Couldn't agree more with the above comment. This is an issue of people, not guns. Mexico is a prime example of how an unarmed populous gets overrun by criminals who have access to REAL assault weapons. It is illegal to own an automatic weapon in the US. Those who have them are criminals by default. The AR-15 or AK-47 platforms today are nothing more than an average semi-automatic hunting rifle and that is what they are used for as well as sporting competition and target/range shooting. Assuming the AR-15 is the problem is also assuming that those who own them are potential murderers. That is not the case. I have several handguns and rifles that I used for strictly target shooting and hopefully someday competition. I don't even hunt. I can't kill anything unless it is attacking me or my family and that includes humans. The last thing I'd want to do is shoot someone but I will if someone invades my home in the middle of the night. This is all to say that a vast majority of folks who own firearms are like me, peaceful law abiding citizens. The most important thing to remember is the Mexico example. When only police and military are allowed to have weapons, the country becomes corrupt and very dangerous as is Mexico today. The other point I'd like to make is that these murder stats that are being thrown around have no basis. The proper way to do that is to say "of a population of 330,000,000 people, 30 people a year are killed by guns. It's a per capita stat. So when you compare the US to other smaller countries, the total population should be considered. We are a huge country. Statistically, the more people, the more crime. It's pretty simple and not a stat that is valid. The other issue is that many gun deaths are accidental or suicides. I have not seen any mention of this. It all seems to be bundled in with the "murder" category. How about disclosing all stats.....the total population, death by suicide, deaths by murder, deaths by accidents. 65% of all gun deaths are due to .22 cal firearms. Think about it. 35% are by the above, murder, accident and suicide. If we are going to throw out numbers, let's throw them all out for everyone to see the reality. 30 people a year out of 330,000,000 is equal to .0000000909% of our population (30 / 330,000,000) of people getting killed yearly. For a country as large as we are that is minuscule. Though they are still human beings, were some gang bangers or other types of criminals killing each other? Why is there no mention of that? Lets be fair about this debate. Look at the stats properly and compare to other countries. We are so huge there is going to be murders, rapes, thefts and every other kind of crime known and there will be a lot, but compare it to the size of the country. Use the numbers properly. Don't sway them to make them look like our country is full of murderers. That is just not the case. We also have to consider the incidence of major psychological issues we have in our country. Again, do it per capita to be fair. One more point.....there was an incident in China where a madman stabbed many small children to death with a big knife. If there are no guns, these nutcases will find another way. The US is not alone in this type of mass murder. Again, look at the population size. China is more populous than we are. I guarantee there are a lot of mass murders in China and likely Russia too. Again, look at the numbers of people in these countries and use math....if you have the ability to think logically and look at stats. I honestly think that many of these anti-gun people don't know how to look at things mathematically and also don't want to because they want to sway the numbers in their favor. That is wrong and unfortunately too many others don't know enough to look at this mathematically. All they see is "guns = murders" and can't think past that. Australia has a very small population so it is much easier to deal with issues concerning the population. If they had 330,000,000 people, it would be a completely different story.
There was another New Town – in Australia – which experienced a mass shooting that killed 35 people in 1996 (with an AR-15, similar to the weapon used in Sandyhook). Just 12 days after what became known as the Port Arthur massacre, Australia’s government responded by announcing a bipartisan deal to enact gun control measures, including a national assault weapons ban. There was also a 650,000 gun buy-back-and-destroy campaign, larger than any other in the world. There have been no mass killings since, gun deaths have dropped 50%, and the nation is saving not only hundreds of lives every year but also about $500 million in economic costs of gun violence.
I imagine the previous post refers only to fertilizers commercially manufactured from sewage sludge and tested for metal residues. It's good to have standards for traces of heavy metals but I doubt that any of these standards can take into account the long term accumulation of these metals in the soil. Many are chemically reactive and bind to the soil so they don't "go away". Continuous additions of biosolids will just keep increasing their soil concentration.
But heavy metals are not the only dangerous components of biosolids coming from sewage. There are thousands of man-made organic compounds for which screening would be impossible. Research studies have found residues and metabolic products of pharmaceutical compounds that have passed through people using medications, including some radioactive tracers. We know some of these organic residues pose a health risk.
I live in a rural area where pumping out homeowners' septic tanks is a thriving business. When mine was pumped recently I saw the operator add a bag of lime to the sewage being pumped into his tank truck. When I asked him why he did that he said "That will turn it into fertilizer." I said "I thought you would pump this into the sewage plant in town." He said "Oh no. This will all get used as fertilizer." I would guess that this practice is widely spread across the country and represents a significant source of sewage-derived fertilizer to which no processing and no standards apply. And since it is not strictly a biosolid it probably doesn't get reported even in those states that regulate biosolids.
Anonymous,
I am curious as to what the process of "scrutiny" and "delineat[ion]" is, and the "strict measures...taken" that will ensure that the consumer consumes no more than "trace amounts of such elements," which you say could only be toxic in "large quantities."
My understanding is that some of these toxins are cumulative. So the concept of "trace" evolves into "concentration" at some point in time. My understanding of the word delineate means to sketch, draw, outline or depict. I'm not aware of that word meaning "remove." Merely identifying is not "removing."
So, let's focus on removal, and what is known about it. There is a significant percentage of the public taking estrogenic compounds and other fertility and hormonal substances that are endocrine disrupting (EDC's), and are the most difficult to remove. There are in addition, large quanties of pain killers, anti-bacterial soap, etc. Those who study this (I worked with a water utility that did this research and explored treatment options for drinking water) know that there are as yet no agreed upon testing strategies and decision-making criteria for environmental monitoring and for sludge and water treatment. Most treatment plants do not yet have the more advanced methods, such as ozonation and activated carbon treatment, high enough temperature and nitification needed to remove the EDC's.
Your reply to this blog strikes me as more of the "double speak" and vagary described as being used on him when he complained to Whole Foods. It is inaccurate to imply--as you have-- that these chemicals, now ubiquitious in the environment, can be removed to the degree that they are at a "trace" / unharmful level, and it is inaccurate to imply that there is scientific agreement even on what "trace" means in the context of the wide range of humans and animals, from pregnant mothers to infants to elderly with serious medical conditions.
You make some interesting points. Unfortunately, since you chose to identify yourself as "Anonymous", there is no way I can accept your statements as valid. You statement "As someone who is currently creating a job analysis and selection procedures for soil scientists . . . " causes me to question exactly how "unbiased" you are. Who is funding your work? There needs to be some transparency before I am convinced you are not employed by the exact people who foist this on an unsuspecting public.
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