RawForBeauty.com
“Never-Before-Seen-Evidence points to genetically engineered foods as a major contributor to rising disease rates in the US population, especially among children. Gastrointestinal disorders, allergies, inflammatory diseases, and infertility are just some of the problems implicated in humans, pets, livestock, and lab animals that eat genetically modified soybeans and corn.”
So, folks still think we have two major political parties who are quite different from one another, eh? People think the world would be a much different or better place “If Only…” their candidate and party of choice had won the election of 2012…or 2008…or well, you get the point. Hell, even thought I had found a “purist” party this time around when I jumped on the Libertarian train. Figures that I’d find out only a few short weeks after the election that my beloved Savior Party has been working with the corpo-legislative whores known as The American Legislative Exchange Council…ALEC. There is no place, no party and no politician that the huge agra-giants like Monsanto cannot sink their poisonous roots into…
CLN “The roots of the relationship between Monsanto and the White House go back for decades. Bush senior’s administration was responsible for deeming GMO crops substantially equivalent to non-GMO crops, opening the flood gates for the industry to take over the food supply with little room for the opposition.
Mitt Romney was intimately involved with Monsanto’s transition into biotechnology. During the presidential primaries, Romney named an 11-member agricultural advisory committee that was full of Monsanto connections.”
After promising to label GMO’s during his 2008 campaign, President Obama has opened the doors for the following GM crops during his administration:
Monsanto GMO alfalfa
Monsanto GMO sugar beets
Monsanto GMO BT soybean
Syngenta GMO corn for ethanol
Pioneer GMO soybean
Syngenta GMO BT cotton
Bayer GMO cotton
GMO papaya strain
This is not surprising given the fact that Obama has appointed the following people to regulatory bodies that are supposed to be responsible for the safety of our food (click on the links to see the announcements of Obama’s appointments):
International Business Times – “The “Monsanto Protection Act” is the name opponents of the Farmer Assurance Provision have given to this terrifying piece of policy, and it’s a fitting moniker given its shocking content.
President Barack Obama signed a spending bill, HR 933, into law on Tuesday that includes language that has food and consumer advocates and organic farmers up in arms over their contention that the so-called “Monsanto Protection Act” is a giveaway to corporations that was passed under the cover of darkness.
There’s a lot being said about it, but here are five terrifying facts about the Farmer Assurance Provision — Section 735 of the spending bill — to get you acquainted with the reasons behind the ongoing uproar:
1.) The “Monsanto Protection Act” effectively bars federal courts from being able to halt the sale or planting of controversial genetically modified (aka GMO) or genetically engineered (GE) seeds, no matter what health issues may arise concerning GMOs in the future. The advent of genetically modified seeds — which has been driven by the massive Monsanto Company – and their exploding use in farms across America came on fast and has proved a huge boon for Monsanto’s profits.
But many anti-GMO folks argue there have not been enough studies into the potential health risks of this new class of crop. Well, now it appears that even if those studies are completed and they end up revealing severe adverse health effects related to the consumption of genetically modified foods, the courts will have no ability to stop the spread of the seeds and the crops they bear.
2.) The provision’s language was apparently written in collusion with Monsanto. Lawmakers and companies working together to craft legislation is by no means a rare occurrence in this day and age. But the fact that Sen. Roy Blunt, Republican of Missouri, actually worked with Monsanto on a provision that in effect allows them to keep selling seeds, which can then go on to be planted, even if it is found to be harmful to consumers, is stunning. It’s just another example of corporations bending Congress to their will, and it’s one that could have dire risks for public health in America.
3.) Many members of Congress were apparently unaware that the “Monsanto Protection Act” even existed within the bill they were voting on. HR 933 was a spending bill aimed at averting a government shutdown and ensuring that the federal government would continue to be able to pay its bills. But the Center for Food Safety maintains that many Democrats in Congress were not even aware that the provision was in the legislation:
“In this hidden backroom deal, Sen. [Barbara] Mikulski turned her back on consumer, environmental and farmer protection in favor of corporate welfare for biotech companies such as Monsanto,” Andrew Kimbrell, executive director of the Center for Food Safety, said in a statement. “This abuse of power is not the kind of leadership the public has come to expect from Sen. Mikulski or the Democrat Majority in the Senate.”
