FEB-MAR 1996
Jerry Brown Speaks Out
on Corporate Power
In a special session of the California Legislature-by a vote
of 8 to 4 after less than an hour of debate-the Policy Committee extended
the exemption for a substance called methyl bromide. This is the first time
that a governor of California has ever called a special session so that
poison may continue to be applied in the state. This vote will have
implications for untold numbers of people.
Most importantly, notice the power of the Ethyl Corporation, the Great Lakes
Chemical Corporation, the two principal corporations supplying this poison.
Look at their power over a governor, over a legislature. This is a juggernaut.
Fifteen million pounds of methyl bromide are used in California-a big piece
of ozone depletion. These are real matters for a free people to deal
with.
Methyl bromide is a colorless, odorless gas, a very deadly neurotoxin developed
as a weapon during World War II. After the war, the good scientists
at the University of California figured out a way to use it to kill bugs
instead of "enemies." It's used as a fumigant to clear the soil
and destroy living matter that would interfere with the production of a
particular crop. But it has other consequences for the applicator injecting
the gas into the ground in fields for grapes, for walnuts, for strawberries,
for cut flowers and it has consequences for people living nearby, and for
the 800+ schools in California, elementary and licensed daycare centers,
within roughly a mile where methyl bromide is injected into the soil The
consequences can be FATAL!
Here's how this chemical affects you. It can affect your health if you live
near one of these fields. It can affect you if it's used to fumigate your
house because it's still used for that purpose. And it can affect you because
it's one of the most serious of ozone depleters. The size of ozone depletion
is significant, is growing, which means more ultraviolet radiation.
The United States is responsible for 40% of methyl bromide used worldwide,
so we are definite contributors to this depletion of the ozone layer. The
state of California-the strawberry growers, some of the grape growers and
the cut flower industry- is responsible for about 25 % of the United
States' contribution of methyl bromide to the rest of the world. We're not
talking about something trivial. Ozone depletion kills people. It causes
cancer; it causes consequential disruptions to the global environment and
the food chain. It is so shocking and so threatening that over a hundred
nations of the world came together in Montreal and signed a treaty to ban
methyl bromide in order to protect the stratospheric ozone layer. A couple
of years later, because they did not think it was tough enough, they even
tightened it. This is a success story. The chlorofluorocarbons are being
cut back. Methyl bromide, one of these ozone depleting gases, is supposed
to be phased out after the year 2000.
The people producing this poison don't worry about the consequences. They've
got a strawberry crop; they've got an almond crop; they've got some grapes
to get out, they've got some cut flowers to put into the export market,
they've got to sell strawberries in Tokyo, so never mind that some farm
workers can be killed or some little children can be permanently
brain-damaged, or that melanoma is one of the fastest rising cancers not
only in Australia but right here in North America.
How is this danger treated? First of all, the context is in the political
arena. The pesticide makers and their allies have given over $400,000
in the last three years to the state legislature in California, about $100,000
to Governor Pete Wilson, so that's already the conflict, the bias. These
are not judges; these are not human beings acting as thoughtful sensitive
people very much engaged with the consequences. They are going to buy an
extension for another year and a half. The lower house in California
is controlled by the Republicans and the bill will pass with virtually no
notice, no discussion, yet they're talking about lives; they're talking
about the ozone layer, the global environment affecting a lot of people.
There's a lot of fund-raising potential around this. They will follow orders
and deliver enough votes for a bipartisan commitment to environmental destruction
and an assault on human health, innocent children, school yards, homes-places
where real people are affected. They don't give a damn!
This is not a new issue. Back in 1984, a law was passed by the State of
California, signed by a conservative governor, that was aimed at preventing
birth defects and required certain toxicological tests to be undertaken
regarding various chemicals and pesticides. By 1991 the Great Lakes Chemical
Company and the Ethyl Corporation secured another extension to do more tests.
That extension expires in March of this year. They're not doing the tests
because they know those tests won't turn out pretty. The United States government
has labeled methyl bromide as a Class I neurotoxin. It doesn't get
any more lethal than that. We are not talking trivialities here. Ozone depletion
kills people, it causes cancer, untold consequential disruptions of the
food chain and the global environment.
