The Politics Of Fear: Liberals Use Scare Tactics To Suppress Innovative Plastic Technology

Reminiscent of campaign against and subsequent ban of DDT based on little more than hysteria and exaggerated science, the usual suspects also launched a campaign against a plastic product called BPA.
Yesterday, the AP reported an interesting story coming out of California indicating that a regulatory board refused to buy into that particular strain of hype:

“A California regulatory board voted Wednesday against placing Bisphenol A, a chemical used to manufacture plastic baby bottles and toys, on the state’s list of chemicals that are believed to cause reproductive harm.
The panel, comprised of seven physicians, unanimously decided that the chemical known as BPA should not be covered under Proposition 65, a voter-approved measure used by regulators to identify substances that can cause birth defects, developmental or reproductive harm.”

That’s right, after years of scaring Americans about BPA, even the liberal state of California has ruled that the chemical (which is used to make plastics stronger) is safe. So how did this scare campaign (which has been going on for years, now) get started?
It turns out, the anti-BPA forces were pushed by Fenton Communications, the same leftist PR company who gave us the “General Betray Us” MoveOn.org ads. The scare campaign, of course, began even after The Food and Drug Administration had ruled that the chemical was safe. The attacks were especially vicious, because the claims were that it posed a danger to babies using baby bottles.
As Human Events reported in 2007:

With offices in Washington, New York, and San Francisco, Fenton operatives work up smear campaigns whether the target is Gen. David Petraeus, Fox News’ Sean Hannity or the conservative movement in general.

Putting aside the fact that the claims were entirely bogus, the fear campaign against BPA was a brilliant business move for Fenton — and a win/win/win for liberals. David Fenton, of course, is a liberal activist. He represents many radical environmental groups like the San Francisco-based Tides Foundation, who could benefit from creating a bogey man. And he also represents trial lawyers, who could make millions by bringing about class action lawsuits against the manufcaturers of plastics. Lastly, trial lawyers are major donors to Democratic politicians, so getting them on board was easy. And plastics competitors who didn’t use BPA could now charge absurd prices for their products at upscale stores like Whole Foods, based on the fact that their product (though more expensive) was ostensibly “safer.”
Rest assured, the attempts to destroy this safe product will not go silently into the night. Despite the fact that the liberal state of California has unanimously voted that BPA is safe — and numerous studies (most recently the Statistical Assessment Service (STATS) at George Mason University, which found that risks associated with BPA were “seriously misleading and caused unnecessary public anxiety”) — liberals will continue their witch hunts, as evidenced by this post on the liberal DailyKos.
Now, maybe you don’t really care about BPA, but isn’t it interesting how often liberals, who refer to themselves as progressives, stand in the way of actual progress because they think we all need to be protected from ourselves? Or because of their hysterical conspiracy theories?