4.) The President did nothing to stop it, either. On Tuesday, Obama signed HR 933 while the rest of the nation was fixated on gay marriage, as the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral argument concerning California’s Proposition 8. But just because most of the nation and the media were paying attention to gay marriage doesn’t mean that others were not doing their best to express their opposition to the “Monsanto Protection Act.” In fact, more than 250,000 voters signed a petition opposing the provision. And Food Democracy Now protesters even took their fight straight to Obama, protesting in front of the White House against Section 735 of the bill. He signed it anyway.
5.) It sets a terrible precedent. Though it will only remain in effect for six months until the government finds another way to fund its operations, the message it sends is that corporations can get around consumer safety protections if they get Congress on their side. Furthermore, it sets a precedent that suggests that court challenges are a privilege, not a right.” Full Article Here on IBT
Top 10 excuses for Obama signing the Monsanto Protection Act (thesurvivalplaceblog.com)
Obama Signs Monsanto Protection Act Into Law After Promising GMO Labeling in 2007 (naturalsociety.com)
Top 10 excuses for Obama signing the Monsanto Protection Act (jonrappoport.wordpress.com)
FOCUS | Monsanto and the Seeds of Suicide (readersupportednews.org)
Farmers and food safety advocates lead Monsanto backlash (salon.com)
‘Monsanto Protection Act’ slips silently through US Congress (rt.com)
Monsanto Required (Nutrition Optional) (factgammon.wordpress.com)
Obama Betrays Americans Again…with the “Monsanto Protection Act” (thedailysheeple.com)
Monsanto, DuPont bury the lawsuit hatchet, set to make more GMO (EndtheLie.com)
Monsanto is up to no good… AGAIN! (thebubbaeffect.wordpress.com)
World Truth TV – “The world of genetic engineering has fallen even further into the surreal with the announcement that New Zealand “scientists” have unveiled a genetically modified mutant cloned cow which they say produces a reduced-allergen milk for consumption by human babies. This is being reported by the BBC and elsewhere.
Horrifyingly, these Frankenscientists cloned a cow and then altered the embryo using RNA interference. After gestation, the mutant GMO cow was born without a tail! But these scientists say that’s no problem, and that the mutation of having no tail couldn’t possibly be related to anything they did with the cow’s DNA.
I’m not making this up. This is the insanity of the quack science world in which we now live.”
—
“To make Daisy [the cow], scientists took a cow skin cell and genetically modified it to produce molecules that block the manufacture of BLG protein. The nucleus of this cell was then transferred into a cow egg that had its own nucleus removed.
The reconstituted egg was grown in the lab until it formed what is called a blastocyst, a ball of around 100 cells, and then transplanted into the womb of a foster cow.
The cloning technique is not efficient. Of around 100 blastocysts the scientists implanted into cows, more than half of the pregnancies failed early on, and only one live calf, Daisy, was born.
And even that calf was a mutant calf, born without a tail, rendering the whole thing a horrifying example of genetic mutilation…”
—
Humanity is risking a genetic apocalypse
This has got to stop, friends. The mad GMO scientists are operating in gross violation of natural law. They are playing genetic roulette with Mother Nature. They’re fumbling in the dark with dangerous tools, like children with suitcase nukes and a happy red button that seems inviting to just push and see what happens.
Our modern-day human civilization has neither the ethical foundation nor the wisdom to pursue such technologies. Altering the digital code for the expression of life is not something to be pursued under the crude selfishness of corporate greed, nor the wild fantasies of naive scientists who relish in playing “what if” experiments with all remaining life on our planet.
These experiments on animals — and crops — are worse than foolish. They are inherently evil… even demented. Just because we know how to alter DNA doesn’t mean we have the wisdom to understand the consequences of doing so. Yet in the race for the next biological profit machine — a cow, a crop, or even a pharmaceutical — caution is thrown out the window and replaced by pure mindless greed.
