GM Alfalfa Approved – It’s Criminal, Evil, and Unacceptable

Like on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Google+ Share on LinkedIn Pin to Pinterest Share on StumbleUpon +

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has announced his decision to authorize the unrestricted commercial cultivation of Monsanto’s genetically engineered, herbicide-resistant alfalfa.

The genetically modified alfalfa was developed by Monsanto and Forage Genetics, an alfalfa seed company owned by the Land O’Lakes farming and dairy cooperative. Monsanto’s alfalfa contains a gene that makes the plant resistant to the herbicide Roundup.

As the New York Times notes, Alfalfa is grown mostly to make hay fed to dairy cows and horses, and is the nation’s fourth-largest crop by acreage — more than 20 million is grown in the U.S. — behind corn, soybeans and wheat. About 1 percent of alfalfa is organic.

Vilsack trashed plans that would have restricted growing genetically engineered alfalfa to protect organic farmers from biotech contamination. Monsanto and their various placed stooges in Congress and US regulatory agencies are concerned that restricting the growth of GE alfalfa would “undermine Washington’s efforts to persuade other countries to accept genetically modified crops”.

Monsanto Stooges Infiltrate All USGOVT Levels

In what can only be characterized as a nightmare horror film (Invasion of The Body Snatchers), you cannot awake from, Monsanto has succeeded in placing their ghoulish stooges everywhere:

1) Tom Vilsack previously handled litigation for Monsanto Roundup before becoming Secretary of Agriculture. Vilsack was hailed as “Governor of the Year” in 2001 by the Biotechnology Industry Organization, the largest biotechnology industry group, and “traveled in a Monsanto corporate jet on the campaign trail”.

2) Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, formerly chief counsel for Monsanto, also penned the majority decision in a 2001 case that paved the way for companies like Monsanto to patent seeds.

Last year, The Supreme Court lifted a nationwide ban on the planting of genetically engineered alfalfa seeds, reversing a 2007 California US District Court ruling that the USDA illegally approved Monsanto’s GE alfalfa without carrying out a full Environmental Impact Statement. Only one Justice dissented — Justice John Paul Stevens.

3) Michael Taylor, our current Food Safety Czar is the former Monsanto executive who crafted the FDA’s GMO friendly policy while serving as the FDA’s Deputy commissioner for policy. It was Taylor who wrote the FDA’s guidelines on recombinant bovine growth hormone (rBGH), banning dairies from labeling their milk “rBGH Free“. This was accomplished despite opposition from scientists, farmers and consumers.

As Jeffrey Smith, executive director of the Institute for Responsible Technology points out, Michael Taylor who was in charge of FDA policy in 1992, allowed GMOs on the market without any safety studies and without labeling, and Taylor’s policy claimed that the agency was not aware of any information showing that GMOs were significantly different.

Seven years later, says Smith, because of a lawsuit, 44,000 secret internal FDA memos revealed that that policy was a lie. “Not only were the scientists at the FDA aware that GMOs were different, they had warned repeatedly that they might create allergies, toxins, new diseases and nutritional problems. But they were ignored, and their warnings were even denied, and the policy went forth allowing the deployment GMOs into the food supply with virtually no safety studies.”

Leaked Wikileaks cables revealed that U.S. officials — in the highest levels of government — are involved in a conspiracy with Monsanto to force the global sale and use of genetically-modified foods.

And in the Bush, Clinton, and Obama administrations, Monsanto has prevented consumer “GMO truth-in-labeling laws from getting a public discussion in Congress”.

Betrayal of The Organic Elite

According to the Huffington Post’s Ronnie Cummins, a self-appointed cabal of the Organic Elite, spearheaded by Whole Foods Market, Organic Valley, and Stonyfield Farm, has decided it’s time to surrender to Monsanto.

Top executives from these companies, says Cummins, have publicly admitted that they no longer oppose the mass commercialization of GE crops, such as Monsanto’s controversial Roundup Ready alfalfa, and are prepared to sit down and cut a deal for “coexistence” with Monsanto and USDA biotech cheerleader Tom Vilsack.

In exchange for becoming Monsanto shills, Whole Foods Market wants “compensation” to farmers “for any losses related to the contamination of his crop.” Cummins alleges that Whole Foods and their distributor, United Natural Foods, are part of what Cummins calls an “organic food mafia”.

John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods Market, offers his customers 100 percent organic food, but also pimps GMO wintertime air-freighted mangoes and Argentina asparagus he calls “natural food”.

In fact, “Whole Food’s Dirty Little Secret,” as Cummins puts it, is that most of the so-called “Natural” processed foods and Animal Products they sell are contaminated with GMOs. Whole Foods makes a killing marketing GMO food as “natrual food” by charging premium “organic” prices.

According to Cummins, informed sources disclosed that the CEOs of Whole Foods Market, and Stonyfield are personal friends of Tom Vilsack, and in fact made financial contributions to Vilsack’s previous electoral campaigns.

GMO Food and Truth-in-Labeling Laws

We need to place truth-in-labeling initiatives directly on the ballot in 2011 or 2012. If you’re interesting in helping organize or coordinate a Millions Against Monsanto and Factory Farms Truth-in-Labeling campaign in your local community, sign up here.

To pressure Whole Foods Market and the nation’s largest supermarket chains to voluntarily adopt truth-in-labeling practices sign and circulate this petition widely.

Like on Facebook Share on Twitter Share on Google+ Share on LinkedIn Pin to Pinterest Share on StumbleUpon +

Comments

comments