The Myth of Killer Mercury

[bripat9643]

Tell you what. Go have yourself a nice big glass of mercury and then let us know how it turns out for you.

Tell you what, sit in the dark and freeze this winter. Let us know how you enjoy having no electric power, you dumb asshole.

 

[bripat9643]

While they're at it, they might as well smoke a few cigarettes since the tobacco companies have 'experts' who have told anyone who would listen that there was NO conclusive evidence linking smoking to lung disease.

Those claims were easily disproved. For that matter, who has disproved anything I have posted? No one is even disputing it. Infantile insults are the only thing numskulls like can respond with, it appears.

 

[bripat9643]

My thoughts exactly!

And we have been using mercury in flourescent tube lights for 50 years and more but it only became a proplem in the curley bulbs?

How can people be such stooges and not even see how they appear?

The thing I love about liberals is that they are so proud of their scathing hypocrisy. Environmental wackos are the ones who claim we have to shut down hundreds of coal fired power plants at the cost of hundreds of billions of dollars because the slightest trace of Mercury is a threat to mothers and children. Yet, they force us all to use dangerous Mercury laden light bulbs. Are you truly so stupid you can't seen the irony of that?

 

[Bfgrn]

Ah yes, the classic Marxist propaganda ploy of attacking the messenger.

"He's an evil capitalist exploiter, so what he says can't be right!"

That may fool left-wing morons, but rational people know a logical fallacy when they see one.

Facts are facts, no matter what the source of them is. Try addressing the facts he presented. Can you dispute any of them? Do you disagree that Chinese power plants pump 400 tons of Mercury into the air every year? Do you dispute that cremation pumps 26 tons into the air? Which claims do you dispute?

Here you go 'Marxist'...



If you can be well without health, you may be happy without virtue.
Edmund Burke

The ALA is a hack propaganda operation. Read all about it here:

MILLOY: Defund EPA’s enablers

NPR is not the only partisan political organization that ought to have its public funding cut. Congress should put the American Lung Association (ALA) on the chopping block, too.

As Congress went on recess last week, the ALA took out billboard advertising in Michigan targeting House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton, Michigan Republican. The billboard ad features a child with an oxygen mask over her face and reads, “Rep. Fred Upton, protect our kids’ health. Don’t weaken the Clean Air Act.”

The ALA attacked Mr. Upton because he is leading the bipartisan effort in Congress to block the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) from regulating greenhouse gases - essentially President Obama’s retaliation for Congress‘ “failure” to pass “cap-and-trade” legislation last year.

Although greenhouse gas emissions have nothing to do with air quality - colorless, odorless carbon dioxide is labeled a greenhouse gas and causes no adverse health effects - the ALA is nevertheless trying to stir up hometown opposition to Mr. Upton with its over-the-top attack ad.

This isn’t ALA’s only attack on Congress‘ effort to rein in the out-of-control Obama EPA.

At a recent Energy and Commerce Committee hearing to finalize the so-called Inhofe-Upton bill to block EPA’s greenhouse gas regulations, Rep. Lois Capps, California Democrat, used her turn to speak to spotlight an ALA-sponsored poll purporting to show that the public opposed efforts to limit EPA’s authority.

Though ALA no doubt hopes the public believes that efforts to contain the EPA are so dangerous to public health that the self-haloed organization had to get involved, the reality is much less noble.

Since 1990, EPA and ALA have had a symbiotic relationship. EPA shovels money out to ALA and, in return, ALA agitates for expanded EPA air-pollution regulation.

In addition to ads and polls, ALA lobbies Congress for more EPA regulation, has sued to expand EPA’s authority and regularly issues reports that lament supposedly poor air quality in the United States and tout the purported benefits of EPA actions.

We’re not talking chump change. In the past 10 years, EPA has paid ALA more than $20 million - perhaps double the payments that EPA made to ALA in the 1990s. ALA also received another $3.7 million from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

No doubt, ALA, EPA and the Obama administration will deny any quid-pro-quo relationship between this funding and ALA’s advocacy, but the facts speak for themselves.

Another inconvenient reality for EPA and ALA is that America’s air is safe to breathe - a fact the organizations apparently don’t want Americans to know.

