Wal-Mart and more

[Dan M]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: brin-l-bounces at mccmedia.com [mailto:brin-l-bounces at mccmedia.com] On
> Behalf Of Curtis Burisch
> Sent: Monday, February 18, 2008 10:33 AM
> To: 'Killer Bs (David Brin et al) Discussion'
> Subject: RE: Wal-Mart and more
> 
> Dan M: wrote:
> 
> >3) Are you interested in discussing what I just quoted and will requote:
> 
> >" The third is a discussion of the case at hand: if we (as I think we do)
> >agree that improving the lives of the poorer among us at least _a_
> >worthwhile goal, has Wal-Mart done more to aid or more to harm those
> >lives."
> 
> >Yes or no answers will suffice.  Elaboration would be appreciated.
> 
> This is a question that is enormously complex to answer.
> 
> First, the trival bit:
> 
> >"if we (as I think we do) agree that improving the lives of the poorer
> >among us at least _a_ worthwhile goal"
> 
> I think there are very few who would admit to not thinking this an
> admirable
> goal.
> 
> Second, the hard bit. " ... done more to aid or more to harm ... ". This
> is
> the tricky part. Without a complete assessment of Walmart's entire impact
> on
> poor people (and in fact the whole ecosystem of humanity), it's nearly
> impossible to answer accurately. I'm in no position to have much of an
> opinion on this one. But then again, nor is anyone else, much.


Actually, there are good data on this....I've read on this subject for
years.  One good source is Kerry's former economic advisor

http://www.americanprogress.org/kf/walmart_progressive.pdf

One can also do very straightforward mathematical modeling that indicates
this general trend.  I

> You were ranting on about the EU pandering to Green Party pressure,
> accusing
> them of sacrificing children to malaria for some political agenda. If
> you'd
> bothered to learn a little about DDT, 

Actually, I read fairly extensively on the subject for years before making
this post. 

>you'd have seen that it is VERY nasty stuff. 

Can you quantify VERY nasty stuff?  One of my differences with many folks is
that I do not think we can go to a zero risk world.  For example, I'd take a
med that cut my chances of a heart attack in half even if increased my
chances of cancer by 1%.  But, I'm a research physicist who deals with
probability in a manner that I think differs from others.

Most of the (extensive) Wikipedia article on DDT is about how nasty
> it is.
> 
> Then I remembered Charlie's reference to the 'Gish Gallop' (to which you
> were responding), and this made me wonder if your abrupt change of topic
> might just be a hint suggesting that the whole Wal-mart argument was
> simply
> a cunning troll, rolled up in several layers of misdirection!?

Nope, the change in topic is because the malaria thing has been bothering me
for a while.  My daughter _twice_ came close to dying from it.  DDT has a
horrid reputation.  

You also have to understand the difference in standards with regards to
chemicals.  DDT was regularly used in the US for decades.  Here's one
sentence that is key to me from Wikipedia:

"The EPA, in 1987 , classified DDT as class B2, a probable human carcinogen
based on "Observation of tumors (generally of the liver) in seven studies in
various mouse strains and three studies in rats. DDT is structurally similar
to other probable carcinogens, such as DDD and DDE." Regarding the human
carcinogenicity data, they stated "The existing epidemiological data are
inadequate. Autopsy studies relating tissue levels of DDT to cancer
incidence have yielded conflicting results." [42] "


I've read conclusions like that from a number of different studies on a
number of different things.  In the US we have a very low threshold for
risk.  If a large exposure might be a cancer risk, then we need to ban the
substance (like various sweeteners that have been band).  So, the massive
spraying of DDT in the US, India, etc.  might have caused some deaths.  But,
as we know from here:

http://www.malariasite.com/MALARIA/history_parasite.htm

Malaria killed millions upon millions worldwide before DDT.

So, we probably have a small risk from DDT to humans that is small enough to
be hard to measure on one hand, and a known killer of millions per year
right now on the other.  Indications are that the deaths due to DDT were
from very large doses/exposures...while simply returning to Africa for two
weeks resulted in Neli getting malaria.

Given this, if it was someone you loved, would you want their country to use
DDT in house spraying against malaria?

Finally, I had hoped that analysis such as the one at:



Dan M.