Life Isn't Precious to the Wingers

It's pretty revolting to see the blows against the public the occupied White House is throwing at us in its final days in office. While the hazards of BPA have been detailed by FDA scientists, and detailed in studies and articles, the administration's anti-life tools will not let be businesses be inconvenienced by protecting the public from it.

A Food and Drug Administration panel on Friday endorsed a review that called the agency's report on a chemical found in plastic food containers inadequate.

The review, released Wednesday, was sharply critical of the FDA's report, released in August, that said the chemical Bisphenol-A, or BPA, is safe at current levels found in plastic food containers. The review said the FDA relied too heavily on studies funded by the chemical industry and didn't back its stance up with available science.

A panel of medical experts on Friday endorsed the review, meaning it will now go to FDA Commissioner Andrew von Eschenbach for consideration. It's unclear what decision the FDA will make going forward regarding BPA. The FDA is scheduled to respond to the panel's report by February, but may do so sooner.

Canada recently moved to ban BPA from baby products, and retailers such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. (WMT) have removed BPA containing baby products from their shelves. Those moves have pressured the FDA to make a decision on BPA's safety.

The agency has repeatedly said it wants to review more studies to determine BPA's safety, a move that has sparked criticism from scientists and even some panel members that the FDA is acting too slowly.

"That's why the system is losing credibility with the public," said Larry Sasich, the panel's sole consumer representative. "We do a lot of hard work and a lot of really good science but we don't do anything with it."

Sasich said the FDA should consider banning BPA in baby products immediately. Although such a recommendation was outside the rules of Friday's meeting, the FDA said other panel members can write to the FDA next week if they think the agency should consider banning the chemical from baby products.

The FDA has been packed with anti-life administration tools who are okay with endangering the health of children because business must be served at any cost. Putting off the measures that public safety needs is the FDA chief's way of continuing to obstruct the public interest. He is well paid to play this role, as are the many criminals fighting against America all through the executive branch.

These cronies of the White House should be prosecuted for malfeasance. They have violated their oaths of office, and enriched themselves at the country's expense.

I would like to see Public Enemy numbers attached to their files, perhaps a set of playing cards with their pictures on them, starting with No. 1, Darth Cheney.

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.

Over the railings of the sinking ship of state, some good things come.

Have some (veggie) fries with this.

Coughing up a little bit of truthtelling even by Presidential appointees? Must be the lame end of a failed presidency. And coming out of the woodwork is a bit of truth. Maybe this is another signal that even the enablers of the executive branch are ashamed of the monster they've created.

A new presidential report on cancer takes on not only tobacco companies but the food industry while calling on the federal government to "cease being a purveyor of unhealthy foods" and switch to policies that encourage Americans to eat vegetables and exercise.

The report, issued on Thursday, also urged changes in public and private insurance policies to encourage doctors to spend more time counseling patients on how to stay healthy by eating right, exercising and avoiding tobacco.

Federal, state, and local policies have actually made healthful foods more expensive and less available, have limited physical education in schools and created an environment that discourages physical activity, the report said.

"Ineffective policies, in conjunction with limited regulation of sales and marketing in the food and beverage industry, have spawned a culture that struggles to make healthy choices -- a culture in dire need of change," said the report, available on the Internet at http://pcp.cancer.gov.

Margaret Kripke of the University of Texas M.D. Anderson cancer center, a member of the President's Cancer Panel, said in a telephone interview, "What became clear to me is that we simply don't have the political will to protect the public health."
(snip)
"We heavily subsidize the growth of foods (e.g., corn, soy) that in their processed forms (e.g., high fructose corn syrup, hydrogenated corn and soybean oils, grain-fed cattle) are known contributors to obesity and associated chronic diseases, including cancer," the report reads.

"The people who are doing the U.S. agricultural subsidies need to connect their subsidies with the policy on public health and I don't think that has been done," Kripke said.

Yet fresh fruits and vegetables are not subsidized in the same way. "And physical education classes in school have almost disappeared," Kripke said.

Does this mean we're going to see the cretin in chief having his stomach pumped alongside one of his food poisoning victims, like his jogs with the amputees he's created? Or maybe pricking his finger alongside one of his overweight diabetics?

More like this please, presidential appointees who live up to their roles, keep their oaths, and protect the public interest. Closet democrats, in other words.