The Competitive Enterprise Institute Daily Update
Issues in the News
SECURITY
Congress moves forward with a plan to mandate tougher safety plant security procedures.
CEI Expert Available to Comment: Director of Risk and Environmental Policy Angela Logomasini on how more regulation may not improve security.
“All the answers that Congress has considered largely involve growing the federal bureaucracy with needless paperwork and meddling in production processes of which they have no knowledge. Indeed, the chemical plant security issue has mostly been used as an excuse for environmental activists and their allies in Congress to push an environmental agenda to reduce or eliminate the use of chemicals. It’s not surprising that Greenpeace—which has advocated banning the chlorine that is necessary to kill dangerous pathogens in our water supply—leads the effort to push for such “security” legislation.”
TOBACCO
A judge rules that smokers of light cigarettes can sue tobacco companies.
CEI Expert Available to Comment: Policy Analyst Brooke Oberwetter on the twisted reasoning used by anti-smoking crusaders.
“Of course the industry is concerned about the health of smokers, and it’s concerned about addressing their demand for less dangerous smoked tobacco products. It’s 100% in the tobacco companies’ best interests to create, market, and sell healthier products. Because while yes, it would be a “special problem” for the industry if smokers quit smoking entirely, it would also be a special problem if they all died. My understanding is that dead people aren’t such reliable customers.”
HEALTH
Critics blast the WHO’s decision to use DDT in the fight against malaria.
CEI Expert Available to Comment: Adjunct Scholar Steven J. Milloy on how DDT can save lives.
“The WHO’s strategy of mosquito bednets and malaria vaccine development has been a dismal failure. While the death toll in malarial regions has mounted, the WHO has been distracted by such dubious issues as whether cell phones and French fries cause cancer. It’s a relief that the WHO has finally come to its senses, but on the other hand, the organization has done too little, too late. The ranks of the WHO’s leadership need to be purged of those who place the agenda of environmental elitists over the basic survival of the world’s needy.”
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