fight against monsanto made it to the supreme court this week

[897tgigvib]

Luther Burbank did a lot of work for those precise same problems.

The thornless prickly pear gtows practically anywhere. The less it's taken care of the better it grows. Grows in deserts.

The thornless leaves are edible, but mainly great as feed for animals.

The fruit is absolutely delicious! Each variety has different flavor, but mainly similar to watermelon, peach, pear, cantaloupe, each person describes it differently. They are a cinch to harvest.

If you break a leaf or plant, no problem. It'll grow back, and the broken part will take root almost anywhere you drop it.

They are not obnoxious weeds. Cut it down to the root a time or two and it's done.

Their huge root system is great for soil conditioning.

They need no poison or chemicals, have very few pests or diseases. Among cactus they avoid overwater rot better than almost all others.

There are lots of varieties of them. Most are essentially completely thornless, some have a few thorns.
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Real question is, why has it not been much more utilized?

 

[so lucky]

No fast way to harvest? Great tasting or not, I sure don't like the stuff. I have spent too much time picking spines out of my hands!

 

[897tgigvib]

You have a variety that has some thorns and spines. There are varieties entirely spineless.

 

[hoodat]

In my experience even though the big spines have been eliminated even the best varieties still have some of those tiny @#$%^ hair spines that dig into you and are all but impossible to dig out. Better wear leather gloves when you harvest, but I agree the nopatillos (fruit) are very usefull. Green they are used as a vegetable and ripe they are delicious, nutritious and make great jelly. They sell both the pads and fruit in Mexican markets around here.

 

[hoodat]

Remember that in any Supreme Court case against Monsanto one vote in favor of Monsanto will always be in their favor. Clarence Thomas made his living as a Monsanto lawyer before being appointed to the Supreme Court. He has yet to cast a vote against Monsanto and most likely never will.

 

[897tgigvib]

Isn't that conflict of interest, a most immoral and unethical thing for any judge to allow himself or herself to be a part of?

I think that even if conflict of interest is legal for a judge to do, no good judge would allow him or herself to be a part of it.
I think that any judge who would commit conflict of interest should suffer the vote of the people or of the senate for full censureship and utter humiliation.

There I go thinking again...

 

[hoodat]

Yes, by any standard of ethical conduct he should recuse himself from any case involving Monsanto but he doesn't do it. Monsanto influence is what got him to the supreme court after all the scandals at his confirmation hearing.

 

[897tgigvib]

Then he needs to be humiliated by massive worldwide public opinion.

 

[so lucky]

At this point, I doubt if Clarence Thomas cares a fig about public opinion. He's sitting pretty for his lifetime, regardless of what kind of judge he is now. And politics don't have anything to do with ethics. And yes, the SCOTUS is political.

 

[Jared77]

The real problem is the price. Nobody wants to pay more for food. Be it a tomato, or ground beef, eggs, or apples, or Dole Mixed Salad Greens. Nobody wants to pay more for milk, or cereal, or anything else for that matter.

That's where Monsanto has their claws into society is price. To market a uniform product that is cheaper, higher yield, can be grown in places where its not traditionally found, decreases cost. The trade is that your a slave to their product be it the farmer who has to keep buying their seeds to still turn a profit, or the average consumer who can't afford a dollar hike in the price of milk.

I just was at the store yesterday. Milk was 2.37 a gallon. Organic milk? 6.57 a gallon. Don't know too many people who either can or are willing to spend that much in milk. Some folks can and do either by making it a priority or having enough $ in the bank that those prices don't bother them. Either way its not for the average joe to afford.

What about school lunches? In many schools, the lunch program is the only meal some kids get to eat ALL DAY. 1 in 6 Americans are struggling with hunger. And you want to raise the price of food? How many people are cutting back just to try to make ends meet? And thats just in America. The land of the free, home of the brave, by many to be considered the greatest country in the world.

Raise your hands if you want to raise taxes to increase the budget to pay for non GMO products to feed the children? Sure the school could grow their own, but someone has to take the initiave and make it happen. Anybody want to raise taxes to increaes the budget to pay for non GMO products to feed prisoners? Once again they could grow their own but then you have the ACLU being involved because it could be considered cruel and unusual punishment, plus paying for increased patrols and officers to keep an eye on prisoners who now have shovels, spades etc in their hands.

What about the people on assistance? We going to raise taxes so we can increase the amount of money available for people so they can afford to eat non-GMO cheese? Peanut butter that does not have GMO ingredients?

And those are just issues off the top of my head.

I don't like Monsanto at all, and I have no interest in eating genetically altered food. HOWEVER we're in the minority here. Many people trust the FDA & trust the Govt. (which is a different argument for a different place & time) so they buy the products they like at the lowest prices they can. Until more people are willing to grow a garden, and learn to can, and other methods of preservation this is going to continue to be an issue and Monsanto is going to be profiting off of it. Its not just as simple as "teach a man to plant a tomato and he'll eat for a lifetime" kind of scenario. There are bigger issues at hand here and while I don't think Monsanto is the answer we do need to figure something out.