Why not keep eating that assembly line meat and raw greens?
It is what we call health food in america.

Our government will gladly import foods that are far too toxic for sale in the EU. Why do they hate us?

I wonder if the meat producers who sell products that get sprayed with manure and urine eat their own products?

I guess there isnt much difference between meat and shit but still, that's what i dont fathom.

I can see how in our warped scientific religious society we would try to break everything down to atoms and say: the nutrients from manure is the same as the nutrients from grain, but common sense says differently.

Our plutocratic government doesn't hate us. Its corporate sponsers place profits before people. And they possess massive PR machines and legal departments to somewhat protect themselves from the results that stem from putting profits before people.

Anyway, the corporate plutocrats have busily eroded many of the regulatory safeguards that used to protect us as consumers, workers and environmental citizens.

And they have used the political process to limit class action suits, large cash awards for damages, and other examples of "frivolous" lawsuits.

A successful megacorporation owns food companies, drug companies, weight loss clinics, insurance companies, hospitals, etc.

That way they make money 1) selling the bad food, 2)selling drugs to get rid of the indigestion caused by the bad food,3)selling drugs to treat diseases caused by the bad food, 4)selling weight loss services to deal with obesity caused by the bad food, 5) selling insurance to allegedly pay for drugs and medical services.

Next time you go shopping skip the supermarket and all the bad food you have been buying there, and head straight to a stockbroker and buy stock in the megacorporations that are raking in the dough.

"... basically an honor system". We know how well that works. It drove Texas' air quality to dead last in the country under Bush's watch.

The European Union and Japan have a more robust system of food inspection than the United States because they care about their citizens.

Doesn't that pus get heated up, to kill any germs?

Oops, cottage cheese. I have noticed it is sort of yellowish some times.

Here's another reason: before we entrusted Monsanto with introducing alien, mutant organisms into our food chain, they proved their patriotism with Agent Orange.

How could that go wrong?

So 67% more people are killed by food-borne illnesses than the 9/11 attacks? And that's not just one attack, that's how many die every year. Who are the real terrorists?

Don't like the companies? Don't buy there food! I wish it were that easy. If you are anything like me, and not rich, you can't exactly afford to buy the expensive, high quality food. Just one more way that the poor get fucked over in our socially darwanistic society of everyman-out-for-himself capitalism.

Europe tends to have political systems that respond more to their citizens than the US. They tend to have multiparty governments, with proportional representation, such that no party can have a monopoly on the system. If the citizens get fed up with a party, the system allows them to easily switch support to a party that better represents them. They tend to have rules limiting advertising. For instance, I think I've heard that in the time right before an election (a week is what I have in mind), ALL political advertisements are banned.

By having political systems that actually respond to their citizens and where their citizens have more power and choices, they then have governments that care about their citizens.

"We the WEALTHY 5% OF THE people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice FOR SOME OF US, insure domestic tranquility FOR SOME OF US, provide for the common defense FOR SOME OF US, promote the general welfare FOR SOME OF US, and secure the blessings of liberty to SOME OF US our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

COMarc---once again you nailed it.

I quit eating grocery food dairy after I heard that cows fed hormones and antibiotics will sometimes develop mastitis that produces pus that gets in the milk. I eat only organic dairy now.

It isn't just pus and antibiotics. A friend's three year old daughter had been drinking cheap milk, unlabeled regarding BGH. She started developing breast tissue and her pediatrician put her on hormones to suppress the development. Her mother switched to a more expensive milk that was labeled BGH-free.

I read that a criticism of the FDA is that it has become an approval agency instead of a review agency.

Anyone read Fast Food Nation lately? Apparently things have gotten a lot worse since Bushie became our leader. But at least him and his buddies are rich enough that they can afford to buy organic and eat free range, hormone free meat.

Must be nice.

Jesus.

No wonder I felt so sick all these years eating crap from the supermarket chitstore. We're just a bunch of lab rats to these people. While where at it, why don't we break out the infamous Dr. Josef Mengele from WWII? We could put him in charge of the FDA to dream up more torture for the American people. German medical experimentation on p.o.w.s was never this far reaching. These gov turds have disemboweled every important safety system we've ever had. I don't even want to know about all the funding cuts at the CDC. For all we know we're eating BSE mad cow disease since the bastardds even put the bovine gelatin in everything including toothpaste for christsakes. Nothing is fit to eat or put in your mouth in the States anymore. And good luck flushing out of your body the "nano particles" that industry is pumping into things like cosmetics and suntan lotion. Your immune system can't deal with tiny particles like that, can it?

At every turn, this government is incapable of being a competent custodian of public safety.

I think we should ditch it, and hand all power back over to the states as the founders intended.

pac - out

your being fed poison...what will it take to make you wake up US citizens, if not THAT???!!!

This is an example of how to thwart regulation without repealing laws. Simply defund enforcement, demoralize scientifice staff so that they quit in droves, and proclaim that you are getting "big government off the backs of the american people".

