Concordia res Parvae Crescunt
by Mike Adams, NaturalNews.com
Raw milk battle reveals FDA abandonment of basic human right to choose your food
The Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund (FTCLDF), an organization whose mission includes “defending the rights and broadening the freedoms of family farms and protecting consumer access to raw milk and nutrient dense foods”, recently filed a lawsuit against the FDA for its ban on interstate sales of raw milk. The suit alleges that such a restriction is a direct violation of the United States Constitution. Nevertheless, the suit led to a surprisingly cold response from the FDA about its views on food freedom (and freedoms in general).
In a dismissal notice issued to the Iowa District Court where the suit was filed, the FDA officially made public its views on health and food freedom. These views will shock you, but they reveal the true evil intent of the FDA and why it is truly a rogue federal agency.
The FDA essentially believes that nobody has the right to choose what to eat or drink. You are only “allowed” to eat or drink what the FDA gives you permission to. There is no inherent right or God-given right to consume any foods from nature without the FDA’s consent.
This is no exaggeration. It’s exactly what the FDA said in its own words.
You have no natural right to food
The FTCLDF highlighted a few of the key phrases from the FDA’s response document in a recent email to its supporters. They include the following two statements from the FDA:
“There is no ‘deeply rooted’ historical tradition of unfettered access to foods of all kinds.” [p. 26]
“Plaintiffs’ assertion of a ‘fundamental right to their own bodily and physical health, which includes what foods they do and do not choose to consume for themselves and their families’ is similarly unavailing because plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to obtain any food they wish.” [p.26]
There’s a lot more in the document, which primarily addresses the raw milk issue, but these statements alone clearly reveal how the FDA views the concept of health freedom. Essentially, the FDA does not believe in health freedom at all. It believes that it is the only entity granted the authority to decide for you what you are able to eat and drink.
The State, in other words, may override your food decisions and deny you free access to the foods and beverages you wish to consume. And the State may do this for completely unscientific reasons — even just political reasons — all at their whim.
This has all emerged from the debate over whether raw milk sales should be legal. But the commonsense answer seems obvious: Of course raw milk should be legal! Since when did the government have any right to criminalize a farmer milking his cow and selling the raw, unpasteurized milk to his neighbor at a mutually-agreeable price?
The U.S. government’s secret agenda to eliminate raw milk
Raw milk has been in the spotlight recently as defenders of the food are constantly battling with state and federal authorities over the freedom to buy and sell it. At the national level, the FDA has been on a ruthless crusade to eliminate all sales of raw milk everywhere. Lately, the agency seems to have shifted its tactics from attacking raw milk dairy farmers directly to going after raw milk “buying clubs” and “cow-share” programs, which effectively bypass the draconian laws in many states by establishing private contracts between individuals.
In a cow-share program, you buy a share of the cow’s produced milk, and you pay a cost of the cow’s upkeep. It’s sort of like CSA shares for farm veggies, but with cow’s milk instead of veggies. This arrangement drives the FDA absolutely batty because it bypasses their authority and allows free people to engage in the free sales of raw dairy products produced on small family farms.
But why is the FDA hell-bent on stopping raw milk from being sold in the first place? Think about it: What is it about this particular whole food that has regulators working overtime to make sure you don’t drink it?
It certainly has nothing to do with food safety, as the FDA commonly claims is its reason for opposing it. Raw milk’s track record of safety is phenomenal, and all legitimate studies indicate that it’s actually less prone to harbor harmful bacteria than the pasteurized stuff (which is all dead, modified milk anyway).
According to a Weston A. Price Foundation (WAPF) report, between 1980 and 2005, there were ten times more illnesses from pasteurized milk than there were from raw milk. And most of the reports that link illness outbreaks with raw milk provide little or no evidence that raw milk was even the culprit.
But apparently the facts don’t really matter to the FDA (is anyone surprised?) because the agency continues to repeat false talking points about how raw milk is inherently dangerous and that drinking it is “like play Russian Roulette with your health”.
Big Dairy behind push to eliminate raw milk
The real reason why the FDA opposes raw milk is because Big Dairy opposes raw milk. Just like Big Pharma, Big Dairy has worked very hard behind the scenes to steer FDA policy in its favor. And according to some recent reports, Big Dairy is one of the primary forces trying to eliminate raw milk because it threatens the commercial milk business.
Recently in Massachusetts, for example, the state’s Department of Agricultural Resources (MDAR) has been targeting raw milk buying clubs that purchase raw milk from rural dairy farms and have it delivered to urban drop-off points where many of the customers live. Raw milk sales are legal in Massachusetts as long as they are done at the farm, and the state has long tolerated buying clubs, which are convenient for customers and technically perfectly legal.