With the GM crops, the GM wheat that alters human liver function, the GM corn that causes cancer tumors, the GM cows and the GM seeds being carelessly strewn about, we are risking a genetic apocalypse that could destroy humanity in a cosmic blink of an eye.
No one knows what happens when the genetic engineering of mutant chimera animals get unleashed across the land. Nobody really knows the long-term effects of genetic pollution. Nobody even knows the long-term effects of humans eating GM crops!
So it’s all a grand, malicious, conceited genetic experiment being carried out on us all: our bodies, our children, our lands, our animals, our crops and our planet.
The GM “scientists” are risking EVERYTHING. And they do so blindly, while mutilating animals and calling it “progress.”
It is disgusting. It is an abomination. I pray for the sake of humanity that all genetic engineering activity in our planet is halted by any means necessary.
We are floating through space, my friends, on a blue ball of water inhabited by fools who call themselves “scientists.”
They risk everything. And there is no backup plan.
Spread the word. SHARE this story. STOP the genetic mutilation of animals. HALT GMO crops and save our planet from the risk of total disaster.”
—
And hey, if you don’t care for the idea of this ‘reduced allergin’ milk, you could always hop on over to Japan and get a big glass of human breast milk…straight from a cow’s teet…
Excerpts, Seattle Organic Restaurants – “30 healthy GM babies were born after a series of experiments by Institute for Reproductive Medicine and Science of Saint Barnabas in New Jersey. The babies belonged to women who had fertility problems. So in order to fertilize their egg, extra genes from a female donor were inserted into their eggs. The genetic finger print on two of the one year olds shows that their DNA is inherited from two female and one male. This technology also allows the GM babies to pass their genetic change into their off springs.
The research was conducted by embryologist Professor Jacques Cohen and his colleagues who promised a new technique that helps couples who can’t have kids become fertile. Dr Jacques Cohen in the Journal Human Reproduction mentions how this is the first time that the human germline genetic modification has resulted in normal kids…
…Since most of our foods are genetically modified, we can now see the vast health and environmental problems related with GM foods including increase in superweed and superbugs, loss of useful microorganisms in soil, mystery organism related to infertility, autism, premature aging,gastrointestinal problems, organ failure, increase inallergies and even cancer.
It’s the same with GM babies. Now, few years later after the first GM babies are born, we can find reports that question the success of genetic modification method for treating infertility. Many of these reports express concerns about dangers and long term health risks associated with this technology.
Even a report by USDA seems to have looked at the ethics of ooplasmic transplantation and how this method can increase the chances of chromosomal anomalies. In fact this report shows how an 18-month old child born from this technology was diagnosed with autism. The report by USDA also states how there are no long term tests or follow-up studies regarding GM kids. So lack of long term tests and further research has resulted in doubt and hesitation about the safety and effectiveness of GM technology. I have to say, this is the same with GM foods. The GMOs were unleashed into our food supply without proper testing and long term studies while both FDA and USDA showed no hesitation in approving GMOs.
Crazy enough, since the biotech companies have secured patents on everything, they could also claim that the GM human beings are also their patentable property. As crazy as it sounds, they are already in the process of making decisions on whether or not they can patent the GM life…” Full Story
(NaturalNews) A new vaccine for influenza has hit the market, and it is the first ever to contain genetically-modified (GM) proteins derived from insect cells. According to reports, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently approved the vaccine, known as Flublok, which contains recombinant DNA technology and an insect virus known as baculovirus that is purported to help facilitate the more rapid production of vaccines.
According to Flublok’s package insert, the vaccine is trivalent, which means it contains GM proteins from three different flu strains. The vaccine’s manufacturer, Protein Sciences Corporation (PSC), explains that Flublok is produced by extracting cells from the fall armyworm, a type of caterpillar, and genetically altering them to produce large amounts of hemagglutinin, a flu virus protein that enables the flu virus itself to enter the body quickly.
