Re: ATSDR Child-Health Materials via Duke's What's New Page

["Jon Campbell" <jon@cqs.com>]

  Alex,
  
  
  What Greenpeace did was necessary
  
  because it was the only way that the
  
  samples were ever going to be gotten.
  Just my opinion...
  
  
  When people and the environment are
  
  being poisoned, there is a "higher law"
  
  that governs our behavior, and it does not
  
  necessarily need to be announced in
  
  advance or, in some cases, ever made
  
  public. I do not encourage people
  
  purposely and wantonly breaking laws.
  
  But there are times when higher
  
  laws take precedence.
  
  
  Consider, for instance, that
  
  there are now laws in about
  
  13 states which make it illegal
  
  for a company employee to
  
  reveal that his/her company
  
  is poisoning people if that
  
  company has "self-reported"
  
  the activity. Some of these
  
  laws make a whistleblower
  
  liable for any fines or lawsuits
  
  that a company might face
  
  as a result of the media
  
  exposure. I would absolutely
  
  support a whistleblower secretly
  
  revealing the pollution, even though
  
  he/she is breaking the law.
  
  Consider the case of one of Dr. Bill's member
  
  firms that "arranged" with the EPA
  administrator to keep confidential the effects of 2,4,5-T
         in the Alsea Basin. Someone broke a
  law and leaked the contents of a report
  to the women who had the miscarriages
  
  
  All of us make moral judgements about
  
  the laws that govern us. We will not have
  
  anarchy because Greenpeace activists
  
  scaled a fence and exposed themselves
  
  to the most poisonous substances known
  
  (protective clothing notwithstanding). I
  
  support their actions in this case.
  
  
  And we will have breakins of our
  
  homes and offices. But they will not use
  
  the Greenpeace action as precedent for
  
  this activity. The FBI, NSA, and CIA have
  
  provided adequate precedent. I will
  
  personally not feel any contradiction
  
  protesting such breakins while supporting
  
  Greenpeace's actions...
  
  
  Jon