But this situation now seems to have changed. MDAR recently sent cease-and-desist letters to four buying clubs even though there is no Massachusetts law that prohibits their existence. When club members challenged the legitimacy of the warnings, MDAR decided to propose a new regulation to specifically outlaw buying clubs. (They just can’t stand the fact that people are buying raw milk, can they?)
Get this: Scott Soares, a Massachusetts legislator who is friends with the MDAR commissioner, held a preliminary meeting in advance of the May 10th proposal hearing to discuss the matter with interested parties. Fifteen educated and passionate consumers and farmers of raw milk showed up to challenge Soares, who ended up revealing to them that “large dairy producers” had contacted him to push for raw milk restrictions.
To make matters worse, it was revealed that Soares failed to follow proper protocol by not opening a docket to keep a record of all interactions relating to the proposal. So not only did Soares reveal that he’s basically bowing to political pressure from Big Dairy by supporting the restrictions, but he’s also violating proper legislative procedure in the process.
So what we have here is a classic case of a large and powerful industry pushing government regulators to outlaw competing products so that it can monopolize the market. It’s the same thing that Big Pharma does in getting the FDA to destroy nutritional supplement companies. But now it’s happening with raw milk, too.
What’s next? Will all farmer’s markets be outlawed because the veggies haven’t all been irradiated or pasteurized?
As usual, it’s all about the money, and as you follow the money trail all the way up to the federal level, you find the same thing happening everywhere: At the FDA, USDA, FTC and so on. U.S. government regulators have become monopoly market enforcers for Big Business, and they won’t let anything get in their way… not even personal health freedoms or just basic access to food.
I’m sensing a Ghandi moment coming on here. Somebody is going to have a powerful public demonstration against tyranny by drinking raw milk in the same way that Ghandi led his followers to harvesting salt. People have a natural-born right to real food, and the FDA is violating human rights by attacking producers of raw milk.
Unconstitutional position of the FDA
It’s not really news to the folks in the natural health community that the FDA opposes personal health freedoms, but according to the FTCLDF, the FDA’s recent response to its lawsuit is one of the agency’s boldest statements yet about how it views health freedom in America. It practically turns the FDA into a dictatorial Gestapo-like agency whose mission is to destroy the U.S. Constitution and deprive people of their natural rights.
Not only does the FDA think it has the power to regulate interstate trade; it also thinks it can regulate intrastate trade (which means buying and selling within state borders). In fact, the agency made this very clear on page 6 of its dismissal when it wrote, “It is within HHS’s authority…to institute an intrastate ban [on unpasteurized milk] as well.”
This is the FDA trying to run rampant over States’ rights. The federal government, after all, isn’t satisfied to exercise control over the limited powers granted to it by the U.S. Constitution — it wants to overthrow the tenth Amendment and dictate rules, regulations and laws that the states are being forced to follow.
This is blatantly unconstitutional. The Tenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution forbids the federal government from intruding on the laws of individual states, and is only allowed to wield powers expressly granted to it by the Constitution (powers granted by the People, in other words).
There is no power granted to the federal government to ban the sales of raw milk. I’ve read the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights, and I never saw it mentioned in there. The very idea, by the way, would have seemed bizarre (and downright stupid) by our nation’s founders, many of whom actually operated farms and drank raw milk themselves.
According to the FTCLDF suit, the FDA is clearly operating outside Constitutional authority by forbidding raw milk from being transported across state lines from states where it is legal to sell it. And for the FDA to arrogantly announce that it has the authority to ban intrastate raw milk sales shows just how tyrannical and oppressive the agency has now become.
The FDA, bluntly stated, has become an enemy of the People. It is taking away the rights that your forefathers helped protect (often with their lives). The FDA is destroying what your fathers and grandfathers fought for in World War II. It is attempting to terrorize the raw milk producers of America and run them out of business through a campaign of threats and intimidation. This is the agency that’s supposed to be working for the People? Give me a break…
Even private contracts aren’t a fundamental right, according to the FDA
But it gets even worse. On page 27 of the dismissal, the FDA also states that Americans do not have a fundamental right to enter into private contractual agreements with one another, either.
Huh? Are you kidding me?
Buying clubs, cooperatives and community supported agriculture programs (CSAs) all rely on private contractual agreements in order to operate. People contract with each other to obtain clean, healthy food from the sources of their choice without government intrusion. But now the FDA is saying that people don’t actually have this right. To enter into such a private contract to purchase food, milk or even water is a violation of federal law, the FDA now claims.
You are just a subject of the King, you see, and you have no rights. You must eat and drink what you are told. You must behave in a way that is allowed by your King. You have no rights, no protections and no freedoms. You are a slave, Neo.
