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)
When will the banners be called to account?
Business are often held liable and forced to pay monetary damages for defective products and false statements. Why shouldn't the National Audubon Society, Environmental Defense, Sierra Club and other anti-DDT activist groups be held liable for the harm caused by their recklessly defective activism?
He reminds us that it was pseudo-science that brought us the DDT ban, starting with Rachel Carson's false Silent Spring and ending with an ideology-controlled EPA.
It was, of course, then-Environmental Protection Agency Administrator William Ruckelshaus who actually banned DDT after ignoring an EPA administrative law judge's ruling that there was no evidence indicating DDT posed any sort of threat to human health or the environment. Mr. Ruckelshaus never attended any of the agency's DDT hearings. He didn't read the hearing transcripts and refused to explain his decision.
None of this is surprising given that, in a May 22, 1971, speech before the Wisconsin Audubon Society, Mr. Ruckelshaus said EPA procedures had been streamlined so DDT could be banned. Mr. Ruckelshaus was also a member of, and wrote fundraising letters for, the EDF.
By the way, Milloy notes, with the exception of the late Miss Carson, the same groups who rushed to judgment against DDT are all now sounding the global warming alarm. So if Osama does indeed have typhus, maybe he'll die en route to the hospital in his government-mandated, low-emission hybrid car.
