Through The Looking Glass

By Rich Kozlovich

Editor’s note: This article has been hit a great deal lately and so I went back and read it. Since I am a bug man and not a trained writer I find that much of the work I have done in past years could stand improvement, therefore I have reworked this article. I hope it is an improvement. RK - 3/9/11

Heisenberg’s uncertainty Theory – The more closely you study the subject the less clearly defined it becomes. May I be so bold as to entertain the thought that this certainly would apply to those who attempt to define Integrated Pest Management (IPM) or Green for the structural pest control industry? Here is the reality we are faced with; we have agreed to use these terms without agreeing on what they mean. I hear the statement often; “we all know what IPM is or; we all know what Green means”. Really? The reality is that there is “no universally accepted definition of the IPM and Green phenomena; there is no consensus as to their range, their ideological origins, or the modalities of action which characterize them.”*

Yet, the activists wield words and phrases such as, “we must reduce our chemical impact” like a cudgel to browbeat anyone who doesn’t subscribe to their views regarding IPM or Green pest control. They suggest that we are a bunch of evil fascists attempting to pollute the world and kill our children for mere profit.

My questions are always the same;

1. Exactly what chemical impact are they talking about?
2. What are the statistics?
3. Where is the reduction in life expectancy?
4. Where is the massive increase in diseases?

They aren’t in countries that are the heaviest users of pesticides. In fact, it is now reported that the life expectancy is increasing in these countries. However, the opposite is true in countries that use pesticides the least. They answer by making unfounded claims in the press, where they sound like songbirds; however, when you challenge these people face to face they sound more like croaking toads.

It can be clearly shown that while they spew out unproven claims about pesticides and those who use them, the green movement has wreaked havoc on people’s lives all over the world. Children dying by the millions and tens millions suffering from a host of maladies and conditions created by the things that they promote, which could have been easily prevented except for the influence activists have on the decision makers of the world. These are facts and they are part of the public record for those who are willing to look for them. They cannot be disputed! They can be spun, they can be denied, they can be twisted and the can be ignored….but they cannot be disputed!

This brings me to some questions that I would really love an answer to:

1. Why are promoters of these misanthropic concepts given columns that regularly appear in our industries trade journals? All of a sudden these people become teachers and journalists to the structural pest control industry and de facto spokesmen for the industry.
2.  Why is it that those who have different views are not given the same opportunity to refute these activists’ views?
3.  Why do I never see a regular column devoted to defending us as we are! I have said it before and I will say this again. They are not the pest control industry! Consultants and researchers are hired help and it is their job to salute and say; yes sir. We need to start telling them and not the reverse. If they don't like it we need to fire them!

For years the green activists have promoted causes and programs that have resulted in devastation to the poorest and most desperate people of the world. And all the while these activist induced devastations have been going on these people have maintained a steady drumbeat of misinformation, condemning us with their unscientific claims about pesticides and public health. And the media inside and outside of our industry has either been silent or has been party to this campaign of Jabberwocky. What has the application industries done to defend itself from these false charges? Little or nothing! Worse yet, the pesticide manufacturing, distribution and application industries are becoming part and parcel of that package.

How do these ideas take hold in an industry? It is caused by decent, everyday, go to work men who willingly but unknowingly take these concepts seriously. And why are they so 'willing' and 'unknowing'?  Actually it is understandable. It is because there is no one from our industries that is rebutting these claims, or responding to the arbitrary demands from the activists and regulators in our own forums. And apparently, it appears that no one else is permitted to publically rebut them. As a result they have no other touch stone to go by except the propaganda of the greenies and the EPA.

Another point that I think should be obvious to the most casual observer is that we can't get “ahead of this green issue”. How can we get ahead of something that isn’t ours? It is their program and they will adjust it to offset anything we do. If we even appear to be “getting ahead” they will adjust it in such a manner that we will fall behind again. We will never get ahead of this “green” phenomenon; period! You can’t get ahead of an irrational concept that is initiated by those who wish you ill. If it isn’t your program you can’t control it; you can only defeat it!

Green is even less definable than IPM. “We didn’t get ahead of IPM and look where it got us”; I was recently told. We waste energy trying to get ahead of things we cannot get ahead of and cannot control. Furthermore, we shouldn’t be trying to get ahead; we should be working to eliminate them. The reason we have “green” as an issue now is not because we didn’t get ahead of IPM; it’s because we didn’t defeat IPM. This was the next obvious step after IPM. Their goal is to eliminate pesticides, and each time we adopt an attitude of appeasement, they will go to the next level and each level will be more extreme than the last. Make no mistake about it; we didn’t stand up to IPM then, and if we don’t defeat “green” now the next step will be elimination. The European Union has already taken steps to do just that. See EU Ministers Clinch Deal on New Pesticides Law in this week's Green Notes Newsletter.

"Through the Looking Glass" was a book by Lewis Carroll with Alice (As in Alice in Wonderland) as the main character. In the book Alice finally awakens from her irrational and nightmarish dream and promptly blames one of her cats for the whole thing.

Who will we blame when we awaken from this irrational and nightmarish attempt to please the green activists inside and outside of our industry? More importantly; who will take responsibility for the disasters that awaits us when the developed world eliminates pesticides and loses the benefits they impart? I will not! I will not have to!

"The time has come," the Walrus said, to talk of many things: Of shoes, and ships, and sealing wax - Of cabbages and kings, and why the sea is boiling hot, and whether pigs have wings."- Lewis Carroll

* Paraphrased statement by Stanley G,. Payne in the book Dictionnaire historique des fascisms et du nazisme as cited and quoted in the book Liberal Fascism.


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Is Green Another Word For Pagan?

Wednesday, June 11, 2008
Wendell Krossa

I would like to thank Mr. Krossa for giving me permission to reprint this information. I will be publishing more of his work dealing with this subject in the future. I recommend following the Anne Gardiner link. RK
Anne Gardiner presents a good summary of some of the pagan mythology behind modern environmental thought. Alston Chase similarly traces something of the mythological roots of this movement in his book In A Dark Wood.

Gardiner also expresses the great battle for human minds and freedom that this environmental movement is shaping up to be. It is becoming the defining issue of our time- the environmentalist assault on human freedom. Some have suggested that it could become a totalitarianism that would outdo totalitarianisms of the past because it wants to legislate human behavior in constraining detail that other movements did not engage. And it demands a reversal of the human enterprise (and humanity itself) on a scale that few other movements envisioned.

But I am not sure that Gardiner's alternative is up to the task of countering the core mythology of environmentalism. The Christian story is also one of human sacrifice and this does little to effectively challenge the similar pagan call for human sacrifice. Competing against one form of mythology with a similar story does not really resolve anything fundamental. Also, the Christian belief system assumes a fallen humanity which is little improvement on the devaluation of humanity offered by environmental paganism.

At the root of all this mythology is the valuation or perspective on humanity that people hold. This is a critical issue - how do we view and value humanity? What is our place in the overall scheme of things?

I would argue that with consciousness we hold a unique place in nature and a privileged responsibility to humanize nature and life. With consciousness we have awareness of what truly humane reality is about and we are responsible to bring this awareness to our engagement with the rest of life. Easterbrook (A Moment on the Earth) suggests that nature has waited a long time for us and our endowments of mind and intelligence. We can now help nature out of the dead ends that it has gotten into by its blind, random, and dumb processes (e.g. predation, disease, natural disasters).

A related issue here is how we view nature. Nature is not some pristine or pure reality aside from humanity. It has rightly been called a "wicked old witch" or Dark Nature (Lyall Watson). It is violent, disease ridden, and in need of rescue. While enlightened consciousness leads us to respect the rest of life, we should not apologize for our status and responsibility toward life and the Earth; to humanize nature. In fulfilling our responsibility, we ought to feel no guilt over our engagement of nature and our use of its abundant resources.

So nature has no inherent right to supremacy over humanity. Ideologies/mythologies that place something else above free human persons have always led to the neglect and abuse of real people. Such is the history of religious and ideological movements. Whenever people place something above human persons and their rights and freedom, then they fall prey to totalitarianism. This is equally true of this pagan nature worship. One would think it would be clear to most people that a dumb, blind, and randomly driven environment cannot take precedence over conscious persons.

