"Cows by the Lake" 24X36
Oil on Canvas
©Cheryl A. Pass
Some several years ago when my children were very young, I had an idea to go organic by buying direct from a local dairy farmer, thereby giving my children real milk straight from the cow, making my own butter and skimming the cream for our use at home. I remember visiting this small dairy farm with my two little children in tow and having an interesting chat with the very nice farmer. My children got to visit the cows and see the milking machines. The farmer, whose name I don't recall, warned me that our business with him was illicit. Being young and naive I was shocked to hear this since it never occurred to me that the government would be standing between me and the ability to buy 'real' milk. He told me he was only allowed to market his milk to certified milk wholesalers who would take it to processing plants. However, he must have liked my idea of treating my family to the "real" thing, so he allowed me to buy some bottles of milk from him...only he reminded me to keep this to ourselves and that I should not pass the word around that he was allowing me to buy from him. Good Lord, I thought to myself, this is like buying uzis on the black market from the underground. It's only milk. Real milk from real cows. What could be sooooo bad in that? I had to take my own containers, which I did. He told me his family consumed the milk in the raw form for generations and had no ill effects from doing this. He stood behind his product. And for some reason, I was not at all worried that my family was going to die from some terrible disease contracted from real cows' milk. You see, when I was young and growing up, my family bought home-made bread and real butter from a local farm woman and it was the most delicious experience! I never forgot that and wanted to recreate some similar experience for my children.
We continued to buy from this farmer for several months, when one day we went there and he told me he was worried he should not continue to sell to me for fear of some jack-booted thugs taking his farm from him for doing this. The government had somehow put the fear of retribution in him and he acquiesced. He was very nice and I did not want him to suffer some terribly ill-conceived consequence for our indulgence, so I said thank you for the wonderful experience and wished him future success. Off we went and I never had the opportunity again.
Flash forward to the complicated world we live in today created for us by busy-body politicians who portray themselves as the saviors of humanity. I am reminded of a quote by Albert Camus: "The welfare of humanity is always the alibi of tyrants." I am also reminded of another adage: "The road to hell is paved with good intentions." That is, if you actually attribute any lofty "good intentions" to politicians, which I don't.
I urge you to research the implications being imposed by the "Food Safety Enhancement Act," already passed in the House (HR 2749), but still pending in the Senate.
From Natural News.com
"It is obvious from investigation that this bill presents incredibly ominous ramifications for small, local farmers, local food producers, and anyone else who grows or sells food. It favors industrial, factory food operators, who are the perpetrators of food contamination, at the expense of small providers who many have come to rely upon for safe and nutritious fare. The bill also shifts a monumental and unprecedented amount of power and control to the federal government to dominate everything from the produce in the grocery store to the peppers a backyard farmer sells to his neighbor."
"Some of the disconcerting and dire provisions within the bill include:
- HR 2749 will require the mandatory imposition of annual registration fees in the amount of $500 upon any "facility" that holds, processes, or manufactures food. Even though "farms" are exempt, the bill's definition of "farm" is so scarcely defined that folks selling cheeses, breads, and other products from their farms or at the farmers market would be required to pay this fee, potentially driving many small producers and start-ups out of business, especially during tough times.
- HR 2749 will give FDA the power to directly regulate the methods by which crops are raised and harvested, essentially handing complete and total control of every farming operation to the federal government.
- HR 2749 will give FDA the power to halt the movement of all food in a particular geographic area in the event of a food contamination scare or outbreak. The provision directly includes "prohibiting or restricting the movement of food or of any vehicle being used or that has been used to transport or hold such food within the geographic area", effectively shutting down any and all local food sources, farmers markets, or cooperatives within that area, even if their products have no connection to the actual contamination source.
- HR 2749 will give limitless power to FDA to conduct random searches of the business records of small farmers and local food providers without a warrant or even the slightest hint of evidence that there has been any sort of violation. It essentially allows clear passage by the federal government into the private records of its choice with no requirement of probable cause or legitimate reason for doing so.
