While we all fuss about guns, our food supply is about to kill us!

[truedelphi]

If you grew up during the Vietnam era, you remember Agent Orange. Agent Orange was the notorious herbicide that was stored in orange barrels. Once it was transported to Vietnam, it was then used as a defoliant, and aerially dispersed above the heads of everyone residing in Vietnam. There were several reasons for defoliating that nation: one reason was to disrupt their food supply, in violation of the Geneva Convention. The second reason was so that the massive jungle ground cover that hid the Troops of the Viet Cong would be removed.

The unexpected result was that there were millions of miscarriages, and millions of babies who were born affected by some type of birth defect. Of course, the majority of these health travesties were endured by the people of Vietnam; however, due to the high level of service personnel from the USA's military serving in or near Vietnam during those years, some of the problems came home to affect us here.

Now a new threat from Agent Orange is upon us. With so much of our soy, corn and rice grown in this nation utilizing the RoundUp ready seeds that are genetically modified to withstand applications of RoundUp, experts watching the situation were predicting that the very weeds the RoundUp herbicde should remove would start to show resistance to the pesticide. Even back in the early 2000's, there were reports coming from Canadian farmers that a SuperWeed was resulting from the RoundUp applications, and that these weeds needed to be removed manually or else with a more powerful herbicide.

Reports now are coming out that our governing agencies will be approving gent Orange for use on our food crops. Since early march, 2013, activists concerned about the safety of our food supply have been giving us some heads up on what is to come. I offer up two citations, one from an "alt News" source, and one from "Business Week," a Main$tream news source:

Source One:
http://www.anh-usa.org/agent-orange-on-our-crops/

One of the two active ingredients that made up Agent Orange is 2,4-D. Despite what Agent Orange did to Vietnam and the Vietnamese people, not to mention a generation of American soldiers, 2,4-D is currently the most widely used herbicide in the world, and the third most commonly used in North America. But apparently we aren’t using this poison enough. By using seeds engineered to withstand it, much more can be applied to our soil and crops.

One of the biggest reasons for genetic engineering of crops is that the harsh poisons used to kill weeds also tend to kill the crops themselves. Scientists genetically alter the crops’ DNA so they will resist damage from the herbicides. Most of the attention to date has been on the creation of Roundup Ready seeds—that is, seeds and crops that can withstand the herbicide Roundup from Monsanto. According to USDA figures, 94 percent of soybeans and more than 70 percent of corn and cotton planted in the US contain the Roundup-resistant gene.

Not at all surprisingly, weeds are becoming increasingly resistant to Roundup, creating “superweeds” which are “galloping through the Midwest.” So Dow AgroScience created a strain of corn that has been genetically engineered to withstand a different class of herbicides—those containing 2,4-D, a known carcinogen.

####

Source Two:
On March 3, 2013, main$tream news source "Business Week" reported on the situation with need to fast track approval of Agent Orange for use on crops that have weeds that are now immune/resistant to RoundUp. Yes, you will indeed discover that Obama's USDA wants to fast-track the applications for Monsanto and Dow Chemical genetically engineered crops, reducing the process from an average of three years to either thirteen or sixteen months. Written from a business standpoint, as in: ‘Watch those stocks rise in value!’, the verbiage is nonetheless startling, as the piece implies that the crops will be approved. They’re right, they will:

“The move to speed biotech approvals comes as seed-makers develop new technologies aimed at slowing the spread of so- called superweeds that are no longer killed by Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide. Half of the 12 plants designated for faster review by the USDA are herbicide-tolerant crops made by Monsanto, Dow, DuPont Co., Bayer AG (BAYN) and BASF AG.

“Farmers needs technology right now to help them with issues such as weed resistance,” Kenda Resler-Friend, a spokeswoman for Midland, Michigan-based Dow, said today in a telephone interview. “The USDA realizes that the longer farmers have to wait, the longer the weeds are going to get a head start.”

