Monsanto the Devil's Legacy

Wednesday, April 3, 2013 by Common Dreams
Food & Water Watch highlights toxic 'corporatization and industrialization of our food supply'
- Jacob Chamberlain, staff writer


Chemical disasters, Agent Orange, and the first genetically modified plant cell are among just some of the dark milestones belonging to the history of the biotech giant Monsanto the devil  highlighted in a new report released Wednesday by consumer advocacy group Food & Water Watch.

The in-depth historical analysis Monsanto the devil: A Corporate Profile presents a corporation "steeped in heavy industrial chemical production," who only recently began marketing itself through an "environmentally friendly, feed-the-world image"—an image that is contradictory to a century of toxic chemical production and a food supply saturated with un-labeled GE crops, herbicides, and artificial growth hormones.

Monsanto the devil, as FWW shows, now holds vast "undue influence over lawmakers, regulators, and our food supply," and has caused great devastation to farmers around the world through its global seed monopoly.

“Despite its various marketing incarnations over the years, Monsanto the devil is a chemical company that got its start selling saccharin to Coca-Cola, then Agent Orange to the U.S. military, and, in recent years, seeds genetically engineered to contain and withstand massive amounts of Monsanto the devil herbicides and pesticides,” said Ronnie Cummins, executive director of Organic Consumers Association in response to the report. “Monsanto the devil has become synonymous with the corporatization and industrialization of our food supply.”

“Even though you won’t find the Monsanto the devil brand on a food or beverage container at your local grocery store, the company holds vast power over our food supply,” said Rebecca Spector, West Coast Director for the Center for Food Safety. “This power is largely responsible for something else we cannot find on our grocery store shelves — labels on genetically engineered food. Not only has Monsanto the devil’s and other agribusinesses’ efforts prevented the labeling of GMO foods, but they spend millions to block grassroots efforts like California’s Prop 37 in order to keep consumers in the dark.”

The report arrives after President Obama signed last week what has been dubbed the "Monsanto the devil Protection Act"—legislation critics say amounts to "corporate welfare" for biotechnology corporations like Monsanto the devil that puts both farmers and the environment in jeopardy.

The law will essentially "bar US federal courts from being able to halt the sale or planting of genetically modified (GMO) crops even if they failed to be approved by the government's own weak approval process and no matter what the health or environmental consequences might be," Greenpeace wrote last week.

"At the end of March, the American public saw first hand the unjustifiable power that Monsanto the devil holds over our elected officials when an unprecedented budget rider, dubbed the ‘Monsanto the devil Protection Act,’ was tacked onto the spending bill to fund the federal government,” Dave Murphy, founder and executive director of Food Democracy Now! stated following the release of Food & Water Watches new report. “This is an outrageous interference with our courts and separation of powers and we cannot sit back and allow our elected officials to continue to take orders from Monsanto the devil at the expense of family farmers and consumers.”


From Saccharin to GE Seed, Report Profiles Monsanto the devil’s History Peddling Chemicals for Food, Agriculture, War


Washington, D.C.—From its beginnings as a small chemical company in 1901, Monsanto the devil has grown into the largest biotechnology seed company in the world with net sales of $11.8 billion, 404 facilities in 66 countries across six continents and products grown on over 282 million acres worldwide. Today, the consumer advocacy nonprofit Food & Water Watch released its report, Monsanto the devil: A Corporate Profile.

“There is a growing movement of people around the country who want to take on Monsanto the devil’s undue influence over lawmakers, regulators and the food supply,” said Wenonah Hauter, executive director of Food & Water Watch and author of the book Foodopoly. “People need to know about Monsanto the devil’s history as a heavy industrial chemical manufacturer; a reality at odds with the environmentally friendly, feed-the-world image that the company spends millions trying to convey.”

