CEI Daily Update

Issues in the News

 

1. TECHNOLOGY

Greenpeace attacks Apple for what it considers “toxic” components in the iPhone.   

CEI Expert Available to Comment: Adjunct Scholar Dana Joel Gattuso on how technology companies are becoming more environmentally sensitive:

“There is some good news. Increasingly, manufacturers are moving on their own to recycle their products, and they’re doing it better and cheaper than government. Hewlett-Packard, Dell, Gateway and IBM are just a few of the many manufacturers operating their own recovery programs, recycling over 160 million pounds of e-waste a year. Equally as promising is eBay’s new “Rethink Initiative” to provide online guidance and tools to consumers on recycling, donating, or even selling their used machines.”

 

2. SAFETY

Credit unions begin moving into the payday loan business.

CEI Expert Available to Comment: Senior Fellow Eli Lehrer on the history of credit unions:

 

“If one looks at the history of credit unions, it is clear that most early credit union loans provided exactly the sort of quick cash that payday loans do today. As credit scoring replaced personal networks as the means of enforcing debt repayment for credit unions, credit unions developed business practices that made them far more similar to banks. This new trend represents a welcome and positive return to the roots of the credit union movement.”

 

3. ENVIRONMENT

Opinion leaders continue to debate the impact of Al Gore’s Nobel Peace Prize win.

CEI Expert Available to Comment: Senior Fellow Iain Murray on Gore’s route to climate change fame:

 

“[Gore] took the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s science, ignored what he found inconvenient, and added speculation and alarmism to present an apocalyptic vision of global warming. By linking global warming directly to such disasters as Hurricane Katrina, massive imminent flooding, the drying up of Lake Chad and the possible extinction of the polar bear, he made the issue immediate to the public and impossible for policy makers to ignore.”

 

Blog feature: For more news and analysis, updated throughout the day, visit CEI’s blog, Open Market.

 

FOR MORE INFORMATION

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