EPA approves ‘AGENT ORANGE’ despite links to diseases, human health, and the environment.

The Environmental Protection Agency has refused a petition that aims to ban the sale of a powerful pesticide linked with cancer.

RT – The Environmental Protection Agency has refused a petition that aimed to ban the sale of a powerful pesticide linked with cancer — and while already available, a surge in sales is expected as scientists ready a new crop resistant to the chemical.

Not only has the EPA rejected a petition that sought to prohibit the domestic sale of the dangerous 2,4-D pesticide — a key ingredient in Agent Orange — but the main manufacturer of the chemical predicts that sales will skyrocket in the coming months. The reason, it would seem, is that Dow Chemicals is awaiting federal approval of a genetically engineered crop they’ve created that will be resistant to 2,4-D.

Research Centre for Gender, Family and Environment in Development (CGFED)
AGENT ORANGE AND THE NEW YORK TIMES 1961 – 1979
Suzanne M. Wilson
Student, Hamilton College, USA

If approved, farmers will be able to plant the frankencrop corn variant and douse their fields with the pesticide to eliminate unwanted weeds with greater success. Although 2,4-D isn’t currently used to a large degree on corn fields, all that could soon change for the country’s most successful crop. Opponents argue, though, that the potential side effects of the pesticide are enough to push for a ban on 2,4-D altogether.

Monsanto: a history

During the 1940s Monsanto also become a leading manufacturer of synthetic fibres and plastics, including polystyrene – ranked fifth in the EPA’s list of chemicals whose production generates the most total hazardous waste. From the 1940s onwards Monsanto was one of the top 10 US chemical companies.

Following the Second World War, Monsanto championed the use of chemical pesticides in agriculture. Its major agrochemical products have included the herbicides 2,4,5-T, DDT, Lasso and Agent Orange, which was widely used as a defoliant by the U.S. Government during the Vietnam War and which was later shown to be highly carcinogenic. The Agent Orange produced by Monsanto had dioxin levels many times higher than that produced by Dow Chemicals, the other major supplier of Agent Orange to Vietnam. This made Monsanto the key defendant in the lawsuit brought by Vietnam War veterans in the United States, who faced an array of debilitating symptoms attributable to Agent Orange exposure. Internal Monsanto memos show that Monsanto knew of the problems of dioxin contamination of Agent Orange when it sold it to the U.S. government for use in Vietnam.

Agent Orange contaminated more than 3 million civilians and servicemen, and an estimated 500,000 Vietnamese children have been born with deformities attributed to Agent Orange, leading to calls for Monsanto to be prosecuted for war crimes. No compensation has been paid to Vietnamese civilians and though some compensation was paid to U.S. veterans, according to William Sanjour, who led the Toxic Waste Division of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, “thousands of veterans were disallowed benefits” because “Monsanto studies showed that dioxin [as found in Agent Orange] was not a human carcinogen.” An EPA colleague discovered that Monsanto had apparently falsified the data in their studies. Sanjour says, “If [the studies] were done correctly, they would have reached just the opposite result.”

The Natural Resources Defense Council, an environmental watch group, has argued that expose to 2,4-D has caused in some cases cancer, hormone disruption, genetic mutations and neurotoxicity, reports the New York Times. In voting not to hear the petition against the pesticide, however, the EPA says that they believe there to be a lack of evidence that would be significant enough to raise suspicion.

According to the National Resources Defense Council, the truth behind the toxicity of the chemical is quite the contrary.

“This dangerous pesticide is lurking all over the place – from ball fields and golf courses, to front lawns and farms – exposing an enormous amount of the American public to cancer and other serious health risks,”NRDC senior scientist Dr. Gina Solomon wrote earlier this year. “There’s no reason to continue allowing a toxic Agent Orange-ingredient in the places our children play, our families live and our farmers work. EPA must step up and finally put a stop to it.”