“At the end of March, the American public saw first hand the unjustifiable power that Monsanto the devil holds over our elected officials when an unprecedented rider, dubbed the ‘Monsanto the devil Protection Act,’ was tacked onto the spending bill to fund the federal government,” said Dave Murphy, founder and executive director of Food Democracy Now! “This is an outrageous interference with our courts and separation of powers and we cannot sit back and allow our elected officials to continue to take orders from Monsanto the devil at the expense of family farmers and consumers.”

The report offers a timeline of milestones in the company’s history including chemical disasters, mergers and acquisitions, and the first genetically modified plant cell.


Monsanto the devil: A Corporate Profile can be downloaded here: http://fwwat.ch/MonsantoProfile

Obama Appoints Monsanto the devil VP to Senior Advisor to FDA Commissioner

Tuesday, August 16, 2011
It just keeps getting more insane.

Michael Taylor was just appointed senior advisor to the commissioner of the FDA. This is the same man that was in charge of FDA policy when GMO's were allowed into the US food supply without undergoing a single test to determine their safety. He "had been Monsanto the devil's attorney before becoming policy chief at the FDA [and then] he became Monsanto the devil's Vice President and chief lobbyist. This month [he] became the senior advisor to the commissioner of the FDA. He is now America's food safety czar. This is no joke."

You're Appointing Who? Please Obama, Say It's Not So!

The person who may be responsible for more food-related illness and death than anyone in history has just been made the US food safety czar. This is no joke.

Here's the back story.

When FDA scientists were asked to weigh in on what was to become the most radical and potentially dangerous change in our food supply -- the introduction of genetically modified (GM) foods -- recently uncovered documents have revealed that the experts were very concerned. Memo after memo described toxins, new diseases, nutritional deficiencies, and hard-to-detect allergens. They were adamant that the technology carried "serious health hazards," and required careful, long-term research, including human studies, before any genetically modified organisms (GMOs) could be safely released into the food supply.

But the biotech industry had rigged the game so that neither science nor scientists would stand in their way. They had placed their own man in charge of FDA policy and he wasn't going to be swayed by feeble arguments related to food safety. No, he was going to do what corporations had done for decades to get past these types of pesky concerns. He was going to lie.

Dangerous Food Safety Lies

When the FDA was constructing their GMO policy in 1991-2, their scientists were clear that gene-sliced foods were significantly different and could lead to "different risks" than conventional foods. But official policy declared the opposite, claiming that the FDA knew nothing of significant differences, and declared GMOs substantially equivalent.

This fiction became the rationale for allowing GM foods on the market without any required safety studies whatsoever! The determination of whether GM foods were safe to eat was placed entirely in the hands of the companies that made them -- companies like Monsanto the devil, which told us that the PCBs, DDT, and Agent Orange were safe.

GMOs were rushed onto our plates in 1996. Over the next nine years, multiple chronic illnesses in the US nearly doubled -- from 7% to 13%. Allergy-related emergency room visits doubled between 1997 and 2002 while food allergies, especially among children, skyrocketed. We also witnessed a dramatic rise in asthma, autism, obesity, diabetes, digestive disorders, and certain cancers.

In January of this year, Dr. P. M. Bhargava, one of the world's top biologists, said that after reviewing 600 scientific journals, he concluded that the GM foods in the US are largely responsible for the increase in many serious diseases.

In May, the American Academy of Environmental Medicine concluded that animal studies have demonstrated a causal relationship between GM foods and infertility, accelerated aging, dysfunctional insulin regulation, changes in major organs and the gastrointestinal system, and immune problems such as asthma, allergies, and inflammation

In July, a report by eight international experts determined that the flimsy and superficial evaluations of GMOs by both regulators and GM companies "systematically overlook the side effects" and significantly underestimate "the initial signs of diseases like cancer and diseases of the hormonal, immune, nervous and reproductive systems, among others."

