Farmers wage war over milk hormone

There’s a milk war under way in Pennsylvania, with a hormone known as rbST at ground zero.

Farmers who use rbST say the hormone is naturally produced by cows, does not harm cows or humans and can increase milk production.

Farmers who don’t use rbST say the hormone is injurious to cows and might be damaging to humans.

What has sparked the war is a decision by some dairies to label their milk as rbST-free, thus implying that their milk is safer than milk from cows that are injected with rbST, which was approved by the Food and Drug Administration for commercial use in 1993.

Pennsylvania Secretary of Agriculture Dennis Wolff sides with farmers who use rbST.

Wolff said labels proclaiming milk to be free of artificial growth hormones are misleading and unfair to competitors, but the Agriculture Department and governor’s office are now reconsidering an earlier decision ordering dairies to stop labeling milk containers as hormone-free. That action was supposed to take effect on Jan. 1 but could be delayed a month or more as officials continue to consider arguments from both sides.

Ethics Is Real Issue Behind Milk-Labeling Controversy

the countries of Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and all 25 members of the European Union have already banned the use of rBST/rBHG in the production of milk.

This is a major issues in some circles. The ‘documentary’ The Corporation talks about rbST/rbHG quite a bit… though they worry about and attack the wrong people in the film. Most people are not familiar with the controversy. Then again most people aren’t aware the federal government restricts “the transportation and sale in interstate commerce of unpasteurized milk and milk products.” The claim that people will be confused is without merit. They may not know what it is but you’d hope that either the rbST-free labels say what it is or the places which sell the milk could provide documentation if customers requested. Hell… they could just look it up on Google.com. If they don’t educate themselves so be it. If they regulate anything it aught to be requiring those who do use the hormone to label their products. This is corporatism masked as nanny statism. Both of which are bad for the public and the economy. As Joshua Katz says over at LewRockwell.com:

Now, the state of Pennsylvania has outlawed the labels. This is quite harmful to producers who built organic farms, which are much harder to build and maintain, on the expectation of being able to obtain a higher milk price. Now that the milk is not labeled, there will be no price differential, and soon enough there will be no untreated milk available for sale in the state, I’d wager.

I’d agree. Hopefully this falls through… and then lets work on getting rid of the milk cartel subsidies.

http://www.downsizedc.org/…

The latest (Sept 24) RSC Update is interesting. It provided us with today’s Quote of the Day that led off this message. It also includes this statement about H.R. 3580, the Food and Drug Administration Amendments Act of 2007 introduced on Wednesday, September 19: “Final bill text released twenty minutes before floor consideration.” That’s bad. What makes it worse is, this bill is 422 pages long. Is it just me, or does 20 minutes seem like not quite enough time to read 422 pages?

Even worse than that, the bill was passed on a “suspend the rules and pass” motion - that is, they voted on the measure without debate. Such motions can only pass with two-thirds of the vote, but that was no problem, as this one passed with 405 in favor and only 7 opposed. The Senate passed the bill the next day by unanimous consent.

Admittedly, the bill wasn’t entirely new. Earlier in the year, the Senate passed an apparently similar bill, the 500-page S. 1082, and the House had passed the similar, 312-page H.R. 2900. The subject, then, wasn’t completely out-of-the-blue. But those two bills were different from each other by 188 pages. H.R. 3580 appears to split the difference, but what has been added from the previous bills? What has been subtracted? Has anything been secretly inserted? Aside from the legislative staffers who put it together, does anyone know? Were they “helped” by Administration bureaucrats? By lobbyists?

I think this speaks for itself. I’d imagine it’s not as bad as the other bill similarly passed… the PATRIOT Act… but it’s still absolutely disgusting that this happens.

This dispatch if you notice mentions blog of bile as a new RTBA coalition member.

http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/…

 I Got Hooked on the White Stuff Back in the ’70s
No, not that white stuff. And not the white stuff that Disco Stu bought from Garth Motherloving. The white stuff I got hooked on (growing up on the family dairy farm) is raw milk — milk that has not been pasteurized or homogenized. Today’s NYT has an article on the growing black and gray markets in raw milk, which the Food and Drug Administration and 15 state legislatures want to shut down.

Yes, that’s right — Uncle Sam and 15 state governments prohibit consumers from buying milk fresh from the cow. And in the nannies’ defense, milk was responsible for much food-borne illness in the era before universal pasteurization. Most consumers likely prefer protection from nasty bugs like E. coli and salmonella.

But others are willing to risk exposure to those illnesses. Some raw milk enthusiasts claim the white stuff is more healthful than processed milk. Others (I count myself among these) say simply that it tastes better that the milk you buy at the store — people who try raw milk for the first time often comment that it tastes more like melted ice cream than the stuff that comes in cartons.

So why should raw milk fans be prohibited from buying the product they want?

How much of this nanny statism can people handle. A black market for cow milk?! It’s absolutely appalling that a situation like this has arisen.  People are more than capable of taking care of themselves and their families. Instead of wasting time worrying about next weeks episode of Lost they could pay attention to the who, what, where and whens of their food supply. Personal responsibility will only make our country stronger.

http://www.latimes.com/…

A Senate committee Wednesday embraced legislation that would for the first time allow federal regulation of cigarettes.

The bill, approved 13 to 8 by the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, would give the Food and Drug Administration authority to restrict tobacco advertising, regulate warning labels and remove hazardous ingredients.

The bill would allow the FDA to reduce the amount of nicotine in cigarettes, but only Congress could permanently ban them.

The committee adopted an amendment by Sen. Michael B. Enzi (R-Wyo.) that would ban clove cigarettes in the U.S., reversing a controversial decision by Kennedy to allow the FDA to decide.

Kennedy, the panel’s chairman, said he was responding to several senators who contacted him with concerns that a ban on clove cigarettes could not be compliant with World Trade Organization rules. But Kennedy agreed to the ban after several senators objected.

They don’t object to limiting the freedom of the public but whether it’s not compliant with the WTO. It’s funny, they take an oath to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic.” They must have a different copy than I do.