Re: Re: Chemical Secrecy Again

["J. Barkley Rosser, Jr." <rosserjb@xxxxxxx>]

     Of the various appalling appointments that
Bush is making, this Graham guy has got to be
one of the worst.  His position is one of the most
powerful, if least visible, in all of Washington.  This
is a very bad news appointment, with potentially
extremely serious consequences.
Barkley Rosser
----- Original Message -----
From: "Louis Proyect" <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>
To: <pen-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Tuesday, March 27, 2001 11:09 AM
>Subject: [PEN-L:9605] Re: Chemical Secrecy Again


> >Citing national security, the
> >Environmental Protection Agency earlier
> >this month rescinded a Clinton
> >administration proposal to increase
> >public access to information about the
> >potential consequences of chemical plant
> >accidents.
> >
> >http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/27/politics/27ACCI.html
> >
> >--
> >
> >Michael Perelman
>
> Yeah, I had to laugh when one of the two pimps for the chemical industry
> told Moyers that scientists from presigious insitutions like Harvard
> University vetted their tests. They must be referring to John D. Graham,
> who was appointed by Bush to run the Office of Management and Budget.
Ivory
> tower? Ivory toilet is more like it:
>
> The New York Times, March 25, 2001, Sunday, Late Edition - Final
>
> REGULATIONS CZAR PREFERS NEW PATH
>
> By DOUGLAS JEHL
>
> BOSTON, March 22 -- For more than a decade, a Harvard professor named John
> D. Graham has raised money, eyebrows and hackles by arguing that in many
> cases the cost of environmental rules vastly exceeds the benefits.
>
> Dr. Graham, the founder and director of a Harvard center that receives
most
> of its money from industry, has become a pivotal figure in the battles
over
> environmental regulation by arguing a theme that is pleasing to his
donors'
> ears. He asserts that Americans would be far better off if, for example,
> the money devoted to pesticide control were spent on very different
> priorities, like hospital emergency rooms, even if in considerably smaller
> sums. . .
>
> Dr. Graham was testifying at the time in favor of legislation by Senator
> Bob Dole, the Kansas Republican, that would have required that any new
> regulation issued by the government pass a strict cost-benefit test. That
> bill was opposed by the Clinton administration, and it was defeated. A
new,
> less strict measure now before Congress would require such tests, and if
> the costs exceeded the benefits, agencies would have to try to justify
> regulations in writing.
>
> In both the environmental organizations and in the academic world, Dr.
> Graham's critics say that nothing is inherently wrong with cost-benefit
> analysis, and that it should be considered a useful analytical tool. But
as
> a gauge of any regulation, it must try to take account of many
> uncertainties, and the assumptions made will have an enormous effect on
the
> conclusions.
>
> "It's not inherently good or inherently bad," said Dr. David Ozonoff,
> chairman of the department of environmental health at Boston University's
> School of Public Health. "It's inherently biased."
>
> Dr. Ozonoff said that much of the research carried out at Dr. Graham's
> Harvard Center for Risk Analysis has amounted to "having the client shoot
> an arrow, and then the analyst paints a target around it."
>
> Sixty percent of the center's annual budget of $3 million comes from
> private gifts and grants, most of them from industry trade organizations
> and large companies, including Monsanto, ExxonMobil, 3M, Alcoa, Pfizer,
Dow
> Chemical and DuPont.  The center's reports have tended to reflect the view
> of industry, as in a study last summer, sponsored by AT&T Wireless
> Communication, that concluded that the hazards of talking on a cell phone
> while driving were relatively small.
>
> In the early 1990's, Dr. Graham solicited money from Philip Morris at a
> time when he was criticizing the E.P.A.'s conclusion that second-hand
smoke
> was a carcinogen, people close to him said. Accepting tobacco money
> violated the policy of the School of Public Health, of which the
> risk-analysis center is a part, and Dr. Graham was ordered to return the
> money. He later accepted an equivalent gift from Kraft, a Philip Morris
> subsidiary, the same people said.
>
> Full article:
> http://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/25/politics/25RISK.html?searchpv=site02
>
>
> Louis Proyect
> Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org
>
>