They want to make it ALL illegal. What do you think of Senate Bill 510

[poltroon]

Quote:
1. FDA has no regulatory power over seeds. That is USDA (and, to some extent, states).

2. The current commissioner of the FDA is a woman, Margaret Hamburg, M.D. She has done research in neuroscience, and before she was FDA head, she was the top public health official for New York City. I do not believe she has ever worked for Monsanto. You can read her bio here.

3. USDA is headed by Tom Vilsack. His previous job was Governor of Iowa. I do not believe he has ever worked for Monsanto (though it is possible and likely that he's had campaign contributions from them).

I am sure someone working at USDA or FDA has worked for Monsanto and I'm sure some people who work for Monsanto used to work for FDA or USDA. Certainly it's appropriate to keep one's eye on them.

 

[Katy]

`
Quote:
Do you even realize that Monsanto is not a person but a large corporation? You refer to Monsanto in your post as if it is a person.`

 

[6chickens in St. Charles]

So..........how did it turn out? Is there a law now about gardens and backyard chickens?

 

[Ridgerunner]

6chickens in St. Charles :

So..........how did it turn out? Is there a law now about gardens and backyard chickens?

No, it was never about that. That is pretty obvious if you actually read the bill.​

 

[buildingmyark]

Quote:
No, it was never about that. That is pretty obvious if you actually read the bill.

Yeah, we were all just wasting our time researching and trying to discuss this topic as an assignment for our law school class (sarcasm*) . We, well I feel threatened by this bill mostly because we don't trust those in charge of our government.

"Dangerous laws created by well intentioned people today can be used by dangerous people with evil intentions tomorrow.”
-Alan Eppers

"The purpose of government is to rein in the rights of the people"
William Jefferson Clinton; during an interview on MTV in 1993 Note: Finally, we get a politician to admit it!

"We can't be so fixated on our desire to preserve the rights of ordinary Americans . . . ."
William J. Clinton, USA Today, March 11, 1993
Note: No, he has to be fixated on destroying our individual rights.

 

[BlackBart]

Quote:
Its not about a political party. It goes beyond that.

Monsanto Corporation has donated almost equally to the Democrats and Republicans.
http://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/pacgot.php?cycle=2010&cmte=C00042069

Monsanto's Government ties, not sure what party these people belong to. Pretty sure Clarence Thomas and Rumsfeld are Republican (aren't they?)
http://www.redicecreations.com/specialreports/monsanto.html

 

[oswegoscott]

Quote:
Unless you are a farmer selling over $500,000 worth of crops, I don't believe this bill creates restrictions on you. I could be wrong. Perhaps you are one of those farmers and you have concerns. If there's a specific thing you won't be able to do, that's information that is worth sharing.

Something to keep in mind: just about every regulation, whether it works out for good or ill, is there because someone was seriously harmed or died. That doesn't mean that the regulation is always 100% good or without its own consequences. But, regulations are added because someone didn't take responsibility, and because the free market cannot bring people back from the dead.

The 1938 Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act - the law that SB510 amends - was itself created in the wake of deaths and injuries.

An article discussing that act is here, and the text for the specific incident is here:

In any event, 5 years later, Watkins moved his family to the relatively cloistered city of Bristol to join the Massengill company as head chemist. He was 55. In the summer of 1937, he set out to find a liquid vehicle for sulfonilamide at the company and turned his attention to the glycols. He based this decision on their chemical similarity to glycerine, a commonly used solvent in liquid pharmaceuticals [19]. He soon discovered that he could dissolve as many as 75 grains of sulfanilamide in 1 fluid ounce of clear, odorless diethylene glycol. However, the resultant solution tended to separate on chilling, so he reduced the antibiotic concentration to 40 grains per fluid ounce and quickly settled on the following mass-quantity recipe for a stable product [1]:

Sulfanilamide, 58½ pounds
Elixir flavor, 1 gallon
Raspberry extract, 1 pint
Saccharine, soluble, 1 pound
Amaranth solution, 1-16, 1½ pints [a synethic, bright red, azo dye, which was presumably added to resemble the color of the patented Prontosil]
Caramel, 2 fluid ounces
Diethylene glycol, 60 gallons
Water q. s., 80 gallons

