art, is that the way this whole story evolved is that in North Carolina, there was a mysterious mortality in the veterinary school with the fish pathologists, and something was killing the fish that they didn't know what, couldn't explain it.
		And the scientist there who was working with it finally gave up, and he turned for help to a female aquatic botanist named Dr. Joanne Burkholder.
		And this woman, over the next couple of years, identified what the killer was.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Where was she?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Was she at a university?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, North Carolina State University.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		North Carolina State, okay.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		And she discovered that there was this little organism that would live in the bottom of the tank.
		They would come up and release this powerful toxin that was killing fish, and then it would go back down.
		And she, about two years after that, tracked it to the estuaries and found that was its natural setting.
		In the process of doing studies and experiments on it, she became ill and her lab assistant began to sort of suffer from problems that were not immediately apparent.
		They were insidious the way they developed and he began to manifest symptoms that the doctors thought was either premature Alzheimer's, multiple sclerosis, or Parkinson's syndrome.
		And they didn't realize that what it was, this organism, the toxin that it released to kill fish, is a neurotoxin that gets airborne.
		It aerosolizes.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		It gets airborne.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		And they were breathing it and didn't know it, and it was having those chronic effects on them.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Of course, they were, I guess, investigating very concentrated.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Not really.
		She was, and she was hit by these strong cultures, but he, always over a period of time, it was more dilute cultures.
		And so there we have two examples where researchers, one exposed to it acutely, and then the other exposed to it over a period of time or more lower levels, both begin to exhibit these kinds of symptoms.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Oh, my.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Now, I've heard a million stories around the country about fish swimming in circles.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, I've heard more of those too.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Is that related to this in any way?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		It's really hard to know.
		I mean, I think that this situation that our waters are continuing to be contaminated by a variety of sources and that they are manifesting problems in wildlife that neurologically is something that's on the increase.
		It's hard for me to speak to the specific situations because I don't Want to overspeak.
		I think water needs to be analyzed.
		The scientists need to come in on this, but certainly it is ominous.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Here's from, let's see, the Wilmington, Delaware Sunday News Journal.
		The headline is: sores on fish baffle state officials.
		It says state environmental officials are mystified by what is causing lesions and open sores that appear on fish that are now being harvested, and it's horrible, and even catfish, and they don't understand at all what it is.
		Now, this is all the way up in Delaware and Maryland.
		Yeah.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, yeah, what you're talking about, this organism, the epicenter of the problem is clearly North Carolina for reasons we can talk about.
		But this scientist has found this organism as far north as Delaware.
		It was responsible for wiping out an aquaculture facility in the Chesapeake Bay last summer.
		She's found it all along the coast in South Carolina, Georgia, all the way around Florida and all the way over to Mobile Bay, Alabama.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, the next obvious question before we investigate this further is where the hell did this thing come from?
unidentified		Yeah.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, it's a story that I believe that, you know, thematically you address in your book, Art.
		They believe the organism has probably been around for millions of years, lying dormant and benign in the bottoms of the coastal waters.
		And it was changing environmental conditions that brought it up.
		What happened is that over the past 30, 40 years in North Carolina, you've had rapid growth.
		You've had industrial growth.
		And you had the pesticides being put on the tobacco farms.
		And all that runoff has been going to the waters and washing down to the coastal areas.
		And it poised the system for one more big thing.
		And what happened is that North Carolina, seeing the writing on the wall about tobacco, courted the swine industry.
		And now North Carolina is number two behind Iowa in hog production.
		And they courted them with lax environmental laws.
		And the effluent from all that corporate hog farming has been going into the rivers.
		And what we're talking about is a toxic soup down there that has allowed this organism that was previously unknown to emerge and flourish and attack with a vengeance.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, do we know for sure that it's been there for millions of years?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		No, this has to be the theory right now.
		And there's also precedent for these organisms being transported around the world in a variety of ways.
		Ballast water in ships is one big one.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		This is such a terribly serious story that I want to be very careful to delineate between what we know and what is theory.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I appreciate that, and I do too.
		So, right now, they have found it almost everywhere they've looked.
		Biologists, water biologists have asked for Dr. Burkholder to come and either teach them how to identify this organism, or they have sent her samples where they are having mysterious die-offs of fish that are unexplained by normal circumstances.
		And even physicians are contacting her where they are seeing mysterious medical syndromes that sound similar to the kind that those exposed to this organism are exhibiting.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		What are the human symptoms?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I'm glad you asked that because that goes back to answering in a roundabout way about the human blood.
		What they're finding is that there are four routes of exposure where you can be personally affected by this organism.
		When it moves into its toxic stage and releases that toxin into the waters, or it goes after fish, and it's clearly it's fish it's going after, that toxin, if you come into hand contact, dermal contact, not only can you develop the same kinds of sores that are turning up on the fish, but that toxin can get into your system.
		So if you go water skiing, or you go swimming, or you're a child going to one of the camps down there in North Carolina, you can be exposed to it in the water just by touching the water.
		The second way is if you have a cut and it gets into your bloodstream, this thing has a voracious appetite for human blood.
		Now, appetite.
		Yeah, now it does, the good news is that apparently it eats itself to death.
		That it will eat and eat until it dies.
		But that is another route of exposure.
		The third we talked about is aerosolization.
		They're finding that there are people down in those coastal areas who are exhibiting the same kinds of symptoms that the researchers in the lab unknowingly exhibited.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, and again, I would like to make it clear.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		You're talking about open sores that don't heal?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I'm talking about open sores that don't heal.
		I'm talking about cognitive impairment.
		I'll move into more of it.
		We're talking about immune system suppression.
		We're talking into a whole...
		And that is really disgraceful because health officials were informed a number of years ago about the potential and they have delayed investigating them.
		But I would say the fourth area, possible, a possible infection for people, an infection is probably the poor word, but puff contamination has to do with seafood.
		This toxin can not only kill fish by boring holes in them and by paralyzing it, but it can contaminate seafood.
		And they haven't even done studies to be absolutely sure that a lot of the seafood coming out of North Carolina is not infected with this toxin.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		So you mean not just fish, but other seafood that would be harvested in North Carolina?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Shellfish.
		So we're talking fin fish and shellfish being marketed nationally, coming out of North Carolina.
		Now let me say, Art, because we don't want to scare people unnecessarily.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		You're scaring me.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, I know.
		For the most part, if you cook fish, it neutralizes toxins.
		But not all toxins.
		And that was why it's so important for that fishing industry there to be able to say to people, listen, we will give you meaningful scientific reassurance that our fish is safe.
		And right now, they can't do that.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Who knew about this, agency-wise, And how long ago?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, that's important because what this story chronicles, Art, is the discovery process by this very determined and brave young scientist, female scientist, and the struggles and frustrations she has as she tries to bring it to the attention of the environmental and health bureaucracies in North Carolina, who at first resisted her findings.
		I almost came to feel there's a scientific equation that discovery equals skepticism plus jealousy.
		I mean, they kept demanding more science.
		They kept her more information.
		They didn't believe her.
		They put her off.
		And then when they finally were just compelled by the sheer amount of evidence to say there was a problem, they funded some money and it became part of a scandal in terms of where the money went and who got it.
		And so we have very few answers now that we didn't have three years ago when the legislature there appropriated over a half million dollars.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		God, we're idiots.
unidentified		I know.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		We're such idiots.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		We are literally destroying our world and we are protecting that destruction politically because of money.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I think there's two things here.
		I think that our agencies, our health agencies are crisis-driven.
		They wait until there is a clear health problem.
		People are actually just rolling over and dying before they'll respond sometimes, I think.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		It reminds me of the ozone thing.
		I mean, you've got measurements by NASA and by everybody else who's in space of the depletion of the ozone.
		We know at what rate it's going, although, by the way, it is now speeding up.
		And by the way, ozone certainly can't be ruled out as, you know, the depleted ozone with the increased radiation, UV radiation, as something that might have keyed this as well.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, you're right, because we're talking about climate change as having an impact on this.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I mean, a lot of sort of new and mysterious phenomena is going to be occurring as a result of the changes we're bringing to our environment, plus climatical changes that we have absolutely no control over.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I've got a very great deal on the changing climate, and again, it's part of my, very much part of my book, The Quickening.
		But I'll get back to that.
		This has my mind blown.
		I would like to hear from some people in North Carolina.
		We can do that.
		We're heard extensively in North Carolina.
		And I'm sure, as a lot of people listen to this in North Carolina this morning, they're going, oh, my God.
		Or would you say they already know about it?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I just finished a week of touring in North Carolina, and it was on all the media.
		It was on TV and radio and print.
		I think a lot of them are familiar with it.
		I certainly will be glad to hear from any of the listeners too there.
