Friday, July 13, 2007
The Law Of Unintended Consequences
As some liberals in Congress propose the return of the Fairness Doctrine as a means to institute balance in the opinions expressed by all the media outlets, let none doubt their true target is talk radio. But before they go too far, they should carefully consider the law of unintended consequences.
The best, yet most underreported incident on the subject is the ban on DDT. Dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane is an insecticide that kills insects with few acute effects on humans. Swiss scientist Paul Muller, who received the 1948 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work, developed it in 1939. The primary value of the pesticide is its ability to eliminate malaria-transmitting mosquitoes. According to U.N. estimates, malaria kills one child every 30 seconds and more than a million people each year. All right, let’s say that again very slowly, malaria murders MORE THAN ONE MILLION PEOPLE A YEAR!
DDT met its demise when Rachel Carson initiated the movement against the use of the product in her 1962 book Silent Spring. The belief, though not thoroughly investigated, was that the pesticide softened the shells of egg laying species, particularly birds. It was banned in the US and eventually that led to a worldwide prohibition.
Here is the rub; the science was never substantiated. Emotional envoirmentalism took over before rational scientific research was performed. The rallying cry was that something had to be done before the product killed millions of birds. The unintended consequence, the lack of an effective insecticide results in the murder of millions of humans. At least the birds are safe.
Now I could point to Algore’s minions and stress the need to review the law of unintended consequences but, my aim is more toward those without an emotionally based agenda. The liberals in Congress have few strongly held beliefs for which they are willing to go down in a blaze of glory, notwithstanding their public personas. As Diane Feinstein has demonstrated with the way she has enriched her family off of military appropriations, they are more interested in making money and amassing power than fighting for the good of America. If the fairness doctrine were enforced across the board, CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, PBS, MSNBC, a host of news services and newspapers would suddenly find themselves under the microscope of public scrutiny and perhaps conservative wrath. Fairness would be defined by who was in power at the time. So, I would say to liberal lawmakers, beware what you ask for, you might just get real fairness in the media and you could be its first victim!
The best, yet most underreported incident on the subject is the ban on DDT. Dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane is an insecticide that kills insects with few acute effects on humans. Swiss scientist Paul Muller, who received the 1948 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his work, developed it in 1939. The primary value of the pesticide is its ability to eliminate malaria-transmitting mosquitoes. According to U.N. estimates, malaria kills one child every 30 seconds and more than a million people each year. All right, let’s say that again very slowly, malaria murders MORE THAN ONE MILLION PEOPLE A YEAR!
DDT met its demise when Rachel Carson initiated the movement against the use of the product in her 1962 book Silent Spring. The belief, though not thoroughly investigated, was that the pesticide softened the shells of egg laying species, particularly birds. It was banned in the US and eventually that led to a worldwide prohibition.
Here is the rub; the science was never substantiated. Emotional envoirmentalism took over before rational scientific research was performed. The rallying cry was that something had to be done before the product killed millions of birds. The unintended consequence, the lack of an effective insecticide results in the murder of millions of humans. At least the birds are safe.
Now I could point to Algore’s minions and stress the need to review the law of unintended consequences but, my aim is more toward those without an emotionally based agenda. The liberals in Congress have few strongly held beliefs for which they are willing to go down in a blaze of glory, notwithstanding their public personas. As Diane Feinstein has demonstrated with the way she has enriched her family off of military appropriations, they are more interested in making money and amassing power than fighting for the good of America. If the fairness doctrine were enforced across the board, CBS, NBC, ABC, CNN, PBS, MSNBC, a host of news services and newspapers would suddenly find themselves under the microscope of public scrutiny and perhaps conservative wrath. Fairness would be defined by who was in power at the time. So, I would say to liberal lawmakers, beware what you ask for, you might just get real fairness in the media and you could be its first victim!
Sunday, July 08, 2007
The HAT People: How Pollution Saved Earth
Liberals have, since the creation of liberalism, maintained one consistent truth; Do As I Say, Not As I Do. Regardless of their pet cause, a liberal can always be counted on not to live by whatever law, regulation or statute they push as the fix for whatever evil they have uncovered. It is the lifestyle of others they expect to change.
Enter Al Gore, trying to fit an oversized butt into a pair of pre-washed jeans. Seems physical fitness is not currently on the agenda. But, because Al cares, he has been jetting around the world and consuming resources to denounce people who, well, jet around the world and consume resources. And leave it to the liberal MSM not to challenge him on his hypocrisy, NBC to provide millions of dollars in free TV time to promote his hypocrisy and millions of willing liberal activists joining him in his hypocrisy by polluting the Earth so they can tell us we have to stop. Okay, Al, you first!!
