Propaganda Management by Google In the second article of my data center series, I noted that the Water Authority and the Board of Supervisors bound themselves contractually to allow Google… Read more Private Betrayal, Public Defiance: Botetourt’s Board of Supervisors →
In the two previous articles, we looked at 2010 and the 2026 Comprehensive Plans of Botetourt County. I was so overwhelmed by the impudence of the 2026 plan that I didn’t have energy to comment much upon it. Well, I’m back, I’m angry, and I’ve learned some new context. Envision 2045 “Envision 2045” is, even for a comprehensive plan, a strange, ridiculous, and sinister document. At 354 pages, it is three and a half times as large as its predecessor. Despite its length and considerably more florid language, it purports… Read more Vomitous Prattle & Statutory Conspiracy: The 2026 Comprehensive Plan →
Next up is the 2026 Botetourt Comprehensive Plan, but I think we’d better recap this series first. We’ve seen how a favorite corporate practice is to find something public, inexpensive… Read more The 2026 Botetourt Comprehensive Plan: Bend Over →
Contrary to Botetourt’s “News Flash” of July 3, planning commissions are required by Va. Code § 15.2-2223 to publish a “comprehensive plan” which may, among other things, “provide for the continued availability, quality, and sustainability of groundwater and surface water.” Consequently, it’s no surprise that Botetourt’s Comprehensive Plan of 2010–in effect while the Board of Supervisors conducted their secret negotiations with Google–had a lot to say about water: The Code further holds, in § 15.2-2232, that a comprehensive plan “shall control the general or approximate location, character and extent of… Read more The Botetourt Data Center, The Planning Commission, and Broken Promises →
Marshall McLuhan tells us that every technology is a prosthetic, and every prosthetic entails an amputation. We lost our legs (and visible abs) to the automobile. Memory died with the printing press. Apple’s advertisements for its new “airpods” tell us what artificial intelligence proposes to amputate. Apple plans to launch these in 2027. They will have tiny cameras built in, not to take photos, but to be the eyes of your phone’s artificial intelligence. One ad I viewed boasted that the airpod cameras would scan your refrigerator for ingredients, and… Read more The Botetourt Data Center: Don’t Fear the Hamster Kaiju →
No proper article this time, but rather a data dump. Below I will paste portions of the Va. Code which Botetourt doubtless forgot to cite in its recent “News Flash”… Read more Notes for the Planning Commission Meeting 7/13/26 →
The Water Authority is a species of public-private partnership, i.e. “inverted fascism” unaccountable to the people; such entities cooperate in secret; the true water usage of the data center?
In discussing the “inverted fascism” of public-private partnerships (e.g. the water monopoly) I mentioned that, theoretically, under fascism proper the government was the master in its union with corporations. Theoretically… Read more The Water Authority: The Legacy of Fascism →