The EPA should be abolished

"European nations and the United States used insecticides to rid themselves of disease and then pulled up the ladder, denying Africans, Asians and Latin Americans the benefits of those same insecticides," explain Dr. Donald Roberts and Richard Tren in their 2010 expos", The Excellent Powder: DDT"s Political and Scientific History. You seem well educated on the effects of DDT, but I must ask you a question. Is it really appropiate to ban it because of those side effects, because this was intended to be sprayed on a populace infected with malaria, of course if the people wanted it sprayed on them, how can you say otherwise? And perhaps only the U.S banned DDT, but do you know how much that effected the other nations? Besides, DDT isn't the only thing the EPA banned "The DDT ban does not only affect tropical nations. In the wake of the DDT ban, the United States stopped its mosquito control programs, cutting the budgets for mosquito control and monitoring. Exactly as scientists had warned 25 years ago, we are now facing increases of mosquito-borne killer diseases""West Nile fever and dengue, to name the most prominent." A shocking majority of people in that day supported DDT, even scientists. As a result of the propaganda and lies, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency convened scientific hearings and appointed a Hearing Examiner, Edmund Sweeney, to run them. Every major scientific organization in the world supported DDT use, submitted testimony, as did the environmentalist opposition. The hearings went on for seven months, and generated 9,000 pages of testimony. Hearing Examiner Sweeney then ruled that DDT should not be banned, based on the scientific evidence: ""DDT is not carcinogenic, mutagenic, or teratogenic to man [and] these uses of DDT do not have a deleterious effect on fish, birds, wildlife, or estuarine organisms," Sweeney concluded. South Africa, which reintroduced DDT in 2003 after a seven-year ban, saw its malaria rates plummet 80%. So therefore you are wrong on believing what the EPA says, DDT does not have deleterious effects on wildlife, the majority of scientists after all their studying proved this. "The lies and hysteria spread to defend the DDT ban are typical of the irrationalist, anti-science wave which has virtually destroyed rational forms of discourse in our society. If you want to save science""and human lives""the fight to bring back DDT, now being championed by that very electable candidate for the Democratic Presidential nomination, Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr., had better be at the top of your agenda." DDT was used with dramatic effect to shorten and prevent typhus epidemics during and after WWII when people were dusted with large amounts of it but suffered no ill effects, which is perhaps the most persuasive evidence that the chemical is harmless to humans. The product was such a boon to public health that in 1948 the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Dr. Paul M"ller for his discovery of the "contact insecticidal action" of DDT. Although the use of DDT is not risk-free, there is a vast difference between applying large amounts of it in the environment "" as farmers sometimes did before it was banned in the United States "" and using it carefully and sparingly to fight mosquitoes and other disease-carrying insects, as it is used in a handful of African and Asian countries even today. It is sprayed or dusted indoors in small amounts to prevent mosquitoes from nesting, so exposures are extremely low. The now well-known problems associated with the thinning of raptor"s eggshells "" while always exaggerated "" can be completely avoided by using DDT with care exclusively in residential areas, because the chemical remains largely near where it is sprayed. No study has ever linked DDT environmental exposure to harm to human health. You said that DDT has harmful effects on wildlife, let me give a few facts to debunk that. 1.) DDT kills robins? The United States used DDT liberally beginning in the late 1940s, with peak usage in 1959. According to the Audubon Society, robin populations increased by a factor of 12, and birds in general increased fourfold during that time. Ironically, the only logical reason for this boon was the destruction of mites and mosquitoes that spread disease among birds, particularly in swampy areas. 2.) DDT is both toxic to humans and a human carcinogen? The International Agency for Research on Cancer classifies various agents based on carcinogenicity. The highest ranking agents include such common items as birth control pills, tanning beds, chimney soot, and smoking. DDT is classed with pickled vegetables and coconut oil. The U.S. Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry issued a Toxicological Profile for DDT in 2002 which concluded: "Relative risk of death, and specifically of death due to any cancer, was not significantly elevated in the high serum DDT tertile groups. No consistent positive trend in risk of cancer mortality relative to serum DDT was observed." 3.) DDT persists in the environment for years and accumulates and concentrates in the food chain? DDT actually breaks down more rapidly than other insecticides, many of which are proven toxins to humans and the environment. The crude instruments used to measure pesticide stability in Carson"s day lumped all these together, resulting in guilt by association. By 1969, the FWS could report that DDT breaks down more quickly than some insecticides, based on tests conducted at its Pesticide Field Station in Gulf Breeze, Florida. Besides... The EPA was mixed up on the decision to ban DDT, so yes, there was a selfish guy for his banning on it. Spurred by complaints based on Carson"s screed and resulting anti-DDT propaganda from the ultra-left Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and its allies, the EPA called a hearing on DDT. After considering testimony of 125 witnesses, EPA judge Edmund Sweeney issued his verdict in April, 1972. He supported DDT unequivocally, stating it is not carcinogenic and that its benefits far outweigh any risks. Sweeney noted the "present need for continued use" of the excellent powder and remarked that evidence showed potential replacement pesticides would "in many cases have more deleterious effects than the harm allegedly caused by DDT." However, two months later, ignoring his own agency"s ruling and advice, EPA Administrator William Ruckelshaus single-handedly outlawed almost all use of DDT. He made the unscientific assertion that it poses "unacceptable risk to the environment and potential harm to human health." He had not bothered to attend a single day of the seven-month hearing and, according to aides, had not read any transcripts. Critics quip that his decision shot him to the top of an infamous list: Hitler, 20.9 million deaths; Stalin, 61.9 million deaths; Mao Tse-Tung, 77 million deaths; Ruckelshaus, estimates range from 100 million to more than the competition combined. I see that you refused to talk about the ban on incandescent lightbulbs. I assume you support the EPA's hysteria over incandescent lightbulbs. Here are 5 myths about incandescent lightbulbs. http://www.nationalcenter.org.... Funny enough, the federal government wants to replace incandescent lightbulbs with mercury-filled lightbulbs. "Before the incandescent bulbs go out for good, it"s worth shining a light on its cause: The ban was pushed by light bulb makers eager to up-sell customers on longer-lasting and much more expensive halogen, compact fluourescent, and LED lighting. When customers balked at paying more for home lighting, General Electric, Sylvania, and Philips did what corporate behemoths always do: They turned to the government for regulation that rigs the market in their favor." http://reason.com... Let's discuss the EPA's draconian carbon-tax idea and their bans on coal emissions. The Environmental Protection Agency released a long-anticipated rule proposal that seeks by 2030 to reduce America"s carbon dioxide emissions 30% from 2005 levels. (The full proposal can be found here; http://www2.epa.gov...) Hugh Wynne, analyst at Bernstein Research, has figured that switching from coal to gas will be the most cost-effective method of achieving the EPA objectives. He notes that the nation"s natural gas power plants are currently operating at an average of just 45% of capacity. Ramping this up to 90%, while reducing coal-fired generation by the same amount, would have the effect of reducing carbon emissions by 550 million metric tons per year. That"s equal to about 25% of power generation emissions, or about 8% of total U.S. greenhouse gas emissions. http://reason.com... http://www.forbes.com... http://epaabuse.com... http://www.21stcenturysciencetech.com... http://www.freerepublic.com...