The NRDC is not alone in their opposition, either. The Center for Food Safety has also fought to ban the sale of 2,4-D as Dow develops their pesticide resistant-crop. “Dow’s ‘Agent Orange’ corn will trigger a large increase in 2,4-D use — and our exposure to this toxic herbicide — yet USDA has not assessed how much, nor analyzed the serious harm to human health, the environment or neighboring farms,” the center’s executive director, Andrew Kimbrell, warns. “This novel corn will foster resistant weeds that require more toxic pesticides to kill, followed by more resistance and more pesticides — a chemical arms race in which the only winners are pesticide/biotechnology firms.” MORE AT SOURCE

Short URL: http://www.newsnet14.com/?p=101769

Tenneesee Jury Splits Verdict In Somali Sex-Trafficking Ring

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) – A Tennessee federal jury split its verdict Friday against nine people accused of operating a sex trafficking ring across three states run mostly by Somali refugee gang members, convicting three men and acquitting six.

The defendants are among 30 who were indicted in the case that spans from Minnesota to Ohio and Tennessee. The jury of six men and six women deliberated over five days this week before returning the verdict. The other defendants were severed from the trial and could face trial at a later date.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Van Vincent said the verdict shows that the jury found that sex trafficking did occur and the government won’t cease prosecuting these cases.

“It’s very important for victims to understand that you can come forward, people will listen and that people can believe what you have to say about the crime,” Vincent said.

A Somali witness identified only as Jane Doe No. 2 testified that she was used as a prostitute by gang members starting at the age of 12. She cried in court as she described being taken to several apartments in around suburban Minneapolis to have sex with other Somali men for money, sometimes as little as $40.  ARICLE

______________________________________________________

Sharia Comes To A Tennessee Courtroom

According to TwinCities.com, “Suspects facing trial in sex trafficking ring that included Twin Cities”:

The defendants are Abdifatah Jama Adan, Ahmad Abdulnasir Ahmad, Musse Ahmed Ali, Hassan Ahmed Dahir, Faduma Mohamed Farah, Idris Ibrahim Fahra, Abdullahi Hashi, Fatah Haji Hashi, Abdirahman Abderazak Hersi, Dahir Nor Ibrahim, Abdifatah Bashir Jama, Andrew Kayachith, Fuad Faisal Nur, Yasin Abdirhaman Yusuf and Mohamed Ahmed Amalle.

They are accused of running a decades long rape ring that groomed teenage girls, both Americans and Somalian immigrants, to be prostitutes for older men, in Minneapolis/St. Paul, Columbus, Ohio, and Nashville, Tennessee.

The Somali gangs would give the girls money and drugs in exchange for sex.

[victim Jane Doe] was told that using her for prostitution was referred to as a “mission” and other gang members wouldn’t be charged to have sex with her.  ARTICLE

Short URL: http://www.newsnet14.com/?p=101660

Irish bands Dervish and Fullset cancel Israel performances citing boycott.

JERUSALEM (JTA) – Two Irish bands canceled their heavily advertised concerts in Israel citing a cultural boycott.

Dervish and Fullset were scheduled to play in an Irish music concert on three dates at the end of June in Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Nahalal.

In a statement published on its website and its Facebook page, Dervish called its original decision to participate in the concerts “completely non-political.” The concerts were arranged by an Israeli musician called a “friend of the band.”

Dervish

Dervish said that once it became aware that “there was a cultural boycott in place,” it was not willing to break the boycott. “Our decision to withdraw from the concerts reflects our wish to neither endorse nor criticise anyone’s political views in this situation,” the statement said.

“I deeply regret any upset caused by all of this,”  the band’s lead vocalist, Cathy Jordan, said in a statement. “It was far from our intention to stir up all this anger and hatred, when the opposite was what was intended.

“In hindsight, it was very naive of me to think our motives would not be misunderstood and misrepresented. So much so it started an avalanche of negativity which has made it impossible for us to make the trip regardless of our motives.”

Dervish had more than 350 comments about the concert on its Facebook page as of Sunday, and Jordan’s received more than 200.

In its statement on Facebook, the band Fullset said that because of all of the negative comments it had received about the upcoming Israel performances, “the goodness is gone out of this trip.”

“We are musicians. We love music. We do not discriminate against any person nor push our individual political ideas onto anyone,” the band said in its statement. “We were going to Israel to play for human beings, regardless of their beliefs, political views, religion or ethnic background.”

