FDA

The Republican party is killing Americans. And I don't just mean our soldiers in their useless war in Iraq. I mean regular American civilians, and the killing of Americans, though unintended, is a direct result of Republican policy. Let me say that again. A direct, if unintended, result of Republican domestic policy is the needless death of American citizens.

Grover Norquist, one of the darlings of the extreme rightwing, Gingrich/Bush/McCain branch of the Republican party, once said, "I don't want to abolish government. I simply want to reduce it to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub." This statement has been the basis of Republican policy. Norquist went into more detail:

"Cutting the government in half in one generation is both an ambitious and reasonable goal," Norquist stated in May 2000. "If we work hard we will accomplish this and more by 2025. Then the conservative movement can set a new goal. I have a recommendation: To cut government in half again by 2050"

What are the consequences of this extreme right-wing "Drown Government in a Bathtub" doctrine? You drown AMERICA along with it.

We started to see dramatic consequences of this irresponsible doctrine when Katrina hit. The government had been warned what would happen to those levees, but government had been drowned in Gingrich's bathtub, so while Bush and McCain were partying down...

This is an issue I have been pushing for some time because it amounts to a genuine and widespread health hazard. To quote the Union of Concerned Scientists:

Antibiotic-resistant bacteria are on the rise. Patients once effectively treated for pneumonia, tuberculosis, or ear infections may now have to try three or more antibiotics before they find one that works. And as more bacterial strains develop resistance, more people will die because effective antibiotics are not identified quickly enough or because the bacteria causing the disease are resistant to all available antibiotics.

Why have bacterial strains become resistant? The short answer is overuse of antibiotics. Physicians and hospitals have overprescribed the drugs, and patients have demanded them—even for illnesses not caused by bacteria. Veterinarians, too, overprescribe drugs to treat sick animals.

It is livestock producers, however, who use the vast majority of antibiotics produced in the United States. An estimated 70 percent of antibiotics and related drugs produced in this country are used for nontherapeutic purposes such as accelerating animal growth and compensating for overcrowded and unsanitary conditions on large-scale confinement facilities known as "factory farms." This translates to about 25 million pounds of antibiotics and related drugs fed every year to livestock for nontherapeutic purposes—almost eight times the amount given to humans to treat disease.