		I mean, that state is in shock because from around the country, they've been getting calls from people who were planning their vacations there, who have friends who have retired there, or they wanted to retire there, or they were sending their kids to camp, and they want to know if it's safe.
		Now, clearly, not all of North Carolina faces this problem, but there are definitely sick rivers and estuaries and sounds there that are unhealthy places for people, particularly spring, summer, and fall.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, if the news has been big in North Carolina and reported widely, why in the hell hasn't it been reported nationally?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, now, I'll tell you, I was on Good Morning America a week and a half ago.
		I debated with public health officials on CNN.
		So the word is getting out.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		No, wait, you debated with public health officials.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		What was their side of it?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		What were they?
		They came on and said that I was exaggerating the fear and that it was not as pronounced as I made it the case to be.
		And I refuted them with a letter I'm looking at right now that they had not even been aware of.
		And that was that 110 physicians three weeks ago wrote to Vice President Al Gore saying that these are physicians from the coastal counties of North Carolina saying physicians are notoriously uninvolved politically.
		However, we are seeing medical syndromes we do not understand.
		We feel they are connected to the rivers and to this organism there.
		And they're asking on that national level, Al Gore, because he has a history of being interested in environmental issues to become involved in this issue.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		110 physicians from North Carolina?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		When I saw this letter and I went through the page after page of signatures, I was reminded of the first time I stood in front of the wall, the Vietnam Memorial.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Look at all those names.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Oh, my God.
		Well, Good Morning America is pretty good.
		CNN is pretty good.
		But, you know, until Dan Rather, Tom Brokaw, and company say it on the evening news with a big in-depth story, it doesn't sink in.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I know.
		Well, that's why I'm so glad to be on your show, because even the New York Times Science section two weeks ago had an article about it.
		But this is getting out in a fragmentary way, and the opportunity to appear on shows like yours and reach a whole other audience is important.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I understand the economic impact for North Carolina of what you're saying, Rodney.
		I'm sure you do too.
		But I guess apparently we're not telling the people of North Carolina anything.
		Is there a campaign going on in North Carolina in some agencies, in your opinion, to keep this story minimized?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, you have a tough situation there because, I mean, tourism is a big industry.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Of course.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		And so is the fishing industry.
		And they depend upon a clean and healthy environment.
		And while they privately have acknowledged to me, yeah, we got a problem and we should never have been in this situation, on the other hand, they don't want their immediate industry to be impacted.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Of course not.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		So they're publicly going on the air and saying, listen, things are fine.
		Come on down.
		Don't worry about it.
		And then out there saying, well, I wish you could say that, but show us the sci-fi findings that can prove that and let's have meaningful reassurance, not just optimistic proclamations.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Is there any way to make a determination about the speed of the spread of this?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I think we're going to, you mean in North Carolina or up and down the coast, around the country?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, or how it might spread, if it will spread, if it is spreading.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, let me say that scientists have told us for quite some time that we can expect our coastal waters to be the breeding zones for these new and emerging harmful organisms if we continue to put population and pollution pressures on them.
		And if you look at our population migrations, it used to be from rural to urban.
		Now it's our coastal states that are increasing in population the most.
		So, I mean, it doesn't bode well for the future.
		Now, it may be this organism, and its scientific name, by the way, is Phisteria pisciceta.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Wait a minute.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Are you there?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I am.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Phisteria.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Phisteria pisciceta is its scientific name.
		I mean, again, this scientist has found this wherever she's looked.
		It may be other organisms that are very similar to it, and that's why I'm in California, going to San Francisco and then Seattle, talking to other coastal areas here where they too are having what is called the fertilization of waters, changing the ecology and having new kinds of organisms emerging.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, I want to get this down.
		Cisteria, I've got.
		Give me the last one.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Piscoceta.
unidentified		It's Latin for fish killer.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Ceda.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Okay, piscoceta.
unidentified		Yeah.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		But it's clear that there are probably similar species lurking in the sediment all around the world, just awaiting the right environmental conditions to shift in their favor.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		It's kind of like a bomb set to go off when it gets the right signal.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		It certainly is.
		It's a ticking time bomb.
		And I mean, third world countries that don't have the kind of environmental controls that even we do are seeing these kinds of problems too.
		I mean, it's a global issue.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		What has happened to this very brave biologist?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, she is withstanding some withering criticism from state agencies and fellow colleagues, but she has also generated a great deal of support and sympathy.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		And I happen to know that there are proposals now that are being made to the governor that she be elevated to a position, a higher position than she is at the university, and she be able to devote full time and have financial resources to continuing the study of this organism and other dangerous organisms in the aquatic waters of areas of North Carolina.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Do we have time?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, let me tell you this.
		This organism likes warm weather.
		Its main season is spring, summer, and fall, and that is also the height of tourist season.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		In other words, we're coming into that season right now.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		And if they have another summer like they had in 95, where another tens of millions of fish die, North Carolina's in real trouble.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, I'm going to restrict my line east of the Rockies to North Carolina, is what I'm going to do.
		Stay put.
		You can rest for a few minutes, Rodney.
		If you're in North Carolina, your number is 1-800-825-5033.
		1-800-825-5033.
		Everybody else, please hold off.
		This is such a giant magnitude story that we better do a little investigative reporting here back into the state of North Carolina where we are heard absolutely widely.
		So stay right where you are.
		There's more to come.
		This is CBC.
unidentified		Don't leave me this way.
		I can't move by.
		I can't stay alive without your love.
		Oh, baby, don't need me.
		Ooh, and it's all.
		Alright, it's coming up.
		We gotta get right back to it.
		Love it, love it.
		is done wrong.
		Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh.
		Call Art Bell toll-free.
		West of the Rockies at 1-800-618-8255.
		1-800-618-8255.
		East of the Rockies at 1-800-825-5033.
		1-800-825-5033.
		This is the CBC Radio Network.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		It is indeed.
		I just got a fact that sums up what you're about to hear.
		Art, tonight's subject matter is of the same magnitude of impact as a nuclear bomb can have in its potential to upset your day.
		That's in quotes.
		Einstein once said, there are two things that are infinite.
		One is the universe, and the other is the stupidity of the human race.
		How many wake-up calls do we need?
		That's from Daryl in Los Angeles, and it's right on the money.
		My guest is Rodney Barker.
		His book is And the Waters Turned to Blood.
		And what you're about to hear is going to scare the hell out of you, and it should.
		I've got quite a bit of material which I'm going to use as setup for this, but I need once again to take a moment out and tell you this is the release date, or was seven minutes ago, for my book that so many of you have been waiting for so long called The Quickening.
		And believe you me, that's what we're talking about this morning.
		The quickening.
		If you doubt that, stick around for a few depressing minutes.
		Anyway, you know, this book poured forth from me.
		I knew it was the right book for the right time.
		It absolutely is.
		It chronicles in Every, and I mean chronicles, as in documents, in every area of human endeavor, politically, socially, economically, our weather, our earth changes, an exponential quickening that's going on in our society.
		And when I say document, I mean document.
		This is a 336-page hardcover book available as of now.
		As of now.
		Now, I've got to put a couple of caveats in here because they're totally swamped and you're not going to be able to get through.
		The price of the book, by the way, is $24.95 plus $5 shipping and handling, just like my first book, The Art of Talk.
		And the waters turned to blood.
		I've got an article from Wilmington, Delaware entitled Soars on Fish Baffle State Officials.
		I just got a story from Steve in Portland.
		You may have seen it earlier on CNN.
		Crawling en masse from the sea, they are piling up on shore, providing a bonanza for beachcomers, but a serious concern for fishermen.
		A, quote, red tide, end quote, of crayfish has accumulated on the shore 150 miles north of Cape Town, South Africa.
		And residents have arrived from far away to see the odd spectacle and carry away as much seafood as they can.
		The crayfish have been coming out of the water for the last four weeks.
		They're trying to escape a red tide caused by a type of phytoplankton, I can't pronounce that, that depletes oxygen levels in the sea.
		An estimated, get this, 1,000 tons of crayfish have walked out of the ocean so far, and marine experts are very worried, as are local fishermen, whose livelihood has suffered due to the crayfish exodus.
		In other words, they are committing suicide.
		They're just walking out of the sea, period.
		Now, whether or not that is related to what my guest is talking about in North Carolina remains to be seen.
		Rodney, we are joined at this hour by Los Angeles and San Francisco.
		So we're going to have to refrench a little bit.
		Are you there, Rodney?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I am, Nark.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Your book, again, is not fiction.
		Everybody needs to understand this is well documented.
		What you're about to hear is truth, not fiction.
		Agree?
		Agreed with that?
