The Competitive Enterprise Institute Daily Update

Issues in the News

1. HEALTH

The nation’s largest dairy company declines to use milk from cloned cows.

CEI Expert Available to Comment: Director of Food Safety Policy Gregory Conko on why the FDA made the right decision in approving the sale of milk and meat from cloned animals: 

“Thousands of cloned animals have been born since the world met Dolly the sheep in 1996, but critics still claim the process will create monstrous new hybrids in some kind of barnyard ‘Boys from Brazil.’ Nothing could be further from the truth.”

2. TECHNOLOGY

A New York state senator proposes outlawing use of iPods, cell phones or other electronic devices while crossing the street.

CEI Experts Available to Comment: Journalism Fellow Jeremy Lott on the many small ways regulators are making the country less free:

“But the ‘America = freedom’ mantra is not just wrong, it’s also dangerous to our actual freedoms. According to various surveys, Americans still view government suspiciously but rarely do anything about it. There is no organized political constituency to toss the bums out for legislating and regulating the sort of outrages that I describe above. We’re much more likely to gripe amongst ourselves, then shrug and make with the consolation: At least this is the freest country on earth.”

3. ENVIRONMENT

A new survey finds that children are “losing sleep” over global warming worries.

CEI Experts Available to Comment: Adjunct Analyst Steve Milloy on why saving starving children should take precedence over concerns about global warming:

“In contrast to our quixotic fixation with trying to fine-tune global climate by tweaking atmospheric carbon dioxide levels, the ongoing tragedy of starving children would seem to be a relatively easy problem to solve. After all, wealthy developed nations have plenty of surplus food and the wherewithal to deliver it to the world’s malnourished.”