Bush Administration doesn't REALLY believe in free enterprise

[shira]

Here's a little quiz: If a small company wants to do a little extra to reassure customers about the perceived safety of its products and thereby gain an edge on its competitors, BUT big companies in the same business realize they'd need to spend a lot of money to keep up, what do you think government's position should be with respect to allowing the little company to pursue its plan?

And what do you think the actual government position on this is?

Hint: We're talking the Bush Administration.

Appeals court backs Bush Administration

The Bush administration can prohibit meatpackers from testing their animals for mad cow disease, a federal appeals court said Friday.

The dispute pits the Agriculture Department, which tests about 1% of cows for the potentially deadly disease, against Creekstone Farms Premium Beef, a Kansas meatpacker that wants to test all of its animals.

Larger meatpackers opposed such testing. Their argument: If Creekstone Farms were to begin advertising that its cows have all been tested, other companies fear that they too would have to conduct the expensive tests.

The Bush administration says the low level of testing reflects the rareness of the disease. Mad cow disease has been linked to more than 150 human deaths worldwide, mostly in Britain. Only three cases have been reported in the U.S., all involving cows, not humans.

A federal judge ruled last year that Creekstone Farms must be allowed to conduct the test because the Agriculture Department could only regulate disease treatment. Because there is no cure for mad cow disease and the test is performed on dead animals, the test is not a treatment, the judge ruled.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit overturned that ruling, saying diagnosis could be considered part of treatment. "And we owe USDA a considerable degree of deference in its interpretation of the term," Judge Karen L. Henderson wrote.

The case has been sent back to the district court, where Creekstone Farms can make other arguments.

And then there was this article:

From USA Today

The U.S. Department of Agriculture ? invoking an obscure 1913 law intended to thwart con artists from peddling bogus hog cholera serum to pig farmers ? is blocking companies from selling the testing kits to Creekstone.

USDA is doing the bidding of large cattle barons afraid that Creekstone's marketing will force them to do the same tests to stay competitive. It's true that the incidence of mad cow disease is quite low. But there's little logic in stopping a company from exceeding regulations to meet the demands of its customers, or protecting its rivals from legitimate competition.

Not only is USDA blocking Creekstone, the department said last month that it's reducing its mad cow testing program by 90%. The industry and its sympathetic regulators seem to believe that the problem isn't mad cow disease. It's tests that find mad cow.

So the Bush Administration's laughable position is that testing DEAD animals for an incurable disease is a form of treatment, and thus the USDA can prevent companies from performing even MORE testing than the government performs, testing that the government is going to scale back. Hardly surprising from a pack of unprincipled idiots like the Bush Administration who will side with big business on virtually any issue.

 

[SoundTheSurrender]

This is the greatest country in the world.

 

[CallMeJoe]

What's a little thing like Free Enterprise when a really important principle like Protection of Large Corporations is at stake?

 

[Moonbeam]

Hold on. The appeals court just said they own the USDA consideration for their expertise. If they say testing the dead is a treatment, maybe they know something we don't.

At any rate because of the asshole Bush I haven't bought any commercial beef in years. I pay the rate for grass feed.

 

[Fern]

I haven't read the case, and don't really trust some article unless the author's qualifications merit it.

Having said that, I think on general principal that the company should be able to test as they wish. I suspect the labeling issue is another matter though.

What will the labeling say such that other companies fear it gives a competitive edge?

Is the testing 100% effective?, or will consumers be falsely lead into believing that they are safer than they actually are?

Who's supposed to confirm that they have indeed tested 100% of their cows? What's to stop companies from using the same label, but not really test everything?

I think it could be more complicated than made out to be here.

Fern

 

[cliftonite]

Originally posted by: Fern
I haven't read the case, and don't really trust some article unless the author's qualifications merit it.

Having said that, I think on general principal that the company should be able to test as they wish. I suspect the labeling issue is another matter though.

What will the labeling say such that other companies fear it gives a competitive edge?

Is the testing 100% effective?, or will consumers be falsely lead into believing that they are safer than they actually are?