What I see here is that these corporations aim first to take on California-that
had the earliest phase-out of this ozone depleting gas-and postpone it so
it never really becomes a prohibition. What action can you take? You don't
have to buy strawberries. You don't have to buy almonds. You don't have
to buy cut flowers. Forget the vote-these characters are bought and paid
for-but your dollar is still in your pocket until you exchange it for almonds
or grapes or strawberries. You can make a difference! There are alternatives.
There are organic strawberry growers, organic grape growers and there are
pesticides that are far less harmful than methyl bromide. There is where
we have power as consumers.
Each one of us can go to the grocery store today or tomorrow and say, "
What's on this stuff? Where does it come from?" Maybe you just concentrate
on strawberries. They seem to be the big offender. There is power! Put up
a little pressure. Go organic for a while. The road to political mobilization
is through your buying behavior. If we can make an impact there, start putting
pressure, we will change things. If enough complaints went into Lucky and
Safeway and the local grocery store, these farmers would switch real fast.
Here's a rundown on where methyl bromide is used: 25% goes for strawberries,
12% for cut flowers, 10% for grapes, 7% for almonds, and 7% for sweet potatoes.
Germany has banned this stuff. They grow a lot of strawberries. Holland
grows a lot of cut flowers, probably the world's biggest exporter. They
banned methyl bromide To me, this is a litmus test. If we can't handle
our responsibility in something this easy, how are we going to deal with
the larger issues affecting the environment? At worst, you're talking about
a slight reduction in strawberry consumption, in almond consumption, in
the sale of cut flowers, and some of this stuff is only needed to fumigate
for export, to get those strawberries over to Tokyo or Hong Kong. This is
a matter of survival to the farm worker, to the child living near
the fields. That raises the subject of the food co-op that we are working
to create here in the Oakland/Berkeley area. My vision of the co-op is that
we make alliances with specific farmers. It's a matter of being conscious
of the food we eat and purchase, of knowing the farmers, knowing the conditions,
knowing where it comes from, all collaborating together and being responsible
for how we are in the world.
The powers that be are conspiring against sustained-environment thinking,
analysis, and mobilized response. That is what I call the death of democracy.
Can we, as a species, as human beings, develop the consciousness of our
impact on those closest to us, on the larger environment itself? Our power
to impact has never been greater and yet our consciousness of that impact
is very puny. That is the gap that has to be closed-the wisdom gap. It is
only out of that insight and awareness that we will be able to live in a
sustainable, harmonious, moral, spiritual way and that's the question this
story of methyl bromide raises. It's not just one chemical. It's a whole
way of life.
The nature of the corporation, under American law, is to make money for
the owners, irrespective of the impact on the employee, the community,
or the environment. That's the problem. The corporations, the law firms
fronting for them, the politicians they buy have progressively undermined
responsive legislation. The Republican Contract on America and Newt
Gingrich and the whole effort to weaken the Clean Air Act, to weaken the
Delaney Clause prohibiting cancer causing chemicals in our food, to weaken
the Safe Drinking Water Act, to undermine the right to sue a corporation-this
effort recognizes and responds to corporate pay-offs to your state,
local and federal politicians. And that Behemoth, that monster, that virus,
is incompatible with a healthy body politic or a free America. You've got
to see through it if we're going to save ourselves, our souls and our country.
Welcome to the New World Order. Right here at home there was a real
milestone. The World Trade Organization issued an order that parts of the
Clean Air Act that were enacted by the Congress and signed by the President
into law must be changed to suit the dirty processes and products that will
be derived from imports from Venezuela, Brazil and other member countries.
The WTO was created under the pet program of George Bush and Bill Clinton,
namely GATT, the General Agreement on Trade and Tariffs. The World Trade
Organization is part of the mechanism, the bureaucratic structure, of GATT.
Have you ever heard-since the war of l812-of a foreign power dictating to
the United States? That just happened! The sovereignty of America
has just been eroded in plain daylight by Clinton and the Congress, who
take an oath to the Constitution. Those criminals continue to destroy
this country and the world itself. I know that's strong, but I don't exaggerate.
