Kevin Drum On Lead And Crime

Kevin Drum wrote himself onto the cover of Mother Jones with an article about the link between environmental lead and crime, and what we ought to do about it. Some of it is not news - the NY Times and the WaPo noted some of the key articles back in 2007 while bashing Rudy Giuliani for taking unwarranted credit for the drop in crime in New York City. (Instapundit readers and longtimers here surely remember.)

That said, the intellectual ball has advanced and Kevin has interesting points about both abatement possibilities (lead dust doesn't just walk away) and the non-embrace of this theory amongst the criminologist community. [But let's include some pushback from Ron Bailey of Hit & Run].

However, on that latter point this struck me as strangely unreflective:

My own sense is that interest groups probably play a crucial role [in ignoring the lead-crime connection]: Political conservatives want to blame the social upheaval of the '60s for the rise in crime that followed. Police unions have reasons for crediting its decline to an increase in the number of cops. Prison guards like the idea that increased incarceration is the answer. Drug warriors want the story to be about drug policy. If the actual answer turns out to be lead poisoning, they all lose a big pillar of support for their pet issue. And while lead abatement could be big business for contractors and builders, for some reason their trade groups have never taken it seriously.

Hmm. And why have liberals progressives, the people of science, not been trumpeting these discoveries? A plausible intrepretation of these results is that America has a generation of lead-poisoned, brain-damaged urban blacks who are old enough to be less violent but still afflicted with reduced IQ and reduced impulse control. Is that where MSNBC wants to go? Is there a prominent Democrat who wants to stand up and tell us that one of the pillars of the Democratic Party is disproportionately brain-damaged, through no fault of their own?  I don't think so.

And heaven help any Republican who suggests we need to spend billions getting the lead out of our inner cities so we can stop damaging the brains of the urban poor. Science notwithstanding, it sounds racist. Maybe Mayor Bloomberg could have pulled it off, but he is leaving.

Kevin does waltz near to this problem in noting the reasons for a lack of public discussion:

One of them was put bluntly by Herbert Needleman, one of the pioneers of research into the effect of lead on behavior. A few years ago, a reporter from the Baltimore City Paper asked him why so little progress had been made recently on combating the lead-poisoning problem. "Number one," he said without hesitation, "it's a black problem." But it turns out that this is an outdated idea. Although it's true that lead poisoning affects low-income neighborhoods disproportionately, it affects plenty of middle-class and rich neighborhoods as well. "It's not just a poor-inner-city-kid problem anymore," Nevin says. "I know people who have moved into gentrified neighborhoods and immediately renovate everything. And they create huge hazards for their kids."

Based on a quick word search of his article that is the only mention of "black" or "African-American". No profiles in courage here.

It will be hard to come up with the money to fix this without an explanation of why we need it, and that explanation is fraught with PC peril.

ERRATA: Let me quote the Times from 2007:

No matter how suggestive the economists’ data, it takes a doctor to show that some of the people most damaged by lead are out there breaking the law. Herbert Needleman, the University of Pittsburgh psychiatrist and pediatrician whose work helped persuade the government to ban lead in the 1970s, recently studied a sample of juvenile delinquents in Pittsburgh; the group had significantly more lead in their bones than their peers.

And here is a paper by Rick Nevin, who had this idea early.

AS WE AWAIT THE RESPONSIBLE DISCUSSION: Obama's former minister Jeremiah Wright backed the notion that the US was behind the AIDS virus; Michelle Obama encouraged black patients to distrust pharmaceutical companies. What will these two make of the white-led conspiracy to poison blacks by way of leaded gasoline?

FURTHERING FANNING THE RACIAL FLAMES: Just how will the notion of poisoned blacks track alongside the logic of affirmative action? If urban blacks are disproportionately IQ impaired, just what is the right target representation in colleges, police departments, fire departments and so on?

I see an incredibly awkward and divisive national conversation, I am not surprised we have ducked it, and I won't be surprised if we continue to duck it.

GOOD BACKGROUND FROM THE TIMES:

The Times reported on environmental lead:

Environmental Hazards; After Years of Cleanup, Lead Poisoning Persists As a Threat to Health

Despite steady progress in reducing lead hazards, millions of Americans are still absorbing unhealthy amounts of lead from air, dust, water, food and peeling paint found in older buildings, according to a recent authoritative report and experts in the field.

''Lead is potentially toxic wherever it is found, and it is found everywhere,'' warned a report to Congress by the Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry, a unit of the Federal Centers for Disease Control. The report said ''little or no margin of safety exists'' between levels of lead already found in the blood of large segments of the population and those levels associated with toxic risk.

The warning followed two decades of progress in removing lead from the environment. The amount of lead in gasoline and in paint has been sharply reduced. Lead solder has been banned in plumbing and eliminated from many food cans.

The Environmental Protection Agency this month proposed new standards to reduce further the lead in drinking water. And many cities have conducted cleanup campaigns in decaying neighborhoods to reduce the hazards of severe poisoning from peeling lead-based paint.

And they go on. Lest you wonder, that is from 1988.

And lead poisoning is not just for the poor:

Study Documents Lead-Exposure Damage in Middle-Class Children

By JANE E. BRODY

Published: October 29, 1992

Children from middle-class families are as likely as poor children to suffer losses in intelligence after exposure to low levels of lead early in life, according to a new study.

The study appears to answer critics who have suggested that research on the exposure of poor children to lead might have failed to take into account other factors, like socioeconomic standing or genetics, that could affect intelligence.

...The new findings show that contrary to assertions by industry and some scientists, the losses in intellectual ability and school performance among children with elevated levels of lead in their blood are not solely the result of genetics or socioeconomic status or any other known influences on mental development. Both the Australian and Boston studies took into account factors like the mother's I.Q., parenting styles, other illnesses, birth order, parental smoking and a host of other possible influences on a child's I.Q.

I infer that earlier studies that correlated reduced IQ with elevated lead among poor kids were criticized for a failure to control for the many other possible developmental problems associated with poverty. Putting middle class kids in the mix would be one way to resolve that.

SOME HISTORY: The hazards of lead were well known and widely recognized for centuries. The discovery of tetraethyl lead as a useful anti-knock additive to gasoline back in the 1920's is shocking; here is a short version and a longer one. The US then sounds somewhat like China today.

Inventor Thomas Midgley later added chlorofloroucarbons to his resume, putting him on the short list of Greatest Environmental Supervillain Ever. Since you ask, he had several bouts of lead poisoning.

Comments

[matt]

most atmospheric lead today comes from the weights used to balance tires. They fall off and get ground down. Still, the exposure through tetra ethyl lead would seem to have some credibility.

Lead itself is inert. There has been a massive drive to ban lead in products such as electronics that has absolutely no impact on lead exposure levels. The loons take one instance and make it a template for the complete ban on certain substances. Foolish.

[peter]

That whole lead poisoning scam was and still is a big moneymaker for the trial lawyers.

[Richard Aubrey]

Talked to a contractor about the state and fed requirements for renovating in a home with lead paint. Major, major pain in the rump.

[Rob Crawford]

Lead bulks like tire weights, fishing weights, and slugs are nearly inert. Once the outer layer oxidizes, it's stopped.

The overwrought reaction to lead is also being used to go after shooting ranges. The only source of biologically active lead in shooting is from the primers and their smoke; the slugs are only dangerous if they hit you. But the ignorant want every gram of lead removed from ranges.

Remember when Clinton signed an executive order requiring arsenic levels in water BELOW the natural levels in some areas? That's where the lead scare is going.

[Old Lurker]

Well I worked through dioxin. And I worked through asbestos. And I worked through mold. But when Rhode Island handed down rules and court decisions regarding liability for lead paint I figured I had seen the movie so I sold all interests in rental residential properties and never looked back.

It is an issue in commercial properties but the regs are easier and the ratio of rent to risk is the reverse of residential rentals.

