As George W. Bush and John Kerry vie for the votes of the American electorate, each is portraying himself as the strongest protector of the American people. Regardless of who becomes president, the United States remains a more dangerous place than other advanced capitalist countries.[1] With the two major parties dominated by corporate interests, neither has much motivation for putting the public’s health and safety over profit making. The choice in this election, nonetheless, isn’t just between Tweedledee and Tweedledum. It is between the Democratic Party which, because of its base, is likely to have some commitment to the general welfare, and the Republicans, who are likely to continue their fierce attacks on the physical well-being of the majority of this country’s population.
George W. Bush consistently portrays himself as a protector of the nation. Yet his incumbency has seen an increase in the dangers to public health and safety as corporate wish lists are repeatedly turned into public policy. This cumulative record is receiving scant attention from the media or from the Democratic Party. Narrowly focusing on “terrorism,” the Kerry campaign should be stressing the other dangers to public health and safety of a Bush reelection.
Here is a small sampling of these dangers.
Accurate scientific information is essential for people to make informed decisions to protect themselves and others. As of July 2004, over 4000 scientists had signed a statement tellingly titled Restoring Scientific Integrity in Policy Making. The endorsers include 127 National Academy of Science members, 48 of them recipients of Nobel prizes. The statement charges the administration with distorting and suppressing scientific knowledge.[2] Summarizing the Bush administration’s manipulation of science, environmentalist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. noted that the current president’s “campaign to suppress science … is arguably unmatched in the Western world since the Inquisition.”[3] Under Bush, industry-sponsored science, sometimes called “junk science,” replaces genuine scientific analysis and reporting. For example, when the U.S. Geological Survey found dangerous concentrations of the widely-used and carcinogenic weed killer, Atrazine, in Midwestern drinking water, research on this product was taken out of the hands of Environmental Policy Agency scientists. Syngneta, Atrazine’s Swiss-based manufacturer, will now conduct federally-funded research on its own product.[4]
When information is inconvenient for the White House the offending materials are revised or deleted. The administration has excised from government agency websites over six thousand documents which detail the dangers of environmental contamination, and the transporting and piping of hazardous substances. Executive orders have increased the EPA’s power to keep information secret.[5]
The harm done by the 9/11 assaults was exacerbated by the EPA’s misinforming New Yorkers, including rescue workers, about the contaminants left when the twin towers of the World Trade Center collapsed. According to the EPA’s own Inspector General, “The White House Council on Environmental Quality influenced … the information that EPA communicated to the public….” People with asthma and other respiratory problems were not warned that they were particularly vulnerable to the contaminated air. Lies were told about the levels of asbestos particulates. The National Security Council was given the job of deciding what should or should not be in the EPA’s report. A staffer in the agency’s Office of Communications, Tina Kreisher, reported feeling “extreme pressure” to alter the report’s contents so that the air quality would be seen as less dangerous than it was.[6]
Global warming is threatening the whole planet. In the United States deadly heat waves such as that in Chicago in 1995, and diseases associated with warmer climates, such as West Nile fever, are among the consequences.[7] Yet when the EPA issued a report on climate change, the writers were ordered to make changes that minimized the impact of human activity.[8] What the Union of Concerned Scientist describes as a “discredited study of temperature records, funded in part by the American Petroleum Institute” was made a part of the EPA’s document on climate change,[9] as a way to whitewash the major role of fossil fuels in global warming. In his convention speech, Kerry, at least, acknowledged the importance of seeking alternative energy sources.
Dirty air kills people. Using 1980’s data for 151 metropolitan areas covering 552,138 adults, Harvard Public Health School researchers found a significant relationship between air pollution and deaths from lung cancer and cardiopulmonary disorders. In the 1980s, smog killed a minimum of. 275 people a year in two southern California counties. The 2003 blackout in the Northeast was accompanied by a sharp reduction in smog producing pollutants.[10] This is the kind of evidence the administration ignores.
