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VOLUME 1, NUMBER 35
<> MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 4, 2000
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A job for
Plasticman. DDT, dioxin, PCBs, and CFCs.
Pool cleaners and Hello Kitty backpacks. What do these have in
common? They’re all members of a chemical community known as
organochlorines, which are decidedly bad for your health, according
to biologist Joe Thornton. In Pandora’s Box (MIT Press,
2000), Thornton observes that researchers have linked almost every
organochlorine they have studied to some sort of environmental or
human damage. Echoing Theo Colborn and other chroniclers of
endocrine disruption, he urges a "chlorine sunset," a
gradual and careful phasing out of chlorine-based products. <><><>
The Hartford
Courant of August 24 reports that scientists at the federal
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have discovered the
presence of a generally overlooked family of toxic chemicals in
human tissue at "levels we are concerned about."
Phthalates, which are added to hundreds of plastic and cosmetic
products to make them soft, are so closely linked to birth defects
and hormone disruption that they’ve already been banned in
teething rings and baby rattles. It turns out that adults have
something to worry about as well. Earl Gray, an EPA research chemist
and phthalate expert, says the issue is, "What are we exposing
people to that we don't know about?" The corporation-funded
American Council on Science and Health insists the chemicals are
safe.
Now you see it, now you don’t. It’s
hard to believe that San Francisco has let New York City beat it out
in matters of cool. While Babbittown by the Bay minions scurried out
to Golden Gate Park to remove a surreptitiously placed statue of
Jerry Garcia, Big Applers were ensconcing an image of Jackie Gleason
in front of the bus terminal with all appropriate fanfare. No
matter. Deadheads know his time coming, anyday. <><><>
It’s hard to keep track of Prop L without a scorecard. First it
looks like the grass-roots slow-growth initiative won’t make it to
the November ballot. Then the city attorney rereads the charter and
gives the go-ahead signal. Then a lawsuit to remove the initiative
is cobbled together, with a hearing scheduled for Wednesday
afternoon. The clinker: the 300-page voter handbook has to go to the
printer, and the Election Department can’t wait until then for a
decision. In the unlikely event that Judge Ronald Quidachay knocks
the daughter of Proposition M from its place on the ballot, it’ll
still be listed — with all the arguments pro and con — in the
official election guide. Can’t you imagine frustrated voters
mounting a write-in campaign?
Sufferin’ SUVs. MoJo
Wire is doing its best to keep us apprised of developments in
the sport ute world. For the uninitiated, the latest add-on is a
bull bar or grille guard, invented in Australia, where it was known
for obvious reasons as a "roo bar." Like the cowcatcher on
an old locomotive, this contraption comes handy if you run into a
steer. But it doesn’t treat human obstructions so kindly. MoJo
notes, "When a pedestrian is hit by the flat, rigid front of an
SUV, the body is punched away from, then under the vehicle." <><><>
Elsewhere, MoJo adds that, according to a recent Sierra
Club study, "the 31-mile-per-gallon VW Beetle is safer than
the 21-mile-per-gallon Jeep Grand Cherokee in crash tests." In
another story, MoJo columnist Jack Hitt comments on GMC’s decision
to name one of its models Denali after the mountain in Alaska:
"Even though most buyers ‘will never venture into territory
any less trampled than the local country club parking lot,’ wrote
Ward’s Auto World, ‘the important goal of the Denali marketing
hype is to plant the image in customers’ minds that they can
conquer rugged terrain.’" Ford is also preparing to go back
to nature, announcing that henceforth every advertisement will have
an environmental theme. Imagine an Explorer driving off into the
sunset in a cloud of beautiful lavender fumes. The Union
of Concerned Scientists ranks Ford among the top three
polluters.
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