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As the world gets ready to celebrate the 100th birthday of environmental icon Rachel Carson this Sunday, policymakers are proposing bills to honor her legacy. Yet Republican Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma stands largely alone in efforts to stop these measures — a position for which he deserves much credit. Coburn apparently recognizes that the conventional wisdom on Carson's legacy is wrong, as the results of following Carson's advice have been quite grim. Nonetheless, Democratic Rep. Jason Altmire and Sen. Arlen Specter, both of Pennsylvania, introduced a bill to name a post office in Pittsburgh after Carson.

Rachel Carson honor at risk in Senate May 23, 2007 WASHINGTON – Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn has effectively blocked a resolution to honor environmental author Rachel Carson on the 100th anniversary of her birth, saying that her warnings about environmental damage have put a stigma on potentially lifesaving pesticides, congressional staffers said yesterday. Sen. Benjamin Cardin, D-Md., had intended to submit a resolution celebrating Carson, author of the 1962 book “Silent Spring,” for her “legacy of scientific rigor coupled with poetic sensibility.” Carson, who died in 1964, would have turned 100 this Sunday. Cardin has delayed the legislation, a spokeswoman...

Rachel Carson wrote Silent Spring--the book that got mosquito-killer DDT banned and launched the modern environmental movement--while struggling with cancer. The disease killed Carson in 1964, two years after Silent Spring came out. Today's Washington Post has a story on Carson--whose 100th birth anniversary occurs later this month--and her noble fight against cancer. A touching piece. But maddening, too! Because in the story's 34 paragraphs, there are only a buried pair, the 26th and 27th, that note the ongoing controversy about DDT's ban. A Maryland Congressman (evil Republican, of course ... wink, wink) is quoted as saying that malaria deaths...

Adding to China’s recent problems of food safety is now seafood contamination. As the world’s largest producer and exporter of fish and fish products, China may need to more closely monitor shellfish contaminant levels, because contaminants are finding their way into seafood. A new study found samples from markets that contained concentrations of contaminants high enough to pose threats to human health. The study is published in the latest issue of Environmental Toxicology and Chemistry. Organochlorine pesticides such as DDT can accumulate in top predators, including humans. Though these pesticides were officially banned in 1983, China had been using them...

Environmental movement's 'patron saint' was "attitude changer" -- Rachel Carson, whose book "Silent Spring" is credited with saving species of birds and kicking off the environmental movement, would have been 100 years old this year. Now, a two-act play celebrating the life and work of Carson is the highlight of this week's 174-program Spring Wildflower Pilgrimage in Gatlinburg and throughout Great Smoky Mountains National Park. "A Sense of Wonder," written and performed by Kaiulani Lee, has been touring for more than 10 years - proof Carson still has influence 45 years after "Silent Spring." When the book came out in...

When the Christian Science Monitor recently declared Al Gore "the Rachel Carson of global warming," the former vice president must have bubbled over with pride. There is, it seems, no higher compliment one can bestow on an environmentalist. Next month marks what would have been Carson's 100th birthday, and festivities abound. The author of "Silent Spring" -- the 1962 book that birthed modern environmentalism and made "DDT" a dirty word -- Carson is the subject of an exhibit at the National Archives and the star of its Environmental Film Festival this year. Considered a secular saint by some, she was...

DDT - Dichloro-Diphenyl-Trichloroethane – is a chemical pesticide that was banned in the United States in 1972. The movement to ban DDT can be attributed to Silent Spring¸ a book by biologist Rachel Carson. Silent Spring focused on pesticides – particularly DDT – and their effect on the environment, with special consideration to birds (hence the name of the book; a “Silent Spring” because there are no birds to sing.) Due to the banning of DDT in the United States, a movement towards a global ban was swiftly initiated. Today, the use of DDT – with certain exceptions, such as...

Millions of deaths (mostly women and children) Illness (billions sickened), and poverty (over a trillion dollars in lost GDP, and counting). Who is responsible for this decades-long catastrophe, and will the perpetrators be held responsible? Last week’s announcement that the World Health Organization lifted its nearly 30-year ban on the insecticide DDT is perhaps the most promising development in global public health since… well, 1943 when DDT was first used to combat insect-borne diseases like typhus and malaria….. Rachel Carson kicked-off DDT hysteria with her pseudo-scientific 1962 book, “Silent Spring.” Carson materially misrepresented DDT science in order to advance her...

BE HERE, OR BE NOWHERE!

WASHINGTON - Malaria is fueling the spread of AIDS in Africa by boosting the HIV in people's bodies for weeks at a time, says a study that pins down the deadly interplay between the dual scourges. It's a vicious cycle as people weakened by HIV are, in turn, more vulnerable to malaria. University of Washington researchers who estimated the impact of the overlapping infections concluded that the interaction could be blamed for thousands of HIV infections and almost a million bouts of malaria over two decades in just one part of Kenya. The research, published in Friday's edition of the...

