Food Matters: Are You Fed Up?

Heather Callaghan

But what will you do about it?

The movie documentary FED UP may not have played at theaters near you - but very recently, it was made available on DVD and online. The tagline is: "It's time to get real about food." But will viewers really be empowered to do that when they watch?

Are you interested in seeing it? The trailer is below.

This writer cannot align herself completely with the views and messages of the movie since it hasn't been viewed yet.

(And I have suspicions about its ultimate message...)

The American Diet and The Industrial Food Complex

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Uncle Sam Food History Exhibit Promotes Food Control

Dees Illustration

Rady Ananda
Food Freedom

Oh, gag me with a bowl of propaganda. The National Archives is hosting an historical exhibit on government say in what we eat and grow and how to cook it: “What’s Cooking, Uncle Sam: The Government’s Effect on the American Diet.” From the opening lines of thewebsite, you know our control freak “Uncle” has launched another major psyops campaign to convince us that Government Knows Best when it comes to food:

“We demand that our Government ensure that it is safe, cheap, and abundant. In response, Government has been a factor in the production, regulation, research, innovation, and economics of our food supply.”

Though painting Uncle Sam as Mrs. Doubtfire, when it comes to the results of government intrusion into the food supply, he’s more like Adolph Hitler. Over the last hundred years, we’ve seen climbing rates of cancer, diabetes, obesity, heart disease and neurological disorders, thanks to Uncle Sam’s “regulation” of food additives and environmental pollutants.  We’ve also seen the number of farms decline by 98%.

Kerry Trueman of Eating Liberally is only too happy to regurgitate the promotion of government control of food, pointing out when Uncle Sam actually provides a social safety net, to wit: the SNAP program, otherwise known as food stamps.

She fails to mention that 184 House Democrats (along with 217 Republicans) just voted to make deep cuts in US food assistance in the 2012 Agricultural Appropriations bill (HR 2112), which I summarized here, based on the analysis of several different experts, and my own stumbling thru the massive bill.

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Controversial ag spending bill defunds local food systems, promotes meat monopoly

Capitol Building - Wiki Commons Image

Rady Ananda, Contributing Writer
Activist Post

Plutocrats aimed another weapon at the nation’s poor and at small and midsized farmers, this time thru the 2012 agriculture appropriations bill, H.R. 2112, which the House passed on June 16. The 82-page bill returns some federal spending to 2006 levels and others to 2008 levels.

Now being reviewed by the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Agriculture, the final version of HR 2112 will lay the terrain on which the 2012 Farm Bill will be crafted. The House Agriculture Committee began preparatory hearings on the 2012 Farm Bill this week, reports NSAC.

Key sections provide deep cuts to domestic food programs, threatening food banks, low-income seniors, women and children, and farmers markets supported by WIC vouchers issued thru the Women, Infants and Children program.

Agriculture industry science denial?

Antibiotics used in meat production - Remapping Debate

Eric Kroh
Remapping Debate

Remapping Debate has previously reported on attempts to “repeal” climate science; it appears that the U.S. agricultural industry’s widespread use of antibiotics in animals used for food is another area where science denial is at play.  Even though the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the World Health Organization are united in concluding that such use leads to human exposure to antibiotic-resistant bacteria, the industry is actively fighting efforts to restrict the routine, non-medical use of antibiotics in animals, and the FDA has yet to impose a ban.

The problem — which the FDA and sister organizations say is a risk to public health — is already enormous, and it is growing.  According to the CDC, Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus, an antibiotic-resistant bacteria commonly known as MRSA, kills an estimated 19,000 people per year in the United States. The cost of fighting antibiotic-resistant microbes exceeds $20 billion per year.

Medical misuse of antibiotics in humans is part of the problem.  But another contributor is the misuse of the drugs in food animals. According to the FDA, a staggering 80 percent of the antibiotics used in the United States is used on livestock animals.

Livestock producers do not simply use antibiotics to treat sick animals. They also use antibiotics to promote growth or feed efficiency. The Union of Concerned Scientists estimates that 70 percent of the antibiotics used in the U.S. is used in food animals for non-therapeutic reasons — that is, for reasons other than treating disease. According to the FDA, 90 percent of the antibiotics given to animals is distributed via animal feed or water, a method that critics say is used primarily for non-therapeutic reasons.

