Who are you going to trust about Proposition 37, your family and friends? Or a notorious pesticide-industry front man whose radical ideas defy scientific consensus?

Check out this email sent by the anti-consumer No on 37 campaign:

Patrick –

Who have you spoken to about Prop 37? A friend, a colleague, a family member, perhaps. Have you asked a top scientist in the state what they thought about Prop 37?

We did. We spoke with Dr. Henry I. Miller, the founding director for the FDA Office of Biotechnology. Watch this video and hear what Dr. Miller says about the provisions and exemptions in Prop 37 that make no sense.

The ad was followed by a link to Henry Miller on TV, falsely identified as a doctor at Stanford University (he is actually a researcher at the Hoover Institute). What the ad fails to mention is that a lot of common-sense, obvious things make no sense to Henry Miller -- like the fact that cigarettes are harmful, DDT was banned for a reason, and it is undesirable to be exposed to nuclear radiation after a nuclear power plant meltdown.

BACKGROUND:  The Dubious Credibility of No on 37 Science Spokesperson Henry Miller  

• Miller was a founding member of The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition, a Phillip Morris backed front group that tried to discredit the links between tobacco products and cancer.  http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/The_Advancement_of_Sound_Science_Coalition
• In a 1994 PR memo recommending strategy to help Phillip Morris organize a worldwide effort to fight tobacco regulations, Henry Miller was referred to as “a key supporter.”  http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/pqa35e00/pdf 
• In 2012, Miller wrote, “nicotine … is not particularly bad for you in the amounts delivered by cigarettes or smokeless products.” http://www.hoover.org/publications/defining-ideas/article/111606
• Miller has repeatedly argued for the re-introduction of DDT, a toxic pesticide banned in the United States since 1972, which has been linked to pre-term birth and fertility impairment in women.   http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/re-booting-ddt, http://www.forbes.com/sites/henrymiller/2012/09/05/rachel-carsons-deadly-fantasies/2/

•  In 2011, after the Japanese tsunami and radiation leaks at the Fukushima nuclear power plants, Miller argued that “those … who were exposed to low levels of radiation could have actually benefitted from it.” http://www.forbes.com/sites/henrymiller/2011/12/21/can-tiny-amounts-of-poison-actually-be-good-for-you/
• Miller sits on the “scientific advisory board” of the George C. Marshall Institute, which is famous for its oil and gas industry funded denials of climate change.
  http://cei.org/adjunct-scholar/henry-i-miller
  http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/orgfactsheet.php?id=36
  http://www.forbes.com/2010/03/01/al-gore-environment-climate-change-opinions-contributors-henry-i-miller.html

• Miller has argued that the FDA should outsource more of its functions to private industries, and has publicly attacked the FDA for its efforts to ensure proper vetting and testing of new drugs: 
  http://www.american.com/archive/2007/october-10-07/the-case-for-fda-outsourcing/; http://www.american.com/archive/2007/june-0607/drug-regulation-has-the-worst-become-the-norm/

For more information on Yes on 37 California Right to Know campaign, see www.carighttoknow.org.