“I’d like to see some source material about all this GMO allegations. Crops weaker, less healthy?”

Yep. That’s why you can’t save seeds from GMO crops. They don’t stick.

“Despite the fact that we humans are larger, stronger and living longer than ever before?”

Yep. Wendell Berry addresses that much better than I ever could in his essays.

“Dispite the fact that we are getting a greater yield per acre than we ever have before?”

Greater yields than ever before yet are we also adding greater amounts of compost and fertilizer? No, we aren’t (I’m not counting the stimulant commonly called fertilizer). Are we increasing the diversity, strength, and health of the soil lifeforms? No we aren’t.

Imagine a huge bucket filled with 100++ ingredients all necessary to grow plants. Now imagine taking out a ladle full, and throwing 3 ingredients back in. Bigger yields are like a bigger ladle. As the ladling continues you keep adding 3 ingredients, the same 3. How long can you keep removing the essential ingredients of life before there isn’t enough left? Time will tell. Vitamin content of vegetables is already declining 1/3 from it’s former measured value. Increasing outputs without increasing inputs means the system is doomed. It’s incredibly stupid.

“Lotta statements being made without evidence to back it up.”

Not nearly as many as made by the state and corporations about how they produce food, and if you look, you shall see what I mean.

I really like the Julian Sanchez article btw. The entertainment industry, somewhat ironically, is legendary for the amount of bullshit they will spin as truth. They would strangle the internet with the false reason of retaining their profits, when they really want to destroy the only real competition to their hegemonic control of culture and information. Of course under the “assume stupidity before malice” principle they may actually think their bill would somehow protect their profits, but I doubt it.

Then you are essentially arguing from a “purity of essence” standpoint. And any apt student of history can foresee where that will go.

“The latifundia were a problem not because of the crops that they grew but because they replaced the small-holders, who were the basis of Rome’s citizen army.”

Both aspects were a problem per the perspective expounded upon in “Topsoil and Civilization”. Comparing the best available descriptions of the land occupied by the Romans before and after their agricultural exploitation provides a stark history lesson.

“Then why are you throwing around unsourced freshman-caliber opinions about “food fascism”.”

The answer is that it IS food fascism. As fascism treats people it also treats plants, animals, and the land. That is to say fascism views these things as mere machines to be engineered, designed, manipulated, controlled, dominated, as if it is possible to wave the magic wand of legislation/GM and make everything into the vastly over simplistic idealized photogenic fascist fantasy.

“Deep meditations like “Anyone who endorses food fascism is not a libertarian” do nothing to advance anyone’s understanding of the world.”

Truism are true, but pointless.

“Please, go away for a year or three, write your well-sourced book, and we will all have a conversation. Until then, you just sound like a crazy person.”

Excellent advice that I shall do my best to heed. Thanks!

Unfortunately, it seems that Marx is not alone in his critique. It is understandable that the left leaning blogosphere was irate that one of their favorite republican floggers took on the entire Democrat party, but I have a harder time understanding where the Libertarian leaning writers are coming from. This form of rhetorical dishonesty is not just damaging to the political discourse as Marx argues, it is entirely destructive of it. For a better example, look at the last attempt to even discuss social security reform: we never even had a debate because the seniors were scare-mongered into believing that their benefits were going to be cut. Or try having an honest debate on drug policy outside the safety of Libertarian-leaning panels and blogs. Dishonest scare-mongering about pushing drugs on children and crack babies will drown out any reasoned discourse.

But he did get me motivated to visit those sites to see what they are up to lately. In doing so I quickly found a better example of problems with fact-check sites. In this example Ron Paul mentions a poll suggesting that ‘the majority of the American people support the gold standard’. When the Paul campaign provided a link to his source (an article mentioning 3 polls) it turns out they weren’t national polls. Politifact then turns to a Rasmussen poll that shows 57 percent of likely voters nationwide support the gold standard, but only after being asked a followup question (44 percent before the followup). Their analysis? Paul lied.

Really? There are in fact several polls from around the country and nationwide polls that show a majority in favor of a gold standard – but Politifact doesn’t think they measure up to their standard of “nationwide” and “the american people”, so it is a lie? You could call characterizing it as “the american people” an exaggeration, but a lie? Plus, the thrust of his statement is about how far the debate on the gold standard has come – from kookie fringe to something included in national polling – not the exact percentage points of support. If the very first “fact check” that I clicked on at Politifact is this questionable, it must be fairly common. Why then would you choose a Medicare example that is much less clear cut (so much less so that left-leaning factcheck sites agree with its status)? I suppose the answer is that Marx knows his audience and his readership is much more likely to identify with a takedown of an attack on team-blue.

Rome did the exact same thing. It created the latifundia, ever bigger farms staffed with cheap imported foreign labor, and it used monocrops, and it ignored the operating principles of nature,

The latifundia were a problem not because of the crops that they grew but because they replaced the small-holders, who were the basis of Rome’s citizen army. This was a long process that involved the growth of the empire in the post-Punic Wars period. As the citizen-soldiers were no longer able to return to their farms between campaigns, they lost them to debt collectors (they had to borrow to buy their equipment). The debt collectors were typically acting for the Senatorial and Knight classes who were building up estates.

