The raw connection between our food and our government-Who is on the consumers side?
FDA & USDA Approved
It's called money
Type Monsanto into any search engine on the internet and you will uncover pages and pages of negative media and articles. But who are they? It turns out they are the company behind most of our nations' farmers as well as many other nations around the world. They are the creators of genetically modified organisms(GMO's) as well as the owners of many brands of everyday weed killers found in your local hardware store and much more. They also own companies that produce computer hardware and software designed to enable farmers to increase productivity. What's most impressive is that they had almost 14.60billion dollars in sales in 2022 and they are currently the world's largest-grossing seed company. To know who they are will answer the questions of where the connection lies between what gets sold in the supermarket and our how our government is quietly involved.
To start with, here are some of the government connections:
Michael Tyler is a former Monsanto Vice President for Public Policy and is the current Senior Adviser of the Commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration.
Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is a former Monsanto lawyer.
Earle H. Harbison, Jr. served with the Central Intelligence Agency for 18 years, after which he had a career at Monsanto, rising to the roles of President, Chief Operating Officer, and Director of Monsanto, which he held from 1986 to 1993.
Michael A. Friedman, MD, was Senior Vice President of Research and Development, Medical and Public Policy for Pharmacia, and later served as an FDA deputy commissioner.
Linda J. Fisher was an assistant administrator at the United States Environmental Agency (EPA) before she was a vice president at Monsanto from 1995 to 2000. In 2001, Fisher became the deputy administrator of the EPA and served on Monsanto's board after serving in government as a trade representative.
Mickey Kantor served on Monsanto's board after serving in government as a trade representative.
William D. Ruckelshaus served as the first head of the Environmental Protection Agency(EPA) in 1970, was subsequently acting Director of the FBI, and then Deputy Attorney General of the United States. After leaving government he joined the Board of Directors of Monsanto.
Also, Monsanto is a member of the Washington D.C based Biotechnology Industry Organization(BIO), the world’s largest biotechnology trade association. Between 2010 and 2011 BIO spent a total of $16.43 million on lobbying initiatives. The Monsanto Company Citizenship Fund is a political action committee from Monsanto that has donated millions of dollars to various candidates since 2003.
There are probably more names and connections out there that I missed, but the point is that there are several connections. So, if you are Monsanto and you want to create and sell a product that could be questionable as far as impact on peoples' health, then you go to one of your "acquaintances" that used to work for you, but now found a cushy job in our nations government. For example, you could turn to Michael Tyler, who is the current Senior Adviser of the Commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration, but used to be the V.P. for Public Policy at Monsanto. And if he can't make it work for you, rest assured he has an "acquaintance" who can. It's all one big circle for them and each hand feeds another.
Monsanto is widely questioned and scrutinized and has even been picketed on several occasions, but so has my nearby "Adult" book store. So, what's the difference? The difference is that you have a choice whether you want to walk into that adult store whereas you have very little to no choice of how the food you eat is produced. These GMO seeds that Monsanto has created are supposed to be super seeds. They are supposed to withstand droughts and pesticides(that they make) and produce more inventory of that crop. The problem, and there are so many, is that these bugs that come in contact with these pesticides eventually become immune to the pesticides and become super bugs, so to speak. So then a new pesticide needs to be created and used. And what about the effects all of those chemicals have on us humans? Well, the levels are at "just right" levels that they pass the FDA and USDA guidelines from Monsanto friends because unless you eat 100 apples a day without washing them, then it poses no harm, so they say.
Opening up a can of Worms...so to speak
If you want to see a great film/documentary that reveals much of what has been written in this article and much more, see "Food, Inc." There are also several other films that touch base on the topic of contaminated food, the cross of politics and farming in this country, and the power of corn in the U.S. There is so much information to learn about how the food industry is controlled by just a few corporations, of course Monsanto being one of them . And while they may think they have revolutionized farming with GMO's, the almighty dollar may have blurred their vision along the way.
