House Ag Committee Okays the Monsanto Protection Act
Organic Lifestyle Comments Off on House Ag Committee Okays the Monsanto Protection Act
Well, it’s happened. The DARK (Deny Americans the Right to Know) Act, better known as the ultimate Monsanto Protection Act, aka H.R. 1599, has been voted out of committee with the approval of the House Agriculture Committee.
This is nothing short of a disgusting capitulation to Big Ag by a bunch of bootlicking House members totally hog-tied and bought off by Monsanto and its pals in the agricultural chemical, biotech, big farm, and related industries. It really is awful to read how these toadies gloat and spin this terrible act as though it is the salvation of farming in America and a huge boon to consumers. It is nothing of the kind. It destroys our ability to know what’s in our food. But read it yourself, as reported in the Food Business News. And then write your Representative and your two Senators and give them your feelings about this.
“WASHINGTON — The House Committee on Agriculture on July 14 approved H.R. 1599, the Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act of 2015. The bill, which was introduced in March by Representatives Mike Pompeo of Kansas and G.K. Butterfield of North Carolina, has evolved through bipartisan discussions between the Agriculture Committee and the Committee on Energy and Commerce Committee.
“The Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act is designed to prevent individual states from passing legislation requiring the labeling of food and beverage products containing bioengineered ingredients.
“‘I appreciate the collaborative efforts of the Energy and Commerce Committee in getting this bipartisan legislation completed and approved today,’ said Representative K. Michael Conaway of Texas, chairman of the House Agriculture Committee. ‘H.R. 1599 is the solution to an urgent and growing problem. The current patchwork system of varied labels interferes with the free flow of goods across the country, posing a real threat to interstate commerce and typically results in inconsistent and confusing information for consumers. Creating a uniform national policy regarding biotechnology labeling is the free market solution that will allow consumers access to meaningful information, create market opportunities for those on the production and processing side, and will facilitate future innovation.’
“Representative Rodney Davis, chairman of the Subcommittee on Biotechnology, Horticulture, and Research, thanked Mr. Conaway and Mr. Pompeo for their work on the bill.
“’As a parent, I believe it is important to have national and reliable food labels, and this bill does that by allowing for an effective, uniform labeling system that consumers can trust,’ Mr. Davis said. ‘Without a national standard, we risk the spread of misinformation and increased food costs. Just as consumers can go to the grocery store and identify organic products, this bill will allow them to do the same with G.M.O.-free products.’ (Hint: This is a lie. Re-read paragraph two of this article from Food Business News. The legislation says only the Federal government can create a labeling law, and you know what that’s going to be worth. It will not require the label to state what’s in the food, only what’s not in the food. Picture yourself shopping. If the label is required to say, “Contains GMOs” then you have a way of identifying every food with GMOs in the store. They’ll all have labels. Now picture a voluntary label, which is what H.R. 1599 calls for, saying, “Contains No GMOs.” That voluntary label will tell you something about that particular product, but what about all the other products in the store? The label is voluntary. Products with GMOs likely will have no labeling at all. This is what this terrible piece of legislation calls for. The damn thing was written by Monsanto, for goshsakes.)
“The Grocery Manufacturers Association (G.M.A.) praised the passage of the bill: ‘Today’s House Agriculture Committee vote is further evidence of the growing support and momentum in Congress for this bill, and we urge the full House to pass it before the August recess,’ said Pamela G. Bailey, president and chief executive officer of the G.M.A. ‘This critically important bipartisan legislation will ensure that Americans have accurate, consistent information about their food rather than a 50-state patchwork of labeling laws that will only prove costly and confusing for consumers, farmers and food manufacturers.’
“Pamela G. Bailey, president and chief executive officer of the G.M.A.: ‘It is imperative that the House and Senate move quickly to pass the Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act,’ Ms. Bailey added. ‘It will put a science-based framework in place that provides consumers across the country with uniform food labeling standards.’ (Hint: The phrase “science based framework” is language written by Monsanto and used as a talking point by its minions.)