In a JunkScience.com report published in March, “EPA’s Clean Air Act: Pretending Air Pollution Is Worse Than It Is,” we see EPA’s more-stringent-than-necessary air-quality standards are rarely violated.

In states with coal-fired electricity, for example, particulate-matter standards are violated less than one-tenth of 1 percent of the time. Smog standards are violated in those states just about 1 percent of the time.

Because U.S. air is so clean, EPA engages in a sophisticated game of scientific make-believe and economic hocus-pocus to convince Americans that its ever more stringent regulations are worth their high costs.

Further, EPA estimates that its implementation of the Clean Air Act produces economic benefits to society worth on the order of 10 percent of our $14 trillion gross domestic product. Who knew EPA secretly was our golden goose, continually laying golden regulatory eggs?

The EPA-created illusion of health-threatening air quality is being taken to a new level of outrageousness by the ALA through its deliberate confusion of greenhouse gas emissions with conventional air-quality pollutants.

The Inhofe-Upton bill does not roll back existing standards for conventional pollutants such as particulate matter, sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxides. Rather, it is aimed at EPA’s self-proclaimed and highly controversial authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions.

The outlaw EPA has, so far, escaped meaningful oversight by Congress and the courts. Its attack dogs, such as ALA, aim to keep it that way - and keep the cash flowing.

Challenging EPA has not, historically, been a Republican strong suit, but ALA’s ads should make it clear why the course of that sad history needs to be altered.

Read more: MILLOY: Defund EPA's enablers - Washington Times MILLOY: Defund EPA's enablers - Washington Times
Follow us: @washtimes on Twitter

MILLOY, as in Steven J. Milloy?

Steven J. Milloy is a columnist for Fox News and a paid advocate for Phillip Morris, ExxonMobil and other corporations. From the 1990s until the end of 2005, he was an adjunct scholar at the libertarian think tank the Cato Institute.

Milloy runs the website Junkscience.com, which is dedicated to debunking what he alleges to be false claims regarding global warming, DDT, environmental radicalism and scare science among other topics. His other website, CSR Watch.com, is focused around attacking the corporate social responsibility movement. He is also head of the Free Enterprise Action Fund, a mutual fund he runs with tobacco executive Thomas J. Borelli, who happens to be listed as the secretary of the Advancement of Sound Science Center, an organisation Milloy operates from his home in Potomac, Maryland.

Milloy holds a B.A. in Natural Sciences from the Johns Hopkins University, a Master of Health Sciences in Biostatistics from the Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health, a Juris Doctorate from the University of Baltimore, and a Master of Laws from the Georgetown University Law Center.

In January 2006, Paul D. Thacker, a journalist who specializes in science, medicine and environmental topics, reported in The New Republic that Milloy has received thousands of dollars in payments from the Phillip Morris company since the early nineties, and that NGOs controlled by Milloy have received large payments from ExxonMobil. A spokesperson for Fox News stated, "Fox News was unaware of Milloy's connection with Philip Morris. Any affiliation he had should have been disclosed."

Milloy the Lobbyist

Milloy has spent much of his life as a lobbyist for major corporations and trade organizations which have poisioning or polluting problems. He originally ran the National Environmental Policy Institute (NEPI) which was founded by Republican Rep Don Ritter (who tried to get tobacco industry funding) using oil and gas industry funding. NEPI was dedicated to transforming both the EPA and the FDA, and challenging the cost of Superfund toxic cleanups by these large corporations.

NEPI was also associated with the Air Quality Standards Coalition (AQSC) which was devoted to weakening Clean Air laws. This organization took up the cry of "we need sound science" from the chemical industry as a way to counter claims of pollution -- and Milloy became involved in what became known as the "sound-science" movement. Its most effective ploy was to label scientific findings that were detrimental to the large funding corporations as "junk." Milloy was one of its most effective lobbyists because he wrote well, and used humor.

Milloy joined Philip Morris's specialist-science/PR company APCO & Associates in 1992 as a consultant, working behind the scenes on a business venture known as "Issues Watch". By this time, APCO had been taken over and become a part of the world-wide Grey Marketing organization, and so Milloy was able to use the international organization as a feed source for services to corporations who had international problems.[citation needed]

Issues Watch bulletins were only given out to paying customers, so Milloy started for APCO the "Junkscience.com" web site, which gave him an outlet to attack health and environmental activists, and scientists who published findings not supportive of his client's businesses. Like most good PR it mixes some good, general criticism of science and science-reporting, with some outright distorted and manipulative pieces.