The “substantive due process” clause of the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, however, assures people of this right when it states that no person shall “be deprived of life, liberty or property, without due process of law.” And being able to make personal food choices without having to obtain permission from Big Brother is definitely included under this clause.
But the FDA — aw, heck, all of Washington for that matter — doesn’t honor the U.S. Constitution in any way, shape or form. The document is little more than a tattered piece of American history according to the Nazi nut jobs running federal agencies today. They are no more likely to respect the Constitution as they are to leap from their desk job chairs and magically transform into flying elephants.
But all hope is not lost… there are things you can do to fight for your freedoms.
The Raw Milk Revolution
According to David Gumpert from The Complete Patient, raw milk is a proxy issue that really addresses food freedom at large. Whatever is decided about raw milk will set a precedent for everything else.
That’s why it’s so important to support raw milk freedom whether you drink milk or not (I don’t drink milk, but I support raw milk freedoms nevertheless). Not only is legalized raw milk beneficial to small, family farmers who are able to maintain livelihoods because of it, it also supports the local food economy. It’s also, by the way, a whole lot healthier than pasteurized milk!
On January 28, 2009, Congressman Ron Paul (R-TX) introduced HR 778, a bill that would end all federal restrictions on interstate traffic of raw milk. It’s along the same lines as the current lawsuit which challenges the constitutionality of such restrictions in the first place. You can read the entire bill at the following link:
(http://www.ftcldf.org/docs/HR_778_I…)
The FTCLDF has a petition page where you can contact your Congressmen and urge support for HR 778. You can even ask your Senators to cosponsor it. Please support this effort by signing this online petition.
Even more urgent than this is the need to express your opposition to a “food safety” bill going before the U.S. Senate called the “FDA Food Safety Modernization Act”. Also known as S. 510, this bill, if passed, will drastically increase the FDA’s power over food and make it very difficult to obtain natural, unprocessed foods of any kind. It would give the FDA completely power to irradiate, fumigate, pasteurize or otherwise destroy every item you consume, from fruits and vegetables to dairy products.
Remember how I said that the FDA (wrongly) thinks it has the power to regulate intrastate trade? Well S. 510 would specifically grant the agency this power. The FDA would then have the power to destroy all small, local farming, gardening or dairy operations in your home town, even if your state expressly defends your rights to engage in such activity.
Can you imagine a SWAT team of FDA agents showing up at your door because you grew organic broccoli and sold some at the weekend farmer’s market without fumigating it with poisons first? That’s what’s coming to your home town, everywhere across America.
S. 510 is the final version of H.R. 2749, which was passed last summer by the House of Representatives. There’s still time to stop it, but we need your help. So please sign the petition linked above.
I know sometimes it seems like the politicians aren’t listening, and for the most part that’s true, but a massive outcry against this attempted takeover of food is sure to get their attention and may even force them to back down.
You can read all about both bills at the following link:
(http://www.ftcldf.org/news/news-foo…)
You can also contact your Senators by visiting this link:
(http://www.opencongress.org/people/…)
Reposted from NaturalNews.com
Mike Adams is an award-winning natural health author with a strong interest in personal health, the environment and the power of nature to help us all heal He has authored and published thousands of articles, interviews, consumers guides, and books on topics like health and the environment, reaching millions of readers with information that is saving lives and improving personal health around the world. Adams is a trusted, independent journalist who receives no money or promotional fees whatsoever to write about other companies’ products. He has created over 100 CounterThink cartoons and produced several popular hip-hop songs on socially-conscious topics. He’s also a noted technology pioneer and founded a software company in 1993 that developed the HTML email newsletter software currently powering the NaturalNews subscriptions. Adams is currently the executive director of the Consumer Wellness Center, a 501(c)3 non-profit, and pursues hobbies such as Pilates, Capoeira, nature macrophotography and organic gardening. Known on the ‘net as ‘the Health Ranger,’ Adams shares his ethics, mission statements and personal health statistics at www.HealthRanger.org
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FDA: “There is no ‘deeply rooted’ historical tradition of unfettered access to foods of all kinds.†[p. 26]
FDA: “Plaintiffs’ assertion of a ‘fundamental right to their own bodily and physical health, which includes what foods they do and do not choose to consume for themselves and their families’ is similarly unavailing because plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to obtain any food they wish.†[p.26]
In the spirit of retiring federal Congressman (AZ) John Shadegg’s proposed Enumerated Powers Act (http://johnshadegg.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=13333), federal government agencies like the FDA should be required to preface such statements with the constitutional article, section, clause or amendment which gives the agency the power to make such statements in the first place. This is because if a federal government agency cannot reasonably justify its statements with specific constitutional statutes, as is the case with the FDA and food, the 9th and 10th Amendments automatically reserve the power to regulate such issues, food in this example, to the states, or to the people, not the Oval Office and Congress.
