AMY GOODMAN: Anjali, last night we had a chance to go over to the release of Annie Leonard’s film, The Story of Cosmetics, and you had a chance to speak to someone interesting there.

ANJALI KAMAT: That’s right. Actress and activist Fran Drescher is supporting the bill introduced by Congresswoman Schakowsky. She’s best known for her role as Fran Fine on the long-running former sitcom The Nanny. She is also a cancer survivor and the founder of the group Cancer Schmancer. Well, she was at the premiere last night, and this is what she said.

FRAN DRESCHER: Hi, I’m Fran Drescher, and I’m supporting the Safe Cosmetics Initiative, because I’m a women’s health advocate. I’m a cancer survivor. I’m the president of the Cancer Schmancer Movement, dedicated to living preventitavely, early detection.


Well, I became aware of the fact that the European Union has much stricter regulations than the United States does, and the European Union had eliminated 1,100 chemicals from their skin care compositions and formulations, and the United States eliminated eleven. So I thought, hmm, there’s something wrong here. And then, as I investigated further, I realized that this is a self-regulating industry, which is basically the fox guarding the henhouse. So I thought, well, I am not opposed to certain regulations, because I fear that when certain manufacturers, given the choice between doing the right thing on behalf of the consumer or compromising safety in the interest of profit, and particularly when they are answerable to, you know, shareholders and their profit margin, I suspect that a lot of manufacturers are going to err on the side of greed rather than what’s the right thing to do. And that’s why we now have child labor laws.


And that’s why we should have had more regulations for Wall Street and the banking industry to answer to, and perhaps we wouldn’t be in this economic crisis today. So, and it was regulations that were put in, instituted after the big stock market crash of 1929, and then, in the '90s it was uplifted, and now here we are in 2010 in another economic crisis as a result. So, clearly, people, where there's money involved, can’t be trusted. I’m sure that there are people that can be, and they’re out there, and they’re presently involved in doing green products, but as a general rule, there’s too many out there that are not.


And so, I say that our elected officials, who represent we the people, need to step up to the plate and support the Safe Cosmetics for 2010 Initiative. And I will be in Washington personally lobbying for this. And I hope that members on both sides of the party line will support this bill, because this is a nonpartisan issue. This is a human issue, and it affects all of us.

AMY GOODMAN: That is the actress Fran Drescher. She plays the nanny. She is a cancer survivor and wrote the book Cancer Schmancer

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