Here is what Clinton said in September of 1994: "We need to pass GATT
as quickly as we can. The American people will be a winner. It will create
hundreds of thousands of high paying jobs over the next decade." The
highest good now-higher than religion, the family, the environment, and
wage standards-is THE MOVEMENT OF STUFF across international boundaries.
Sylvia Nassar's column in the December l993 New York Times, was headlined:
"GATT's Big Payoff for the U.S.: The Third World Promises to Become
a Much Larger Trading Partner." She writes: "The most long lasting
benefit for the U.S. . . . may be to encourage growth in many of the world's
poor but aspiring nations. That, contrary to the dire warnings of America's
new isolationists like Pat Buchanan and Ross Perot, would be good
for most Americans too, say most economists who focus on free trade and
growth." I am not going to deconstruct that language, but note
the qualifiers in almost every phrase! Then she goes on to quote Paul Krugman:
"It is true that successful Third World economies are competitors,
but they also become bigger markets for our products, and they are also
suppliers of better and cheaper product to our economy."
Notice the claim: the big payoff from GATT is going to help these poor people.
They are pandering and appealing to your liberal guilt if you are in that
privileged position of a lawyer or a professional embedded into the
service structure not yet challenged by foreign competition and cheaper
labor. All those poor people are going to be benefited by GATT! It is not
just more autos to Japan; it's more jobs in Indonesia, Mexico, China, in
the maquiladoras; it's laborers in Poland and Eastern Europe working for
a couple of bucks a day in crummy factories to replace that bloated American
workforce that has medical benefits and pensions and other forms of
decency that have rigidified the American labor market. Yes, this is a double
pay-off: first, the economy of Americans and then the poor people around
the world. Notice, the claim that these people supply better and cheaper
products-that is the benefit. Do you hear that? The Third World countries
become bigger markets for our products, and they are suppliers of better
and cheaper products to our economy. So why not just move all of America's
business off-shore? We finally got to the New World Order! The continuing
drift toward tearing up the environment, tearing up the Constitution,
and increasing inequality is a direct consequence of the leadership pattern
that both parties are now engaging in. Do you believe Clinton lied and Mickey
Kantor lied and Bob Dole lied and the others that voted for GATT lied when
they said this law cannot invade or diminish our sovereignty? If that
is true, how come this foreign body, the WTO, is able to order the Congress
that represents us, "WE, THE PEOPLE," to do something that we
didn't tell the Congress to do?
It is not the end. It is the beginning. A new waiver allows Mexican
truckdrivers to drive their uninspected trucks all the way to the Oregon
border, and they are making a couple of bucks an hour. Watch out, American
truck drivers: You have just been sold out. You have been sold out by Feinstein
and Boxer and all the others that undercut you by voting for these large
schemes with this fuzzy internationalist feeling to them. You can drive
across the border now, and maquiladoras are popping up all along
the border contrary to Mickey Kantor's promise that NAFTA would put jobs
all over Mexico and hire people within the heartland of Mexico so they wouldn't
have to come to the border for employment. I am not only for sovereignty
in the United States-I want to see some sovereignty in California locally.
If I don't want a nuclear power plant, I can say no. If I don't want a toxic
dump in a Chicano neighborhood, I can say no. This whole dogma which
says there shall be no trade barriers is all part of a multinational corporate
hegemony which is incompatible with human rights, decentralized community,
creativity, and a sustainable environment.
Material for this article was excerpted and edited by Doret
Kollerer, with permission, from Jerry Brown's "We The People"
radio broadcasts.
Jerry Brown broadcasts live on non-commercial radio FM(Pacific
Standard Time: 4-5 p.m., M-F, KPFA, Berkeley, 94.1, & KFCF, Central Valley,
88.1; Eastern Standard Time:7-8 p.m., New York, WBAI, 99.5). Contact "We
The People" in Oakland, 1-800-426-1112, or 200 Harrison St., Oakland,
CA 94607 for more information or to join We The People.
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