[narciso]

Meanwhile they tell us not to focus on those things that are 'clear and present dangers'

http://legalinsurrection.com/2013/01/cair-demands-media-drop-term-islamist/

[Rob Crawford]

I will admit to being biased against the lead scare. Besides shooting, I paint miniature figures that, traditionally, have been made from lead because lead is cheap, easy to cast, and harmless. Back in the early 1990s, a New York attorney general made noise about suing the companies that make the figures over their lead content -- "They're toys! Made from lead!" -- never mind the target audience averaging 30. As a result, the manufacturers moved to god-awful brittle pewters. The prices doubled, it became nearly impossible to modify them, and the life span of figures was easily halved because if the figure bent, well, you could bend it back ONCE.

A few years ago the Indonesians jacked up the price of tin, doubling the the prices of figures again. Some companies started moving back to lead, some to plastic. But the start-up costs for plastics are something like 10x that for metal -- and so many small companies die...

[Jane - Mock the Media!]

Many years ago when I owned a 2 family house I evicted some tenants who were dealing drugs in the apartment and in retaliation they called in the board of health AKA the lead paint police. I had to completely strip all the paint in all the rooms and repaint - even tho it was a 100 year old house and the lead part was about 10 paint layers deep.

The contractor had to pass a course in lead paint removal before he was allowed to do the job and you couldn't do this or that or anything else. It was expensive, ridiculous and as big a pain in the ass as it gets. I felt like I was hanging on for dear life when they did the re-inspection.

It passed but the whole thing was a complete nightmare.

[Beasts of England]

I blame my decreased waterfowl harvest on the lead ban. That's gotta be it, right?

[narciso]

I know this is why Bloomberg was the lesser evil;

http://weaselzippers.us/2013/01/03/msnbc-guest-equates-gun-owners-with-child-molesters-wants-them-treated-the-same/

but he's been drinking from lead lined goblets as well.

[Chelate to the party.]

For Tetraethyllead give Ethylenediaminetetracetic acid.
================

[Clarice]

Well , yes, the lead ban is ridiculous esp the painting of already encapsulated lead paint. It looks even crazier when you consider the govt that puts you thru all those hops demands that you replace your perfectly good lightbulbs with ones containing mercury.

[narciso]

OT, They have gone bonkers over at the Weather channel, haven't they kim, yes there was a SyFy
film along those lines of 'Space Weather'

[matt]

Tin, the major replacement in electronics jumped from $7,000/ton to a rough value of $25,000 ton today because of the shift. Not only that, I was in three separate discussions today on the poor electrical liability of tin soldered printed circuit boards.

Airbus went to all lead free electronics on the A-380 and a lot of us in the electronics industry really don't like flying that model for that reason.

[Clarice]

*hoOps*

[narciso]

Like Venkman, I'm no specialist in metallurgy, and that seems like a crazy move.

[centralcal]

Haven't kept up with the thread today, so hope I am not repeating something posted by others - late in the day and caught up at work, several folks had the same link on Twitter, followed by a stream of HA HA HA's.

The link went to some Democrat Underground comment thread. What a hoot. Apparently, these liberals had gotten their first paychecks of the new year and were whining, wailing, and gnashing teeth because their take home pay was less than last year.

Gave me a great big gloating smile on my face.

[Ignatz Ratzkiwatzki]

Gee, I read and I read and I read Kevvy's article and I saw where he said conservatives were wrong and the coppers were wrong and the prison builders were wrong but I looked in vain to find where he said that the millions of left wing pukes and their stupid claims that poverty causes crime were wrong.
Guess that's what he means when he says it's not a partisan thing, just common sense.

[One our Army's earliest triumphs was escorting the Redcoats into Concord with fife and drum.]

Well, I had a Sam Adams lately, and it tasted like Gage's Grenadiers had been put through the hops, the skips, and the jumps back to Charleston.
============

[Deh!]

One 'of' our....
=======

[rse]

Ah, Kim, just finished looking through nas's "A National Strategy for Advanced Climate Modelling."

It's the models, not reality that prevail.