The Clean Air Act passed in 1970 is supposed to lessen air pollution. President Bush wants to replace this with the falsely named Clean Skies initiative which would greatly increase previously mandated limits on the pollutants causing smog and acid rain: sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide.[11] Under his watch the EPA is creating new rules that allow companies to have, in the words of a National Association of Manufacturers official, “a refreshingly flexible approach to regulation.” In a less sanguine vein the American Lung Association referred to Bush’s roll back of air quality rules as “the most harmful and unlawful air-pollution initiative ever undertaken by the federal government.”[12]
Mercury poisoning can cause brain damage in children and fetuses. In the decade before Bush took office, government regulations had reduced mercury emissions from waste incinerators, but omitted regulating those from power plants. This was about to be addressed by the EPA, but when Bush took office he interfered with the regulatory review process. Additionally, an EPA report on mercury risk was edited to downplay the risks.[13] New Jersey state toxicologist Alan Stern remarked that this seemed to be done in order “to give less weight to the potential health impacts of mercury.”[14]
Lead poisoning wreaks havoc on children’s developing bodies. Experts on lead poisoning recommended by the federal government’s Centers for Disease Control to serve on a committee on the problem were rejected by Secretary of Health and Human Services, Tommy Thompson. According to the Union of Concerned Scientists, “Two of his substitute choices were handpicked by the lead industry.”[15]
The agency supposed to provide protection against environmental hazards is making it easier for PCB-contaminated lands to be used for development, undermining 25-year old protections. PCB’s cause nerve damage in children, and weaken the human immune system. Their production has been illegal since 1977.[16]
Medical research findings harmful to pharmaceutical interests are suppressed. After studying the effects of antidepressants on children, Food and Drug Administration epidemiologist Dr. Andrew Mosholder was prepared to present testimony to Congress that these medications can cause suicidal feelings. The FDA squelched his appearance.[17] Medical research has been derailed to appease religious fundamentalists. Stem-cell research or the lack thereof, is one example.[18]
Food safety is jeopardized. Department of Agriculture scientists are being pressured to approve livestock without screening them sufficiently for diseases such as tuberculosis, and mad cow disease. This was done in the interests of favored countries and food industries supported by the White House.[19]
Going to work has become more dangerous and unhealthy under Bush. The AFL-CIO’s occupational health and safety director, Margaret Seminario, describes the Bush record “as the worst … when it comes to workplace safety.”[20] She noted that the “administration has just shut down the regulatory operation at OSHA.”[21] For 32 years, OSHA’s workplace safety advisory committee had an equal number of members from management and labor. In 2002, the White House removed five of the worker’s representatives.[22]
Former President Clinton had enacted strong ergonomic rules, with a goal of reducing repetitive stress injures that affect nearly 2 million workers annually. Under the Clinton rules employers were supposed to investigate sources of potential muscular-skeletal injures and implement measures to lessen them, such as redesigning work stations. Experts in health and safety predicted that the rules would lead to about 500,000 fewer injuries.[23] When Bush took office in January 2001, Congressional Republicans and several Democrats, with White House backing, used the Regulatory Review Act — never before invoked to overturn a major regulation — to repeal the protection.[24]
Many protective workplace rules have been withdrawn. The Bush administration derailed a process that would have protected workers against infectious diseases, such as tuberculosis, in the workplace.[25] In another anti-worker move the rules requiring employers to keep records on certain injuries have been changed so that it will be harder to even know what is happening and make it more difficult to prove the need for stronger regulations.[26] The current administration wants to reduce the number of workplace inspectors, cut funding for workers’ safety training programs, and for research on workers’ health and safety.[27]
The current chief executive has proposed cutting funds for programs that would improve air traffic safety, and strengthen police, fire, and emergency rescue departments. Social programs that would improve personal and community well-being are also in danger of serious under-funding. These include after-school programs, and counseling for drug and alcohol treatment.[28]
Bush supporters are wrong to think the president offers a protective shield against terrorism. Even Colin Powell’s State Department admits an increase in terrorist incidents between 2002 and 2003, with more people being injured or killed as a result. In an unprecedented action, twenty-six high-level retired military officers and diplomats have formed a group, Diplomats and Military Commanders for Change, calling for Bush’s defeat. Some of them served under Reagan and/or the first Bush.[29]
Summarizing the findings of the bipartisan 9/11 commission, journalist Robert Scheer wrote that they demonstrate that the president’s “credentials” are “nothing more than empty posturing,” and that Bush showed a “near-total indifference” to Clinton administration warnings about an impending threat from Al Qaeda. Presently, funds for protecting ports, airplane cargo, and mass transit are far below what experts say is needed.[30]
If the past four years are an accurate predictor of the health and safety impact of another 4 years of Bush then a Kerry presidency is the better choice in November. Past organized struggles have resulted in environmental laws and occupational health and safety regulations that while inadequate have made a real difference. Progressive activists who want to protect past gains and increase the chances of a better future need to recognize the dangers of a second Bush administration while continuing to organize and fight, even if Kerry is elected.
Notes
1. For data on this see Barbara H. Chasin, Inequality and Violence in the United States: Casualties of Capitalism (Amherst, NY; Humanity Books 2004), 19-23.
2. Union of Concerned Scientists, “Scientific Integrity in Policy Making: Further investigation of the Bush administration’s abuse of science.”
3. Robert F. Kennedy Jr. “The Junk Science of George W. Bush,” Nation, March 8, 2004, 11.
4. Kennedy, 16.
5. The Daily Mislead, “Bush Hides Documents About Environmental Policy“; Andrew C. Revkin with Katharine Q. Seelye, “Report by E. P.A. Leaves out Data on Climate Change,” New York Times, June 19, 2003, A1, A20.
