A week or so ago, I finally composed my letter to Gov. Schwarzenegger regarding the crisis of the people of California being sprayed against their will with toxic chemicals. What follows is the response I received. My rebuttals to the downright lies in this letter are in bold.

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Thank you for writing Governor Schwarzenegger and sharing your thoughts about the Light Brown Apple Moth project. The Governor appreciates hearing from Californians on issues that are important to them.

The Governor isn’t supposed to appreciate hearing about issues. He is supposed to carry out the wishes of Californians. He is our appointed servant.

The Light Brown Apple Moth - if unchecked by aerial and ground applications of a natural moth pheromone - has the potential to devastate California’s forest canopy and endanger threatened animal species and food production. Since the Apple Moth is an invasive pest species, not native to California, it has fewer natural enemies here to reduce its population. This invasive species threatens our diverse range of agricultural and natural plant life.

This is a big fat lie. The Light Brown Apple Moth does not eat the needles of evergreens like the Redwoods and Pines of California’s forests. In fact, it doesn’t EAT leaves at all. It builds its home on them. So, to eat the forest would be to destroy its own home. No smart insect would do this. It doesn’t eat vegetables or fruits at all, either. And, as for it being a threat to endangered species, this claim is based on the nonsense that the light brown apple moth will eat the habitat that animals live in. This is completely false. The Light Brown Apple Moth has done 0 damage in California and is considered a negligible pest elsewhere where it is kept in appropriate population levels by natural predators like birds, bats and earwigs. No spray needed.

The real threat is in the aerial spray Gov. Schwarzenegger has forced on California, killing hundreds of birds, sickening mammals, and destroying the endangered honey bees and frogs that are already in danger of extinction here in California. Gov. Schwarzenegger and his allies have polluted the watershed and air which all creatures depend on for life. This is the truth.

The California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) has determined that an integrated pest management approach - applying the insect pheromone Checkmate OLR-F instead of toxic insecticides - is the best method to combat this growing threat. An aerial application is necessary because mass trapping is not known to be effective, and twist-tie technology is not logistically feasible in the Monterey and Santa Cruz areas.

Huge lie #2. The spray IS TOXIC! It contains documented carcinogens and mutagens that cause deadly cancers. Short term effects include respiratory failure, pesticide skin rashes, eye irritation, vomiting. The sprayed people of the Monterey Bay Area came into doctor’s offices and hospitals displaying all of the documented health effects of the ingredients in the spray. One baby nearly died of respiratory failure. Additionally, menopausal women recommenced menstruation! And if that isn’t scary enough, the rivers and ocean were coated with a toxic sludge that killed hundreds, possibly thousands, of seabirds. Gov. Schwarzenegger and his CDFA allies know very well that the spray is packed with fatal toxins. They are simply lying about this.

Lie #3 revolves around the claim that aerial spraying is the solution to killing the moth. Scientist after scientist have now testified that aerial spraying has never been shown to eradicate a species of insect as widespread as the non-threatening light brown apple moth. It doesn’t work, and Gov. Schwarzenegger knows this. It is a lie that the spraying will kill the moth. It’s just a lie.

Insect pheromones are signals that some insects release to attract mating partners or trigger other behaviors. Humans and other mammals do not respond or react to these insect pheromones and, in fact, cannot detect them. The Checkmate pheromone confuses male moths and prevents them from finding females, thereby stopping the mating and reproduction process. When the pheromone is applied, the moths simply live out their natural life cycles without being able to locate mates. As breeding subsides, the colony collapses.

Lie #4. There have been NO tests to discover what effects of exposure to synthetic pheromones will have on human beings and other lifeforms. It is a lie to say that humans and mammals are not harmed by exposure to a substance that has never been tested. Additionally, when aerial spraying of pheromones is used to confuse moths, there is so much of it that the moths don’t know where to go to be killed. This is the opposite of putting out targeted sticky traps that draw moths to a specific location with pheromones that lure the insects into traps where they die. Because the pheromones don’t kill the moths, all that the aerial spray will do is confuse them, not eradicate them, unlike sticky traps which draw the moths to a specific place and kill them. This lie about aerial spraying eradicating moths is a perfect example of the bad science being used by the California Department of Agriculture to support their plan to subject 17 million Californians to untested chemical trespass.

