C-Span and USAToday Report More Failures

I write today to discuss a childhood memory about the fluoride scare of the 1950s and 1960s. Jan. 25, 1945: Fluoridation — Better Teeth, or Commie Plot?
Grand Rapids, Michigan, fluoridates its water, beginning a controversy that remains unsettled to this day.

Fluoride was added to the water supply to deal with cavities. However, it was the height of the "red" scare and every time it was proposed for water supplies, we had lectures about how it was a commie plot. Well, ve don't need no stinking commies these days. We have lax water inspections, lax laws and lax cleanup so that prescriptions for Joe down the street are getting into the water for Jane who lives in another town or for drugs to get into the water supply of feedlots. USDA and FDA claim they don't have enough inspectors to make foods or drugs safe. They blame the lack of inspectors on the Congress. I say, nay. It is the job of the USDA and the FDA to make sure we have enough competent inspectors to check on the quality of water and slaughter houses. And that is not what is or has been happening. Third party investigators from the Humane Society and AP are the ones who alert the public to these irregularities and outright abuses. I find this even more troubling than the fact that now the water can kill me because I am deathly allergic to penicillin. And yet, the Administration claims that if we want a safe society, we must and give up our rights to phone privacy, email privacy and general privacy. If that is the case, then for that sacrifice, don't we deserve a safe society that isn't potentially being poisoned by these chemicals that are in our water? When security isn't secure, can the phrase freedom isn't free make any sense at all?

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-03-10-drugs-tap-water_N.htm