I would suggest that an effective answer to this environmental mythology lies in the proper valuation of humanity or human persons. Each of us will do this in our own way according to our personal worldviews. Let me just note that helpful alternatives have been offered here by people like Joseph Campbell. Few have expressed the wonder of being human as well he has in his books Myths To Live By, The Power of Myth, and An Open Life. Catholic theologian Thomas Sheehan also offers an interesting valuation of humanity in his essay From Divinity to Infinity. He suggests that humanity is the new "marker" (or stand in) for divinity. Divinity, he says, has disappeared into humanity to explore the infinity of human potential in improving life. Campbell similarly offers the perspective that each of us embodies the great Consciousness or Mind of the universe. From such insight it becomes obvious that we are not just another animal subject to nature and its ecosystems (and after all, the story of humanity is one of freedom from natural constraints and limitations). We are so much more than just the 2 percent difference with apes. Others might prefer more secular perspectives on the wonder of being human such as that offered by Julian Simon in Ultimate Resource.

On the primitiveness or paganism of this contemporary environmental mythology I was reminded of a personal experience with a tribal man in Mindanao (Davao Del Norte province, Southern Philippines). He was fishing in a rainforest river. As he stood shivering on the bank holding his fishing spear I noticed that he had placed a piece of bamboo upright in the bank of the river with an egg held in the split top. I knew the mythology behind such sacrifice but I asked him anyway why he had done that. He replied, "So the river spirit will not be angry when I take fish from the river".

Pagan, barbaric, and ignorant? Yes, it's all that. But it is even more unsettling when such primitive thought is promoted by PhDs in our universities. Bill Rees, the father of the ecological footprint concept, had us read The Re-Enchantment of the World and lectured us on Deep Ecology in grad school (Planning) at the University of British Columbia. He had PhD candidates lecture us on nature as Goddess. And he also stated that he would not only halt the human enterprise for taking from nature, but would actually reverse it. Earth can only sustain about one to two billion people, according to him.

You can't discuss science with such people. Once in the grip of a mythology as powerful as this pagan nature worship, you can only let their hysteria run its course. But when that hysteria begins to push its totalitarian solutions on the rest of us, then it is the responsibility of all of us to stand up and refuse to let such insanity undermine human freedom and progress.

Mr. Krossa lives in BC (Maple Ridge), working with the mentally disabled. Trained as an urban planner (UBC), after which he became involved in rural development in the Philippines for some 10 years. Mr. Krossa contributes to several net forums dealing with various issues including environmental. He is especially interested in the foundational ideas behind contemporary environmental ideology. His work can be viewed at www.thehumanspirit.net

Human Security v. Environmental Activism

I would like to thank Mr. Driessen for giving me permission to reprint his work. I will be adding more of his articles in the future. RK

How environmental policies jeopardize human needs

Wednesday, May 21, 2008 by Paul Driessen

Expanded remarks by Paul Driessen, given in a debate at the International Affairs Symposium held at Lewis and Clark College in Oregon in April, 2008. Does the exporting of our environmental policies to the developing world positively impact human security?

Well, as Institute for Sustainable Development program manager Oli Brown recently pointed out, there are many cases where it undoubtedly does. Some policies. Under certain circumstances. Depending on how you define human security.

Unfortunately, however, there are also numerous cases where such “exports” are anything but helpful. It is those policies that trouble me – for they wreak havoc on human security. In fact, they perpetrate and perpetuate poverty, misery, disease, malnutrition and premature death far too often. Those policies need to be re-examined and discontinued.

I’ve been a strong environmentalist and conservationist my entire life – but also a harsh critic of radical environmentalism, which often fails to pay sufficient attention to people, especially in poor nations. That seeming divergence reflects my background and extensive environmental and international experience.

I’m an Eagle Scout, with degrees in geology and ecology, and environment and resource law. I helped organize the very first Earth Day on my college campus, way back in 1970. A former Sierra Club member, I also hike, camp, cross-country ski and canoe. I’ve had government and private industry jobs, and now work for CFACT, the Congress of Racial Equality and other NGOs around the world. I write regularly about climate change, energy, environmental ethics and corporate social responsibility.

I grew up ten miles from the first house in the world to be lit by hydroelectric power. My home was also two blocks from a huge paper mill, and I saw and smelled its pollution firsthand. I joined the nascent environmental movement primarily to clean up our air and water. And we did it.

I’ve seen environmental devastation. But I’ve also seen the devastation of rampant poverty in African, Latin American and Asian communities. I’ve seen companies do horrendous things to habitats – and others do incredibly good things for people, communities and the environment. I’ve seen environmental groups accomplish tremendous good – and others pursue agendas that I can only describe as anti-science, anti-technology, and anti-people. We export those kinds of policies to poor countries at their peril, and to our shame.

As Danish environmentalist Bjorn Lomborg has said: “We have numerous problems, but limited human and financial resources. We have to set priorities. Climate change can wait. Human health can’t.”

Economist Milton Friedman also got it right: “Poor countries,” he said, “should not do what rich countries are doing now that they are rich. They should do what rich countries did to become rich.”

My grandmother offered this advice: “The only good thing about the good old days is that they’re gone.”

If policies reduce or prevent threats to vital elements of human security, we should export them. If other policies would prolong or worsen already horrid situations in developing nations, then exporting them would be counterproductive … or even unconscionable.

So we need to differentiate clearly between real risks and speculative risks … between immediate risks and those that are so far in the future that predictions are worthless. We need to focus on risks that present a clear and present danger to human life and security – threats that are substantiated, recurrent and costly, especially in terms of lives lost. We need to avoid focusing so much time, money, emotion and regulation on risks that are hypothetical … and based on false assumptions, political agendas, alarmist headlines, hysteria, Hollywood special effects or computer models.
Like Bjorn, I put global warming well down on my list of worries and priorities – and policies to prevent global warming near the bottom of what we should export to poor nations. Like literally hundreds of climate scientists, I believe the risk of catastrophic climate change is hugely exaggerated, and unsupported by scientific evidence.

So … what policies should we export?

Property rights and free enterprise – which Peruvian economist Hernando De Soto says will unleash the creative forces of millions of hard-working people … and turn trillions of dollars of “dead capital” into vibrant economies that generate prosperity, health, opportunity and security.

Drug standards and testing – to ensure that medicines are safe and effective … and we protect people from counterfeit malaria and AIDS drugs that prolong disease or even kill.

Honesty, transparency and accountability standards – for corporations, nonprofit groups, politicians and government agencies alike. In other words, truth in assertions, transparency in funding and spending, and accountability for policies and actions that result in poverty, disease and death.

Reasonable mining and drilling standards, and the best practices of responsible leaders in their industries – to help poor countries get the energy and minerals they need, while ensuring worker safety, minimizing pollution, and restoring any lands that have to be disturbed to extract the resources.

Reasonable air and water quality standards for factories and power generation facilities – to reduce pollution, while also ensuring that poor countries can generate the electricity, jobs and prosperity they need to improve people’s lives and security, and afford even better pollution controls in the future, as they become more prosperous and can pay for upgrades and better technologies. We need to apply the same environmental standards to state-operated mines, smelters, electrical power generators and factories, as we apply to privately owned and operated facilities.

Which environmental policies impair human security – and should not be exported?

#1. U.N.-style sustainable development. The UN originally said we must sustain and expand the resource base, so that people can build more prosperous, just and secure futures. Today, though, the concept is mostly used to block development, on the ground that some future generation might need the resources we want today.

Many sustainability policies delay or prevent all but small-scale development projects, and thus impair human security – even though future technologies, and thus future resource needs, cannot be predicted … any more than people living in 1950 could have envisioned today’s televisions, cell phones, jetliners and computers scans … or what resources would be needed, when, and in what quantities, to manufacture them. SD proponents rarely ask: How long must a deposit, facility or project last to be “sustainable” – 10, 50, 100 or 500 years? Which costs and tradeoffs should be emphasized, and which ones ignored?

Bad policy #2. The precautionary principle. It too is used mainly to delay or prevent development, and only rarely to protect people against real, immediate, life-or-death risks. It focuses too much attention on the alleged, and often overblown or even imaginary, risks of using a chemical or technology. It often minimizes consideration of significant risks that the chemical or technology would prevent.

Bad policy #3. Policies that promote or mandate alternative or renewable energy – especially when they are also used to delay or block fossil fuel, hydroelectric and nuclear energy development.

Wind power is expensive, land and resource intensive, and unreliable. It can add extra power to an electrical grid. But it’s totally inadequate as a primary energy source for any country, rich or poor. Just generating enough electricity to power New York City would mean covering the entire state of Connecticut with towering wind turbines, Rockefeller University professor Jesse Ausubel has calculated. And the city would still need expensive natural gas-fired generators (and thus drilling for gas), to provide electricity every time the wind stops blowing fast enough to operate the turbines.

Producing 7 billion gallons of ethanol in 2007 required corn grown on an area the size of Indiana – plus vast amounts of water, insecticides, fertilizers and petroleum. It has helped send corn and wheat prices soaring, and forced the World Food Program to ration aid, and millions more to go to bed hungry.

