Obama Kills Hope for Change Naming Vilsack to USDA

For a brief and shining moment there was hope for change we can believe in, but the appointment of Monsanto's biotech champion from Iowa effectively kills the idea that consumer rights will be any different under Obama.

For over a decade the world has rejected the patent protected, fee based seeds that tolerate toxic doses of patented herbicides, but denied the right to know what is in our food supply, ignorant Americans have supported these untested ingredients.

Like the policies that allowed subprime ending to create opportunities for a few corporations to benefit at the expense of the public benefit, "biotech policy" has provided the makers of PCB's and Agent Orange the opportunity for unfettered control of the Nations food supply and Vilsack has been among the chief supporters. In fact George Bush's Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns and Visack had partnered in early efforts to advance the climate of control for Monsanto.

Vilsack and Johanns were partners heading the biotech efforts to roll supports for a biotech agenda out in the States, expanding gmo legislative efforts, well beyond Federal lobbying.

The Governors Biotechnology Partnership has significantly grown in recent months with more than half of all U.S. Governors now members of the educational outreach organization.

As the group gathered in Providence during the National Governors Association annual meeting, Governor Thomas J. Vilsack (D-Iowa), who chairs the organization, and Governor Mike Johanns (R-Nebraska), vice chair, announced that twenty-seven Governors are now members. There were thirteen founding Governors when the organization was formed more than a year ago to promote healthy discussion of the potential of biotechnology.

Anyone who believes that party affiliation changes the lure of corporate dollars in the corporate government is sadly mistaken. Bipartisan support for the deep pockets is the overlooked element of the corporate government and Vilsack is more of the same.

In the announcement Reuters quoted Senator Democratic Senator Tom Harkin in support of the Vilsack appointment, but no mention was made of how Harkin joined John Ashcroft in attacking the EU concerns over the dangers of biotech crops. When the British Medical Assn. cautioned against GM foods in 1999, Harkin cowrote the complaint with Ashcroft.

In a strongly worded report that immediately increased trade tensions with the United States, the British Medical Association also called for gene-altered crops to be processed separately from conventional crops, rather than mixed together as is done today in the United States, so that any health effects that may eventually turn up will be traceable to the products that caused them.

If growers in the United States or other countries continue to refuse to segregate gene-modified products, the association concluded, then Britain should consider banning imports of those foods.

In America we have a don't look, don't find policy when it comes to identifying Monsanto's products or dangers associated with them. No one has been a bigger supporter of this corporate coup than Vilsack.

Change we can believe in was a great theme for the campaign but the reality is becoming clear, this land is owned by Monsanto so Americans who want to have pure foods or the right to choose what they eat can just shut up and swallow what serves the corporate interests.