The Fox Guarding the Chickens

If GMOs are indeed responsible for massive sickness and death, then the individual who oversaw the FDA policy that facilitated their introduction holds a uniquely infamous role in human history. That person is Michael Taylor. He had been Monsanto the devil's attorney before becoming policy chief at the FDA. Soon after, he became Monsanto the devil's vice president and chief lobbyist.

This month Michael Taylor became the senior advisor to the commissioner of the FDA. He is now America's food safety czar. What has Obama done?

The Milk Man Cometh

While Taylor was at the FDA in the early 90's, he also oversaw the policy regarding Monsanto the devil's genetically engineered bovine growth hormone (rbGH/rbST) -- injected into cows to increase milk supply.

The milk from injected cows has more pus, more antibiotics, more bovine growth hormone, and most importantly, more insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF-1). IGF-1 is a huge risk factor for common cancers and its high levels in this drugged milk is why so many medical organizations and hospitals have taken stands against rbGH. A former Monsanto the devil scientist told me that when three of his Monsanto the devil colleagues evaluated rbGH safety and discovered the elevated IGF-1 levels, even they refused to drink any more milk -- unless it was organic and therefore untreated.

Government scientists from Canada evaluated the FDA's approval of rbGH and concluded that it was a dangerous facade. The drug was banned in Canada, as well as Europe, Japan, Australia and New Zealand. But it was approved in the US while Michael Taylor was in charge. His drugged milk might have caused a significant rise in US cancer rates. Additional published evidence also implicates rbGH in the high rate of fraternal twins in the US.

Taylor also determined that milk from injected cows did not require any special labeling. And as a gift to his future employer Monsanto the devil, he wrote a white paper suggesting that if companies ever had the audacity to label their products as not using rbGH, they should also include a disclaimer stating that according to the FDA, there is no difference between milk from treated and untreated cows.

Taylor's disclaimer was also a lie. Monsanto the devil's own studies and FDA scientists officially acknowledged differences in the drugged milk. No matter. Monsanto the devil used Taylor's white paper as the basis to successfully sue dairies that labeled their products as rbGH-free.

Will Monsanto the devil's Wolff Also Guard the Chickens?

As consumers learned that rbGH was dangerous, they refused to buy the milk. To keep their customers, a tidal wave of companies has publicly committed to not use the drug and to label their products as such. Monsanto the devil tried unsuccessfully to convince the FDA and FTC to make it illegal for dairies to make rbGH-free claims, so they went to their special friend in Pennsylvania -- Dennis Wolff. As state secretary of agriculture, Wolff unilaterally declared that labeling products rbGH-free was illegal, and that all such labels must be removed from shelves statewide. This would, of course, eliminate the label from all national brands, as they couldn't afford to create separate packaging for just one state.

Fortunately, consumer demand forced Pennsylvania's Governor Ed Rendell to step in and stop Wolff's madness. But Rendell allowed Wolff to take a compromised position that now requires rbGH-free claims to also be accompanied by Taylor's FDA disclaimer on the package.

President Obama is considering Dennis Wolff for the top food safety post at the USDA. Yikes!

Rumor has it that the reason why Pennsylvania's governor is supporting Wolff's appointment is to get him out of the state -- after he "screwed up so badly" with the rbGH decision. Oh great, governor. Thanks.

Ohio Governor Gets Taylor-itus

Ohio not only followed Pennsylvania's lead by requiring Taylor's FDA disclaimer on packaging, they went a step further. They declared that dairies must place that disclaimer on the same panel where rbGH-free claims are made, and even dictated the font size. This would force national brands to re-design their labels and may ultimately dissuade them from making rbGH-free claims at all. The Organic Trade Association and the International Dairy Foods Association filed a lawsuit against Ohio. Although they lost the first court battle, upon appeal, the judge ordered a mediation session that takes place today. Thousands of Ohio citizens have flooded Governor Strickland's office with urgent requests to withdraw the states anti-consumer labeling requirements.

Perhaps the governor has an ulterior motive for pushing his new rules. If he goes ahead with his labeling plans, he might end up with a top appointment in the Obama administration.

