I had to bring this one to everyone's attention for a variety of reasons, most of them having to do with California's recently - and I might add, suspiciously - defeated Proposition 37, that would have required labeling of genetically modified food. As I and many others noted, California was deluged with millions of dollars worth of advertisements, most of which were sponsored by Mon(ster)santo and other corporations up to their earlobes in pushing pathetic products on the market. As I already noted in a previous blog on this subject, the vote on this ballot initiative was called suspiciously early, while millions of votes were still being counted. Here's Jon Rappaport's take on the subject, and the questions this raises, as recently as Nov. 9:

VOTE FRAUD: WHO DESTROYED PROP 37 ON ELECTION NIGHT?

Indeed, that was my first thought as well: how does a granola state like California suddenly defeat such a measure, and by such a margin; admittedly, my gut reaction remains today what it was on election night: it is inconceivable to me that Californians would have defeated the measure, at least, not by this margin.

One of the companies involved in the advertizing campaign was the soft drinks giant Coca Cola. The obvious question here is "why", and the answer is: diet soft drinks, and aspertame. Now, under current labeling practice, aspertame and artificial sweenters have to be labeled on products. But after early assurances that aspertame was entirely safe (think "GMOs are entirely safe), we now have studies increasingly linking the sweetner to cancers:

Aspartame is linked to leukemia and lymphoma in new landmark study on humans Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/037772_aspartame_leukemia_lymphoma.html#ixzz2BnQ9P6tQ

For me the confirming paragraph is the last one, for the common criticism of previous aspertame-cancer studies was precisely the short length of tests, whereas this new study apparently confirms a correlation between prolonged aspertame intake and lymphomas.

Enter Proposition 37 and its suspicious "defeat". Here I ask the reader to indulge me in a bit of speculation on why Coca Cola would have joined the companies lobbying and pushing for its defeat. I have strongly suspected, just as the GMO-labeling proponents (and count me among them) were hoping that CA Prop 37 would be the beginning of a rollback of GMO-friendly regulations, and bureaucracies, nationwide, and the beginning of a new growth of organic food growing and availability, that the same proposition was viewed by its opponents in the corrupt agribusiness world as a gateway to the possibility of rolling back other food labeling laws, and ultimately, with dispensing with them altogether.

The problem is, Californians surprised the agribusiness elites by daring to propose a state measure... and other states should take notice... and introduce similar measures in their own states, insist upon paper ballots, and scrutinize every aspect of such ballot initiatives for scrupulous fairness. And do it again and again, until the measure succeeds, and let the GMO businesses spend millions to defeat such measures, each time. Note to Californians: don't give up, do it again,a nd again; Note to everyone else: do it in your state or province as well

See you on the flip side.