So rather than have to produce vaccines the “traditional” way using egg cultures, vaccine manufacturers will now have the ability to rapidly produce large batches of flu virus protein using GMOs, which is sure to increase profits for the vaccine industry. But it is also sure to lead to all sorts of serious side effects, including the deadly nerve disease Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GSB), which is listed on the shot as a potential side effect.
“If Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GBS) has occurred within six weeks of receipt of a prior influenza vaccine, the decision to give Flublock should be based on careful consideration of the potential benefits and risks,” explains a section of the vaccine’s literature entitled “Warnings and Precautions.” Other potential side effects include allergic reactions, respiratory infections, headaches, fatigue, altered immunocompetence, rhinorrhea, and myalgia.
According to the US Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service, the average per-acre cost of soybean and corn seed increased 325% and 259%, respectively, between 1995 and 2011. This is roughly the time period when acreage of GM corn and soy grew from less than 20% to more than 80-90%
Excerpt, The Organic & Non-GMO Report -”The introduction of genetically modified crops has corresponded with increasing monopolization of seed by biotechnology companies and higher seed costs that have led to tragedies in some countries, while pushing out conventional, non-GMO seeds, and reducing farmer seed choices. These impacts are being seen in the United States, Brazil, India, the Philippines, and South Africa, and even Europe.
According to Philip Howard, a researcher at Michigan State University, economists say that when four firms control 40% of a market, it is no longer competitive. According to AgWeb, the “big four” biotech seed companies—Monsanto, DuPont/Pioneer Hi-Bred, Syngenta, and Dow AgroSciences—own 80% of the US corn market and 70% of the soybean business.
Monsanto has become the world’s largest seed company in less than 10 years by capturing markets for corn, soybean, cotton, and vegetable seeds, according to a report by the Farmer to Farmer Campaign. In addition to selling seeds, Monsanto licenses its genetically modified traits to other seed companies. As a result, more than 80% of US corn and more than 90% of soybeans planted each year contain Monsanto’s patented GM traits.
Other factors that have led to industry domination by a few players include purchase of smaller seed companies by larger companies, weak antitrust law enforcement, and Supreme Court decisions that allowed GM crops and other plant materials to be patented, while prohibiting seed saving by farmers…” Full Article Here
Oh, gosh, golly, gee-frickin’-whiz!!
Monsanto shareholders voted to do the wrong thing and denied a proposal that would finally force them to admit their GMO crops cause damage and harm to organic farms…who’d have thunk they’d so such a thing?
Monsanto shareholders voted down a proposal Thursday that would have forced the biotech seed giant to report on how its genetically modified products might affect organic farmers.
Only 7 percent of votes cast by shareholders were in favor of the proposal, the Creve Coeur-based company said Thursday.
Monsanto had opposed the proposal, which would have required the company to make a report on the financial impact of the unintentional introduction of GMO seeds into organic farms.
In other matters at the company’s annual meeting Thursday, shareholders re-elected four members to three-year terms on Monsanto’s board of directors. Shareholders approved a proposal to phase out the current three-year, staggered terms of directors in favor of annual election of directors. They will serve one-year terms, beginning next year.
CREVE COEUR, MO – On Thursday, January 31, 2013, the Monsanto Company officers and shareholders will vote on a shareholder proposal to create a study of “material financial risks or operational impacts” associated with its chemical products and patented genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Activists in favor of the measure will demonstrate outside the meeting to raise awareness that the public does not currently have the right to witness what will be the only democratic vote of accountability on Monsanto’s leadership because the company bans cameras inside their Annual Shareholder Meeting.
WHO: Anti-GMO Food Activists, Adam Eidinger, Monsanto Shareholder
WHAT: Protest at Monsanto Annual Shareholder Meeting
WHERE: Monsanto Global Headquarters, Creve Coeur, MO, East Campus Entrance on Olive Blvd.