[newfie11]

1. Wake the hell up America

This is absurd.
Rachel Carson must be rolling over in her grave.

[truedelphi]

4. I agree. I think that Rachel started rolling over in her grave,

Around the time that "The New Yorker," which was the magazine that had serialized her novel "Silent Spring," began to shower accolades on Monsanto's top executive.

Under Tina Brown, The New Yorker became a Main$ream propaganda rag, used for purposes of selling us teh MIC's version of reality, and no longer cared about the Truth.

[Buzz Clik]

2. "2,4-D, a known carcinogen"? Starting when?

That certainly is not the consensus opinion.

[truedelphi]

5. Yes, under the revolving door that is now used to "weed

Out" the Corporate Scientists from real researchers, we all hear all the time, how safe all our products are.

In a most powerfully prophetic manner, Eisenhower had it right when he originally tried to state that the public needed to be vigilant against the Military/Industrial/Governmental forces that were descending on our population. But his advisers made him cut the word "governmental" from the expression.

Even so, from a study of 2, 4 D commissioned by the National Institute of Health's eight scientists in 1991, one of the researchers believed that it was extremely probable that the substance would lead to non-Hodgkins sarcoma.

[Buzz Clik]

6. It's not one extreme versus the other -- "known carcinogen" vs "totally safe"

Anyone with any training in chemical application or anyone who has bothered to read the label on any chemical you can buy knows that pesticides of all types have danger associated with them. If you follow the guidelines outlined on the label, the chances of encountering a health problem are greatly diminished.

But "known carcinigen" has a very specific meaning.

Even so, from a study of 2, 4 D commissioned by the National Institute of Health's eight scientists in 1991, one of the researchers believed that it was extremely probable that the substance would lead to non-Hodgkins sarcoma.

And two follow-up studies disagreed, finding the results inconclusive and not supportive of the original claim.

Even in the absence of the two subsequent studies, the most extreme statement you could make with scientific backing would be "suspected carcinogen".

[truedelphi]

14. If we ever got a Blue Ribbon Panel of scientists, headed by someone

With impeccable credentials, such as John Froines, I bet we would get at the truth. But getting John Froines to head a panel and look into the safety of an item comes with a price. The last politician that got such a panel assembled, got to be able to state with scientific certainty that MTBE the gas additive was a no benefit, only risk proposition. And then the MTBE was banned. Unfortunately, that politician, Gov Davis of California, was pretty much almost immediately recalled and then replaced by Schwarzenegger, who used Big Oil money to help elect himself to that office.

[Buzz Clik]

15. What was wrong with the other panels?

[bvar22]

3. DURec.

My Wife & I feel so strongly about the contamination of our the Factory Food Production, Handling,Transportation, Processing, Packaging, and Distribution system
that we moved to The Woods and started growing our own.

All GM crops (including products like Corn Syrup), as well as all non-natural pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers are forever banned.

[otohara]

7. Fuss Over Guns?

I just love how our gun problem gets diminished all the time in comparison to all our other problems.

I gave up crap food years ago, along with all the chemical & fragrance laced products in the everything from dish soap to lotion. I don't have control over the gun problem, I don't want to die a violent bloody death. I worry about my healthy son who travels this country with a band. Two of the places they've played had shootings recently.

[truedelphi]

9. Statistically speaking, your son and

All of the rest of us are about 550 times more likely to be killed by someone texting and driving, or cell phoning and driving.

And alcohol related deaths in cars eclipse even that statistic - every nine minutes, another American dies in an alcohol related road fatality.

There is no real way to have gun control. The folks in the ghetto didn't start owning assault rifles until back in the 1980's, when our beloved CIA left tens of thousands of the weapons on railroad cars in inner city RR tracks.

In any event, it is possible to be steamed up and pro-active about two items of concern at one point in time. I confess that one of my reasons for living out here in very rural America is because I don't have to worry about being shot over a parking spot.

