Feel the Math

There Ain't No LBAM Moths on Me

This is a video I produced (with the help of ANIMOTO) and posted to YouTube to help spread the word about the plans by the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) to shower much of the Bay Area and surrounding communities with chemicals that are not safe, especially for kids, and not effective at eradicating the moth they fear so much, and not necessary.  Go check it out and comment, and spread the word.   AND please write Governor Schwarzenegger and all his friends and family to ask him politely to not let this happen.

Credits to Charity and the JAMband for the excellent soundtrack and catchy lyrics that really tell the story in a nutshell.   Bottom line, there ain't no moths on us, so why do you wanna spray the places we play?   Check out their site too:

www.jamjamjam.com

CHECKMATE: Health Impacts of Moth Eradication Madness

Here's some sobering reading from the Moms of Marin Against the Spray:

MOTHERS OF MARIN AGAINST THE SPRAY (MOMAS)
BACKGROUND INFORMATION

A. HEALTH IMPACTS & TESTING OF SPRAY CHEMICALS

The proposed chemicals have never been sprayed over densely populated area.
Numerous chemicals will be sprayed repeatedly throughout the Bay Area every 30-60 days by low-flying airplanes, over highly populated urban areas near water, for a period of 3-10 years.
The chemicals to be sprayed, which are contained in a formula called CheckMate, were designed to be applied only over unpopulated agricultural areas.
California’s consensus document on the health risk of the spray explicitly states that studies assume “aerial application over agricultural areas rather than aerial application over populated areas.” [Cal. Dept. Pesticide Regulation, Cal OEHHA Oct 31 2007 Consensus statement]

No tests have addressed long-term exposure of the chemicals on humans.
No tests have addressed the impact of breathing these chemicals over a long-term period by varied populations, including pregnant women, children and the elderly.
CheckMate and other similar formulations of pheromone pesticides have undergone only short-term testing on rats and rabbits.
The active ingredient, a synthetic pheromone, has not undergone long-term human toxicity testing. [Testimony of Philip Richard in County of Santa Cruz v CDFA, Superior Court of California, Santa Cruz County, Oct 31, 2007]

The spray contains hazardous chemicals.
The product label, which can be found on the manufacturer’s website (Suterra LLC of Bend, Oregon, www.suterra.com) states “Hazardous to Humans and Domestic Animals. Harmful if absorbed through the skin. Causes moderate eye irritation. Avoid contact with skin, eyes, or clothing. Harmful if inhaled. Avoid breathing vapor or spray mist.”
The State continues to focus on the alleged safety of the pheromones contained in CheckMate. However, the spray contains at least 8 other chemicals.
Material Data Sheets for several of these chemicals state:
“Substance may be toxic to blood, liver, central nervous system.”
”Toxic to lungs and mucous membranes.”
“Very hazardous in case of eye contact.”
“Hazardous in case of skin contact.”
”May cause cancer based on animal studies.”
“Harmful by inhalation.”
”Risk of serious damage to eyes.”
“Material is irritating to mucous membranes and upper respiratory tract.”
“May affect genetic material.”
“May cause adverse reproductive effects and birth defects.”

A Bird and a Plane in the Sky

Link: A Bird and a Plane in the Sky.

They both can fly, but one burns fossil fuels and the other burns food.  One is capable of dropping pesticides on the entire San Francisco Bay Area, and the other capable of eating moths.  (Click the image to magnify.) For more on the topic of planned monthly aerial sprays of checkmate pesticide, visit:

www.stopthespray.org

Letter to Arnold About Moth Anihilation

Here is a note I sent to Arnold, the Governor of California and good friend of Stewart Resnick, a gazillionaire that donated $144K to his campaign, and owner of Suterra, the company that makes Checkmate, a pesticide that they both want to spray over most of the Bay Area, including our homes, playgrounds, schools, gardens, shopping malls, and parks.   

If you don't like monthly pesticide showers, I suggest you do the same.   Call him and/or send a note via this site:  http://gov.ca.gov/interact

Dear Arnold,

I just read your press release "Gov. Schwarzenegger Meets with Local Officials on Light Brown Apple Moth" and didn't find it very reassuring.  It sounds like your "six-pack" of tests is only short term, and doesn't explain much about your methodology or extent of testing, and who is doing the tests.   Where can we find more details?

As a father of two children and relative and friend of several who have suffered from cancer, alzheimer's, and autism, I have read too many press releases about other programs like this that were supposed to be safe, but are now highly correlated with long-term side effects due to prolonged exposure.   (Remember DDT and Malathion?)   I don't care about getting a sore throat and watery eyes the day after we get showered the first or second time, but monthly, for years?   The micro-capsules are considered particle pollution which is considered dangerous by the American Lung Association, and the "inert ingredients" don't appear to be on your list for testing.   Please clarify if I am wrong about this.   Kids have a different metabolism than us, put things in their mouths, and like to play in the places you spray.

