This is a lighthearted song that hints about a complicated and serious matter: Inappropriate connections between government regulations and the commercial interests. The government “buddy system” profits enormously from lucrative government contracts, subsidy programs and strategic regulations. This graft is even more insidious when it masquerades as beneficial social programs designed to gain public approval.
One line of the song’s chorus sings out, “They make us all dumb and easy to lead” reflecting the disturbing belief of the political elite that thinks it can get away with picking our pockets. And clearly, they have gotten away with it…both political parties for too many years.
It was difficult for schools to know whether the beef they bought from the feds had Pink Slime or not. That’s because Pink Slime is made from “beef” and although it’s treated with ammonium hydroxide, doesn’t need to be listed as a separate ingredient. The product is a low-cost “filler” in ground beef made from various fatty “left over” meat trimmings. The bits are heated to about 100 F, spun to remove fat, compressed into blocks for use in ground meat, and then exposed to ammonium hydroxide gas to kill bacteria, such as E. coli and salmonella.
Pink Slime was approved by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the Food and Drug Administration. Nearly a million pounds of pink slime per day was produced by one organization. Large amounts were purchased by the U.S. Department of Agriculture for the National School Lunch Program. School districts have fed it to our children. Substantial amounts of money were exchanged.
The fog cleared when the USDA announced that the National School Lunch Program will allow districts to choose ground beef that does not contain Pink Slime. Lean Finely Textured Beef or “LFTB” is what the USDA prefers to call Pink Slime. The USDA said that it believes Pink Slime is “safe and nutritious.” Critics however, are concerned that people do not know what was added to their food and believed that they are being deceived.
After social media exploded, and a petition seeking the removal of the product from schools drew hundreds of thousands of supporters, Beef Products, Inc., a leading supplier of beef containing Pink Slime, faced a public relations disaster of astonishing proportions. BPI suspended production at three plants amid public uproar over the filler. The plants in Iowa and Kansas each produced about 350,000 pounds of Pink Slime every day, while the plant in Amarillo produced about 200,000 pounds a day.
…& Gov Cheese
Government cheese came from food surpluses stockpiled by the government as part of the Dairy Price Support Program. The term “Government Cheese” has become negatively associated with government subsidies.
In 1924, a branch of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), developed the Standard Milk Ordinance, known today as the Pasteurized Milk Ordinance, which essentially requires milk to be pasteurized before it is sold to the final consumer. This regulatory requirement created a need for dairy processors and made the dairy farmer dependent on them in order to sell their milk.
Since that time, many billions of dollars have been spent on Dairy Price Support Programs and a variety of federal programs that have been enacted to control the market price of milk and help equalize the market supply of dairy farmers with the federally created regulatory advantage of the dairy processors. As a consequence, since 1965, the United States has lost over one million dairy farms.
But now, in more recent times, many natural foods enthusiasts and naturopathic physicians have promoted the health benefits of “raw” dairy products (unpasteurized). The demand for raw milk has increased considerably in recent years. As a result, the FDA has offered financial assistance to state health departments to help reduce raw milk consumption. Why?
The FDA regulations are masquerading under the guise of the protection of public health; however, it is relatively safe to use raw dairy. Milk straight from the cow is a complete and properly balanced food, and like a miracle food, has been used as medicine to treat and sometimes cure some serious diseases. In reality, raw dairy may have risk-to-benefit ratios better than many modern pharmaceutical drugs. Proponents say that, today you are statistically more likely to die in your car going to the store to purchase pasteurized dairy than you are from drinking raw milk.
So they’re not really protecting you, are they? Are the corporate owned bureaucrats protecting their agribusiness buddies? Within the government, it’s usually easy to find waste, corruption or political currency – just follow the money.
Why shouldn’t it be a matter of the consumer’s freedom of choice? Why do we have laws criminalizing a natural food, which is legal in Europe and most of the world? American taxpayers have paid billions for multiple subsidy programs to allow the pasteurization business to profit, placing the government and its favored cronies in the flow of cash between the farmer and the consumer, artificially elevating the cost of milk to provide you with a less healthy product. Enormous amounts of money have moved in a lot of directions for many years, mainly out of the taxpayer and consumer pockets. As a result, we have put many small farmers out of business.
Why can’t we recover our right to choose the food we eat? Why can’t we eliminate these expensive regulations and stop funding these programs? Some people may still want pasteurized milk, and others will want raw milk, just like some might choose chocolate milk. So, why can’t we let the consumer choose?
…on a Monsanto Bun made from GMO wheat.
Is this just a nonsensical, popular, pop culture cliché? Search the internet to find out more. Try key words like “Evil Monsanto”, etc. Days of scary reading should follow. “GMO” is an abbreviation for “Genetically Modified Organism” and it sounds it like science fiction, but it’s not. Some say “GMO mutations” are clinically documented to cause nausea, depression, infections, fatigue, and more.
Are there financial incentives? Some say that they are trying to make sure you will never be able to drink milk, eat a chicken, or enjoy a meal that Monsanto and the huge food factories don’t sell. And certain self serving politicians are incentified to help them do that to you. They create a tangle of government regulations that stifle the efforts of organic farms, shock watchdog organizations, and destroy family farmers.
Please buy the song…you’ll get a kick out of it. This one makes you smile in spite of the scary message that we all need to be aware of. So play it, and turn it up so others can hear the message.
Click below to buy “Pink Slime Burgers & Gov Cheese”
