Re: Uranium Workers Used in Experiments

[Neon John <johngd@bellsouth.net>]

Bob Flood wrote:
> 
> At 12:36 PM 2/9/00 -0600, you wrote:
> 
> >Making Tobacco Inc pay for
> >this is, imho, the nanny state run amok.
> 
> During the 25 years that I smoked, I most certainly can be described as the
> one who made the decision to smoke. No argument. And for all of those
> years, I certainly did understand that there was a health risk from
> smoking. Again, no argument. But during those years I certainly was NOT
> aware that the nicotine levels were being enhanced during manufacture to
> "improve" the product's addictive properties to keep the customer hooked. I
> happened by dumb luck to find a method to quit that circumvented the
> boosted nicotine - I switched (exclusively) to a pipe for a number of
> years, and pipe tobacco wasn't enhanced in nicotine, so when I quit the
> pipe it wasn't terribly difficult. No good planning involved, just luck. It
> was years later that it became known that the industry manipulated nicotine
> levels to increase addiction.
> 
> The tobacco industry took actions to addict customers to a product that
> they knew would harm the health of the customer, collected their profits,
> and left the customer, insurance companies, and various governments to foot
> the medical costs they knew were inevitable. I find that behavior
> unacceptable; recovering medical costs from an industry that preyed on the
> public isn't my idea of a "nanny state run amok."

I don't mean this to be insulting, but do you have any idea just how
absurd you just sounded?  Can you imagine a junkie saying "geez, I'd
never have gotten addicted had that mean old dealer not given me
such strong smack!" or "geez, I'd not be a fat pig with cardiac
vapor lock had MickyD not put so much good tasting fat in that Big
Mac and fries."

It wouldn't matter if Big Tobacco had packaged up 20 little syringes
of pure nicotine in each pack - you made the conscious decision to
use a known-beyond-the-shadow-of-a-doubt killing and addictive
product.  Big Tobacco didn't prey on you - they simply provided you
with what you chose to consume.

If this kind of illogic continues to prevail, then none of us are
safe.  They've done it to the tobacco industry.  They're trying to
do it to the firearms industry.  What next?  One of my businesses is
a restaurant.  Do I need to worry that someone will accuse me of
being part of the Giant Cholesterol Conspiracy for serving tasty
food?  Am I going to have to compensate all the lard-asses out there
because they ate too much, got fat and had a heart attack? 

Saying that Big Tobacco preyed on the poor innocent smokers is on
the same level of prevarication as asserting without fact that
environmental levels of radiation are harmful and then forcing us
(radiation industry) to compensate them for the "damage".

BTW, you might want to take a look at what the proceeds of the
government-sponsored extortion of the tobacco industry is being used
for.  Here in Tennessee, the state's share of the booty is already
being included in the general budget.  Just another revenue stream.

> >> How do you think the AMA will deal with this? If this low dose compensation
> >> idea survives, it seems inevitable that significant numbers of people will
> >> begin to refuse xrays and other medical procedures because "deadly
> >> radiation" is involved, and that's a phenomenon that could easily snowball
> >> into a nationwide epidemic.
> >
> >I look at it differently.  If this comes to pass, it will be natural
> >selection at its finest.
> >
> >Yeah, that's radical but I'm just a bit weary of coddling the
> >stupid.
> 
> Really? You'd stand by watching a small group misrepresent the dangers of
> radiation, take no action to correct the misinformation, and blame the
> public when they react normally to the misinformation?

I spent a career fighting the anti-nuclear hysteria.  But you know
something?  I've come to the conclusion that the fight is not
winnable.  Intellectual entropy pretty much guarantees a continual
increase in the level of stupidity in the population and there's
nothing our little group can do about it.  Anywhere there is a
population of people who believe in UFOs and black helicopters and
giant conspiracies such as the tobacco industry is accused of will
believe what the intellectual entropists tell them.  Especially if
it comes out of the boob tube.

Given that the population ALREADY believes that low level radiation
is already deadly, in direct contradiction of all available credible
evidence, then it follows that segment of the population where the
ignorance coefficient is particularly high will believe the lie
about medical radiation.  Given that, then I consider their refusing
life saving medical procedures involving radiation to be Darwinism
at its finest.  I will spend my political effort toward preventing
the state from using my tax dollars to coddle them in their death
throes in the aftermath of their decisions.  Let them live with the
consequences of their stupidity.

John
-- 
John De Armond
johngdSPAMNOT@bellsouth.net
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