Who's supposed to confirm that they have indeed tested 100% of their cows? What's to stop companies from using the same label, but not really test everything?

I think it could be more complicated than made out to be here.

Fern

Or it could just be another case of the government bending over for big business.

 

[shira]

Originally posted by: Fern
I haven't read the case, and don't really trust some article unless the author's qualifications merit it.

Having said that, I think on general principal that the company should be able to test as they wish. I suspect the labeling issue is another matter though.

What will the labeling say such that other companies fear it gives a competitive edge?

Is the testing 100% effective?, or will consumers be falsely lead into believing that they are safer than they actually are?

Who's supposed to confirm that they have indeed tested 100% of their cows? What's to stop companies from using the same label, but not really test everything?

I think it could be more complicated than made out to be here.

Fern

It might be complicated, but none of the issues you raise (test accuracy, test coverage, advertising accuracy) were included in the USDA action. One thing we do know is that if a company makes a claim ("100% of our meat comes from animals tested to be free of mad cow disease") that's false, they can be fined, sometimes severely. If the company really wants to make a point, they can get an outside auditor to confirm their claims and post the auditing results on their website.

I think this case is what it appears to be at face value: Under pressure from the biggest meatpacking firms, the Bush USDA is preventing a smaller company from voluntarily testing all its beef. I included links to two mainstream newspapers - the L.A. Times and USA Today, and these aren't opinion pieces.

Here's yet another story, this one from the New York Times, which gives a little more insight into why Creekstone wants to test its beef:

NY Times Story

An excerpt:

Barred From Testing for Mad Cow, Niche Meatpacker Loses Clients

It isn't losing the Japanese market for filet mignon that bothers Bill Fielding most. It's losing the market for tongue.

Until a case of mad cow disease was found in the United States on Dec. 23, a tongue from his premium cattle fetched $17 in Japan. American wholesalers pay $3.50.

Asian buyers also paid more for the company's prime beef, but the real money was in the spare parts, said Mr. Fielding, chief operating officer at Creekstone Farms, a high-end beef producer with an ultramodern plant here in the flat Kansas corn belt. Mexico snapped up his stomachs and Russians paid 30 cents a pound for liver that goes for 8 cents domestically.

But after Dec. 23, foreign countries shut their doors. Creekstone lost 25 percent of its sales, laid off 45 of its 750 workers and idled its plant one to two days a week.

Japanese buyers assured Mr. Fielding that they would buy again if he tested his beef for the disease, formally known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy.

In response, he built a laboratory five feet from the overhead chain that carries skinned heads through the plant. His staff was trained in testing for mad cow, using a machine that gives results in seven hours, while the carcasses are still in the cooler.

But on April 9, the United States Department of Agriculture forbade Creekstone to test its cattle, saying there was ''no scientific justification'' for testing young steers like those Creekstone sells. Certifying some beef for Japan as disease-free, the department said, might confuse American consumers into thinking that untested beef was not safe.

.
.
.
Top officials of the National Cattlemen's Beef Association, which represents 27,000 cattle ranchers, argued strongly in an interview that Creekstone should be stopped. Testing young animals, said Jan Lyons, the group's president, ''is like testing kindergartners for Alzheimer's.''

Terry Stokes, the chief executive, said, ''If you let one company step out and do that, other companies would have to follow,'' at considerable expense.

Mr. Fielding also argued that the decision contradicted a recent one on organic meat.

For nearly a decade, the department and big beef producers said in unison that the Europeans, who bar beef raised with hormones or antibiotics, were just being protectionist. American beef, they said, was perfectly safe but consumers would be confused if some was certified as hormone-free. Then, in 2002, the department reversed itself and began certifying organic beef.

 

[Balt]

Originally posted by: Fern
I haven't read the case, and don't really trust some article unless the author's qualifications merit it.

Having said that, I think on general principal that the company should be able to test as they wish. I suspect the labeling issue is another matter though.

What will the labeling say such that other companies fear it gives a competitive edge?

It will likely say that they test 100% of their cows. They would not be foolish enough to claim something like "100% safe".