No animal or clinical tests were conducted by Watkins or the company at large to determine the toxicity of the individual ingredients or that of the combination. Any possible effects of diethylene glycol on sulfanilamide were also left to chance. The company's sole process for quality control consisted of checking the elixir for its appearance, flavor, and fragrance. The Acting Chief of FDA's Drug Division, Theodore Klumpp, bluntly described the company's elixir development: "[T]he only criteria of its safety and value as a medicine were that the ingredients were mixed, did not immediately explode, and the color, taste and smell of the product were satisfactory to their so-called control department" [20].

Watkins was evidently unaware that, for several years, the FDA had advised against the use of glycol solvents in foods, on the basis of limited safety data [21]. He was also presumably ignorant of 2 published reports, one in 1931 and one in early 1937, which described the lethality of diethylene glycol in experimental animals [22,23].

diethylene glycol is, of course, antifreeze, and highly poisonous.

Commercial lots from 1 pint to 1 gallon were shipped from Massengill's Bristol and Kansas City plants, as well as from its New York and San Francisco sales branches. In all, 633 shipments were made. The product label (example below) failed to list the product's ingredients, other than sulfanilamide. In addition, a total of 671 physicians' or salesmen's samples were sent from Bristol or Kansas City.* In time with the mass distribution, a promotional brochure for physicians announced, "Our research department has just released an Elixir Sulfanilamide...It is ideal for your patients who can take liquids—but little else. Also, it is not unpleasant to take, so is suitable for children" [28].

Both commercial and sample lots were distributed nationwide through October 15, 1937—the same day that Tulsa physicians telegraphed the AMA to convey their autopsy findings from 5 children who had consumed the elixir.

This was written by a doctor, who had no idea what the inactive ingredients were, and who dispensed it to patients, who died:

"Nobody but Almighty God and I can know what I have been through these past few days. I have been familiar with death in the years since I received my M.D. from Tulane University School of Medicine with the rest of my class of 1911. Covington County has been my home. I have practiced here for years. Any doctor who has practiced more than a quarter of a century has seen his share of death.
"But to realize that six human beings, all of them my patients, one of them my best friend, are dead because they took medicine that I prescribed for them innocently, and to realize that that medicine which I had used for years in such cases suddenly had become a deadly poison in its newest and most modern form, as recommended by a great and reputable pharmaceutical firm in Tennessee: well, that realization has given me such days and nights of mental and spiritual agony as I did not believe a human being could undergo and survive. I have known hours when death for me would be a welcome relief from this agony." (Letter by Dr. A.S. Calhoun, October 22, 1937)
FDA: Taste of Raspberries, Taste of Death: The 1937 Elixir Sulfanilamide Incident

Over 100 people died before the news got out.

The FDA could only fine Massengill for labeling the product as an elixir when it contained no alcohol. It wasn't against the law to adulterate medicines with poisonous solvents, nor was it the law that all the ingredients had to be on the package.

The chemist who created the raspberry sulfa drops committed suicide.

The public was outraged, and this incident is why the FDA was given the authority to require that companies test drugs before marketing them.​

Many people here indicate that they have read the Tester Amendment. Did you know that there are STILL many small farmers who can't read well,or at all? They work hard and support themselves & a family.
The ones who can read--won't this burden them due to the time required to fulfill the requirements? Those who depend on tourists can NOT sell to them if they live more then 275 miles away.
How many will be affected in Florida alone? Sellers will need to have a computer handy to calculate mileage.
Here it is;

First, the Tester Amendment purports to exempt farms with less than $500,000 in sales from the requirements of S.510. However, to be “exempt” one must sell more than 50% of their products directly to consumers or restaurants within a 275-mile radius from production, and keep records substantiating those sales. The records are open for inspection and verification of the exemption. In other words, you have to prove you are playing by their rules through record keeping and approval of those records, or meet the more onerous requirements of S.510.