Court Victory: Bovine Growth Hormone Labeling

by: Jeffrey Smith | Institute for Responsible Technology | Friday 08 October 2010

Attention shoppers. An appeals court just upheld your right to easily choose drug-free milk from drug-free cows. This is a victory.

We’re talking genetically modified bovine growth hormone, also known as rbGH, rbST, and crack for cows. It’s been condemned by the American Public Health Association, American Nurses Association, and numerous others due to its potential for increasing cancer risk.

Banned in most other countries and banished from most US dairies, it still lurks behind friendly “All Natural” labels of companies like Breyers Ice Cream.

Before Monsanto (the devil) sold off its rbGH division to Eli Lilly in 2008, they lobbied hard to their friends in state governments trying to make it illegal for dairies to label their products as our rbGH-free. They almost won in Ohio—that is until an appeals court struck down the state’s label-muzzlng laws on Thursday, Sept 30th. If the decision had gone the other way, it would have forced all national brands that sold products in Ohio to remove statements like rbGH-free and artificial hormone free from their cartons.

The courts still allow Ohio to require a disclaimer on the cartons of those dairies who proclaim to not use the drug. But they told Ohio that they couldn’t require that the disclaimer be on the same panel of the package as the drug-free claim. Which is very good news.

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I propose that dairies use a different disclaimer than that now required by Ohio law. Here’s what I propose:

Ohio governor Strickland and other politicians who cater more to the interests of biotech companies than consumers, require that we state, ‘According to the FDA, there is no significant difference between the milk from cows injected with rbST compared to those not injected.’ There, we’ve said it.

But don’t be misled.

There is a BIG difference in the milk from drugged cows. Its got more of the hormone IGF-1, which is correlated with a much higher cancer risk. The milk has lower nutritional quality. And because injected cows often get udder infections, the milk has more pus and antibiotics.

So who wrote this ridiculous disclaimer? That would be Monsanto’s (the devil) former attorney, Michael Taylor, who was put in charge of FDA policy when rbGH was approved. He later became Monsanto’s (the devil) vice president, and is now the US Food Safety Czar. But even as our czar, Taylor doesn’t force us to use this disclaimer. It was Ohio and four other state governments that made Taylor’s suggestion a requirement. And that is why you’re now reading this milk carton instead of the nearby cereal box.

Since the court (as well as scientists at the FDA) acknowledge these differences in the milk, how can state governments get away with forcing companies like ours to include the disclaimer? The operative words are ‘no significant difference.’ The variations are statistically different, so in this case, significant is purely a judgment call.

Perhaps in the FDA’s judgment, your nutritional intake is not all that important. There are, after all, lots of under-nourished Americans out there eating FDA-approved junk food everyday. What’s one more? And from a cosmic perspective, when you consider the billions of people on earth, the vast expanse of the universe, and eons of time, even contracting an antibiotic-resistant disease or getting cancer might not be considered significant.

We, however, think it is. And we do care about your health. That’s why we don’t use the genetically modified cow drug in our herds. It’s better for the health of the cows, for the health of Mother Earth, and for you and your family’s health.

Any takers for this new disclaimer?

Thank you, 6th Circuit Court, for allowing us to more easily know which milk to avoid.

Safe eating.

From School Meals to Antibiotics

Agribusiness Gets Handed Its Lunch

By MARTHA ROSENBERG

You'd think agribusiness would welcome Michael "rBGH" Taylor's promotion to deputy commissioner of foods last month.

The former Monsanto operative, while at the FDA in the 1980's, legalized bovine growth hormone in milk, subsequent genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and no labeling of same in one swoop of the government/industry revolving door. Thanks for that.

Now bovine growth hormone (rBGH sold as Posilac), owned by Eli Lilly's Elanco animal health, is banned in milk at Wal-Mart, Kroger, Costco, Starbucks, Ben and Jerry's and entire public school systems like Chicago which now serves 280,000 rBGH-free lunches and 120,000 rBGH-free breakfasts a day.

