Pb Free, Free The Lead

There's been a ton of chatter on the interwebs today about this lead toxicity issue being discussed by Kevin Drum and Mother Jones.  The issue itself is important; lead is understood to be highly toxic, very dangerous, and children are still tested for lead in their blood because of the serious problems lead poisoning can cause.  I'm also somewhat stoked to see science and society being discussed in such a rational way.  Teabaggers and Koch-sucking reactionary retards might not like science because science apparently scares the shit out of Jesus, but science and scientific issues are often misunderstood beyond the insane right wing, so this sort of coverage of lead toxicity and its effect on the population and crime rates is gratifying.  Removing lead chromate and lead carbonate from paint and the tetraethyl lead from gasoline--now's the time to get the TEL out of aviation fuels, too--could very well have prevented wide-ranging learning disabilities and other neurological damage that lead (get it?) to a profound decrease in crime and violence.  This is exactly the sort of science and the sort of progress that the reactionary teabagger types would fight on Fox News and with shitloads of Koch-sucking conservative money in the name of  a proud American tradition of poisoning our children because we're ignorant fucking shitheels.