Ethanol puts food for hungry mouths into cars that should be fueled by oil that Congress and state legislatures have made off limits. It’s causing food shortages, deforestation and even riots over food.

Telling poor countries they must rely on wind, solar or ethanol condemns them to poverty and insecurity … and tramples on their energy and economic human rights. Such policies are unsustainable – morally, economically and ecologically … even when they’re promoted or imposed out of concern about catastrophic climate change.

Climate change has been real since time began. Twentieth century warming and cooling trends were not abnormal, air and ocean temperatures have been stable for nearly a decade … and there is no credible evidence that future warming will be driven primarily by humans – or be catastrophic.

Some computer models make such projections, via worst-case scenarios. But they are based on our still poor understanding of complex climate systems. They assume carbon dioxide is the primary cause of climate change. They fail to consider solar energy fluctuations, cosmic ray influences on cloud cover, the cooling effects of precipitation, or negative (cooling) feedbacks from high cirrus clouds.

They are notoriously unreliable, and unable to forecast events and climate shifts even one year in the future, much less 50 or 100. In fact, projections and scenarios generated by models are consistently at odds with actual observed changes and trends. Models simply are not evidence – and certainly should not be relied on as a basis for policies that would seriously disrupt our economy and human security.

The fact is, slashing CO2 emissions by 60 to 90 percent, in a quest to stabilize our planet’s unstable climate, would be a costly disaster. It would exact huge penalties on economic growth, jobs and human security – especially in poor countries. Cutting US carbon dioxide emissions to 80 percent below 1990 levels would send us back in time to CO2 emission levels that America has not seen since 1905.

Some analysts claim the cost of preventing future climate disaster scenarios would be far lower than the costs they would impose on society. However, the scenarios are merely speculative, whereas the cost of “preventing” them would have to be paid today by families whose living standards and security would be impaired. In the case of the Stern Report, the authors emphasized only the lowest estimate for preventing the alleged disaster, though even that was $440 billion, and his other estimates were many times higher.

Imagine an institution like a college campus, hospital or even a city, without dependable, affordable energy. For lights, transportation, computers, heating and hospitals … water purification and sewage treatment … refrigerators to keep food and medicine from spoiling. For mines and factories that create products that improve, enrich and safeguard our lives. Without this energy, life, living standards and security as we know it would cease.

Now try to imagine life in Africa – where 95 percent of the people rarely or never have electricity. In many parts of Asia and Latin America, the deprivation is nearly as bad. Instead of switching on a light or appliance, millions of mothers and daughters spend hours every day collecting firewood and manure for cooking and heating fires. When the sun goes down, their lives shut down.

Instead of turning a faucet handle, they spend countless more hours carrying water from distant rivers and lakes … that are often contaminated by parasites and bacteria.

Instead of enjoying a modern kitchen, mothers and babies spend hours bent over primitive hearths, breathing polluted smoke from their fires.

The impacts on human health are hideous, intolerable and unnecessary.
Four million infants, children and mothers die every year from lung infections – caused by breathing the smoke, soot, bacteria and pollutants that are a constant fixture in their homes and villages.

Two million more perish every year from intestinal diseases, caused by unsafe water and spoiled food – due to a lack of electricity, refrigeration and water treatment.

And still, many environmentalists and politicians are saying climate change is the greatest threat facing poor countries – and using hysteria over climate change to forestall the construction of fossil fuel power plants. The Rainforest Action Network even attacks banks that want to finance fossil fuel and hydroelectric projects.

And former Earth Island Institute editor Gar Smith has the arrogance to say: “African villagers used to spend their days and evenings sewing clothing for their neighbors, on foot-peddle-powered sewing machines. Once they get electricity, they spend too much time watching television and listening to the radio. If there is going to be electricity, I’d like it to be decentralized, small and solar-powered.”

It would be laughable, if it weren’t so perverse and tragic. Kenya’s Akinyi Arunga is right:

“Cute, indigenous customs aren’t so charming when they make up one’s day-to-day existence. Then they mean indigenous poverty, indigenous malnutrition, indigenous disease and childhood death. I don’t wish this on my worst enemy, and I wish our so-called friends would stop imposing it on us.”

Bad policy #4. The war on biotechnology. Around the world, millions of people face starvation. 800 million are chronically undernourished. Over 200 million children suffer from Vitamin A Deficiency. Up to 500,000 of them go blind from VAD every year. Millions die.

Biotechnology could be an important tool in the battle to end malnutrition, control plant diseases and improve agriculture in poor countries. It’s not a magic bullet – there is no such thing – and it’s not appropriate for everyone. But it could play a huge role, especially in combination with hybrid seeds, chemical fertilizers and modern farming practices.

Whether to use biotechnology should be a decision for Third World countries and farmers to make – without lies, scare stories and pressure from outside agitators like Greenpeace and Sierra Club … and without threats of trade sanctions by countries that already have plenty to eat.

Biotechnology can fortify rice and other plants with vitamins, to reduce malnutrition, prevent blindness and save lives. Genetic engineering can also produce plants that grow better in saline and nutrient-poor soils … fight off insects and viruses … replace crops devastated by disease and drought (papaya ringspot virus, cassava mosaic virus, eg) … reduce soil erosion, by allowing farmers to use herbicide-resistant plants and no-till farming methods … dramatically reduce the need for (and exposure to) pesticides … and eliminate dangerous fungal contamination like fumonisin that causes birth defects and death.

“Our planet has 6.5 billion people,” Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Norman Borlaug points out. “If we use only organic fertilizers and methods on existing farmland, we can only feed 4 billion. I don’t see 2-1/2 billion people volunteering to disappear. And I don’t see environmentalists demanding that we plow under millions of acres of wildlife habitat, to feed everyone with organic and traditional farming.”

An African farmer told Congress of Racial Equality chairman Roy Innis: “By planting Bt cotton on my 15 acres, I was able to build a house and give it a solar panel. I bought a TV and fridge. My wife can buy healthy food, and we can afford to send the kids to school.”

Another one said: “The old plants would be destroyed by insects, but not the new biotech plants. With the profits I get from the new Bt maize, I can grow onions, spinach and tomatoes, and sell them for extra money to buy fertilizer. We were struggling to keep hunger out of our house. Now the future looks good.”

Biotech seeds cost more. But they save farmers hundreds of dollars on pesticides, ensure that insects and diseases don’t destroy their crops, and reduce the time they have to spend in their fields. As one farmer noted: “With the old maize, I got 100 bags a year from my [40 acres]. With Bt maize I get 1,000 bags.”

That’s security – food, health and economic security. Why would we export policies that impair it?

“I appreciate ethical concerns,” says Kenyan plant biologist Florence Wambugu. “But anything that doesn’t help feed our children is unethical.”

That brings me to …

Bad policy #5. Paranoia about pesticides and DDT. Many Africans and disease specialists consider these policies to be worse than unethical. They view them as a crime against humanity.

“I’ve suffered high fevers for days, vomited until I thought I had no stomach left. It’s left me dehydrated, thirsty and weak. Sometimes I couldn’t even tell day from night,” Ugandan business woman and malaria eradication activist Fifi Kobusingye told me.

“My friend’s little child wasn’t able to walk for months because of malaria,” Fifi said. “She crawled around on the floor. Her eyes bulged out like a chameleon, her hair dried up, and her stomach was all swollen because the parasites had taken over her liver. Her family didn’t have the money to help her, and neither did the Ugandan government. All they could do is take care of her the best they could, and wait for her to die.”

Somehow, miraculously, she recovered. But Christine was one of 500 million people a year who get malaria. That’s more people than live in the entire United States, Canada and Mexico combined. The disease kills up to 2 million people a year – four times the population of Portland. Three-fourths are in sub-Saharan Africa. Ninety percent are children and pregnant women.

Malaria leaves many victims with permanent brain damage – or makes them so frail that they die of AIDS, typhus, dysentery or lung disease. It makes all its victims so weak that they can’t work, go to school, care for their families or cultivate their fields – for weeks on end. It’s a primary reason many Sub-Saharan countries are destitute, and many Africans have to survive on two dollars a day.

But in the face of this needless tragedy, Pesticide Action Network and other Green pressure groups promote policies that prevent the use of insecticides and DDT to combat this killer disease. They say families should rely on insecticide-treated bed nets and new ACT drugs.

Africa clearly needs nets and drugs. But it also needs the weapons these activists don’t want malaria victims to use. Africa needs the entire arsenal: larvacides to kill baby mosquitoes and insecticides to kill adults, DDT to keep the flying killers out of homes, nets to keep them away from sleeping people – plus education and sanitation … and drugs, doctors and hospitals to treat people who get malaria, despite all these efforts. Only comprehensive programs like this can defeat malaria.

