The Survive and Thrive Boomer Guide

EPA’s plan to regulate harmful PFAS chemicals is too little, too late, environmental group says

U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released a plan Thursday to regulate PFAS chemicals, which includes making a determination by the end of the year about how the harmful chemicals should be regulated under the Safe Drinking Water Act and listing them as hazardous substances to aid in cleanup efforts.

PFAS, short for perfluoroalky and polyfluoroalkyl, are a group of highly fluorinated chemicals used in nonstick cookware, fire retardants, oil and water repellents, furniture, carpets, waterproof clothes, take out containers, and fire-fighting foam. The chemicals are very persistent in the environment and in the human body – meaning they don’t break down and they can accumulate over time.

EPA’s PFAS management plan would only make the nationwide crisis of pollution from fluorinated compounds worse, according to the Environmental Working Group. It wouldn’t stop the introduction of new PFAS chemicals, end the use of in everyday products, alert Americans to the risk of PFAS pollution, or clean up contaminated drinking water supplies for an estimated 110 million Americans.

What presidents are celebrated on Presidents’ Day?

What are your plans for Presidents’ Day? Enjoying a day off? Exercising? Reading? Binge watching TV programs? Shopping? Working? Cleaning house?

I bet not many people are thinking about their favorite president today or about citizen participation to help our government work better.

Again this year, I’ve been seeing the Mount Rushmore presidents on a Presidents’ Day articles. In addition to George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, many people are adding the two other Mount Rushmore presidents, Thomas Jefferson and Theodore Roosevelt, to honor.

Honda recalls vehicles because car wash soap damage may cause them to catch fire

Photo: Kelvin Eng

Honda and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration are recalling about 106,683 Ridgeline sport utility trucks because they could catch fire after being washed in a car wash.

In 2017, 2018, and 2019 Ridgeline trucks, the acid from car wash soaps could cause the fuel pump feed line to crack. The damage increases the chances the trucks will catch fire.

The recall is expected to begin on March 7.

Honda is notifying owners, and dealers will repair and replace the fuel pump at no cost to owners.

Copyright 2019, Rita R. Robison, Consumer Specialist

Education Department fails to adequately supervise student loan servicers, federal watchdog says

Student loan debt is now the second largest debt in the United States with only mortgage debt higher. And, since 2013, most people aren’t able to discharge their student loan debts through bankruptcy.

That’s what makes a report from the Office of the Inspector General of the U.S. Department of Education, which is highly critical of how the department is handling federal student loan servicers, disturbing. A loan servicer is a company that handles the billing and other services on a federal student loan.

In an audit, the inspector general found that Federal Student Aid, an office of the department, hadn’t adequately supervised student loan servicers.

Federal agency to slash energy efficiency standards for some light bulbs, costing consumers billions and increasing pollution

The U.S. Department of Energy is proposing a rollback of energy efficiency standards for about 2.7 billion light bulbs, cutting nearly in half the number of bulbs to be covered by its 2020 energy-saving rules.

The proposal, announced Wednesday, would remove three-way bulbs, candle-shaped bulbs used in chandeliers and sconces, reflector bulbs used in recessed lighting, and the round globe bulbs usually found in bathroom lighting fixtures from the energy-saving lighting standards scheduled to go into effect on Jan. 1, 2020.

The result will be $12 billion in additional consumer energy bill costs and the need to generate 25 coal-burning plants’ worth of extra electricity every year, said Noah Horowitz, director of Natural Resources Defense Council’s Center for Energy Efficiency Standards.

Federal consumer agency proposes gutting protections on payday loan debt traps

Photo: Aliman Senai

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said Wednesday that it’s proposing to roll back payday lending protections. The bureau is proposing to rescind the requirements that lenders make sure consumers can repay payday loans before issuing them.

While the bureau contends the changes will increase consumer access to credit, consumer groups say it's gutting consumer protections.

The bureau also proposed to push back the date lenders must comply with the rule from this August to November 2020.

Breaded popcorn chicken recalled by Pilgrim’s Pride because it may be contaminated with rubber

Pilgrim’s Pride Corp. is recalling about 58,020 pounds of breaded popcorn chicken that may be contaminated with rubber, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service said Friday.

The frozen, breaded chicken items, which are not-ready-to-eat, were produced on Jan. 4, 2019. The following chicken is included in the recall:

EPA report for 2018 under Trump brags about saving polluters $2 billion, while falsely claiming to protect children’s health

The Environmental Protection Agency’s 2018 list of accomplishments contains policies that make it easier and cheaper for polluters to pollute, while painting a distorted record of protecting children’s health.

In acting EPA chief Andrew Wheeler’s Year in Review, topping the list is pushing through “13 major deregulatory actions, almost one a month.” Since the beginning of the Trump administration, according the report, the EPA “has finalized 33 major deregulatory actions, saving Americans almost $2 billion.”

The report needs explanation, said Environmental Working Group President Ken Cook.

Consumer Reports finds unacceptable levels of heavy metals in fruit juice

Fruit juices are known to be high in sugars, but they could also pose another health risk: potentially harmful levels of heavy metals, according to testing conducted by Consumer Reports, a nonprofit advocacy organization.

In its analysis of 45 popular fruit juices sold across the country, Consumer Reports found that nearly half contained unacceptable levels of inorganic arsenic, lead, or cadmium. 

Children, who are particularly vulnerable to the harmful effects of heavy metals, drink a lot of fruit juice. More than 80 percent of parents of children three and under give their kids juice at least sometimes, according to a recent national Consumer Reports survey. In 74 percent of those cases, kids drink juice once a day or more. Yet, ingesting heavy metals can put kids at risk for lowered IQ, behavioral problems, type-2 diabetes, and cancer, among other health issues, depending on how long they are exposed to these toxins.

Federal actions against corporations continue to drop in Trump’s second year, despite his ‘tough on crime’ rhetoric

Under President Donald Trump, the “tough on crime” president, corporate enforcement actions at the U.S. Department of Justice fell for the second year in a row, according to a Public Citizen report.

In Trump’s second year, the DOJ completed just 227 cases against corporate offenders, 14 fewer than in 2017, and down heavily from 308 in President Barack Obama’s final year in office.

While the Trump DOJ’s financial penalties did increase to $15.7 billion in 2018 from $4.9 billion, the 2018 level is below Obama-era penalties. In addition, the report states that 62 percent of the 2018 total is attributable to just four cases against big banks – Royal Bank of Scotland, Wells Fargo, Barclays, and HSBC – which were initiated by the Obama administration for financial crisis-era allegations.