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It Cost The Koch Brothers Only $299,000 To Block Labeling Of Genetically Modified Foods
In what may have been the most underreported event overnight, the House quietly passed legislation that would keep states from issuing mandatory labeling laws for foods that contain genetically modified organisms, often called GMOs. The Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act of 2015, as the law is formally known, passed 275-150, creating a federal standard for the voluntary labeling of foods with GMO ingredients. And since clearly nobody wants to advertise they are using GMOs in their food, the number of "volunteers" will be precisely zero.
As the Hill reports, Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-Kan.), who authored the bill, called mandatory labeling laws — which have already passed in Vermont, Connecticut and Maine — unnecessarily costly given that GMOs have been deemed safe by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
“Precisely zero pieces of credible evidence have been presented that foods produced with biotechnology pose any risk to our health and safety,” Pompeo said. “We should not raise prices on consumers based on the wishes of a handful of activists.”
Well, sure. Then there is the curious case of a lobbyist who back in March proclaimed that Monstanto's weedkiller "won't hurt you", only to promptly refuse drinking it on live it adding "I'm not stupid."
Somehow we doubt Mike Pompeo is stupid either, which is why he will use all his hard-earned lobby dollars to only purchase organic foods which do not have GMO ingredients, and which happen to be a premium food category, precisely for that reason. Which makes Pompeo's statement even odder, considering the prices of non-GMO foods are already substantially higher.
And while a minority was not willing to trade off healthy food for higher food prices, the victorious majority claimed a patchwork of labeling laws at the state level would drive up food costs.
Citing a study from a Cornell University professor, the Grocery Manufacturers Association said state-level GMO labeling mandates would increase grocery prices for a family of four by as much as $500 per year and cost food and beverage manufacturers millions of dollars to change food labels and supply chain systems.
Actually, where it would hurt manufacturers would be in the public's revulsion to eating foods clearly labelled as being genetically modified, leading to a collapse in sales in this high margin food category, and forcing even higher non-GMO prices. Outcomes that would lead to a dramatic erosion in shareholder value for the owners of those companies who stood to lose the most should the Labeling act not pass in its current form.
Owners such as the Koch Brothers and Monsanto.
Last night's passage of the anti-labeling law was the culmination of a very long and tedious process, one which started well over a year ago. In fact, as Andrea Germanos recalls, it all started last April, when in a move slammed as sealing "an unholy alliance between Monsanto and Koch Industries," a Kansas congressman submitted legislation that would ban state-level GMO labeling laws.
Called the Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act of 2014, the industry-supported legislation sponsored by Republican Rep. Mike Pompeo would "amend the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act with respect to food produced from, containing, or consisting of a bioengineered organism, the labeling of natural foods, and for other purposes."
At least between its 2014 name and the final 2015 version Pompeo and his backers added "Safe" to the front just in case the irony was lost on someone.
Which brings us to the biggest winners from this law, and how Rep. Pompeo made a few very rich people even richer.
Starting with the Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA).
According to The Center for Food Safety: "Koch Industries’ subsidiary, Georgia-Pacific, is a member of the Grocery Manufacturers Association, which donated more than $7 million against the recent Washington State ballot initiative to label GE foods. Monsanto, another GMA member, was the single largest contributor to that campaign. Between Washington State and California, Monsanto, GMA (including Georgia-Pacific), and others, have contributed over $67 million to keep consumers in the dark about GE foods."
Others quickly jumped onboard, especially those who would reap the biggest incremental profits such as biotech companies, and now the GMA and other industry groups like the Biotechnology Industry Organization are cheering Pompeo's legislation.
At the time, many were livid that a full-court press by a few corporations and even fewer billionaires would keep Americans in the dark as to the genetic content of the food they eat:
"GMA’s selection of Congressman Pompeo as their champion shows how extreme the proposal really is," stated Colin O’Neil, director of government affairs for Center for Food Safety. "Selecting Pompeo creates an unholy alliance between Monsanto and Koch Industries..."
