The Unsafe Food We Are Buying

The continuing efforts of this administration to subvert protections of the public for the furtherance of purely business interest never ceases to appall. As we watch the breakdown of the economy that has been promoted under the auspices of deregulation, a lot of the small stuff has faded away from public attention.

Maybe because I love seafood, this one struck me right in the gut. Can I start growing my own fish and shrimp?

In March, inspectors checking Chinese seafood arriving at U.S. ports made some unsettling discoveries: fish infected with salmonella in Baltimore and Seattle and shrimp with banned veterinary drugs in Florida.

Meanwhile, a shipment intercepted in Los Angeles March 19 labeled "channel catfish" wasn't catfish at all, though records don't say what it was.

"A lot of those products coming in from overseas, you have no clue as to what is in them," said Paul Hitchens, an aquaculture specialist in southern Illinois, where cut-rate Chinese catfish are threatening the livelihood of fish farmers.
(snip)
FDA officials are requesting new authority, including the ability to license private companies to assist with inspections. But the Bush administration has signaled opposition to key provisions that would require regular inspections in foreign lands and limit ports where food can arrive to docks with FDA labs.

Former FDA officials argue that change is urgently needed.

William Hubbard, formerly the FDA's associate commissioner, noted in an interview that the FDA's inspection system was designed early last century when the big challenge was finding bugs or mold in arriving barrels of commodities like flour or molasses. Now, the U.S. gets millions of shipments of foreign food each year from around the world.

Hubbard, who retired in 2005, recalled inspectors reporting particularly disturbing methods of Chinese aquaculture: raising chickens in cages kept above fish-ponds _ a potential source of the salmonella in seafood, he said.

"Increasingly, the world is moving in a better direction in food safety and we're falling behind. As our system becomes more antiquated and more ineffective, the world is sending us their junk," said Hubbard. (Emphasis added.)

The increasing incidence of food poisoning is directly due to this administration. When the war criminal at its head took the oath of office, that evidently was the kickoff of the war against America.

We cannot believe in those FDA approved labels, because the FDA has been gutted. Our inspection process, set up over many years to protect the public, was turned around to protect business interests.

As for ameliorating the international trade agreements many Americans believe have been detrimental, forget about it. In straight power terms, America, now the world's largest debtor nation, cannot raise tariffs to bar creditor nations' merchandise. A person does not order around those to whom he owes money and from whom he is borrowing more.

We are in debt to China, ergo, we have to meet its demands. It is impossible to conduct a war on loans to China if we don't bow to its need to foist off unsafe products on the American consumer.

Put down the fish and back away slowly.