Comment on the Montana Jones case

From Zeb Landon:

David Eagelson, chief investigator in the Shropshire case. Photo Michael Schmdt. See Michael’s story “Silence of the Lambs” (post below this one) describing David’s role in the ongoing investigation.

The disease that CFIA suspects Montana Jones’ sheep of carrying poses no threat to humans. Agriculture Canada is merely anxious to protect Canada’s export market for sheep, we are led to suppose. And the CFIA presumes the right to interfere in a farm, either because they genuinely believe there is a risk, or, which seems no less likely, simply because they feel bound to maintain a public image of absolute safety.

Silence of the lambs

From Michael Schmidt:

Lambs to the slaughter.

Seeing the coverage of the latest CFIA killing spree to enforce the genetic cleansing policy by our bureaucrats supported by countless OPP “peace officers” painfully reminded me of the many documentaries about Nazi Germany and all those who “just did their job”.

As I more and more hear this excuse by police or bureaucrats I wonder how much have we learned from the past.

Canada and it’s law enforcers keep bragging about their important role in keeping this country safe and how they are protecting us from ourselves, because they know better.

ADHD drugs linked to suicide in kids

From David Bruser and Andrew Bailey on The Star.com:

“Adverse Reaction Report No. 324764

Submitted by: Health Professional

Date: 2009

Location: Canada

Patient: Male

Age: 15 years old

Suspect Drug: Strattera

Side Effect: Completed Suicide

This is just one of nearly 600 cases of Canadian kids suffering serious, sometimes fatal side effects suspected to have been caused by ADHD medications in the past 10 years.

A Toronto Star investigation has found a growing number of doctors, nurses, pharmacists and parents are reporting that they believe attention deficit drugs are causing major health problems in patients, many as young as 6 and 7 years old.

Montana Jones coverage in local paper

From John Campbell, in the Northumberland News:

TRENT HILLS – The Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) showed up again at Wholearth Farmstudio last Saturday to collect four more sheep it suspects could have scrapie.

Montana Jones said a cavalcade of about 20 CFIA personnel and OPP officers arrived at her farm east of Hastings around 8 a.m. Sept. 22 to execute a search warrant for four lambs. The four-month-old sheep were removed without incident to be slaughtered and tested for scrapie. The federal government has argued the animals’ genotype, ARQ, makes them susceptible to the degenerative neurological disease that’s fatal to sheep but not considered a threat to humans.

FDA as a tool of the pharma industry

Here on the Bovine we don’t usually cover the supplements scene. But often, in the raw milk controversy, one does hear claims that the FDA is acting as a proxy for industrial interests that want to see raw milk stamped out because it’s competition for supermarket milk. And this story details a couple of example of the FDA being used by the pharma industry to remove natural products from the market to make way for future allopathic drugs. 

From Elizabeth Renter, on the Activist Post:

Vitamin B6, naturally present in a variety of foods, is necessary for proper nerve function, protein synthesis, regulating blood sugar, and producing antibodies and hemoglobin. In other words, it’s pretty important stuff. But, while many people get their B6 through supplements, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration is looking to make things a lot more difficult—by slowly taking all forms of B6 supplements off the market so Big Pharma can make millions off of prescriptions instead.

According to the Alliance for Natural Health (ANH), the FDA has already begun their crusade. They removed Pyridoxamine (a natural form of B6) supplements from the market at the request of BioStratum, a pharmaceutical company.

Mitt Romney promoting GMOs for Americans while he eats organic?

From Tom Philpott, on Mother Jones:

“Mitt Romney hasn’t divulged many details about what kind of agriculture policy he’d pursue as president (sound familiar?). But all signs suggest that he’d follow the agribiz party line. As Wayne Barrett showed in a recent Nation piece (my comment here), Romney has ties to agribusiness giant Monsanto that date to the ’70s, when GMO seeds were an R&D project, not a business model. According to Barrett, Romney, then a young Bain consultant, helped nudge Monsanto on its path away from disgraced industrial chemical concern toward its current status as world-beating agribiz player. Then there’s the agribiz execs and shills the GOP nomineee tapped for his campaign’s Agriculture Advisory Committee.

But guess what? In the privacy of his campaign jet, the beleaugured presidential contender apparently eats organic, reports the Today Show’s Peter Alexander:

Call for government inspected roadkill?

The Smithsonian on banned foods:

“Once upon a time, Americans went blind from homemade moonshine, and meatpacking plants produced something more mystery meatloaf than pasture-raised. The ever evolving dance of food safety and regulation marches on, this time to protect us from…Wisconsin dairy farmers?

1. Raw Milk: In a state where citizens proudly wear giant wedges of foam cheese on their heads, dairy is king. Yet even in Wisconsin the lactose-centric cheer is quiet around raw milk. Many people swear by its such and such properties but plenty of others, including the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention,agree that “While it is possible to get foodborne illnesses from many different foods, raw milk is one of the riskiest of all.” In Wisconsin, raw milk devotees can acquire the semi-illicit substance only if purchasing it directly from a farmer. Roughly half of US states forbid the sale of raw milk entirely….”

Mother Jones’ surprising raw milk story

From Kiera Butler, on Mother Jones:

“Over the past year, I’ve been involved in an illegal, underground, super-secret speakeasy. I smuggled contraband to my house, even distributed it among my friends. Nope, not meth: milk. Creamy, delicious, unpasteurized milk.

When I first tried raw milk, I found the taste odd, but soon I came to crave its distinctive flavor. Better yet, I was told it could cure my allergies and eczema. “People see amazing results when they give this stuff to their kids—they have ear infections and asthma and allergies, and with raw milk it goes away,” says Mark McAfee, CEO of Fresno, California-based Organic Pastures, the nation’s largest raw-milk dairy. McAfee pointed me to a peer-reviewed study suggesting a link between raw-milk consumption and diminished allergy rates—as the theory goes, raw milk contains proteins and compounds that somehow keep the immune system from overreacting to allergens.

CFIA: 4, Shropshire lambs: 0

This just in from Montana Jones:

CFIA agents came to Montana Jones farm Saturday to take four lambs to be killed.

The CFIA’s seemingly on again, off again plan to kill lambs from Montana Jones’ farm was on again Saturday, as agents came to the farm and reportedly took  four lambs away, presumably to be killed and tested. The video below documents an exchange between Montana Jones and the CFIA last Thursday. We’re expecting another video to be released tomorrow.

MDA sore losers in raw milk case

From David E. Gumpert, on the Complete Patient blog:

This frame grab from a Japanese film sums up what the regulators must be feeling about now.

“The 250 or so people attending my presentation Saturday on “America’s Underground Food War” at the Mother Earth News Fair in Pennsylvania broke into applause when I told them, near the end of the talk, that Alvin Schlangen had been acquitted of all charges Thursday in connection with his raw milk and private food case.