GMO Answers (Biotechnology website GMOAnswers.com) Posted 5 years ago under Uncategorized

GMOs have been around for thirty years, but recently, a new website gained popularity and public scientist support that auspiciously fostered connections between academics at well-known U.S. universities and agricultural-chemical corporations that manufacture, distribute, advertise and push GMO, genetically modified organisms, on Americans. Most Americans, in fact over 90%, want labels on their food in order to know if the ingredients have been genetically modified or not. This is of great concern to humans that, with due credit, suspect that eating chemical pesticides could cause cancer, Alzheimer’s, lowered immunity, suppressed brain function, disrupted central nervous system functioning, and a host of other chronic-care, yet preventable diseases and disorders. Genetically modified organisms serving as pesticides is new to the world, as of just thirty years ago, when “agri-chemical” companies first discovered how to insert pesticide genes into the seedlings of corn and soy without killing them. The website gmoanswers.com is ironically not scientific at all, but rather a response to this valid, monumental concern that health enthusiasts have about this new technology that is experimental and infantile in it’s depth of true research regarding safety, efficacy, and resistance to bugs, weeds and crop disease.

The top questions posed and answered by the biotechnology constructed Q&A (home page) address several concerns they have most likely received from skeptics and scientific or holistic person’s questioning their tactics and less-than-thorough science proof. Why would anyone want to eat a product that contains pesticide on the inside and outside when organic foods have been proven safe for thousands of years? (1)

Do people believe that the biotechnology, chem-ag firms will take over all food and seeds and make everything genetically modified, thus controlling all the seeds of the world? How can we sustain our soil, animals and humans if we are inserting the genes of toxic, dangerous pesticides into the food and then spraying those fruits and vegetables with more toxic herbicide, insecticide, fungicide, algaecide, and foreign bacteria or virus that otherwise would not normally or naturally enter our food? How can that be called sustainable farming practice?

And finally, what is the true difference in cost, when true yield is examined, and the healthcare costs for those who suffer from GMO toxicity and exposure to these chemicals on the farms and fields of America? Are we actually using MORE pesticide, since the superbugs and superweeds have become immune or “resistant” to the new super-toxic cocktails of pesticides? These are the concerns that gmoanswers.com must address in order to quell public fear of their practices, and companies like Monsanto, Dow, Dupont, BASF, Bayer, Cargill and Syngenta (3) want to be sure they’ve countered every major concern, so they’ve hired and paid scientists and PR firms to draft up some user-friendly propaganda. (2)

Dirty NY Public Relations firm feeds answers to GMOAnswers.com via public scientists and academics

Ketchum PR group and “Frankenfoods” Monsanto organize (recruit) dozens of “public scientists” from universities around the country and journalistic hacks (shills) who reiterate prolific-sounding industry slogans and rhetoric (4) that have no scientific basis in order to brainwash the public and government officials alike into accepting this new, dangerous form of agriculture–genetically modified organisms functioning as pesticides and combined with synthetic, chemical insecticides, herbicides, and fungicides, and then inserted into the genetic makeup of our food. Here’s the header at the top of the home page on gmoanswers.com:

“More than 100 experts have contributed to this site including independent experts in leading academic institutions, industry groups and representatives from member companies.”

More than a few of those “ experts ” have been caught recently in a dirty public relations game (5) of promoting propaganda for money and luxurious favors. The US Right to Know group used the FOIA – Freedom of Information Act, to request email correspondence that reveals a whole hidden inner-network of biotechnology companies paying off university scientists and public scientists to say exactly what industry hacks have written in their own literature about the so-called safety, sustainability, drought-resistant miracles they’ve somehow created with chemical pesticides inserted into seeds.

Epitomes of the Corporate Shills

Among the top creators, website launchers and “experts” answering questions at GMOAnswers.com are the following:

Georgina Gustin, Staff Writer, CQ RoleCall and Dwell Media –

Launched gmoanswers.com; Covers Monsanto and most other biotech propaganda

Jenny Hopkinson, Agriculture and Food Policy Issues Reporter, Politico –

Top GMOAnswers specialist; vies for deregulation of biotechnology

Dr. Kevin M. Folta, Chairman and Associate Professor, University of Florida –

Horticultural Sciences Dept., Plant Innovation Program & Molecular Biology

GMOAnswers specialist and Monsanto’s favorite of the whole “enlisted” response team.