So the real problem is that the FDA is wrongly ignoring basic constitutional statutes and can therefore pound sand. Unfortunately this is not a big surprise with respect to federal agencies these days.
Also since the people of Massachucetts are having problems with state officials, its up to the people of Massachusetts to work with their state lawmakers to make legislation which will at least give the voters the power to get rid of such troublemakers.
There is a long list of unconstitutional powers that Congress has granted various federal agencies. Like this case where the FDA thinks it controls every garden patch in the country there are numerous invasions of both State sovereignty and individual freedoms being conducted by the federal government every day. Another that comes to mind is the EPA placing requirements on individual homeowners. How can that be considered “regulat(ing) Commerce … among the several States� Remember the 10th amendment protects both states AND individuals from the federal government. A suggestion for the 10thers is to start a running list of cases like these where individuals have a legitimate basis for suing a federal agency for violating the 10th amendment. Perhaps someone with the time and money for such a legal battle will realize the opportunity for individual citizens to stand up for our constitution.
I know that the 5th Amend. says that "right to remain silent in what I say OR DO,..." Thus, at least they cannot "make" us eat what they want. Guess that leaves us all to starve to death?... Lord come quickly!
This article seems to be cherry-picking information out of the document. How about the other side of the arguments made by the FDA?
"Plaintiffs argue that “FDA could use a less stringent means of regulating raw
milk,” such as warning labels stating that the products are unpasteurized. Am. Compl.
¶¶ 79-81, 105-108. In promulgating 21 C.F.R. § 1240.61, FDA specifically considered
“the use of labeling to ensure that consumers who voluntarily choose to consume raw
milk are informed as to the risks inherent in that choice,” but FDA concluded, for
reasons it explained, “that labeling is not an acceptable alternative approach.” 52 Fed.
Reg. at 29,513 (explaining that “the risk of infection . . . does not arise from the misuse
or abuse of the product but rather from its customary food use,” and those who “are
particularly susceptible to serious risks of infection,” including the elderly and children,
“may not have the ability or the opportunity to understand the risks identified in
labeling”). " - Page 28
In the end, the FDA is actually trying to protect the consumer. The author of this article seems to think that people getting sick is a good thing. And I thought the sensationalism nonsense was for the larger media outlets. Learn something new every day...
Clackamas Walmart employees in Portland Oregon are poisoning there spouse's for life insurance money and there molesting children in the back of there store!
There caught bragging about it in there break room and there caught on a audio recorder confessing!
Eric Carlson is doing the molesting of children while Walmart employees hide his employment by calling him by alias's and Joan Wagar was poisoning her husband Terry for life insurance money!
Eric Carlson's "Bro" in law enforcement provides Eric Carlson with the kids he molests and also covers up the poisoning's at the hospital!
I believe the whole point of this article is that no man has any right to tell another man what to do with his own body. We have reached the point of no return when we REQUIRE BY THREAT OF FORCE that a person or company do something because "science" says that it is the right thing to do. Science is never wrong is it?
Thank you Matt I was about to ask that same question! I bet these loons won't understand it though!
From the article:
"According to a Weston A. Price Foundation (WAPF) report, between 1980 and 2005, there were ten times more illnesses from pasteurized milk than there were from raw milk."
And what percentage of the market do you think raw milk has? I'm sure it's well under 10%, meaning that raw milk is more unsafe than pasteurized. And do you honestly think that the raw milk market threatens big dairy's profits in any way?
I get that this issue is more about the FDA breaching state's rights, but don't pretend that raw milk is so great for you.
Google "Codex Alimentarius "
Not only unconstitutional its bad government and thats why the founders left this sort of power well beyond the limits of our Constitution.
FDA has banned raw milk cause the big dary industry producers have been in cahoots with the regulators to get them to do it in order to help squash their competition.
Anther classic case of Government being so big its imposable to keep honest or weld competently, cause there is no way in hell that the 1 right hand or head can know what the 10 thousand little left hands are doing and why.
*sarcastic shock!*
Think about it the president(who is responsible here) can't passably keep track of all of this, even if he spend every hour of every day reviewing all the choices of all the industry.
Nor is he necessarily inclined to do so as hes getting lots of money from theses industry to simply "look the other way".
The people cant hold him accountable for that either cause we are holding an election on 15-20 different issues of the day including the most important war and peace which is actually one of his enumerated responsibility. How we suppose to even notest things like this and make it matter more to his reelection that the money hes getting from theses industry?
We can't! and thats why our government is too big to function either competently or accountably. Adding more powers(control) and "responsibility" pile is just going to make matters even worse.
This is why you should appose the Federal government getting involved in health-care and a whole host of other issues, its just going to make the existing government even worse while not aiding in health-care management either.
