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Fw: Molly Ivins speaks up!! (again) (fwd)

From: "Ella Scott" <emsjaj@git.com.au>
To: "Victor Guest" <vic@daena.eepo.com.au>
> Dear all,
> 
> Here's another highly informative piece on GM, (genetically modified
> foods), by the great Texas progressive Molly Ivins.
> 
> -- Paul
---------------------------snip------------------------------------
Friends some more information that has got through the media net.
It must be with tongue in cheek that Molly suggests that Monsanto Co., 
a naive and innocent little chemical corporation. 

 Monsanto is a "potentially responsible party" at 93 Superfund sites. 
Monsanto has been buying up seed companies at an astonishing rate.
Prof Chomsky on the MAI, gives us very good reasons why the US govt
hasn't shut Monsanto down. and other information suggests that the USDA
will get a %age of the profit from Terminator technology.
 Monsanto is a "potentially responsible party" at 93 Superfund sites. 
Vic 
---------------------------Snip--------------------------------------

>From the Fort Worth Star-Telegram:

http://www.startext.net/today/news/columnist/ivins2.htm

Updated: Monday, Jan. 4, 1999 at 16:05 CST
 

Let's go back to maroon bluebonnets 

AUSTIN -- Monsanto Co., a naive and innocent little chemical corporation,
was engaged in a benevolent scheme to make a better world through
genetically engineered crops -- practically without thinking of profit.
Last year the company offered its humanitarian products to what should
have been a grateful peasantry around the world, but, alas, unpleasant
things began to happen.

In India, unhappy farmers torched Monsanto's test plots of genetically
engineered cotton in an outburst of fury they called "Operation Cremation
Monsanto." In Ireland, ungrateful protesters sabotaged fields of
genetically engineered potatoes. French farmers staged a raid on a cache
of modified seeds, sprayed it with fire extinguishers and then urinated on
it. 

Gee. `Quel' Luddites. How can it be, you ask, that all over the world
people are raising Cain about GMOs (genetically modified organisms) while
in this country we hear not one discouraging word? (Well, perhaps one or
two -- the `St. Louis Post- Dispatch,' in Monsanto's hometown, ran an
excellent investigative article last month on the company's misadventures
around the globe.) 

Well, the rest of the world thinks we're making perfect fools of ourselves
over the Monica Lewinsky scandal, too, so that just shows you how much the
rest of the world knows. 

In fact, you might have heard more about worldwide protests over GMOs if
it weren't for Monica; the Center for Media and Public Affairs just
announced that the Lewinsky scandal got more network news air time than
the combined total for the Asian and Russian economic crises, Iraq,
embassy bombings in Africa, Middle Eastern peace, nuclear testing in India
and Pakistan, and John Glenn in space. What self-respecting medium had
time to worry about the food supply? 

Another reason we hear so little about GMOs in this country was explained
by Bill Lambrecht in his `Post-Dispatch' article: Americans have no entry
into a regulatory system that was fixed during the Reagan administration. 

"In 1986, Monsanto and allies persuaded President Reagan's administration
to adopt a framework that would operate with no new legislation. This
strategy assured that genetic engineering would, for the most part, remain
out of the domain of the Congress and therefore away from the forum where
people sound their concern." 

The Food and Drug Administration has been our most aggressive regulator on
food safety issues, but the FDA has limited authority because genetic
traits are not considered food additives. 

The U.S. Department of Agriculture is stuck with a dual role as both
regulator of biotechnology and its ardent booster. As we learned with the
old Atomic Energy Commission, which had the same conflicting roles over
nuclear power, the result is complete bureaucratic impotence. 

But what exactly is the problem? If Monsanto can make vegetable seeds that
are resistant to bugs, what's not to like? 

Some of Monsanto's problems are traceable to greater European skepticism
about science in general. And the Continent just went through the
experience of mad cow disease in which 11 million cattle had to be
slaughtered; that certainly increased people's suspicions about food
safety and their doubts about the adequacy of government regulation. 

The British paper `The Guardian' reported in November:  "Monsanto, the
world's leading genetic food company, is facing public meltdown in Britain
and Germany with a `society-wide' collapse of support for its radical
technologies, according to leaked internal documents. Amid deepening media
problems, and resentment by supermarkets, only senior civil servants have
shown support for Monsanto's controversial technologies in the past year." 

One nightmarish Monsanto patent is for "The Terminator," a new genetic
technology designed to render the seeds of crops sterile. It was invented
to block farmers from saving seeds, ensuring that they buy the jazzed-up,
genetically improved varieties. The official name is Technology Protection
System, but it's called The Terminator all over the globe, and farmers,
who have been saving seeds and resowing for millennia, are terrified of
it. 

 Just imagine if that little genetic fix should somehow get loose and
start jumping species. In October at the World Bank in Washington,
scientists and farm economists voted to condemn the technology and
prohibit in the projects of the Consultative Group on International
Agricultural Research, the world's largest ag research network. 

Critics of biotechnology are afraid that seeding farmland with transgenic
crops could spread genetic pollution, upset the balance of nature and
release uncontrollable food allergies. Jane Rissler with the Union of
Concerned Scientists told Agence France-Pressue, "The purpose of
biotechnology is to increase the profits of the manufacturers by
persuading farmers to use more herbicides." 

But aren't these fears just that -- fears without evidence? The problem is
that Monsanto has a record. 

The company manufactured virtually all the PCBs in the United States until
they were finally banned in 1976, and taxpayers are still shelling out to
clean up PCB-riddled waste sites. Monsanto also manufactured Agent Orange,
which is linked to cancer and reproductive problems in Vietnam War vets.
And the company makes pesticides, which contaminate ground water.
According to the Environmental Protection Agency, Monsanto is a
"potentially responsible party" at 93 Superfund sites. 

In other words, this is a company that has put its faith in technology
before without bothering to properly research the consequences. 

Molly Ivins is a columnist for the `Star-Telegram.' You may 
write to her at 1005 Congress Ave., Suite 920, Austin, TX 78701; 
call her at (512) 476-8908; or email her at mollyivins@star-
telegram.com


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