HR 875 Anyone else Freaked Out by this??

[bid]

I have 2 friends that run roadside stands selling produce, some of which they grow themselves and some of which they buy at a farmer's market. Both of them are concerned about what this legislation, if passed, will do to their business. They both said that they thought it would force them to charge higher prices.

We all want the food products we buy to be safe, but I have been dealing with small scale growers in my area for years and I have no complaints. If I did, I simply wouldn't do business with them anymore.

Of course this is still just a bill...on capitol hill...I can't remember the way the rest of the song goes.

 

[bigredfeather]

I'm with you vfem!

Me too! The government wants to regulate the food we produce for our families, yet they can't keep a peanut butter producer from killing and making many other very sick! Just doesn't seem right.

 

[2dream]

1st it was NAIS (being voted on tomorrow - March 20th). Then it was the rush through bill for lead content that had everyone scared to death and basically put all the small business people sewing clothes for children, not to mentiong the little grandpaw at the flea market who sells wooden toys, out of business. Now they want us to stop growing food and selling it locally.
Does anyone else see a pattern here?

Looks to me like all these bills that are suppose to be for our safety is more about our control. Big business is the basic guilty party on all our problems. There are already controls in place for all the above mentioned things. These existing controls are not being inforced. The only reason for new bills is to make them geared to the small farmer, business person, etc to gain more control.

 

[curly_kate]

I agree with Vfem (I think you said it) that they need to make the FDA do it's job and not waste our time & money creating ANOTHER government entity to do a job that we already have an organization to take care of! But wasting taxpayer's time and money seems to be the name of the game these days. I guess it will create some jobs.

 

[Rosalind]

There is only ONE part of this bill that I like: Separate the food administration from the drug/medical device administration.

Everything else...I don't see how that would even be feasible. At all.

For example: "Make a list of all the possible contaminants and rank them according to importance." A thousand toxicologists and microbiologists could type on supercomputers 24 hours/day and never be finished with this task. NEVER. There's thousands upon thousands of industrial chemists inventing new molecules and biologists creating new synthetic bacteria every day--the pharmaceutical chemists where I work produce something like 50-100 new compounds per year, and we employ a few hundred of them. That's just one company, so multiply by many more. Today I made eight new transgenic bacteria, some of which probably produce a toxic protein that alters lipid metabolism in humans. We've got a few hundred biologists who do similar work. How are they possibly going to keep up?

I was especially amused about the part of the bill that claims to require science-based standards, when the rest of it is so clearly written by someone who understands exactly NO science whatsoever.

Unfortunately, I don't know that Tom Vilsack is well-advised enough to realize how bad this is either. Huh. Guess I'll write my senators in little words for the hard-of-thinking...

 

[rebbetzin]

My neighbor, a very Libertarian type person, said something about this that made me think...

Governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.

The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776

I am not giving my "consent" to the Government to decide what is best for me. I am still a "Free" person. The Government only has the power over me, that I allow it to have.

 

[wifezilla]

Looks to me like all these bills that are suppose to be for our safety is more about our control.

This is exactly what it's about

 

[dbjay417]

freaked out, is an understatement for me.

This is right up the ally of the UNs CODEX ALIMENTARIUS.

any third world dictator will tell you that when you have absolute control over the food supply you have absolute control over the population.

What peeves me is that they claim that the law is for public safety yet the USDA and FDA were more than happy to greenlight BGH even though most other western nations refused.

The congresswoman who introduced the legislation is married to a Monsanto employee. isn't that too convenient?

More gross abuse of the interstate commerce clause, as if the illegalization of marijuana wasn't enough of a stretch.

Thoraeu said it best in my signature.

 

[Reinbeau]

Oooh, that's a good quote, I'm going to steal it - but not for my sig! And I share your thoughts. People really need to start thinking.

 

[vfem]

Well, we should all stop mingling among ourselves in anger, and should probably do what we can to contact legislators as soon as we can. Have our voices heard and the whole thing thrown out or given a second look with any clause needed to protect ALL american farmers, gardeners and anyone who DARE go organic in life style!

Slap a copy of that puppy up at your local "Whole Foods" and watch the people freak out in person!!!!

Maybe the people should write their own version and send it in?
(Slap in a legalize marijuana clause!!!! )