LETTERS
LETTERS Phantom Fathers The Last Word essay, "Phantom Fathers" (August issue), was touching and addressed a significant problem. However, the author's attitude toward the responsibility of fathers...
...The concluding statements attributed to a Monsanto spokesman were lifted out of context from a discussion of another product altogether...
...Where was she when Senator Boren of Oklahoma ripped General Secord for his arrogant disregard of the Constitution...
...The folks at the Dodge dealership were kind enough to provide us with a loaner van, which we drove more than 1,000 miles with a disconnected odometer...
...S. Ted Isaacs Cincinnati, Ohio After many years of subscribing to The Progressive, I confess I was about to give it up—mostly because I have such a hard time keeping up with all my reading...
...There can be little doubt that if Bork and his supporters had been living at the time of the War of Independence, they would have been hard-core Tories and supporters of the monarchy of George III...
...I particularly liked her irreverence toward such sacred cows as "intensive supervision...
...Pia C. Jensen Santa Rosa, California Anthony Kimery tries to persuade readers that Roundup is dangerous and that Monsanto is evil by citing such "experts" as Steve Dreistadt of Citizens for a Better Environment and Jordan Barab of the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees...
...They have been pretty free with their moral judgments...
...Harley Cahen Ithaca, New York Road to Nowhere Our warm applause for Karen Franklin's excellent article on the Tongass National Forest ("The Forest Service's Road to Nowhere," Datelines, June issue...
...No one seems to know whether there is a connection...
...Did we expect a Koran in return...
...Andrea DiLorenzo Takoma Park, Maryland Weed Killer The shoddy, irresponsible reporting of Anthony L. Kimery ("Weed Killer," July issue) hardly deserves a response...
...John D. Vivian Lantana, Florida A Brief Against Bork The contention by many opponents as well as supporters of the Bork nomination that Supreme Court appointments should not be made on "ideological grounds" has no validity whatsoever ("A Brief Against Bork," Comment, September issue...
...The interview with Noam Chomsky gave me exactly what I needed...
...Thank you for the good work...
...When Senator Rudman of New Hampshire savaged Owen, Abrams, and others...
...Eric Storlie Madison, Wisconsin The author replies: Iam sure Monsanto's supporters have honorable intentions when they claim Roundup is safer than some other products...
...In fact, pesticides like Roundup disappear from crops a few months after application, so that the danger of human consumption is less than minimal...
...I can only sympathize with the victims, most likely residents of areas where poverty—and crime—hit hardest...
...Does Rocawich also think toxic dumpers are just reacting to, say, competitive pressures...
...These, too, were provided without working odometers...
...Several of the accepted studies show significant discrepancies...
...The story reported issues resolved in the past as current—for example, that invalid tests from a defunct laboratory, IBT, support gly-phosate's registration...
...National security and the national interest, as you indicated, provide the perfect substitute for thought and debate...
...Environmental Protection Agency and those declared invalid have been replaced with acceptable studies...
...It is virtually immobile in soil and will not leach into groundwater systems...
...Monsanto calls my reporting "shoddy" and "irresponsible...
...Thus a few words seem appropriate to begin to set the record straight...
...The true patriots of today are those who recognize the deadly danger to our nation of the Bork nomination, and who are working to save the living spirit of the American Revolution...
...Who ate it...
...Chris Finch Southeast Alaska Conservation Council Juneau, Alaska The editors welcome correspondence from readers on all topics, but prefer to publish letters that comment directly on material previously published in The Progressive...
...Monsanto and its supporters completely avoid the fact that out of almost 200 pesticides used in California, Roundup causes by far the greatest number of problems...
...David Sterling Minneapolis, Minnesota Roundup has been researched extensively and has yet to yield a major, harmful impact on wildlife or humans...
...In fact, his doctor later stated that he was being treated for cellulitis, that there never was a worry of amputation, and that amputation was never discussed with the patient...
...Yet I do not believe that stinging criticism unaccompanied by viable, tested suggestions for reform will do much, if anything, to improve the present dreadful realities...
...While the replaced studies have, indeed, been "accepted" by the Environmental Protection Agency, they are still under review to determine whether they validate Monsanto's claims that Roundup is safe...
...However, the author's attitude toward the responsibility of fathers is unsatisfactory...
...Leo Uzych Wallingford, Pennsylvania Idon't know how many Quakers in the 1790s knew about Cesare Beccaria's advocacy of imprisonment as an alternative to execution, but I do know that Quakers preferred jails because of their belief that "there is that of God in every person...
...G.D...
...Its acute toxicity is less than that of table salt or aspirin...
...At other times, I was able to put more than a few miles on the sales manager's custom black Challenger and a green-and-white Dodge Po-lara...
...Gary Baldwin Chicago, Illinois Linda Rocawich's article is important because it focuses left-progressive attention on a very important topic that is too often ignored...
...Today, Quakers are in the forefront of those seeking abolition of prisons...
...Committee members are making moral judgments—the right judgments—raising scruples, and even giving lectures on the Constitution...
...In the period just after my exposure I developed bilateral carpal-tunnel syndrome, and I am not sure of the cause...
...These studies have been reviewed by the EPA, by national regulatory agencies around the world, and by independent toxicologists and other scientists...
...Perhaps living in a large city skews my view of criminal behavior...
...The scientific^evidence is clear that glyphosate is one of the safest herbicides known...
...Our position was not directly sought for the story, but only lifted from other publications...
...record in Central America...
...Colleen A. Vachuska Milwaukee, Wisconsin Gavel to Grovel Gavel to Grovel" (September issue) was strong, pointed, and needed...
...They are doing their job...
...One correction of an editing error: The article included mention of "subsistence farming...
...And, of course, there was no hesitation about denying other peoples the right to choose their own political and social paths...
...it would set our country back more than 212 years, robbing our nation and our people of the fruits of the first and greatest revolution of modern history...
...Criticisms of an environmental witness (described as a "genetic toxicologist") were based on a two-year-old EPA comment taken out of context, and seemed to imply some cancer risk in laboratory mice...
...This obvious fault in Chomsky's thinking causes me to doubt much of what else he says...
...It is simply a rehash of misinformation and groundless charges against our firm's herbicide, glyphos-ate...
...The story ignored this concluding comment from the same document: "The agency does not expect any significant risk from the level of glyphosate to which humans are likely to be exposed...
...But the bottom line remains that Roundup has not been determined to be safe, despite claims to the contrary by Monsanto and its friends...
...It is not solely a woman's "fault" if she gets pregnant, and the consequences should not fall on her alone...
...All letters may be edited for clarity and conciseness...
...I am a recently graduated agronomist who abhors our current reliance on chemicals in agriculture...
...A scruple raised...
...Maybe the callers are more sophisticated in New England than they are here in Ohio, but I doubt it...
...Pity the team that would allow itself to be managed by such incoherence...
...Monsanto needs to get its facts straight...
...Supreme Court justices are sworn to defend the Constitution, a highly "ideological" document...
...It is much more serious than that...
...Monsanto is playing semantic games...
...Ruth W. Shearer adamantly disagree with Monsanto's position, pointing out that "a carcinogen is a carcinogen no matter how you look at it...
...We need to know who and what we are dealing with, and to understand how the practitioners of illegal, covert contra-wars have earned for themselves the right to be prosecuted under Federal criminal-racketeering statutes...
...I wonder whether I qualify for retirement benefits...
...Or the teen-ager tied to the bumper of a car and dragged, Wild West-style, through the streets...
...You're right: The contra-gate panel handled its hearings with all deliberate superficiality...
...And, incidentally, the Monsanto spokesman I talked with was specifically referring to Roundup...
...Daniel K. Garvey St...
...Furthermore, Monsanto continues to withhold from the public important health-effects data necessary for adequate validation of its safety claims...
...She complains (Small Favors, July issue), "Has anyone heard a moral judgment being made in these present hearings...
...Or the youngster shot to death by anonymous gunfire on the Fourth of July...
...The American Revolution was one of the most "ideological" in history...
...There have been 121 studies conducted on the health and environmental characteristics of Roundup herbicide and its active ingredient, glyphosate...
...Subsistence hunting and fishing is an economic necessity that is endangered by current logging practice...
...Martin L. Cohnstaedt Winnipeg, Manitoba An American Dissident have long admired Noam Chomsky for his intellectual honesty and the brilliance of his political writings, but I have seldom felt so enlightened by a few pages of interview as I did in reading Jim Peck's interview with Chomsky (July issue...
...The answer to Ivins's question is, "Yes...
...Acceptance means only that the new studies meet the guidelines set for replacing IBT's fraudulent reports...
...Ingenthron Monsanto Agricultural Co, St...
...But the day the July issue arrived, I sent in a two-year renewal...
...After all, I tested new cars for them...
...The van, I'm certain, was sold as new...
...As for the contention by Robert Bork's supporters that the Constitution needs to be interpreted on the basis of the "original intent" of the framers, that is a fraud intended to substitute the dead bones of the 1770s for the living spirit of the American Revolution, which for more than two centuries has been a beacon of hope and inspiration for the poor and oppressed of the world...
...The story also retold stale, refuted charges—the highway worker, for example, who supposedly "almost lost a leg" to pesticide poisoning...
...And, as important: What was the recipe for the cake they took...
...What I hear when I happen to listen to a sports call-in show is some of the most ignorant and irrational commentary that can be imagined...
...There was no challenge to covert actions, no questioning of the premises of the Cold War, no speculation about the larger costs of a military approach to global issues, little concern as to whether political democracy and imperial behavior were compatible...
...Facts are frequently incorrect and the opinions expressed are mostly foolish...
...It was troubling to perceive how the areas of agreement between witnesses and members of Congress during the Iran-contra arms hearings often seemed greater than the points of controversy...
...These men are not scientists, so they have no knowledge about the effects of using Roundup...
...Robert Engler New York, New York Even in your excellent article on what was not covered in the Iran-contra hearings, you overlooked the one top-secret, vital question that was not asked: Who was the loony that had Ronald Reagan inscribe the Good Book that our old gentleman in the White House sent to the other old gentleman in Qum...
...When there are so many more deplorable agricultural chemicals on the market today, why did Anthony Kimery choose to indict one of the few decent ones...
...It does not produce damaging substances during degradation...
...I would strongly advise caution before mindlessly "tearing down the walls...
...Anyone who reads the company's literature on Roundup will find it replete with inaccuracies and grossly misleading statements...
...It's time to do extensive and valid research on this product before more people are injured...
...Unless and until alternatives are shown to be effective and acceptable to the public, I believe it may be unwise to abandon the present system in favor of some unknown mechanism that might turn out to be even more unworkable...
...Actually, Tongass subsistence practices do not involve farming but fishing and hunting...
...Think of the housewives, and even the pastry chefs in multi-star restaurants, who would like to have this recipe...
...Quakers used jails to give expression to their faith that caring for the imprisoned person provides inmates with an alternative to wrongdoing...
...Ironically enough, in draining off funds for social programs, the enormous and growing expenditures being poured into building and operating prisons are compounding those social problems...
...Six months later, in February 1986, the scientific advisory panel of the EPA stated that it did not believe glyphosate should be categorized as a possible human carcinogen...
...When I visit inmates in penitentiaries, I am appalled at how the whole system contributes to the brutaliza-tion of inmates and guards alike...
...Residents such as the six-year-old girl beaten and raped by three men...
...Ivins's snide rhetorical question may reflect The Progressive's standard mistrust of government, but it is grossly unfair...
...Therefore, nominees to the Supreme Court must always meet the requirement of a strong and unswerving commitment to the ideology of the American Revolution...
...Anthony L. Kimery Oklahoma City, Oklahoma Moral Judgments Iusually agree with Molly Ivins, but I wonder whether we've been listening to the same Iran-contra hearings...
...The reaf danger to humans is that the waste products from the industrial production of herbicides are sitting around in toxic-waste dumps, waiting to leak into the ground and contaminate the water supply...
...One can only wonder in dismay how such a deplorable situation has come to pass in a nation whose democratic ideals are so deeply rooted in fairness...
...Granted that government and industry are often badly managed, I shudder to think how much worse the situation would be if management were in the hands of the people who call in on sports radio with the "analytical skills that almost all normal people have...
...Has she heard any of the questioning by Senators Mitchell and Cohen of Maine...
...Stuart Van Orden Perkins, Oklahoma Thank you for your penetrating critical review of a bewildering Congressional miscarriage...
...Eugene Werntz Friday Harbor, Washington Big Wheel at Chrysler Regarding your claim that Chrysler "made it a practice to disconnect the odometers on some new cars [and] turn those cars over to company executives for private use" ("Would You Buy a New Car from This Man...
...Locking 'em up is also America's all-purpose cure for social problems: home-lessness, retardation, mental illness, illiteracy, alcoholism, drug addiction, and troubled or troublesome youths...
...As for the cancer studies, such respected independent scientists as Dr...
...There was no sense of history about the U.S...
...The very measures being used to fight crime are creating more crime...
...Chomsky's voice is a blast of fresh air driving cant before it...
...Louis, Missouri My attention was drawn to Noam Chomsky's comments on radio call-in shows dealing with sports...
...In fact, all the IBT studies on glyphosate were reviewed by the U.S...
...I have helped research Roundup with grants from its producer, Monsanto, but I defend the product only because it appears to be safe and effective...
...Maygene Giari Pasadena, California Linda Rocawich's statement that "certainly for as long as our society is as unjust as it is, some people will react in dangerously violent ways to their environment" is nothing less than preposterous...
...I now consider myself a "Chrysler executive...
...But in no way can I write off to poverty, injustice, or any other excuse the types of senseless, violent acts reported almost daily in the newspapers here...
...Are people who visit such behavior on others merely "reacting" to an "unjust society...
...Comment, August issue): The year was 1973, shortly after my parents purchased a new Dodge station wagon that turned out to need warranty work...
...The result of each of the reviews has been supportive, and glyphosate is registered for use in more than 100 countries...
...It is not a matter of trying to preserve the bourgeois family but rather of building a fair world in which men arid women share their responsibilities...
...John Rossen Chicago, Illinois The Prison Solution Congratulations to Linda Rocawich for her excellent article, "Lock 'em Up: America's Ail-Purpose Cure for Crime" (August issue...
...It has been said that Bork's nomination would set our country back the thirty years of the Warren Court...
...Now the American people need to learn the histories of certain personnel of Oliver North's patriotic business enterprise...
...Louis, Missouri Anthony Kimery's article on the possibility of nerve damage resulting from exposure to Roundup was of special concern to me, since I have had the experience of being splashed with Roundup just below my neck...
...Ninety per cent of all households in southeast Alaska consume noncommercial wild game and fish...
...Russ Immarigeon Somerville, Massachusetts Profound racism as well as an apparent inability to achieve deterrence are merely some of the major problems afflicting the present incarceration process...
Vol. 51 • October 1987 • No. 10