Linguistics tricks and illegal “paid-for” propaganda

Most of the answers, language and diction found on GMOAnswers.com is directly derived from the agrichemical industry hacks’ writing themselves, and those same writers use many words that have no business anywhere in the biotech “manuals” or “guides” for agriculture, such as the word sustainable. Huge corporations implement dirty tricks and industry lingo that’s designed to fool authorities, like the USDA , and the public, into believing their methods and products are somehow tested for safety. True independent experts do not accept gifts and bribes from corporations, especially not to say and write what the corporations want them to say and write. This is fraud and would be illegal, not to mention unethical. Public scientists, reporters and journalists alike are supposed to report the truth as best they can and let the public be the final decider on the facts and/or theories with scientific evidence that at least support it. (6)

These so-called experts are far from independent, as revealed by the US Right to Know group (USRTK) through FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) requests for hundreds (possibly thousands) of emails and documents sent back and forth from public scientists to PR firms to Monsanto and other Biotech firm representatives. This collusion of industries between agricultural biotechnology and academics that study science and communication is an atrocity that must be revealed to all consumers, for their safety and ingredient awareness regarding every product they purchase and consume. (7)

Because the website GMOAnswers is funded by the industry giants, including Monsanto, DuPont, BASF, Bayer and Syngenta, there is much money to be “thrown around” to inspire public scientists and academics to regurgitate industry lies without any scientific proof, simply because they enjoy science and enjoy the cash and gift payoffs.

On the “Studies and Articles” page of gmoanswers.com, you will see the following quote:

“The viewpoints expressed by our contributors are their own and do not necessarily represent those of the Council for Biotechnology Information.” Notice the linguistics and context they deliver when they tell you that the viewpoints “do not necessarily represent” those of CBI. The site, as uncovered in emails, is a “straight-up marketing tool to spin GMOs in a positive light.” So they are spin doctors, more-or-less who are showered with extravagant gifts to take something bad and make it sound good, but in this case, it’s not some gimmick or cheap product for sale on late night television, but rather 90% of America’s staple crop (corn, soy, canola, cottonseed, alfalfa, sugar beets) converted into food that contains chemical pesticides in their genetic makeup. These public scientists, public speakers and journalists lie through their teeth in order to receive grants that, as Monsanto reps write, “may be used at your discretion in support of your research and outreach projects.”

Public Scientists Regurgitate Industry Lies Verbatim

Dr. Folta of University of Florida has sworn up and down for years that he has no financial ties to Monsanto and would never accept money (personal compensation) from them, that he is not a shill or a huckster, although now it is proven that he has done exactly that– accepted bribes –and is exactly that–a shill for Monsanto (8) . He has outright offered a “solid return” on Monsanto’s investment in him, and he has outright offered to “write anything” they want him to write. This is not a public scientist. This is a man who loves science and loves making easy money for regurgitating industry-fabricated lies about GMOs and theories and products in use right now that neither he nor the corporation ever tested for safety regarding the environment, farm animals, crops or humans who consume them.

Nobody tests GMO for safety because no regulatory agency opposes GMO

The biotech industry can hire anyone they want to – – for attesting to their rogue and reckless technologies, including public relations firms that run their websites, because the scripted responses will never be held to the test of science, at least not by the US government or the regulatory agencies like the FDA, USDA , CDC or the EPA, that fully support GMO and marketing it all to Americans with no labels or warnings whatsoever. The PR firm Ketchum runs GMOAnswers.com. “Public Scientist” Kevin Folta is one of the most frequent contributors to the website and has been exposed for cutting and pasting exact scripted answers to the site that “Frankenfoods” Monsanto sent him, even though they told him to make his responses authentically his own. After doing this, Folta could not remember later whether he “used them, modified them or what” – – per the emails revealed by USRTK.