Well, today the unholy alliance won, and the GMA was delighted:
“Today’s bipartisan passage of the Safe and Accurate Food Labeling Act (HR 1599) clearly demonstrates the growing support for this critically important legislation,” said Pamela G. Bailey, president and CEO of the Grocery Manufacturers Association. “We thank the sponsors of this bill, Congressmen Mike Pompeo (R-KS) and G.K. Butterfield (D-NC), along with Congressmen Mike Conaway (R-TX), Collin Peterson (D-MN), Fred Upton (R-MI) and the other members who supported it for standing on the side of consumer choice, science and fact-based labeling. We now call on the U.S. Senate to move quickly on a companion bill and pass it this year.”
Finally, the question everyone is dying to get the answer to: how much did it cost the Koch Brothers to purchase Mike Pompeo and his bipartisan congressional peers, both republicans and democrats, and pass a law that would save the company billions in profits?
Which is why the stock market with its annual return of 7% is for chumps. If you want to make the kinds of quadruple digit returns on investment, you better buy yourself a congressman.
As for the general American population, well: your food may be every so slightly more mutated, but the good news is that it will remain as cheap and unhealthy as always.
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I once bought a Congressional critter, but he kept chewing up Mrs. Cogs slippers and peeing on the carpet so I had to let him go. Of course I spent less than a million, so mine might have been of inferior quality.
Next time we'll settle for a 'normal' lapdog.
Bet you anything they dont eat GMO food.
Use to be a guy on ZH calling for more Congressional Vegetables. After Gabby.
Ruff ruff.
I know they don't even bother pretending to care what the constitution says anymore, but how is this not a blatant violation of the 10th amendment?
The very same way that Robert's ruled the ACA to comport with the Constitution under the $Tax code, Carl. That's how the rule of law works during the last stages of Empire.
This will make it much easier to start a Koch Boycott-Divest-Sanction movement.
Just when you think banksters and dual-citizen congressmen were the most despised people on earth, the Koch brothers show up to piss you off even more.
[edit: added the 'dual-citizen' because Hasbara was so quick to down-arrow.]
Time to queue up the anti-capitalism rants.
Recently educated (indoctrinated) fools, please note that none of the above Koch/gov't actions represent capitalism, liberty, nor anything else that requires moral fiber. That is, save the exposure of such disgusting behavior by oligarchs and government.
Fuck the oligarchs. May they choke on a bag of dicks.
As someone who had nothing against the Koch brothers and even thought they were being attacked unfairly by the rabid left wingers, let me say this to them - welcome to my shit list, hopy you die soon.
Far be it from me to defend the Koch bros, but GP makes many things including paper towels and consumer goods that would be found in grocery stores everywhere... Just because the GMA donates millions does not mean it is a Koch enterprise. The authors need to support their assumptions.
That being said, fuck gmo's. What annoys me the most is that the Agri-lobby is so powerful that my organic milk has a label that explains to me the benefits of hormones that my milk does not contain. Through the looking glass.
1) Georgia-Pacific does not make food (well unless you count the cellulose that goes into Filet-O-Fish).
2) The article cleverly conflates GPs membership in the GMA with the GMAs donations (not GPs).
3) Koch donations to (R) congressmen can indicate buying of said critter for any number of non-GMO related reasons.
VERDICT: Inclusion of Koch Brothers in this article is a dog whistle for morons that far too many fell for. What is it about ZH that you people refuse to read the articles closely, hmmm? At least the good doctor above is sentient, and his detractors are kneejerk leftard idiots.
PS - GMOs should be identified. It should be decision allowed to the states. A pox on the anti-consumer choice Republicans.
The problem is, the 10th amendment is too far down the page. If it were the 3rd ammendment, perhaps We The People would know its significance to the Republic.
Justice will be served. Sometimes you have to motivate the knuckledraggers with quarantine. Sometimes you wait for the braintards to crash and burn. Regardless of Jane and Ted's deviant delusions, water finds its level.
Nah, they'd still stop reading after the 2nd.
This is a liberal hit piece that would please any socialist. The Koch brothers are conservative and liberals hate it. Where is the evidence that the Koch brothers benefitted or influenced this piece of legislation. Bill Gates, who is a raving liberal owns 500,000 shares of Monsanto and he isn't mentioned. The article stated that the Koch Borthers own Georgia Pacific. They're making wood products, not foods. No benefit.
I smell progressives.