The Junkscience web site was supposedly run by a pseudo-grassroots organization called The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition (TASSC), organized by APCO for Philip Morris,[3] which initially paid ex-Governor Garrey Carruthers of New Mexico as a front. Milloy actually ran it from the back-room, and issued the press releases. Then when Carruthers resigned, Milloy started to call himself "Director." Bonner Cohen -- who also worked for APCO -- became "President."[citation needed]

Initially all of this was funded by Philip Morris, but later PM broadened the focus to gather even more funding by garnering participation from energy, pharmaceutical, chemical companies. TASSC's funders include 3M, Amoco, Chevron, Dow Chemical, Exxon, General Motors, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Lorillard Tobacco, Louisiana Chemical Association, National Pest Control Association, Occidental Petroleum, Philip Morris Companies, Procter & Gamble, Santa Fe Pacific Gold, and W.R. Grace, the asbestos and pesticide manufacturers.

Tobacco industry documents

Milloy blames smokers for their illness and death:

A 2003 "Tobacco Weekly" newsletter (a publication of the Tobacco Merchants Association) states,

Steven Milloy, author of JunkScience.com, also criticized the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for claiming that 400,000 people die every year from alleged smoking-related illnesses, saying that studies linking smoking to heart disease are not entirely reliable. He pointed out that smokers have higher heart disease rates than non-smokers partly because smokers also tend to be people who do not exercise, have worse diets, avoid doctors and have less healthy lifestyles overall. (CNS News 8/1).

Milloy was involved with R.J. Reynolds Project Breakthrough:

An activity report created for R.J. Reynolds by the lobbying firm Powell Tate indicates Steve Milloy was involved in RJR's Project Breakthrough, an multi-year effort to link tobacco prevention to alcohol prohibition in the public mind. Milloy's junk science web site appears to have been part of, or used in this project. An item under the heading "Project Breakthrough" in the report states, "Reviewed and revised junk science Website including calls with Steve Milloy, researching and compiling Website visitor comments, and reviewing and editing new materials for inclusion on Website."

Milloy provided medical and political information service to British American Tobacco.

For a number of years Milloy acted as an information source for British-American Tobacco. His relationship with Sharon Boyse, Director of BAT's Scientific Communications division (actually a PR division) began in the mid-1990s when he was running TASSC for Philip Morris, and seeking wider funding support from the tobacco industry.[10] Later it was formalized through the regular provision of abstracts and news about scientific research into smoking and health, and other addictive behaviors.

This was further extended into the political sphere with his regular fax distribution of the "Issues Watch" newsletter which went out to most of the major tobacco companies by fax or e-mail.

TASSC was then exposed publicly as a fraud, and so Milloy established the Citizens for the Integrity of Science to take over the running of the Junkscience.com web site.

 

[uscitizen]

Perhaps mercury ingestion is what is wrong with Bripat?

 

[bripat9643]

Perhaps mercury ingestion is what is wrong with Bripat?

You're clearly suffering from brain damage.

 

[bodecea]

You REALLY are some kinda stupid. If you've EVER seen how chemists handle mercury in the lab ...... oh nevermind... Go back to snacking on lead paint chips..

I figure the OP has had his fair share of those.

 

[bodecea]

While they're at it, they might as well smoke a few cigarettes since the tobacco companies have 'experts' who have told anyone who would listen that there was NO conclusive evidence linking smoking to lung disease.

Those claims were easily disproved. Who has disproved anything I have posted? No one is even disputing it. Infantile insults are the only thing numskulls like can respond with, it appears.

Got a town in Japan you can move to

The Poisoning of Minamata

 

[bripat9643]

Thanks for the typical and totally expected attack on the source. That's what Marxists like you do when you can't discredit the facts posted. According to you're own implied theory that the source of the funding determines the conclusion of any scientific claims, the ALA is not a credible source. The EPA has greased their "scientific" opinions with over $20 million.

If you could dispute the claims posted, you would have done so.

MILLOY, as in Steven J. Milloy?

