Mdix, I've been to 14 countries, and each had its abandoned yards with piled up 55 gallon drums of yuck.
In Majorca, on my teacher training course, I snuck off to the local village about ten miles away, and I could hardly breath just because so many wood fires were burning in individual homes. This was 1971 "modern" Spain, but the air was actually foggy with smoke. Reminded me of Saturday mornings when everyone in the burb gets out their lawn mower and beclouds the neighborhood with a Briggs and Stratton pollution machine. But, a "natural" smoke of a "wood stove" is noxious enough, but the puking of industry today just cannot be considered quite so quaint. America's pollution is not just "a lot of campfires." The sheer number of different chemicals that "nature never made" that are poured into our biosphere where they interact in unknown, unstudied ways is a far more egregious effluence. So, yes, I think third-world use of wood and high sulfur coal/oil is horrid, and 25% of L.A. smog is Chinese soot, but our 30,000 (some say 300,000) officially designated toxic dump sites, exude a brew of terrifyingly virility, and the grandfathering of so many industrial processes that are not subject to pollution laws leads me to believe that America's pollution is a deeper shade of vile. Edg --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > > > In a message dated 10/16/07 10:07:27 A.M. Central Daylight Time, > [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: > > Mdix, > > To hell with global warming theory -- what about pollution? > > > > > Hey, I'm all for cleaning up any toxic waste. I breath the same air, drink > the same water and eat the same foods you do. But let me ask you, have you ever > traveled outside the United States or Western Europe? If you have ever been > to countries like India, Mexico, or China, you would think of down town L.A. > as being virtually *smog free* . I only mention these three countries because > I've been to India and Mexico and have friends who have been to China and > our experience is that our pollution problems are miniscule compared to those > in those countries, yet our industries and use of fossil fuels is far greater. > I guess what really annoys me is that the very same people that complain the > loudest seem to be the same ones that stand in the way of ideas and > solutions that could help remedy the problems. Example, nuclear power plants to > generate electricity are fought tooth and nail as are wind turbines off Nantucket. > The people willing to invest in these things eventually give up because > the legal battles involved in getting it done, add too much to the initial cost > of start up. Meanwhile, we keep burning coal to get what could have been > generated very cleanly and cheaply. > > > > ************************************** See what's new at http://www.aol.com >