Need to set up more funding.

Need to bribe all in computer science or weather tracks into this "well-paid career paths."

Need to aspire to centennial modelling.

Might as well hit that cliff. We are building huge infrastructures all over the place committed to implementing pure fantasies.

Power and money.

[Another Bob]

matt: Ditto the auto industry. All auto electronics must be lead-free.

Given that industry makes 'em by the hundreds-of-thousands, I'm pretty sure the supplier's quality people would know if tin solders were an issue. Their PPMs seem to indicate they aren't.

[Jim Miller]

When I have seen those studies on lead, I have always wondered whether they had controlled for everything they should have controlled for, since living in lead-painted houses, and near freeways have to be correlated with lots of other things. (For instance, being without a father in the home.)

Or if they had looked at some of the special cases.

For instance, he doesn't mention one of the first things I'd do, if I were studying the problem -- look at lead miners, their families, and lead mining towns. Fifty years ago, some of those people must have been exposed to very high levels of lead.

There are also any number of veterans who were shot with lead bullets, some of which were not be removed completely.

And he neglects what I think must be part of the explanation: As crime began rising in the 1960s, the chances of significant punishment was falling; as those chances rose again the the 1980s, crime began to fall again.

[Rick Ballard]

Ignatz,

If you're interested in wild flights of correlation, read the Nevin's link. I'm rather surprised he didn't do a lead/climate change study to cap it off.

[RichatUF]

Airbus went to all lead free electronics on the A-380 and a lot of us in the electronics industry really don't like flying that model for that reason.

RoHS. In y previous job it was a pain in the ass.

kim-

lol. I had two;) Celebrating going home-finally.

[RichatUF]

Jim-

I see a grant in your furure.

[Jim Miller]

Speaking of crime, some studies (mostly by economists) find that the death penalty deters somewhere between 5 and 15 murders per execution.

I am inclined to believe those results (as is Gary Becker, who knows way more about the methodology than I do), but will admit that the very range of the results should make us uncertain about the generalization.

Would Drum accept those results, see them as interesting but unproven, or just dismiss them?

[Jim Miller]

RichatUF - Not if I don't learn to proof my applications. As most of you must have guessed, that "the the" should be "in the". (And I did use the preview.)

[RichatUF]

blame the cat...or the beer (burp).

[Clarice]

I recall reading some time ago that the soil in Japan (urban areas I assume) was more heavily contaminated by heavy metals than the soil in the US) and though they did not apply the expensive remediation procedures we require there was very little lead in their bodies. The reason is they remove their shoes before entering their homes and regularly wash their hands when entering and before eating.

Perhaps we ought to have a federal hand washing and outside shoe box cadre.

[Jim Miller]

I could blame the half glass of Charles Shaw Merlot. Which isn't bad for a wine that costs $2.50 a bottle here in Washington state.

[narciso]

Wait there's even more to Nevins;

http://www.ricknevin.com/Energy_Efficiency.html

[narciso]

And some of his hisruptcy;

http://www.ricknevin.com/research.html

[narciso]

I'm sure when Bush won, he told Obama the right thing, right;

http://www.therightscoop.com/wolf-blitzer-to-ted-cruz-you-cant-be-overly-idealistic-you-have-to-compromise-because-obama-won/

[Captain Hate]

Remember when Clinton signed an executive order requiring arsenic levels in water BELOW the natural levels in some areas? That's where the lead scare is going.

Didn't Mr Clot sign that on the way out the door to make it rough for GWB to be in compliance and give the greens something to whine about?

Do any of these sooper jeenyusses realize that lead, like arsenic, is an element and, lacking a huge breakthrough in alchemy, can't be changed into anything different (it can be combined with something to make a compound although lead is pretty inert).

[RichatUF]

1. Yes. And predictibly, a bunch of ecokook groups had kids in ads about "arsenic in the water".

2. It makes for really colorful paints;) But sure the group that put this press release out wants to turn it into gold.

[narciso]

You weren't kidding, Jim, or Rick,

http://www.ricknevin.com/uploads/Exerpt_-_Correlation__Causation__Consistency__and_.pdf

[Clarice]

What I also recall is that the congenitally tongue tied Bush administration never bothered to make the point about arsenic levels at least not clearly enough to matter.

