DUMB STUFF—FROM DC: CYANIDE AND GLYPHOSATE

DUMB STUFF:  THE EPA BANNING LABELING OF “ROUNDUP” AS A CARCINOGEN!!!
REAUTHORIZING CYNIDE BAITS???

“Roundup” the widely used herbicide is the commercial name of a substance which has the poison glyphosate as its main active ingredient. Glyphosate is classed as a “probable carcinogen” by the World Heath Organization.  Glyphosate kills weeds by interfering with the production of essential amino acids in the actively growing tips of the plant.  Weeds desiccate, turn brown and die. (The dead trees you see so commonly on lawns and golf courses are probably the result of this too widely used weed killer). It is also used on grain crops such as oats to desiccate the crop and facilitate cutting and processing prior to harvesting.  That use is why small amounts of glyphosate are frond in your “Cheerios” and even children’s oat meal.  Agricultural use of glyphosate products has been correlated with the incidence of  Non Hodgkins Lymphoma (NHL) a cancer.  An American  couple who brought suit against the company do to the fact that they contracted NHL won a $2 billion dollar settlement from Monsanto?Bayer (later reduced to $87 million dollars)      Finding the “smoking gun” of a direct relationship between cancer and the chemical for such substances is difficult.  Recall how long it took for the government to arrive att the conclusion that the use of tobacco products and cigarettes caused lung cancer.  There is plenty of evidence which correlates glyphosate with cancers in humans but—making a case for causation is always more difficult.  Powerful, companies making billions of dollars on the sales of millions of tons of these products can often wriggle off the hook and claim that there is “no direct proof”.  But the fact that the WHO classes it as “a probable” carcinogen is all that I need to avoid its use.  The EPA should be working for the environment and the American people.  They seem to be protecting the big (German) Bayer company on this deal instead.  Tsk tsk tsk.  This is dumb stuff par excellence.

:MORE DUMB STUFF:  REAUTHORIZING  the use of the M44 sodium cyanide killer baits for use against“predators”.   It’s past time that we ended the practice of setting out poisons to kill “predators” indiscriminately.  Our old Wild West of the last century is gone,  gobbled up in to many places by suburban sprawl.  Our formerly untrodden  national wild places are commonly and frequently camped on and crisscrossed by humans and their pets, who with increasing frequency enter formerly wild or infrequently visited areas where these baits might be placed.    Predator control when absolutely necessary should be by the direct action human control agents who can distinguish actual predators from innocent pets, non-target animals and protected species.  In the face of increasing use of wild lands the careless setting out of an M 44 canister which look like an innocent  lawn sprinkler but which kills instantly and indiscriminately is asking for problems.  Furthermore, the possibility of killing non-target animals, even those that are protected by law, as well as harming humans is always a very real possibility.    Over the years of its use in the past these horrific devices have killed scores of pets, and sickened people who accidentally encountered the deadly devices.  No! no! no! to the M 44! reauthorization..