“The American Soybean Association (A.S.A.) also applauded the House Agriculture Committee for marking up and approving the bill: ‘Consumers continue to demand more transparency and accountability from food producers,’ said Wade Cowan, president of the A.S.A. and a soybean farmer from Brownfield, Texas. ‘This bill ensures that a multi-state patchwork of state regulations is avoided.’ Mr. Cowan said the A.S.A. is now engaged in efforts to garner chamber-wide support for the bill. We’ve seen that the effort to bring clarity to the G.M.O. labeling debate has significant support on both sides of the aisle’” he said. ‘It’s clear that consumers want practical solutions that give them the confidence they want in their food, and this legislation does exactly that. In the coming weeks, we’ll meet with every lawmaker in soybean country to urge them to support this legislation. It’s a bill that moves us closer to a science-based dialogue on food and farm issues, and we will encourage every member of the House to get behind it.’”
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HOW THE RIGHT SPINS LIES ABOUT CRUCIAL ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES
Okay, so I’ve been reporting and repeating information about how neonicotinoid pesticides have been implicated in the Colony Collapse Disorder that’s been ravaging bee colonies in the U.S. for the last number of years. I haven’t been out there in the field documenting bee deaths, but I have been looking at the science. And it’s pretty clear that neonics, as they’re called, are at least a part of the problem of bee colony collapse. There’s actually quite a bit of scientific work on this, because we’ve known for centuries that if bees fail to pollinate our crops, we won’t have crops.
So today I received this post on my Facebook page: “Bee Experts Dismantle Touted ‘Harvard’ Neonics-Colony Collapse Disorder Study As ‘Activist Science.’”
Oh—bee experts are saying neonics aren’t the cause of colony collapse disorder (CCD) at all? And that a study attributed to Harvard scientists is nonsense? “Activist Science” seems to mean that those opposed to neonics have some sort of political agenda.
Well, where is this information coming from? This article, published by the Genetic Literacy Project at the University of California, Davis (a respected ag school), was written by someone named Jon Entine.
Wow. This is news. Evidently, I’ve been wrong all along. Maybe neonics aren’t the cause of CCD. So here’s an excerpt from Entine’s article:
“Chensheng Lu was in his element last month at a speech before a green group at Harvard Law School. The School of Public Health professor was lecturing on his favorite topic–his only subject these days, as it has become his obsession: why he believes bees around the world are in crisis.” This sounds like a patronizing put-down: “his only subject,” “his obsession,” and “why he believes bees around the world are in crisis.” Is it just Chensheng Lu who believes bees are in crisis. No! There’s a ton of data so starkly troublesome about disappearing bees that it has scientists around the country worried.
“Lu is convinced, unequivocally,” Entine writes, “that a popular pesticide hailed by many scientists as a less toxic replacement for farm chemicals proven to be far more dangerous to humans and the environment, is actually a killer in its own right.
“’We demonstrated that neonicotinoids are highly likely to be responsible for triggering Colony Collapse Disorder in bee hives,’ claimed Lu. The future of our food system and public health, he said, hangs in the balance.
“Lu is the Dr. Doom of bees,” Entine writes. “Not clear to most other experts in the field, is that colony collapse disorder (CCD), which first emerged in 2006, can be directly linked to ‘neonics,’ and also to genetically modified crops. Phased in during the 1990s, neonics are most often used by farmers to control unwanted crop pests. They are coated on seeds, which then produce plants that systemically fight pests.”
This doesn’t sound like journalism. With its argument ad hominem (“the Dr. Doom of bees”), it sounds more like an apology for a very toxic pesticide. What in the world is the University of California, Davis, doing getting mixed up in what seems to be a propaganda piece for the pesticide industry?
So my investigative journalism gene—the one I acquired when I studied journalism at my university—kicked in, and I saw that the article’s author was Jon Entine. So, who is Jon Entine?
Well, he’s executive director of the Genetic Literacy Project, a sister organization of the Statistical Assessment Service (STATS). He’s also a Senior Fellow at the World Food Center Institute for Food and Agricultural Literacy at the University of California, Davis, and is a fellow at the Center for Health and Risk Communication, George Mason University. That’s quite a fistful of bona fides, right? Let’s take a closer look at his affiliations.
The Statistical Assessment Service (STATS) touts itself as a “non-profit, non-partisan organization,” but its funders are not transparent. It is itself an arm, or “sister organization,” of the Center for Media and Public Affairs (CMPA), and it is affiliated with the Center for Health and Risk Communication at George Mason University. STATS in turn has two “sister organizations”: the Genetic Literacy Project, which promotes GMOs (uh-oh); and EconoSTATS, which promotes privatization and opposes government regulation. Hmmm. Promotes privatization and opposes government regulation. That sure sounds like the conservative agenda.
Oh. Wait—didn’t we find out that Jon Entine is the executive director of the Genetic Literacy Project and its STATS affiliate? Here’s a little more about Mr. Entine, as reported on Natural News:
“Forbes.com contributing writer Jon Entine, long known as a biotech shill and pesticide apologist, committed physical violence against his wife and psychologically traumatized his own daughter, according to court documents now revealed in a comprehensive, five-part investigative article by Natural News. The documents reveal how his wife pleaded for court protection against domestic violence and child abuse and sought a restraining order against Entine to halt him from ‘physically, verbally and or psychologically abusing, annoying, harassing or injuring’ herself or their young female daughter.
“Jon Entine has professional ties to Monsanto, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Proctor & Gamble, and other similar corporations. He is a research fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a research fellow at George Mason University, and was a paid lecturer at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. Entine is a key ‘attack operative’ for the biotech industry, well known for authoring wildly defamatory character assassination articles to target GMO skeptics and scientists who disagree with the biotech industry’s contrived safety claims.
“With the help of Forbes.com and the American Enterprise Institute — both key players in attacking and smearing GMO skeptics and scientists — Entine has been instrumental in viciously smearing the reputations of numerous scientists, activists, independent journalists, and environmentalists, usually through the use of wildly fraudulent smear tactics and the wholesale fabrication of false ‘facts.’
“It turns out that Jon Entine has been leading a double life. In one life, he presents himself as an upstanding, award-winning journalist and research fellow with a well-credentialed resume. But in his secret life, Jon Entine is described by his own wife as a belligerent, violent, mentally unstable individual who committed acts of violence against his wife, psychologically traumatized his own daughter, installed surveillance equipment to spy on his wife’s activities, attempted to compel his wife’s therapist to testify against her in court, interfered with his wife’s professional activities, and engaged in a bizarre series of other reprehensible activities.”
Well—enough. You begin to get a picture of Mr. Entine. But why would he want to spread disinformation about neonics, their effect on bees, and GMO crops? Well, there was that reference about the link to Monsanto, and his being an attack operative for the biotech industry.
Let’s go back and look more closely at STATS, the sister organization of the Genetic Literacy Project and the Center for Media and Public Affairs. STATS promotes itself as a disinterested, non-partisan guardian of scientific and statistical integrity to media outlets. It has been surprisingly successful in this guise, with many media outlets citing STATS information as the gospel truth. If STATS gives it the okay, it must be okay, right?
From its inception, however, STATS has repeatedly attacked environmentalists, civil libertarians, feminists, and other “liberals.” The first director of STATS, David Murray, was not a statistician at all. His academic training was in anthropology, but he was often described in the media as a “statistician” when he commented on various topics.
As for funding, is it any surprise that we find, among others, the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation (which is funding an array of Republican and right-wing ideological interests, including the Tea Party via front groups like Freedomworks)?
The Genetic Literacy Project is affiliated with The Center for Media and Public Affairs (CMPA), too. It’s a U.S.-based, tax-exempt, nonprofit 501(c)(3) media watch organization. On its website, CMPA claims to be politically neutral: “The Center for Media and Public Affairs (CMPA) is a nonpartisan research and educational organization which conducts scientific studies of news and entertainment media. CMPA’s goal is to provide an empirical basis for ongoing debates over media coverage and impact through well-documented, timely, and readable studies.” Guess who dug up the seed money for the CMPA? Pat Buchanan and Pat Robertson.
CMPA also runs the Statistical Assessment Service (STATS), described on the front page of its website as a sister organization, and which is considered a front organization.
CMPA: out of the total of $3,323,416 in its foundation grants, nearly all of it ($2,693,916) came from the John M. Olin, Scaife, and Smith Richardson foundations. In other words, CMPA received 81 percent of its foundation funding from those donors. Here is a sample of other right-wing causes funded by these same donors:
John M. Olin Foundation funds the American Enterprise Institute and the Project for the New American Century. The Scaife Foundation funds the American Enterprise Institute, Heritage Foundation, the Smith Richardson Foundation, and the Hudson Institute. All of them are ideologically far right organizations devoted to advancing radical conservative causes.
According to Salon journalist Joe Conason, “The IRS form 990 returns filed by the CMPA redacts (eliminates) the names of all the individuals and organizations that contribute to it, thereby concealing them from public scrutiny. But the watchdogs at Media Transparency have collated the 990 returns filed by conservative foundations, which disclose their contributions.” And it turns out that, yes indeed, the Genetic Literacy Project, the CMPA, and STATS are all supported by the same few conservative foundations.
So how does this all work out in the public media that supposedly informs America?
Here’s one headline widely reported in news media across America a few years ago: “Fox News Gives Most Balanced Coverage.”
The Huffington Post reported in December, 2007, that “a study released this month by the Center for Media and Public Affairs (CMPA) at George Mason University found that Fox News Channel’s evening coverage was more ‘balanced’ than that of the broadcast networks.” Yet, one only had to look at the money behind the CMPA study to see that the results were tainted from the start. Journalists! Start doing your due diligence.
The CMPA staff includes President Robert Lichter, who is a paid contributor to the Fox News Channel. During the mid-1980’s he held the DeWitt Wallace Chair in Mass Communication at the conservative American Enterprise Institute. In addition, according to the CMPA website, he has taught at Princeton University, Georgetown University, George Washington University, and George Mason University, and he was a Postdoctoral Fellow in Politics and Psychology at Yale University, a Senior Research Fellow at Columbia University, and a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellow at Smith College.
All these positions at some of America’s finest institutions of higher learning would be laudable, if it weren’t for the fact that this arch-conservative is part of a campaign that has, as one of its aims, to discredit scientists who show that neonicotinoid pesticides are destroying our bee populations. You might almost think that people at institutions like Princeton and Yale are behind the conservative assault on scientific inquiry into environmental problems. Perish the thought!
So the question comes down to this. Once we peer behind the curtain and see the Wizard of Oz for who he really is, of what value to the conservative corporatists is the discrediting of a pesticide that’s killing our bees?
Let me venture a guess.
If the public gets the idea that a pesticide is bad for us, the public might demand that pesticides be regulated or removed from the environment. And who makes pesticides? Well, Bayer Crop Science makes neonicotinoids. Monsanto makes Roundup. Syngenta, Dow, and many others make toxic agricultural chemicals. And they are VERY profitable.
And so, I get this seemingly innocuous Facebook post telling me that bee die-off isn’t really due to neonics. And when I wend my way back through the maze of front groups and phony organizations and propagandizing smokescreens, I always come back to the same people. And they are the arch-conservatives who have stolen the American dream from working folks and the middle class and hidden it in their safety deposit boxes in the Cayman Islands.
Wake up, America. You’re being had!
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MONSANTO TAKES UMBRAGE AT WHO ROUNDUP CANCER REPORT
Reuters is reporting that Monsanto is demanding a sit-down with members of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC). This international scientific body is being called on the carpet for reporting that Monsanto’s Roundup, the world’s most widely sold herbicide, which is inextricably linked to the majority of their genetically engineered products, is probably carcinogenic to humans. In a DO-YOU-KNOW-WHO-WE-ARE? moment, Monsanto’s vice president of global regulatory affairs Philip Miller said the following in an interview:
“We question the quality of the assessment. The WHO has something to explain.”
Evidence for the carcinogenicity of glyphosate comes from a peer-reviewed study published in March of 2015 in the respected journal The Lancet Oncology.
Glyphosate is a broad-spectrum herbicide, currently with the highest production volumes of all herbicides. It is used in more than 750 different products for agriculture, forestry, urban, and home applications. Its use has increased sharply with the development of genetically modified glyphosate-resistant crop varieties. Glyphosate has been detected in air during spraying, in water, and in food.