I ran into a similar problem trying to procure non-pasteurized honey. I guess it's not legal to sell it unpasteurized.
The sad part is that, even with all these new powers the FDA is claiming, they aren't doing a very good job at protecting the public health.
How many times in the past year have there been outbreaks of disease and large-scale recalls of contaminated peanut butter, contaminated ground beef, contaminated vegetables, and on and on? There was a time when this didn't happen constantly. The FDA for all its faults used to know what it was doing. Nowadays, not so much.
The FDA's position would be defensible if they weren't doing a worse job now than they did in the 1950s and 1960s.
The fact that there are recalls at all show that the FDA is doing its job, if they weren't there would be no recall. The raw food movement is just like the anti vaccine movement, and we all know how well that's going with the recent outbreaks of things like mumphs. Besides, those pesticides, mass farming, and genetically modified foods are the reason we have access to cheap and plentiful food. Oh, and here's one for you, almost all the foods that can be grown, whether by you, or by a farmer, are modified to be more resilient against pests, disease, and damage. They are not natural, they haven't been natural for some ten thousand years, it's called Artificial Selection. We find the plants that fare better in our climate, against pests, against disease, etc, and only plant those, genetic modification does the same thing, just much faster since you don't have to breed the damn plant a hundred thousand times to get what is needed.
Also, if a scientific report is going to be included in an article, give the full name and a link. Make sure it is peer reviewed by an unbiased source and has been published. Peer review is key here.
No, you do not get to mass market unsafe products. There is an available method of purifying the product to prevent illness and the FDA is right to require it be used in consumer products. You raw milk people are whackjobs.
Before pasteurization, milk borne disease was rampant - the fact that the FDA requires interstate milk transport/sales to be pasteurized has been a lifesaver, literally. And I agree with you that some of those posting the greatness of whole, unpasteurized and homogenized milk are a little weird - everywhere you look you see someone claiming that some 'natural food' is being kept a secret from the people to enrich some corporation and that if you only follow our steps, you'll get rid of (insert snake-oil style laundry list of maladies).
However - if I want to drink raw milk, that is my right. It is fundamental. It is a right not requiring permission from a government drone. It is as much a right as my right to the pursuit of happiness. If I live in town and don't have a cow, then I also have the right to barter with someone who has one to obtain raw milk and all it's myriad of possible diseases. Again, not something the FDA or any other alphabet agency should have a single concern with, other than perhaps the Fed. Trade Commission if the moron is making snake-oil claims about his raw milk.
So, yes, someone DOES get to market products that in the opinion of some are 'unsafe.' And the vast majority of us will purchase mass produced processes milk which will keep longer and not separate in the fridge. But who are you to think you get to blow off 'whackjobs' and deny them their rights?
baboy
That is awesome, I also found this great experiment video about a diet coke and mentos explosion in a microwave on youtube that was really entertaining. It is pretty near death as far as diet coke and mentos goes. It is athttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVPZSK77yTw. Take a peek, its worth it.
What a bunch of crock. Don't you people have anything better to do than constantly grumbling about how the big bad government is out to get us. The reason we have a FDA is because in the old days producers of food would sell you anything. Tainted, rotten, infected with bacteria, you name it and you could buy it. The only motive the producers had was profit. Innocent people died as a result. That's why we have regulations. If you want whole milk, then get a cow! Milk it yourself and drink all you want. The problem comes in when you want to sell an easily spoiled product such as milk. If some dumbass adult wants to drink that crap, i wouldn't have a problem with it, but the problem comes when those that can't defend themselves, or know the difference between spoiled and fresh milk ingest it, get sick and die. Then I'm sure these same people would be up in arms demanding the government do something to protect them and flooding the courts for their share of awards. Pathetic.
You are not qualified to write this article because you throw around terms like 'fundamental right' like they mean what you think it means, instead of a fairly specific legal term.
To add some context to your Evil FDA Quotes:
"... the Supreme Court has established demanding criteria for the recognition of fundamental rights; a plaintiff must show both that the rights claimed “are, objectively, deeply rooted in this Nation’s history
and tradition . . . and implicit in the concept of ordered liberty such that neither liberty or justice would exist if they were sacrificed."
...
"But there is no “deeply rooted” historical tradition of unfettered access to food of all kinds. See Glucksberg, 521 U.S. at 721. To the contrary, society's history of food regulation stretches back to the dietary laws of biblical times."
...
"b. There is No Generalized Right to Bodily and Physical Health.
Plaintiffs’ assertion of a “fundamental right to their own bodily and physical health, which includes what foods they do and do not choose to consume for themselves and their families” is similarly unavailing because plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to obtain any food they wish."