WHEN: Thursday, January 31, 2013, Noon to 3:30PM
“Monsanto pledges transparency, but provides very little,” says Adam Eidinger, an organic food activist and Monsanto shareholder who organized a march from NY to Washington, DC on behalf of honest food labeling in 2011. For the second year in a row, Eidinger will present a shareholder resolution on behalf of Napa, California-based Harrington Investments (HII) with help from the Pesticide Action Network of North America (PANNA).
“Companies like Starbucks, Walmart, The Washington Post, Oracle, Apple and Coca-Cola among many others provide the public and media access to their shareholder meetings in one form or another, but Monsanto, a company who’s patented genetically engineered products are in most people’s food, meets in secret,” says Eidinger.
What the biotech industry doesn’t want you to know – how industry manipulation and political collusion, not sound science, allow dangerous genetically engineered food into your daily diet. Company research is rigged, alarming evidence of health dangers is covered up, and intense political pressure applied…
Scientists were offered bribes or threatened. Evidence was stolen. Data was omitted or distorted.
Government employees who complained were harassed, stripped of responsibilities, or fired.
Laboratory rats fed a GM crop developed stomach lesions and seven of the forty died within two weeks.
The crop was approved without further tests.
The only independent in-depth feeding study ever conducted showed evidence of alarming health dangers.
When the scientist tried to alert the public, he lost his job and was silenced with threats of a lawsuit.
ConAgra: Genetically Modified Foods You Love (g1a2d0035c1) (Photo credit: watchingfrogsboil)
Do these GM foods impact the behavior of our children? You decide…
Watch Full Length GMO Trilogy Documentary Here
Oh gosh, what a shocker…DuPont is following in Monsanto’s footsteps and using all of the latest intimidation tactics to force their product down our throats…
Excerpt from RT – “GMO giants DuPont have contracted dozens of retired law enforcement officers to begin patrolling farms in the US next year to spot any potential intellectual property theft.
DuPont Co, the second-largest seed country in the world, is hoping to find farmers that have purchased contracts to use their genetically modified soybean seeds but have breached the terms of agreement by illegally using the product for repeat harvests. Should farmers replant GMO seeds licensed by DuPont, they could be sued for invalidating their contracts.
“Farmers are never going to get cheap access to these genetically engineered varieties,” Charles Benbrook, a research professor at Washington State University’s Center for Sustaining Agriculture and Natural Resources, tells Bloomberg. “The biotech industry has trumped the legitimate economic interests of the farmer again by raising the ante on intellectual property.”
DuPont competitors Monsanto have been known to relentlessly sue small-time farmers who have been caught abusing their own patented GMO products, but the latest maneuver is being considered by some a form of intimidation. DuPont has cut a deal with Saskatchewan-based Agro Protection International, a company that contracts mostly retired police officers to patrol potential violations of IP law.” Full Story Here
Related articles
“…This history matters not just because of the light it sheds on Romney’s self-ballyhooed business experience but because of the litany of Monsanto corporate objectives that clash with planetary concerns. If Romney is elected, this bête noire of environmentalists will have a very old friend in a very high place.
…The romance between Romney and Monsanto began back in 1977, when the recently minted Harvard Law and Business School graduate joined Bain, the Boston-based consulting firm launched in 1973, the same year Monsanto became one of its first clients. One of Bain’s founding partners, Ralph Willard, described to the Boston Globe in 2007 how “Romney learned the technical aspects of the chemical business so thoroughly that he sounded as if he had gone to engineering school instead of business school,” and that Monsanto executives soon began “bypassing” him to go directly to Romney…
…John W. Hanley, the Monsanto CEO at the time, has said how “impressed” he was with the 30-year-old Mitt. Hanley became so close to Romney that he and Romney’s boss Bill Bain devised the idea of creating Bain Capital as a way of keeping Romney in the fold. Unless Mitt was allowed to run this spin-off venture firm, Hanley and Bain feared, he would leave. Hanley even contributed $1 million to Romney’s first investment pool at Bain Capital. Monsanto’s Hanley is in fact the only business executive outside of the Bain founding family to so shape Romney’s career—jumpstarting the two companies, Bain & Company and Bain Capital, that account for all but two years of Romney’s much-ballyhooed business experience. Bain and Romney whispered in Monsanto’s ear until 1985, when Hanley’s successor Richard Mahoney says he “fired” them and when Romney moved on to Bain Capital…
“Romney won’t answer our questions, or anyone else’s, about where he stands on the two pending farm bills—the Senate version backed by Obama that passed with overwhelming bipartisan support, or the House bill that made it through the agriculture committee with two Republican amendments dubbed “Monsanto riders.”