Private sector scientists are being revealed as charlatans lately, and now the health enthusiasts across the world that suspected this deep-seeded brain-washing and blatant miseducation by the biotech industry are proven right. This strengthens the fight for organic food that is free of chemical pesticides and genetically modified and mutated organisms that cause cancer, Alzheimer’s and other preventable diseases. This strengthens the organic, clean food movement and the dire need for consumers to read the labels of all products to distinguish these lethal food chemicals the biotech industry has manipulated and modified to seem normal and beneficial in the eyes of millions of unknowing, unsuspecting chemical-food victims.

These FOIA revelations are huge but are only the tip of the iceberg, revealing a long arduous battle for human rights, ethics in agriculture, MORE stringent regulations, checks and balances, and thorough investigations of any PUBLIC SCIENTISTS or JOURNALISTS who defend or apologize for GMO. The public now knows, with proof, that they recruit and enlist these plant scientists to be shills for their “toughest” GMO questions and answers.

The Council for Biotechnology Information (CBI), which funds GMO Answers, includes most if not all the major biotechnology companies and corporations, who know the value of fooling millions of people into believing their agricultural practices are sustainable. Much like the Genetic Literacy Project, run by the most notorious shill, Jon Entine, former writer for Forbes.com, GMO Answers is a front for biotech propaganda meant to derail any skeptics of GMO and further convolute the gray area where GMO manufacturers have not proven GMOs are safe nor proven safety of their own massively toxic and destructive chemical agents they use in combination with their own patented toxins, and market as being safe, sustainable herbicides and insecticides. (9)

Food Transparency Campaign Gains Ground from FOIA Revelations

The US Right to Know investigation of this intricate networking of biotech fraud has revealed over 4,500 pages of emails and other records of the propaganda campaign being run by biotech, mainly Monsanto. US Right to Know has referred to Ketchum PR firm out of New York as a marketing tool being used to spin and flip the whole GMO image, which is not very good right now, and getting worse fast, ironically. Monsanto must have forgot that the records of public-sector researchers are all subject to freedom-of-information laws, that, or Folta just got too sloppy and carefree and blew the whole thing wide open.

Folta actually used material provided by Ketchum’s PR representatives as his own GMO answers, so essentially a PR firm is brainwashing millions of people and a public scientist is signing his name to it for $25,000 here and there, to be used at his discretion to promote GMO, without any science to back it up. These are the same shills who refer to anyone who challenges their concocted theories as “anti-science.” Meanwhile, Folta has gone on record time and time again saying he has no connections to Monsanto and has never taken “a dime” or any gifts from them. (10)

Glyphosate Apologist and Monsanto “Public Scientist” #1 Puppet: Kevin Folta

Dr. Kevin Folta, the favorite speaker and writer of the “enlisted response team” for GMOanswers.com, has been known to fly off the rails, by daring to drink Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide during public talks and he posts on Twitter that he drinks this known carcinogen and registered poison in order to convince consumers it’s safe. On Twitter, he said he drinks it “to demonstrate harmlessness.” On another occasion he declared , “I’m going to tip a freshly-opened pint next week at ISU. No fear here. Trust science.”

This is the same “clowny” and radical “public scientist” guy who promised Monsanto reps a solid return on (their) investment (in him).

Disclosures of industry payments such as these, most notably by scientific journals, proves this networking has been going on since the inception of GMO. The AMA and the notorious Morris Fishbein ran their racket in a similar fashion nearly a century ago. (11)

Sources:

(1) http://usrtk.org/hall-of-shame/

(2) https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/2303691-kevin-folta-uoffloridadocs.html#document/p10/a237532

(3) http://www.ncbiotech.org/content/agbiotech-summit-bios

(4) https://gmoanswers.com/

(5) http://www.truthwiki.org/dr-kevin-folta-university-of-florida/

(6) http://www.truthwiki.org/usda-and-monsanto-biotech-industry-collusion/

(7) http://www.naturalnews.com/051096_science_for_sale_Monsanto_financial_influence.html#ixzz3mCBqB079

(8) http://www.naturalnews.com/047667_Jon_Entine_biotech_front_man_wife_abuser.html

(9) http://www.truthwiki.org/monsanto/

(10) http://gmwatch.org/news/latest-news/16340-kevin-folta-received-25-000-from-monsanto