How do you want it cooked?
"Fishermen say they can’t afford to pay monitors" by Patrick Whittle Associated Press May 04, 2015
PORTLAND, Maine — New England fishermen of important food species like cod and haddock say the looming cost of paying for at-sea monitors could put them out of business this year.
Officials with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Marine Fisheries Service said the money it had been using to pay for the monitors — trained workers who collect data on fishing trips — will be needed for other obligations.
Like what, phonying up global warming data?
That means groundfishermen who catch fish like cod, haddock, and pollock in New England waters will likely have to start paying the cost around August.
This from the goddamn government that is serving you, yup! All the money must be needed for the wars, Wall Street, well-connected corporations and friends, Israel, and the lavish and partying lifestyles of the political cla$$.
Of course, this government, and NOAA in particular, would never lie to you, nor would those grant-dependent $cienti$ts.
Now your carbon tax total calculated by Wall Street comes to....
The new expense is coming at a time when it could cripple the fishery, fishermen said.
I'm thinking that is what it is meant to do, thus leaving the seas open for corporate conglomerates with vast fleets of ships.
Paying for at-sea monitors can cost fishermen about $800 per trip, which can be nearly half the gross profit of a good haul, they said.
Fishermen said the new expense will compound the costs of necessities like crew, insurance, and fuel in a year that will already be bad for fishing. Among the challenges facing the industry is a quota cut of about 75 percent to Gulf of Maine cod that went into effect on May 1.
Jan Margeson, who fishes out of Chatham and Harwich, said he has fished for 38 years and transitioned to harvesting skates and monkfish as cod became an increasingly difficult species to make a living on. He said he will have to pay for the monitors because he has a groundfish license, and it will be a burden — and a move that shifts hundreds of thousands of dollars in costs from regulators to fishermen.
‘‘It’ll probably bankrupt the fleet when this comes on board if we have to pay this kind of money,’’ Margeson said. ‘‘You’re going to see a lot of boats just stop fishing.’’
NOAA’s current rules state that at-sea monitoring costs were to be put on the industry in 2012, said Teri Frady, a spokeswoman for NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center in Woods Hole.
However, the agency continued paying because of ‘‘continuing economic problems’’ in the industry, which has weathered challenges such as quota cuts and low spawning, she said.
Not exactly a healthy catch though.
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What does the label say about the stink?
"EPA pressed to back off on formaldehyde" by Eric Lipton and Rachel Abrams New York Times May 04, 2015
WASHINGTON — A decade after emergency trailers meant to shelter Hurricane Katrina victims instead caused burning eyes, sore throats, and other more serious ailments, the Environmental Protection Agency is on the verge of regulating the culprit: formaldehyde, a chemical that can be found in commonplace things like clothes and furniture.
Of course, government was coming to the rescue and loving you at the time -- like they always do.
See: FEMA Knew Katrina Trailers Were Poisonous
FEMA Seeks Immunity for Willful Negligence and Poisoning of Americans
And they got it.
Good thing this government is looking out for you.
But an unusual assortment of players, including furniture makers, the Chinese government, Republicans from states with a large base of furniture manufacturing, and even some Democrats who championed early regulatory efforts, have questioned the EPA proposal. The agency is now preparing to ease key testing requirements before it releases the landmark federal health standard.
What is there left to say about this corporate-controlled $y$tem?
The EPA’s five-year effort to adopt a rule offers another example of how industry opposition can delay and hamper attempts by the government to issue regulations, even to control substances known to be harmful to human health.
This from the same government screaming climate change! I mean, c'mon. Same government that exempts the war machine, and any time there is oil to secure it's move in the planes, warships, and troops. On true threats to human health, the pollution, radiation, and the rest.... it's bend over backward for industry.
Formaldehyde, a known carcinogen, can also cause respiratory ailments like asthma, but the potential of long-term exposure to cause cancers like myeloid leukemia is less well understood.
The EPA’s decision would be the first time the government has regulated formaldehyde inside most American homes.
“The stakes are high for public health,” said Tom Neltner, senior adviser at the National Center for Healthy Housing. “What we can’t have here is an outcome that fails to confront the health threat we all know exists.”
The government and ma$$ media are more interested in creating nonexistent ones for war or looting purposes.
The proposal is not to ban formaldehyde — commonly used as an ingredient in wood glue in furniture and flooring — but to impose rules to prevent dangerous levels of the chemical’s vapors and set testing standards for products sold in the United States.
The debate has sharpened in the face of growing concern about the safety of formaldehyde-treated flooring imported from Asia, especially China.
It's the Lumber Liquidators thing I haven't bothered to read about. Now we know what forests they are butchering.
What is certain is that a lot of money is at stake: US companies sell billions of dollars’ worth of wood products each year that contain formaldehyde, and some argue the proposed regulation would impose unfair costs and restrictions.
And really, that is THE MOST IMPORTANT THING!
Determined to block the agency’s rule as proposed, these industry players have turned to the White House, Congress, and top EPA officials, pressing them to roll back the testing requirements in particular, calling them redundant and too expensive.
Now take a deep breath of this.
“There are potentially over a million manufacturing jobs that will be impacted if the proposed rule is finalized without changes,” wrote Bill Perdue, chief lobbyist at the American Home Furnishings Alliance, in one letter to the EPA.
On top of all the ones lost and losing.
Industry opposition helped create an odd alignment of forces. The White House moved to strike out key aspects of the proposal. Subsequent appeals for more changes were voiced by players as varied as Senators Barbara Boxer, a California Democrat, and Roger Wicker, a Mississippi Republican, as well as furniture industry lobbyists.