… Monsanto has so far spent $4.2 million to defeat a labeling referendum on the ballot in California this November, more than any other opponent, and several of the organizations connected to members of Romney’s advisory council have also opposed the referendum. President Obama supports a labeling requirement, though he’s done nothing to make it happen, while Romney’s campaign declined to respond to The Nation’s questions about his position on labeling or the California referendum…”
Read the (fantastic) full article here on Truth-Out
As if I didn’t already have enough reasons for not liking Mitt Romney, this latest little tidbit of information regarding his extensive ties to Monsanto would have definitely eliminated any chance there ever might have been for him to get my vote.
THIS is the man people claim is going to *save* America?
This blatantly obvious corporate whore is going to SAVE us?
How is he going to do so, exactly?
By stuffing us all with government subsidized GMO corn crops when all other foods are too expensive for people to buy?
Oh…but wait..! There’s more…! I HAVE A CHOICE!
If I vote for Obama things will be so much different!
Just so long as we ignore HIS connections to Monsanto…
Tuesday, September 25, 2012 by: Jon Rappoport
“The new president filled key posts with Monsanto people, in federal agencies that wield tremendous force in food issues, the USDA and the FDA:
At the USDA, as the director of the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, Roger Beachy, former director of the Monsanto Danforth Center.
As deputy commissioner of the FDA, the new food-safety-issues czar, the infamous Michael Taylor, former vice-president for public policy for Monsanto. Taylor had been instrumental in getting approval for Monsanto’s genetically engineered bovine growth hormone.
As commissioner of the USDA, Iowa governor, Tom Vilsack. Vilsack had set up a national group, the Governors’ Biotechnology Partnership, and had been given a Governor of the Year Award by the Biotechnology Industry Organization, whose members include Monsanto.
As the new Agriculture Trade Representative, who would push GMOs for export, Islam Siddiqui, a former Monsanto lobbyist.
As the new counsel for the USDA, Ramona Romero, who had been corporate counsel for another biotech giant, DuPont.
As the new head of the USAID, Rajiv Shah, who had preciously worked in key positions for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, a major funder of GMO agriculture research.
We should also remember that Obama’s secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, once worked for the Rose law firm. That firm was counsel to Monsanto.”
Source – Natural News
Trying to choose between Obama & Romney is the equivalent of being forced to eat Monsanto’s GM Corn…or DuPont’s GM Soybeans.
Both choices are unsatisfying…and both make me ill.
RoBamma, BoRamney…
DuSanto…MonPonto…
There really is no difference.
I hope to hell they don’t get any new funding for this project. We simply do not know enough to approve releasing GMO animals into our food supply. How arrogant could we possibly be..?!
(Reuters) Pigs that might have become the world’s first genetically modified animals approved for human consumption may instead face an untimely end, as key backers of Canada’s “Enviropig” project withdrew their support for the controversial engineered animal…
…The project has produced eight generations of Enviropigs, including the current herd of 16 animals. But they may be the last of their kind, after Ontario Pork – an association of hog farmers in the eastern Canadian province – yanked their funding last month…
…Canadian environmental groups welcomed the setback for the Enviropig…
…”The GM pig was going to drive consumers away from eating pork if it was ever approved for market,” said Paul Slomp of the National Farmers Union, in a statement. “This GM pig fiasco could have permanently damaged (Canada’s) domestic and international pork markets.”