CDFA is completely confident in the safety of the Checkmate pheromone. During more than a decade of using such pheromones to control Apple Moth infestations in Australia and New Zealand, no adverse effects have been reported. Pheromone safety records have also prompted the United States Environmental Protection Agency to conclude that consumption of food containing pheromone residues presents no risk. In fact, the United States Department of Agriculture has also approved this pheromone for use on organic crops. On October 20, 2007, Governor Schwarzenegger further directed CDFA to disclose all ingredients in Checkmate. The complete list of ingredients can be found on the California Department of Food and Agriculture website at www.cdfa.ca.gov.

CDFA is engaging in the spraying of 17 million human beings in order to receive funding from the federal government to keep their organization financially solvent. They are very well aware of the fact that spraying carcinogens on human beings will ruin their health but they don’t care. In order to protect their pocketbooks, they are completely willing to poison millions of children, women and men, the watershed, the soil, wildlife and the environment while they hide behind the ridiculous lie that they are spraying a harmless pheromone from their airplanes. The pheromone is but one of the many ingredients in the spray. Gov. Schwarzenegger and CDFA know very well that they are spraying carcinogens on innocent human beings. They have already proven themselves to be corrupt and totally unworthy of Californians’ trust.

Additionally, true organic agriculture will come to a devastating end in California when once-organic farms are aerially sprayed with the cancer-causing chemicals in the spray. Every bit of soil and water will be poisonous. The governor and the CDFA know this. They simply don’t care.

This project is thought to be the most environmentally friendly pest eradication project in the history of the Department. This approach also fully addresses unique local environmental concerns, such as protecting the monarch butterfly and local sea life by creating coastal buffer zones based on wind speed.

The watershed of the Monterey Bay Area, including the Pacific Ocean, was fouled by the toxins, surfactants and carcinogens that drifted into them from the aerial spraying in 2007. The same thing will happen to the precious watershed of the SF Bay Area when spraying begins this summer of 2008. It is a federal offense to introduce poisons into human water sources, and the label on the substance sprayed in Monterey asserts that it is forbidden to introduce it into water. CDFA knows this. The governor knows this. They have broken the law.

One of our nation’s truly worst threats to agriculture is honeybee colony collapse. Honeybees are responsible for nearly all of the food we eat, the food farm animals eat, and basically our whole ability to nourish life on the planet. Following the spraying of the Monterey region, beekeepers reported total confusion and die off amongst their bees. Local gardeners reported thousands of bees struggling on plants and on the ground, or having totally vanished from the landscapes they once inhabited. From this, it’s pretty reasonable to confer that the ingredients in the spray disorients and kills vital honeybees (not just the light brown apple moth). The moth is no threat to agriculture, but the death of honeybees could turn our continent into a desert, resulting in a deadly world famine. For this reason alone, the spraying must be stopped.

Again, thank you for contacting Governor Schwarzenegger and adding your voice to this issue. The Governor truly appreciates your commitment to the future of our Golden State.

The future of the Golden State? Unlike Governor Schwarzenegger, I was born in California and my dream for the future of my state is to see that humans are protected by International, Federal and State laws concerning human experimentation. My dream includes people breathing air free of particulate plastic, eating organic food grown in safe soil and water, and having non-toxic water to drink. My dream for the future of my state is that it will try and convict offenders against human and environmental rights. My dream for the the future of my state does not include airplanes dumping toxins over cities full of frightened, sickened, enraged people.

People with dreams like this should not be running our state or any state. If Governor Schwarzenegger does not give up his dreams of power and wealth, his is a name that will live in infamy for the poisoning of 17 million American citizens. Such a thing, on such a scale, has never happened in this country before and the official policy of deception about what is being done to the people…to lie to our faces as they spray us with carcinogens…is being documented in the letters that they are sending out (like this one) to the Californians who are writing in to express their demand that the spraying be stopped.

Sincerely,
David Richey
Office of Constituent Affairs
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Have you written to the governor’s office? Did you receive this same intentionally deceitful letter in reply? Please, feel free to copy any response you have received in the comments field. The Internet is the tool that is breaking the dangerous silence and documenting, publicly, that Gov. Schwarzenegger, his staff, Secretary of the Dept. Of Agriculture A.G. Kawamura and his staff are lying to the citizens of the United States. Many people, including the Mayor of Albany, are calling for the resignation of Kawamura and I believe we will soon be hearing people demand that Schwarzenegger be removed from his present position of power.

These men are liars. We are all seeing this.

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