Why DDT? Because DDT is the strongest and longest lasting repellant in existence. Spraying just a little on the walls of traditional mud huts repels mosquitoes for six months or more. It kills any that land on the walls, and it irritates those it doesn’t kill or repel, so they leave the house without biting.

No other chemical in existence can do this. It’s like putting a bed net over an entire house, 24-7-365.

Thankfully, the U.S. Agency for International Development and World Health Organization finally changed their anti-insecticide and anti-DDT policies. But tens of millions died before they did so – and many environmentalists are still spreading scare stories to prevent or discourage their use. In my view, that is lethal, unconscionable eco-imperialism. It continues to sicken and kill millions every year.

As Fifi says: “I lost my son, two sisters and four nephews to malaria. Don’t talk to me about birds. And don’t tell me the risk of using DDT is worse than the risk of losing a million African children every year.”

It’s easy to worry about speculative risks from using DDT and other insecticides – fifty years after we used them to eradicate malaria in this country. But we need to put ourselves in the shoes of people who still worry every day about the real risk that a mosquito will send them or their baby to an early grave.

To wrap it up …

We should export policies that improve human security and save lives – based not on the ideals, perceptions and concerns that come from living in countries that now are rich … but on the realities and priorities of poor families that still face hardships and risks that many of us can barely imagine.

These are the real stakeholders – the ones who have to live with the consequences of their decisions.
They want to develop … stop depending on trickles of foreign aid … become healthy and prosperous … and be able to protect and educate their children, protect their environment, and enjoy the freedoms and opportunities we often take for granted.

The best thing we can do is impart to them the wisdom, experience and policies we depended on to achieve our aspirations – by eliminating the poverty, misery, disease, pollution and childhood death that were once the hallmarks of life in the United States … back in the good old days.

Paul Driessen is a senior policy analyst for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT) and other international public policy organizations. He is the author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power ∙ Black death (www.Eco-Imperialism.com) and was editor of CORE chairman Roy Innis’s book, Energy Keepers - Energy Killers: The new civil rights battle

What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part IV

By Rich Kozlovich

Everyone who knows me knows what my position is regarding our industry going green. However, I have found that there are misconceptions as to what I think going green really means. First off, being green has nothing to do with whichever products or techniques are being used to control pests.

Some months ago I bought a steamer to use on bed bug jobs. As I was walking out with the steamer an industry friend, who knows me very well, said, “Rich, what is happening here? Is this IPM?” (IPM stands for Integrated Pest Management for those outside of pest control) I responded by saying, “No, it’s pest control”. Although he knew the answer and agrees with me, he just had to bust my chops.

I recently ordered some products from a company that is known for selling “green” products. The sales representative claims that this particular product will absolutely control bedbugs. I happen to know that efficacy testing is currently going on regarding these products, but I am not prepared to wait. I want to know now, so I ordered some for myself. This same person overheard this conversation and mockingly asked if I was backpedaling? They couldn't wait to chortle and tell everyone that "Rich is going green"!

And these are my friends!

I realized that I had to clarify my position. My view regarding pest control products and techniques is really quite simple. I will use any product or technique that works. I will just as quickly and assuredly abandon any product that ceases to work. Period!

My objection is not the products. My objection to the green movement is the philosophy behind it. I object to the malicious and false statements made by the green movement regarding pesticides and good health. I object to the disastrous consequences of their programs on so many poor people around the world.

Thirty years ago, I would have agreed with them. In fact until recent years I had an emotional affinity with their views. Having grown up around the coal mines, coke ovens and steel mills of rural Southwest Pennsylvania I know pollution, and was appalled by it. Worse yet, I was like the vast majority of the population; I was startlingly misinformed by a compliant media that will toot any horn the activists tell them to.

Now, I will not allow anyone to claim that the products we use causes cancer, autism, endocrine disruption, asthma or neurological damage without an argument. I will not passively sit by and listen to their unreasonable and irrational demands without comment. Why?  Because I took the time to look up the information to find out for myself as to what was true, and I was mortified to find that everything the activists say is a fallacy.

Fallacies aren’t all lies! Regarding fallacies the Fallacy Files states, "However, not just any type of mistake in reasoning counts as a logical fallacy. To be a fallacy, a type of reasoning must be potentially deceptive, it must be likely to fool at least some of the people some of the time."

Some fallacies are simply mistakes in reasoning that causes people to believe something that is true. Unfortunately many fallacies are deliberately twisted logic. Thomas Sowell outlines this in his book by saying:

“Fallacies are not simply crazy ideas. They are usually both plausible and logical – but with something missing. Their plausibility gains them political support. Only after that political support is strong enough to cause fallacious ideas to become government policies and programs are the missing of ignored factors likely to lead to “unintended consequences,” a phrase often heard in the wake of economic or social policy disasters. Another phrase often heard in the wake of these disasters is, ‘It seemed like a good idea at the time.” "

That is why it pays to look deeper into things that look good on the surface at the moment." Being green is a philosophy. A concept of life that believes that mankind is the world’s foremost virus.

Environmentalism is no longer a philosophy that shows responsible and proper concern for the environment. It has now become an excuse for massive and intrusive regulations, crippling taxes, a massive bureaucratic machine that will eventually govern all that we do. Green believes that gas isn’t priced high enough. Green believes we eat too much. Green believes there are too many of us. Green believes it should control the world. Green believes it must get a message of hysteria out to the public in order to panic them into giving them these controls. Green believes that any lie that promotes these goals is acceptable. Green believes that it is acceptable for tens of millions to die from malaria. Green believes it is acceptable for hundreds of millions to live in squalor.

Green is not about what products we use. Make no mistake about it, eventually all of these so-called green products will come under attack from the activists. They are not monolithic, and they have no command and control structure. Eventually one of the groups will attack these products with the same vigor they attack other chemicals. No matter what we do they will never be satisfied. They will never end their attacks on us. No amount of appeasement will work. The only way that we can possibly satisfy them is if we all commit suicide.

Whether it is IPM, organic, all natural or whatever else happens to become the philosophical flavor of the day, they will demand more until there is nothing left to give. Green is not about products, it is about philosophy. A philosophy that is a vile, contemptible, irrational and misanthropic!

Let’s take a look at the type of people populating the green movement. They are only good at finding fault…they are completely incompetent at finding solutions and when they do it isn’t long before they protest their own solutions and blame someone else. Which bodes well the question; why in the world do we listen to these people?

If you owned a company who had an employee who:

• Challenged everyone’s integrity.
• Challenged your authority and competence daily.
• Constantly ran down the company.
• Never offered any positive solutions.
• Never produced anything for the company.
• Made false public accusations against the company.
• Demanded the company give him a seat at the board of director’s meetings.
• Demanded veto power over company policy.
• Demanded special compensation.

What would you do? In most companies they would be fired. Although they could probably make excellent anarchists, they would obviously and clearly be unqualified to hold down a job because you would immediately assume that anyone who acts in this manner has something wrong with their mind.

Why in the world do we then listen to people such as this in any other area of endeavor?

Is this a form of dementia that acceptable in the public arena?

Since the public arena is an arena that impacts human health and welfare so dramatically we should be especially concerned!

Whether it is IPM, organic, all natural or whatever else happens to become the philosophical flavor of the day, they will demand more until there is nothing left to give. Green is not about products, it is about philosophy; a philosophy that is a vile, contemptible, irrational and misanthropic; organized and run by seriously flawed human beings! When we claim to go green, we are enablers to that philosophy.

What Does It Mean To Be Green?
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part II
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part III
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part IV


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What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part III

By Rich Kozlovich

Since I have been publishing Green Notes as a weekly E-Newsletter I have gotten some feedback from readers who have been appreciative and supportive and a number of them have sent me updates on issues and articles worth linking. There also have been some new acquaintances…… who have been….let us say…..not as supportive. But that is what Green Notes is all about; forcing dialogue about issues facing our industry. Green issues in particular. It really comes down to what it means to be green and why we would want to be green. We have to ask; what is this overwhelming need to change what and who we are?

I have linked large numbers of articles dealing with global warming and energy because they are inextricably interlinked. I use these two issues because as I follow them I keep being amazed how irrational this has become. I understand the greenies; they have embraced an irrational misanthropic philosophy with the ultimate goal of destroying humanity. (If anyone has any doubts regarding this I will be happy to forward that information.) Disagreeable and irrational as that may be, it at least this gives understanding to their actions. Yet people who have the intelligence and availability of information to see the long term consequences, and who should know better, keep right on pursuing the same insane course of acquiescing to greenie demands that has proven to be disastrous over and over again. To believe that you will get a different outcome by doing the same things that have consistently failed is insanity! Let’s take some examples.

