Politicians began to panic. Unless they were seen to do something people might stop voting for them. And to them that would be the real tragedy.

So the government came up with the nutrient management legislation (bill 81). Government workers quickly patched together several hundred pages of regulations and created a furor among farmers, many of whom saw their livelihoods going down the drain. Many of the regulations defied nature. They wouldn’t work.

But the government persisted and made some changes designed to keep the heat off until the next election. They were going to turn Ontario into a beautiful, odourless and tasteless garden where retirees and DINKS (double income no kids) could build bigger, more beautiful homes.

Farmers became easy pickings, because the mainstream news media had managed to make factory farm synonymous with large farms and pollution. The city of Ottawa, using taxpayer money, tried to control the expansion of pig farms through court challenges, even bringing their own building inspector, who followed the letter of the law, to court.

The federal government got into the act. At Napanee, it tied a real estate broker up in court for a year after two of his cows were found paddling in a stream. While farmers are under pressure, urban municipalities from Toronto east pump with impunity more raw sewage into the water at a rate unheard of on any farm.