Al Franken is introducing his second piece of legislation, which would expand the requirements for labeling products used in the household. From MPR: “Moms and dads have a right to know whether harmful chemicals are present in their kitchen cupboards,” Franken said. “When my wife Franni and I were raising our own kids, we were constantly concerned with what we used to wash their cribs, their pacifiers, the floors, and surfaces they played on. This is just a common-sense measure to help parents keep their kids safe and healthy.”
Sen. Franken introduces bill for labeling household products
Sep 24 2009 — 2:26pm
15 Reader Comments
2:31 pm
Here a link to a tipsheet on some alternative household cleaning products you can try.
2:42 pm
bob, reminds me of when I lived in Nicaragua. Everyone used limes to clean their dishes. Cut a lime in half and scrub the dishes. Cut the grease and left dishes clean. I think they used soap too though.
Anyway, we use Mrs. Meyers for a lot of our household products. They list their ingredients.
2:48 pm
Vinegar.
That’s really all you need, isn’t it?
2:49 pm
Not the most fragrant of cleaners, though.
3:04 pm
Vinegar.
If you are not aware of the many uses of vinegar, you need to find out what you are missing.
Google vinegar and you’ll be surprised at it’s many uses.
Use it to Kill Weeds:
I live in AZ and our front lawn is rock. Folks with grass lawns will want to stay away from this.
1 gallon of cheap vinegar
1 26oz box of cheap table salt
Stir / shake until dissolved. Put into your sprayer and begin the kill.
You don’t have to worry about kids & pets getting into lawn chemicals. And it won’t contaminate the ground water with chemical run-off.
Remember: it will kill ALL the green…and I mean ALL the green.
3:08 pm
Not the most fragrant of cleaners, though.
There are many types of vinegar, Rat. Rice wine vinegar doesn’t smell at all like apple cider vinegar.
You can also get away with mixing in a bit of orange or lemon oil if the vinegar aroma is too strong for you.
3:20 pm
News your can use, as Jason might say.
3:24 pm
I guess there’s nothing wrong with this, but don’t we already have Amy Klobuchar to write well-intentioned, inoffensive, relatively unimportant legislation? We need a fighter; there are too many serious issues to deal with first.
3:32 pm
Al is serious about this job, and he wants to earn the respect and credibility that should come with the title. He still has a lot to learn.
I’m sure we will see Franken throw a few punchs at some point. Hopefully, not literally.
5:11 pm
I use vinegar a lot in cleaning…also Borax has an incredible number of uses as well.
5:42 pm
If it won’t ever give me cancer, then it’s not getting anything clean.
5:50 pm
… just like bug dope. Only DEET works.
11:35 am
How do those homemade vinegar and Mrs. Meyers solutions work (cleaning effectiveness) in the laundry and dishmachine?
Curious…
12:17 pm
@Green or Clean: It doesn’t take much of a Google search to find out. Apparently, quite well:
Laundry
Dishwasher
5:57 pm
Thanks for no help noodleman.
Anyone willing to swear up with some testimonials. I’d love to make an impact, but i’m not willing to downgrade in cleaning results.
Anyone?