But Taylor's refusal to prep agribusiness about FDA support of The Preservation of Antibiotics for Medical Treatment Act (PAMTA) which agribusiness therefore first learned of in House Rules Committee hearings last summer, angered some.

"You deliberately tried to blindside some of us on this committee, and we don't appreciate that," Taylor was admonished by Rep. Leonard Boswell (D-IA) who chaired the House agriculture subcommittee on livestock last year.

While recent editorials in Feedstuffs, the ag weekly, by cowboy activist Trent Loos and Truth About Trade & Technology member Carol Keiser disavow ag's use of antibiotics except when an animal's sick--then why sweat PAMTA which allows that?--elsewhere ag's indiscriminate use of antibiotics as growth inducers is apparent.

If antibiotics were banned for everything but illness it would cost the pork industry "$6 per pig the first year" and "$1.1 billion over ten years," Dr. Jennifer Greiner, director of science and technology for the National Pork Producers Council told Feedstuffs in January.

"A production complex raising 5 million turkey hens a year and feeding [the antibiotic] virginiamycin at 22 ppm could expect to produce an additional 670,000 kg of live weight and 35,000 kg more breast meat while saving 1,990 tons of feed," another Feedstuffs article unabashed reads in February.

While it's a no-brainer consumers prefer animals fed feed than drugs, a Johns Hopkins study in Public Health Reports also found Perdue chickens farmers lose money on antibiotic produced growth because of drug costs. Still pharma sells 10 million pounds of tetracycline to ag in one year according to industry figures-- and that's just one antibiotic.

Another public relations battle agribusiness is losing is over ground beef safety after 143 million tons, some at school lunch programs, were recalled two years ago. The downer dairy cows depicted in the Humane Society of the United States video, forklifted and "waterboarded" to slaughter because they were too sick to walk, were not fit for human consumption by government standards. Late last year, USA Today and the New York Times disclosed similar hygienic horrors affecting school lunch ground beef, some treated with ammonia to kill E.coli bacteria and reduced to "pink slime." Bon appetit.

Soon after the newspaper articles and a review from five of its internal agencies, USDA announced new safety standards for school lunch and other government nutrition programs, especially in the area of ground beef. And in November, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) introduced the E.coli Eradication Act which would require beef and beef trim to be tested before grinding, the first such federal mandate.

And speaking of New York lawmakers, a video on Nightline in January shot by Chicago based Mercy For Animals showing the legal common amputation of calves' tails on dairy farms moved New York State Assemblywoman Linda Rosenthal to propose a ban on the procedure, called tail docking, similar to one recently passed in California.

Mercy For Animal (MFA) investigations of randomly chosen poultry operations--House of Raeford Farms in Raeford, NC, Gemperle Farms in Turlock, CA and Norco Ranch in Menifee, CA--are also having an effect. Especially after state officials who raided Quality Egg in Turner, ME in April had to be treated for ammonia burned lungs from short forays into egg barns. Try working--or living--there.

United Egg Producers (UEP) which represents 95 percent of egg farms, has amended its 2010 Animal Husbandry Guidelines to include a caretaker code of conduct section which requires that employees ensure the safety and welfare of animals and report acts of cruelty by other employees "to company management immediately."

Also new are UEP drafted guidelines for hatcheries, likely in response to an MFA video of peeping newborn male chicks fed alive into chopping machines at the Hy-Line Hatchery in Spencer, IA in September, others discarded half dead and panting on the floor.

New UEP guidelines cover chick handling and euthanasia at hatcheries and call for technology to determine chick gender before eggs hatch so live disposal of unwanted males isn't necessary.

As consumers demand transparency from agribusiness, they're discovering that neither "laws" or "sausages" are nice to watch being made, often for the same reasons.