I lived in Iowa for about 10 years, couldn't agree with you more. I have good memories of the place, and have occasionally visited Atlantic,IA, which is off the Nishnabotna river, polluted by this incident. The state is very clean and livable as far as air pollution goes. Air pollution is almost non-existent. Water, on the other hand...

A personal experience: I stopped washing my hair as reguarly as I used to when I was in Iowa, since it had started falling out. I thought, ageing, and what not. But when I stopped washing my hair more than twice a week, the hair-fall stopped. This was more than 20 years ago, and I still haven't balded much after that. I have always wondered whether it was related to the water quality.

Phrased passively like this, it’s darkly hilarious.

It’s preventable.