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Yessir, I live in Newark, NJ and I am glad that they cleaned up the Passaic River and got rid of all of those other Superfund sites in the Garden State.

BRB, going for a swim with the three-eyed fishes.

Wouldn't happen to be an economist by any chance? Good engineering projects don't work that way - you work out a design that is far superior to everything else FIRST and then that becomes the standard - until you improve it.

CAE's latest project, included a mobile DNA extraction laboratory for testing food products for possible transgenic contamination. It was this equipment which triggered the Kafkaesque chain of events. FBI field and laboratory tests have shown that Kurtz's equipment was not used for any illegal purpose. In fact, it is not even _possible_ to use this equipment for the production or weaponization of dangerous germs. Furthermore, any person in the US may legally obtain and possess such equipment.

In a political climate where the one loses all right to due process at the mere accusation of involvement in terrorism and with Education Secretary Rod Paige revealing the administrations definition of "terrorism" by labeling the National Educational Association a "Terrorist Organization" for excercising their first amendment rights to criticize Bush Regime policy and a White House aide is quoted elsewhere in this discussion as saying "In this administration, you don't have to wear a turban or speak Farsi to be an enemy of the United States. All you have to do is disagree with the President" , there are some things about this particular case that should be regarded as red flags.

Educating people about the presence of unsafe GM organisms in their food could be the "terrorism" in question. In this case, it is not the Bush Regime who is being criticised but their sponsors at Monsanto. According to the Organic Consumer Association the link between Monsanto and the Bush Regime is almost as bad as the Haliburton/Oil Industry Links.

• Clarence Thomas, Supreme Court Judge, "who put GW Bush in office", Former Monsano Lawyer
• Anne Veneman, Secretary of Agriculture, Former boardmember of Monsanto subsidiary
• Donald Rumsfeld, Secretary of Defense, former monsanto subsidiary board member
• Attorney General John Ashcroft, one of the top two monsanto campaign contribution recipients in a recent election. This is the same John Ashcroft who lost to a dead man in a prior election.
• other campaign recipients

The death of Prof. Kurtz's wife combined with the biological laboratory is legitimate reason for at least some investigation. But it also could be a convenient excuse for an administration that is motivated to harrass him. If these artists have committed a crime, it is probably bad web design (Shitwave Flush (tm) web navigation) rather than terrorism. Unless the mutant flies and roundup-sensitizing compounds prove to be not just consciousness raising experiments but actual intended eco-terrorism; but I certainly don't trust the likes of John Ashcroft to make such a determination.

The social concious thing may still be somethign they're doing, but the dedication to putting out the most "healthy" (in terms of lack of artificial additives and ingredients) ice cream around has definitely dropped off. Every single B&J pint used to have All Natural printed on it, and it was true. Now, some of the flavors include partially hydrogenated vegetable oils and high fructose corn syrup (i'm thinking of "Makin' Whoopie Pie" in particular, though other examples exist) and have lost the All Natural label.

Somewhat ironic, given Ben and Jerry's removal of paper bleeched with Dioxins(one of the most dangerous-to-your-health chemicals currently produced, if you believe the hype) from from their products, that they would chose to include chemicals that have been strongly linked to health problems.

Also somewhat ironic: Bryers ice cream, which is also owned by Unilever but not known for it's humanitarian efforts, produces (as far as i have seen) only all natural ice cream.

Don't put too much stock into the socially conscious stuff, it's still about making money.

• organ damage
• thickening of the small intestine
• poor brain development

Other dangers from this this article come to include:

• New toxins and allergens in foods
• Other damaging effects on health caused by unnatural foods
• Increased use of chemicals on crops, resulting in increased contamination of our water supply and food
• The creation of herbicide-resistant weeds
• The spread of diseases across species barriers
• Loss of bio-diversity in crops
• The disturbance of ecological balance
• Artificially induced characteristics and inevitable side-effects will be passed on to all subsequent generations and to other related organisms. Once released, they can never be recalled or contained. The consequences of this are incalculable.

Here is yet another article that you can read on this topic.

1) We will not run out of oil within the 21st century

Assuming that their is a fixed supply, we will run out at some point. An astronomer has suggested that hydrocarbons well up from the core(The Deep Hot Oil). But he has no substantial evidence for that.

So I guess this is kinda a toss up. We have to look at things from the standpoint of prudence. Is it more prudent to assume a limitless supply of a critical resource or a fixed supply. I guess that's a value judgement. However, most prudent planners would assume a fixed supply in order to gauruntee that we don't run out and find ourselves in a crisis.


2) Human activity is not and will not under current trends measureably change global climate


Climate changes over time, that's a scientific fact. Sometimes it's affected very quickly by violenet phenomenon. That's a fact.

Excessive CO2 gas CAN lead to global warming. That's a FACT. Excessive reduction of CO2 gas can lead to global cooling. That's a FACT.

The question is whether we as humans have a capability to create a radical phenomenon on par with mother herself. We know that we are flooding the atmosphere with giant amounts of CO2 in short periods of time. We know that we are rapidly diminishing the earths natural CO2 reducer, vegetation.

So here's the question. Are we making more CO2 than we have vegetation to prcoess??? We aren't certain. But again, prudence may dictate a measure of caution.

It should ABSOLUETLY dictate a lot of effort to studying the issue in more details. More temperature monitoring globally and extensive monitoring on and below the oceans. More money to generate more core samples to generate more detail about historic CO2 and temperature levels.

The statement that we AREN'T creating climate changes is effectively unproveable since it's a negative. The notion that we ARE isn't proven, but it's clear that if we put out too much CO2, things will get hotter here on earth.

3) dietary fat is not a leading cause of cardio-vascular disease

There are pretty good correlations between people who eat high-fat diets and heart disease. This undoubtedly is influenced by lifestyle.

What you have to remember is that this notion is being pushed by the Atkins crowd. They are making claims about false science with little or no empirical evidence to back their claims. Atkins has been selling his diet for 30 years. He seems to have little interest in proving it's philosophy empiracly.

4) There is life on Mars and Gilbert Levin discovered it with the LR experiment on the Viking lander

There is a legitamit concerns that the experiment does not necessarily mean there is life on mars. The experiment doesn't eliminate a possibility. The exact chemical nature of the samples is unknown so ruling out any other reaction is impossible.

5) HIV does not cause AIDS

There is a VER strong correlation between having the HIV virus and having aids. Since viruses tend to cause disease, this is a natural conclusion.

The fact that people with high HIV counts have "full-blown" aids while people who low counts are "just infected" leads to a fairly natural conclusion.

I read this and I'm still unmoved. Under these explanations using retro-viral drugs like AZT should promote aids, not stop as it is with the "standard" treatments. Beyond this, it doesn't have evidence of a SINGLE case of AIDS without HIV. The fact that some people seem to be immune from HIV is not proof of anything. Most diseases don't infect at 100%. If they did, we would likely all have died out millions of years ago.

But other than those two extremes, NJ is a fucking great place to live. Pretty much everything outside of those two uber densely populated areas is greener than green.

Some of it even glows green.

New Jersey, the 5th smallest state, has more superfund sites than any other. That's why people make fun of it, not just because of Camden.