Saving the Bees Means Saving the Food Supply!

The world population sits at just over 7.6 Billion humans, our impact on the health of the planet ranges from disregard for our personal pollution, to toxic waste released from our mines and wells, to global warming from our excessive carbon release into the atmosphere…and it is only getting worse. With all of this in mind, and an expanding population, you’d think we would want to protect bees…as they provide a great deal of the food needed for our survival.

Today we find our Federal Government, led by Trump …an uninformed, and often caustic science denier, is reversing the positive course established by the past four Administrations…retreating into the pockets of petrochemical and pesticide developers…raising their profits while damaging our nation and the planet. Trump will be long in his grave by the time our global population crests…at about 9.6 Billion in the year 2050, but his disastrous policies will have damaged America beyond our imagined impact…and it will have ended the histories of many other nations.

One of our biggest issues is the loss of pollinators. Bees the world over are suffering the attacks that our corporate producers are throwing at them. Bayer, BASF, Dow Agro, Monsanto, and Syngenta are key among these conglomerates.  And the worlds bee population is being devastated by the broad band pesticides and herbicides that these companies are spraying to protect ornamentals, and crops from other varieties of insects, bugs, and worms.

Unpublished field trials by pesticide manufacturers show their products cause serious harm to honeybees at high levels, leading to calls from senior scientists for the companies to end the secrecy which cloaks much of their research. The research, conducted by Syngenta and Bayer on their neonicotinoid insecticides, were submitted to the US Environmental Protection Agency and obtained by Greenpeace after a freedom of information request. What was reported was alarming.

Neonicotinoids are the world’s most widely used insecticides and there is clear scientific evidence that they harm bees at the levels found in fields, though only a little to date showing the pesticides harm the overall performance of colonies. Neonicotinoids were banned from use on flowering crops in the EU in 2013, despite UK opposition.

While flowers are treated by these same broadband insecticides to keep them pretty, flowering crops are their primary target and bees work all these fields. Here are some examples of what bees pollinate:  Cranberry Celery Coffee, Sweet Cherry, Tangerine, Tomato, Watermelon, Broccoli, Blueberry, Avocado, Apple, Strawberry, Sunflower, Carrot, Cucumber, Squash (plant),  Pumpkin, Gourd, Marrow, Zucchini…and the list could go on for rows and rows.

So, if you are hungry …keep in mind that we are destroying the very crops that we cherish by wiping out bees through the profit game that these corporations are engaged in.  Time to ask Trump what he wants on his salad…and force Pruitt to keep the EPA engaged in meaningful anti-pesticide programs nationally, and internationally. It’s a must, and the time for it is now!

The EPA Isn't Just About Air and Water...and Science Isn't Fake-News!

I keep hearing the Trump Administration say that CO2 is not causing Global Warming…science be damned… and that all they really need to do is work with the states to help keep air and water clean. Then, of course, Trump goes and revokes EOs that prevent Coal Empires from “Mountain Topping” and dumping the tailings down the sides of those devastated mountains and into the streams and rivers below…carrying heavy metals and toxic byproducts out to the surface water used by communities. And they reverse regulations on clean water…quietly reducing the cleanliness of our rivers and lakes.

As for their anti-EPA actions, the world’s leader in fighting pollution and recovering our environment from the extremes we have pushed it to…they have placed the EPA on the block, if not gone…tied up by reduced funding, cancelled programs, and blocked access to resources and an intensely interested citizenry.

Most of us don’t agree with Trump. First is the fact that he has close ties with other 1%ers who fight the EPA with their fortunes…like the Koch brothers, members of Trump’s corporate resort Mar-a-Lago in Florida…no wonder Trump doesn’t want to release the log books on who visited with him. Back Room Politics are alive and well in the GOP…and the Trump clan is making a killing on their corporate affiliation with the Donald. And then he insults us by promoting anti-science as the alternative facts of the day.

The idea that we should live for today’s profits and let the government clean up our pollution tomorrow does not sit well with me. EPA isn’t just about water and air…it’s about pollution, and establishing the standards that will keep America safe for time immemorial. Let’s look at one case, one of many thousands of super-fund sites. Love Canal, a winner of awards for their reclaiming of land and conversion of industrial sites into home sites. And, as a result of the chemical waste stored underground by Hooker Chemical, the land was poisoned, the ground water was contaminated, cancer ran rampant, and people died.

Pesticides and herbicides, toxic waste runoff from Coal and coal fired power plants, fracking waste water from oil and gas production sites, Canadian pipelines from Canada to Texas…to feed foreign owned refineries for oil exports that will never profit Americans, but threatens to pollute the Ogallala Aquifer in the heart of the United States, waste dumping in open ocean, a practice that we have reduced…but may come back if Trump has his way, increased acidification of our oceans, reduced controls on over-fertilization for places like Trump Organization (his company) resorts and golf courses…nitrates dumping into our water and killing our harbors …dead zones reaching into the open ocean …

The EPA sets standards to save the planet, and whether Trump and the Kochs like it or not…we are the Global leader in this field and we must fight to ensure that we remain the leader. I don’t live in China, India, or Russia…the nations with the worst pollution…nor do we have polluted harbors and bays the way China and Brazil do…why, the EPA corrected those issues for us several decades ago. Now Trump has signed an executive order that directed the Environmental Protection Agency to limit the scope of what counts as a regulated body of water under the Clean Water Act.

The EPA is a solid part of the Sustainable process that our nation is capable of achieving for America, and for the World…our economy and our history of social equity are the other legs of that important structure. Trump is working to end our leadership in this crucial global program…one that must be won now…or future generations will suffer, even Trump’s grandkids, whether he likes it or not, will suffer…The EPA isn’t just about water and air, it’s about the survival of the planet; it’s about managing tides so that islands remain above the oceans and coastal cities survive as well…Trump’s precious Mar-A-Lago will be under water before Donald Junior can say “hot-damn…I shot the last Lion”… the oceans are rising, and it’s not just because of nature. It’s because man has reached 8.5 billion and we pump out GHGs by the ton, the ice is melting...the reefs are bleaching, and we are killing thousands of species a year...way out of the box.

Let’s close on a high note. Donald Trump does not acknowledge Global Warming in the US…but he openly promotes national funding for protective barriers in Great Britain where his golf courses are threatened by higher tides than ever before…Telling the British Government that he needs their funding to protect his properties from the rising seas. Maybe Trump will bring this idea home…as he strives to make his vision of America great…but don’t hold your breath. This man isn’t about the truth…he is all for one and one for the Trump Organization.