An 85-year-old vial of oil from a whaling ship has revealed that a mysterious group of organic chemicals resembling human-made compounds are naturally produced in the sea. A SHIP'S SECRET. The Charles W. Morgan, one of the last whaling ships operating during the 19th and early 20th centuries, still carried whale oil from a late voyage. Analysis of the oil showed that some mysterious compounds that resemble DDT and PCBs are naturally produced. E. Peacock A decade ago, scientists monitoring marine mammals' flesh for pollutants began finding unknown organic compounds containing the halogen atoms bromine and chlorine. More than 20...

Who says there's never any good news? After more than 30 years and tens of millions dead -- mostly children -- the World Health Organization (WHO) has ended its ban on DDT. DDT is the most effective anti-mosquito, anti-malaria pesticide known. But thanks to the worldwide environmental movement and politically correct bureaucrats in the United States and at the United Nations, the use of this benign chemical has been discouraged in Africa and elsewhere, permitting killer mosquitoes to spread death. I don't expect any apologies from the people who permitted this to happen. But I am thankful this nightmare is...

Who says there's never any good news? After more than 30 years and tens of millions dead -- mostly children -- the World Health Organization (WHO) has ended its ban on DDT. DDT is the most effective anti-mosquito, anti-malaria pesticide known. But thanks to the worldwide environmental movement and politically correct bureaucrats in the United States and at the United Nations, the use of this benign chemical has been discouraged in Africa and elsewhere, permitting killer mosquitoes to spread death.

An open-minded review of what extreme environmentalists have wrought on the USA and on the world inescapably leads to the conclusion that they have caused millions of deaths and trillions of dollars in damages and losses. If you think this is incorrect or an exaggeration, let us consider the record with respect to just three issues: the snail darter, nuclear power and DDT. The Snail Darter In 1976, with the Tellico Dam on the Tennessee River 99% complete, its construction was stopped and its destruction was ordered after a tiny fish called the snail darter was discovered in that river.

Sept. 27, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) – In his August 16, 2006 LifeSiteNews.com Special Report, Green Hands Dipped In Blood: The DDT Genocide, John Jalsevac exposed what may have been the worst crime of the 20th century, exceeding perhaps even the many millions of deaths caused by the Nazi’s or the horrific mass killings of Stalin or Mao Tse Tung. The current cause celebre of AIDS has caused nowhere near the perhaps 80 million deaths that have resulted so far in large part from the 30 year ban on the use of DDT to prevent malaria.Finally, recent news is that, despite...

Last week's announcement that the World Health Organization lifted its nearly 30-year ban on the insecticide DDT is perhaps the most promising development in global public health since well, 1943 when DDT was first used to combat insect-borne disease like typhus and malaria. Overlooked in all the hoopla over the announcement is the terrible toll in human lives (tens of millions dead, mostly pregnant women and children under age 5), illness (billions sickened) and poverty (more than $1 trillion in lost GDP in sub-Saharan Africa alone) caused by the tragic, decades-long ban.

WASHINGTON - The World Health Organization on Friday called on more developing countries, particularly in Africa, to begin spraying the controversial pesticide DDT to fight malaria The difference: DDT, longed banned in the United States because of environmental damage, is no longer sprayed outdoors. Instead it's used to coat the inside walls of mud huts or other dwellings and kill mosquitoes waiting to bite families as they sleep. A small number of malaria-plagued countries already use DDT, backed by a 2001 United Nations treaty that set out strict rules to prevent environmental contamination. But the influential WHO's long-awaited announcement makes...

The World Health Organization is poised to promote broader use of the controversial pesticide DDT in the battle against malaria. Long banned in the United States because of environmental damage, DDT is used legally in a few impoverished countries to kill malaria-bearing mosquitoes. It's no longer sprayed outdoors, but indoors — to coat the inside walls of mud huts or other dwellings where mosquitoes lurk. The aim is to protect sleeping families from bites at night. There has been little progress in recent years in preventing malaria, which sickens up to half a billion people annually and kills more than...

9-Year-Old Boy Dies After Mosquito Bite John Fontaine Got Eastern Equine EncephalitisPOSTED: 7:44 am EDT September 1, 2006 UPDATED: 8:12 am EDT September 1, 2006 BOSTON -- A 9-year-old Middleboro, Mass., boy died from Eastern equine encephalitis Thursday. He is the state's first EEE fatality this year. John Fontaine developed a fever on Aug. 18 and was hospitalized two days later. His two-week battle with EEE ended at Boston Children's Hospital Thursday morning. Middleborough was among the communities in southeastern Massachusetts that have undergone two rounds of aerial spraying to kill the mosquitoes that carry the virus. The first round...

I can't cut my grass because there's about a million wasps (or something like wasps) flying around at ground level. What are they looking for and how can I get rid of them?