LETTERS: DO RESEARCH, NOT JUST PARROTING

To the editor:

While I support state Sen. Peter Kinder's efforts to represent my best interests in our area, I would appreciate it if he would research his columns in the Southeast Missouri instead of just parroting the agenda of the extreme right wing. In his Nov. 30 commentary, he quoted "the redoubtable" Dr. Fred Singer and supported his view that there is no global warming taking place. I believe Kinder should have said the "doubtable" Dr. Fred Singer, especially when he ignores the evidence and goes against the 2,500 other scientists who have proven very conclusively that global warming is indeed taking place. Global warming jeopardizes our future and that of our children.

Kinder is quoting the same Dr. Singer who said there was no such thing as danger from the damage to the ozone layer. Now people all over the world are experiencing skin damage from increased ultraviolet exposure with more serious consequences to come. The European Union Commission estimates that just last winter's ozone loss will result in about 80,000 additional cases of skin cancer in Europe alone.

This is the same Dr. Singer who is being bankrolled by the Global Climate Coalition, one of whose members is the American Petroleum Institute which paid $1.8 million to the public relation firm Burson-Marsteller to defeat a proposed tax on fossil fuels. The Global Climate Commission has already spent more than $1 million to downplay the threat of global change and is expected to spend another $850,000 in the next year.

This is the same Dr. Singer who receives consulting fees from Western Fuels Association, a $400 million consortium of coal suppliers and coal-fired utilities. He also has received fees from Exxon, Shell, Unocal, ARCO and Sun Oil.

The biggest threat to our democracy is not from the environmental extremists but from the disaster that faces our democracy when changes in our climate destroy our ability to live as we have in the past and we can no longer continue to farm in the United States. The energy lobbies have succeeded in dictating the policies of the United States so far, but we have to realize that our economy depends on the global environment, not the other way around.

Please, Senator Kinder, take off the blinders and think for yourself.

S.L. HODGE

Cape Girardeau