You must “apply” to be included in the “protections” of the Tester amendment. You must substantiate through your records for three years that you fit the category of selling more than “50% of average annual monetary value” within this 275-mile radius. So, if you sell on the roadside or at a farmers market, you must have a map handy and ask for ID from everyone who purchases from you or lose your exemption. Nice, huh?​

 

[oswegoscott]

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There are no parties. 99% of "them" are in it for personal gain-at our expense. Sometimes their actions will benefit someone--but that sho ain't the criteria

 

[Katy]

Quote:
HUH? Most farmers in my area are college or trade school educated and can certainly read very well. We have to be to get thru the mound of paperwork we already deal with at the FSA office and to do our book-keeping.

 

[Ridgerunner]

Quote:
No, it was never about that. That is pretty obvious if you actually read the bill.

Yeah, we were all just wasting our time researching and trying to discuss this topic as an assignment for our law school class (sarcasm*) . We, well I feel threatened by this bill mostly because we don't trust those in charge of our government.

"Dangerous laws created by well intentioned people today can be used by dangerous people with evil intentions tomorrow.”
-Alan Eppers

"The purpose of government is to rein in the rights of the people"
William Jefferson Clinton; during an interview on MTV in 1993 Note: Finally, we get a politician to admit it!

"We can't be so fixated on our desire to preserve the rights of ordinary Americans . . . ."
William J. Clinton, USA Today, March 11, 1993
Note: No, he has to be fixated on destroying our individual rights.

Great. Since you studied it, maybe you can be the first on this thread to point to specific provisions of this bill and explain how you feel that specific provision threatens you. I don't mean general comments with no backing, but specific provisions and its effect as you see it. I think you will be really challenged to come up with anything that prevents me from growing my own food or saving my own seeds. I do not consider Oswegoscott's post to qualify since no link to specific text was provided.

Best I understand, the current version exempts certain small operations that sells food to the public from the requirements. It does require an operation of a certain size (I believe a half a million dollars is the current cut-off) to keep a paper trail so that tainted food can be traced. There are also some inspections of the larger operations that can be performed. It also would allow the government to force a recall of tainted food instead of depending on voluntary recalls. Several of the provisions are aimed at food imported from abroad, but yes several also are aimed at food raised and sold in the US. This is an attempt to update a 70 year old law regarding food safety on the premise that things may have changed in the agricultural business in the last 70 years. It is also a response to the approximately 76 million illnesses, 325,000 hospitalizations, and 5,000 deaths in the United States each year caused by foodborne ilnesses. These numbers do not differenciate between illnesses and deaths caused by meat and poultry and other foodstuffs so I do not know how many of the above numbers would be affected by this bill. This bill is about the FDA, not the USDA. The USDA is responsible for meat and poultry. The FDA has no jurisdiction over meat and poultry, so this bill never did threaten anyone's chickens.

In general, Big Agriculture supports this bill. Not because it wipes out the little man as competition, but because if a small operation starts selling tainted food and there is no paper trail to show where it came from, the public stops buying all of that product, including the produce of the big corporations. That severely hurts profits. It also hurts international sales if tainted food is in the marketplace and no one can prove where it came from. So Big Agriculture wants good inspection of everyone to find the source of the tainted food and restore confidence in the food supply. They are not really in favor of the Tester Amendment since it exempts some operations from this inspection requirement.

I’ll include a link to the Tester Amendment. I’m not sure this is the actual latest version. If there is a later version, can somebody please supply a link.

http://farmandranchfreedom.org/sff/Tester-Hagan-amendment-Sept-2010.pdf

Line 22 on page 3 is where it talks about the $500,000 exemption.

Line 10 on page 6 is where it talks about the End User. Among other things, the limit is 400 miles. The way I read this, it has nothing to do with where the customer lives. It has to do with where the food is sold or consumed. If your roadside stand is more than 400 miles from where the food was produced, I will admit you might not fall under this exemption.

Page 7 line 12 talks about where they have to perform a study to actually determine how much food borne illness is caused by what size and type of facility to help determine realistic limits and exemptions. They have 18 months to complete this study and issue a report. I suspect the exemptions may be tweaked after they get actual data of risk to base the exemptions on.