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The Colonial Pipeline spill has caused 6 states (Tennessee, Virginia, Georgia, South Carolina, Alabama, and North Carolina) to declare a state of emergency. Gasoline (petrol) prices on the east coast are likely to spike. Yet, most puzzling is how this vast emergency and its likely effect on cost of living has gone unnoticed by mainstream media outlets. The pipeline is owned by Koch Industries: is this why the media is silent?
[Are there any Soylentils in the affected area who can corroborate this story? Have you heard of the spill, seen long gas lines, or any price gouging? -Ed.]
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Six US States Declare Emergency after Major Gasoline Pipeline Spill; Media Almost Silent
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Nadia Comaneci, simple perfection.
-- '76 Olympics
(Score: 3, Insightful) by stretch611 on Monday September 19 2016, @11:57AM
...when Bayer-Monsanto puts franken genes in store-bought food.
What do you mean when???
Its already happening. Monsanto makes roundup ready crops... which are genetically modified to be resistant to roundup (and made sterile to force farmers to buy seeds every year instead of saving seeds from the crop to plant the next year.) http://web.mit.edu/demoscience/Monsanto/about.html [mit.edu]Roundup ready crops have been around for 20 years now.
Also a year ago farm workers started suing Monsanto alleging that http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-monsanto-lawsuits-idUSKCN0S92H720151015 [reuters.com]roundup causes cancer.
So it seems that the franken genes are already in all our food... and to top it off, our food is covered in carcinogens. No wonder why all of congress wass bought off to overrule Vermonts GMO labelling law.
Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Phoenix666 on Monday September 19 2016, @01:38PM
That is true, but it has been possible to buy organic produce to evade GMOs. But then this story [treehugger.com] was published over the weekend. Does anyone really think that Big Ag-produced "organic" produce will really be unmodified? The only to be sure is to grow your own.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 1) by TheSouthernDandy on Monday September 19 2016, @05:34PM
our food is covered in carcinogens
Possibly, but not from most organophosphates. The charge on phosphate groups tends to make them water soluble, and unable to intercalate between DNA bases, where they would cause mutagenesis.
One of many documents here (http://www.nj.gov/dep/enforcement/pcp/bpc/wps/ops.pdf) mentions that this class of compounds is not generally considered carcinogenic, and the EPA is only considering two (parathion and phosmet) as possible ones.
That's not to say you can't tack a phosphonate group onto some huge planar organic compound that is a carcinogen, and make an organophosphate carcinogen, but what's the point? It's lousy in both roles (water insoluble AND probably less carcinogenic).
Sadly, it's this kind of argument ("it's alleged, so it must have some truth because CONSPIRACY!") that gives me pause on voting Green. Then again, I've no doubt about the evil that corporations are willing to do for a quick buck, and some checks (however ill founded scientifically) would do the world good.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday September 19 2016, @05:47PM
Roundup (which OP mentioned) is not an organophosphate.
There are tests showing that Roundup's declared active ingredient glyphosate is safe but the thing is Roundup isn't just glyphosate it has other ingredients.
And the combination can be a lot more toxic than glyphosate alone: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/weed-whacking-herbicide-p/ [scientificamerican.com]
https://theintercept.com/2016/05/17/new-evidence-about-the-dangers-of-monsantos-roundup/ [theintercept.com]
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3955666/ [nih.gov]
As for organophosphates if you're unlucky they might give you neurological problems (not so much cancer): https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/03/080328070136.htm [sciencedaily.com]
In short, cancer is not the only problem with pesticides and other poisons: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/parkinsons-disease-and-pesticides-whats-the-connection/ [scientificamerican.com]
(Score: 1) by TheSouthernDandy on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:33PM
Quite right, my typo--glyphosate is an organophosphonate (extra "-on-", I got it right latter in the comment :} ).
(Score: 2) by dry on Tuesday September 20 2016, @01:48AM
Organophosphates, which were developed to kill people quick by interfering with the nervous system, aren't the problem. The common household ones such as Malathion are broken down by liver enzymes pretty quick in most people and on farms the stronger ones also break down fairly quick, which is why they replaced the Organochlorides, of which DDT was the most harmless.
The parent was talking about glyphosate, a herbicide that is considered quite safe. The problem as the sibling AC said is the surfactants, emulsifiers and such, which are totally unregulated and not talked about as they're not the active ingredient.
(Score: 1) by TheSouthernDandy on Thursday September 29 2016, @03:49PM
The problem as the sibling AC said is the surfactants, emulsifiers and such
That could be, I wasn't responding to the sibling. Although, we'd have to know how much of these compounds make it into the ingested plant parts, are removed in processing, and their persistence in the environment, to know whether they are problems as carcinogens. Carcinogenic chemicals that don't actually make it into an organism may not be such a problem. A gas-powered mower may put out more carcinogenic aromatics in one's immediate environment via incomplete combustion than they're exposed to via agriculture, but we don't think too much about it because the exhaust gets diluted quickly, and it's unrealistic to demand everyone use electric or manual mowers.
I agree that it would be better to use safe chemicals when available and realistic to do so, but I also hold that digging into the issues presents more nuance than is presented here, and that risk is quantitative--it must be balanced against the alternatives (agriculture without those chemicals, or with alternatives).