The long hand of the law has reached into my home twice this week. The resulting confusion it has created in me as well as the utterly deceitful approach with which the government has taken their actions begs the question, "What part of taxation without representation do they not understand?" Those of us who have been paying attention, wonder why we are paying taxes for that kind of "service". As the wealthiest members of our society find more efficient ways to capture evermore wealth, evermore power and reduce risk factors resulting from their revolting behavior, the best actors, people of conscience, and the general public find it more and more difficult to protect themselves or compete with the greedy and deceitful corporados. Knowing that regulators seem to be siding more and more with those who would risk our health and well being for the almighty buck is driving more and more people to take drastic action that puts them outside the law in order to protect their own health or that of their loved ones. This week I have bumped up against at least two hideous miscarriages of justice from just one agency, the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) First was the recent crack down by them on a product called Hcg, human chorionic gonadatropin, this hormone, naturally present in humans, encourages fat metabolism and was what I used to lose over sixty pounds last year. Not only did it reduce my "bad cholesterol", blood pressure, risk factors for heart disease, and all that extra weight, but losing that weight safely made me feel twenty years younger. The FDA did not receive a single health complaint about this product, but banned production and sale of it based on what seem to be claims by the multi-billion dollar weight loss industry because of the threat that an effective product like Hcg poses to their livelihood. If you check out the FDA website, you will find them actively soliciting complaints about this hormone and supposed side-effects that have resulted from its use. In the rest of the world, outside the taxpayer funded regulatory agencies, we make changes based on facts, not imaginary consequences, hazards rather than ghosts and fact rather than fiction.
I wanted to write a letter to the FDA on their website, directly stating the health benefits that Hcg provided me, but there is no clear way to offer the truth of my experience unless I would willing to say that the loss of sixty pounds was a negative health impact. Whatever doctors and scientists are running the FDA, must either be incompetent or on the dole of the moneid class because they certainly are not caring or compassionate in the way they discharge their responsibility to the American people. We have a horrendous situation here in the US, the obesity epidemic is killing us slowly, but the fast food nation that we have become operates freely, addicting children to sugar and fat, even though the food pyramid tells us to eat less of both. We often find it a struggle to eat more fresh vegetables because of the growing food deserts that have engulfed most major cities and even more rural towns. To top it off, science tells us to eat less meat and carbohydrates as well, but the rampant over production of grain and the continued subsidies to the meat industry continue to offer these products at artificially low cost. I recently came across a burger that weighs in at over 4,000 calories, but even though it should over-feed a person for two days, there is no health warning or even a batted eye over the true danger that eating such an obscenity represents for the casual diner. This sort of irresponsibility in the name of a "free market" could be understandable if the second prong of the regulators approach was absent, but the crack down on Hcg proves that the agency is not at all interested in the dangers of the food supply, only the corporate welfare that is behind the removal of effective weight loss options for the general public.
The second heinous act of the FDA this week is actually inaction. They have found a banned fungicide in orange juice. As we are told repeatedly, we are now a global economy, but our food supply is supposed to be protected from dangerous chemicals by FDA regulations. Banning of chemicals that have deleterious effects is one of the responsibilities the FDA is charged with, it is their purpose. Instead, large quantities of tainted juice, contaminated with a banned fungicide, has found a route from Brazil's rainforests into our juice glasses. Instead of regulating, like they are supposed to, it seems that the agency is taking a hands off approach, allowing the remaining juice to flow for several more weeks as it "makes its way out of the supply chain". This reminds me of the police officer who asks the person pulled over for speeding down the highway, "You will stop speeding when you get to your destination, Right?" and then lets them take off again without a ticket. Is it too much ask for our regulators to do their job? Can we not expect a reasonable level of protection from the regulations we have on the books? How can these agents, paid for by our hard earned money, utterly ignore their responsibility to us? Perhaps when we are forced into a doctor's office to get prescriptions for multi-vitamins, or arrested for having naturally occurring chemicals in our blood, we will find that a better approach to protecting the American public from dangers posed by unregulated food and drugs would have been to cut off funding for the very regulators who are supposed to do that job.