These are all from Section 4 of subsection D of subsubsection Y-14 blahblah on a list of counterarguments. You make it sound like it's a core component of the FDA's mission statement.
Why would you want to drink milk that hasn't been pasteurized?
This sounds like it's going to turn into the same scenario that we had with vaccinations.
Hippy celebrities: "Even though I know nothing of medical science I think that these vaccinations are bad for your kids."
Everyone else: "Yeah! Fuck you science, fuck you doctors, we're demand to have this removed from our vaccinations."
And then everyone got sick.
whether someone WANTS to do that or not isn't the question - do you WANT to punish them, by fines or jail, if they make that choice?
And if so, what other bad choices would you like to punish people for - too much fat in their diet, too much tv, smoking in their home....what else?
that has very little to do with the point he is making really. if the government do not require pasteurisation of milk that is traded interstate, do you believe that anyone will do it? no, because it is much cheaper not to. so all the milk is unsafe, meaning that those people who do wish to take precautions against milkborne diseases, which there are many of, will not be able to without home pasteurisation, which is unreliable and irregulated at best.
i can agree with the point against the FDA regulating INTRAstate commerce, but that's just simple common sense, allowing farmers the right to sell their milk to whoever they choose is fine. however, the majority of people get their foods from the supermarket, and it is the government's responsibility to ensure that they are consuming a safe product. this cannot be ensured if you combine unpasteurised milk and the time it takes to transport said milk to where most people buy it from. hence, regulating interstate trade on milk to ensure it is safe.
Yeah if it wasn't for the gov't everyone would be poisoning their customers, that's a great way to run a business. The primary reasons raw milk would be unsafe is if the cow is ill or the equipment is contaminated. Hmmm, so if I run a factory farm where my cows are ill and covered in excrement, the only way I can make my milk safe is to boil the crap out of it (killing most of the nutrients) and the only way I can compete with farms with clean healthy cows is to lobby the gov't and force everyone to pasteurize their milk.
In line with what you've said, Michael, I offer an quote sent to me by a friend; although, I'm not sure who's responsible for the quote. Here it is:
"First Job of Government: Protect people from government.
Second Job of Government: Protect people from each other
It must *never* be the job of government to protect people from themselves."
How ironic that the same people who demand powerful government agencies to regulate every aspect of our lives now have their rights sacrificed for the good of the state. Karma, people. Karma.
FDA -- Food Taliban!! Food Terrorists!!
http://www.dairyforall.com/milkborne-diseases.php
As far as Conservative talk-show hosts go, I enjoy listening to Rush when I get the chance. The difference between me and some others is I understand these hosts are just entertainers. Their job is to get the highest ratings possible for their respective networks. It's true some people choose to regard them as pundits on the issues to which they speak without fully vetting the information for themselves, but that's their own faults. I'm sure many of the things people say about Rush, Beck, Savage, etc., could be said for equally biased talk-show hosts on the left. I think it's just that the Conservative talk-shows are some of the most listened to in America, so their hosts are constantly in the limelight.
Wow, you really missed the point of the FDA response. "the government has neither brought nor threatened to bring a single enforcement action against consumers who purchase unpasteurized milk for personal
consumption or retailers of such products who do not engage in interstate commerce."
And it isn't the FDA that claims they can the intrastate sale of unpasteurized milk, but chose not to, its that the court said they could: Public Citizen v. Heckler, 653 F. Supp. 1229, 1241 (D.D.C. 1986)
And why did the court find for the FDA? Because some member of the public sued the government for not requiring pasteurization. And now people want to complain because the FDA is following the law?
Also, regulation of interstate commerce is deeply embedded in the Constitution. See Article I, Section 8, Clause 3. As a federal agency, it falls on the FDA to ensure that clause is enforced in regards to food safety. I understand the desire to have government play a limited role in out lives, but our birth rate has fallen because of actions taken by the FDA. Our quality of life has risen because of the intervention of the FDA. Our food supply is safer because of the FDA.
If your going to report facts, report all the facts, not just the ones that you feel make you case.
thank you..
everyone else... read The Jungle by Upton Sinclair
Yes to food safety, not to food denial (growing your own food). Food from the garden to the table tastes so much better and is much healthier than something that takes days to get to you. I grew up on a farm and we raised all our food. We drank raw milk and churned our own butter. We canned our food for the winters. There were three children in our family. Allergies were unheard of. And I can't recall ever having a problem with E. Coli in our food. Nor did we ever have any cases of food poisoning.
Now in spite of all their supposed precautions there are problems with E. coli and salmonella. Why is that? Would it be because of the quest for quick sales and the bottom line that proper food preparation (especially meat) is no longer enforced. Just zap it or put some chemical in it to make it last longer and supposedly kill all the bugs and put it on the shelf. You can eat it, dead bugs and all. Give me food from my garden and spare me the heavily processed stuff that is on the shelf.
