Holy Cow! The war on milk…

Illegal substance “partakers”???

By, Gayle Lane

Extending for four decades now, the war on drugs has ingrained a certain ideology into society. What was sold as an initiative to get dangerous drugs off the streets has conceived a totalitarian mindset that government has the authority to control everything you eat and drink and, if you disobey, the state can fine you, destroy your property, raid your home and throw you in jail. I’m not talking about cocaine or meth. I’m not even talking about marijuana. I’m talking about milk.

According to Time Magazine , “for some Americans, milk has become a test of their freedom. And they’re not paranoid kooks either; the government really is out to get them, authorizing seizures of bottles and jugs of unpasteurized milk and, in one recent case, a full-on, agents-brandishing-guns raid.”

There is indeed a war going on, and it’s threatening one of your most basic freedoms – the right to eat a wholly natural, healthful food!

The FDA has long banned the sale of raw milk across state lines, and in many states it’s illegal to sell raw milk entirely. (For more information about laws in various US states, please see this link. For information about raw milk in other countries go here.)

Why has a natural food source been banned for sale in so many areas?

Well, they claim raw milk is simply too dangerous to consume and by restricting its sale they are serving the public health and reducing the risk of illness….

Yet shockingly there’s no evidence backing up this claim.

According to CDC data, from 1993 to 2006, only about 116 illnesses a year were linked to raw milk. That amounts to less than .000002 percent of the 76 million people who contract a food-borne illness in the United States each year!

Looking at the evidence, or rather lack thereof, it is quite clear that raw milk has been unfairly singled out and targeted by the FDA, the USDA, and even the FBI, despite the fact that it’s so low on the food-borne illness risk scale it’s hardly measurable.

The recent enforcement efforts against raw milk sales is so disproportionate to the risk it poses to consumers that it defies all logic.

Is the Ban on Raw Milk Unconstitutional?

Raw milk enthusiasts and raw dairy suppliers began fighting back in early 2010, filing suit against the FDA, claiming that banning interstate sales is unconstitutional.

The rebuttal received from the FDA was shocking to say the least. It contained the following outrageous statements, which make it very clear they believe you have   no right  to natural, unadulterated food:

Live free, drink raw milk.

“There is no absolute right to consume or feed children any particular food.”

“There is no ‘deeply rooted’ historical tradition of unfettered access to foods of all kinds.”

“Plaintiffs’ assertion of a ‘fundamental right to their own bodily and physical health, which includes what foods they do and do not choose to consume for themselves and their families’ is similarly unavailing because plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to obtain any food they wish.”

The FDA’s brief goes on to state that “even if such a right did exist, it would not render the FDA’s regulations unconstitutional because prohibiting the interstate sale and distribution of unpasteurized milk promotes bodily and physical health.”

“There is no fundamental right to freedom of contract.”

With these assertions, the FDA essentially claims to have the authority to prohibit any food of their choosing, and make it a crime for you to seek it out.

This is simply unacceptable.

Raw Milk Safety Standards – Actually HIGHER than Those for Pasteurized Milk

It’s essential to understand the reasons why most dairy is pasteurized in the first place.

The dairy cows used to produce much of the pasteurized dairy sold in the United States are raised in such unsanitary conditions that it affects the cows’ health and hence the quality of their milk.

Factory farming conditions are the reason why the milk has to be pasteurized in the first place. If it wasn’t, it simply would not be safe to drink. This fact is also what prevents the conventional dairy industry from competing with smaller organic farms.

In terms of quality and nutritional content of the milk, you simply cannot compare the milk produced by factory farms to that of organic farm that raise their cattle on grasses and let them out to pasture. These cows are healthy, and produce high quality, uncontaminated milk that does not require pasteurization to kill off dangerous pathogens.

Still, despite the fact that grass-fed organically-raised cows are at a distinct advantage, from the get-go when it comes to the quality of their milk, organic dairy farms in most states still must meet or exceed pasteurized milk standards, without pasteurizing.

California, specifically, (where raw milk is legal) has its own special set of standards for raw milk for human consumption.

So, if it’s not really about food safety, what’s all the hubbub about?

In a word: money.

The conventional dairy industry, realizing that consumers are flocking toward raw milk because of its health benefits, has redoubled their efforts to quench raw milk sales.