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FDA Accused of Endangering U.S. Health by Caving to Cattle Farms on Antibiotics

Wiki Image

By Adam Klasfeld
Courthouse News Service

MANHATTAN (CN) - A supine Food and Drug Administration is allowing the use of low doses of antibiotics in animal feed to deal with cramped and unsanitary conditions on cattle farms, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists and four other groups, raising the "specter of untreatable infections" just around the corner. 
  

The Natural Resources Defense Council, the Center for Science in the Public Interest, the Food Animal Concerns Trust, Public Citizen, and the Union of Concerned Scientists sued the U.S. FDA and its Commissioner Margaret Hamburg, the Center for Veterinary Medicine and its Director Bernadette Dunham, and the Department of Health and Human Services and its Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.
  

The watchdog groups say the FDA first approved feeding of "preventative" antibiotics to healthy livestock in the 1950s. 
But in 1977, the FDA found that found that "subtherapeutic" doses of penicillin and tetracyclines - at levels too low to treat disease - contributed to development of antibiotic-resistant bacteria that could be transferred to humans. 


‘Ag-gag’ bills face tough row to hoe

Wiki Image

Tom Laskawy
Grist

Big Ag is having trouble installing its Iron Curtain. I am referring, of course, to the various "ag-gag" laws proposed in Florida, Minnesota, and Iowa that would make it illegal to produce (and, in some cases, possess) undercover videos from within factory livestock farms. The latest state legislature to pursue this dubious goal is New York's -- but the fate of ag-gaggery in other states makes success in the Empire State seem unlikely.

Florida's bill died a few weeks ago when legislators withdrew the bill from consideration as the legislative session ended. And now the Humane Society of the United States reports that the Minnesota bill -- in some ways the most egregious, not to say ridiculous -- has suffered the same fate. Perhaps this will teach state legislators that self-dealing isn't the best way to approach their jobs; several cosponsors of the bill stood to personally gain from the protection the bill offered factory farm operators.

As for Iowa, its legislative session is still going on and passage of the bill is considered a priority with Republican Gov. Terry Branstad on record as believing that such undercover videos represent "a problem that should be addressed." According to this report in Iowa's Globe Gazette, the major problem isn't finding a majority to back the bill, but rather trying to get around sticky constitutional issues, specifically the concept of "prior restraint." In America, at least, it's very difficult to stop someone from doing something they haven't done yet, especially when we're talking about First Amendment issues. Iowa legislators are rewriting furiously as we speak -- and I wouldn't be surprised if they pass something just to see if it sticks.

Family Farmers Worse Off Despite High Prices (Video)

The Real News

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Groups sue US over antibiotics in farm feed

Hogs are raised on a farm in Iowa
© AFP/Getty Images/File Scott Olson

AFP

NEW YORK (AFP) - A coalition of consumer groups filed a federal lawsuit Friday against the US Food and Drug Administration over the use of human antibiotics in animal feed, saying it creates dangerous superbugs.

The suit alleges that the regulatory agency concluded in 1977 that the practice of feeding healthy animals low doses of penicillin and tetracycline could lead to the rise of antibiotic resistant bacteria in people.

"However, despite this conclusion and laws requiring that the agency act on its findings, FDA failed to take any action to protect human health," the groups said in a statement.

Family Facing $4 Million in Fines for Selling Bunnies

"There, the inspector began running the width of her finger across the cage and told the Dollarhites they would need to replace the cage, because it was a quarter-inch too small and, therefore, did not meet federal regulations."

BobMcCarty.com

Almost nine months after a Missouri dairywas ordered to stop selling cheese made from raw milk, I share details of another hare-raising story from the Show-Me State:  John Dollarhite and his wife Judy of tiny Nixa, Mo., have been told by the USDA that, by Monday, they must pay a fine exceeding $90,000.  If they don’t pay that fine, they could face additional fines of almost $4 million.  Why?  Because they sold more than $500 worth of bunnies — $4,600 worth to be exact — in a single calendar year.

About six years ago, the Dollarhites wanted to teach their young teenage son responsibility and the value of the dollar. So they rescued a pair of rabbits — one male and one female — and those rabbits did what rabbits do; they reproduced.  Before long, things were literally hopping on the three-acre homestead 30 miles south of Springfield, and Dollarvalue Rabbitry was launched as more of a hobby than a business.