And what does our falling birth rate have to do with the FDA? As a disgression from the subject here, I have read recently that the Muslim birth rate is 7.1 children per family while the USA is down around 2.???. What does that tell you population wise. Before you know it they (FDA or government) will be telling you how many children you can have and what you must teach them.
I'm sure there will be posts slamming me and my comments. But, that's to be expected. Probably get a few death threats as well. Listen folks, everyone is office is liar, but don't be taken for a ride simply because you can't think for yourselves. That's why our country is in decline. Because many Americans have turned into sheep. What a sad commentary. I'll listen to anyone's point of view and engage in thoughtful conversation at anytime. But, for me to be labeled UnAmerican because I don't follow the NAZI propaganda machine of the right doesn't mean I'm not a "Good Ameican" as Hannity would say.
I know this comment may be off subject of the original story, but, J. Sykes, don't fret. You're being critical of one side or the other certainly doesn't make you Unamerican. In fact, it rather reaffirms your Americanness because our criticality helps us keep an eye on our government and make sure they aren't running us over. It's a right we enjoy in this country. But I would make a challenge to you, presuming you don't do this already (I may presume incorrectly). Be critical of BOTH sides; not just the right or the left. Both sides of the aisle attack our Constitutional rights in their own ways, and both usually try to wrap it up in pretty paper so it's easier for us to accept. It reminds me of a song in the movie 'Mary Poppins'..."Just a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down." Both sides can try to sweeten it as much as they want to, but we can't let them force it down our throats. Before we're donkeys, elephants, or somewhere in between, we're all simply Americans, and it isn't just the Democrats' or Republicans' rights being threatened. It's everybodys'.
We REALLY need to get rid of people like Rush, Beck, Savage, O'Reilly, Bachmann, Pailn, Tea Party, et. al. These people simply have no idea what the heck they're talking about. O'Reily screams over you, Back simply cries, Savage rants like a mad man, Bachmann and Pailn (piar of dolts) whose combined cup sizes is still greater than their combined IQ, Rush who simply doesn't haven't facts and avoided the draft because of an anal cyst. Then there are the tea partiers who should be wearing tin foil hats. Where were they when Bush was in office? They couldn't have cared less. Where was the outrage at W's spending?
I reserve the right to call you out for hypocrisy when you say to "get rid of" people you don't like. You want to talk about Nazis? How about you, saying that those who disagree with you need to be silenced? Did not the Nazis silence those they disagreed with? You are no better. And the personal attacks on prominent Americans, insulting their intelligence? And the Left likes to say they're the "tolerant" ones. Your comment is proof of the utter hypocrisy of that claim.
And the Tea Party? They are average Americans who are utilizing their CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT to peacefully assemble. Are you saying that you wish that right to be taken away? It's a good thing that the creators of this site aren't like you, or your comment would have been deleted.
You're concerned about death threats? Why should you be, when YOU wish death on Rush Limbaugh? You, yourself, are a hypocrite of the first degree.
If you look hard enough on this website, you will find PLENTY of criticism of George W. Bush. And, what's more, the criticism on this website is even more sharp than what you hear from the New York Times, since this website backs up its claims with facts and logic. You are making radical and false claims about people you've never even met, which makes you a liar.
Stop being ridiculous, Obama has spent more in one year than bush did in almost 8.With all your whining you should realize Congress spends the money not the president.
Quoted from story above:
"According to a Weston A. Price Foundation (WAPF) report, between 1980 and 2005, there were ten times more illnesses from pasteurized milk than there were from raw milk. And most of the reports that link illness outbreaks with raw milk provide little or no evidence that raw milk was even the culprit."
So, that sounds like a good argument, but instead of simply linking the report to the story, why not link the study itself (I haven't been able to find it yet). I would be less cynical about the evidence contradicting the FDA if I could see it for myself rather than simply reading that the evidence exists...And can any of these organizations, whether the FDA, CDC, Weston A. Price or the FTCLDF (Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund), be considered viable sources of information on such studies since all would seem to be inherently biased on the issue of raw milk sales directly to consumers? This is just a more cynical point of view, I guess.
Unfortunately every one of those food control laws all came about because of lethal profit driven abuses. Whilst there are many who demonstrate honesty and integrity, there are many who display nothing but greed and an absolute willingness to take every cheap nasty shortcut possible. The end result is a lethal gamble, which will result in the death of innocent unsuspecting people upon a regular basis. The hassle has always been how to write laws to stop the corrupt whilst allowing honest people to operate in a reasonable manner. Honestly what large corporation would you trust to supply legal raw milk free off liability for food poisoning, customer chose to take the risk.