Steven J. Milloy is a columnist for Fox News and a paid advocate for Phillip Morris, ExxonMobil and other corporations. From the 1990s until the end of 2005, he was an adjunct scholar at the libertarian think tank the Cato Institute.

Milloy runs the website Junkscience.com, which is dedicated to debunking what he alleges to be false claims regarding global warming, DDT, environmental radicalism and scare science among other topics. His other website, CSR Watch.com, is focused around attacking the corporate social responsibility movement. He is also head of the Free Enterprise Action Fund, a mutual fund he runs with tobacco executive Thomas J. Borelli, who happens to be listed as the secretary of the Advancement of Sound Science Center, an organisation Milloy operates from his home in Potomac, Maryland.

Yada, yada, yada . . . . .

 

[Bfgrn]

Thanks for the typical and totally expected attack on the source. That's what Marxists like you do when you can't discredit the facts posted. According to you're own implied theory that the source of the funding determines the conclusion of any scientific claims, the ALA is not a credible source. The EPA has greased their "scientific" opinions with over $20 million.

If you could dispute the claims posted, you would have done so.

MILLOY, as in Steven J. Milloy?

Steven J. Milloy is a columnist for Fox News and a paid advocate for Phillip Morris, ExxonMobil and other corporations. From the 1990s until the end of 2005, he was an adjunct scholar at the libertarian think tank the Cato Institute.

Milloy runs the website Junkscience.com, which is dedicated to debunking what he alleges to be false claims regarding global warming, DDT, environmental radicalism and scare science among other topics. His other website, CSR Watch.com, is focused around attacking the corporate social responsibility movement. He is also head of the Free Enterprise Action Fund, a mutual fund he runs with tobacco executive Thomas J. Borelli, who happens to be listed as the secretary of the Advancement of Sound Science Center, an organisation Milloy operates from his home in Potomac, Maryland.

Yada, yada, yada . . . . .

They don't get any slimier than Steve Malloy. He is a paid advocate of polluters. What do you THINK he's going to say???

EPA - Grant Awards Database - All Awards to Non-Profits

Unlike polluters, the EPA cannot hand out money without full disclosure. If you look at the money the ALA received, it is not for research, it is for educating children, teachers and parents on how to avoid toxic environments, teaching kids with asthma, caregivers and school personnel who can identify indoor environmental asthma triggers and who can develop effective asthma action plans.

You really are a morally bankrupt human being.

 

[bripat9643]

While they're at it, they might as well smoke a few cigarettes since the tobacco companies have 'experts' who have told anyone who would listen that there was NO conclusive evidence linking smoking to lung disease.

Those claims were easily disproved. Who has disproved anything I have posted? No one is even disputing it. Infantile insults are the only thing numskulls like can respond with, it appears.

Got a town in Japan you can move to

The Poisoning of Minamata

FDA Mercury Warning Based on Junk Science, Experts Say | Heartlander Magazine

What does that have to do with coal fired power plants? A chemical company next to the town was releasing massive quantities of Mercury into the bay near the town.

Minamata disease - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hair samples were taken from the victims of the disease and also from the Minamata population in general. In patients the maximum mercury level recorded was 705 ppm (parts per million), indicating very heavy exposure and in non-symptomatic Minamata residents the level was 191 ppm. This compared to an average level of 4 ppm for people living outside the Minamata area.[14]

That is several hundred times the maximum level the EPA considers safe, and those levels are many times higher than levels found in almost all Americans. Note that in the story below, the Florida EPA found 0.25 ppm million in the hair of Florida women. The concentration in Minamata women was 3000 times higher. Minamata women with 400 times the level found in Florida women were "non-symptomatic."

All your Minamata example shows is how safe current Mercury levels in the US are.

Fishy Mercury Warning | JunkScience.com

Aside from Minamata Bay, not a single clinical case of mercury poisoning associated with fish consumption is to be found in the scientific literature, according to Carson.

Here's the full story on the EPA's bogus propaganda campaign on Mercury:

SOON: Bad science behind Florida mercury phobia - Washington Times

On May 24, the Environmental Assessment and Restoration Division of Florida's Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) issued a draft report proposing much stricter limits for mercury in Florida’s river, stream, lake and coastal waters. The FDEP claims the rules are based on sound science and will improve public health.

