Something in the Air
You know those moments when some item in the news, a fabulous quote or some whammo-concept stops you long enough to make you actually think? Your mind starts racing and before you know it, you are pondering this idea taking root in your world.
This has been going on for me all week. It started with this announcement of a new Utah advocacy group. You also can read about Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment by linking to Doug Fabrizio’s live KUER-FM90 interview here.
Environmental groups, even organizations as button-down as the American Lung Association, have been warning about the danger of auto emissions and unfettered coal burning power plants for decades. When strides are made, like the federal Clean Air Act (34 years ago!), we’re all jumping up and down. Then a few more steps forward. Then nothing. Or worse, the clock gets turned back under presidential administrations and congresses that can’t say no to auto makers and big energy interests.
But ah, what about doctors? What about those men and women wrapped in white coats, with stethoscopes hanging from their necks and offering that thoughtful nod as they listen to your list of symptoms? Credible folks, those docs. And smart. And in the eyes of our state lawmakers, the docs have no political axes to grind. When the guys in the white coats begin beating the drum for air quality along the Wasatch Front, someone in power might really listen.
Dr. Brian Moench, a Salt Lake anesthesiologist and leader of the physicians’ group, has written several opinion pieces for Salt Lake City newspapers on the topic. He’s got current research about increased afflictions related to minute particulates in the air that link directly to asthma (rates are skyrocketing in children everywhere–especially in urban areas), cancers (more than 80 percent of them are environmentally caused) and generally shortened life spans.
Among other ideas, Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment are advocating for fewer vehicles on the road. To help accomplish that, they’re pushing for free mass transit. Whoa. Now that’s an idea with some heft. Can you picture a Utah state budget that for once defers to better transit options — and maybe even free — over more and more highway construction?
It’s so radical the thought makes me shiver.
My stepdaughter, Jenny Wilson, had the same stop-in-your-tracks feeling I did last week, apparently. Jenny is running for mayor of Salt Lake City this year, and according to one privately commissioned poll by a prominent local business, is far ahead of the 10-candidate pack for the race, at 21 percent name recognition and favorable image.
Jenny and her husband, Trell Rohovit, are parents of two little boys, ages four and one. Zach and Max are healthy and adorable. But they will take over this planet someday, and their parents and grandparents are starting to worry about its future. A lot.
Currently a Salt Lake County Council member-at-large, Jenny last week spoke in favor of a Salt Lake County Council of Governments proposal for a commission to study Utah’s endangered air quality and ways to improve it.
I know, I know. You read the words “commission” or “task force” and have to stifle a yawn. But it’s like this: If the county (and Salt Lake City, which I hope will be under Jenny’s charge after the November election) gets a jump on this issue — working in tandem with these progressive physicians and other advocates for clean air — we have more ammunition for the state Legislature and Utah’s congressional delegation to do something meaningful.
I haven’t been this charged about an issue since Roe vs. Wade.
April 8th, 2007 at 7:31 am
The worst air pollution I`ve seen is over China. Looking down from 35,000ft on the New Dehli-Hong Kong route the entire country is cloaked in a blanket of gray,with a few 14,000` mtns peeking through. For months our one alternate Kunming never had visibility of more than 2000m in “haze” (soot and smoke).
Here in California there is a concerted effort to increase air quality,including lawsuits against the myopic Bush administration. Even no more buying out of state power from gross polluters like in Utah & Nevada.
Living in Salt Lake ? I wouldn`t be hopeful with that business friendly legislature…may take people dying on the sidewalks before those primitives do anything. I really hope your step-daughter wins the election !
PS; 20% of the particulate air pollution here in N.Cal is from Asia…wafting all the way across the Pacific.
April 8th, 2007 at 7:40 am
Vanity Fair has once again posted an article by Gail Sheehy written in 2000. Among other things, it provides a penetrating look inside the energy industry and how they have operated under Bush as Governor of Texas and now as our President.
Go to http://tinyurl.com/ytu2lh
In fact the entire article will give insight into why we our in the place we are under the Bush administration.
April 8th, 2007 at 11:12 am
Last year I rather suddenly had difficulty staying asleep. I could fall asleep with no difficulty but staying asleep for more than one or less hours made for many bad nights. In Dec I went to the sleep clinic and discovered that I had apnea and now sleep with oxygen. My problem is probably due to my age, 82, but having to go upstairs to the oxygen generator to take a nap is very annoring. In my limited time remaining alive, I will support anyone with a solution or a practical method to alleviate the crud we are breathing world-wide.
April 9th, 2007 at 5:42 am
Yeah, Joe! You may be 82, but your heart and soul are still young and thriving. Let’s hope you’re able to see at least a small change in the atmosphere while you’re still with us. Take care.