Georgia Pacific is a member of the Grocery Manufacturers Association, the GP CEO is a member. So they do have an interest.
The Grocery Manufacturers Association stipulates items come to the stores on what is known as "GMA pallets". This is a standardized pallet the entire industry uses and for good reason, not only in warehousing but also trucking benefits from the standardization. That connection between GP and GMA would seem to be a natural one as most pallets are made of wood.
Congratulations, you are part of the problem.
Remember Pelosi, "You'll have to pass it (ObamaCare) to see what's in it"? So we don't deserve to know our healthcare law before the vote, nor our food content, nor what the "terrorism" charges against us may be, nor what's in the TPP treaty, etc., etc..
Anyone see a pattern here, or is this just "conspiracy theory"?
Hey Confederacy - it's just a conspiracy.
Why? The points are actually quite valid. Everything that people on the left don't like is somehow connected to the Koch brothers even when they have nothing to do with it.
In the case of GM foods what we have is mostly people being scared because they do not understand what is going on. Most of the tomatoes that you consume today are genetically modified. So are most other fruits, many vegetables, and even the beef that you eat. Few of the products that we eat today can be confused for their ancestors of even a few centuries ago, let alone the original ancestors that are unfit for consumption on a large scale. The problems are the anti-science luddites.
This hysterical piece cites the absolutely reprobate progtard group the Center for Food Safety. Orwellian name.
Of course it's a hit piece. It is assumed, likely incorrectly, that Koch industries donated just for GMO labels and based on the fact that Georgia Pacific provides wood pallets to the industry, calling it a hit piece seems quite fair. Koch donates to both parties as any major corporation does. The anti GMO crowd comes off a little hysterical or at least irrational. Lot's of dubious claims. Very similar to the global warming religion.
So, irrational, are we? I suppose the rational argument is that we should all eat untested food that didn't even exist 50 years ago instead of that non-gmo crap that has only been around for a few million years. Yeah, right. I think you should stay out of any discussions of rationality, unless, of course, you want everyone to know how ignorant you are.
Do you eat potatoes? How about tomatoes? Eggplant? Apples? How about beef? These have all been genetically modified with many of the modifications taking place in the last few decades. Yes, it is irrational to have GM foods as the biggest part of your diet yet calling for labelling of GMO products. As I have pointed out above, almost all foods have been genetically modified. And if we label everything the end result is the same as labelling nothing.
They eat restaurant grade. I eat better. I grow half of it. If you tasted one of my tomatoes and then a store tomato you'd puke. My garden has many as many fragrances as a flower garden, because many of my herbs are flowers. A produce aisle has no garden smells. I catch most of my meat in the wing. While pols run in circles, I have flying at me, ducks. Geese. Rabbit. Deer. Bass. I take what I need. I feed the rest, so they come back. The waste is mulched into the garden.
Have you ever been experienced? I have...
But aren't your tomatoes are genetically modified? The original fruit of the tomato plant was small and somewhat difficult to eat even when we ignore the toxicity issues. Most tomato varieties are a recent development.
They do not serve GMO food in the Monsanto employee cafeteria.
That should be a clue.
For the retards out there, just eat the poison. That's how eugenics is supposed to work.
Most of the food that we eat has been genetically modified. Few modern foods resemble their ancestors and the way that they were modified through trial and error introduced more risks to the consumer than what the modern methods do.
Sadly, this is a debate based on ignorance and fear. The very same people who promote certain proteins and enzymes as healthy when purchased as part of a vitamin blend are screaming about the danger of consuming those proteins and enzymes from a GM product.
I have observed some congress critters, and fed some. Contrasted to my violent world, they are poets. If I had the means, through no provable act of mine none of these traitors would be giving speeches and you'd have more, smarter, better cops on patrol everywhere, for the same price. I am a son of Tammany. This game is all or none. Compromise with slime and you get slime.
If this is so OK then why'd the Federalies stop the radionuclide monitoring of imported Jap foods?
Oh yeah, somebody got to profit ..... Silly me.
Is this the same government who has quantified an acceptable level of rat turds in my processed meat? Not that I would eat processed meat.....except maybe those lovely hot sausages. LOL
Any agency with "federal" in front of it is corrupt. America has become its primary adversary.