[JohnyCanuck]

8. Seeds of Freedom documentary - free to view online

The story of seed has become one of loss, control, dependence and debt. It’s been written by those who want to make vast profit from our food system, no matter what the true cost. It’s time to change the story.

Seeds of Freedom charts the story of seed from its roots at the heart of traditional, diversity rich farming systems across the world, to being transformed into a powerful commodity, used to monopolise the global food system.The film highlights the extent to which the industrial agricultural system, and genetically modified (GM) seeds in particular, has impacted on the enormous agro -biodiversity evolved by farmers and communities around the world, since the beginning of agriculture.

Seeds of Freedom seeks to challenge the mantra that large-scale, industrial agriculture is the only means by which we can feed the world, promoted by the pro-GM lobby. In tracking the story of seed it becomes clear how corporate agenda has driven the take over of seed in order to make vast profit and control of the food global system.

Through interviews with leading international experts such as Dr Vandana Shiva and Henk Hobbelink, and through the voices of a number of African farmers, the film highlights how the loss of indigenous seed goes hand in hand with loss of biodiversity and related knowledge; the loss of cultural traditions and practices; the loss of livelihoods; and the loss of food sovereignty. The pressure is growing to replace the diverse, nutritional, locally adapted and resilient seed crops which have been bred by small-scale farmers for millenia, by monocultures of GM seed.

http://www.seedsoffreedom.info/

Watch the documentary online here: http://www.seedsoffreedom.info/watch-the-film/watch-the-film-english/

[truedelphi]

10. What a great link, and thank you for adding it to the discussion.

I'd been trying to remember the name of that documentary, and now I have it.

[JohnyCanuck]

11. Another good video on the importance of maintaining bio-diversity in our seeds.....

in order to ensure the viability of human life on planet earth.

From the Real News Network:
Subsidized Corn Destroying Global Bio-Diversity

James Boyce Pt.3: Industrial agriculture threatening existence of small farmers growing corn in Mexico and Guatemala; potatoes in Peru and the Andes; rice in Bangladesh and Southeast Asia - farmers who maintain the reservoir for adaptation of crops to new insects, new pests, and climate change

[Motown_Johnny]

12. Factually incorrect statements abound in the OP.

Just glancing casually at the OP it is impossible to overlook the falsehoods. For one thing Roundup does not contain any 2,4-D, it contains Glyphosate.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glyphosate




Yes, Agent Orange was 50% 2,4-D but the other 50% was 2,4,5-T and that was outlawed in the U.S in 1985. 2,.4-D is still in use... for a reason. Blaming the illnesses caused by Agent Orange on the safer chemical is a pretty transparent way to mislead the reader.



Calling 2,4-D a known carcinogen without any documentation, or even any supporting statement is also a real problem here. The jury is still out on this issue.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2,4-Dichlorophenoxyacetic_acid

Cancer risk [edit]

Studies have yielded conflicting results, and different organizations have taken different stances, with regard to the cancer risk of 2,4-D. In 1987, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) concluded that the phenoxy acid herbicides including 2,4-D, MCPA and 2,4,5-T as a group were classified as a class 2B carcinogen - "possibly carcinogenic to humans".[15] A 1990 study of farmers in Nebraska, even when adjusting for exposure to other chemicals, found that 2,4-D exposure substantially increased the risk of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma (NHL).[16]

A 1995 panel of 13 scientists reviewing studies on the carcinogenicity of 2,4-D had divided opinions. None of the scientists thought the weight of the evidence indicated that 2,4-D was a “known” or “probable” cause of human cancer. The predominant opinion indicated that it is possible that 2,4-D can cause cancer in humans, although not all of the panelists believed the possibility was equally likely: one thought the possibility was strong, leaning toward probable, and five thought the possibility was remote, leaning toward unlikely. Two panelists believed it unlikely that 2,4-D can cause cancer in humans.[17]

A 2000 study of 1517 former employees of Dow Chemical Company who had been exposed to the chemical in manufacturing or formulating 2,4-D found no significant increase in risk of mortality due to NHL following 2,4-D exposure, but did find an increase in risk of mortality due to amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.[18] On August 8, 2007, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency issued a ruling that stated that existing data do not support a link between human cancer and 2,4-D exposure.