Factory Farms Produce 100 Times More Waste Than All People In the US Combined

"Factory farms are dangerous to the environment; they are ticking time bombs of manure just waiting to be spilled into public waters."

Jill Richardson
AlterNet

The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals recently delivered a major victory to factory farms. Under a 2008 EPA rule, any confined animal feeding operation (CAFO) "designed, constructed, operated, and maintained in a manner such that the CAFO will discharge" animal waste must apply for a National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit under the Clean Water Act. The livestock industry ridiculed the notion that a farm must apply for a permit to discharge manure whether it intended to discharge it or not. And while, when phrased that way, it might sound ridiculous to you too, the details of the case betray a different story.

David Kirby, author of Animal Factory, The Looming Threat of Industrial Pig, Dairy, and Poultry Farms to Humans and the Environment, tells story after story in his book of factory farms discharging waste irresponsibly -- sometimes on purpose, and sometimes not. As Karen Hudson, whose story is told in the book, says, "Factory farms are dangerous to the environment; they are ticking time bombs of manure just waiting to be spilled into public waters."

Free our food

 Wiki Image

By Deirdre Fulton
The Portland Phoenix

"From farm to table" isn't just a meaningless foodie slogan anymore. It's the rallying cry for the smallest of small-scale farming operations in Maine, which are fighting against what they consider to be burdensome state and federal regulations. In the process, they're laying the groundwork for a nationwide "food sovereignty" movement, aimed at restoring the direct relationship between food producers and consumers, while reducing government interference in local food systems.

It started on the Blue Hill peninsula, a cluster of tiny, rural, coastal towns about three hours northeast of Portland. A controversy over poultry regulations led a group of family farmers to Augusta, where they told legislators that state food-safety rules were too strict. They claimed that current law could require them to spend tens of thousands of dollars in permitting fees, equipment, and new facilities, just to butcher a few chickens and sell the meat to their neighbors.

At a public hearing and later at a work session, the farmers were told — sympathetically, but still — that if the state were to loosen its meat-inspection conditions, federal funding would be pulled. Hal Prince, director of the state's Quality Assurance and Regulation division within the agriculture department, explains that in order for the state to run its own meat-inspection program, its standards "have to be at least equal to the [US Department of Agriculture]." The USDA chips in about $200,000 — roughly half of the program's operating costs.

Big Ag Lobbies Want to Make it Illegal to Secretly Film Animal Abuse

Activist Post

Big Agribusiness is fed up with pesky animal rights activists who expose abuses of farm animals on film.  According to the Associated Press, agriculture committees in the Iowa state government have approved a bill to outlaw secret filming of animal abuses and punish the accused with a $7500 fine and up to five years in jail.



Strangely, consumers may actually want to know if their meat is being electrocuted, beaten, or ground up alive as some recent videos have exposed.  Consumers may also want to know what the animals eat, if they ever see sunlight, if they are injected with chemicals, or even genetically cloned. Since the FDA does little to shine light on these and other concerns, activists have been the only source of this information.  Now, they will face jail time for doing so if this measure passes.

Data Shows 20 Percent Growth in Factory Farming In Past 5 Years

Jennifer Mueller
Care2

A new interactive web tool from Food & Water Watch provides a dramatic illustration of the increasingly consolidated animal agriculture industry in the United States. The advocacy group mapped USDA livestock census data from 2002 and 2007, providing a new way for concerned consumers to explore the origin of meat and dairy foods in the United States.

The trends revealed are striking. For example, nearly half of factory-farm egg-laying hens are located in just 5 states — Iowa, Ohio, Indiana, California and Pennsylvania. Overall, total animals on factory farms grew by 5 million, or more than 20 percent in 5 years.

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Endgame Legislation: Lame Duck Session Ushers in Tyranny

Eric Blair
Activist Post

When most of us think about "lame duck" Congressional sessions we think of a "do-nothing" government. However, this so-called lame duck session appears to be a time where legislation that has the most restrictions to individual rights is being rammed through. 

It seems the members of government who have been recently voted out of office are vying for corporate jobs by pushing such legislation as the Food Safety Modernization Actand the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act which are now on the fast track to becoming law. Both of these laws reek of tyranny for the citizens and a means of corporate consolidation for the big boys.

It seems whenever a piece of legislation has the word "safety" in it we can expect to lose our right to make our own decisions.  For example, consumer protection groups pushed hard for the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act in 2008 after large numbers of Chinese-made toys and other products proved to have dangerously unhealthy toxins.