April 9th, 2007 at 7:10 am
I applaud the state of California for the effort to stop transferring its energy pollution problems to neighboring states. For here in Utah, I say no additional coal-fired plants. They are huge polluters, and actually give off as much radiation as a typical nuclear power plant. Let’s examine conservation alternatives, along with more friendly power generation alternatives.
Maybe we could also stop advertising our state or building up the economy here. If it weren’t so attractive a place to live and work, fewer people would come, fewer people would stay. Along with no more coal plants, his would go a long way to slowing down our pollution growth…
April 9th, 2007 at 7:13 am
Clarification on my radiation statement, which as I read it looks foolish. Of course nuclear power plants generate more radioactivity than coal-fired plants. What I meant to say was that coal-fired plants emit as much radiation into the atmosphere as nuclear-powered plants.
April 9th, 2007 at 9:07 am
France generates 77% of their electricity from nuclear power and their cars average 43mpg…….just a thought.
April 10th, 2007 at 2:43 pm
I agree with everyone here. However, during the last few years, and perhaps even this year, our population growth has been exclusively fueled by immigration from south of the border and a very high birthrate-to-deathrate ratio. (The census bureau has shown that people have been much more likely to move from Utah to other states than to move from other states to Utah. Historically, Chardonnay has had a much more legitimate complaint about “all those damned Utahns moving to California and driving up property values” than we have had about the reverse, for example. I suppose the recent migration of retirees to St. George is an exception to this trend).
The immigrant issue is a debate for another day. Saving that, the solution to our population growth lies with controlling family size (and, no, we’re not gonna start knocking off old folks, the denominator in the natural growth ratio. That’s off the table).
April 11th, 2007 at 8:18 am
Stats I was reading about our 2% population growth in Utah for 2005 attributed 70% of the growth to more births than deaths, 20% to international net inmigration, and 10% to net inmigration from other states. Didn’t differentiate between legal and illegal international migration. This would confirm gabespop’s reading of the situation, except for the interstate migration issue.
Since Utah has far fewer teenage and single births than the nation, and a higher % of married households, and birth rates also follow the economy, here are some creative approaches to reducing population growth:
-Place a moratorium on marriage for a couple of years.
-Allow Utah women in their 20’s to restate their age to 15-19.
-Sabotage the booming economy in Utah. This would reduce both birth rate AND inmigration!
Radical solutions, perhaps, but not as radical as a soylent green approach.
April 11th, 2007 at 9:16 am
I just checked the census bureau statistics and there does appear to be a bit of net inmigration from other states (for a while there wasn’t). mSteele is no doubt correct that this is due to our strong economy.
But we agree: the largest contributor to our population growth is too many births and not enough deaths. Therefore, we should introduce our kids to contraceptives . . . Just kidding, kids! Repeat after me, “Within the sacred confines of the marital relationship and for procreation only!”
We’re not gonna stop reproducin’, baby, so we gotta start dyin’. The air-quality problems that were the original topic of this discussion could help us out in this regard.
Bring on the smog! We can be “smoked” soylent green!
April 11th, 2007 at 10:54 am
This discussion is taking on a life of its own……
“Soylent Green” (1973) is wonderful camp, a classic. Edward G.Robinson`s last film and Leigh Taylor-Young was awesome as Heston`s love interest.
But…there are places in Asia with worse air quality than the film depicts. Maybe because the world population has gone from 1.4b to 6.7b in the last one hundred years.Just too many people for the planet.
How about this for a start;
1.) Empower women with reproductive control over their own bodies.
2.) Education
3.) Get the Pope to shut-up about the evils of secular Europe…one place where the population is in gradual decline.
April 11th, 2007 at 11:39 am
And, as long as the discussion has been completely derailed and Chardonnay has made suggestions that I believe are . . . Jeezuhs H. Christ! I just looked out my window and saw a large group of USU students protesting! The end is near, folks!
Anyhoo, what ever happened to the great dystopian film that explored the existential dilemmas of our times? The 60s and 70s had lots of ‘em. Strangelove, The Graduate, Easy Rider, Midnight Cowboy, The Planet of the Apes, Soylent Green, The Stepford Wives, Taxi Driver.
Nope . . . Jeezuhs, there they go again . . . they don’t make ‘em like that anymore.
April 11th, 2007 at 12:45 pm
My personal movie favorite is General Jack D. Ripper of “our precious bodily fluids” fame. Fluoridation was a monsterous Commie plot………..
April 11th, 2007 at 12:47 pm
Three words: Blades of Glory