Glyphosate has been detected in the blood and urine of agricultural workers, indicating absorption. Soil microbes degrade glyphosate to aminomethylphosphoric acid (AMPA). Blood AMPA detection after poisonings suggests intestinal microbial metabolism in humans. Glyphosate and glyphosate formulations induced DNA and chromosomal damage in mammals, and in human and animal cells in vitro. One study reported increases in blood markers of chromosomal damage (micronuclei) in residents of several communities after spraying of glyphosate formulations.
Recently, Monsanto’s Dr. William “Bill” Moar presented the latest project in their product pipeline dealing with RNA. Most notably, he spoke about Monsanto’s efforts to educate citizens about the scientific certainty of the safety of their genetically engineered products. The audience was mostly agricultural students, many of whom were perhaps hoping for the only well-paid internships and jobs in their field.
One student asked what Monsanto was doing to counter the “bad science” around their work. Dr. Moar, perhaps forgetting that this was a public event, then revealed that Monsanto indeed had “an entire department” (waving his arm for emphasis) dedicated to “debunking” science which disagreed with theirs. This is the first time that a Monsanto functionary has publically admitted that they have such an entity which brings their immense political and financial weight to bear on scientists who dare to publish against them. The Discredit Bureau will not be found on their official website.
The job of Monsanto’s Discredit Bureau is to attack the unimpeachably respected Lancet and the international scientific bodies of WHO and IARC. However, they have no choice but to attack, since the stakes are so very high for them. Glyphosate is their hallmark product upon which the majority of their profits are based. Make no mistake, this is extremely bad news for Monsanto.
But their enablers are coming to the rescue.
In a growing number of cases, USDA managers are interfering, intimidating, harassing, and in some cases punishing civil service scientists for doing work that has inconvenient implications for industry and could have direct policy/regulatory ramifications. For example, in recent months USDA scientists have been subjected to:
• Directives not to publish data on certain topics of particular sensitivity to industry;
• Orders to rewrite scientific articles already accepted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal to remove sections which could provoke industry objections;
• Summons to meet with Secretary Vilsack in an effort to induce retraction of a paper that drew the ire of industry representatives;
• Orders to retract a paper after it had been accepted for publication in a peer-reviewed journal. The paper could only be published if the USDA scientist removed his authorship thus leaving only the names of authors unassociated with USDA;
• Demotion from supervisory status and a reprimand after the scientist provided testimony before Congress that did not reflect agency preferences;
• Disruptive and lengthy internal investigations to search out any irregularity that could be used for management leverage against the targeted scientist;
• Suspensions without pay and other disciplinary actions for petty matters, such as minor irregularities in travel paperwork;
• Inordinate, sometimes indefinite, delays in approving submission for publication of scientific papers that may be controversial;
• Restrictions on topics that USDA scientists may address in conference presentations; and
• Threats by USDA managers to damage the careers of scientists whose work triggers industry complaints.
At least 10 USDA scientists have been investigated or faced other consequences arising from research that called into question the safety of certain agricultural chemicals.
There have been mounting complaints over the last year from USDA scientists claiming they have been ordered to retract studies, water down findings, remove their names from authorship and experienced delays in approvals for publication of research papers. These ten USDA scientists are laying their careers on the line. Although they are not identified by name in the petition for fear of retaliation, they will be instantly recognizable to Secretary Vilsack from the list of specific complaints. Their bravery characterizes the highest calling of scientific integrity.
Science is not a shining citadel on a hill founded on unassailable objective facts and data. Science is a human endeavor subject to human frailties and failings. Science, increasingly divorced from integrity and accountability, becomes subverted when it is manipulated and orchestrated by multinational corporations whose sole aim is global market share to increase profits.
Recently, companies “such as Monsanto” were implicated in a watchdog group’s petition to the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) on behalf of anonymous scientists within the agency who say their research is suppressed when it upsets powerful agrichemical interests.
The allegations enraged the industry’s critics, who have been busy touting recent reports linking popular herbicides often used in tandem with genetically engineered crops, or GMOs, to cancer and antibiotic resistance.
Monsanto holds up the sheer abundance of their own well-funded studies citing the safety of glyphosate, done over the past 20 years, which is a short period of time in scientific inquiry, particularly when dissenting research is actively suppressed. They also hold up the findings of regulatory bodies, particularly in the United States where the revolving door between agrochemical corporations and government spins at high speed.