And where is the believable evidence this moth is such a big threat that it requires total eradication?   It sounds like you are planning to spend more of our tax dollars on the eradication program than we could potentially lose by leaving it to natural predators and voluntary control programs.   And that is not even counting the potential collateral costs of health complications, tourism declines, real estate drops, and other side effects.

Do a few bad apples really warrant an all-out war on a moth, and more importantly, potential harm to millions of adults, kids, and pets? 

Why can't we change our mindset and become leaders in the organic farming evolution?  Organic food is becoming popular and commands higher prices, and farming methods are becoming more efficient.  We should be investing in the startups and projects that are innovating new methods to farm efficiently (use resources more intelligently while reducing waste), reduce the carbon footprint, and make better tasting food that is healthier for us all.   That could even help solve our healthcare crisis at the same time.   (Think of those economics...)

PS -
Hope to see a press release soon that is titled "Gov. Schwarzenegger Meets with 'Local Moms and Dads and their Kids' on Light Brown Apple Moth"

Come to the Bay Area for Your Monthly Pesticide Showers

Link: LBAM Petition: Stop the Spray, Demand Safe Alternatives to Aerial Pesticide Spraying!.

If you don't like the idea of airplanes flying over your house every month for several years showering you with pesticides, I'd suggest you visit Stop The Spray and sign their petition, write to Governor Shwarzahoweveryouspellit, call and email everybody you care about, and study up on the subject and do something about it.

The spray, Checkmate, targets the light brown apple moth, known affectionately as "LBAM", an enemy combatant that has no access to due process as the DHS, in voluntary cooperation with the USDA, the CDFA (California Dept. of Food and Agriculture), and the Governor of California, has been classified under terror threat level "A" for the actions of a few bad apples among their population that have been seen nibbling on leaves.

This terrorist moth is an "invasive species", like carrots, tomatoes, cows, and most of the food and animals grown commercially in California. The difference is, it is only located in San Francisco, Marin, Berkeley, Santa Cruz, and Monterey. And before it gets to Atherton, Hillsborough, Sacramento, and our central valley farms, we need to eradicate it completely.

The CDFA argues the pesticide is not a pesticide, but more like a cologne that makes the male moths get confused and mate with everything that gets sprayed with it. It hasn't been tested for long term health effects and special effects on children and others who like to eat dirt and frolic in gardens and playgrounds after the showers. But, don't worry, they assure us it is much safer than DDT and Malathion and the other solutions of the past that were also supposed to be good for us. Just because the American Lung Association is worried about the particulate matter getting lodged in your deep lung tissue doesn't mean you should worry.

And don't believe any of the conspiracy theories. It is only a coincidence that Stewart Resnick donated $144K to Arnold's campaign, and just happens to be the owner of Suterra, the company making the Checkmate spray that will be bought with our millions of tax dollars.

Sure, Arnold said on August 31, 2003 "Any of those kinds of real big, powerful special interests, if you take money from them, you owe them something.” But he was talking about the other politicians at the time...

Check out my Slide Show!

Balance of Power

Jon Stewart discusses the White House plans to sell $20 billion in weapons to the Saudi Arabian royal family.  Part of the Bush administration offer of more than $60 billion in new weapons and military assistance to Egypt, Israel, Saudi Arabia, and other countries that have diverse ideas about where boundaries should be drawn.   Should be good for business, if you're an arms dealer. Video expires on Sept. 23rd due to draconian licence deals, but read the post continuation for the full transcripts.

AT&T History

The history of AT&T as it disintegrates then reassembles itself.

Ministry of Truth

Keith Olbermann just questioned the prophet, Donald Rumsfeld.   He has since taken on some other tough subjects like Habeus Corpus, while the rest of the Ministry of Truth keeps feeding us with more on drunk celebrity debutantes, car chases, anthrax scares, and Elvis sightings.

A key take-away from this was his quoting of Eward R. Murrow: "We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. When the loyal opposition dies, I think the soul of America dies with it."

Solution to Oil Addiction

A simple solution that can cure obesity, curb global warming, reduce the need for war, and help us to see the Nazunas blooming along the hedges.  Brought to you by common folk consumer-generated media artists at Revver.

The Sky is Falling

Link: Google News keeps bringing us more news that the end of the world is near.  Mexico is invading from the South and the Canadians are terrorizing us from the North and North Korea from the West and Cuba from the SouthEast.  The bird flu is flying its way closer, while the West Nile mosquitos are starting to swarm.   The Palestinians are throwing rocks at their neighbors on all sides again.  Kenneth Lay had a heart attack and Dick Cheney shot his lawyer cause he looked like a quail.   Evolution is just some theory made up by a bunch of scientists with a hidden agenda to kill God.   

