Several years ago I drove through an area where in the mid-late forties I played as a kid, there was a beautiful little lake stocked with bream, bass, crappie and catfish, there were monstrous trees and plenty of small game... When I laid eyes on the place I felt sick to my stomach, it was nothing like I remembered, the trees were all dead, not a blade of grass to be found, and not even a bird in site. What happened? Industry had disposed of their waste in the area, a lot of mercury, lead, oil and grease, it was so polluted I was sure it was dead forever, that in the early sixties.
Sometime later, along came the tree huggers, the environmentalist, folks that knew how to clean the area up, and had the assets to do it. They did a great job of making the place look better, but there is still so much pollution (mercury, lead, etc.) in the soil that is not a safe place to spend time, even today.
The point here, American has done so many things over the years to make our life more comfortable, without thinking about the hazards associated with progress, that we are now faced with massive cleanup projects in almost every community. Think about your area and the quality of life improvements residue that is killing you and your family today. Look at the batteries we throw in the land fills, electronic equipment, chemicals that leached back into the water we drink or water run off that migrates into the fields where our crops are grown. Bottom line, are we killing ourselves?