The band concluded, “We encourage everyone to please stop arguing over this tour. It’s finished. Time to move on.”

source JTA

Short URL: http://www.newsnet14.com/?p=101748

May 6th marks the 75th anniversary of the Hindenburg Disaster.

The Hindenburg Disaster

May 6th marks the 75th anniversary of the Hindenburg disaster. The Hindenburg, a German zeppelin, burst into flame while attempting to dock at the Lakehurst Naval Air Station in New Jersey on May 6, 1937, killing 36 people. thank you battleskin88

Inventor: Ferdinand Adolf August Heinrich von Zeppelin, (Count)

The Mystery of the Hindenburg Disaster

It was the largest airship ever built; over eight-hundred feet long from its nose to its massive tail fins. It was the height of luxury travel and carried over 2,656 people across the Atlantic from Germany to New York and Rio de Janeiro. It was theHindenburg. In the space of 37 seconds the mighty zeppelin was destroyed in a fire that killed a third of its crew and passengers and left spectators crying in horror.

What caused this catastrophe? Was it negligence, sabotage, or as Hitler called it, “An act of God”?

The first successful dirigible (a balloon that has engines to control its horizontal movement) was built in France in 1852. Although other countries built these types of airships, the Germans quickly became the most advanced in this form of lighter-than-air technology.

 Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin, a German businessman, built a fleet of experimental dirigibles. The type of airships Zeppelin built were spindle-shaped with a rigid internal steel structure (unlike the flexible bodied blimps common today). Inside the craft were large bags filled with gas that gave the ship its lift as well as catwalks to allow the crew to move back and forth inside the hull to service the airship. Beneath the craft was a gondola which carried the crew and passengers. By 1911 Zeooelin’s airship LZ-10 (also known as the Schwaben) was in passenger service and would go onto make 218 flights carrying 1,553 passengers. Zeppelin became so well-known for this type of dirigible that his name soon became synonymous with that type of airship.

Starting in 1914, the beginning of WWI, the Count’s zeppelins were used to drop bombs on cities in a number of European countries. They made over fifty raids on London alone, dropping nearly 200 tons of explosives. As the war progressed, however, most of the German’s zeppelin fleet was destroyed by British guns or aircraft. The gas that gave them their lift, hydrogen, was very flammable, and even a small bomb hitting a zeppelin could reduce it to ashes in just a few minutes.

After the war Germany again began building large airships. As part of war reparations the Germans built the ZR-3 Los Angeles for the U.S. Navy. In 1928 the Zeppelin Company built what was the most successful passenger dirigible of all time, the Graf Zeppelin.

The dirigible Hindenburg is shown in its final stages of construction in Friedrichshafen, Germany, on March 6, 1936. (AP Photo)

-Lakehurst/New Jersey, May 6th 1937, 7 pm: The “Hindenburg” has come all the way from  Europe  a luxurious flying hotel, faster than any ship. The pride of the Third Reich prepares to land, and hundreds of onlookers have gathered to watch.

Then, all of a sudden, a burst of flame just forward of the upper fin. In a matter of seconds, the largest airship ever built goes down in a fiery blaze.

35 people died in the flames – and nobody knew why. Sabotage? A bolt of lightning? The mystery surrounding the disaster has never been resolved – until now. In many years of research, a NASA scientist at Cape Canaveral has found proof that neither the hydrogen in the hull nor a bomb was to blame, but the fabric of the Hindenburg’s outer skin and a new protective coating. A single spark of static electricity was enough to make it burn like dry leaves. The “infallible” German engineers had designed a flying bomb just waiting to explode.

The dirigible Hindenburg is shown in its final stages of construction in Friedrichshafen, Germany, on March 6, 1936. (AP Photo) The fabric-covered walls in the main lounge aboard the zeppelin Hindenburg were decorated with a map of the world showing the routes of famous explorers, seen in this undated photograph. (AP Photo) The German zeppelin Hindenburg flies over Manhattan on May 6, 1937. A few hours later, the ship burst into flames in an attempt to land at Lakehurst, USA. (AP Photo) This May 6, 1937 file photo, taken at almost the split second that the Hindenburg exploded, shows the 804-foot German zeppelin just before the second and third explosions send the ship crashing to the earth over the Lakehurst Naval Air Station in Lakehurst, N.J. (AP Photo)