Across the U.S., thousands of industrial facilities use and store hazardous chemicals in large quantities that pose great, and often unnecessary, risks to the general public. For example, 50 oil refineries across the country use hydrofluoric acid, putting over 15 million Americans at risk of injury or death from an accident or terrorist attack, even though safer alternatives exist that would eliminate the threat.

The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee is debating legislation supported by the chemical industry that would make security guidelines at chemical facilities voluntary and could exempt parts of the industry from any regulation.

Please take a moment to ask your senators to oppose the industry-supported Senate Bill 994 and support amendments that would increase public accountability and close industry loopholes. Then, ask your family and friends to help by forwarding this e-mail to them.

To take action, click here or paste this link into your web browser: pirg.org/alerts/route.asp?id=456&id4=OHFreep

*This article was written with Jeffrey St. Clair.

"It's agricultural asbestos!" That ripe phrase is how one British farmer described the menu of genetically modified (GM) crops being offered by Monsanto, a food biotechnology company in the United Kingdom. It became a rallying cry for farmers and environmentalists across Britain seeking to keep GM seeds out of English soil. For its part, Monsanto, and the Blair government, dismissed such charges as the ravings of Luddites. But now, a three-year study by British scientists, commissioned by Blair's own environment minister, Michael Meacher, reveals that the environmental risks of GM crops may be even greater than previously believed.

Jackson Browne is a class act that keeps getting classier.

From "Running on Empty" and "Doctor My Eyes" to "For Everyman," "The Pretender" and "Late for the Sky," Jackson has been a mainstay of the rock scene for thirty years. He's also been a pillar of strength for the movements for social justice and environmental sanity. His countless benefits have helped grassroots organizations work for peace in Latin America, fight nuclear power, and much more.

Now he's on that riskiest and most demanding of musical ventures, a solo acoustic tour.

How many rock icons could sit on a stage alone and truly hold an audience for a full concert? A loud band armed with riffs and theatrics, amps and antics, can roll over a lack of real talent. Rock is an industry built on hype, short-term profits and one-hit wonders.

But with more than a dozen albums, Jackson is still writing and recording songs that resonate emotionally, politically and spiritually. He can also perform them acoustic, on a bare stage, with warmth and genius.

By way of disclaimer, I've known Jackson since 1978, when he peformed with

The Bush administration is continuing to work with polluters on one of the broadest efforts to weaken our clean air protections in the history of the Clean Air Act. In October, Congress is expected to make a number of crucial decisions on clean air, including whether to allow a Bush administration practice known as the "Senior Death Discount."

The White House is trying to downplay the health impacts of proposed environmental rules by underestimating the value of a human life, and counting the lives of senior citizens for even less. For example, the Bush administration had devalued saving the life of someone over 65 by 37 percent compared to younger people, helping to mask the health impacts of various pieces of clean air legislation. These "death discounts" should not be used to derail public health proposals.

October 18, 1972, thirty one years ago, it all seemed so easy, when Congress passed the Clean Water Act and Senator Muskie stated on the Senate floor: "This Act simply means, that we can not use our rivers any longer to treat our sewage".

Even tough many claim that this second largest federal public works program has been successful; neither of the Act's goals -- swimmable and fishable waters by 1983 and elimination of all water pollution by 1985 -- have been achieved.

Neither can they ever be achieved, because the regulations implementing the Act ignore 40% of the pollution caused by fecal waste and all the pollution caused by urine waste in sewage.  All this is the result of an incorrectly applied pollution tests.

This pollution test is called the BOD (Biochemical Oxygen Demand) test, which measures the oxygen used by bacteria that feed on the organic matter in sewage. Sewage contains carbonaceous matter (fecal), which is used by heterotrphic bacteria and nitrogenous matter (urine and proteins), which is used by autotrophic bacteria.

When the test was developed in England, around 1920, it was found that