HUMAN STUPIDITY IS PERVASIVE & THREATENING TO THE WORLD

Many years ago Time magazine carried a story and photographs of children born in Vietnam, years after the U.S. had stopped spraying Agent Orange on the jungles. As you can imagine the birth defects were horrific. If the photograph of the running child, burned by U.S. napalm wasn't enough to shorten the war, imagine if these horrific photographs had been available at the time.

Fast forward to today and the K-W Record have published a story about Agent Orange being used right here in Ontario in the 50's, 60's and 70's. The title of the story is "Agent Orange once used on Ontario trees". Over the past couple of years there has been publicity regarding Canadian military personnel exposed to Agent Orange around military bases in New Brunswick. This latest public offerring revolves around forestry workers in Northern Ontario. Apparently Spruce Falls Power and Paper Company in Kapuskasing were responsible for the spraying of these herbicides although with the blessing of the government of the day.

Two things which we would do well to remember. Agent Orange was manufactured right here in Elmira, Ontario courtesy of Uniroyal Chemical, now Chemtura. Secondly our governments are elected by a majority (sort of) of our citizens but they have long been co-opted by a tiny minority with money and influence. Hence government approval of industrial and commercial enterprises must always be watched with extreme care. Most government's list of priorities have the protection of the health and safety of their citizens way behind their political requirements of keeping the wealthy and influential minority happy.