She's leaving anyway, the great environmentalist.
Industry groups like the American Chemistry Council have repeatedly challenged the science linking formaldehyde to cancer, a position championed by David Vitter, Republican senator from Louisiana, who is a major recipient of chemical industry campaign contributions, and whom environmental groups have mockingly nicknamed “Senator Formaldehyde.”
Yeah, it's okay to challenge that science.
By 2010, public health advocates and some industry groups had secured bipartisan support in Congress for legislation that ordered the EPA to issue federal rules that largely mirrored California’s restrictions. At the time, concerns were rising over the growing number of lower-priced furniture imports from Asia that might include contaminated products, while also hurting sales of US-made products. Maneuvering began almost immediately after the EPA prepared draft rules.
Oh, the ONLY REASON they are RESPONDING at all is because of.... MONEY!
Good thing I believe in the goodwill of our leaders that love us and want to protect us!
White House records show at least five meetings in mid-2012 with industry executives — kitchen cabinet makers, chemical manufacturers, furniture trade associations, and their lobbyists, like Brock R. Landry of the Venable law firm. These parties, along with Vitter’s office, appealed to top administration officials, asking them to roll back the EPA proposal.
The White House Office of Management and Budget apparently agreed. After the White House review, the EPA “redlined” many of the estimates of the monetary benefits that would be gained by reductions in related health ailments, like asthma and fertility issues, documents reviewed by The New York Times show.
The more you read the more this $tinks!!!!
As a result, the estimated benefit of the proposed rule dropped to $48 million a year, from as much as $278 million a year. The much-reduced amount deeply weakened the agency’s justification for the sometimes costly new testing that would be required, a federal official involved in the effort said.
Opponents in the furniture industry then targeted a provision that mandated new testing of laminated wood, a cheaper alternative to hardwood. (The California standard on which the law was based did not require such testing.)
But EPA scientists had concluded that these laminate products posed a particular risk. They said that when thin layers of wood, also known as laminate or veneer, are added to furniture or flooring, the resulting product can generate dangerous levels of fumes from often-used formaldehyde-based glues.
Just get in your hole and shut up, will ya? You never mind those ever-increasing mansions of the wealthy.
Industry executives turned every lever within reach to get the requirement removed. It would be particularly onerous, they argued, for small manufacturers that would have to repeatedly interrupt their work to do expensive new testing. The EPA estimated the expanded requirements for laminate products would cost the furniture industry tens of millions of dollars annually. The industry said that the proposed rule would cost its 7,000 US manufacturing facilities more than $200 million each year.
“A lot of people don’t seem to appreciate what a lot of these requirements do to a small operation,” said Dick Titus, executive vice president of the Kitchen Cabinet Manufacturers Association, whose members are predominantly small businesses. “A 10-person shop, for example, just really isn’t equipped to handle that type of thing.”
Big industry players also weighed in. Executives from companies including La-Z-Boy, Hooker Furniture, and Ashley Furniture all flew to Washington for meetings with the offices of lawmakers including House Speaker John Boehner, Republican of Ohio, asking several of them to sign a letter prepared by the industry to press the EPA to back down, according to an industry report.
Yeah, thanks for helping with the greenhouse gas and carbon footprint problem. I'll disregard the stench of hypocrisy.
Within weeks, two letters — using nearly identical language — were sent by House and Senate lawmakers to the EPA, with the industry group forwarding copies to the agency as well, and then posting them on its website.
Safety advocates say tighter restrictions are necessary, particularly for products coming from China, where items as varied as toys and Christmas lights have been found to violate US safety standards.
While Neltner, the environmental advocate who has been most involved in the review process, has been open to compromise, he has pressed the EPA not to back down entirely, and to maintain a requirement that laminators verify that their products are safe.
But further changes to the rule are likely, agency officials concede, as they say they are searching for a way to reduce the cost of complying with any final rule while maintaining public health goals. The question is just how radically the agency will revamp the testing requirement for laminated products — if it keeps it at all.
What an insult! Protecting the public health is a "radical" idea as the government $crambles to protect indu$try!
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Related: New video warns firefighters of cancer dangers
Don't eat fish, although I suppose it is safer than the chicken.
Think I will spend the rest of the day under a tree and in the shade.
NDU:
"New carbon emissions standards that were proposed last year for coal-fired power plants in the United States would substantially improve human health, according to a new study, and prevent 3,500 premature deaths per year. The study, led by researchers at Harvard and Syracuse universities, used modeling to predict the effect on human health. The study comes as President Obama plans to unveil by midsummer a set of finalized climate change rules to curb planet-warming carbon dioxide emissions from US power plants, a move that he hopes will stand as a cornerstone of his environmental legacy. Carbon emissions trap heat in the atmosphere, which contributes to a warming planet."
The stench still lingers. Yup, used modeling to predict and how does that work out anyway, be it elections (?) or sports? How did you pick the football games, and what garbage-in, garbage-out information was fed into the program?
Other than that, more public relations dressed up as reporting spews forth regarding the great Obummer. Makes you sicker than the cola spew, and I'll tell you something right now: I'm not here arguing for the greedy energy companies I pillory as well. I'm not for the pollution, but then again, where are they dumping the stuff (and why are the coal ash contaminations of water stories not covered or stuck with like other stories)?
Oh, I know, that will bring howls and insults from certain quarters, and it took me a long time to admit there may be something to that and the HAARP. Seeing the drones crisscrossing the sky laying down trails that turn to wisps that I thought were clouds was a real jolt, as was realizing there is more to the weather than what once was. Same with the amount of land that has been paved over with asphalt. Not helping this planet, but who am I to stand in the way of corporate development?
