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TALKING ABOUT DU
April 20, 2006
Editor's Note: The following letters concern our Mar. 30, 2006 story "Weapon of Mass Destruction."
I liked your story. I have been getting citizens to write DU songs and am putting together a CD for people to play on local radio stations. It is going to be a riot to have these jingles playing in all the states with and without DU bills. Good job on covering the DU story.
-Leuren Moret, Berkeley, California
Regarding the statement that the U.S. Military does not believe DU is dangerous or that research shows no long-term health effects among uranium miners. The movie Homeland-Four Portraits of Native American Action, produced by www.katahdin.org, has a 20-minute segment on Navajo Uranium miners at Crownpoint on the Navajo Reservation. In it are these disturbing statistics: after 20 years of mining there is a 100 percent increase in infant mortality, a lung cancer rate 28 times normal existing among Native American miners and a bone cancer rate five times the national average with children there.
Recent testimony from Major General Robert G.F. Lee, the Hawai'i Adjutant General, before the Hawai'i State Senate committee hearing on Depleted Uranium screening for returning Iraq veterans (SCR40/SR 21) stated "depleted uranium does not pose a safety risk for our returning soldiers…" This despite Terry Jamison, Public Affairs specialist of the Department of Veterans Affairs, reporting that, "Gulf Era Veterans now on medical disability, since 1991, number 518,739." Arthur N. Bernklau, executive director of Veterans for Constitutional Law in New York, states that out of 580,000 Gulf War Vets 11,000 have since died and by the year 2000 325,000 were on permanent medical disability.
Mr. Pignataro, you're absolutely right that you can hardly blame people for not trusting the military. If you need more information on DU please go to our website www.noduhawaii.com. Further, despite the military objecting to screening tests for returned veterans the Hawai'i Senate passed unanimously out of committee the Resolutions and already 18 Senators have signed on as sponsors and on the federal side Congressman Ed Case has co-sponsored the Depleted Uranium Screening and Testing Act, H.R. 202.
-Lance Holter, Chairman,
Sierra Club Maui Group
Interesting how you like to focus on "stuff" that seems like such a big scary mistake. Like your piece on "DU"—depleted uranium. Coincidently, amazing that a recent bestselling book by Gary Renard, The Disappearance of the Universe, often also gets referred to as "DU."
DU, "weapon of mass destruction" vs. "DU,"Straight Talk About Illusions, Past Lives, Religion, Sex, Politics and the Miracles of Forgiveness.
I don't know if you have enough time away from your campaign to keep us informed of what might make our lives less comfortable. But if you do, I highly recommend reading "DU" so that you can find out what is really going on in this world, this illusory universe.
And, you could find out the actual purpose of this world in which we seem to live, a world (and this is really scary, especially to people like you and those who read your newspaper) that will disappear when it no longer serves its purpose. Only two things exist in our universe: "Love" and "Calls for Love." Which one do you do? Good Night and Good Luck!
-Steven Joshua Blue, Wailuku