Is the testing 100% effective?, or will consumers be falsely lead into believing that they are safer than they actually are?

If testing isn't effective, then consumers have already been misled by claims that existing testing is sufficient.

Who's supposed to confirm that they have indeed tested 100% of their cows? What's to stop companies from using the same label, but not really test everything?

The same people who already confirm that existing testing is being done. Quality Control, Quality Assurance, the USDA, whoever. Clearly there are already people in place to confirm the existing test standards. As for using the label but not actually doing the testing, that would be violating the law and opening themselves up to litigation.

A lot of the issues you've brought up are things that are already enforced under existing standards, this company just wants to increase the % of cows that are under scrutiny. It's still up to the consumer to decide if they want to pay a premium for that greater scrutiny. The government action in this case is seeking to deny customers the freedom of that choice.

 

[abaez]

This is just mind boggling

 

[DrPizza]

This has been going on for years. The USDA is no longer about protecting the consumer. The USDA is about protecting big business. I highly recommend the book "Mad Sheep" by Linda Faillace. After reading that, it becomes even more obvious how it's become a bureaucracy that serves special interests rather than the American public.

Europe had banned the feeding of meat and bonemeal nine years earlier, did extensive testing for BSE, and kept certain parts of the animals (referred to as "specified risk material," or SRM) out of the human food chain. The United States lagged woefully behind. There were no bans on feeding MBM (meat and bonemeal) or SRM (specified risk material), and as far as imported MBM, U.S. officials claimed that "no MBM imports from Europe occurred between 1990 and 1998." However, after further investigation the Scientific Steering Committee discovered that the United States imported thirty-six tons from the UK in 1997.

Even after the Europeans figured out what was probably a major factor in mad cow - cows eating other cows - the practice continued in the United States. And, our testing methods are anything but random.

for starters
this site appears to be from some nutjob, but a lot of the information in there is factual, especially concerning risks.
more - more fruit-cakes? But, a lot of similar information.

probably the best source: here - Appears to not be run by alarmists. There may be as many as 150 cases each year in the U.S. Testing only a couple thousand out of millions isn't likely to find those. (Then again, it has found 3 so far.) But, can you imagine would would happen if big beef business were forced to spend (gasp!) $20 per head to test every animal? With at least 500 pounds of meat per cow, that's... 4 cents per pound to be safe. You know, I think that I wouldn't mind if my $9.99 per pound rib eye went up to $10.03.

 

[shira]

Originally posted by: DrPizza
This has been going on for years. The USDA is no longer about protecting the consumer. The USDA is about protecting big business. I highly recommend the book "Mad Sheep" by Linda Faillace. After reading that, it becomes even more obvious how it's become a bureaucracy that serves special interests rather than the American public.

Europe had banned the feeding of meat and bonemeal nine years earlier, did extensive testing for BSE, and kept certain parts of the animals (referred to as "specified risk material," or SRM) out of the human food chain. The United States lagged woefully behind. There were no bans on feeding MBM (meat and bonemeal) or SRM (specified risk material), and as far as imported MBM, U.S. officials claimed that "no MBM imports from Europe occurred between 1990 and 1998." However, after further investigation the Scientific Steering Committee discovered that the United States imported thirty-six tons from the UK in 1997.

Even after the Europeans figured out what was probably a major factor in mad cow - cows eating other cows - the practice continued in the United States. And, our testing methods are anything but random.

for starters
this site appears to be from some nutjob, but a lot of the information in there is factual, especially concerning risks.
more - more fruit-cakes? But, a lot of similar information.

probably the best source: here - Appears to not be run by alarmists. There may be as many as 150 cases each year in the U.S. Testing only a couple thousand out of millions isn't likely to find those. (Then again, it has found 3 so far.) But, can you imagine would would happen if big beef business were forced to spend (gasp!) $20 per head to test every animal? With at least 500 pounds of meat per cow, that's... 4 cents per pound to be safe. You know, I think that I wouldn't mind if my $9.99 per pound rib eye went up to $10.03.

:thumbsup: