From the New York Times:

“Despite a federal ban on importing PCBs, or polychlorinated biphenyls, the company, Veolia Environmental Services, has asked the Environmental Protection Agency for an exemption to move the chemicals by truck from Mexico and to burn them at its incinerator just outside Port Arthur. The incinerator has been disposing of the United States’ PCB waste since 1992.”

How does the EPA get off even tentatively approving something like this?

The people of Port Arthur aren’t welcoming 40 million pounds of toxic shit into their backyards (obviously). Since the 1970s, pollution in the area has earned the town nicknames like Cancer Alley and the Armpit of Texas. This is sad. The Times uses poverty, race and geography to explain the abuse of Port Arthur.

Still, the situation isn’t so simple. The toxins are being held in temporary facilities in Mexico, and that is likely to do more damage to the gulf than the incineration. Dear lord.

Oh, just FYI: “Port Arthur, with a population of about 58,000 people, face a legitimate risk of exposure to PCBs, which have been linked to cancer, brain and liver damage, skin rashes and harmful effects to the reproductive system.”

It’s also interesting that the mayor of Port Arthur refuses to get involved in the dialog because the incinerator is outside of city limits and he claims this to be a federal matter. I wonder how he sleeps at night

Newsweek had a good article about Texas’s F’ed up environmental policies, too.

China and Iran are pretty well known for oppressing freedom of speech and pouncing on anyone who dares speak out against the government.

But the worst country to be caught blogging in is Egypt, where officials have been “arresting, detaining, harassing, and beating bloggers that span the entire ideological spectrum, from the ultra-conservative Muslim Brotherhood to Coptic Christian minorities to socialists.”

Saudi Arabia and Syria are also on the top five.

I wonder what would happen if bloggers in the United States, and other free-speech oriented countries, collaborated with the writers living in these strictly controlled areas of the world. This has already happened to an extent, but some kind of anonymity would have to be established (use of public computers, anonymous sources). And that could get tricky.

Radiohead performed for Conan O’Brien’s late night talk show tonight, in light of the ‘green’ episode, and for NBC’s obvious back-patting promotion of Earth Week.

As much as I hate corporate use of environmental consciousness (and by this I mean latching on to once-a-year events to pretend to be green – meanwhile not giving two shits about the impact of societies on Mother Earth the rest of the time), I do love me some Radiohead.

“The chorus of this song is denial, denial,” Thom Yorke said about the song ‘House of Cards,’ while making reference to the man who refused to sign the Kyoto Agreement. “But he’s history,” Yorke smiled.

Yorke claimed the band was broadcasting in London instead of NYC because the amount of CO2 emissions from flying the distance would be the equivalent of driving for a year. I don’t have the scientific knowledge to prove this to be right or wrong, but it’s interesting to think about.

Radiohead rocks.

I was surprised tonight, to say the least, when I came home and stumbled upon a large rock on the kitchen floor, and shattered glass everywhere.  I knew I had almost caught you in the act, because I could still hear the glass crumbling in the frame of the door.

You may not know this, but the door you decided to smash was brand new.  We finally started to remodel our small, humble home, and you stupidly considered robbing what little we have.

You’re very lucky that my sweet chihuahua, Deuce, was unharmed (terrified nonetheless).  If anything would have happened to him, I would have tracked you down and ripped your balls off with my bare hands.

You should also know that we own a loaded pistol.

Enjoy karma!

A Los Angeles jury has just convicted 77-year-old Helen Golay and 75-year-old Olga Rutterschmidt guilty of murder and conspiracy to murder.

For the most part I regard the elderly as sweet and slightly senile, but these women are straight up scary.

The two targeted a homeless shelter in Hollywood, made BFFs with middle-aged homeless men, then provided the men with apartments. Conveniently these men were family-free, so no one noticed when Golay and Rutterschmidt took out multiple life insurance policies on the clueless dudes.

After about two years of this charade, the victims were killed in a “hit and run accident.” But nothing about it was accidental.

Golay and Rutterschmidt almost got away with $2.8 mill. 2 men were killed.

As The New York Times reported today:

“The French parliament’s lower house has approved a bill that would make it illegal for anyone — including fashion magazines, advertisers and Web sites — to publicly incite extreme thinness…”

Last year, Spain banned super skinny models from the runway, and France isn’t far behind. Much of this has been spurred by the 2006 death of Brazilian model, Ana Carolina Reston, who died at 88 pounds.

The proposed French law would “give judges the power to imprison and fine offenders up to about $50,000 if found guilty of ‘inciting others to deprive themselves of food’ to an ‘excessive’ degree.”

I’d hope that the author of this post, titled “How to become a better anorexic,” from everything2.com, would be fined this $50,000, if accessible in France.

And as for the US, fashion and self-degradation will continue to strip the minds and bodies of all meaty substance… one cute top at a time.

About to throw that bottle out the window, or ditch that plastic shopping bag in the parking lot? Please think twice.

The Pacific Garbage Patch: it’s created by humans, and destroying life in our precious waters.

And water is nothing short of precious.

This is not “news” but this underwater landfill continues to grow. Read more, from the San Fransisco Chronicle, here.

Please watch this, and be aware:

This man is far from a hero.  No person, especially a presidential candidate, has any right to joke about the bombing of other countries.  It is disgraceful that anyone could find his song silly.

I first read about this in The Economist.  I can only hope that discourse about this matter will cause an awakening among the conservatives who think McCain is the right person to lead our country.

Now, for the second year in a row, Health E-Stats released death caused by poisoning as the #2 reason for death by injury.

Usually the term ‘poisoned’ creates images of toddlers breaking into their parents’ cabinets and fatally playing with/tasting cleaning or yard care products. But in this case, the poisons are narcotics.

As a 23-year-old college student, I’m not surprised. I recently had shoulder surgery, and following my procedure, I suddenly became a popular person to call. The “Hi, how are you feeling?” turned into “So, what kind of pain killers did you get? Any extra?”

I know that tons of people swallow pills recreationally, and never accidentally overdose. But the fact is, these prescription drugs are killing thousands of people every year. Methadone is the main culprit, but plenty of other narcotics are highly addictive and leave their consumers yearning for more.

Educate? Publicize? Limit Prescriptions? I don’t know what the answer is exactly, but the stats show that adults in their middle ages are dying at the highest rates here. I think popping a pill is often substituted for human interaction, and confronting depression (in our population as a whole) is a good place to start.