Critics of the agrochemical industry have often cited the history of these corporations who rush their products to market with protestations of safety only to discover down the road that they have become persistent ecological and health nightmares. We are seeing the end of that road for Glyphosate.
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ICE
About a year ago, the PR people for a new company that produces a drink called ICE asked me if I wanted to have a sample. They said the drink was made from mountain stream water, was low in calories, slightly sparkling, and refreshing. So I said okay, meaning to tout it in this blog if I liked it.
It was a very fine product, I thought. Not sweet. Clean tasting. So I wrote about it. Although it was made with city water in Preston, Washington, the city water itself comes from a lake fed by mountain streams.
I was in my local market the other day and I was thirsty. I spied ICE in a cold case, but now it was all colored and fruit flavored. I bought a bottle anyway, and when I opened it, was astonished to find that it was cloyingly sweet. What happened? I immediately thought that the company must have had focus groups trying the drink, and they urged the company to sweeten it. Yuck. Its lack of sweetness was what I liked about it. And it wasn’t only way too sweet, it had generic fruit flavorings. I wondered how much sugar it contained and looked at the label. It had no sugar, no calories. It did have sucralose, an artificial sweetener better known as Splenda.
Sucralose is a non-nutritive sweetener. The majority of ingested sucralose is not broken down by the body, so it has no calories. In the European Union, it is also known as E955. Sucralose is about 320 to 1,000 times as sweet as table sugar, twice as sweet as saccharin, and three times as sweet as aspartame. It is stable under heat and over a broad range of pH conditions. Therefore, it can be used in baking or in products that require a longer shelf life.
ICE now also contains maltodextrin. Several studies have linked maltodextrin consumption to the suppression of “good bacteria” in the digestive system. These bacteria are the foundation of strong immune systems, so suppressing them is asking for trouble. This potentially puts people who consume a lot of the additive at risk for bacterial infections such as salmonella or E.coli. Despite being only slightly sweet, if at all, maltodextrin is a carbohydrate. It will affect your blood sugar. This is an important thing for people with diabetes to remember. Maltodextrin has the same amount of carbohydrates as table sugar, and its glycemic index is higher than table sugar: 106-136.
In this age of over-information, it should come as no surprise that there’s misleading and conflicting information when it comes to maltodextrin. Product labels aren’t required to mention how much of the additive is included. Instead, it’s added to the total carbohydrate count.
Though some vouch for it as a good option for people with diabetes, it can affect blood sugar even more dramatically than table sugar, and should be counted towards your daily carbohydrate load.
Too bad about ICE. If you bought some on my recommendation, I’m sorry. But the product changed drastically from when I sampled it last year until now. It’s an example of a good product gone bad.
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CHIPOTLE MEXICAN GRILL PICKS BEST GAME NAME EVER
Although Chipotle Grill isn’t strictly organic, the chain does make an effort to use good ingredients. I always wondered when someone was going to start an organic fast food chain and make a jillion dollars. Well, Chipotle is heading in that direction. But what struck me about the chain’s latest effort to help customers understand its good ingredients is the name it chose for a new interactive game. Here’s the press release from its PR company:
DENVER – On July 21, Chipotle Mexican Grill will launch “Friend or Faux” – an integrated marketing campaign and interactive digital experience that invites consumers to learn about the differences between Chipotle’s ingredients and those commonly used to make fast food. The “Friend or Faux” game is optimized for mobile and desktop use, and will be accessible by visiting www.chipotle.com/friendorfaux. The campaign will be supported by extensive online advertising.
“Friend or Faux” reinforces Chipotle’s commitment to serving real, high quality ingredients raised with respect for farmers, the environment, animals, and consumers, while taking a progressive approach to continue conversations about where food comes from and how it is prepared.
In a marketing-driven industry where new menu items are often used to drive customer traffic and proliferation of menu items is the norm, cheap, heavily processed foods that include thousands of additives and artificial ingredients have become common. Chipotle has chosen a different path, focusing instead on making food with great quality ingredients prepared using classic cooking techniques. Through this campaign, Chipotle will showcase the limited number of ingredients it uses to make its food (just 68 ingredients in total), and contrast that with the long and complex ingredient lists on which many fast food brands have become so reliant.
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