Congressman and Agricultural Subcommittee Chairman: “Nearly 80 Percent of the Food Produced In the United States Contains Some Kind of GM [Genetically Modified] Product”
Well....that certainly explains why 'they' don't want the food labeled. Fight back and start a backyard garden. Every little step forward helps, if only by letting you know the source of your salad and salsa.
Truths here. Primarily, putting your energy where you want to see it develop. Fighting them is attaching to them - and simply not worth it to me.
Always good to see you in the comments section, Cog. Hope the mine's been treating you well. :)
The Salt Mine has not yet full infiltrated my Salt Mind. I continue to resist and have passed on both the 401(k) and stock options. In precious metals I do trust and not corporate paper.
I will, however, accept slave wages in return for a day's work if only to keep Mrs. Cog in scrap booking accessories. :-)
Glad to hear it. Cheers to your wingwoman, Mrs. Cog, for keeping you fed and watered. Git'n'er done. :)
Mrs. Cog's lovingly made lunches for work are to die for. I could easily trade her wraps and salads for fiat or possibly even corporate shares. And her lunch box love notes have all the ladies in a lather and the guys rolling their eyes in mock distaste.
I am so grateful to have Mrs. Cog as a life partner. It is rare to find someone of like mind these days.
Refreshing to hear how you & Mrs. C love & care for each other Dis. Carry on.
Truths on the last bit. Too funny on the first (luckyy). Truly great stuff here.
Many thanks to you and your crew for spreading the good word.
http://twoicefloes.com/canning-fest-2015-and-so-it-begins/
http://twoicefloes.com/perspectives/the-art-of-fighting-without-fighting/
*OK, this gave me a good giggle.. http://twoicefloes.com/financial-shenanigans-should-have-trained-me-for-...
"Fight back and start a backyard garden"
Be careful where you get your seeds, too! Monsanto has a lock on those also. Here's where I get mine; http://www.heirloom-organics.com/
It's great because the way they are packaged, they will last for many years.
The same is true of food purchased elsewhere. Almost everything you eat has been modified from its ancestral form, most of it not too long ago as commercial varieties of most fruits and vegetables are recent developments. Please note that the ancestral forms of some products used to be quite poisonous so genetic modification has brought about a positive effect.
Good.
I'm tired of hearing about those evil Koch brothers!
Ajax
Hickory DICKory Dock
Your wife's Ass, her Mouth and My Cock
Hickory Dickory, Hickory Dickory
Hickory Dickory Dock.
Nah, nah, nah Fud...
It goes like this:
"Hickory Dickory Dock
This chick was suckin' my cock
at half past two I dropped my goo
And dumped her off at the next block"
Aaayyyyy...
-The Dice man
LoL! What nasty things to say! She's my ex, so have your way with her - if you dare. Personnally, I wouldn't wish that on you guys. She may be the spawn of George Soros.
Except...your dick wasn't still attached.
Might be a stretch to label the koch boys 'evil'.
If they were actually evil, the progs such as hairy reed wouldn't have a meltdown at the mere mention of the name.
You want evil.......Try soro's.
That bastard is evil.
Nope, when you put your profits above the health of others, to the point where you need to lie to execute the plan, you're evil.
Can't shake the devil's hand and say you're only kiddin'
With voluntary labelling, it has become easier to determine which ones are GMO. The ones that don't have the label are GMO. Thanks Congress and Koch brothers for making it clear now.
Works wonders, the power of negation!
that's what I was thinking... just use negation and don't buy the ones that aren't labeled as non-GMO... problem solved
I certainly look for non GMO.
The other thing is buying organic. As I understand it, organic by definition cannot be GMO.
Damn, Harry Reid was right! Geez o peetz.
Grow your own food or just walk past the GMO isle. Mrs Atomizer and I are in Ohio. We went to a grocery store. Couldn't believe how small the corn was. Tiny tomatoes from Canada. It doesn't matter, returning to Charleston, SC on Sunday. (near General Dynamics) has a huge fresh food market 30 minutes away.
Cannot wait to get back home. Ocean and palm trees rather than Obama scumbags in Strongsville, OH.