Well, so long as the USDA is acting in a completely neutral and non-corporate influenced manner and not showing any favoritism towards GMO producers over we the consumers, I guess this is all good…right?? Besides, it’s not like shortening the length of time the public has to object to GMO foods will make a difference when the Secretary of Agriculture, (re: Monsanto mouthpiece) Vilsack has already proven that public opinion doesn’t matter a whit when it comes to decisions made.
(ANH-USA) In an attempt to cut already too rapid approval times for genetically engineered seeds in half, the US Department of Agriculture will, under forthcoming rules (expected in March), give GE seed companies—including the Monsanto Company— faster regulatory reviews.
USDA now says it plans to invite public comments as soon as seed developers file a complete petition for deregulation rather than waiting until the end of the review process. However, faster rulings will almost certainly mean that public comments will get short shrift. The USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, or APHIS, will get to address the public’s concerns (that is, argue against them) earlier in the process, and GE crops reviews will get rubber stamped even faster than the current average of about three years.
This is precisely what the GMO industry wants. If they can get the approval time reduced, they can sidestep opposition and start getting sales that much faster…
(USDAWatch) As Iowa Governor, Tom Vilsack was a leading advocate for Monsanto, genetic engineering, and factory farming. President Obama proudly lauded his new Agriculture Secretary for “promoting biotech.”
Vilsack has, in fact, promoted the most controversial and dangerous forms of agricultural biotechnology, including pharma crops, plants genetically engineered to produce pharmaceuticals. When grown outdoors on farmland, where most pharma crop trials have occurred, pharma crops can easily contaminate conventional and organic varieties.
In one chilling example from 2002, a corn crop engineered by ProdiGene to produce a vaccine for pigs contaminated 500,000 bushels of soybeans that were grown in the Nebraska field the next season. Before this incident, a similar thing had happened in Iowa where the USDA ordered ProdiGene to pay for the burning of 155 acres of conventional corn that may have been contaminated by the firm’s biotech plants.
ProdiGene eventually went out of business, but not before it received a $6 million investment from the Governors Biotechnology Partnership, chaired by Iowa Governor Vilsack. Vilsack didn’t want any restrictions placed on experimental pharma crops. In reaction to suggestions that pharma crops should be kept away from food crops, Vilsack argued that “we should not overreact and hamstring this industry.”
The Obama administration shows no sign of changing the government’s position on labeling of biotech foods despite a renewed effort by consumer advocacy groups and environmental organizations require manufacturers to disclose the use of genetically engineered ingredients.
Jose Fernandez, the State Department’s assistant secretary for economic, energy and business affairs, said today that such labeling would scare consumers away from those foods.
“If you label something there’s an implication there’s something wrong with it,” said Fernandez, speaking on a panel organized by CropLife International, a group that represents Monsanto, DuPont and other biotech giants.
The State Department has been working along with the Agriculture Department to encourage foreign countries to permit the production and use of biotech crops.
I grew up eating things like Keebler crackers and cookies; who didn’t love Ernie and the other adorable little elves? It is hard to wrap my brain around the idea that what I ate for most of my life was contaminated with poisons – or that no one cared enough to scream in outrage.
Why would companies who want our lifelong business want to do us harm? Doesn’t that just go against all logic and reason?
It would go against logic – except for the fact that corporate conglomerates and global partnerships will ultimately profit from making society ill. They’ll make a buck (or several million) on every step of your life from the GMO soy formula start to the Ensure(d) GMO soy ending. Corporations don’t care if they make their money selling you junk food, junk medicine or the junk caskets they’ll bury you in – it’s all money and it’s all the same to them.
Those ‘harmless’ little mascots from elves to cookoo birds are nothing more than early death wrapped up in pretty packaging. What truly defies logic is how many people are willing to still pay outrageous prices for their own sugar-coated and cartoon wrapped, deaths…
We can point fingers and blame corporations for their evil deeds all day long – but at the end of the day, we need to look at ourselves in the mirror and consider the fact that we aren’t forced to sell our health for the convenient poisons we consume. We have choices; there are alternatives to consuming the tasty toxic products they pitch at us with such force. Educate yourself, learn about the dangers of GMO’s, fake sugars, soy, etc.
