THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume XIV, Issue # 86, April 18, 2012
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
PESTICIDE ADVENTURES AT TRIANGLE LAKE
By Dennis T. Avery
ENVIRONMENTALISTS & THEIR "PITCHFORK REBELLION" AGAINST THE USE OF PESTICIDES: GOVERNMENT AGENCIES AS HAVENS FOR ACTIVISTS NOT
INTERESTED IN THE BASIC GOVERNMENTAL FUNCTIONS OF PUBLIC SAFETY & REGULATION OF COMMERCE, BUT IN "RESHAPING" AMERICAN SOCIETY -- THE
THREAT THAT THE ENVIRONMENTALIST MOVEMENT & THE PITCHFORK REBELLION POSE TO AGRICULTURE, FOOD PRODUCTION, & PUBLIC HEALTH -- THE
DANGER OF FARMERS LOSING THE ABILITY TO CONTROL OR PREVENT THE SPREAD OF INVASIVE, NOXIOUS WEEDS THAT POISON FOOD CROPS & OTHER USEFUL
VEGETATION -- BANNING HERBICIDES THAT KILL TOXIC WEEDS -- WHAT THIS WILL COST THE U.S. NATIONAL GOVERNMENT & THEREBY AMERICAN TAXPAYERS
FULL STORY:
My brother lives in Triangle Lake, a small community in Oregon’s Coastal Range foothills, surrounded by pastures and forests. Recently, a wealthy couple from
Chicago bought a local property and is kindling what they call the “Pitchfork Rebellion” against pesticides. They allege environmental damage and health hazards
to local residents from tree, crop, and roadside spraying.
I thought of Larry and Linda when the American Farm Bureau Federation sent me a recent column that said Obama appointees have been demonstrating what
farmers and ranchers have known for years: that too many government agencies have become havens for activists not interested in the basic functions of safety
and commerce, but in “reshaping” our society.
Back at Triangle Lake, the EPA’s Pesticide Analytical Response Center has come in to assess the local pesticide risks. The EPA has already collected urine, water,
and garden samples from 64 local volunteers. They’ve tested for residues of 116 different pesticides. Linda says she volunteered, and the EPA found no pesticides
traces in her urine or the family drinking water. There have been problems with the EPA’s volunteer sampling because many of the volunteers do not live where
this year’s spraying was scheduled. The Pitchforks now accuse the local landowners of hindering the collection of post-spray samples on their properties.
At a public meeting on April 10, 2012, many residents said they were concerned that, if the Pitchfork Rebellion prevailed, they would lose the ability to control
Russian knapweed, an invasive Asian alien with creeping roots that sink 20 feet deep into the soil. It literally poisons other vegetation. Experts warn that the
knapweed is spreading across the Mountain West region at rates of 8-14 percent per year.
Triangle Lake suffered many job losses in the 1990s, after the Clinton administration radically cut Pacific Northwest logging to “protect” the spotted owl.
Monitoring since the shut-down has found the spotted owls are actually hybridizing with the Eastern barred owl, which is moving across Canada and into the
Pacific Northwest, but the rural Oregon lumbering jobs are still gone.
So, Triangle Lake is now more dependent on pastures and Christmas tree farming. But the Russian knapweed is threatening those enterprises too. The usual
treatment has been with the herbicides atrazine and 2, 4-D -- herbicides which have had decades of safe effectiveness.
The Natural Resources Defense Council has recently — again — demanded both atrazine and 2, 4-D be banned. The alleged threat to humans from 2 4-D is
unproven “endocrine disruption.” (Eating soy products and peas will also “disrupt” your endocrine system.) Atrazine’s safety has been repeatedly confirmed by
the EPA itself, but it’s targeted because non-toxic traces of it turn up seasonally in Corn Belt drinking water. There are newer herbicides that kill knapweed, but
they’re expensive — a real problem for rural Oregon.
What is this costing the U.S. national government, (and thereby the U.S. taxpayers) and to what purpose? The pesticides being used today even survived the
EPA’s vengeful attacks during the Carter years. But Carol Browner, Carter’s EPA Administrator, is now a White House Czar. She wants some pesticide scalps to
placate the folks who have forgotten why we needed pesticides in the first place — such as keeping bedbugs out of hotels and schools, and ensuring we have a
potato crop next fall.
What will the Pitchfork Rebellion cost Triangle Lake, and what does EPA’s eagerness to jump into a meaningless fray mean for our futures?
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Agriculture, the Economy, & Human Health & Welfare:
Policy Issues Relating to Food Production & Consumption
Political Environmentalism Versus Human Progress & Prosperity:
Policy Issues Relating to Energy, Environment,
& Natural Resources
Dennis T. Avery, a senior fellow for the Hudson Institute in Washington, D.C., is an environmental economist. He was formerly a senior analyst for the U.S.
Department of State. He is co-author, with S. Fred Singer, of Unstoppable Global Warming Every 1500 Years. Readers may write to him at P.O. Box 202,
Churchville, Virginia, 2442; send email to cgfi@hughes.net; or visit our website at www.cgfi.org
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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Conservative Government Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity