Juggling Dynamite

Old, leaky, inadequate treatment plants are part of this story (infrastructure under-investment has been epic during the past decade of ‘financialization’ obsession), but the epidemic use of pharmaceuticals for every ‘dis-ease’ rather a focus on nurturing health is the main piece. We are poisoning ourselves and everything around us in the process. Time to shift tactics? See Drugs found in Puget Sound salmon:

Puget Sound salmon are on drugs — Prozac, Advil, Benadryl, Lipitor, even cocaine.

Those drugs and dozens of others are showing up in the tissues of juvenile chinook, researchers have found, thanks to tainted wastewater discharge.

The estuary waters near the outfalls of sewage-treatment plants, and effluent sampled at the plants, were cocktails of 81 drugs and personal-care products, with levels detected among the highest in the nation.

The medicine chest of common drugs also included Flonase, Aleve and Tylenol. Paxil, Valium and Zoloft. Tagamet, OxyContin and Darvon. Nicotine and caffeine. Fungicides, antiseptics and anticoagulants. And Cipro and other antibiotics galore.

Ride along with Rebecca Hough, Evatran CEO in a Plugless Chevy Volt. Learn about the benefits wireless EV charging and watch a Chevy Volt charge hands-free in this Plugless video test drive. Here is a direct video link.

The financial elites have been so nepotistic, indulged and unduly enriched for so long that they have completely lost all sense of fairness or due process or principles of justice. We have to hold them accountable and return to basic principles of a fair and democratic society. The other way lies only anarchy and further darkness.

Elizabeth Warren is one of the rare politicians advancing a return to the rule of law.  Conscientious, enlightened people must do likewise.  As with the Pecora Commission in the 1930’s bringing unethical, illegal, embarrassing conduct to the light of day is our best hope for breaking up the cartel.

Elizabeth Warren shines a light on the CME’s and Craig Pirrong @streetwiseprof ‘s conflicts with the CFTC. https://t.co/o9vJA1ezSJ

— Sal Arnuk (@ThemisSal) March 3, 2016

Read Warren’s letter to the Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) here.  This is her conclusion:

Congress directed the CFTC to establish the Energy and Environmental Markets Advisory Committee so that the agency could benefit from a diverse set of views on the possible impacts of CFTC actions. The committee that has been constituted under that authority-and the final report that was released earlier today- fails that test. The Committee itself did not meet the statutory requirements to represent a “broad spectrum of interests,”instead forming an industry- insider group that produced a product reflecting the highest hopes of the industry for as little regulation as possible. The meeting transcripts indicate that the Committee failed to conduct a robust investigation of the key issues in question, and the final report mischaracterizes key aspects of the Committee’s recorded discussions.

This report, which bears the official stamp of a CFTC committee, is nothing more than a recitation of industry talking points, and it should be treated as such. Because of the legal, substantive, and procedural irregularities, I ask that you withdraw this report and refrain from submitting it to the CFTC  for consideration.”