Patrick Leahy: “we make a mistake when we say this is a matter of cap and trade. It is not. We are talking about a toxic waste, one that…”

“we make a mistake when we say this is a matter of cap and trade. It is not. We are talking about a toxic waste, one that causes birth defects, IQ loss, mental retardation, and continues to poison children and pregnant women. One-sixth of pregnant women are affected. That is not cap and trade. This idea that we are only talking about 1 percent, of course, is not the case. Forty percent of the mercury comes from the United States. We are talking about the 40 percent that is affecting our rivers, our streams, our children. Do we simply ignore the proliferation of warnings all over the country that fish caught in our streams and lakes and rivers are unsafe to eat? Do we allow this rule to move forward when it has been harshly criticized by the Bush administration's own EPA inspector general? When the Government Accountability Office has said there are major shortcomings in the analysis? Or do we uphold the bipartisan work that produced the Clean Air Act that protects the health of pregnant women and children and try and clean this up now? Every one of us will give speeches about how family friendly we are. We are talking about children. We are talking about pregnant women. I can't think of anything more family friendly than to remove this threat of mercury from them. If we vote this down, we are telling a whole generation of women and children their health is less important than energy company profits.…”