Thursday, May 31, 2007

"State socialism in defense of Mad Cow"

Via dailyKos, this is just one of the stupidest things I've ever heard (and that's saying a lot, what with the past 7 years).

Apparently, the Bush administration is going to keep meatpacking companies from voluntarily testing all their animals for mad cow disease, because some up-and-coming, small meatpacking company in Kansas wants to test all its animals. Of course, the larger companies don't like this, fearing they'll have to test all their larger herds, too, and that will cut into profit! So the USDA is quashing the small company from voluntarily testing its herds. And free-market competition? Sorry, can't allow that - that will piss off some of the corporate sponsors who pay for us to get elected! So the public won't know if it's meat is free of mad-cow, because the bigger meatpacking companies fear the threat to their profits from a small company that wants to act freely in a "free" market. Awesome.