You might think that if raw dairy became attractive enough the dairy industry would simply follow suit and begin producing raw products to meet the demand. Alas… this is virtually impossible because of the way their overcrowded farms are run.

You simply CANNOT drink factory farmed milk raw. It would be extremely unsafe. Their business depends on pasteurization, and that is why their powerful lobbyists will stop at nothing to persuade government agencies to keep raw milk bans in full force.

Big Dairy simply cannot compete, so to maintain their market share, they’re employing dirty tactics to destroy the competition instead.

A yearlong sting operation, including aliases, a 5 a.m. surprise inspection and surreptitious purchases from an Amish farm in Pennsylvania, culminated in the federal government announcing this week that it has gone to court to stop Rainbow Acres Farm from selling its contraband.

Related articles

• Setbacks and Bizarre Turns in the Raw Milk Saga (libertycrier.com)
• Baylen Linnekin on the Fight for the Right to Choose Raw Milk (reason.com)
• Setbacks and Bizarre Turns in the Raw Milk Saga (txwclp.org)
• Raw milk appeal breaking news in TO (thebovine.wordpress.com)
• Sheriff Brad Rogers takes on the Feds in defense of Elkhart County Dairy Farmer

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OVERWHELMINGLY — Indiana’s voters willing to risk government shutdown to derail ‘Obamacare’

Tags

Continuing Resolution, CR, Dan Coats, Defund, Defund Obamacare, Government Shutdown, House, Jackie Walorski, Joe Donnelly, Marlin Stutzman, OBAMACARE, Senate, September 30 Deadline

To understand why so many conservatives in Congress are willing to risk a government shutdown in their quest to cut spending and derail “Obamacare,” take a look at Indiana and the state’s crop of young Republicans in the U.S. House Representatives.

The voters in their home districts gave them a simple message at town hall meetings in August:“Stand up to President Barack Obama and block his health insurance reforms.”

Indiana constituents don’t support the health care law and are insisting their elected officials vote to defund it.

The efforts of Indiana’s House Republicans are certain to be rejected by Democrats. Obama has already issued a veto threat. So the ensuing fight will heighten the risk of a government shutdown or debt default which will unnerve financial markets.

That is a risk that many conservatives see as essential, with key parts of the law due to take effect in October.

______________________________________________________________________

“The American people want this law stopped one way or another,” Representative Marlin Stutzman of northeast Indiana told Reuters. “We are willing to hold out on this one.”  _______________________________________________________________

Republicans argue that the Affordable Care Act will cost jobs, reduce employee working hours and increase health premiums and are focused on the projected spending increase which would nudge the sprawling U.S. healthcare system to over $3 trillion in total spending for 2014, representing a cost of $9,697 for every man, woman and child, or 18.3 percent of the U.S. economy! (Source of information is Reuters. Click HERE to reference.)

Over the longer term, healthcare spending growth would accelerate to 6.5 percent by 2022, when the industry would hit the $5 trillion mark and represent 19.9 percent of gross domestic product.

Indiana’s Republicans are willing to make tough choices and to accept the accompanying risks.

These Republicans do not fit the Democratic caricature of conservative Tea Party novices who are holding the House hostage. Several have experience in Indiana state government, making tough budget choices under former Republican Governor Mitch Daniels.

Daniel’s success in turning around the state’s finances prompted speculation that Daniels might make a presidential bid in 2012, but he opted against running.

Under Mitch Daniels’ leadership, Indiana cut taxes and built up a surplus. Now it consistently ranks highest in the Midwest in business climate surveys, while neighbors Illinois and Michigan struggle financially. But Indiana’s unemployment rate, at 8.3 percent, is a full percentage point above the national average as its manufacturing base struggles to recover from the recession.

The experience at the state level has driven the Indiana Republicans in Congress to try to replicate the same formula in Washington.

Three members – Todd Rokita, Messer and Jackie Walorski – now serve on the House Budget Committee, a big presence for a state with only 6.5 million residents. Todd Young switched from that panel to the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee. And Stutzman, another Budget Committee alumnus, saw his standing in the caucus rise after the House passed his plan to separate the $74 billion food stamp program from a long-stalled farm bill, a move aimed at shrinking the nutrition subsidies.

