Washington Post Starts A New Column To Look Into The State Of What Americans Eat

In yesterday's Washington Post Ezra Klein, commenting on the recently released film Food, Inc., writes that "something is wrong with our food production system... Food, Inc. joins In Defense of Food, Fast Food Nation, Super Size Me and dozens of other polemical books and films in the necessary effort to convince us that checking out at the supermarket is, on some level, a political act, with consequences for ourselves, our families and our world."

I dropped out long ago. I was lucky that a girlfriend when I was in college was a health-conscious vegetarian and a great cook. I never made a decision to become a vegetarian... but it's been almost 40 years (not counting, in the old days, here and there, some chicken-- which my doctor says is worse than beef-- and fish). I do remember, much more recently, becoming a raw foodist. The aforementioned doctor gave me a choice: go raw (or, really, rawish) or die from the cancer that had recently been discovered. I learned-- with little fuss and no hesitation-- to love raw food.

When I started, there were no restaurants serving raw cuisine anywhere near my home. The closest was an hour away. Learning to prepare my own meals was a joy all over again. It's so healthy! Now there are several in L.A. I could walk to in a pinch. Actually now I'm in Bali and there are almost as many restaurants serving raw cuisine here as there are in L.A. In fact, the house I rented just outside Ubud is a paradise for a raw foodist with a Vitamix, a dehydrator and a wonderful chef who just made me some raw yogurt from coconut milk!

If I go to a "straight" American grocery store, it might be to get toilet paper, a light bulb or a battery. And that includes Whole Foods, which is maybe 10-20% more health conscious and more organic and less deadly than supermarkets with far less pretension. Ezra isn't talking about me when he points out that Americans "know rather less about our food than our grandparents did. In part, that's because the process of creating food in a lab is less familiar than the process of growing it in a garden. Food producers might have to print ingredient lists, but no one ever passed a law saying we had to understand them. (How do you hydrogenate an oil, anyway?)"

I know I'm not going to live forever, but my cancer is gone, I lost over 40 backbreaking pounds, I feel better than I can remember in decades, I don't get sick, I have more energy and my feet never itch. I don't eat food created in labs and I feel sorry for folks who eat hydrogenated oils.

But there also has been a concerted effort to pull a curtain across the food production system. You see that twice in "Food, Inc." Once, when a farmer who raises chickens for Tyson agrees to allow cameras onto his farm, only to have Tyson quickly call and persuade him to rescind his offer. And again, when Monsanto refuses to comment on, well, anything. It's one thing to be kept out of Dick Cheney's underground lair(s?). But we're eating this stuff.

Ezra interviews the director of Food, Inc. who points to the Inside the Beltway power structure: "Industry, committees on the Hill, the USDA, and very little input from us." He forgot the FDA. I'm sure Ezra will get around to it in his new twice monthly column on the politics of food, but no one mentioned the fount of death-by-eating, Congress' most corrupt enclave, the Blue Dog-dominated House Agriculture Committee. Forget the Medical-Industrial Complex and the banksters when it comes to running wild over their slices of our lives. Compared to AgriBusiness they are each thriving in an oasis of enlightenment, instead of the den of iniquity run by America's chief poisoner, Collin Peterson.

Behind The Food, Inc Movie-- Massive Bribes To Congress From AgriBusiness

Last night I went to see the Anvil movie. It was great. But a trailer for Food, Inc stuck in my consciousness as much as the story about these Jewish Canadian heavy metal rockers. And I found that trailer... for you:



It's not just about healthy and nutritious food either. With the whole country alarmed about an unending series of food-borne illnesses and, courtesy of the "Free Market" Bush gang and their Republican accomplices in Congress, a hollowed-out FDA, more frequent sudden death from taking a bite-- whether from China, Mexico... or Georgia-- food industry lobbyists are pressuring the members of Congress they've financed to prohibit even debate on the food industry! Tools of AgriBusiness run the regulatory industries meant to protect consumers but that, under the GOP and the equally corrupt Blue Dogs, now protect only company profits.

Jill Richardson at La Vida Locavore is out there fighting for us everyday but this year alone-- and it's not even May yet-- AgriBusiness spent $14,391,387 on lobbying. Lobbying doesn't include the $163,831,785 AgriBusiness doled out directly to members of the House (nor the $73,711,910 to the members of the Senate) since 1990. The overwhelming legalized bribes went to Republicans but Democrats-- particularly reactionary and corrupt Blue Dogs-- have been at the trough as well. The average Republican House member they financed got $46,656 and the average Republican senator got $98,744. When AgriBusiness invested in Democrats corrupt enough for their standards the average House member only got $28,905 (and the average Democrat in the Senate, $58,996).

Not counting presidential candidates-- predictably, McCain got more corrupt bucks from AgriBusiness than anyone in Congress-- the biggest whores currently serving have been this shameful dirty baker's dozen who are actively participating in poisoning the country:

Saxby Chambliss (R-GA)- $3,544,909
Miss McConnell (R-KY)- $2,219,241
Pat Roberts (R-KS)- $1,747,178
Collin Peterson (D-MN)- $1,559,273
Devin Nunes (R-CA)- $1,449,107
Richard Lugar (R-IN)- $1,392,680
Bob Goolatte (R-VA)- $1,364,395
Thad Cochran (R-MS)- $1,318,242
Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX)- $1,270,008
John Boehner (R-OH)- $1,245,813
Max Baucus (D-MT)- $1,231,565
Kit Bond (R-MO)- $1,217,110
Blanche Lincoln (D-AR)- $1,215,736

Thanks for this, guys (and Kay and Blanche):




UPDATE: How Responsible Are Susan Collins And Backward Republican Ideology For The Pandemic?

If you go to Susan Collins' website, you'll notice her bragging about how she made sure $8 million in pork was included for the Acadia National Park (as well as $30.6 million in EPA funding for clean water and a whole page of other Maine projects. Less apparent is Senator Collins bragging about how she stripped the money for pandemic preparedness out of Obama's Stimulus package.

Famously, Maine Senator Collins, the supposedly moderate Republican who demanded cuts in health care spending in exchange for her support of a watered-down version of the stimulus, fumed about the pandemic funding: "Does it belong in this bill? Should we have $870 million in this bill No, we should not."

Even now, Collins continues to use her official website to highlight the fact that she led the fight to strip the pandemic preparedness money out of the Senate's version of the stimulus measure.

The Republicans essentially succeeded. The Senate version of the stimulus plan included no money whatsoever for pandemic preparedness. In the conference committee that reconciled the House and Senate plans, Obey and his allies succeeded in securing $50 million for improving information systems at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
But state and local governments, and the emergency services that would necessarily be on the frontlines in any effort to contain a pandemic, got nothing.

Did Rove, Collins and their compatriots want a pandemic?

Of course not.

They were just playing politics, in the exceptionally narrow and irresponsible manner that characterized the Republican response to the stimulus debate-- and that, because of Democratic compromises in the Senate, dumbed down the plan President Obama ultimately signed.