Great info. Thank you. I hope everyone using this site makes a donation, as I did.
Thank you for covering such an important topic prominently.
Myself and my family have benefited immensely from consuming raw milk. We don’t drink the highly processed and harmful milk that is sold in the stores. Thanks to that my 6 year old son has no allergies, he is growing in a very healthy way and the milk and home made yogurt tastes much better and healthier than anything money could buy in the supermarkets.
It is weird that in a free society it is possible to get highly processed and harmful homogenized (aka harmful) and ultra pausterized (aka devoid of nutrition) milk but it is not possible to operate buying clubs to get fresh raw milk directly from the farms?
I want raw milk available on the shelf with appropriate warning information in supermarkets.
I hope common sense and health consciousness dawn on this agriculture commissioner – Scott Soares. May he and his family discover the health benefits of raw milk and benefit from it. We would welcome him to our buying club.
I personally would like to see raw milk (and many other products) on the shelves based on the free choices of people in their states and communities - not based on the dictats of the federal beast.
Thank you for leaving some feedback on this article, Siva - I hope to see you here more in the future - whether you agree or disagree with the viewpoints presented.
Good article. I have written before that the federal government has simply become a lobby center for big business to seek monopolies and stamp out small business. I spoke of this issue in terms of how the way it works is a vicious cycle resulting from wealth disparity. Got money to lobby? Do it and gain more market, to make the little guy suffer and to make more money for yourself, and on and on.... I got a little backlash in disbelief that this occurs, and so I am glad your article was posted, describing the battle between big dairy and local farmers. I am also glad you recognize, too, that this in all sorts of industries, almost across the board.
Corporatism - there's plenty of examples of how big business lobbies DC hard to press for "regulations" that claim to "help" people but only keep smaller competitors out of the marketplace. Get rid of that power in D.C. and the lobbyists will have a much harder time doing their deeds, in my opinion...
Raw milk is a threat to public health. There are legitimate reasons for pasteurizing milk that have nothing to do with the American constitution .
What is your evidence, and what is your real name? You can't just come in and drop anonymous statements without backing them up.
This happened just a few days ago. There are now six cases of e-coli from this milk
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2010...
Pasteurization leads to slacking standards and sanitation. It allows farms to be filthy because they just super heat their products to kill off whatever contaminated them and guess what, your consuming disgusting amounts of dead bacteria. Also, the pasteurization process kills off anything beneficial in the food so why even bother eating it? Milk becomes a lifeless white water, devoid of nutrition. I eat raw eggs and raw milk and absolutely zero pharmaceuticals so my gut is healthy and strong. This will make any small amounts of bacteria that might happen to be in my food a non-issue.http://www.realmilk.com/crime-against-raw-milk.ht...
FDA: “There is no ‘deeply rooted’ historical tradition of unfettered access to foods of all kinds.” [p. 26]
FDA: “Plaintiffs’ assertion of a ‘fundamental right to their own bodily and physical health, which includes what foods they do and do not choose to consume for themselves and their families’ is similarly unavailing because plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to obtain any food they wish.” [p.26]
In the spirit of retiring federal Congressman (AZ) John Shadegg’s proposed Enumerated Powers Act (http://johnshadegg.house.gov/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=13333), federal government agencies like the FDA should be required to preface such statements with the constitutional article, section, clause or amendment which gives the agency the power to make such statements in the first place. This is because if a federal government agency cannot reasonably justify its statements with specific constitutional statutes, as is the case with the FDA and food, the 9th and 10th Amendments automatically reserve the power to regulate such issues, food in this example, to the states, or to the people, not the Oval Office and Congress.
So the real problem is that the FDA is wrongly ignoring basic constitutional statutes and can therefore pound sand. Unfortunately this is not a big surprise with respect to federal agencies these days.
Also since the people of Massachucetts are having problems with state officials, its up to the people of Massachusetts to work with their state lawmakers to make legislation which will at least give the voters the power to get rid of such troublemakers.
Not a big surprise at all - and as long as we the people keep letting it happen, it'll keep getting worse. Hopefully we're seeing a bit of an awakening out there...
There is a long list of unconstitutional powers that Congress has granted various federal agencies. Like this case where the FDA thinks it controls every garden patch in the country there are numerous invasions of both State sovereignty and individual freedoms being conducted by the federal government every day. Another that comes to mind is the EPA placing requirements on individual homeowners. How can that be considered “regulat(ing) Commerce … among the several States”? Remember the 10th amendment protects both states AND individuals from the federal government. A suggestion for the 10thers is to start a running list of cases like these where individuals have a legitimate basis for suing a federal agency for violating the 10th amendment. Perhaps someone with the time and money for such a legal battle will realize the opportunity for individual citizens to stand up for our constitution.
"The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
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