Green acres

Today's science corner:

When smelling salts are put under your nose, the ammonia fumes irritate the inside of your nose. This triggers a reflex that causes you to breathe deeply in and out to clear your nasal passages, even if you've fainted.

When the resulting rush of oxygen hits your brain, your sympathetic nervous system responds with a “fight or flight” reaction that sends the hormone adrenaline through your body. This wakes you up if you've fainted, and may make you feel temporarily more alert.

I bring this up because, while there's always a faint odor of government corruption here in Oregon, the story of the Amazon data center in Morrow County is giving off fumes that could wake the dead.

Mike Rogoway of the O has been on this one from the get-go, and today he unloaded some important new facts. The graft in Boardman, legal or not, is at the nine-figure level.

Where is the state attorney general? Where is the U.S. attorney? Sometimes this place really is unbelievable.

Part of the problem is "local control" over lucrative property tax breaks and sweetheart real estate deals. I think that when most of the bobbleheads in the Legislature set up that kind of system, they're picturing the county commission or port authority in Portland. But if you put that "discretion" in a county where the population is fewer than six people per square mile, well, look out. Eventually Jeff Bezos's lackeys meet up with the old boys in the back room at the grange hall, and funny things are going to happen.