Apparently, it is now illegal to sue Monsanto.

[orthodoc]

Originally Posted by footfootfoot

I'm sure the rest of the department of agriculture reads like a Who's who? of the bio-tech industry.

Exactly. Industry execs should be automatically disqualified from governmental appointments/employment/committees. They do NOT represent us.

[Griff]

Japan cancels U.S. wheat order on GMO fear:

[Lamplighter]

Here is a somewhat lighter-hearted background story,
published today in MarketWatch...

May 29, 2013, 9:31 a.m. EDT
Monsanto sows seeds of protest
Commentary: Is this corporation saving the world, or ruining it?

DENVER (MarketWatch)
Saturday 5/26/13
— Monsanto Co. may have just planted as much ill-will and suspicion
as it has at any point in its controversial corporate history dating back to 1901.
<snip>

If you look up what protesters are saying, Monsanto is all about its “Frankencorn.”
As one protester’s sign put it:
“Still wondering how the zombie outbreak started? One word: Monsanto.”
<snip>

Protester: “If you’re so proud of your products, why don’t you label them?”

Monsanto: “People will ... prosper, through healthier diets, greater educational opportunities,
and brighter futures fueled by more robust local economies.”
<snip>

You can go with how one protester put it:
“If Monsanto needs a bill to protect them from legal action,
then they must know what they are doing is illegal!”

Or you can go with Monsanto:
“Integrity is the foundation for all that we do.
Integrity includes honesty, decency, consistency, and courage.”
<snip>

[Lamplighter]

NY Times
AMY HARMON
August 24, 2013

Golden Rice: Lifesaver?

ONE bright morning this month, 400 protesters smashed down the high fences surrounding a field
in the Bicol region of the Philippines and uprooted the genetically modified rice plants growing inside.

Had the plants survived long enough to flower, they would have
betrayed a distinctly yellow tint in the otherwise white part of the grain.
That is because the rice is endowed with a gene from corn and another from a bacterium,
making it the only variety in existence to produce beta carotene, the source of vitamin A.
Its developers call it “Golden Rice.”
<snip>
They are driving the desire among some Americans for mandatory “G.M.O.” labels on food
with ingredients made from crops whose DNA has been altered in a laboratory.
And they have motivated similar attacks on trials of other genetically modified crops in recent years:
grapes designed to fight off a deadly virus in France,
wheat designed to have a lower glycemic index in Australia,
sugar beets in Oregon designed to tolerate a herbicide, to name a few.

And a looming decision by the Philippine government about whether to allow Golden Rice to be grown beyond
its four remaining field trials has added a new dimension to the debate over the technology’s merits.
Not owned by any company, Golden Rice is being developed by a nonprofit group
called the International Rice Research Institute with the aim of providing a new source of vitamin A
to people both in the Philippines, where most households get most of their calories from rice,
and eventually in many other places in a world where rice is eaten every day by half the population.

Lack of the vital nutrient causes blindness in a quarter-million to a half-million children each year.
It affects millions of people in Asia and Africa and so weakens the immune system that
some two million die each year of diseases they would otherwise survive.
<snip>
If Golden Rice is a Trojan horse, it now has some company.
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, which is supporting the final testing of Golden Ricem
is also underwriting the development of crops tailored for sub-Saharan Africa,
like cassava that can resist the viruses that routinely wipe out a third of the harvest,
bananas that contain higher levels of iron and corn that uses nitrogen more efficiently.
Other groups are developing a pest-resistant black-eyed pea and a “Golden Banana”
that would also deliver vitamin A.

Beyond the fear of corporate control of agriculture, perhaps the most cited objection to G.M.O.’s is
that they may hold risks that may not be understood. The decision to grow or eat them relies,
like many other decisions, on a cost-benefit analysis.

[Lamplighter]

Washington State has an Initiative #522 on the next ballot to require
food products containing genetically modified products to be labeled.

What is strange are the TV ads being run in opposition to this labeling...
This one is a woman on a "family farm" that is "a certified non-Genetically Modified farm"



...but notice the small family farm sponsors at the end of the ad...
Monsanto
Dupont Pioneer
Dow Agrisciences LLC
Bayer CropScience

[Griff]

William Leggett would not be a fan of these special privileges, it may be time to listen when the lefties talk about revoking corporate charters.

Governments have no right to interfere with the pursuits of individuals, as guarantied by those general laws, by offering encouragements and granting privileges to any particular class of industry, or any select bodies of men, inasmuch as all classes of industry and all men are equally important to the general welfare, and equally entitled to protection.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Leggett rocks.