- HR 2749 will appoint the Secretary of Health and Human Services as the taskmaster in establishing a food tracing system that will require an extensive, convoluted system of tracking each item and ingredient from origin to distribution. Because the bill fails to outline the logistical procedures for how this complex task will be accomplished and how it will be paid for, it once again hands an unprecedented amount of power over to the federal government to control and tax as it sees fit in order to accomplish whatever arbitrary requirements it wishes to inflict upon our farmers and food producers.
- HR 2749 imposes grievous criminal and civil penalties, including fines of up to $100,000 for each violation, per individual, and up to 10 years in prison."
Well, thank God that farmer is not going to be prosecuted for selling me that wonderful, wholesome, purely unadulterated, raw, real milk. I hate to think what punishment he would be facing today.
Some anecdotal reinforcement I can relate to you lies in the "Mad Cow" fears that were rampant not that long ago. The USDA and the FDA, under pressure from the industrial meat producing industries allowed slaughterhouse waste to be included in the feeding of livestock.
From an article at SequoiasGarden.com
"Researchers have long shown that blood can transmit mad cow type diseases, yet under the 1997 labeling regulations massive amounts of cattle blood are today being fed to calves in milk replacer, calf starter and feed supplements. Government and industry sources are telling reporters that it is safe to feed cattle blood to calves and cattle, yet Dr. Stanley Prusiner, the Nobel-prize wining mad cow researcher, says that feeding cattle blood to calves is "stupid."
Why was cattle blood exempted from the 1997 FDA regulation? The politically powerful dairy industry wanted cheap blood protein in milk formula for weaning calves. The 1997 FDA regulations were written for industry, not to protect human or animal health.
Also, under the 1997 FDA regulations, all parts of cattle are rendered and fed to pigs and poultry, which are rendered and all parts are fed back to themselves and to cattle. This feeding loop can spread and amplify mad cow disease, and even create and spread new, never before seen, strains of the disease."
In 2003 the USDA finally removed the livestock waste of "downer" cattle from the human food supply. Six years between the 1997 report and the 2006 action. Meanwhile, today we have more interference from the DC politicians in our food supplies removing us even further from the independent and small producers and forcing the food supply production into the hands of large conglomerates who may easily pay fines rather than change their methods. However we are still fighting the problem by a circular feeding loop whereby poultry litter is being used as cattle feed, poultry being fed by cattle waste, and the circle creates diseases and unsafe food.
From Food Safety News, Nov.2009
"According to Consumers Union, in addition to the mix of feathers and feces, poultry litter can contain "disease-causing bacteria, antibiotics, toxic heavy metals, restricted feed ingredients including meat and bone meal from dead cattle, and even foreign objects such as dead rodents, rocks, nails and glass."
Just a question: Was I safer buying milk from a local small dairy farm or buying beef from the huge industrial food complex and lobbies that manipulate the FDA and the politicians? Food distribution has become one of those monsters, 'too big to fail?' George Soros has bought up a large portion of Conagra recently. Do you suppose George Soros gives a Nazi's damn about the safety of the food supply? Or do you suppose George Soros cares about making more billions on the slavery of millions of consumers? Gee...let me think about that.
BIG GOVERNMENT is not in our interest, fellow travelers in cyber-space. Over time, in the name of the 'welfare of humanity,' the ugly head of socialist tyrants who have no interest in the welfare of humanity have rigged the system to keep you from self determination and self reliance. The unrelenting attacks on our Constitution have weakened our ability to survive. Where we used to have interconnected and voluntary reliance on our closest friends and neighbors, we now are, by force, supposed to rely on the likes of Barry Soetoro Obama, Kathleen Nurse Ratchet Sebelious, Cass Nudge Sunstein, John Population Bomb Holdren, George Open Society Soros, Eric the Red Holder, etc. Frankly, I trust these people as far as I can throw them....which is not an inch.
