From: russ@wpg.com (Russell Lawrence)
Subject: Re: Combine'd' laziness
Organization: WP Group
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 02:08:38 GMT

From article <1993Jan27.170716.12860@pixel.kodak.com>, by young@clpd.kodak.com (Rich Young):
>> According to WorldWatch:
>> 
>>    "... the water used to supply each american with meat, milk
>>     and eggs each day probably matches a typical american's
>>     daily water use at home, about 380 liters".
>
>First, I said "nearly as much"; second, does the WorldWatch number
>include swimming pools, fountains, lawns, and commercial car washes,
>or is it more like just the water each individual uses for washing,
>cooking, flushing, and drinking?  

It covers "at home" use.  This would include residential pools and
fountains, residential lawns, washing, cooking, and flushing, but
it wouldn't include commercial car washes.   [Sorry if this explanation
sounds condescending, but you seemed to be having some trouble figuring
out the data].

>By the way, the American Water
>Works Association, as quoted in the 1992 World Almanac, says average
>daily water use is more like 636 liters.  My, oh my.  Who SHALL we
>believe?

You cited the wrong figure, Rich.  You were using total water use 
per person, rather than "at home" use.  According to the 1993 
edition of the World Almanac, the average home use is 107,000 
gallons per residence per year.  [You'll find this datum on the
line below the datum you cited]   The average residence contains 
2.63 persons (according to the same World Almanac), so the "at home" 
use per person would be roughly 421 liters per day.  This is 10% 
more than the WorldWatch figure, but close enough to make both 
sources more credible than one source alone.  

>How much water is used for swimming pools, lawns, fountains, 
>commercial car washes, and other human uses which could be
>eliminated without risk to life, health, and major industry, Russell?

In view of the fact that agriculture has been heavily subsidized 
for years, especially the dairy industry, I don't understand why 
you'd be willing to sacrifice the jobs of swimming pool companies, 
lawn maintainance companies, car washers, etc, in order to save the 
jobs of cattlemen and meat packers.  Surely we can retrain everyone 
all around, if it would serve the nation overall, and we can recoop 
the training costs by using just a fraction of the resulting 
savings on bypass surgery alone.  Or alternatively, we could easily 
cut the subsidies and let the free market economy price meat and 
dairy products out-of-existence over a gradual period of time.  
When water subsidies disappear in California, for instance, I 
suspect that a lot of consumers will think twice before buying 
$10/gallon milk.   

One thing we can't do so easily is find cures for colon cancer and
heart disease.   Hmm.  Permit me to correct myself.   There is a 
non-surgical cure for heart disease, and if memory serves, it's been
endorsed by the director of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood
Institute at NIH as well as the editor of the American Journal of 
Cardiology.  This cure is fully described in Dean Ornish's book, 
_Reversing Heart Disease_.   

BTW, Dr.  Ornish not only explains the health hazards associated 
with milk and dairy consumption, but presents some great 
vegetarian and vegan recipes as well.   Very tasty.

-- 
Russell Lawrence, WP Group, New Orleans (504) 443-5000
russ@wpg.com   uunet!wpg!russ
Newsgroups: talk.politics.animals