• Irrational and easily refutable claims against DDT were thrown up? Solution? Ban it! What happens? Millions die! Solution? Ban more pesticides! The fact that millions have and are dying is immaterial to those demanding these bans.

• Availability goes down and the price of gas goes up. Solution! Tax it! What happens? Price of gas goes up. Solution! Forbid drilling and the building of refineries. What happens? Price of gas goes up! Solution? Tax it some more and demand less drilling and add more regulations on refineries and impossible emission standards. What happens? Less refineries and the price of gas goes up. Solution? Demand energy independence by imposing ethanol? What happens? Price of gas goes up and government subsidizes ethanol which is a hidden extra cost. What happens? The price of food rises over time because we are burning food as energy! Cost of fuel and food goes up. What should be obvious to the most casual observer is that eventually the cost of food and fuel will continue to climb and availability of both will diminish. What happens? People all over the world start to starve to death! Starting with those least able to deal with the costs or the lack of nutrition!

• Business and political leaders have available to them all the real science that would allow for them to make wise decisions based on facts. What do they do? Agree to more insane greenie measures that, if followed, will ensure the eventual elimination of manufacturing, mining, logging, pest control, medicines and advanced living in an advanced modern world with all the benefits that entails!

How is it to be turned around? Recently a Green Notes reader sent me an e-mail discussing this very issue.  “Just follow the money now. Even when hard science debunks the climate change mass hysteria--- so much money [and so many political aspirations] are tied to the need to 'change' it will be like turning a large ship to moderate or reverse trends.  WSJ on 3-13-08 outlined how an English firm that is making millions or even billions trading 'carbon credits'--- it will soon be an important subsidy for US farmers as well as they begin to receive per acre payments for carbon sequestration. Once these practices become embedded--- some group becomes at least partially dependent--- then facts become less and less important.”

I agreed with him that in the beginning there would be a great deal of money made by a handful of people, but eventually the economy would force everyone to change course. Between the free flowing information of the internet and the economic costs of all of this nonsense people would demand a change of course.  After years of following this stuff, I’m no longer so sure. Armored from head to toe with the “invincibility of ignorance” the “momentum of the misinformed” is overwhelming because the informed are so colossally outnumbered.

There are three forces that are driving this insanity; the irrational misanthropy of the greenies, the short sighted greed and self interest of the business and academic communities and the pandering self interest of political leaders. They have instituted changes to society without consideration of the long range consequences, except for the activists; they know what they want. A pristine world!

The word “change” has become a mantra and is in the air constantly now. You can’t watch or read the news without being bombarded with this undefined “philosophy” with change as a goal. Change isn’t a goal! Change is an alteration! For change to be a goal it would mean that everything would be in a state of flux unendingly. There is a term for that – anarchy. So we have to ask ourselves; does change necessarily mean improvement? What are the overall costs of such actions? What are the benefits? What about unintended consequences?

When it comes to becoming “green” in pest control these are questions that are not being asked, yet the history of the green movement has been misanthropic since John Muir started the Sierra Club. Teddy Roosevelt is credited with being the first president to be concerned with preservation of the environment. That is a fallacy. The difference between Roosevelt and Muir was that Muir wanted “preservation” and Roosevelt wanted “conservation”. Those are two different concepts with two entirely different goals. Preservation wants everything pristine unsullied and primitive, untouched by mankind. Conservation implies continued use by humanity. Those two didn’t see eye to eye, nor did they like each other.

The leaders of our industry are making the decision to “go green”. This appeared as a promotion for activity at Legislative Day:
This is an action that I find disheartening and I have some questions.

• What does “taking green to the next level” really mean in the long term?
• How many levels of green are there?
• Is it a finite number?
• Is it possible that the number of levels is infinite?
• Who determines that?
• Who told them to do this?
• Do the directors of our national and state associations direct the industry or does the industry direct them?
• No one asked me what I thought; was I accidently left out of the polling? .
• Did the state associations decide this and then tell the national association that this is what they wanted? If that is the case, I don’t remember being involved in any discussions regarding this.
• Perhaps Ohio was left out of the polling?

Green demands will never cease and their actions in Canada should be a clarion call to all the pest control related industries. For pest control to become green is to publically take a stand that tells the world that we were wrong for sixty years. We are telling the world that the activists have enlightened us. We are telling the world that all the health claims by the environmental activists against us were right. "Being “green” is like being a little bit pregnant. The green movement is all consuming; once in, it is all or nothing. “You cannot cut deals with, or offer alliances to misanthropic environmental activists without being a promoter of misanthropic environmentalism or advancing the goals of misanthropic environmentalism.”

“The Green Council Meeting (Monday Morning). During Legislative Day there will be a forum discussion and an educational program that will include industry experts to take green to the next level. As a follow up to NPMA’s Going Green meeting in November, topics discussed will include the definition of green, the industry's approach to green, green consumer research, the industry's strategy to green, a review of the green tool kit, and much more.”

What Does It Mean To Be Green?
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part II
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part III
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part IV

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What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part II

By Rich Kozlovich

Many years ago I was watching a television show dealing with how seriously peer pressure impacts children, in this case teenage children. They demonstrated a study using a classroom as the lab for this experiment in human nature. Two sentences appeared on the blackboard, sentence “A” and sentence “B”. The class was asked; “Which sentence was the longest?” I don’t actually remember which sentence was the longest, but for this commentary let’s say that sentence “B” was actually the longest. This test was structured in such a way that only a small number of the kids in each group was unaware as to what was going on and could vote which- ever way they saw fit. All the rest were in on it and their job was to vote for sentence “A” as being the longest when in reality it was the shortest. Now the question! How many of the test students voted along with the crowd for sentence “A” as being the longest, ignoring the obvious truth that sentence “B” was in reality longer? It appears that 93% of the test subjects chose to go along with the crowd rather that have the courage and integrity to stand up for the evidence of their own eyes. Going along to get along!

My original thought was that this number seems to be high. I had reason to change my view some time later. One of my accounts was a local high school where once a year I would make presentations to the science department on pesticides, the theme being, “Risk Versus Benefit”. At the beginning of each program I would write a number on the blackboard (which was always around 50,000) and tell each class this was how many people died last year as a result of using this product. Then I would ask, “Should this product be removed from the market?” The answer was always a resounding “Yes”. At the end of each class I would tell them that these people were killed on the nation’s highways by automobiles. Then I would ask; “How many of you want to do away with cars?” In every class except one, they all wanted to keep cars on the highways. Out of about 200 students only one was willing to stand up and say, “Get rid of them”. Is this a going along to get along attitude being expressed here? Is this a matter of personal self interests? Probably a little of both, it did make me wonder; is 93% a valid number?

Although a recent study actually put the number at 95%, studies have a way of proving what the creator of the study wants proven. Therefore there is no way of knowing if 93% is a truly reliable number. Does it matter? Would it matter if the numbers were 90% or 80% or even less? Probably not, because science should be proving things that we can easily see going on around us and our own experiences in life show that the pressure on youngsters to go along is tremendous and most youngsters succumb to that pressure in greater or lesser degrees.

What is the point of all of this? The desire of young people to fit in is well known, but this isn’t really the issue. The real issue is this. How serious is this problem as we age? Quite frankly, I don’t think it changes all that much except on little issues. Adults have the courage to stand up for issues that don’t amount to much. I used to work with someone who was always the first to stand up and be counted. Always the first to criticize over any tiny issue that really didn’t matter much and would have had little impact on anything, especially his job. How did he respond when a serious issue arose between the company and the employees? Such as a change in how we were to be compensated? This was one of those issues where standing up and being counted could possibly cost you your job. The silence was deafening.

Adults, like children, also have convenient memories. Some years later at a social gathering this came up in discussion and his recollection was, “if you remember, I was the only one to speak out on this issue”. Since he was generally regarded as being outspoken no one questioned it, at least until someone actually pointed out what was actually said and happened at that meeting. Memories became clear again because it was pointed out that after the boss temporarily walked out of the room his comment to the only one speaking up was “why don’t you shut up, I just hope this is all that they take away”.

I would appear that whenever issues become complex or challenging you get the same result with adults as you get with children. Why? Just because issues may appear to be a small matter to adults it doesn't mean it isn’t “big” to children. They don’t have the same concerns as adults. Being accepted by their peers is extremely important to children, especially teenage children. To their perspective, it has the same level of importance as major issues do for adults. It is a matter of perception, and once we realize this it is easy to realize why so many adults make so many decisions to go along with programs and issues that are clearly detrimental to their own interests. We use the term “peer pressure”, but in reality it isn’t a peer pressure problem. It is a herding problem. The innate desire to go along to get along. The need to be part of the herd. The size of the issue is a matter of perspective and fear of rejection, fear of being ridiculed, fear of job loss and fear of isolation cause people to go along to get along. Coupling these fears with a lack of knowledge and proper understanding of important issues absolutely assures the 93% rule. Is 93% the actual percentage for adult decision-making? Once again, I have no idea, but the rule certainly applies as a principle because the actual percentage is immaterial when that percentage is still very large.

Pesticide use is one such issue. We have pest controllers, entomologists, trainers, consultants, university researchers and even owners and their technicians working to promote IPM and other foolish programs that will ultimately destroy the pesticide application industries and there is neither outcry nor any contrary commentary from any of the information deliverers or “leaders” of our industry. In fact the leaders of our industry are promoting these green concepts.

• Is it possible that no one sees the obviousness of promoting IPM or so-called “green” pest control is destructive to our industry?
• Does no one see that calling pest control something other than pest control implies that what we have been doing is wrong and that the environmentalists have been right all along?
• Is it possible that no one sees the obviousness of supporting the Montreal Protocol and eliminating the use of methyl bromide is counter -productive to our industry and mankind?
• Is it possible that no one sees that the fruitage of the environmental movement has been the unnecessary death of millions along with wretched living conditions and sickness for millions more?
• Is it possible that no one sees the devastation that has ensued in the third world as a result of promulgating environmentalist programs?
• Is it possible that no one sees that most of what the environmental movement has promoted has been based on fear mongering and lies? At the very least lies of omission?
• Is it possible that no one sees that the EPA is not a neutral government agency and at its very beginning was willing to make decisions that have been disastrous to mankind without any scientific basis what so ever? One could even say fraudulent science!
• Is it possible that no one sees that there is no scientific basis for the promotion of any of these policies?
• Does no one see that these policies are detrimental to humanity?

Either we are making uninformed decisions or we are guilty of the 93% rule. Going along to get along! The appeasement mentality of Neville Chamberlain was in reality the 93% rule.

"It has now become the duty of the pesticide application, manufacturing and distribution industries to obediently ignore obvious and provable realities. Inculcated deep within the collective psyche of the pest control industry we have now come to believe every bit of the horse pucky so-called experts and consultants and university researchers heap upon us.”

“We are required to stand up for things which are unproven or unprovable. To support things that are not true, while refuting or rejecting those things which are true! We must proclaim our unwavering resolve to support IPM or whatever the latest “green” philosophical flavor of the day is. We must resolve to support the idea that pesticides cause a whole host of maladies and are destroying the environment. We must accept the fairy tales of people like the Mother of Junk Science, Rachel Carson and her acolytes (including many in our industry) and call it science.” The only thing left is to hallow that which is unholy! This is what green means.

What Does It Mean To Be Green?
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part II
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part III
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part IV

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Rising Up or Laying Down

By Rich Kozlovich

Recently at RISE’s annual Industry Grassroots Breakfast Karen Reardon, director of communications and grassroots, announced that RISE was going to attempt to increase its “army of industry advocates” by 600, increasing the membership to 1000 by 2009.

To work to develop a grassroots movement nationwide in support of the nation’s pesticide applicators is a work to be applauded. However, I find it most distressing when someone in a position of responsibility, such as RISE President, Mr. Allen James, states that “We’re being left behind in the green sustainability movement,” “In fact, we’re being looked at as the demon in this one.”

What does “green sustainability” mean? This desire to jump on the “phrases without any possible hope of definition” bandwagon is becoming pandemic in the pesticide application industries. No one can define “green”. Actually everyone can define “green”, because it is unendingly definable depending on your personal philosophy. Remember “organic” when it first was touted. It meant no pesticides then. Now they have a list of pesticides….oops…..now the meaning changed.

“Sustainability” is another nonsense term that is thrown around because it also can mean anything you want it to mean. The important thing is that neither one can be defined scientifically in such a manner that those who tout it will agree to. That is why these terms are being used. Because they sound great and mean nothing, but can be made to mean whatever the activists wish it to mean.

Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT) defines sustainability “as development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." They reasoned that “We thus realized that we, too, were advocates of true sustainable development – that is, our mission in the developing world is to encourage and assist people and their governments to take the steps necessary to transform their stagnant, dependent societies into forward-looking, prosperous communities so that they will have the resources at hand to address environmental and human health concerns over the long term.”

Sounds good to me; but what if the activists decide that “sustainable” really means that prosperous communities are the problem and not the answer? Furthermore, what if they decide that all we have to do to be “sustainable” is to return to nature and “live in handmade huts without paved streets, running water, flush toilets, or even electricity” in order for all future generations to meet their needs? Do we then adopt another level of appeasement? This is what they support worldwide! In every undeveloped area of the world where their policies have been adopted or hold sway, dystopia has prevailed.

If we abandon that which is based on facts and adopt some sort of “green sustainability” program it implies that everything we have done in the past has been wrong, but now we have come to enlightenment and agree with the activists. Do we really believe that?

To paraphrase Col. John Boyd, "One day you will come to a fork in the road. And you're going to have to make a decision about what direction you want to go. If you go one way you can be somebody. You will have to make compromises and you will have to turn your back on your friends. But you will be a member of the club, you will lauded and applauded and you will become prominent. Or you can go the other way and you can do something — something for your friends and your industry and yourself. If you decide to do something, you will not be lauded or applauded, you will not get positions of prominence and you will not be a favorite of those who are prominent. But you won't have to compromise yourself. You will be true to your friends and to yourself. And your work might make a difference. To be somebody or to do something. In life there is often a roll call. That's when you will have to make a decision. To be or to do? Which way will you go?"

As for being “the demon in this one”; if standing up for science, facts, and truth demonizes our industries, then so be it. Winston Churchill once observed that “An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last”. I for one will not become one that chooses to feed my friends to the crocodiles, nor do I willing choose to be fed to them myself. Those who choose to do rather than to be, will stand with me.

Appeals to Authority

I would like to thank DR. JOHN J. RAY (M.A.; Ph.D.) of Brisbane, Australia for extending his permission to me to reprint this article. RK

By John Ray

It is the nature of intellectuals to think that they know better than anyone else. So they rarely defend the status quo. They mostly want to change it in some way that would suit themselves -- mostly to get the money away from those dumb capitalists and channel it in a direction that will be better for intellectuals. In short, intellectuals usually lean Left to at least some degree. Conservatives can take the status quo or leave it, depending on what the particular status quo happens to be. But a loathing of the status quo is intrinsic to Leftism -- so much so that they may often oppose a status quo that they themselves have been instrumental in creating -- with the now-common Green/Left opposition to wind farms (a shout-out to Ted Kennedy here) being one rather amusing example.

One outcome of all that it that Leftists generally find much comfort in the outpourings of intellectuals -- with G.W.F. Hegel and Karl Marx being early players in that field. So an appeal to authority often suits Leftists. They say, in effect: "All these wise men say we need to change the way we do things so that must be right." The most notable tendency of that today is of course the constant Greenie claim that there is a "consensus" among scientists about the human origin of the slight degree of global warming observed in the late 20th century (but which has been conspicuously absent since 1998). The Greenies luxuriate in having so many authorities on their side and they do their best to discredit the many experts who reject the Warmist view.

Sadly, of course, authorities can often be wrong. Even the smartest of intellectuals can make big mistakes when speaking outside their own field of expertise. Albert Einstein had clearly Marxist views on the economy, for instance. You can read his now mostly archaic thoughts on the matter in the old Marxist publication Monthly Review.

And the greatest philosopher of the 20th century, Ludwig Wittgenstein, admired Communism so much that he actually emigrated to Russia. He lasted three weeks there and came back with distinctly modified views. Albert at least was wise enough not to put his money where his mouth was.

And experts can even go wrong when speaking WITHIN their field of expertise. Almost all of my academic career was devoted to exposing the flaws in the Leftist theories conventional among political psychologists. I was repeatedly able to show that the reigning consensus was contradicted by the facts. I don't believe I changed anybody's views, however. Ideology is not easily knocked off its perch by mere facts. But for anybody willing to look, I think I was able to show very clearly that the consensus within my own field of expertise was just plain wrong. You can see therefore why I regard ALL appeals to authority as very third-rate thinking -- as a rather pathetic substitute for looking at the actual evidence.

Given that the Green/Left have so conspicuously hitched their wagon to appeals to authority, however, it does on occasion become necessary to reply in kind. If a Leftist says: "All the experts say... " one needs to reply: "But THESE experts deny ..." if one is to have any hope of making a persuasive case. In other words, although appeals to authority have little objective merit, they do have considerable persuasive power for many people and one has to recognize that and fight back by questioning the authority concerned -- and an easy way to do that is to quote OTHER authorities with different opinions. And I do that often on my Greenie Watch blog.