“I think we’ve been able to prove in this state, statistically, that balanced budgets create stable economies, create jobs, and there is a way out of the mess we’re in at the federal level,” said Walorski, who once described herself as a “pit bull” in the state capitol.

Freshman Representative Susan Brooks, a former U.S. attorney in Indiana, has local, state and federal government experience, most recently as general counsel for the state’s network of community colleges.

The group often repeats a Daniels mantra: “You’d be amazed at how much government you won’t miss.”

Three years after President Obama signed his signature health care overhaul, Americans are MORE negative toward it than they have ever been. Disapproval of the president on the issue has reached a new high. Here are findings from a USA TODAY/Pew Research Center Poll.

INDIANA VOTERS ARE WATCHING

The seven Indiana Republicans face little threat of losing their seats to Democrats in 2014 if they dig in on the budget and Obamacare. The congressional boundaries some of them helped redraw in 2011 concentrated the state’s two Democrats into central Indianapolis and the industrial northwest corner. The Republican districts are now largely carpeted in corn and soybeans, giving them a naturally conservative rural base.

“Indiana is an agrarian state. A bumper crop one year could be met with drought the next, so you better focus on long-term goals,” said Wendy Dant Chesser, president of One Southern Indiana, the Chamber of Commerce in New Albany, Indiana.

Instead, any threat is more likely to come from the right if they are too soft on spending. The influential conservative group Club for Growth, headed by former Indiana Republican congressman Chris Chocola, is watching their every vote.

Similar sentiments expressed in conservative Republican districts across the country have put members in no mood to compromise on the fiscal deadlines.

Rokita, a second-term congressman who boasts that his 2010 budget as Indiana secretary of state was at 1987 levels, said the Obamacare defunding vote was “a reasonable reflection of what my constituents wanted of me. I think we’re best when we’re bold,” he said. “I keep trying to preach that to our leadership.”

Opposition to ObamaCare — already wildly unpopular when it was passed — is becoming increasingly strong and widespread. In my opinion, it’s about time MORE politicians follow Indiana’s elected representative’s example and deeply consider WHO they SHOULD BE fighting for. (HINT TO LAWMAKERS: The WHO should NOT be your pharmaceutical and insurance political donors.)

Sources:
Red State
The Indiana Gazette
Rasmussen Reports
Reuters
Political Outcast

Elkhart County: On the edge of nuclear disaster?

Tags

Cancer, Cancer Rates, catch basins, Corroded, Covert Township Michigan, Death Rates, Health Risk, Lake Michigan, Leaks, New Haven, Nuclear Energy, Palisades Nuclear Generating Station, Public Safety, Radioactive Waste, Reactor Parts, Safety, Steam, Tritium

I subscribed to a Nuclear Energy Newsletter on June 7, 2012 so that I could keep track of what was going on with Palisades Nuclear Plant in Covert township, Michigan. That day someone had tweeted that a radiation monitoring station in St. Joseph County was reporting radiation levels as high as 7,139 counts per minute (CPM) for most of Northern Indiana and parts of Michigan

Normal radiation readings are between 5 and 60 CPM.

Something had to have happened and although the mainstream media wasn’t saying anything about the high readings, I suspected there was more to the story.

Screen capture of reading of 7,034 from ‘Radiation Network’ website. Normal readings are between 5 and 60 CPM.

A screen capture from Black Cat radiation website showing a reading of over 3500 for the same area. http://www.blackcatsystems.com/RadMap/map.html

EPA reading from a separate website which shows Southwest Michigan is in the danger (red) zone.

My husband said that there was a nuclear plant located in Southwest Michigan that had been named the 3rd worst nuclear plant in the nation. A report, by nuclear engineer Dave Lochbaum, a member of the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) confirmed what my husband told me and then some. Lochbaum compares the “Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Palisades nuclear plant situation to a driver trying to get out of a speeding ticket by saying their car doesn’t have a speedometer”.

It seemed VERY coincidental that THREE Radiation Monitoring Stations in different locations, but ALL within a 50-mile distance of Palisades, a nuclear power plant known to be leaky, and the 3rd worst-maintained plant in the United States, were getting dangerously high radiation readings.

Strangely enough, within a few days after the Radiation Monitoring Stations showed high radiation levels in Southwest Michigan and Northern Indiana, Reuters reported Entergy Corp had shut DOWN Palisades nuclear power plant in Michigan due to leakage from a refueling water tank.