Also, Canada outlawed 2,4-D in 2008. Why are we just now, 5 years later, seeing "super weeds" develop in Canada that are resistant to this chemical? How about we look to where the product is still in use, like the U.S. so that we can see the plain truth. These "super weeds" are not present where we still use 2,4-D but are present where they do not use it. Think that one through for a minute.. go ahead... just think about it.


I could go on but why bother? This thread belongs in "Creative Speculation".

[truedelphi]

13. As to your point one that you want to discuss:

Your point number one:

You say -
Just glancing casually at the OP it is impossible to overlook the falsehoods. For one thing Roundup does not contain any 2,4-D, it contains Glyphosate.

I did not say that RoundUp contains 2, 4 D. What my OP is stating is that because of the pernicious effects of RoundUp, to wit, that it ends up resulting in mutated weeds that are super weeds, and that can no longer be able to be done in by RoundUp so that now the farmers have to go one level higher, that is to more toxic herbicides, and to engineering crops that are about resistance to 2,4 D.

So please re-read this and think about it before you respond.

[truedelphi]

19. As far as the superweeds that you want to discuss, here are

Some considerations to take into account and can catch up on the subject:

In principle the new transgenic plants should pose the same environmental risks as new plants generated by traditional breeding.

In practice, it may prove that the risks from some transgenic novelties will considerably exceed the risks of the conventionally bred plants. Transgenes may be able to produce larger nd quicker jumps in adaptation

For instance, there is the possibility, whenever farmers employ the new GM seeds, there is a certain amount of risk of hybridization with trans gene infiltration into related weed and/or wild species of plants, that are occupying agricultural and /or disturbed sites and/or alteration of natural gene frequencies in these species.

Weeds that are presently inconsequential could become invigorated to the point that they become a more serious problem.

In the UK for example, Raybould and Gray 1993 examined the probability of introgression from crops into wild species, (both introduced wild weeds and indigenous species) and noted a range of probability from minimal to very high, depending on the particular crop and its wild relatives.

Weeds that are already very successful may become even more of a problem, once these changes occur.

So when you examine the Canadian farmers problem with the new superweeds, most of which I know of that came from the use of Gm rapeseed, then you realize that the fears of those early activists against Gm crops have been right all along.

Never forget for a minute that much of what constitutes the various methods and blueprints for creating Gm seeds came from e majoprity of researchers who were steeped in the mythology of the fact that a good deal of the DNA of a plant species is "empty DNA." That theory, of the junk-i-ness of the "empty" section of DNA, raged along all through the nineteen eighties and nineties. When it was finally discovered that the DNA portion considered to "be empty" actually contained no specific instructions for a specific part of a plant (or human being for that matter0 but instead, the vast "blank" DNA areas were all about the overall programming of the entity, then you realize why Gm seeds, crop and foodstuffs are such a terrible problem.

[Motown_Johnny]

20. use spell check and try again

When the first four words of that long a post are all misspelled you can't expect people to read through that mess.

Besides, this is from 16 months ago.

At least provide some new links for new evidence


That post is embarrassing.

[truedelphi]

21. Sorry about the mis-spellings.

If Huckleb can suddenly spout off on something posted months ago, why can't I or you or anyone elsefor that matter...

[Motown_Johnny]

22. You can, but don't expect me to waste time on it n/t

[HuckleB]

16. We're still here, and the food hasn't killed us yet.

[truedelphi]

17. Yes, but some of us have apparently had our brains affected,

So that all we can do is parrot the industrialists' favorite lines.

[HuckleB]

18. So why are you parroting the organic industry's lines?

I mean, what do have against safe food at prices that everyone can afford?