It is also because of the Leftist authority-orientation (an orientation which makes it all the more amusing that Leftist psychologists constantly brand conservatives as "authoritarian") that I occasionally make mention of my academic background and the fields wherein I can speak with some authority. I would much rather discuss ANY issue on the basis of the facts but if a Leftist insists on personalized arguments in a field where I happen to be an authority, then I feel that I might as well take the easy way out and squash the Leftist using his own hammer. It might just conceivably teach him something about the inherent inconclusiveness of relying on arguments about persons rather than on arguments about the facts. I do however draw the line at claiming any GENERAL authority. Leftist academics very often do implicitly claim that. They get credit for pronouncements made outside their own field of expertise. A linguist like Chomsky, for instance speaks on all sorts of topics outside of his field and Leftists seem to get great comfort from his "authoritative" misrepresentations. They are fools do so. Arguing from an irrelevant authority is in fact what logicians refer to as one of the informal fallacies.

I was rather amused recently, however, when a very skeptical reader asked for my list of academic publications. He evidently thought that I must be the sort of fraud one so often finds on the Left. When he was referred to a full list of the relevant citations, he lost that battle but as a comeback complained that many of my publications were quite short. He seemed to think that you could judge the worth of a research article by its length! I am sure that a lot of academics wish that were true. Writing reams of waffle seems to come very easily to many of them. If there is any criteriality in the length of a research article, I would tend to think that merit is more likely to lie with short articles. If you know what you are talking about and your results are clear, you don't need to ramble on.

I certainly do strive for succinctness in all that I write. People are more likely to read and understand what one has to say that way. But there are of course some topics that NEED to be discussed at great length -- histories and literature reviews, for instance -- and for my sins I do sometimes write at length in those areas.

With my academic background I suppose I could be said to be an intellectual but I sedulously avoid that label. Intellectuals generally seem to me to be a rather miserable bunch who are puffed up with oversimplified theories and who are prone to parasitizing others. By contrast I have always been happy with my lot in life. I have the gift of contentment and "just the facts" will do me fine. And when I do splash out big with money (usually by giving it away. My own needs have always been small), I do it with money honestly earned in business -- not with money ripped off the taxpayer under some pretext. But being someone who has been successful in business as well as in academe does make me an odd bod, I guess.

What Does It Mean To Be Green?

By Rich Kozlovich

Mike Potter once said that the greatest challenge of the 21st century for the pest control industry will be the control of bedbugs. While controlling bedbugs may be our greatest pest control challenge, the real challenge for the pesticide application, manufacturing and distribution industries will be to define what it means to be “green”.

The people in pest control have a rational concern for the environment. We are trained to do good things for people while not harming the environment. Furthermore we actually believe that we do good things for people while not harming the environment, and we do. We believe that we are part of that thin gray line that is the first line of defense in the war for public health, and we are. We are the “hunters” that keep the tribe healthy. However, being concerned about the environment along with good health and being green are two entirely different things.

I firmly believe that in order to understand any issue you must understand the history of that issue. Therefore, In order to determine what it means to be green we need to see what those who profess to be green are for and what they are against. There are a host of issues that could be discussed, but for the sake of space let’s take just two; genetically modified foods and pesticides.

Genetically modified foods are anathema to those who are green. They consistently make all sorts of claims which have no basis in science. Some of these claims being outright lies about the effect of genetically modified organism’s on the environment and the impact on people’s health.

Vitamin A is a nutrient that is lacking in the diets of peoples living in Southeast Asia. As a result of intensive research scientists have found a way to add a molecule from a flower that would produce beta-carotene in rice. In turn the body would turn that into vitamin A. It was called by the trade name “Golden Rice” and developed specifically to address this deficiency. A deficiency “which kills at least 6,000 children every day” from malnutrition and “leads to irreversible blindness in 500,000 people each year”. The “green” activists, who claim to be so concerned about human health, especially children’s health, continue to stand against the use of these products. At one point they threw up so many barriers to this product that it was estimated that it would take five years before it could be made available. That means that 2,190,000 children would unnecessarily die and 2,500,000 people would go blind before this product could be available to work its healing properties. This is what it means to be green!

Pesticides are and have always been the great boogeyman of those who are green, especially after Rachel Carson’s book, Silent Spring. In fact, everything that the public believes about DDT is a lie. Carson was a wonderful writer, but she was wrong on almost everything she claimed, including her predictions. Furthermore, in one case she deliberately misrepresented the facts. Her evidence was largely anecdotal and if it had been peer reviewed it never would have been published. It did not appear in a peer reviewed science journal, where scientists could take a long hard look at her “science”. It appeared as excerpted installments in New Yorker magazine and did exactly what it was intended to do; grab a hold of the public’s fears and emotions through scare mongering. The result was the ban on DDT and the death of millions. Yet, that hasn’t stopped those who are green from demanding more and more bans on pesticides. These demands are supported by equally outrageous unscientific statements about cancer, asthma, endocrine disruption and a host of other hypothetical unwarranted fears about pesticides.

We are removing life saving products from the market at a record pace. Although new products become available, they also come under attack. Colony Collapse Disorder impacted the honey bee populations around the world. The first thing that came out of the environmental movement was that this was caused by genetically modified foods. Then neonicotinoids were blamed and one European country even banned (at least temporarily) the use of these products because of these claims, but to no avail. This was then followed by cell phone radiation. Although the overwhelming evidence was that this was a cyclical phenomenon probably caused by disease or fungus, in short it is “natural”. This irrationality is what it means to be green.

We are told that we should view becoming green in pest control as merely a marketing tool. However, when we start doing this, aren’t we in reality telling the public that we need to change what we are doing because what we are currently doing is wrong and what we have been doing it wrong for over sixty years? Are we not in fact saying that the environmental activists have been right all along and we may have been responsible for the death or infirmity of untold thousands because of our use of pesticides? Is this not a tacit approval of the greens and their accusations against us? Do we really believe that? This is what it means to be green.

Alan Caruba, of the National Anxiety Center, made this observation. Greens always have and always will oppose anything that benefits human beings. They will save the whales, the wolves and the grizzly bears.....They will seek to ban every pesticide and herbicide needed to protect against disease and the growing of crops, but the one thing they will NOT do is anything that will improve and protect the lives of human beings!”

We have discussed what greens are against; let us look at what they are for. Actually that isn’t as easy as it would seem. First, we have to understand that the environmental movement isn’t monolithic. When an activist group takes a stand that some members disagree with, they simply form another activist group with those who share their views and stand against those positions taken by other activists groups. This is why the greens are really good at finding fault while being very poor at finding solutions. They simply can’t find any solutions that they all agree on. There is however four areas in which they are in almost total harmony. First; there are too many people in the world. Second; the world’s wealth and resources need to be redistributed equitably, with them as the final arbiters as to how this is to be done. Third; we all need to return to nature and become one with the biosphere. Fourth; all chemicals are evil.

In April of 2007 Cheetah the chimpanzee of Tarzan movies fame turned 75. How long do you think he would have lasted if he had been living “back to nature”? How many people would survive one year by going “back to nature”? No modern conveniences, no electricity, no running water, no supermarkets, no public sanitation, no mechanized transportation, no central heating or air conditioning and no pesticides, no vaccinations and only organically grown foods. Not very many I would guess. Yet we keep hearing how people “have” to return to nature.

Earth First founder Dave Foreman was overheard saying, "Ours is an ecological perspective that views Earth as a community and recognizes such apparent enemies as 'disease' (e.g., malaria) and 'pests' (e.g., mosquitoes) not as manifestations of evil to be overcome but rather as vital and necessary components of a complex and vibrant biosphere." That is what it means to be green.

In the real world how long do you think “Jane” would have lasted in a real jungle in real life? Millions have contracted malaria and died in that area of the world and yet Tarzan and Jane never seemed to get sick? Why? Because it was a fantasy.

Hollywood presented their fictional life as happy and healthy, even healthier than those living in the modern world. In fact, the only real problems they ever encountered were when people from the modern world intruded on them. Occasionally one of these outsiders would be bitten by a poisonous spider or come down with some other malady, but never fear, they had a secret herbal “jungle” remedy, giving the impression that nothing else was needed. Jane would send Tarzan swinging out into the jungle to get some “natural” miracle cure. After returning Jane would smugly and confidently pronounce how there was nothing to worry about as they had their own pharmacopeia. The inference was obvious. Naturally occurring products were better than anything produced by man and we clearly needed to become one with nature. Perhaps this was the real beginning of the modern environmental movement. I wonder; is it possible that Rachel Carson liked the Tarzan movies? Makes sense, after all, Hollywood fiction is usually very well written smoke, mirrors, fantasy and make believe history! Just like Silent Spring.

In the real world it is quite different. Paul Dreissen points out that “Two billion people rarely or never have electricity – for lights, refrigeration and cooking, water treatment plants, hospitals, schools, offices, shops and factories. Women and children are plagued with lung infections caused by wood and dung fires, and by acute intestinal diseases caused by tainted water and spoiled food. Up to ten million die from these causes every year.” The fact of the matter is that where ever green policies have been strictly adhered to dystopia has followed. We must ask ourselves; if the green activists are so concerned about the health of those in the developed world, why do they show such distain for the health and lives of those living in the less developed parts of the world?

What does it mean to be Green? To be green is to be irrational and misanthropic.

What Does It Mean To Be Green?
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part II
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part III
What Does It Mean To Be Green, Part IV

ECO-ANTI

ANTI-HUMAN, ANTI-HUMAN LIFE QUALITY ADVANCE ILLOGIC THEORY/ACTIONS

By Dave Dietz: Submitted to Green Notes on 11/31/07

In the early 19th Century (1811, to be exact), Luddites (modern day eco extremists) tried to stop life progress by stopping labor and life saving change. Misguided Luddites tried to stop, to turn back the change now known as the Industrial Revolution. They failed and human lives and life quality advanced ...But today, again we face a popularly perceived movement that is, in fact, an anti-human, anti-human life quality advance protest simply clothed in a popular, important symbol of our time. In fact, honest headlines today should truthfully read:

ECO EXTREMISTS TRYING TO KILL MILLIONS OF HUMANS
... Eco leaders/extremist supporters unmasked ...And it's not a pretty picture!!

Certain environmental radicals will scream at and try to deny this truth. That's because the facts do and will honestly expose them as the human haters they are. Will they own up to this truth? Of course not. To do so would reveal not only their too true character but their phony motivations. So what are these motivations? They see humans as the antithesis of their imaginary, right place earth. They not only see any/all human life effort made or any/every human act or action taken to induce change for human life quality improvement as inimical, they actually attempt to delay, halt or reverse any such effort that is attempted.
As bad, the eco radicals actually do real harm to the environment. How are these anti-everything attitudes manifested?

Read on ...

Eco radicals have wrapped their anti-human modus operandi in layers of logical sounding statements which are, in reality, oxymoron's designed to hide the actual motivations, intentions and regulatory-practical human hindrances underhandedly undertaken by these sheep-clad carnivores.

Need an example?

Try the so-called "Precautionary Principle." The "precautionary principle" was developed at a conference of environmentalists and like-minded academics at the Wingspread Conference Center, Racine, Wisconsin, in January, 1998. According to the Wingspread Declaration:
"When an activity raises threats of harm to human health or the environment, precautionary measures should be taken even if some cause and effect relationships are not established scientifically."

This principle captures much of the skepticism many environmentalists feel and have about the value and promise of technology. Environmentalists and like-minded skeptics see only technology's potential to cause a perceived, as against real, harm and do not, at all, balance a technology's actual benefits against this perception of harm or doom, be it imaginary or even possible. This extreme negativism, this rejection of change no matter the potential benefits of the change innovated, is a verbose restatement of Mother's child safety admonition of, "It's better to be safe than sorry." In other words, never risk making any change, no matter the potential benefits of such change. But, is such risk denial safe for human health or environment quality advance?

Perhaps not.

A critical flaw in the "safety first at any price" enviro argument is that obvious costs of such a policy are either ignored or not counted. The argumentative flaw is easy to see and simple to understand. It is that while the imagined but misperceived human health and environment harm risks might be reduced from doing nothing, by doing nothing real health and environment harms these policy changes might alleviate or correct continue and may worsen. Clearly, in other words, the imagined but unproven harms the eco radical critics of change fear are, to them, better than the reality (even if harmful or not as good as is possible) now and is also better than the life quality improvement that can be expected to be experienced from the change that is, by whatever method, purposefully delayed or denied. In short, unfounded fear and negative perception wins out over intended, needed change and truth.

Take the current controversy surrounding GM (Genetically Modified) foods.

GM, or derisively called "franken," foods are popularly imagined by critics to harmfully threaten natural food stuffs' genetic codes, potentially harm human nutrition and digestion and adversely affect all things from the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity.

But, again, this perception is belied by truth. And the truth does matter. As regards GM food development and widening use, in fact no human or environment ill effects or undue human health or environment harm have resulted from the development and increasing use of GM foods and materials. GM foods actually promise reductions in global hunger and malnutrition and a less chemical-dependant agriculture. Increased use of GM foods and materials further promises less land and water used for an ever better fed world, more targeted use of fewer pesticides, improved soil nutrition bases, increased distribution of essential foods which can be longer, more healthily stored and the aforementioned improved planetary bio-diversity.

In sum, the actual, proven benefits to human life and health and environment improvement are truly enormous, diversified and ubiquitous. Imagined perceptions of harm are completely belied the now well and conclusively proven real world truth/reality.

GM foods example conclusion statement/sentiment.

Why the radical eco actions are human harmful to humans and the environment. And, as you read the following, keep just one fact in mind. Agriculture today needs 65% of all fresh water with-drawls and consumes 80% of all fresh water used.

"By comparison with conventional crops, GM crops would, in fact, increase the quantity and nutritional quality of food supplies. Therefore, such crops would improve public health by reducing mortality and morbidity rates worldwide. In addition, cultivation of GM, rather than conventional, crops would, by increasing productivity, reduce the amount of land and water that would otherwise have to be diverted to humankind's needs. GM crops would also reduce the environmental damage from soil erosion and use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. Thus, GM crops would be more protective of habitat, biological diversity, water quality, and carbon stores and sinks than would conventional agriculture.

"Hence, a ban on GM crops--whether accomplished directly through the invocation of the precautionary principle or indirectly through application(s) of the Bio-safety Protocol--is likely to aggravate threats to bio-diversity and further increase the already considerable hurdles facing in situ conservation. Therefore, a ban would be counterproductive and contravene the spirit and letter of the Convention on Biological Diversity. The precautionary principle - properly applied, with a more comprehensive consideration of the public health and environmental consequences of a ban - argues instead for a sustained effort to research, develop and commercialize GM crops, provided reasonable caution is exercised during testing and commercialization of the crops.

"In this context, a "reasonable" precaution is one in which public health benefits are not negated by the harm incurred due to reductions (or delays) in enhancing the quantity or quality of food. The public health costs of any reductions (or delays), which would make food more costly and reduce broader access to higher quality food at least for a period, would be disproportionately borne by the poorest and most vulnerable segments of society. Also, the environmental gains flowing from a "reasonable" precaution should more than offset the environmental gains that would otherwise be obtained." (Indur M. Goklany, The Promise and Peril of Bioengineered Crops, The Improving State of the World 286-7)

IT'S TIME TO STOP THE NEEDLESS, SENSELESS KILLING OF INNOCENT HUMANS. IT'S TIME FOR PERCEPTION TO BE TRUTH ... FOR OUR AND THE ENIRONMENT''S HEALTH.

Point - The eco-radicals were very deliberately loosey-goosey when they drafted their "precautionary principle" just so they could logically and within the "principle's" misguided intent always object to any and every proposed life change no matter the level/extent of the change's likely benefits to/for humans. Their "principle" is far worse than the Luddites sadly mistaken opposition to mechanized progress because it is deliberately, knowingly anti-human and anti-human life quality advance.
Another point.

At least when Congress asked FIFRA users to prove a negative, which we know is an impossibility, they intended a balancing act. Congress intended a risk-benefit analysis under FIFRA to thus permit the "safe" (a relative, ever subject to change word/term) pursuit of benefits with "reasonable," and in their judgment acceptable risk.

In establishing the "precautionary principle" the eco-extremists deliberately chose to eliminate any kind of balance or attempt to judge risk v. benefit. They chose, instead, to argue that any risk/harm, be it real or simply perceived or "dreamed up," was sufficient to delay or deny any human lifestyle change/advance. They will tolerate no human lifestyle change, no matter the risks it eliminates or the benefits it promises.

Each approach is argumentative and subject to endless interpretation. Congress, however, recognizes the potential human benefits of change. The eco-extremists not only try, with a perverse but well sounding logic, to delay/deny any/all change, they deliberately work to harm humans for their own satisfaction.

Mr. Dietz has a law degree from Willamette University and was the Executive Director of Oregonians for Food and Shelter (OFS) from its inception in 1980 until 1987.