What If Tomorrow Never Came?
My mom just sent me a rant by Bill Moyers about the dangers of dispensational premillennialism. Pretty amazing to see him get so worked up. I can't imagine believing rapture is right around the corner. It makes me wonder why President Bush is bothering to even think about fixing Social security.
Update:
My uncle, who works in the Office of Pesticide Programs at EPA, has this response:
I don't know much about the other allegations that Mr. Moyers makes about environmental issues, but I find his "reporting" on pesticides to be so slanted as to approach untruth. It is frustrating.
The portion of the article by Mr. Moyers referring to research on children's exposure pesticides is technically correct. He likely did read an article in the news that said what he reports, but such article seriously misrepresented a study proposed by EPA. The research, the Children's Environmental Exposure Research Study (CHEERS), is an observational study designed to measure the amount of exposure familly members get from the normal use of pesticides around their homes. You can find out more information about CHEERS at www.epa.gov/cheers
The Moyers article ignores the fact that the families who volunteer and are accepted as participants in the study will make all of the decisions about which pesticides to use and even whether to use pesticides. EPA does not require anyone in the study to use any pesticides, either as a criterion for acceptance into the study or as a condition to remain in the study. To protect the participants, EPA will advise all participants before and during the study about the need to follow product directions and about non-pesticidal methods of controlling pests. EPA will also monitor all participants and if it appears that anyone is misusing the product, we will inform them and encourage them to change their behavior. If we see anyone experiencing unsafe levels of exposure, we will inform them and advise them on how to lower their exposure. Any person may quit the study at any time.
Mr. Moyers is correct in noting that the research is partially funded by the American Chemistry Council. EPA and ACC entered into a Cooperative Reseach and Development Agreement (CRADA). CRADAs are authorized and encouraged by Congress as a way to leverage the taxpayers' dollars in the research arena. CRADAs contain numerous provisions to ensure that the private sector partner does not influence the research in a way that would bias the results.
Here, ACC's financial support had nothing to do with the design of the pesticide portion of the study. Rather it allowed EPA to expand the number of chemicals to include non-pesticidal materials that can be found in homes and about which we would like to get a better understanding, e.g., flame retardents.
Finally, Mr. Moyers is also correct that Congressional staff proposed to add a rider to the FY 2005 Omnibus Appropriations Act that would have had the consequence of exempting the use of pesticides from the Endangered Species Act. I understand that the rider was proposed by the pesticide industry's trade association, Crop Life America. I am pleased to say that the Administration did not support the rider, although I am unaware that the Administration actively opposed it. I think that shortly after the proposal became widely known, public opinion forced the staff to withdraw it. As the saying goes, sunlight is an excellent disinfectant.