		Do you agree with that, Rodney?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Oh, absolutely.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		You want to be very careful.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Absolutely.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		You have discovered, or that's not right.
		You have written a story about a botanist who has discovered a new organism in North Carolina.
		Now, you just heard what I read about in Africa.
		Does that sound the same?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		It sounds very similar.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		In fact, before they discovered what this organism was that was causing marine animals to behave so strangely, they were having what they called crab walks in North Carolina waters, where crabs were climbing out of the water, trying to climb pilings and posts, and going on shore to get out of the water like there was something harmful in there, and they just didn't know what it was.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		And now we do know what it is.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		And it sounds uncannily similar.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		This, again, it's called Phisteria piscosida.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		It's a microorganism that has lived in the sediment of the coastal waters of North Carolina, but it's been found all up and down the eastern seaboard and around over into the Gulf of Mexico.
		It attacks fish with a powerful toxin that bores holes in them.
		It paralyzes them.
		It feeds on them.
		And it also is releasing toxins that appear to be having profound human health effects.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Human health effects, like get this, folks, it feeds on human blood.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Am I correct?
unidentified		Yeah.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		It produces open sores.
		We're talking about conditions in human beings now, not just fish.
		It is airborne.
		Is that correct?
unidentified		Yes.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		It affects cognitive brain ability, apparently, much as Alzheimer's does.
		It affects the immune system, suppresses the immune system in human beings.
		Is that an exaggeration?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		No, it's not.
		In fact, what they call it is, when they see what it does to fish, is fish AIDS, because it so suppresses their immune system, it makes them vulnerable to a whole range of opportunistic diseases.
		And there are those who have even wondered if people chronically exposed to it in the waters themselves are not suffering with a suppression of the immune system that makes them not dissimilar from HIV patients.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		So in other words, you're saying that even swimming in those waters that are infested, as you talk about, in North Carolina and maybe elsewhere, if you had an open sore, it could get into your bloodstream and produce all of those symptoms.
		The botanist who did the work on this herself got sick.
		And somebody else, you said, got sick?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Oh, in the laboratory, they have had problems.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Ten different researchers in six different labs have suffered from a range of symptoms similar to what we're talking about.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		We're killing ourselves.
unidentified		We're out of our minds.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		How many of the waterways in North Carolina, would you estimate, are affected?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, what we're talking about is primarily the Pamlico Sound, which is the large sound, the Albemarle and the Pamlico Sound, which are held in by the outer banks.
		You have three main rivers that feed them, the Pamlico, the Noose, and the New River, but it's also been found in the Cape Fear River.
		I mean, all those waters along that area seem to be the epicenter of the problem right now.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		From Greg in Seattle, our talk about a crisis of biblical proportions.
		This is the same organism that causes red tide poisoning in shellfish, question mark.
		Is it?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		It is similar to the organism that causes red tide.
		The difference is the red tide dinoflagellate is what they call a plant.
		And this is similar, but it is an animal.
		It has the nutritional needs of an animal.
		So it is similar, but it is also different.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, it goes on.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Would you ask your guests to clarify under what conditions this organism might adapt totally, for example, to fresh water and what the potential is for massive bloom or blooming that might eventually affect drinking water?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah.
		All good questions.
		It has exhibited a tolerance for absolute fresh water to absolute seawater, but it clearly prefers brackish water, which is a mix of fresh and seawater.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		It can live in fresh water?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, it can live in it, but it seems to like the best a mixture of the salt and the fresh.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, now, the thinking is, the theory, ladies and gentlemen, is that this horrible thing has been waiting like a time bomb for millions of years in the water at the bottom?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Is that a bottom?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, in sediment.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		In sediment.
		And that all of the pollution that we've been putting into our waters, particularly in North Carolina, has caused this thing to suddenly come alive.
		Right.
		Is that a...
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Altered environmental conditions have allowed it to emerge in numbers and with a ferocity that was unknown before.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		I want to take a couple of calls as this story unwinds, and I realize a lot of you are new to it by about five or ten minutes, but I want to take a couple of calls from near the area.
		So East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
		Hi.
unidentified		Good morning.
		This is Marty from Virginia Beach, Virginia.
		I have the Alvemaros Fountain to my back door and have been adjacent to it for over 39 years of my life.
		The old timers can tell you of the same things that have happened with fish kills years ago in regards to if we don't have a lot of rain to push a lot of sediments out and cycle the earth like it's supposed to be.
		I believe if you do some core samples, you'll find out that this parasite has been around for quite some time.
		It's just because of certain environmental aspects of runoff and things are probably expiring it to dominate more and come out, flourish it.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Color, I'm going to ask a question of you.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		How aware of this story were you there near North Carolina before tonight?
unidentified		This has been something that comes up when we have a lot of hot weather, drought conditions.
		You'll get fish killed then.
		But when we have a lot of rain, a lot of runoff, the parasite's not a problem.
		It's a twofold problem.
		You've got people who are lobbyists that will poo-poo this if it comes up and say it's no big deal.
		But you also have environmentalists who make it sound like it's the end of the world type of animal and this is going to happen to us if we don't treat it.
		And that's the sad thing about it.
		It's an organism that's been in the Alboro Sound.
		I'm sure if you do core samples and do better studies on it and make it sound like it's the wrath of God, it's just becoming a little bit more prevalent because of environmental reasons, dredging, runoff, things that are making it grow a little faster, drought conditions when the Albemarle Sound doesn't have a lot of rain.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, Claire, I think we've got the picture.
		Rodney, how do you answer that?
		That sounds like somebody you would debate with or may have been debating with.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		No, I think he's making a point.
		I think the perception for a lot of people down there is, well, we've got this situation here, but it isn't as bad as some people are making it out to be, and yet it's worse than some others are making it out to be.
		And what I did in this book that had not been done was to go out and to comprehensively bring the information that was available both from the scientific community and from the academic community, and then down, collecting stories from people mainly in the Pamlico Sound and the rivers that feed that to get from them.
		And I'm getting a much more complete picture.
		But I also talk to the doctors in the area and doctors doing scientific studies.
		And all of that adds up to a much more informed and alarming picture.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		You said there was a letter sent to Vice President Gore by 110 doctors in North Carolina, which essentially said what?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I'm looking at it right now.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, let's hear it.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Okay, physicians are usually notoriously uninvolved in political or environmental issues.
		An environmental issue is now, however, threatening the people of our community in New Bern, North Carolina.
		As doctors, we feel the need to speak out as advocates of our patients to protect them from possible health risk, which in this case involves exposure to our coastal rivers.
		The pollution in our rivers has caused an overgrowth of several organisms, one known as pisteria, which has been implicated not only in fish kills, but in mammalian neurological dysfunction.
		And it goes on to call upon Dr. Al Gore to get involved and show a concern about this problem.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		And that's 100 physicians signed this.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		110 physicians signed this from three coastal counties.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Oh, my God.
		All right.
		Would you go swimming in those waters?
unidentified		No.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Would you drink any of that water?
unidentified		No.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, of course, it's salt water you would drink anywhere.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		No, but, you know, they're talking about, because of the population expansion of a thing called the global transport there, of using waters from the noose that is heavily polluted and treating it and becoming, and becoming the drinking water.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		How does it get, how does it, Well, it could be because of two things.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		One, in the laboratory, you had workers who were exposed to its toxins that came down with the same symptoms as people who come into contact with it.
		People out on the estuaries who've been exposed to these blooms have succumbed to the same series of symptoms.
		And in the laboratory test with rats, they're finding that they exhibit the same symptoms.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		And a lot of people are calling this fish AIDS.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Fish AIDS.
		Fish AIDS.
		Because they have found that, you know, it's hard to get human subjects to experiment upon.
		So we're at that stage where we're getting an awful lot of circumstantial reports from a variety of people.
		We have the experience of researchers who didn't take proper precautions in the lab, but we're having to rely on other species.
		And that is fish, and that is the rats.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		What was determined?
		I remember when you were talking to Linda Moulton Hound, she asked you something about they did an experiment with this animal and human blood.
		They put human blood, I guess, in a petri dish or something like that.
		And if you'll hold on after the bottom of the hour, we'll tell everybody what happened.
		And so if you think this is not a serious problem, I suggest you stick around for a moment.
		The book is, And the Waters Turned Blood, and we will tell you how to get that.
		It's absolutely an incredible story, and everybody should know about it.
		Now, he's been on ABC's Good Morning America, and I believe CNN.
		But, you know, until Broca says it, as you all know, it just isn't true.
		Sit back, listen, and decide for yourself.
		This is CBC.
unidentified		CBC.
		Art Bell is taking calls on the wildcard line at 702-727-1295.
		That's 702-727-1295.
		First-time callers can reach Art Bell at 702-727-1222.