The increased budget won't do any good if it is being administered in the hands of some political hack (of either party) who simply uses it to hire all of his or her buddies instead of stricter enforcement.

China won the cold war.

The dismally low inspection rate is in place because the regulated industry lobbied to have the inspection requirements lowered in order to avoid delays in the process (and thusly increase efficiency/profit). Gee, who'd'a thunk that in these here United States a regulatory agency might be corrupted by the industry it regulates?

If you have a patch of dirt, plant veggies in it. If you don't have a patch of dirt, put some in half-barrels and grow veggies in them. Without intending to start the vegan vs. omnivore war: If you need meat, get a hunting license and go get some organic, free range meat (and help to reduce the exploding deer population that's halted the regeneration of many of our forests). That's how you opt out of the agribusiness wreckosystem while providing your family a more healthful diet.

Sorry. Most of this is not about enforcement. It's about agricultural practices that defy nature that have been permitted and subsidized by our government for decades.

Other ways to enhance what Heathen has said about opting out of agribiz food: Learn to cook and eat dried beans and whole grains. They're relatively cheap, you might even be able to afford some organic. Buy good quality eggs if possible at least some of the time. Even at $3.00 a dozen you can get 12 grams of top quality protein for 50 cents.

To learn about Codex Alimentarius (the Food Code from Hades): www.healthfreedomusa.org

I worked in various food-supply industries during the '70s, and our food was downright filthy back then - it's just that nobody knew about it. Inspectors just sat in offices and drank coffee until their shift was over - and the US allowed so much filth and trash in our food that foreign countries refused to accept it. I quit eating all that store-bought junk back then, and have been healthy ever since - except for when I let down my guard and buy supermarket junk, get sick, and learn my lesson again for a couple more years. Fixing all your food (or growing it) it time-consuming and expensive - and if you live in a zoned area or rent, you don't have any choice. Buying from local markets can be dicey as well - Asians used 'night soil' on their gardens and caused problems right after the Vietnam War brought so many refugees to our country - I won't buy from them either, even if they claim they've reformed. Like the government, it's just their word, for what it's worth - and my life isn't part of the bargain. Americans are just plain stupid. At least Europeans have some principles. We are what we eat.

In "Omnivore's Dilemma", Michael Pollan discusses an organic meat producing farm at great length.

http://www.polyfacefarms.com/

The owner of the farm is something of a christian right-wing nut, but he's figured out an exceptionally environmentally benign system of raising chickens, hogs and beef.

The farm owner repeatedly points out that the so-called "regulatory" system is designed of, by, and for the factory farmers, and it's designed to squeeze out the small producer who sells to a local market.

WmC,
I've been to Polyface and it is an interesting operation and idea factory. You know the owner also, I take it.

This is a good site for information about what is being done to address some of the issues discussed so far on this thread..its the National Family Farms Coalition..

Fair Trade Policy: Promoting Food Sovereignty

NFFC belives that a healthy economy both nationwide and in rural areas is essential. Working with many organizations we are adamant in our stance that farmers, other producers, and governments themselves, must have the ability to set prices. This must be done in a fair and responsible manner, involving the creation in the near future of an International Commodity Agreement.

• Food Sovereignty
• Fair Trade
• CAFTA
• AUSFTA
• WTO

http://www.nffc.net/ (I don't know how to make a link out of this)

Also at this site is a Dr. Daryll Ray, Univ of Tenn, who writes some really useful stuff..
http://apacweb.ag.utk.edu/articles06.html

There are many sites devoted to local, community agriculture--who's doing it, where its being done, how to set it up. I will try to round some of them up if anyone is interested.

I would say that in general, buying the basic ingredients, even if they are not organic, and doing your own prep is a very good way to start to help yourself. The real cost per serving,and in many cases the contamination, is higher as you buy pre-prepared. Staying away from high-fructose corn syrup and MSG will go a long way toward making you feel better. There are quite a number of ways to prepare food that don't use high price ingredients and go together quickly. Crock pots and roasts provide several meals for one time in the kitchen. It is possible that as you improve the nutritional value of your food you will find that you actually require less, particularly if you include beef (preferably range-fed) and what I call yard chickens and yard eggs. If you don't know how to kill and clean a chicken, pay the producer to do it for you. They probably will.

Think positively, we can work our way out of this mess if enough of us make a big enough noise. Interestingly, the food safety and food availability issues can be effectively tackled at the local level, at least for the moment. What I think we need to do is demand more control by citizens at the local level.

You nailed it granny,

Control by citizens at the local level would solve most of American ills, including even eliminate ghettos; But big police departments and big food corporations are never going to let us do that without a fight. They want us hooked on their wares; they want all power and wealth in their sectors (the devil with the individual in society and the devil with the individual's problems.)

The only answer is to eliminate and break up these near monopolies.

Good Luck

(this is why I left.)