Requiring Produced With Genetic Engineering on labels will unfairly stigmatize GM crops and food processed from GM ingredients. -- Krista Kafer, Independence Institute. We continue to see this claim from the biotech public relations flacks who have been hired by Dow, Monsanto and Syngenta to defeat Prop 105 in Colorado. Their aim is to convince Colorado voters to reject labeling seeds, crops and food in the supply chain to maintain its identity all the way to your kitchen table. The crass calculation behind this claim deserves some scrutiny. You can imagine the suits sitting around a luxurious conference room at the Monsanto headquarters in St. Louis, thoughtful faces asking how can we fool these pesky Coloradoans? (Hopefully someone in the room knows we are Coloradans! Keep your third O, Monsanto, thank you very much!) Waaaaaa! Its not fair to Monsanto! The propaganda team settles on whining Its not fair to Monsanto as their platform. The government says genetically engineered food is equivalent to regular food. Citizens thus have no right to say different. The Independence Institute, founded in 1985, claims to have expertise (in) education, the environment, transportation, personal freedom, government reform, local government... The Institutes primary goal is to Teach the enduring truths of personal and economic freedom by reducing federal government involvement in our lives. So how can these good folks -- who say their mission is to protect our personal freedoms -- fight to prevent us from having any? Why would the Independence Institute lend its name to Monsantos propaganda effort to take away our personal freedom to choose what we eat? Why would the Independence Institute stake out a position that defers in all matters to federal bureaucrats known to be controlled by corporate interests? The Independence Institute should be advocating for supply chain labeling to ensure the fairness and transparency of the free market exchange of money for goods. It has failed in its mission. Labeling genetically engineered foods in the supply chain represents everything the Independence Institute says it believes in. The institute should be advocating for supply chain labeling to ensure the fairness and transparency of the free market exchange of money for goods. Without consistent labeling, no one really knows the characteristics of the product they are buying and selling. The Institute should recognize that disruptive federal agriculture policies have grossly distorted free markets for a century. The Institute should demand the end of crop subsidies for genetically engineered commodities controlled by wealthy corporations who spend millions each year manipulating our democracy. Its stance on GMO labeling exposes the Independence Institute think tank as another corporate-funded protector of government control over our personal lives. The intellectual gymnastics of their thought process is dazzling. But in the end they have as little interest in protecting our freedom as -- well, you finish the sentence. They dont really care. They just dont want Monsantos feelings hurt. Enough already. Let the rest of us people know what we are eating and how it was grown. What is really showing through is their fundamental belief that Monsanto as a corporation has rights greater than you as a human being, a parent, an advocate. Its not that hard for the likes of Monsanto to fund a place like the Independence Institute, find people who will take a paycheck to support corporate control, and have them spout off about personal freedom in direct contradiction to its true meaning. Keep that in mind when their well-funded mouthpiece rears its head again in the Denver Post and elsewhere. Their policy papers write themselves: dont burden corporate profits because corporations are people too. And the are more powerful (and profitable) than you. Enough already. Let the rest of us people know what we are eating and how it was grown.
Posted on: Sun, 31 Aug 2014 15:35:25 +0000