The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission said in a report that the company was in the midst of cooling down the reactor in order to make repairs to the refueling water tank. Palisades nuclear plant spokesman, Mark Savage, told Reuters that the plant would return to service once repairs were completed. The tank was believed to be leaking from several locations.

Palisades nuclear power plant, Covert Township Michigan

It took a FULL MONTH for the Palisades Nuclear Plant to be repaired. While the plant was shut down the, the Michigan Department of Community Health made Potassium Iodide pills available FREE to anyone who lived, worked or was visiting within 10 miles of Palisades nuclear plant. Congressman Edward J. Markey, D-Mass., sent a letter to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission requesting more information about the leaking cooling tank. Markey said he was concerned because, according to NRC documents, the leak was first noticed in 2011 and a  YEAR PASSED without ANYTHING being done to fix it. According to Markey’s letter, radioactive water was dripping into the plant’s Control Room and Auxiliary Building and being captured in “catch basins” with nuclear waste designators attached. Read Congressman Markey’s letter HERE.

Despite Congressman Markey’s efforts,  Palisades Nuclear Generating Plant has continued to have problems.

Early this summer, when more tank leaks led to another shutdown of the nuclear power plant, the plant owner, Entergy, patched up the leak, fired back up the reactor, and hoped for the best.

Unfortunately, the best did not materialize.

The tank began leaking again. Which didn’t concern Entergy. Palisades was only leaking a gallon a day. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission allows nuclear power plants to leak up to 38 gallons a day.

But, before the weekend was over, the leaky drip turned into a gush. All the hoping in the world couldn’t hold back the tide of spilling radioactive water. The NRC told the AP news that over 80 gallons of “slightly” radioactive water spewed into Lake Michigan.

How did the Nuclear Regulatory Commission know the water was just “slightly” radioactive?

They didn’t.

“Officials say they don’t know how radioactive the leaked water is.” Michigan Radio reported.

Spokeswoman for the Entergy plant, Viktoria Mitlyng quickly reassured the public, “The radioactive water pouring into Lake Michigan will have no impact on the health and safety of the public.” said Mitlyng “This tank has leaked before. It leaked in 2012 too. It’s a repeat occurrence.”

NRC Commissioner William C. Ostendorff

Palisades Nuclear Plant has been shut down nine times since 2011. The leakage in 2012 caused significant water seepage into the plant’s control room. As a result, NRC Chairman Gregory Jaczko toured the plant and ordered an investigation. Jaczko’s request allegedly caused NRC Commissioner William Ostendorff to shout at top agency investigators, that “further inquiry would be a waste of resources.”

Adding to southwest Michigan and surrounding area concerns, a study by the nonprofit group, Radiation and Public Health Project links Palisades nuclear plant to increased death and cancer rates in Van Buren County. “We’re suggesting a causation,” said Joseph Mangano, executive director of the health group, “between the plant and an increase in deaths. This report is a start with a number of red flags raised.”

Major findings in the report include:

• The plant stores massive amounts of high-level radioactive waste, mostly in a waste pool of water that must be constantly cooled to avoid a fire.
• Palisades operated 93.5% of the time between 2006 and 2011, which means the aging and corroding reactor parts are being pushed to their maximum.
• A 2006 report concluded that of 200 “near-miss” accidents at U.S. reactors from 1986 to 2006, four occurred at Palisades, among the highest of any U.S. reactor. Another five potentially harmful incidents occurred since 2010.
• A 1982 federal estimate of 16,700 radiation poisoning cases and 13,000 cancer deaths after a meltdown to the Palisades reactor core would be greater today, due to higher population and effects beyond the study’s geographic limits.
• From 2001 to 2007, sharp increases in releases from Palisades for several types of airborne and liquid radioactivity were observed in data compiled by the U.S. Environmental Protection agency.
• In the late 1990’s, the latest data available, tritium levels in Lake Michigan at South Haven (near Palisades) exceeded those of most U.S. reactors.
• The Van Buren County death rate from all causes was 3 to 6 percent below the state in the 1970’s and early 1980’s but has risen since, to a level 12.5% greater than Michigan (2003-2010). This change suggests that 1,330 “excess” deaths have occurred in the county since Palisades started operating. Elevated levels were observed for all age groups (especially children/young adults), both genders and all major causes of death.
• The Van Buren County death rate for all cancers combined was 10.5% below the Michigan rate in the 1970’s, but is now 12.0% above the state (2005-2010). This rate is the highest of the 34 most populated Michigan counties.