Even growing your own food, with your own heirloom seeds, could eventually be a criminal act, as it is in Europe already:
http://www.alt-market.com/articles/1913-european-commission-to-ban-heirl...
These bastards will keep doing this shit until they control. absolutely. EVERYTHING.
you are spot on, they argue that one of the biggest fixes of GMOs will be to feed the starving masses. Problem is that as a farmer my price (in a rigged market) is supposably set by stocks to use ratios, as an industry most farmers (apart from subsidised ones) barely make reliable returns year on year, these twits think we can afford to produce more for people who have no money?. This is a blatant grab for control, they tried to starve the people of IRAQ into rebellion against Saddam and they are using food just the same way they do oil.
"Its the Cock Brothers!" Caitlyn Jenner ;-)
Murdoch duct tapes Caitlyn's dick before each new tranny episode.
Ninety nine percent of San Fran would pay good fiat just to watch that...lol. Its like...a whole new capitalist marketplace has opened up or sumpin ;-)
You are what you eat!
Shlubalub.
Burn Pompiss's House down preferably with him in it before he spends his cut of the $300k.
The GOP is NOT our friend. They are the flip side of the same coin with the Demonrats. WE HAVE NO FRIENDS, save a Jeff Sessions and a handful of others. The Tribe WILL NOT permit us to vote our way out of this...
South African Dan Roodt, November 9, 2012
let me get this straight, the corporate sector DOES NOT fund democrats? What fucking planet are you on?
Dude you're talking crowdfunding chump change there. Feinstein would let an Al-Queda live on her patio for $700 month. These whores are cheap.
Pieces of shit is all I see.
My everbearing strawberries are doing well this summer. I accidentally grew 4-5 more plants that need repotting.
The parent plant is 5 years old and was given to me by my Grandmother, who passed 3 years ago.
My Asparagus fern is on roids. It's in a huge pot and trying to grow through my terracota patio tiles.
My bell peppers got invaded by aphids after they gave me nice fruit this spring. I repotted them.
My pomegranate, lemon, tangelo trees are doing great, and still flowering new fruit.
I have just started to grow rare succulents, and they're doing well.
Toomanyfakeconservatives
There is no law out there which _prevents_ labeling a non-GMO food as non-GMO. And so many (most? all?) producers of non-GMO food are happy to already mention this fact on the packaging. The rest can be assumed to contain some GMO ingredients. Labeling it as such would not change the fact that it is GMO and would not somehow make the non-GMO stuff more affordable. It would just irritate those people who cannot afford to shop in Whole Foods. So why pushing for it?
That's okay, a Russian scientific group is spending 25 million and three years testing thousands of rats which will be fed Monsanto GM maize and will include the herbicide glyphosate that it is commonly grown in. They already know that they are both killers and that 3 years will be more than enough time to prove this.
The rat study started in 2014.
The appetite for rebellion no longer exists. People would rather sit in line all night for a new apple. Worse still there are no politicians with any balls or integrity.
Grow your own. Eat your own, excluding your kids, of course, unless in case of a national emergency, like they'e not doing their chores.
Eat 'em, eat yer kids.
If you've been feeding them right, they'll be meaty and tasty and non-GMO.
I'll have another scotch and soda, waiter.
why stop there... breed your own, change their genetics... wait, what
lol go ahead and downvote me on this you morons... you do realize selective breeding is a GMO technique, right? so guess what, that grass fed organic (as opposed to inorganic lol) beef that you're eating is the result of _thousands of years_ of selective breeding performed by humans, and would never ever have occurred in the wild without that activity taking place... that seedless fruit you eat that was "organically" grown? guess what, GMO... the list goes on and on...
I swear you dumbasses jump at your own shadow at every corner... go hide in your caves...
http://www.forwardprogressives.com/dear-anti-gmo-activists-keep-your-stu...
You are so full of shit. Our scientists here (much better than your paid shills ) say otherwise.
You are a fucking idiot .
Is Labeling Really About Our ”Right to Know”
Your Trolling dude. Even if these products were safe, which has not been proven, there is absolutely no excuse whatsoever for these products to be hidden from the consumer who does not wish to eat them. Claims that GMO are safe that originate from the FDA (which Monsanto has captured) have zero credibility.