Consequently, the bill was passed with 407 Ayes, 0 Nays in the House. Only later did the public find out that the bill did more to regulate, tax, and impose fines on neighborhood garage sales than it did to stop dangerous Chinese imports.  Clearly, the bill is used to clamp down on an individual's right to sell their used items without governmental oversight.  In other words, the corporate-government will not allow any form of black market to threaten their cartel control of consumerism.

The Food Safety Modernization Act has the backing of establishment liberals who think more big government regulation will protect us from food-borne diseases derived from factory farming.  Their heart seems to be in the right place, but placing trust in this horribly corrupt government to "protect" us makes them utterly gullible. The vote of 74-25 in the Senate proves the bill was more broadly supported than just with progressives, indicating strong corporate support from the Big-Agri lobby that wrote the bill.  According to Darrell Castle of the Constitution Party, the bill purports to:

• Preclude the public’s right to grow, own, trade, transport, share, feed and eat each and every food that nature makes.
• It will more than likely make Michael Taylor (former Monsanto executive) the Food Czar.
• End U.S. sovereignty over its own food supply by forcing compliance with WTO guidelines.
• Even direct sales of food between individuals could be defined as smuggling under the language of the bill.
• Codex Alimentarius, a global system of control over food and food supplements, would control all U.S. food and supplements. Access to natural food supplements would be removed under Codex rules.
• Control of all seeds would transfer to Monsanto and other global multinationals.
• The National Animal Identification System ( NAIS ) would be enacted, forcing bio-chipping and other identification and tracking methods for all animals, whether food or pets.
• What is left of the American food system would be transferred into total control of Multinational Corporations under the guise of global governance.

Despite the draconian intentions of the bill, many respected alternative agriculture experts like Michael Pollan and Grist have given their lukewarm blessing to the bill as "as step in the right direction."  Controversial bills typically have enough seemingly logical solutions that become the focus of selling new regulations.  This bill is no different, as it gives the appearance of cracking down on large factory farms, exempting small family farms, creating better tracing methods for the origin of food-borne diseases, and certainly injects more financial resources into government agencies tasked with regulating food.  All of these were sold to the public amidst the fear of massive egg and meat recalls because of E. coli and Salmonella contamination.

We should know by now that nearly all legislation is not written or read by our elected officials, but rather by heavy-handed corporate interests who seek nothing less than total domination over their industries.  Yet, the public is still easily swayed.

The second piece of legislation that was flushed out of the Judiciary Committee last week with a 19-0 vote is the Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (COICA).  This bill is pure tyranny against Internet freedom.  In other words, they're not even using the guise of protecting the people to hammer this one home.  This bill seeks to arbitrarily create an Internet "Blacklist" of domains, much like the arbitrary "Terror Watch List."  The government is seeking the power to shut access to sites it flags . . . no judge, no evidence, no jury. The law will also apply to websites hosted outside the U.S. where the corporate-government will claim global control over information on the Internet.  The government plans to enforce the blocking of these Blacklisted websites by using major Internet service providers (ISPs).

To demonstrate how draconian this bill is, Copyright Laws are already very clear where if a media corporation can demonstrate that a given website used their material against Fair Use rights, they can be sued individually for damages.  This new law will bypass the current legal system of innocent until proven guilty with no warnings, presentation of evidence of wrong-doing, or determination of fault by a jury of peers.  Although the legislation is said to be focused on sharing movies, music, and television shows; the copyright violations are defined very broadly and will surely extend to any usage of Associated Press or Reuters stories (or the like) and/or images.

This broad definition will essentially put all alternative news websites in violation despite their Fair Use rights. In fact, nearly every article or commentary about world events that is covered by independent news organizations that quote or link to mainstream media stories as a reference may be in violation (including this article you're reading).  The COICA will effectively crush any opposition to the mainstream media's domination on the currently free and open world wide web.  If properly debated and dissected there is no way this bill would be passed, hence the rushing to pass it under a quiet Congressional session.

Both of these bills will likely become laws given their overwhelming support in Congress.  When enacted, the corporate-government tyranny will begin to work stealthily to regulate their competition out of the marketplace.  By the time the vast majority of people realize this tyranny, it will be too late to complain as the independent voices will assuredly be Blacklisted from any debate.

RECENTLY by Eric Blair:
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