Data presented in the Radiation and Public Health Project report suggest a link between emissions from Entergy Palisades and elevated health risk. This finding is particularly important at this time as the reactor has been operating for over 42 years. Regulatory decisions to allow the reactor to stay in operation have been made with no attention paid to the health risks.

The U.S. and other governments have been covering up nuclear meltdowns for fifty years to protect the nuclear power industry.

To this day, governments worldwide continue cover up the amount – and health effects – of radiation released by military and energy facilities. Psst…unless you have a LOT of time, don’t even get me started on the Fukushima “accident” in Japan.

Related Articles:

• Palisades Nuclear Plant Shuts Down With Radioactive Waste Leaking Into Lake Michigan
• Nuclear Plant Spills Waste Into Lake Michigan
• Radioactive water was released into Lake Michigan before nuclear plant shutdown
• Study links Palisades nuclear plant to death, cancer rates in Van Buren County
• Study claims cancer rates higher in Van Buren County

The produce keeps rolling in!

Tags

Church Community Services, Fair Donations to Food Pantry, Farm Donations, Farming, Fellowship, Food, Gardens, Helping Others, Volunteering

Please spread the word that Church Community Gardens is always looking for volunteers for their gardens. My husband and I have been working at the Goshen Garden on Monday nights and the people are so friendly. It is a great way to make new friends and although I admit to feeling sore sometimes afterwards, I don’t mind because the conversation and fellowship are so fulfilling:

Goshen Garden: 14723 CR 36, Goshen. Mondays @ 5:30pm. Coordinator: Jeremy Shue: jeremyshue@gmail.com. 574-536-2010

Bullard Garden: 22104 CR 14, Elkhart. Tuesdays @ 5:30pm. Coordinator: Kurt Bullard: Kurtbullard4444@gmail.com. 574-298-9059

CCS Garden: 902 Thomas St, Elkhart. Wed & Thurs @ 8:00am. Coordinator: Katie Jantzen: mailto:Kurtbullard4444@gmail.com. 574-295-3673 ext 122

Northwest Goshen: 538 S. Indiana Ave, Goshen. Wednesdays @ 5:30pm. Coordinator: Andrea Milne andreajillmilne@gmail.com.574-400-5858

Heart’s Desire Garden: 3030 Old US 20, Elkhart. Thursdays @ 5:30pm. Coordinator: Dave Hochstetler Dhhooch@aol.com. 574-349-4905

Church Community Services News

It’s fair week, and we’re pleased to report that the auction and tractor rides the Fair Board organized to benefit Seed to Feed brought in $1,620 dollars!  Thank you!

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Julie Miers, Family Nutrition Program Assistant, was at the pantry on Tuesday to provide samples of simple recipes, and this week she spent much of her time educating interested clients about basic nutrition.  Here she is speaking to a group of women about healthy meal planning.

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Here they are!  The first Seed to Feed tomatoes of the season!  These came from the Goshen garden on Monday.

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The CCS garden also had a few tomatoes ripe, as well as lots of yellow squash, patty pan squash, eggplants, yellow beans, purple beans, collards, kale, chard, hot peppers, and sweet peppers!

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Adding this to the zucchini and cucumbers from the River Oaks garden and the zucchini from the Heart’s Desire garden, we’ve really got a…

View original post 13 more words

CHECK OUT: Church Community Service’s New Food Pantry

Tags

Church, Church Community Service, Civic Engagement, Civic Service, Community Service, Elkhart County, Elkhart County Business Donations, Elkhart County Indiana, Food, Food bank, Friends, Good Deeds, Goshen Indiana, Helping, Helping Friends, Helping Hand, Labor of Love, Michiana Tea Party Coalition, Neighbors, Volunteering, We the People 912

Labor of Love, which included businesses from St. Joseph and Elkhart counties, as well as “We the People” 912 and  the Michiana Tea Party Coalition distributed 80 bins and were among the first contributors to the new pantry.