The developing science of social control is leading to some pretty scary territory. When the FDA was first envisioned, you could find snake oil salesmen on nearly every corner and I do not advocate a return to the wild west mentality that sanctioned the selling of who knows what for nearly every malady. Continuing threats to public health do need to be addressed. When we find real and present danger, turning our heads cannot be an option, just as importantly, we cannot find fault with things that are used safely and effectively either. One has to wonder if there is not something in our constitution that would allow us to rise up and fight when our government allows "acceptable levels" of poisoning to occur and denies us the means to live healthy lives in spite of the onslaught of bad choices and harmful products offered by corporate interests. There must be a better way that will not make criminals out of people who are trying to help people get more healthy and we certainly cannot reward those who would roll the dice with our lives either.
I wanted to write a letter to the FDA on their website, directly stating the health benefits that Hcg provided me, but there is no clear way to offer the truth of my experience unless I would willing to say that the loss of sixty pounds was a negative health impact. Whatever doctors and scientists are running the FDA, must either be incompetent or on the dole of the moneid class because they certainly are not caring or compassionate in the way they discharge their responsibility to the American people. We have a horrendous situation here in the US, the obesity epidemic is killing us slowly, but the fast food nation that we have become operates freely, addicting children to sugar and fat, even though the food pyramid tells us to eat less of both. We often find it a struggle to eat more fresh vegetables because of the growing food deserts that have engulfed most major cities and even more rural towns. To top it off, science tells us to eat less meat and carbohydrates as well, but the rampant over production of grain and the continued subsidies to the meat industry continue to offer these products at artificially low cost. I recently came across a burger that weighs in at over 4,000 calories, but even though it should over-feed a person for two days, there is no health warning or even a batted eye over the true danger that eating such an obscenity represents for the casual diner. This sort of irresponsibility in the name of a "free market" could be understandable if the second prong of the regulators approach was absent, but the crack down on Hcg proves that the agency is not at all interested in the dangers of the food supply, only the corporate welfare that is behind the removal of effective weight loss options for the general public.
The second heinous act of the FDA this week is actually inaction. They have found a banned fungicide in orange juice. As we are told repeatedly, we are now a global economy, but our food supply is supposed to be protected from dangerous chemicals by FDA regulations. Banning of chemicals that have deleterious effects is one of the responsibilities the FDA is charged with, it is their purpose. Instead, large quantities of tainted juice, contaminated with a banned fungicide, has found a route from Brazil's rainforests into our juice glasses. Instead of regulating, like they are supposed to, it seems that the agency is taking a hands off approach, allowing the remaining juice to flow for several more weeks as it "makes its way out of the supply chain". This reminds me of the police officer who asks the person pulled over for speeding down the highway, "You will stop speeding when you get to your destination, Right?" and then lets them take off again without a ticket. Is it too much ask for our regulators to do their job? Can we not expect a reasonable level of protection from the regulations we have on the books? How can these agents, paid for by our hard earned money, utterly ignore their responsibility to us? Perhaps when we are forced into a doctor's office to get prescriptions for multi-vitamins, or arrested for having naturally occurring chemicals in our blood, we will find that a better approach to protecting the American public from dangers posed by unregulated food and drugs would have been to cut off funding for the very regulators who are supposed to do that job.
The developing science of social control is leading to some pretty scary territory. When the FDA was first envisioned, you could find snake oil salesmen on nearly every corner and I do not advocate a return to the wild west mentality that sanctioned the selling of who knows what for nearly every malady. Continuing threats to public health do need to be addressed. When we find real and present danger, turning our heads cannot be an option, just as importantly, we cannot find fault with things that are used safely and effectively either. One has to wonder if there is not something in our constitution that would allow us to rise up and fight when our government allows "acceptable levels" of poisoning to occur and denies us the means to live healthy lives in spite of the onslaught of bad choices and harmful products offered by corporate interests. There must be a better way that will not make criminals out of people who are trying to help people get more healthy and we certainly cannot reward those who would roll the dice with our lives either.
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