House of Paine

product protection: korporate de-konstructivism

 "  feasible doubt 
     is product one
in our  biz  ..." 
                  professor vioxx
                       of
                    " Say It Ain't So " 
                                      (LLC)   

----------------------------------
  yes 

when it comes
to the interface
between 
corporations profits
    and 
the  big old world's
          natural  destiny ......
well
      sometimes 
      you get a few ass hole doom and gloomers 
armed with hard lookin evidence 
and 
cryin'  so loud the Almighty Himself
             can't 
                TAKE A SHIT 

well madame 
           such  fuckers 
          need 
               a  "scientific"   lobotomy 
 
  and thats where
   korporate amerika's
            truth rattlers   step in ....

         


( for more
     visit DefendingScience.org )
  
================================     
 


  
 since way 
too many  
    " shared "   ugly facts 
           can  
            lead to public action....

               as in 
                   "profit squeezing" 
                             type public action 

   common sense sez

       sanity  sez
                docktor  doubt 
                      needs  a turn at bat 

---------------

read this:


"To many scientists and policymakers 
in Washington,
 the revelation this month 
that Philip Cooney, 
chief of staff for the White House Council
 on Environmental Quality, 
had rewritten a federal report 
to magnify the level of uncertainty 
on climate change came as no surprise.

 Uncertainty is easily manipulated,
 and Cooney — a former lobbyist 
with the American Petroleum Institute,
 one of the nation's leading manufacturers
 of scientific uncertainty — 
was highly familiar with its uses. 

As an epidemiologist 
with a special interest 
in occupational diseases,
 I share a fundamental problem 
with the scientists 
who are studying climate change.

 Our ability to conduct 
laboratory experiments is limited; 
we can't go out 
and intentionally expose people 
to carcinogens 
any more than climatologists 
can measure future temperatures. 

Instead, we must harness "natural experiments,"
 collecting data through observation only.
 We then build models 
from this data,
 and use these models 
to make causal inferences and predictions,
 and, where possible, 
to recommend protective measures. 

By definition, uncertainties abound 
in our work; 
there's nothing to be done
 about that. 

Our public health
 and environmental protection programs 
will not be effective 
if absolute proof 
is required before we act.

 The best available evidence 
must be sufficient.
 Otherwise, we'll sit on our hands
 and do nothing. 

Of course,
 this is often exactly 
what industry wants. 
That's why it has mastered 
the art of manufacturing uncertainty,
 of demanding often impossible proof
 over common-sense precaution 
in the realm of public health. 

The tobacco industry 
led the way. 

For 50 years, cigarette manufacturers 
employed a stable of scientists 
willing to assert 
(sometimes under oath)
that there was no conclusive evidence
 that cigarettes cause lung cancer,
 or that nicotine is addictive.
 An official at Brown & Williamson,
 a cigarette maker now owned 
by R.J. Reynolds, 
once noted in a memo: 
"Doubt is our product 
since it is the best means
 of competing with the 'body of fact' 
that exists in the mind 
of the general public." 

Toward that end, 
the tobacco manufacturers 
dissected every study, 
highlighted every question,
 magnified every flaw, 
cast every possible doubt 
every possible time.
 They also conjured 
their own studies 
with questionable data 
and foregone conclusions. 

It was all a charade,
 of course,
 because the real science 
was inexorable. 

But the uncertainty campaign 
was effective; 
it delayed public health protections,
 and compensation for tobacco's victims,
 for decades.

The tobacco industry, 
left without a stitch of credibility
 or public esteem, 
has finally abandoned that strategy 
— but it led the way for others. 

Every polluter and manufacturer of toxic chemicals
 understands that by fostering 
a debate on uncertainties
 in the underlying science 
and by harping on the need for more research
 — always more research — 
it can avoid debating 
the actual policy 
or regulation in question.

It is now unusual 
for the science 
behind a public health
 or environmental regulation 
not to be challenged. 

In recent years, 
corporations have mounted campaigns 
to question studies documenting 
the adverse health effects
 of exposure to,
 among others, beryllium,
 lead, mercury, vinyl chloride, 
chromium, benzene, benzidine and nickel.

Manufacturing uncertainty
 is a business in itself. 

You too can launch a pretty good campaign.
 All you need is the money
 with which to hire 
one of the main players 
in the "product-defense industry," 
many of whose stalwarts 
first honed their craft 
defending cigarette smoke. 

These firms will hire the scientists,
 throw the mud, 
crank up the fog machine.

A classic case is beryllium,
 a lightweight metal useful
 in nuclear weapons. 
For many years it has been clear 
that workers exposed to beryllium levels
 below 
the federal Occupational Safety 
and Health Administration standard
 can develop chronic beryllium disease.

When OSHA tried to lower the standard,
 the industry hired Exponent,
 a leading product-defense firm 
to focus on all the things 
we don't understand, 
calling for more research
 before OSHA could act. 
Meanwhile, workers are still exposed 
at the old, unsafe level, 
and are still getting sick. 

Among themselves, 
these product-defense lobbyists 
and their clients 
make no secret 
of what they're doing. 

Republican political consultant 
Frank Luntz wrote in a memo, 
later leaked to the press:

 "The scientific debate remains open….
 Should the public come to believe 
that the scientific issues are settled,
 their views about global warming 
will change accordingly."

Decades from now, 
this campaign to manufacture uncertainty 
will surely be viewed 
with the same dismay and outrage 
with which we now look back
 on the deceits perpetrated 
by the tobacco industry.
 But will it be too late



----------------------------------------


so  manufacturing feasible doubt
      costs money eh?

   u bet 

especially when
  its not easy to make it
                at all feasible enough 


 and so considerable investment prtection 
must be  made
     in  de constructing "scientific  facts "
            

bustin  the iron links

with "feasible  doubts "


  and as the corporate world 
       cooks up neat new stuff...



    the carpers and trimmers 
 go        
           
on and on 

halting progress 
with science 


blah blah blah 

fuck it brothers and sisters 

to keep a  gig goin 
with all these
high price counter measures
ain't  good  fer profits

 there's gotta be 
   a cheaper answer

and there is ......

blow the fuckers away 

turn
 their  sound science
 into junk science 

raise the bar of proof 

who can attack 
  a plee 
for higher standards ?


some geek comes forward 
with evidence of nasty side shows....


hit em with 
the new higher standards
and 
presto 

" sorry junior 
 case  not proven ..."


pretty swell drift eh?

 hence the new skepticism 
inside our hallowed 
              halls of justice 


     the elephant courts are 
               growing wildly pyhronic 

throwing out top notch  research
 as 

       " insubstantial willful-wishful trash  "

 yup
   tossin the shit
   even 
     before a jury can get
            to sink its teeth into  it 
----------------------------------------------
   
 " shit man 

         standards of proof
      have been raised so high
recently             
           galileo had a better shot 
                               with the vatican
                      then he'd have with todays 
                                federal court system "

                                       justice   wally george