More and more Elkhart County families are struggling on a daily basis to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table. It isn’t just the unemployed either. Parents are working multiple jobs and skipping meals just so they can make sure their children are fed.  They have tough decisions to make every day: whether to fill up the car or put food on the table; whether to pay the utilities or put food on the table; whether to pay the rent or put food on the table. All it takes is one illness, one dead car battery or one rent hike and they can no longer take care of their family without help.

For those without family or friends nearby, Church Community Services provides hope , in the form of food and education and finanacial assistance to families going through hard times in Elkhart County.  When families are living in poverty, they have to do without a lot of things – food should not be one of them.

Tuesday, September 4th, 2012 was a huge day for Church Community Services.

It was the grand opening of Church Community Services’ long awaited renovated food pantry and warehouse.  Church Community Services has been working towards making this transition for 4 years.  The new building will give them the resources, space, and opportunity to better serve needs in our growing community.  It will allow them to store and distribute more food. It  will be cleaner and more welcoming, and will give space to be more volunteer- and client- friendly. They will also be able to put more focus on education, such as providing handy recipes and nutritional facts.

The new pantry is 1,225 sq. ft. compared to the former 494 sq. ft.  The new warehouse is 2,910 sq. ft. compared to the current 1,680 sq. ft.  There is also a 864 sq. ft. welcome center complete with a children’s area, and a prayer room for anyone who feels a need to pray. Lots of love and labor was put into this project, and IT SHOWS!

This nutrician video, full of advice on meal planning, preparation and nutrition runs 24/7 in the waiting room.

Amazing things happen when we are given the privilege of being the channels of the Holy Spirit’s prayer. Church Community Service’s new pantry facility includes a chapel to assist client’s needs.

Here is part of the children’s play area where volunteers watch the children while their parents shop at the pantry.

The ‘Seed to Feed’ vegetables look so good! Fresh garden vegetables are ALWAYS so appreciated.

Mary Kneller, Food Director for Church Community Services, generously used up some of her very valuable time to show me the new facilities. It was a real pleasure.

HOLY COW: The war on milk…

Tags

Amish, Co-ops, Dairy, Dairy Industry, Farming, FBI, FDA, Food and Drug Administration, Food Industry, Fundamental Right, Health, Healthy Food, Illegal Substances, Milk, Milk Wars, Monsanto, Organic Farms, Pasteurization, Pasteurized Milk, Raw milk, The Constitution, United States

Illegal substance “partakers”???

Extending for four decades now, the war on drugs has ingrained a certain ideology into society. What was sold as an initiative to get dangerous drugs off the streets has conceived a totalitarian mindset that government has the authority to control everything you eat and drink and, if you disobey, the state can fine you, destroy your property, raid your home and throw you in jail. I’m not talking about cocaine or meth. I’m not even talking about marijuana. I’m talking about milk.

According to Time Magazine , “for some Americans, milk has become a test of their freedom. And they’re not paranoid kooks either; the government really is out to get them, authorizing seizures of bottles and jugs of unpasteurized milk and, in one recent case, a full-on, agents-brandishing-guns raid.”

There is indeed a war going on, and it’s threatening one of your most basic freedoms – the right to eat a wholly natural, healthful food!

The FDA has long banned the sale of raw milk across state lines, and in many states it’s illegal to sell raw milk entirely. (For more information about laws in various US states, please see this link. For information about raw milk in other countries go here.)

Why has a natural food source been banned for sale in so many areas?

Well, they claim raw milk is simply too dangerous to consume and by restricting its sale they are serving the public health and reducing the risk of illness….

Yet shockingly there’s no evidence backing up this claim.

According to CDC data, from 1993 to 2006, only about 116 illnesses a year were linked to raw milk. That amounts to less than .000002 percent of the 76 million people who contract a food-borne illness in the United States each year!

Looking at the evidence, or rather lack thereof, it is quite clear that raw milk has been unfairly singled out and targeted by the FDA, the USDA, and even the FBI, despite the fact that it’s so low on the food-borne illness risk scale it’s hardly measurable.

The recent enforcement efforts against raw milk sales is so disproportionate to the risk it poses to consumers that it defies all logic.

Is the Ban on Raw Milk Unconstitutional?