[narciso]

Maybe there is something to this lead thing after all;

http://theothermccain.com/2013/01/03/joe-biden-class-act/

[Rob Crawford]

Need to bribe all in computer science or weather tracks into this "well-paid career paths."

Heh. They're demanding CS people because the Climategate leaks showed their software is crap.

Of course, their "models" are crap, too, so...

[Rob Crawford]

There are also any number of veterans who were shot with lead bullets, some of which were not be removed completely.

I'm not a doctor, but I understand the body wraps foreign objects in scar tissue, and sometimes bone. And, as mentioned above, once the outer surface of the lead oxidizes, it's got its own protection.

[narciso]

That was Abbott where's Costello of the RT set;

http://freebeacon.com/hagel-nabs-coveted-911-truther-endorsement/

[Captain Hate]

What I also recall is that the congenitally tongue tied Bush administration never bothered to make the point about arsenic levels at least not clearly enough to matter.

Why is it only Karen Hughes understood the importance of explaining things to the public?

[narciso]

Did you catch the new episode of POI, Captain?

[Captain Hate]

Yes I did, narc; looks like Reese has his work cut out for him next week.

[RichatUF]

Maybe there is something to this lead thing after all...

An explaination for the rampant criminality on Capitol Hill.

Oregon has this game well in hand.

[Captain Hate]

Dammit, I hate the Ducks. Oh well, they aren't playing for #1

[fdcol63]

CH, don't forget Tony Snow. Man, I miss him.

[Captain Hate]

I was thinking of including Tony except that was his job; one that he did much better than McClellan for sure. I also miss him on FNS.

[narciso]

He did make it seem so easy, it helped that he came from journalism, like the late Tony Blankley
as well,

[Captain Hate]

I'd forgotten Blankley was dead; he was the only thing that made the McLaughlin group tolerable when I could still endure gasbag John.

[narciso]

Sometimes I wish I didn't remember things so well, Captain, in the LUN, 'something completely
different'

[narciso]

And a corrective, I knew that a film underwritten by Dubai and written by Boal and Bigelow would throw some curve balls;

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/a-cia-veteran-on-what-zero-dark-thirty-gets-wrong-about-the-bin-laden-manhunt/2013/01/03/4a76f1b8-52cc-11e2-a613-ec8d394535c6_story_1.html

[Captain Hate]

Ha! I saw that yesterday. Glad she's able to capitalize on something that makes it seem like she's having fun while competing at a high level. Isn't that what sports are supposed to be about?

[narciso]

The problem is even more widespread then I thought;

http://twitchy.com/2013/01/02/mr-not-so-brightside-sen-durbin-lauds-young-rock-group-the-killers-from-senate-floor/

[narciso]

You'll be surprised Captain, that Gov. 'Jiffy Lube' the other beauty contestant is out at Current, since 'the Flame' bought it.

[Manuel Transmission]

When I was in college, we did a fundraiser for our rifle team by cleaning out the sand traps behind the target area. (This was in the basement of the old stadium.) Anyway, a weekend of breathing lead dust while sifting for bullets gave me the worst headache I've ever had in my life. Respirators? we don't need no steenkin respirators.

Looking back on it, I probably injested 10k-100k the maximum recommended daily (lifetime?) allowance.

Somehow, after that, the idea that some inner city brat chewed off the paint on his crib and got stupid seemed preposterous.

[peter]

I work in the field of defense of personal injury lawsuits. The whole lead paint scam is a huge moneymaker for trial attorneys, who have a cadre of "experts" who cut and paste their reports for each welfare recipient plaintiff who then sue their government assisted slumlord, who then has their insurance company settle the cases because the jury pool is composed of welfare recipients, municipal workers and liberals. Great for everybody. A true slice of Obama's America.