Read labels before you buy the foods you consume. Learn what ingredients are toxic to you & your family.
Boycott the corporations who twist childhood emotions into an unnatural world filled with early deaths.
Stop allowing their greed to twist our logical understanding of what is natural and good for us!
If you use Wesson brand cooking oils, you may be able to join a class-action lawsuit against food giant ConAgra for deceptively marketing the products as natural.
These days it’s hard to walk down a supermarket aisle without bumping into a food product that claims to be “all-natural.” If you’ve ever wondered how even some junk food products can claim this moniker (witness: Cheetos Natural Puff White Cheddar Cheese Flavored Snacks — doesn’t that sound like it came straight from your garden?), the answer is simple, if illogical: The Food and Drug Administration has not defined the term “natural.”
So food marketers, knowing that many shoppers are increasingly concerned about healthful eating, figured: Why not just slap the natural label on anything we can get away with? That wishful thinking may soon be coming to an end if a few clever consumer lawyers have anything to say about it.
Full Story ConAgra sued over ‘natural’ GMO cooking oils | Grist.
Genetic engineering is a threat to food security, especially in a changing climate. The introduction of genetically manipulated organisms by choice or by accident grossly undermines sustainable agriculture and in so doing, severely limits the choice of food we can eat.
Once GE plants are released into the environment, they are out of control. If anything goes wrong – they are impossible to recall.
GE contamination threatens biodiversity respected as the global heritage of humankind, and one of our world’s fundamental keys to survival.
Image via Wikipedia
“We look forward to this opportunity to provide growers with advanced technology that combines Bayer CropScience innovation in seed treatment with Monsanto seed,” said Keith Vodrazka, product manager at Bayer CropScience LP. “This combination will help ensure that soybean growers can have the best protection against yield-robbing nematodes and early season insects.”
What a chilling statement that is, eh? Doesn’t it just create a warm, tingly feeling inside to think of the potential behind products like BaySanto soybeans? How about some MonBay beans? Gosh, what mouth-watering thoughts and I can hardly wait until Monsanto-Bayer products are available in a super store near me!
I wonder…
…will beans now replace aspirin as the common headache remedy? I can easily imagine the conversation that will take place in bedrooms around the world, “Not tonight honey, I took some BayerBeans for my headache!…No, I don’t smell anything at all…maybe it was the dog again…!”
From CropLife -
“Soybean growers now have access to a biological mode of action to help protect their crop from nematodes — as well as other pests — as part of an agreement made by Bayer CropScience LP and Monsanto Co.
Offered with Monsanto’s Acceleron Seed Treatment Products for soybeans, Poncho/VOTiVO seed treatment from Bayer CropScience combines a seed-applied insecticide with a new living-barrier approach to nematode protection…
…Under the agreement, Monsanto will have rights to commercialize Poncho/VOTiVO on seed from its soybean brand Asgrow, the Channel brand, and regional brands, as well as to sell the product through its seed licensees, which include numerous independent seed companies across the U.S…”
Monsanto, which already controls 60% of the U.S. corn market, is including traits in the new sweet corn that make it resistant to both Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide and to insects (through the inclusion of Bt toxin, a trait that disrupts insect digestive systems and eventually kills them). As we have mentioned before, at least 21 weed species have become resistant to Roundup. And Bt toxin may have negative health effects–a recent study found the toxin in the maternal and fetal blood of pregnant women, though the implications of that aren’t known quite yet.
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by E.B. de Mas, reachable at: pink.agendist@yahoo.com
Trying to get to a better place.
The journey is the destination
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Stories, poems, and the stuff of life - from a mom, a writer, an artist, and wife.
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Knowledge Is Power
Standing Up for Truth and Justice- In a violent and oppressive world where lies and injustices prevail.
บันทึกความไร้สาระของชีวิต
Step One to Solving any Problem is Admitting a Problem Exists
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a humble documentation of my twenties, feminism and mismatched socks.
A complete guide to natural organic ethical poultry keeping
Rebuilding a sustainable world.
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