THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume IX, Issue # 45, March 11, 2007
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
THE NEW DARK AGE
By Alan Caruba
POLITICAL ENVIRONMENTALISM & THE ANTI-CHEMICAL MOVEMENT VERSUS HUMAN HEALTH: ENHANCING THE
LONGEVITY OF INSECT & RODENT PESTS & ELIMINATING HUMAN DFENSES AGAINST THE DEADLY DISEASES THESE PESTS
SPREAD -- POLITICAL ENVIRONMENTALISTS & ANTI-CHEMICAL IDEOLOGUES IN GOVERNMENT & INTERNATIONAL
AGENCIES USE THE SOCALLED "PRECAUTIONARY PRINCIPLE" TO RESTRICT THE SALE & USE OF PESTICIDES, HERBICIDES,
WATER-CLEANING CHEMICALS, & CHEMICALS USED IN PLASTIC -- THE COMING OF ANOTHER GREAT PLAGUE, WHICH WILL
KILL COUNTLESS MILLIONS OF PEOPLE
FULL STORY:
In the 1970s, as a public relations consultant, I helped introduce a new pesticide to the American market. More specifically,
to the pest control industry, as it was not available for use by the public. It was called “Ficam,” and, after having undergone
the costly Environmental Protection Agency registration process, it was quickly and widely used by pest control
professionals, not just for its capacity to eliminate cockroaches and a variety of other pest insects, but because it was
applied with nothing more toxic than water.
For two decades, this pesticide thrived. I wrote case histories of where it was used in hotels, casinos, restaurants, and theme
parks, as well as in homes and apartments. The pest control profession embraced it, and there never was a single case of it
causing any hazard to those who applied it or benefited from it.
I never found out why, but, for some reason, the EPA demanded that the manufacturer re-register the product and the
decision was made that it would be withdrawn instead. It was just too costly to prove what everyone already knew. It
worked wonders protecting people against the diseases and property damage a wide variety of insect pest species cause on
a daily basis.
The EPA did a similar number on a pesticide called “Dursban.” This excellent pesticide had been around for decades and was
widely used because it was a component in more than 80 products that the public could purchase off the shelf of the
supermarket or garden supplies store. The EPA proceeded to restrict its consumer use against insect pests. If it posed such a
health hazard, why wasn’t there evidence of countless people being affected? Who benefited from its loss? The insects.
Some may remember the “Alar” crisis that impacted the apple growers, particularly in the northwest. Millions of dollars were
lost, until it became clear that there was no threat whatever to the public from use of Alar. People are still safely eating apples,
just as they were before an environmentalist group perpetrated the manufactured crisis.
The reason cited for these actions is called “the precautionary principle,” which says that, if anything poses a possible risk,
no matter how small, a chemical cannot be used. Proof of its effective use, in the case of pesticides, in protecting the public
against the vast range of diseases pest insects or rodents routinely spread, was not to be considered.
What any chemist or pharmacist will tell you is “the poison is in the dose.” It is the amount of exposure that determines the
level of hazard, and we routinely eat, drink, and use things that have chemicals as part of their structure in such minute
quantities as to constitute no threat. As just one example, potatoes contain trace amounts of arsenic, a deadly poison, but no
one is ever going to consume enough potatoes at a single sitting to die of arcenic poisoning.
I was reminded of this when I recently read of still more fear mongering against a plastic ingredient called bisphenol-A,
otherwise known as BPA. The food packaging industry has used BPA in the linings of metal cans since as far back as the
1950s. It is also used to make hard plastic as well as lacquers for bottle tops, water pipes, and even dental sealants and tooth
coatings.
The Environmental Working Group, a self-anointed “watchdog” organization rolled out the usual scare campaign in early
March, 2007, claiming that BPA “may be poisoning pregnant women and infants,” according to a study by the Group.
Typically, these “studies” involve force-feeding huge amounts of the chemical to laboratory rats until a correlation can be
made that it poses a threat to humans, but correlation is not the same as causation.
I can assure you that the cost of the canned foods identified and probably all others is about to rise. Indeed, the cost of
everything that uses chemicals in the course of its manufacture is going to rise.
The reason for this is a program initiated by the European Union that has passed sweeping new chemical regulations that
will go into effect in June, 2007. Based on that idiotic precautionary principle, the EU has instituted a program intended to
rid the world of chemicals they deem to have an impact on the environment and human health. It is called “Green chemistry,”
and it has more to do with eliminating the use of beneficial chemicals than in offering any protection to Mother Earth and
human beings.
The U.S. Commerce Department is putting on “roadshows” for U.S. businesses to bring them in line with the Registration,
Evaluation and Authorization of Chemicals (“REACH”) regulations.
As Kathleen Morson of Stratfor -- a private intelligence group that advises U.S. corporations -- says:
“The REACH regulation represents a shift from the Western
regulatory world’s reliance on risk assessment to something
more precaution-based. Significantly, it shifts the regulatory
burden from government agencies to the producers themselves
to demonstrate that their chemicals are safe.”
No chemical is safe if it is ingested in an amount wherein the dose becomes injurious. This includes the chemical we
commonly call water.
Because American manufacturers commonly export their products all over the world and Europe represents a major market
for them, they will have no choice but to submit to this EU plan to restrict chemicals, some of which have been safely in use
for decades and longer. A little group of Green gnomes in Helsinki will decide the fate of every chemical in use today.
This is what I predict. At some point in the future, after most of the world’s pesticides and herbicides, after chemicals used
to clean water, after various chemicals used in plastic have been restricted by the political environmentalists and
anti-chemical ideologues in government and international agencies and, as a consequence, these substances are no longer
a part of our lives, a huge plague will make its way across the world. It will be spread, as the famed Black Plague was, by
insect and rodent pests, and it will kill countless millions of people.
A new Dark Age will follow. It, in fact, will have been in place since the European Union’s draconian anti-chemical program
was imposed. What is REACH really about? It’s about killing you.
LINKS TO RELATED TOPICS:
Policy Issues Relating to Energy, Environment,
& Natural Resources
Science, Ethics, & Human Health
Alan Caruba is a veteran business and science writer, a Public Relations Counselor, and Founder of the National Anxiety Center, a
clearinghouse for information about media-driven scare campaigns. Caruba writes a weekly commentary, "Warning Signs," posted
on the Internet website of the National Anxiety Center, which is located at
www.anxietycenter.com.
Caruba’s new book, Right Answers: Separating Fact from Fantasy, has been published by Merril Press.
© Alan Caruba 2007
Published with Permission of Alan Caruba
ACaruba@AOL.Com
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
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Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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