		702-727-1222.
		Now, here again, Art Bell.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I'm afraid what we are discussing this morning is worse than science fiction.
		I wish it was science fiction.
		It's not.
		It's what's happening in our oceans, and while the people in the Carolinas apparently know about it, I'm afraid you may be finding out about it for the first time.
		There's something new, alive, part plant, part animal, or in this case, animal, killing fish, in effect, giving fish what's being called fish AIDS, sores that will not heal.
		Many other symptoms, if in a human being, and it's airborne, will cause cognitive difficulties, will cause immune system suppression, and it is airborne, and in a moment we're going to tell you what it does to human blood.
		My guest is Rodney Barker, and he wrote, and the waters turned to blood.
		And art wishes this was science fiction.
		It is not.
		Give me, oh, by the way, on my website right now, a link to the Charleston Post and Courier, which has an article entitled, Scientists Track the Phantom.
		The Phantom You're About to Hear About.
		All right, well, this may have nothing to do with anything, but ABC News at the top of the hour just ran a story that girls are developing sexually at an extremely young age in North Carolina.
		Reports said doctors believe it is because of elevated levels of estrogen in diet.
		50% of black and 15% of white girls are affected in North Carolina.
		Does that strike you as odd, Rodney?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, both yes and no.
		You know, I think this is a theme in your book, Art, that the world is going through some revolutionary changes now because of what we've done to it.
		And we've all known that if we continue to put pressures on the environment around us, population and pollution pressures, that sooner or later limits will be reached and it'll come back to haunt us.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I think it's pushing back.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, and the question is, what does it look like?
		Will we recognize it and how will we respond?
		And I think some of the things that your listeners are sending in tonight, some of the things that both you are concerned about and I am, are examples of the Earth striking back.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Look, they took some of this animal, you're calling it, and did what with a Petri dish with yellow.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		What happened was, and the news gets worse in terms of they still do not know the full range of human health effects here because the toxins of this organism have not been characterized yet.
		And typically marine toxins are released in sweets.
		That's S-U-I-T-E-S.
		The brevitoxin that causes red tide, there are six different toxins there.
		They think there are at least this many here.
		And that means six different ways at least it can get you.
		Six different manifestations.
		I mean, some may target the liver, some the lungs, some the heart, some the central nervous system.
		So they just, they still don't have all the answers in here.
		But what you're asking me about is something that they do know.
		And that is when the assistant to this Dr. Joanne Burkholder at North Carolina State, who discovered this organism, when he finally recovered his mental abilities, this is after three or four months of being out of the lab because he had inhaled its toxins, he came back into the lab one night and he wanted to see if it affected human blood.
		And I go into this in the book, The Dramatic Incident, as he goes in there and he takes a sample from his hand, he puts it under the microscope, puts it on the slide, he puts the water with this organism in it, and he watches.
		And he watches this organism literally swarm around his blood cells like a vampire and suck all his blood cells of the internal contents.
		And they went from one blood cell to the next blood cell to the next until all were consumed.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Until all were consumed.
		Oh, my God.
		You know, again, this is so alarming to people that I want to be very sure that everybody understands that we're not just feeding them some sort of science fiction.
		What we're telling them about what's going on in North Carolina, and apparently elsewhere, is well documented.
		Now, how do I guess people are going to want to read your book, so how do they get your book?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, the book is available around the country.
		There was a big ad in the New York Times book review this weekend, and I mean, it's widely distributed.
		But let me say, Art, you know, one of the things that we have to be careful about is just overwhelming people with bad news.
		And I think that really what I tried to do in this book, too, is to present it in a somewhat inspiring context.
		And that is the struggle, and I can't say victory yet.
		That would be maybe the epilogue for the paperback of this female scientist to get authorities to be responsible to it.
		And what she goes through, and the struggle still is inspiring in a way that I hope can galvanize people rather than sort of depress them.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, I'm sitting here feeling sorry for the people of North Carolina because I realize the impact it's going to have on you.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		They deserve better.
		And that's what I said there.
		And that's why I went there expecting a lot of hostility and antagonism.
		And I was continually, wherever I went, I was thanked by people that made me feel like I was speaking for a lot of the citizens in that state who are being unnecessarily victimized.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Let me tell you why that is, Rodney.
		It's because everybody knows it's true.
		Everybody knows this is going on.
		They damn well know about it.
		First time caller line, you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
		Hi.
		Oh, wait a minute.
		I didn't push the button.
		There we go.
		First time caller line, now you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
		Where are you calling from, please?
unidentified		I'm calling from the Midwest.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
unidentified		Okay.
		Just as an aside to your remark about the early sexual maturation of young women, there was a report done, oh goodness, I'd say about 94, 95, I've got a copy of it around somewhere here, that was done in England, right around in the Towns estuary.
		And they noticed a significant increase in the amount of deformed fish, primarily with dual sets of sexual organs.
		And the causal link between that type of deformity and the environmental impact of birth control pills that it entered into.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Linked to estrogen in some way, in other words.
unidentified		Pardon me?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Linked in some way to estrogen as well.
unidentified		Exactly, exactly.
		So it's all over, basically.
		My question for Rodney is what in particular, as far as the areas where these organisms are located, is this industrialized areas, agricultural areas?
		What type of runoff is this attributed to?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, well, what they're finding is that it's a system that has been inundated with variety of runoffs, agriculture, industrial, sewage treatment plants, and even what they call non-point sources.
		That would be acid deposition, runoffs from sewers, golf courses.
		But really what has tipped the balance is the swine industry.
		And it was courted by North Carolina that saw the writing on the wall with tobacco.
		And the way they treat hog influence is very primitive.
		They use hog lagoons there.
		And so it leaches into the water table.
		And the nitrogen and phosphorus, the nutrients that are in that hog waste, have really thrown the ecological balance over the brink.
		So, you know, that's what makes it so difficult because every time you point your finger at one sort of source of the problem, you've got four fingers going in other directions.
		So all of it is contributing to it, and that's why they're having so much trouble getting people to clean up because it is economically costly, and no one person can be pointed to as you're the source of the blame, and they're all contributing to it.
unidentified		All right.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Wildcard Line, you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
unidentified		Hi.
		Hi, Art.
		This is Alex, and I live about 25 minutes from North Carolina.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yes, sir.
unidentified		And I read the USA Day every day.
		I read our local paper here, and I watch CNN and news.
		So I'm not media literate, but I haven't heard anything about this.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		All right.
unidentified		And I guess my question is, well, I guess first of all, I've heard the ABC report, too, about the girls maturing at eight.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		That may or may not have any relationship with New York.
unidentified		Well, that's what I was saying.
		I didn't hear them say North Carolina in particular.
		They didn't mention that in the ABC news report that I heard.
		But anyway, my question, with the hepatitis outbreak that everybody's hearing about with the strawberries and that kind of deal, that came from Mexico, right?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Right.
unidentified		Which supposedly we're supposed to have stringent laws about things that come into the United States.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Somebody violated a law, by the way.
		It is against the law to import for distribution for that purpose.
		So there's going to be a lot of...
		There's going to be a whole lot of trouble for somebody over this, believe me.
unidentified		Well, how I wanted to relate that was with this being from our own area, I mean, with, you know, the North Carolina fishing industry and that, do you not think that, you know, it would be very easy for us to ship around fish that is infected by this too?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Oh, I see.
		That's a very good question.
		Rodney, what about the fish that are caught in North Carolina and sent all over the place for one reason or another?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I met on Saturday night.
		I went down to Moorhead City to meet with the North Carolina Fisheries Association, who were upset at the negative publicity that was coming out and the idea that it might impact their industry.
		And I'll have to say, I said to them, fellows, you should never have been put in a situation when this organism was first identified and linked to fish kills in 1993, you should have demanded right there and then from your state tests to determine what toxin it releases and is that toxin in the fish flesh?
		Is it in the seafood there that You're exporting to other states.
		If not, you're putting yourself in a legally precarious position.
		They have basically not had those studies done, so they do not have the scientific data to reassure people.
		Now, let me say, cooking fish for the most part neutralizes toxins, but not always.
		And the possibility that on microscopic levels those toxins are harboring those fish flesh and are going out, if those studies come out later on and confirm that presence, I mean, there are going to be major lawsuits.
		And so they should have moved in this a long time ago, and that's not my fault.
		And that's only not their fault either.
		That's the state bureaucracies that should be making those tests.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Part of the book that I just wrote has to do with the weather changes.
		Let me read you what I just got.
		Art, as I sit here in Minneapolis and St. Paul, Minnesota, with the worst flooding in recent memory, a month and a half early, with a blizzard raging on at 30 degrees below zero wind chill in April, winds up to 60 miles per hour,
		with floodwaters, freezing cars, houses, and everything else that moves flat in its tracks, I can only come to the conclusion that it is the beginning of the geographic changes that so many guests have predicted.
		Now will man be able to adapt and cope with these changes, or is it also the beginning of the life changes that are to come to bear?
		Is this the weather change that Ed Dames remotely viewed?
		What next?
		A volcano in Kansas or an earthquake in South Dakota?
		So we have been, you know, we've had a year of this or more now, Rodney.
		The weather is clearly, clearly changing.
unidentified		Yeah.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		You have some very eloquent listeners, Art.
		Yeah, and as the weather changes and the climate impacts the environment, we can expect more strange phenomena.
		We can also expect new species to mutate that had not been previously toxic or harm for people.
		And we're only going to know about it when they start manifesting bizarre symptoms.
		And I see this organism is an example of that.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, and we should be clear that this new or old organism, this horrible thing that will kill fish and can it kill human beings?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I mean, it has not killed them.
		The lethality is not directly related where you can say, well, you're exposed to this, you take it into your system, you are going to die, other than the compromise immune system.
		Again, we don't know what all it does, and that's why we shouldn't be in this position of ignorance, because this was brought to the attention of the health authorities three years ago, and we still don't know answers, and they are still doing studies.
		All it knows is this is everything we learned about it is disturbing.
		It gets worse.
		All right, if you have characterized.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Rodney, if they have a very bad year in North Carolina, meaning it gets very hot, very hot, probably with hurricanes roaring in, how is that going to affect this?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I mean, they've been talking about that.
		If we don't act as a result of the publicity generated by this book, and then we have on top of that another bad summer, you know, we are in real trouble here.
		So we need to begin to start doing things.
		And that's why, when I was there, I really tried to give the book somewhat of a positive spin and said to North Carolinians, really, you know, this is a challenge and an opportunity.
		You can set an example for other states by how you handle this situation because there will be a paperback.
		And that paperback will have an updated chapter of what North Carolina has done since this book has come out.
		But if you have another bad summer and you don't begin to act on this book, you know, that could really spill major economic problems.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, with the story I've got from Wilmington, Delaware, and the story from South Africa, and people, I think, have seen that on CNN, red tide there, with just thousands of things crawling out of the sea.
		It's unbelievable.
		Thousands of tons, excuse me.
		This may already have spread.
		I mean, it may be too late in that regard.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I like to think the only way to stop this, now I propose they do extensive monitoring and detection systems in all the hot spots of North Carolina this summer, and then issue alerts like you have in L.A., pollution alerts.
		Have them publicly posted in the newspaper.
		What the levels of this organism are, where, when are the days you don't go fishing or don't go swimming, that doesn't solve the problem, that but immediately addresses the concern of people.
		In the long run, the only way they're going to solve it is really not solving it, but manage it, and that is by cutting back on the nutrients and the pollutants that are going into the rivers.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		What do you think the chances are we'll actually do that?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Gosh, Art.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		You know, I mean, I think that if North Carolinians can say it's going to cost us more if we don't do it than if we do, there's hope.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		They're not yet to that point, though.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I don't think you have the political support up in the legislature, and I know the governor is in a difficult situation because of the incredible pressures of the hog industry there.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
		Hi.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Hey, I'm in North Carolina?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yes, sir.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Where in North Carolina?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Charlotte.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Charlotte.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I've suffered with the neurotoxin degrees bacterially for over 20 years.
		And it is a terrible thing to go through.
		I now do support group work.
		I found some answers that helped me after 20 years.
		I became housebound, city-bound, and then housebound, and couldn't get out of bed.
		I'm now living 98% normal life again.
		And Rodney Barker's book, I've been, of course, keenly aware of this because of my illness.
		I've been looking into all this.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, but let me ask you, have you seen a lot of publicity about it there in North Carolina?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, it's been like his book, when it came out, there's been a two-minute snitch on the local news, TV, and things like that.
		But the articles have been in the paper about the, he's right about the hog farming, and one of our big senators has a huge hog interest, and his lagoons broke and polluted, and they find him, you know, a slap on the wrist.
		But basically, the news has been kind of spotty but if you really have been aware of it I mean I've been aware of it for for quite a few years and they are getting sores and and they and the the brain symptoms are the first three I go to the short-term memory loss being the second most prominent symptom and you know you go to sleep and you wake up the next morning and see the leaves on the trees and you wonder if you're going crazy because
		you thought you went to sleep in the winter.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, sir, I appreciate the call.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, I was in Charlotte at the beginning last week and Charlotte is more inland, it's not on the coast.
		And he's right in terms of the regional coverage.
		I did a couple of TV spots and a couple of radio shows there.
		I mean, I don't know what it takes to sort of blanket the media.
		I've done a number of national shows.
		I was on Dateline two weeks ago as well as Good Morning America and CNN.
		And there is the New York Times.
		And I know in Raleigh, this has been a big story.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, if I play the bureaucrat who thinks Rodney Barker is full of it and that this is just some sort of overblown non-story that Rodney Barker is blowing up to sell books, how do you answer it?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I mean, I say go to the newspapers, go to the, down on the coast, talk to the doctors who are seeing the patients, take a trip down through all those coastal towns and cities that I do, see how seriously they take it.
		Talk to the people who've been given money to do research, see how seriously they take it.
		The only people who are going to be talking like that are going to be the bureaucrats who I challenge and reveal and expose in the book.
		For the most part, I am getting endorsement from both the scientific circles, from the medical circles, and certainly from the population.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Rodney, if we do nothing at all, what will happen?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I think we're going to have more and more of one of the long-standing things is we're talking about health care in this country, and I think you're going to have chronic problems.
		You're going to have acute problems.
		I think that it's going to have a major, major impact on North Carolina.
		I think its economy, its population is going to be affected.
		I mean, I hate to think about that, Art.
		I mean, it's only going to get worse and dramatically worse because, I mean, points, the critical point has been reached in North Carolina.
		I think it's the first in line from a lot of coastal states are going to be affected by these kinds of problems.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		North Carolina now, the East Coast as a whole, perhaps later.
		All right, Rodney, can you hold on?
		I can.
		All right.
		Coming to the top of the hour, Rodney Barker is my guest, and the waters turned to blood is his book.
		I'm Art Bell, and you're listening to the CBC Radio Network.
unidentified		CBC
		Radio Network CBC Radio
		Network This is an on-core presentation of Coast to Coast A.M. with Art Bell.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I want Rodney to hear this.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Rodney, are you a religious person?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Somewhat, Art.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I'm not a practicing, I don't go to church, but I have my own private religion that I continue to believe in.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, that makes two of us then.
		Listen to this.
		It is from Pastor Bradley.
		Dear Art and Rodney, I know you don't like quoting from the Bible on your show, but there is a verse that describes precisely what your guest is talking about.
		It is described in the curse of the second bowl, which is found in Revelation 16, 2 and reads, quote, Then the second angel poured out his bowl on the sea, and it became blood as of a dead man, and every living creature in the sea died.
		The very next verse, number four, describes the same thing being introduced into the fresh water system.
		Quote, the third angel poured out his bowl on the rivers and springs of water, and they became blood.
		Signed Pastor Bradley.
		I'm not a strictly religious person by a long shot either, and I'm not sure how to approach what we're doing to ourselves right now, Rodney, but I don't know.
		That gives me sort of a nervous little tick.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		It certainly does too.
		I know that I was aware and excited by the recent sort of coalition building between environmentalists and theologians who do see a common cause in the preserving of the earth and being the steward of the earth.
		And that's, I mean, I like hearing about that kind of coming together.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, let me tell you something.
		Politically, most of my life, I have been a conservative with libertarian leanings.
		And the traditional conservative position on environmental matters is BS.
		You know, it's BS, and all that matters is the economy.
		And I have come in the last several years to understand that it's not BS, that I'm afraid it's real.
		What we're doing to ourselves is now coming back to haunt us.
		It's what drove me to write this book.
		I guess it's what drove you to write the book, isn't it?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		In larger part, yeah.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yeah.
		All right, let's take a few more calls.
		First time caller line, you're on the air with Rodney Barker in L.A. Hi.
unidentified		Hello, Art.
unidentified		Hi.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Where are you?
unidentified		In Hannibal, Missouri, hometown of Mark Twain.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yes, sir.
unidentified		I used to live in Rock Hill, South Carolina, which is right on the border of North and South Carolina next to Charlotte.
		And the guy that called just a little while ago, I can back up what he said.
		The Catawba River, which ran I'd say maybe about half a block away from where my apartment was, had a very interesting occurrence, to say the least, happening there in the latter part of 93 going into 94.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		What was that?
unidentified		There were scores of fish that ended up on the banks of the rivers on both sides.