By and large, however, the latifundi grew the exact same crops that the smallholders did. (And that same soil has continued to produce crops even up to the present.) The fantasies of ecofreaks had nothing to do with the fall of the Roman Republic and the rise of the Empire.

This format is far too brief to address such a complicated topic

Then why are you throwing around unsourced freshman-caliber opinions about “food fascism”. Deep meditations like “Anyone who endorses food fascism is not a libertarian” do nothing to advance anyone’s understanding of the world.

Please, go away for a year or three, write your well-sourced book, and we will all have a conversation. Until then, you just sound like a crazy person.

Bono (idiot) backs Santorum because of Africa/AIDs funding.

Nice to have all the idiots in one place.

o_0

But I can accept that other libertarians may disagree with the arguments I find convincing without feeling compelled to question their motives.

This is what the Internet must be like on planet Bizzaro.

And they are producing stuff that one can consume, but it isn’t food. It lacks many of the vitamins/etc that the natural version has (e.g. when comparing GMO carrot to non-GMO carrot), and has negative side effects. To what degree cannot be stated because GMO is such a new thing that long term studies do not yet exist.

I will stick with my Farmer’s Market and those there that do not spray and allow me to see how they grow food on their farm. I give myself the best chance at eating natural food. Your body is genetically wired through a lot of evolution to perform optimally when you eat certain things. Your body is a machine, just like a vehicle. You can keep it running, but it is sub-optimal and you could be hurting yourself.

Consider Primal Diet and give it a read. I was skeptical, gave it a try 2 months ago, and I feel so much better and had several life-long health issues disappear in weeks. I will never go back to processed foods and non-fresh foods and a carb-based diet. Natural veggies, meat, nuts for me.

“We need to keep and expand our commitment to humanitarian aid, especially in Africa,” Santorum said in a speech to the National Press Club in April 2011. “China and Islam are competing for the hearts and minds of much of Africa, and we cannot turn our back from the investment and commitments we have made.

I didn’t know China and Islam were the enemy (if there is such a thing). Santorum sure does. Fuck this guy AND Bono. This kind of State Team crap has wrecking millions of lives in Africa. Too bad Bono can’t see around his own swelled head to notice.

/rant

“A critic, as long as you keep misusing the word “fascism,” it’s not unreasonable to ignore your opinions on the matter. ”

My experience has been that opinions are ignored as a matter of course. I was rather surprised that anyone bothered to respond to me, although I suppose as I was attacking cash sources I should have expected it.

Fascism as I understand it is corporatism, the merging of state and corporations, with the end being total power and control, same as any type of statism.

“Your opinions on GM foods sound like opinions by vaccination opponents: broad, meaningless statements on “nature,” warnings of calamities to come, and zero scientific evidence to support your assertions.”

It reduces the diversity and strength of the gene pool. The changes are so pathetically weak that they are not reproducible through reproductive means, or in other words, the altered specimens reject the changes, most likely because the changes are not real improvements. The modifications are done primarily by copying and pasting DNA and the beta testing is done by the public – and anyone who has a grasp on the fundamentals of quality programming should see the folly in that.

Further, GM crops are intended and used to sustain the unsustainable practice of monoculture that is dependent on petro-fertilizers that deliver less than 1/30th of necessary nutrients and minerals, a practice that wastes precious water and erodes the very precious topsoil, a practice that creates lower overall yields and that continues to lower the quantity of nutrients in the fruits and vegetables. All of this produces a people ever more dependent not only on oil for food, not only on corporations for food, but also government to protect the oil and corporations, thus empowering the government at the expense of our liberty.

Rome did the exact same thing. It created the latifundia, ever bigger farms staffed with cheap imported foreign labor, and it used monocrops, and it ignored the operating principles of nature, and it grew from a republic into a vast empire, and it had it’s bread and circuses and it’s foreign wars and so on and so forth. America is New Rome and the end shall be the same. For a preview of the future of this land, check out the formerly verdant lands of the Middle East and North Africa.

Recommended reading: “Topsoil and Civilization”

“The Marines taught me that you should never go through the front door, and that whenever possible you should make your own entrance. This is why.”

We are back to the suspect being ex military.

“A woman who claims she is a family member of the fallen officer told KSL’s Doug Wright Thursday morning that task force members were highly-trained for such situations. She said the family was told Wednesday night that the suspect may be former military and was armed with an automatic weapon and a handgun.”

http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=18748705

GMO is the result of the unholy triumvirate of government, corporations, and academia (all of which are funded and assisted by the state) working together to realize the dream of eugenics in plants and animals. They want perfect looking bland characterless uniform clones/copies with no deviations. Doesn’t work for people, won’t work out in the long run for plants or animals. The fundamental premise, that we can engineer life and control it and prevent “undesirables”, is the same fundamental premise that underlies eugenics.

This is not simply true. Not one sentence of it.