Raw milk enthusiasts and raw dairy suppliers began fighting back in early 2010, filing suit against the FDA, claiming that banning interstate sales is unconstitutional.

The rebuttal received from the FDA was shocking to say the least. It contained the following outrageous statements, which make it very clear they believe you have   no right  to natural, unadulterated food:

Live free, drink raw milk.

“There is no absolute right to consume or feed children any particular food.”

“There is no ‘deeply rooted’ historical tradition of unfettered access to foods of all kinds.”

“Plaintiffs’ assertion of a ‘fundamental right to their own bodily and physical health, which includes what foods they do and do not choose to consume for themselves and their families’ is similarly unavailing because plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to obtain any food they wish.”

The FDA’s brief goes on to state that “even if such a right did exist, it would not render the FDA’s regulations unconstitutional because prohibiting the interstate sale and distribution of unpasteurized milk promotes bodily and physical health.”

“There is no fundamental right to freedom of contract.”

With these assertions, the FDA essentially claims to have the authority to prohibit any food of their choosing, and make it a crime for you to seek it out.

This is simply unacceptable.

Raw Milk Safety Standards – Actually HIGHER than Those for Pasteurized Milk

It’s essential to understand the reasons why most dairy is pasteurized in the first place.

The dairy cows used to produce much of the pasteurized dairy sold in the United States are raised in such unsanitary conditions that it affects the cows’ health and hence the quality of their milk.

Factory farming conditions are the reason why the milk has to be pasteurized in the first place. If it wasn’t, it simply would not be safe to drink. This fact is also what prevents the conventional dairy industry from competing with smaller organic farms.

In terms of quality and nutritional content of the milk, you simply cannot compare the milk produced by factory farms to that of organic farm that raise their cattle on grasses and let them out to pasture. These cows are healthy, and produce high quality, uncontaminated milk that does not require pasteurization to kill off dangerous pathogens.

Still, despite the fact that grass-fed organically-raised cows are at a distinct advantage, from the get-go when it comes to the quality of their milk, organic dairy farms in most states still must meet or exceed pasteurized milk standards, without pasteurizing.

California, specifically, (where raw milk is legal) has its own special set of standards for raw milk for human consumption.

So, if it’s not really about food safety, what’s all the hubbub about?

In a word: money.

The conventional dairy industry, realizing that consumers are flocking toward raw milk because of its health benefits, has redoubled their efforts to quench raw milk sales.

You might think that if raw dairy became attractive enough the dairy industry would simply follow suit and begin producing raw products to meet the demand. Alas… this is virtually impossible because of the way their overcrowded farms are run.

You simply CANNOT drink factory farmed milk raw. It would be extremely unsafe. Their business depends on pasteurization, and that is why their powerful lobbyists will stop at nothing to persuade government agencies to keep raw milk bans in full force.

Big Dairy simply cannot compete, so to maintain their market share, they’re employing dirty tactics to destroy the competition instead.

A yearlong sting operation, including aliases, a 5 a.m. surprise inspection and surreptitious purchases from an Amish farm in Pennsylvania, culminated in the federal government announcing this week that it has gone to court to stop Rainbow Acres Farm from selling its contraband.

Related articles

• Setbacks and Bizarre Turns in the Raw Milk Saga (libertycrier.com)
• Baylen Linnekin on the Fight for the Right to Choose Raw Milk (reason.com)
• Setbacks and Bizarre Turns in the Raw Milk Saga (txwclp.org)
• Raw milk appeal breaking news in TO (thebovine.wordpress.com)
• Sheriff Brad Rogers takes on the Feds in defense of Elkhart County Dairy Farmer

Elkhart County’s unfunniest video — ‘really bad’ drivers

Tags

Automobile Accidents, Bad Driving, Dash Video, Elkhart County, Elkhart County Indiana, Indiana, Purdue University, Running Red Lights, United States

Automobile accidents are the fourth leading cause of death in Elkhart County. According to Purdue University’s 2012 Elkhart County Community Health Assessment, they are the number one cause of death for teens,

I don’t think this video dash compilation of ‘bad driving’ and ‘near misses’ in Elkhart County will surprise anyone. Every day, automobile fatalities lead local news stories.

Please drive defensively. Take responsibility, not just for yourself, but, keep an eye on the “other guy”.