I do my best to feed my children well, but today I learned that all along I’ve been poisoning them with phthalates! I’m ashamed to admit it now, but we bake all our own bread here. To promote the advancement of Science for the Public Interest, I’ll admit to our recipe.
We feed 10 cups of organic hard red winter wheat through our Nutrimill to make our own organic 100% whole wheat flour. While the grain is grinding, we put the following in our Bosch kitchen machine’s bread bowl:
5 cups warm filtered water
2/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
2/3 cup local honey
4 teaspoons unrefined sea salt
3 tablespoons fresh active dry yeast
Optional: The sky’s almost the limit, but we often add some ground flax seed and whole millet.
This recipe and method produces wonderful 100% whole wheat bread in just about an hour. It’s delicious with 100% natural peanut butter and Smuckers Simply Fruit 100% fruit jelly or buttered along with soup or grilled with natural Wisconsin cheese and tomato or (on a special day) with sliced turkey or beef, cheese, avocado, sprouts, and homemade mayonnaise.
But I’ve just learned that MY BREAD IS POISONOUS with evil, dangerous PHTHALATES!
Extra-virgin olive oil includes naturally ocurring dimethyl phthalate (DMP), di-(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate (DEHP or DOP, which is restricted by CPSIA), diisoamyl phthalate (DIAP), and dihexyl phthalate (DHP).
Based on non-analogous rat studies, the pseudoscientists at Greenpeace have decreed that my male children will grow up sterile eating this horrible, poisonous diet! I had better get my little guys to McDonald’s pronto for loads of Happy Meals and start buying case quantities of cruddy cookies and fluorescent candy BEFORE IT’S TOO LATE!
I’m overwhelmed with guilt as it is, so please don’t ask for details about the diethyl phthalate-laced 100% whole wheat cranberry bread that I inflicted on my children last Christmas morning–or make any unpleasant remarks about the fact that I served red and green grapes laced with dibutyl phthalate (DBP, which is also restricted by CPSIA) at the very same meal!
And, most shameful and telling of all, the evil mother of this family is dedicated to the low-carb lifestyle for her own diet. She doesn’t herself eat the bread with which she wickedly poisons her multiple little ones!
1. This legislation has been put on hold for one year.
Not true. Certain manufacturers have a one year stay on certain testing. There is not a broad one-year exemption. The stay on testing does not affect schools, libraries, retailers or resellers in any direct way. (Some libraries think they have a year off, but this is not what a “stay on certain manufacturer testing” means; they are not manufacturers.)
2. The CPSC exempted resellers.
Not true. We resellers do not have a legislative requirement to test our products, but we resellers must comply with every CPSIA standard for every product we sell. Now. At this time, we resellers can choose between testing products and having no way of knowing when we are breaking the law.
3. Old books can be sold as “collectibles for adults”–and that takes care of the book issue.
It’s true that old children’s books can be marketed as collectibles for adults, but this does not help libraries, schools, or bookstores that are serving the educational needs of American children. Children benefit from twentieth cenury books every day in this country, and every product must be marketed effectively in order to be sold successfully. Restaurants market to hungry people; automakers market to drivers; and booksellers traditionally market our books to and for readers.
It’s important to understand that most 20th century children’s books are out-of-print and the few that are in-print are generally not available in hardcover.
4. This might be hard for people–but in the long run it will be healthier for kids.
We have no evidence that this legislation, burdensome and destructive as it is, will prevent a single death or disability. I’ve searched records at the CPSC, CDC, National Institutes of Health, and National Library of Medicine, and I can find not record of any child ever lead poisoned by a book, an article of clothing or a regular children’s toy. (Lead jewelry and lead paint in children’s furniture have very rarely caused problems, but rare events do not call for broad, sweeping, punitive legislative solutions.)
Lead is dangerous in an inappropriate amount in an inappropriate place; lead is quite safe in an appropriate amount and an appropriate place. While CPSIA doesn’t improve safety, its impact is more likely to be negative. Now, low-income children will have greater difficulty getting protection from the cold, bicycle manufacturers are being pressed to get minimally tested (but lead-free) parts to market, parents are tempted to buy oversized ATVs, minibikes, and snowmobiles because the youth models are all illegal across the board. Also, the CPSC has revealed that they are so busy chasing CPSIA non-hazards that they cannot effectively target their resources toward genuine risk to real children.
5. Congress is fixing this–or surely will soon.
At this point, Congress is adamantly refusing to take any action. At least 10 bills are being ignored in committee. The #1 place to put pressure is on Congressman Henry Waxman, Chairman of the House Committee on Energy & Commerce. He needs to hear from America; he is the major obstacle to getting this horrible legislation amended.
The Dictionary of the Middle Ages (14 Volumes) edited by Joseph Strayer. An attractive ex-library set, on consignment from a local library, this sold for $1249.00 today. It’s going to a research library in Germany.
We’re so thankful to have this sale just now as this economy is absolutely brutal to the book business, especially at the high end.
One of my daughters looks at our government’s plans for the wealthy and asks, “Don’t they understand that we need rich people?” Think about it.
Democrats Willfully Abuse Low-income Children AGAIN
Responding to Consumers Union
Valerie Jacobsen
Valerie is the Christian wife of Paul Jacobsen and homeschooling mother
to their eleven children.
The Jacobsen Family owns Jacobsen Books, a small bookstore in Clinton,
Wisconsin and maintains the web sites JacobsenBooks.com
(general book sales), ValeriesLivingBooks.com
(Contraband Living Books for Homeschooling Families), and ValeriesLivingBooks.info
(Underground Information on Living Books: Why They Should be Quietly Embraced and
Not Destroyed).
"Books won't stay banned. They won't
burn. Ideas
won't go to jail. In the long run of history,
the censor and the inquisitor have always lost."
--Alfred Whitney Griswold