How can you justify a product being pushed by stealth? I'll look for your answer later, I'm going to go out and try not to consume any of that frankenfood you defend so often.
The safety has been proven, it is just that science deniers put their fingers in their ears and yell "blah blah blah blah..." whenever evidence is shown to them. Then they call you a paid shill, then worse.
I can't make other people understand the science so I just mock the everloving piss out of them for being such ignoramuses.
You do realize that most of the "research" on GMOs is controlled by big biotech firms? This is essentially the same thing that happened with trans fats. There were a buch of manufactured studies showing that trans fats were "safe and healthy." Then the bullshit was pulled back, and everyone realized that the science had been keeping us in the dark about their dangers. Mainstream Academia is largely controlled by moneyed interests.
GMOs are a time bomb waiting to explode. We've gotten lucky with the gene combinations tried so far in that they pose no short-term danger. The long-term danger of current GMOs is still up in the air, not to mention the risk of creating something that could destroy the planetary ecosystem.
This is a good paper on the dangers of GMOs.
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B8nhAlfIk3QIbGFzOXF5UUN3N2c/edit?pli=1
added to that is the fact that Unis are backed by private financiers, check out kellogg, gates, etc foundations to these unis and see who really is putting the money up, also most who are defending their safety are geneticists and plant scientists who have no qualifications in medicine.
Oh, like climate change? THOSE scientists don't know squat, according to some. But the scientists who study GMOs do...
Interesting.
That's why it's the Jimmy Kimmel show!
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/opinion/columnists/2014/10/07/joh...
i expect most of those outraged at genetically modified food are A OK with crushing embryos and genetically modified human beings.
looks like the koch haters (lib whack jobs) have found another cause while the world crumbles around em
I listened to a genetics professor talking about CRISPR technology and its use on human gene editing the other day and he spoke of a mesophylioma study where unintended effects occurred. He was saying this tech is unpredictable and we as a society need to have a discussion about it, not sweep it under the carpet like this and pretend there is no problem.
Fuck that labeling shit. Ban the GMO's or eat organic.
R-KS?
oh Repeated Koch Sucker
This dangerous crap food is what America wants to push on us here in Europe. People are getting very pissed off here.
would be interesting to see obesity rates in Europe pre GMO vs USA post GMO, all that yummy corn syrup sending people to a prolonged pharmaceutical dependant ageing process. Wonder who owns the pharma industry? funny thing is the studies for GMO safety often include weight gain as a indicator of safety, must mean the citizens of USA are real safe if obesity correlates to health.
GMO food bad.
GMO people good. http://www.bbc.com/news/health-27682884
Winning The Future.
Most people do not read the labels on their food. So, the GMO labeling would have made little difference, except to those who are already checking.
But now that they've done this, more people WILL start looking. Now, if I'm a food producer who doesn't use GMO products, I'm going to want to advertise this...right on my packaging..."Does NOT contain GMO products". There's no law against that.
THAT is going to be the response...Instead of losing sales because their altered food is labeled as such, they will lose those sales because their food ISN'T labeled as being free from alteration...DUH!
Which boxes them into a corner where they don't have to disclose, but their sales will continue to drop unless they do. But if they ARE using GMO's, they can't label their food as being free of them...hmmmm...
These people are so smart it makes my eyes water.
I'm of the opinion that most of the consternation over GMOs is overblown, but I'm a firm supporter of the notion of subsidiarity, so states ought to be able to establish their own laws and guidelines and the federal government should stay out of it.
“Precisely zero pieces of credible evidence have been presented that foods produced with biotechnology pose any risk to our health and safety,” Pompeo said. “We should not raise prices on consumers based on the wishes of a handful of activists.”
This is just like the Tobbacco Statements Many Years Ago and The Profits Never Paid Those who Suffered Deaths in Horrible Ways. The American Dream.
It is all Maul-santo's fault with their promotion of Gay-ethically Modified Organism (GMO) Jenner diet.
A law requiring grocery stores to post a simple chart of what items contain GMO's would do away with the need to label each individual item.
GW posted a link to a comment by an agricultural commitee chairman who said nearly 80% of the food produced in the U.S. has some genetically modified ingredients. Maybe it would be simpler to require posting which foods do not have any GMO ingredients.