German company Bayer just acquired American company Monsanto for $66 billion.

Reuters

Cash. That makes it the biggest deal ever in the history of blah blah blah, who gives a shit, are we right?

If you're anything like us, your brain turns off when you hear numbers that big being transferred from one giant group of white guys to another. And traditionally, that's exactly the way giant groups of white guys want it. Especially this one. See, there's reason to believe this particular group of rich white guys shouldn't be trusted with the awesome power they'd have after combining.

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The new, combined company would sell 29 percent of the world's seeds and 24 percent of its pesticides. Once combined, their revenue would be $67.11 billion, which would make them the 70th-largest economy in the world, which means they're larger than 120 countries, including Croatia, Libya, and Bolivia. Of course, that slightly undersells their power, since Croatia doesn't control a major part of America's food supply. Croatia also didn't supply the United States with Agent Orange during the Vietnam War or supply the Nazis with Zyklon B gas during World War II.

Together, Monsanto and Bayer have the kind of resume that makes the Umbrella Corporation look like Ben & Jerry's. For starters, Bayer first launched to mega-corporate-hood when it patented and started selling aspirin and heroin. Here's an ad they published urging parents to give their young children straight-up horse. For their coughing.

Bayer

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And Bayer didn't stop the innovation train at Drugging Children Station. They also got into the profitable business of poisoning vermin. IG Farben, Bayer's parent company until it was broken up after the war, bought a firm that invented the cyanide-based pesticide Zyklon B. Unfortunately for, just, everyone, the Nazi definition of "vermin" covered "everyone who isn't Aryan as fuck, especially Jews," and Zyklon B became a major killing instrument of the Holocaust. Bayer apologized for their role in the Holocaust in 1995, and then four years later, a lawsuit was brought alleging that camp inmates were injected with diseases as part of Bayer clinical trials.

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While we're in the 1940s, it's probably worth pointing out that Monsanto played a critical role in building the atom bomb. To be specific, they helped make the trigger. And during the Vietnam War, they helped manufacture Agent Orange for the U.S. government. Their website emphatically reminds us that eight other companies also produced Agent Orange, and besides it's probably not that bad anyway, you guys.

Monsanto

Monsanto's buck-passing there is pretty egregious, considering the VA is NOT famous for giving away money and readily admits that a ton of health problems among Vietnam veterans can be traced to Agent Orange. Today, the biggest claim against Monsanto is that 300,000 Indian farmers have committed suicide due to the company's expensive seeds and pesticides driving them to bankruptcy and making them ill.

RT