		It was as though somebody had just plowed right down the center of it with a net or something and just shoved all the fish over to the side.
		I mean there were thousands of them laying around.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Thousands.
unidentified		The soil conservation people were running around telling people to keep away from the river, away from the fish, because they were rotting and it would get you sick and all that stuff.
		But considering it was so close to my house, you know, I was wondering what the heck is going on with all the smell down there.
		I went to take a look and I saw fish with the same kinds of signs and symptoms as what I've seen on the TV, the stores and stuff like that.
		There were kids that during that same time frame had been downriver playing around in the water and they had come down with meningitis, one of which was 17 years old, football star, no problems whatsoever health-wise, who died from it.
		You know, just boom, out of the clear blue.
		No rhyme, no reason.
		The health officials blew it off and they would not admit, even when we called the CDC to say, look, are we in danger?
		Are we having an outbreak?
		What's going on?
		The people down there, up to and including Dr. David Thatcher, the director who I personally talked to about this, would not tell us anything.
		Just blew us off and said, oh, there's nothing to it, which is typical of the downplaying of the usual government bureaucracy.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Thank you.
		I have got to somehow impress the audience with the urgency of this.
		110 physicians from North Carolina wrote a letter to our vice president.
		That's 110 doctors in North Carolina.
		Would you read it one more time, please?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Certainly will.
		Let me just say before I do it, it's really amazing when you do something like this, the different stories you hear from people who have encountered something similar, whether it's this organism or not, but who are frustrated by what is happening to the environment and the lack of response on the part of public health officials.
		This letter to dear Vice President Gore.
		It's from physicians of Craven County, North Carolina and surrounding areas.
		It reads, Physicians are usually notoriously uninvolved in political or environmental issues.
		An environmental issue is now, however, threatening the people of our community in Newburn, North Carolina and nearby.
		As doctors, we feel the need to speak out as advocates of our patients to protect them from the possible health risk, which in this case involves exposure to our coastal waters.
		The pollution in our rivers has caused an overgrowth of several organisms, one known as fisteria, implicated not only in fish kills, but mammalian neurologic dysfunction.
		And it goes on and it calls upon Vice President Al Gore to come in, to support the governor.
		To me, it's a stunning rebuke to the public health system in North Carolina that they are going above them, outside the state, appealing to Vice President Al Gore for help.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, now, suppose I lived in the state of Maine, on the coast, and I'm going to take it, I'm going to just give you a reaction.
		I'm going to say, look, fine, that's North Carolina's problem.
		That's not my problem.
		I don't care.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I would say to them that this organism has been found up and down the eastern seaboard.
		I would say to them that they should not be complacent because they have not been impacted by this particular organism because I think what this organism indicates is that our coastal waters are being changed by environmental and pollution pressures.
		And it's not this organism, it very well easily could be another organism.
		And all the scientists are predicting that this is the direction we're moving in.
		There's a global increase in these kinds of pathogens, and they're going to be happening in Maine's waters sooner or later.
		And they even had, there was a big incident up in Canada dealing with toxicity.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I just picked on Maine as a, you know.
		In other words, if we don't do something, the ocean is literally going to be poisoned.
		Is poisoned the wrong word?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, no, it's not.
		No, it's not.
		I mean, there is a strong possibility that this kind of thing is going on elsewhere and the organism just has not yet been identified.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, you heard the story.
		Maybe some of the audience did not, that I just read, which just broke out of South Africa.
		There are some photographs on CNN or some video of it.
		An estimated 1,000 tons of crayfish have literally walked out of the ocean, worrying marine experts, I'm quoting from CNN, due to a red tide, trying to escape a red tide.
		And what you're talking about is a red tide, isn't it?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, the organism that I'm talking about, North Carolina, is really a cousin to the organism that causes the red tide.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		A nastier cousin?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yes, it's a nastier cousin because it exhibits direct predatorial behavior, attacking fish, and the toxin appears to be more potent and more dangerous to humans than the one causing red tide.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Wildcard line, you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
		Hi.
unidentified		Good morning, Mr. Bell.
unidentified		This is Robert in San Joaquin Valley.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yes, sir.
unidentified		First of all, that Golden Eagle food, I tried that.
unidentified		And they've come a long way from K-rations.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, no kidding.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, I know.
unidentified		Yes, good evening, sir.
		Yes, sir.
		And I'm really enjoying hearing you.
		There's so many things I could ask you, but let me lump it all into one real quick, Art, and then I'll listen on the answer.
		Sure.
		First of all, after I mention the main subject, I was hoping maybe you could tell us, seeing as we can't really depend on politicians and their agendas, what we could do to come together in hopes that we can turn things around.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Pressure.
unidentified		Yeah, if it's not too little, too late.
unidentified		But are you familiar with the Red Tide, the Salton Sea in Southern California?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Go ahead and tell us more about it, though.
unidentified		I'd like to hear what you think.
		They've had it several times.
		I drove by there not too many years ago.
		All the fish were floating.
		The stench was terrible.
		The people were sick.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		The birds were getting sick.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, birds are falling out of the air.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yes, sir.
unidentified		I was just wondering if you knew much about that and what the cause is.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I know that it's been linked to what is called the fertilization of the coastal waters, which is causing various microorganism cells to turn toxic, and then it works its way up the food chain.
		And you've had that problem here.
		You had a die-off in 91 of pelicans that were feeding on anchovies that had then were feeding on toxic diatoms.
		And so California has had its spouts, as well as the whole Pacific coast has, with these marine organisms turning toxic.
		And in this case, as we said, working its way up the food chain.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		I've got two reports here.
		One from MSNBC.
		Let me read it.
		At a conference in Brussels, insurance company scientists warned not only that climate is changing, but that resulting storms and other erratic weather could actually bankrupt the industry.
		A quote, it is feared that climate change will produce in nearly all regions of the world new extreme values of many insurance-relevant parameters that will lead to natural disasters of unprecedented severity and frequency.
		And now from CNN, McGinty, Clinton's point person on environmental issues, largely steered clear of the blame, commenting, focusing instead on the consequences of doing nothing.
		McGinney said, quote, as we see increasingly severe storms, we begin to get a glimpse of what a post-climate change world would look like.
		But I'm beginning to wonder if we're going to make it that far.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		You know, when it comes to the environment art, we have relied on other species to be our early warning systems.
		That's why miners took canaries into the mines with them.
		When they stopped singing, they knew they had air problems.
		But the assumption is when the environment reaches a point where it can longer support wildlife, that we will recognize that.
		We'll pay attention to it, and we will react to it.
		And, boy, some of the stories we've heard tonight, you hear about the frogs up in Minnesota and Wisconsin growing legs out of different parts of their body.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Let me give you one that you might not know about.
		I live out here in the desert, Rodney, and Lake Mead is the big drinking water supply for Las Vegas.
		And there were front-page headlines about two months ago that said that the carp in Lake Mead were showing gross deformities.
		Now, bear in mind, this is in the drinking water of Las Vegas.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, you know, and there are those who say, you know, it's not fair to extrapolate from other species to human health.
		And I think that's the case I make in this book, is basically the line between us and them, between other species and people, has been crossed.
		The same things we're doing to the environment that are causing an organism to emerge is killing fish.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, why do they call it the food?
		Why do they call it the food chain?
		It's a food chain, right?
		We're at the top of it.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Oh, I see.
		Yeah.
		I know.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		East of the Rockies, you're on the air with first-time callers.
		Call Area 702-727-1222.
		Oh, hold it, Steve.
		We can't allow you to put a last name on the air.
unidentified		Okay.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		So let us begin again.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Your name is Steve, and Steve, where are you calling from?
unidentified		I'm calling from Wilmington, North Carolina.
		Two questions for you, and maybe a main concern.
		This, you said it might be going airborne, right?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		No, it does.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		The toxin aerosolizes.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		It is airborne.
unidentified		It is airborne.
		All right.
		Being that I'm just about two minutes away from the ocean and a few minutes away from several of the branches off the Cape Fear River, is it possible that I could be affected?
		And if so, should I be in the thought of moving someplace else?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Oh, no, I wouldn't align there.
		First of all, we're talking about blooms of this organism.
		That's when you have concerns.
		When it blooms in the water, then, and the problem is like a red tide, you don't get the discoloration.
		That's when the toxin aerosolizes.
		In terms of the ocean side, even though it has a salinity tolerance for the ocean, the churning of the waves, the turning over, makes it so that it's inhospitable for it.
		So on the exterior parts of the oceans, you don't need to worry.
		It has been found in the Cape Fear, yes.
		I would keep my, you know, attuned to the newspaper there.
		The Wilmington Star News is very good on this kind of thing.
		I was just in Wilmington last week, and you have a river keeper there who is monitoring this kind of situation.
		And I had a long conversation with him.
		So there will be those kind of alerts posting.
		He's going to be looking for it too.
		So I would not consider moving at this time, no.
		I don't think you would, again, I think you should become involved.
		And I mean, if they're, I mean, stay in touch with your river keeper there.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		On the other hand, if you were to ask you, should I go swimming?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, the Cape Fear's got its problems, too.
		I mean, all those coastal rivers, I mean, it's not one thing, it's another.
		There's a variety of bacteria and organisms they've been found in those rivers.
		I don't think they're healthy places.
		I certainly wouldn't.
		I believe in informed consent art, and that's what makes me so angry here, is that the health and environmental bureaucracies just don't have the information to be able to provide to citizens and consumers to make them feel meaningfully reassured of what they know what they're eating or what they're swimming in.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, caller.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		So the word is you don't have to move, but stay informed.
unidentified		Okay, one more quick question for you.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Sure.
unidentified		How much do you think it's going to get worse?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Again, that goes back to if we do nothing, what are we facing?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, I can say to you this, is that there was, I mean, if we look back in time, the population sort of shifts moved from rural to urban.
		Now the population shift is moving to the coastlines.
		You look at what states are growing the fastest.
		It is our coastal states.
		And that is clearly the target area.
		Those coastal waters are the breeding zones for these new organisms.
		The states are going to have more and more people to them as there's been more and more pollution and population pressures.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Welcome to the Rockies.
		You're on the air with Rodney Barker.
		Hi.
unidentified		Hello.
		Hello.
		Yes.
		I'm.
		Well, I have a couple of questions.
		One is: are there any places one could go, I mean, aside from your book, obviously, which is a prime source of information, which could be considered an official research.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I mean, if you could look, in my book, it refers to a nature article, a scientific prestigious journal out of Britain when it was first published about this.
		I cannot refer you to any information in terms of the state officials in North Carolina.
		There are a couple of environmental groups, foundations that are clearing houses for information.
		Perhaps if you wanted to call Art Producer back, ArtBack at a later time, I could give them those numbers.
		You could call them.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		In the meantime, we've got a related article now on our website, Caller.
		So if you have a computer, it's www.artbell.com.
		All right, Rodney, sit tight.
		We'll be back to you in a moment.
		His book, And the Waters Turned to Blood.
		This is a very strange organism we are discussing that unfortunately, well, is now affecting the fish, but also is beginning to affect human beings.
		You might want to stick around and listen.
		I'm Art Bell and this is CBC.
unidentified		And now, back to the best of Art Bell.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yeah.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Well, you know, I really see when we talk about North Carolina as a signal event sending up a flare for a lot of other states to see.
		And that's what my hope is, and that's why I really appreciate the opportunity to be here, Art, is to bring this issue to the attention of people around the country.
		Because, yes, we have a major problem in North Carolina, but other states are just standing in line.
		It's going to be coming their way.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		East of the Rockies, you are on the air with Rodney Barker.
		Hi.
unidentified		Hi, I'm Larry.
		I'm calling from Watertown, Wisconsin, and I've lived in Western North Carolina for 13 years.
		They have a very large commercial farm, fish farm industry in Western North Carolina, rainbow trout, catfish.
		And I started, you know, I drove by one on the way home from work, so I have my wife, you know, I dip some out for the, I have the guy dip some of the fish out for my wife.
		And her health has started to go downhill.
		And they've just opened a new fish market down that she's been patronizing, and she's still very seriously ill.
		She's been eating horns ruffy and some other things.
		And I just spoke with her when the program came on.
		You know, we have a lot of trouble getting you on the radio in Western North Carolina in the mountains.
		And she's very ill.
		She's, you know, to the point she can't sleep, pains, or she's starting to become forgetful.
		She locked herself out of the house.
		They'd even take a purse or keys, and you know how a woman is with her purse.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, these are symptoms typical of what Rodney has described.
		That doesn't mean that's what this is, though.
		Although it does sound eerily familiar, doesn't it, Rodney?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah.
		Again, as we said, Archie, when you start writing about this kind of thing, you become, I mean, you hear all kinds of stories about people who are suffering from similar complaints.
		You know, I did a little research on the Internet with the CDC, and they have a site there talking about new and emerging infectious diseases, and under that is a paper that talks about how poorly equipped public health departments are to be able to discern these new waterborne diseases from all different sources, and that they just don't have the sophistication to detect them.
		They don't test for them, and they really are crisis-oriented, and they wait until just there's ongoing health problems before they'll finally react to a situation.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I know.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, you're not a doctor, but what would you say to this fellow?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Boy, having gone through, I mean, here's so many stories of those people who have had that kind of thing.
		I just don't know any personal physicians.
		I just don't know what to say to this individual.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Color, I'm sorry.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I'm so sorry for you.
unidentified		Is there any danger of that organism being in mountain streams in Western North?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		No, no, let me reassure you about that.
		I mean, you may have other sources of pollution in your mountain streams.
		But in terms of western North Carolina, I mean, I know there's paper mills up there, and I know there's been some spraying up there, so that might be the source of your problem.
		This particular organism, no.
		I don't want to alarm you about it.
		That doesn't seem to be, I mean, you don't need to worry about this causing those problems.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		First time caller line, you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
unidentified		Hi.
unidentified		Hi.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Where are you, sir?
unidentified		My name is Francis.
		I'm calling from Grass Valley, California.
		I'm listening on KNCO.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Okay.
unidentified		And I have a couple.
		I'm an activist in my area with the Green Party.
		And we're and my point is I'd like to request that the letter that the doctors get put on the website so that people could have access to that.
		I think it's valuable information for people.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I do too.
		I'll tell you what.
		Rodney, if you will supply it to me, I will see to it that it gets on the website.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Okay, I'll go ahead and do that.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, caller?
unidentified		Sir, I have another quick request.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yeah.
unidentified		Another quick comment.
unidentified		May I?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yes.
unidentified		A while back, you had this, this is a quick comment, you had this game you played called If I Were a Dictator.
unidentified		Well, if I were a dictator, whenever someone, certain conservative radio talk show host used the term environmental wacko, I would have them castrated.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, well, yeah, I'm sorry.
		My views have, what would be the right word, they've gone past any political concerns or beliefs that I had, and I have embraced because of scientific fact that a lot of people are just ignoring right now about what's going on with our environment.
		I have begun to Realize, as many, many, many others have, that we are really screwing up the place we live in.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		You know, I was asked on a program, like, well, why, actually, I think it was Good Morning America.
		Why would not health officials react?
		And it's difficult to answer that because you think this is their job.
		And it's a complex mix of motives.
		But one of the things that I think that I encountered in this book, I think it's part of one of the, in fact it is one of the themes of the book, and that is how much information is enough.
		And I mean, I think that a lot of our health departments, you know, their demand for scientific certainty is beyond reason, beyond common sense.
		They want absolute scientific consensus.
		They want perfect information.
		And you're never going to get that.
		And I understand.
		The run-the-engines of environmental protection cost money.
		You need to have information because industries can bring lawsuits unless you can back up regulations.
		But nevertheless, I mean, there reaches a point where if you're going to err, you're going to err on the side of protecting public health.
		And I find that a lot of these public health agencies are just so conservative in their demand for more and more science just to avoid those tough political and economic consequences.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		You nevertheless have a lot of science behind what you have written, don't you?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I issued a challenge to that public health department, to the environmental agency there, the Division of Environmental Management.
		If you have any disagreement with the contentions in my book, let's sit down and let's select a major newspaper.
		I chose a News and Observer from Raleigh, but I said anyone you want.
		And I'll present my data and my information and my sources, and you present yours.
		And let's have the public decide.
		And I have had nobody take me up on that challenge.
		And I know someone from the governor's office went to the health department to say, hey, what are your problems with this?
		And they tried to nickel dime me.
		The little things had no consequence to these serious challenges there.
		And she was completely, I mean, appalled and went back and actually reported that to the governor.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		West of the Rockies, you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Hello.
unidentified		Hi.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Hi.
unidentified		Nice to be talking to you.
		I'm from Kempe, Arizona.
		My name is Ellen.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Hi, Ellen.
unidentified		Hi.
unidentified		I couldn't believe what Mr. Barker, is that correct?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yes.
unidentified		Was saying.
		I was just driving home.
		It's almost the same here in Arizona.
		The denial until there were actual dead bodies in this case, and overwhelmingly so, there was a circuit board manufacturer that blew up in a minority neighborhood, which of course the neighborhood wasn't aware of what was being done in there.
		It created a massive fire four years ago.
		We now have about 40 people dead on the same street that was downwind from the fire and eight right away.
		When the people were let back into their area, it was a poor evacuation coordination.
		They didn't have one, basically.
		And they were let back in too soon.
		But they came back to their dead animals and dead plants on their lawn.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		That's the kind of message.
unidentified		Yeah, that would prove not only overwhelming scientific evidence, but they went on to say the Arizona State Health Department and the Maricopa County Health Department that they were just imagining these symptoms and the deaths were normal and the kids started to get sick.
		And now, you know, down there, it's very, very common for kids to have their hair falling out.
		And they don't think it's uncommon down there.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		So in other words, the point you're making is that the bureaucracy treated that incident just the way they're treating what's going on in North Carolina right now.
unidentified		Exactly.
		Not only did we have scientific information that the symptoms were all linked together and not from sick health syndrome, not because African Americans have bad diets and they even had the nerve to say that, but because we had many dead people and what they were saying was, well, they were very old and they were going to die.
		Well, those are the most vulnerable people.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Of course.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		The younger and the old.
unidentified		And then when we went further to the federal level and I petitioned the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry to do a public health survey, they were being told by our state agency that they had it under control.
unidentified		Finally, four years later, 80 deaths and many sick, we finally got the Region 9 director to come down and listen to this.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, does that all sound familiar?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Oh, yeah, that pattern is repeated again and again.
		And I mean, in some respects, this is an old story.
		And that's where I think sometimes it takes a book, a catalyst, for the kind of things bringing to that national attention.
		I mean, this woman's story sounds very familiar.
		And again, I recognize the pattern.
		Thanks for sharing it with us.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right, Wildcard Line, you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
unidentified		Hello.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Hey, how y'all doing?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, you're listening.
unidentified		This is Harold in Jacksonville, North Carolina.
		And I had one quick question.
		I'll get off and listen to the answer on the air.
		But we have down here an epidemic of rabies in the bottom of the raccoon population.
		And I was just curious to know if, by chance, this bug in the water is what's causing the rabies epidemic.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		No, no, absolutely not.
		And we really have to be careful.
		If we're talking about demand for response to the science here, we have to be scientifically.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, everybody begins to blame it on everything.
unidentified		Right.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, and that's a danger.
		In fact, I was just in Jacksonville.
		And by the way, I'm being interviewed by Jacksonville Radio tomorrow morning at about 6.30.
		But no, don't worry about the rabies and this organism have no connection whatsoever.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
		Hi.
unidentified		Hi, this is Steve in New Orleans.
unidentified		Hello, Steve.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I know New Orleans has its own problems.
unidentified		Yes.
		In fact, I'd like to ask your guest, several times over the past five or ten years, there's been a dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico off the Louisiana coast.
		And this zone has been growing in size.
		And what I read from a newspaper was that it might be caused by fertilizer, which was carried down the Mississippi and dumped into The Gulf of Mexico.
		And I would like to ask a guest if he knows if that is accurate or if there might be some type of organism involved.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Rodney?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, I can't speak to that.
		I don't want to overspeak my knowledge here.
		Certainly, the waters you're talking about are prime candidates for what we're talking about.
		I mean, think about with all the different basins that the Mississippi flushes.
		So whether you're talking about a specific chemical contaminant in there that is causing those dead zones, whether you're talking about the changing environmental conditions that have given birth to organisms that are causing that, I really can't speak to you.
		But this is, I mean, either way, it wouldn't surprise me.
		And I know those are the waters that are going to be tested next for this organism.
		I know we've talked to Dr. Burkholder, who's a scientist here.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		The name of this organism again, please.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		The name of the organism is Pisteria pisceta.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		It translates from Latin to fish killer.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Fishkiller.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		And it has caused fish to have open sores.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Open sores.
		It causes them to have muscle paralysis, and they die from the neurotoxin.
		They've been dying by the millions in the waters of North Carolina.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		By the millions.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, and again, this toxin just doesn't stop at fish.
		Not only does it affect the waters, but it affects almost like a poisonous vapor over where these fish kills take place.
		And people entering those zones are susceptible to.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		So a very dangerous time would be when it's hot, when there's a bloom of this.
		Then it would be misty.
		It would be airborne.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, and you wouldn't know necessarily.
		If you're looking on the surface for a fish with holes in them to tell you, that's not what the sign is.
		I mean, those fish could be disturbed down below.
		It could be in the early state of a bloom.
		It could be after that.
		so you can't tell by looking at the waters whether it's active and whether it's dangerous.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		And again, the effect on human beings is?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		But the symptoms.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		The symptoms would be similar to premature Alzheimer's, cognitive difficulty, symptoms like multiple sclerosis, and cognitive impairment, and more to be told.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		And immune deficiencies.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Immune deficiency, which that's what's so hard, is that if it's immune deficiency, then you could be exhibiting a whole range of symptoms that don't have the signature of this organism.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		And you wouldn't know what's causing it.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Let's take a couple more calls, and that's about all we're going to have time for.
		West of the Rockies, you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
		Hi.
		West of the Rockies, are you there?
		East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Rodney Barker.
		Good morning.
unidentified		Yes, this is Charles from Maine.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Yes, Charles.
unidentified		Yes, I was wondering, if this bug were to infect a human or whatever, like, is there any chance of a sore on the fish?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		If there were a bug to affect a human, is there a chance of sores on the fish?
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		I'm sorry, I'm not understood.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I don't follow that either.
unidentified		Like, would the human get the sore, you know, as a symptom?
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Oh, oh, oh, oh, yes.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Yeah, I mean, the humans exposed to the toxin.
		See, I mean, what makes this so difficult is that I can't, I mean, we can't say to you, like, in the auto industry, if you're exposed to benzene, you get a specific kind of cancer.
		The range of toxins have not been clearly identified.
		The range of human health effects hasn't been clearly identified.
		So there's all kinds of possible symptoms.
		The symptoms we're describing today are the ones that are known.
		But until that toxin is studied, until we come up with a set of clinical symptoms associated with it, you know, we really just don't know.
		The sores on the hands are one indication, and they do not respond to antibiotics.
		They are slow to heal, and they would be a symptom.
		But up in Maine, there could be a lot of other things that are causing it, too.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		All right.
		Rodney, we're going to have to stop it here.
		But your book and The Waters Turned Blood is generally available, right, in the UK.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		It's generally available across the country yard.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		And let me say, this has been a public service, and I can't thank you enough for allowing me to bring it to your audience.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Well, I can't thank you enough for taking the time after a busy book signing to be here.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Rodney.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		And it sounds like we're thinking along the same lines, and I'm anxious to read The Quickening.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		I'll arrange it.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Thank you, Rodney.
rodney barker ▲ ● ▼		Thank you, Art.
art bell ▲ ● ▼		Take care.
		That's Rodney Barker, folks.
		And his book again, And the Waters Turned Blood.
		Now, it's one more indication of exactly what I have written about in my book, which is called The Quickening.
		It documents the weather changes, the geographic changes, the social changes, the economic changes, changes in literally every aspect of human endeavor.
		The exponential quickening.
		What's going on?
		It is, I suspect, the best book I will ever have written.
		It is 336 pages, available hardcover only.
		And I'm going to give you a phone number to order it.
		But the lines are hopelessly gridlocked.
		And the best time to call is after 8 o'clock in the morning Pacific time.
		My book is available as of today.
		Now, if you want a first edition signed autographed copy.
		Now, let me explain this to you, okay?
		Because last time there were many people screeching about this.
		I am going to sign copies for as long as I can humanly do it.
		And then I am going to stop.
		I'm not putting an actual cutoff date on this.
		I'll just sign until I get sick of signing.
		Okay?
		And then you will not be able to get a signed copy.
		So that's the deal.
		And I'm going to give you the phone number right now.
		You can try it right now.
		You might get lucky and get through.
		But my guess is after 8 o'clock in the morning, you'd have a better chance.
		All I did was mention it on Dreamland, And it went into utter, complete gridlock yesterday, so you can give it a try.
		The number is 1-800-864-7991.
		I have mixed feelings about the effect this, I know the effect this book is going to have, it's going to shock and anger a lot of people.
		But what you will find in it is documented and true.
		If you're not the kind of person who puts their head into the sand, then this is a book you definitely want to read.
		The quickening is out as of tonight.
		Today.
		Well, actually yesterday now.
		the number to call is 1-800-864-7991 And I'll be interested.
		By the way, they ship out right away.
		They've got them to ship.
		No pre-orders this time, like with my last book.
		They're ready to ship as soon as you call.
		Again, 1-800-864-7991.
		And the quickening is kind of what I think we're going to talk about as the show continues this morning.
		How could we not?

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