Mercury rising?

Captain Fishsticks has a great op-ed in today's Pioneer Press regarding the price of cleaning up Mercury

The goal is achievable and the benefits do outweigh costs — but there are economic and social costs to consider. To claim otherwise just isn't true.

Mr. Westover goes on to say,

Ratepayers eventually foot the bill for upgrading power plants, and "cost" is not just measured in dollars. There are social consequences to environmental policies. Some people won't be able to pay higher prices for energy. However, one can trust that there will be legislators ready to "solve" that problem with a mandate. Of course, implementation will be up to somebody else.

This whole mercury thing leaves me with some very salient unanswered questions. First, as Captain Fishsticks asserts,

I am an outspoken advocate of the plausible connection between mercury, specifically as used in vaccines, and neurological damage in children. Nonetheless, I am angered when Cox and Dibble claim that their legislation will significantly reduce the number of children suffering learning disabilities caused by mercury exposure ("Detoxify Minnesota from Mercury" Feb. 16.). They overstate the impact of environmental mercury. Their conclusion exceeds scientific research and damages credibility for the larger vaccine issue. Their action is a deplorable scare tactic.

Westover may have a point there. I have a son with high-functioning autism, and I've long wondered whether the presence of mercury in vaccines could lead to and/or exacerbate maladies such as autism in children who are so predisposed. And at the same time, most of us have toxic amounts of mercury already in our mouths in the form of amalgam fillings. Granted that these are not liquified mercury, but just the same I asked my dentist at one time whether there was any danger of mercury ingestion from the fillings, to which she replied, "No, only if they break apart or fall out."

Comforting? At any rate, despite any primrose path that proponents of legislation lead us on, I agree with Westover that there will indeed be a cost to be paid (as there always is) with increased environmental regulations, for in the real world, no "good intention" ever goes unpunished, nor untaxed.


(Filed under enviro-whackism)