6. Laurie Garrett “EPA Misled Public on 9/11 Pollution,” Common Dreams News Center. This article was originally published in Newsday, 8/23/03. Quote from Kreisher in Jeff Shaw, “Dissecting the Bush Administration: Deception at Ground Zero,” Multinational Monitor, May/June 2004, 25.
7. For a discussion of the Chicago heat wave, see Eric Klinenberg, Heat Wave: A Social Autopsy of Disaster in Chicago, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002. Klinenberg himself is not discussing global warming. William K. Steven, “Warmer, Wetter, Sicker: Linking Climate to Health,” New York Times, Aug. 10, 1998, A1, A12.
8. Union of Concerned Scientists, Restoring Scientific Integrity in Policymaking; and Global Environment: Climate Change Research Distorted and Suppressed. The latter is an excerpt from their report Scientific integrity in Policymaking.
9. Union of Concerned Scientists, “Global Environment: Climate Change Research Distorted and Suppressed.”
10. CA Pope 3rd, MJ Thun, et al, “Particulate air pollution as a predictor of mortality in a prospective study of U.S. adults,” American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Vol. 151, No. 3, March, 1995, 669-674; Smog Linked to 275 Deaths a Year in 2 Counties,” New York Times, March 18, 1995, 9; “But the Air Was Clean,” New York Times, June 22, 2004, F3.
11. Jeff Shaw, “Dissecting the Bush Administration: Dirtying the Skies,” Multinational Monitor, May/June 2004, p. 23.
12. Quotes from Bruce Barcoli, “Changing All the Rules,” New York Times Magazine, April 4, 2004, 76.
13. Paul Krugman, “The Mercury Scandal,” New York Times, April 6, 2004, A23; Jennifer 8. Lee, “White House Minimized the Risks of Mercury in Proposed Rules, Scientists Say,” New York Times, April 7, 2004, A16.
14. Alex Nussbaum, “Scientist: Mercury report altered,” The Record (Bergen County, NJ), April 8, 2004, A-10.
15. Wendy Johnson, “The Legacy of Lead: Pervasive Poisoning, Suspect Science and the industry Effort to Escape Liability, Multinational Monitor, April, 2003, 15-16; Alden Meter, “Bringing Science Back to the People,” Catalyst: The Magazine of the Union of Concerned Scientists, Vol. 3., No. 1, Spring, 2004, 3.
16. Jennifer 8. Lee, “E.P.A. Relaxes Restrictions On Sale of Contaminated Land,” New York Times, Sept. 3, 2003, A12.
17. Gardiner Harris, “Expert Kept From Speaking At Antidepressant hearing.” New York Times, April 16, 2004, A16.
18. Union of Concerned Scientists, “New Cases of Scientific Abuse by Administration Emerge,” July 8, 2004.
19. Donald G. McNeil Jr., “U.S. Scientist tells of Pressure to Lift Bans on Food Imports.” New York Times, Feb. 25, 2004, A19.
20. Quoted in Lee Drutman, “Dissecting the Bush Administration: Labor,” Multinational Monitor, May/June 2004, 17.
21. Multinational Monitor interview with Margaret Seminario, “Workers at Risk: The dangers on the Job When the Regulators Don’t Try Very Hard,” June 2003, 24.
22. Drutman, 18.
23. Multinational Monitor interview with Seminario, 24.
24. Multinational Monitor interview with Seminario, 23; Helen Dewar and Cindy Skrzycki, “Workplace Health Initiative Rejected; Senate Acts to Kill Ergonomics Rule,” Washington Post, March 7, 2001, A1.
25. Drutman, 17.
26. Multinational Monitor interview with Seminario, 24-25.
27. Steven Greenhouse, “Bush Plan to Avert Work Injuries Seeks Voluntary Steps by Industry,” New York Times, April 6, 2002, A1, A12; UAW, “Bush Proposal Knifes OSHA and NIOSH; Bush Attacks Safety and health Funds.”
28. Edmund L. Andrews, “Bush Budget Cuts or Cancels School Programs, Drug Centers and Air Traffic Changes,” New York Times, Feb. 4, 2004, A14.
29. Ronald Brownstein, “Retired Officials Say Bush Must Go,” Los Angeles Times, June 13, 2004, A1.
30. Robert Scheer “An Excuse-Spouting Bush is Busted by 9/11 report,” Los Angeles Times, June 13, 2004; Daily Mislead, “Bush Misleads on Homeland Security.” See also Stephen R. Shalom “After Two years: Real Dangers and False Solutions in the Age of Terrorism,” ZNET, Sept. 10, 2003.
Barbara H. Chasin is a professor of sociology at Montclair State University. She is the author of Inequality and Violence in the United States: Casualties of Capitalism, Humanity Press. The 2004 2nd edition has been chosen as the best book of the year by the Marxist section of the American Sociological Association.
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