State of the Onion

I just saw a video on YouTube that restored my faith in democracy, and gave me hopes that Web 2.0 can help save the world. There's a lot of manure on there, but hopefully a few good gems like this will start to float to the top. It's a butchered State of the Union address by the leader of the free world that sounds more like what he was thinking when he made the speech. I found it by doing a search on "bush", which led to several other gems I don't have time to review at the moment...  I admit I enjoy watching the common people make fun of our political leaders, but grateful that we can without risking time at the guillotine.  As long as they let us keep getting away with it, I'll still respect them, despite not liking the way they spend our tax dollars.

Letter to Alberto

Dear Mister Gonzales,

You might have the best of intentions to protect us from evil terrorists, but please allow us to make sure the rule of law is followed here.  Our founding fathers put czechs and balances in place to prevent any one branch of government or any one person to accumulate excessive power...

Evolution Devolution

The press is telling us today that kids in Kansas can now cast critical doubt in class with the new curriculum that collectively mandates the teaching of intelligent design. 

According to this MTV article, "CRITICS of evolution have won a major victory in the US with the Kansas education board approving a school curriculum that casts doubt on Darwin's theory."   I'm glad to hear that doubt can be cast on any theory, but wonder why it has to be mandated.   Why can't debate just be a natural part of the evolution of our school systems? 

InTeLLigunt dEzinE holds that the universe is so complex that it must have been created by a higher power.   My question then is - who designed the higher power?  How did this higher power evolve?  Let's talk about that in class too.

Daylight Savings Time Gets a Promotion

Capitol Hill just passed their energy bill.  If you have a conservation conversation with Prezident Shrub about it, he'd tell you that he cares so much about conservation that he made sure to extend our daylight savings time an extra few days each year so we can all save an extra 100 thousand barrels of oil a day for those extra days of extra daylight...

Americans for Energy Independence

Link: Americans for Energy Independence.  Feel the math on this page that I hereby linketh to.  It is full of stats that will make your head spin.   For example, add these few items up:

1. US oil demand is 20 million barrels per day, 75% is imported. 

2. Saudi Arabia supplies nearly 15% of US imports.

3. Iraq has two of the top ten oil fields in the world at Rumaila and Kirkuk. Iran has three of the top ten.

What does that spell?

eXXpose eXXon

Join the revolution and inspire ExxonMobil to invest some of its $25 billion in profits into alternative energy.  According to the whiney environmentalists who are just plain jealous they aren't making as much money as them:  "ExxonMobil is trying to open the Arctic Refuge to oil drilling and sabotaging efforts to slow global warming.  Despite making a record $25 billion profit last year, the company is still shirking paying the money it owes fishermen and other Alaskans hurt by the Exxon Valdez spill 16 years ago and refusing to put its huge profits to good use developing clean, renewable energy."
 
They don't have much incentive to change their ways given the way the economy has been treating them lately, but if we all stop buying their toxic gas, they might start to get the message.  I recommend adding a carrot to your message, and tell them nicely that when they start to clean up their act, you'll not only buy their products again, but also invest in their company and maybe even send in your resume in hopes of getting a job there.  Click on the link above to join the revolution and let them know how much you care.

Government Investment Trends

Link: National Priorities Project:Where Do Your Taxes Go 2005.

Go see where all your tax dollars are being invested...

Democracy Bugs

Evidence Mounts That The Vote May Have Been Hacked. 
I don't want to cry wolf, but I think it is worth verifying.  If President Weed really won this election, then I guess he deserves his "mandate" to do whatever the heck he wants to the planet, but if there were bugs in the new high-tech gadgets we use to count votes, then we all need to stop, take a deep breath, and commit ourselves to fixing the bugs. 

If we plan to spread democracy and freedom around the world, then it would help if the countries we are trying to save have some confidence in the system we apply here at home.  Saddam had an election once and won 99.9% of the vote, but we all know how many candidates were on the ballot, and what happened to the 0.1% who dared to not cast their vote for the obvious choice.  Russian Dictator Joseph Stalin once said "Those who cast the votes decide nothing. Those who count the votes decide everything."  I never believed much in polls, but find it funny that Weed took so many states where the exit polls indicated otherwise.  It also bothers me that the machine jammed when I inserted my own ballot.  Machines have bugs, and without paper audit trails on some of them, how can we ever verify?

All the more reason to vote with our purchases to make the changes we want.  More on that in my "Putting Money in Our Mouths" post.

To read more, check out the post by the Electronic Frontier Foundation.  And to do something about it, send a note to the powers that be via this form.

Decision 2004 - Weed

Decision 2004 - Bush: 'One Country, One Constitution, One Future' 
He has a mandate now.  Before, he was on good behavior.  Beam me up, Scotty...