However, my studies of mercury and its biologically toxic form, methylmercury, over the past 10 years make it clear that the report is seriously flawed and the new limits are not scientifically defensible. Florida’s actions should raise red flags for Sunshine State residents, other states, the United States as a whole and even other countries.

Not only would they drive up emission-mitigation costs for utilities and raise electricity costs for Floridians - with no subsequent health or environmental benefits - the FDEP actions actually would harm people’s health.

First, the FDEP is incorrect in claiming that mercury pollution is a new, man-made phenomenon.

The department cites a 2008 paper that found average mercury levels of 0.25 parts per million (ppm) in the hair of Florida Panhandle women of childbearing age (16 to 49). However, a 2002 study of 550-year-old Alaskan mummified bodies found hair mercury levels five to 18 times higher: an average of 1.2 ppm for four adults and 1.44 ppm for four infants - and 4.6 ppm in one mummy.

The FDEP draft report also failed to mention other recent studies that found no significant increase in mercury levels for tuna caught between 1971 and 1998, demonstrating that mercury in fish is not related to human emissions, which continue to decline steadily in the United States.

The draft report also ignored a 17-year-long Seychelles Islands study that found no harm from mercury in children whose mothers ate five to 12 servings of fish per week - far more than most Floridians consume. In establishing methylmercury exposure risks from fish consumption, the researchers concluded that no consistent patterns exist between prenatal methylmercury exposure and detailed neurological and behavioral testing.

They also emphasized that “ocean fish consumption during pregnancy is important for the health and development of children, and the benefits are long-lasting.”

Moreover, the latest Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data show blood mercury levels for U.S. women and children are already below the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) “safe” levels for mercury - the most restrictive standards in the world. In addition, selenium in nearly all fish is strongly attracted to mercury molecules and thus protects people against buildups of methylmercury.

By scaring women and children into eating less fish, and thus getting fewer Omega 3 fatty acids, FDEP’s misleading literature on “dangerous mercury levels” in fish actually will impair their health.

Second, the FDEP failed to note that natural sources dwarf human mercury emissions.

Forest fires in Florida alone emitted an estimated 4,170 pounds of mercury annually between 2002 and 2006. This single source of local mercury emissions is significantly higher than mercury emitted in 2009 from all man-made mercury sources in Florida, including coal-fired power plants, which emit less than 1,500 pounds per year. Other recent studies calculated that volcanoes, subsea vents, geysers and other natural sources emit up to 2 million pounds of mercury per year.

These natural sources explain why it is unsurprising to find high levels of mercury in samples taken years ago in Florida fish, panthers and raccoons. Mercury has long been part of our environment, in ocean and terrestrial waters and in the earth’s rocks and soils.

Today, mercury from natural sources represents the vast bulk of all the mercury in our atmosphere. Even eliminating all mercury from Florida’s power plants would bring trifling environmental and health benefits - while raising electricity rates for the state’s families, retirees, schools, hospitals and businesses and adversely affecting human health and welfare.

Third, the FDEP is wrong when it says mercury “pollution” is increasing in Florida’s watersheds and fish.

Since the 1970s, contaminants in fish have been monitored increasingly each year. More advisories are being issued because of increased sampling, the EPA says, and “not necessarily due to increased levels or frequency of contamination.”

Finally, FDEP’s proposed new mercury limit for Florida’s inland and coastal waters is an unjustifiably low 1.25 parts per trillion. The Department also assumes mercury levels in water are directly related to mercury levels in fish tissue. In fact, no such relationship exists, as even the FDEP draft report admits on Page 58.

One has to wonder why the FDEP is so intent on setting mercury levels below those existing in nature - and why it is so reluctant to disclose, explain or discuss publicly available information from the scientific literature so that all concerned Florida residents can study it themselves.

Scientific inquiry must be above political pressure and partisan advocacy. Good decisions can arise only if the scientific evidence and knowledge are examined fully, without selective bias.

The FDEP needs to reconsider its mercury rule-making, and this time base it on actual science. So do the Environmental Protection Agency and any other states or countries considering similar actions.

Read more: SOON: Bad science behind Florida mercury phobia - Washington Times SOON: Bad science behind Florida mercury phobia - Washington Times
Follow us: @washtimes on Twitter